GOOD COMPANY

If you’ve been following along for awhile, you probably know I’m a numbers guy. Well last night I was looking through some of my dad’s stuff from the early 1980s. He has the results for Grandma’s Marathon from 1980 – 1982. I thought it’d be fun to compare my time and place from this year to similar times and places for those years.

1980 --- 1981 --- 1982 --- 2009
601st --- 960th --- 926th --- 151st
2:47:03 --- 2:39:39 --- 2:43:19 --- 3:09:43

At least I’m in good company, place-wise. Had I placed 151st in those 3 years, I’d have finished near local legends like; Jack Moran, Alex Ratelle, Brian Kraft, and Olympians Janis Klecker and Ron Daws. That’s some good company.

And get this, I talked about Jared Mondry’s awesome 3:07 at age 67 this year, which placed him 134th. Well, as a 38-year-old in 1981, he placed 126th.

One of the most impressive things from that era is the number of people constantly streaming across the finish line. From 2:50 to 2:55 you’d see 128 runners and from 2:55 to 3:00 there’d be another 158. That’s a 5-minute window with more finishers than from 2:15 to 3:10 this year. Thought of another way, that’s nearly one runner every 2 seconds.

Finally, does anyone want to take a guess at what the cutoff time was in those years? That’s today’s trivia question. I’ll post the answer tomorrow.

Running-wise, I ran an easy 10 miles this morning; 40:35 out and 39:35 back. It was 55 degrees and misty and I was thinking it would make for perfect weather at Grandma’s. I’m sure this year’s conditions won’t help with all the “Grandma’s is always hot” banter. And I’d really love to be able to say I won’t be back next year, but I really love this whole event. Besides, the year I decide not to run is the year it’ll be 55 degrees and misty.

Quote of the Day;

"With a marriage, you can change your mind.” – Juma Ikangaa, on the major difference between one’s commitment to running and one’s commitment to marriage