TC 1 Mile

I ran the Twin Cities 1 Mile again on May 12th.

Making excuses or telling the truth I didn't run very much beforehand because of poor Minnesota spring weather due to chilly temperatures, clouds upon clouds and rain I just didn't get out very much to run. So, I ran my slowest mile in 3 years, 5:25. However, I was okay with that because I really didn't run very much.

I've always set "goals" to try and be in the top 20-30 in the general masses but I can't maintain running in the winter here. Can someone keep me accountable next winter to maintain fitness so I can run faster next year?














The TC 1 Mile also served as the USA Road Mile Championships too and attracted a good crowd of professional runners. Sara Hall, Ryan Hall, David Torrence, Tommy Schmitz, Gabriele Anderson, Heather Kampf and more.

Sara Hall ran under 4:32 and David Torrence won in under 4:00 winning $10,000 each for the time prize in addition to the $4,000 for winning the race.

Here is Sara Hall.

Boston Marathon Slow Mo Videos

I know the Boston Marathon was a few weeks ago but I found these videos and found them to be interesting because of the athletes in them, Ryan Hall and Kara Goucher as well as the running motion-the biomechanics behind running a marathon as fast as they do.




Credit goes to http://runnyknows.tumblr.com/

Ryan Hall






Kara Goucher

NYC Marathon Observations

The women started before the men.

Paula Radcliffe is tall and as known to many already, she has a gait that has alot of upper body movement.

Sometimes I really don't like NYC. Maybe because of the yankees, maybe because of the stress of driving through the city. But just watching Mayor Michael Bloomberg sharing the culture and the extremely diverse people of NYC really attracts me to the city.

I think it would be fun to run the NYC Marathon.

Not a real quick pace for the men's leaders. Ten miles in at 54:44 and Ryan Hall has taken his hat off.

Mile 11 55:10-Meb, Hall and many others.

Josh Moen is at the half way point at 1:06:46, putting him very close to the 2:14:30 that the Fantasy Games at Down the Backstretch predicted.

A bunch of relevant runners from around here. I ran against Matt Hooley and Josh Moen in college. Chris Lundstrom is a cross country coach around here-at Como Park Sr. High School.

Mile 17 and 18 were 4:33 and 4:37-significantly different from the 5:33 at mile 1 and 5:00 range in many of the first half dozen to dozen miles.

Mile 18-American's dropping out of the lead pack. Not what I wanted to see.

Paula Radcliffe at mile 22 still has a head bob. What a running style. Always seems gritty.

Meb is back up in the lead pack with 5-6 others.

Last mile the woman's winner went was the fastest. Wow.

Mile 24-4 American's in the top 10. Wow.

All I've got. Not going to polish this up. Great race to watch with Meb winning! First American win since what, 1982? Yeah, 27 years! Ryan Hall in 4th, Jorge Torres in 7th, Nick Arciniaga in 8th, Abdi Abdirahman in 9th, Jason Lehmkuhle in 10th.

What A Day!

Yesterday was a very enjoyable day as I did many very enjoyable activities.

My day began getting up lazily out of bed at 9 am before heading out on a run. I didn't know how long it was going to go but I wanted a decent day of running. I went down Hamline to Como Park, where I ran around the lake. However, I just happened to be running around the lake at the same time as a 5K heading in the same direction. So, I just cruised along all the way around the lake, making the 1.6 mile loop a little better effort with all of the 5kers around. I got to the pavilion and decided to stop and see who was going to win the race and in what time. Now, who do I see before the leaders come through? Dave Borner! His wife, Nikki, was running and we watched her finish 4th overall. It was fun chatting with him for a while. I then ran the opposite way around the lake for another 1.6 miles, getting myself up to six or seven miles. It was fun to run a couple miles with Nikki too, she's been running about 60 miles a week, working as a nurse and running very well.

It's always fun to run into Dave and Nikki and I just wish we got the chance to hang out more.

I then continued on my run home, but I ran the back loop of the MIAC CC championship course checking out the ground before the big races went off. I made it home and ended up gathering in 9.25 miles for my day, in 1:04 and change.

I showered, relaxed and then headed out to the MIAC Championships. Bethel's women finished 2nd and Marie Borner won by about 30 seconds. The guys finished with some disappointment, 7th overall. But Dan Greeno destroyed the guys race winning by more than 30 seconds as well.

All that time I got to run around with some good friends: Adam Erickson, Dave and Nikki Borner, Josh Tschetter, Peter Caldwell, Josh Otto, Hannah Carlson and so many more. Quite a fun time running around the course with Bethel running alumni.

After the race, Adam and I went to Caribou to get something warm in our hands and down our throats. It was fun to enjoy a coffee with Adam before getting to work and writing the articles for Bethel's athletics website.

Here's the men's article.

Here's the women's article.

So I went home and wrote the articles and enjoyed some of a quesadilla burger and watched the Phillies-yankees World Series with Katy and Paul while flipping back and forth to the USC-Oregon football game too.

All of that...and I still got an extra hour in the day with day light savings!

And now, I'm up at 7:30 am, writing a blog, waiting for Universalsports.com to air the NYC Marathon. I'm looking forward to watching Ryan Hall run, as well as some local runners from Team Minnesota USA.

What a day!

With more to come today!

Great Twin Cities 1 Mile!

Tonight was the TC 1 Miler and was it a very fun night!

Nick, Becca, Paul and I got there quite early on and found the start line. I picked up my stuff for the race while Katy walked down and met us at the start. Then Nick, Becca and Paul wandered over to see the progress on the new Twins stadium.

Time came that I needed to warm up so I went around the start line and about 12 minutes in I saw Ryan Hall and Sara Hall warming up. Sara Hall was running the women's elite race tonight. So I decided to keep it rolling and follow them for a little while. Eventually I turned back before they did and while doubling back I said great to have you two here-as just before that we all had to stop at a stop light to wait for traffic.

The race was then delayed a little bit and I ran into Ryan again. I said there he is again and went over and talked to him for a few minutes. We talked briefly about where I was from and he asked how fast I was planning on going. I said I was hoping for about 5:30-5:45 without too much training over the winter here. He asked if I was a mid-distance runner to which I said yep, 800 meter and some 4x400. I also said it was too bad that we weren't down just a little bit towards the start so he could meet my wife, Katy, who is from Lake Arrowhead. (Right next to Big Bear, CA and Mammoth Lakes, CA where he's from) Here's a map of all three. But he had already met her a couple minutes before-to which Katy says she's proud of yelling Ryan! and meeting him with their California connection. So that was great!

Then I ran the race-with my goal in my head 5:30-5:45 and finished in 5:26! My mouth was so dry which made the run pretty bad but I did alot better than I expected. I ran into a couple guys from the Gustavus Adolphus CC team and I ran a little bit behind them and gained as the race went on. I didn't get any of them but I did a bit better than I was expecting.

Here I am at the halfway point!







We then watched the other more elite races after us-watching Sara Hall and Shannon Rowbury go at it and Jon Rankin and David Torrence as well! Torrence even broke 4 minutes in the true mile-well unofficially he did- and if it stands it'll be the first time on Minnesota soil! And we got to see it!

So, after the races we went to the finish and did some lingering with the athletes.


Ryan and Sara Hall


Nick, Ryan and me!


David Torrence


Flo Track and David Torrance

More Flo Track Interviews

We talked to Ryan and Sara a little more after the race which was quite the treat. Then I chimed in to David Torrence with some media member asking him if Jon Rankin ran himself out of the race a little bit by taking a bad line. Torrence gave a great answer and I'll have to find out if the quote I spoon fed that media member uses.

Anyhow, I'm distracted by Flotrack interviews right now but I may come back and add more!