WEEK OF FEBRUARY 25, 2003 - MARCH
3, 2003
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THOSE DISTANCE MEDLEY RELAY TEAMS
[3/3/2003] At the USATF National Indoor Championships,
the Central Park Track Club women's team consisted of Devon
Martin, Melissa Tidwell, Jessica Reifer, Margaret
Angell and the Central Park Track Club men's team consisted
of Amerigo Rossi, David Epstein, Evan Zeisel,
Clinton Bell. You will note that there are two
new names on the men's team, but these are names that may be
quite familiar (to wit, they should ring a bell or two).
For those who don't know them, here are the brief biographies:
Columbia
University Men's Track Records
Outdoor 800m, Amerigo Rossi, 1:50.37
Outdoor 1500m, Amerigo Rossi, 3:48.79
Outdoor 5000m, Amerigo Rossi, 14:23.42
Indoor 800m, Amerigo Rossi, 1:52.83
Indoor 1000m, Amerigo Rossi, 2:25.05
Indoor mile, Amerigo Rossi, 4:06.40
Indoor 3000m, Amerigo Rossi, 8:15.75
King's
College Track Club
Amerigo Rossi, 1:55.0 for 800m
Amerigo Rossi, 4:10.3 for mile
Amerigo Rossi, 14:59 for 5000m
Amerigo Rossi, 26:20 for 8000m
(note: on the same list, we found more of our teammates ---
John Scherrer 9:11.56 for 3000m and Craig Anne Lake
3:03:56 for 2001 NYC Marathon)
JP
Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge 2001
Amerigo Rossi, 17:50, winner
Seton
Hall University
Assistant Coach, Clinton Bell
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USATF INDOOR MASTERS/SUBMASTERS NATIONALS
[3/3/2003] If you are 30 years or older, you should consider
running at USATF Indoor Masters and Submasters Nationals in
Boston on March 28-30. Last year, we took 25 athletes
and walked away with 14 medals (5 bronzes, 5 silvers and 4 golds
(2 for Sid Howard, 1 each for Kim Mannen and Sue
Pearsall)). We're expecting a lot more hardware this
year. For more info, please click on http://www.usatfne.org/masters/boston2003/index.html#
Entries are due March 14, but the most important thing is to
BOOK your hotel today---you can always cancel your reservations.
HOTEL
The headquarters hotel this year is the Westin Copley Place
Boston (617) 262-9600, 10 Huntington Avenue, Boston - $110 for
single or double, and additional $10 per person per night for
triple and quad occupancy. This is a "Four Star"
rated hotel, and is conveniently located in the Back Bay section
of Boston. It is one block from Amtrak and subway
connection to the airport. Given this excellent rate, there
are no arrangements with other hotels. Call 1-617-262-9600.
To get the special rates reservations must be made by March
7, 2003. You MUST identify yourself as being with the
National Masters Championships at the time of making your
reservation to get this rate. The hotel sold out last
year, and the special rates will not be extended.
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WHY WE LOVE CRICKET [3/3/2003]
Why cricket, indeed? And why not tennis, Formula One racing,
or even curling? Because cricket resides at the core of
the postcolonial postmodernist project, in a way that curling
could never do. In an essay on West Indies cricket
and post colonial cultural globalization, Hilary McD.
Beckles wrote:
In the beginning of the twentieth century West
Indians of all classes and ethnicities had made a substantial
social investment in cricket. The ideological centre of
the game, nevertheless, like all other major cultural institutions,
continued to be occupied by a native white elite whose hegemonic
domination was contested by marginalised and excluded groups.
Promoted as a symbol of social elitism, high culture and colonial
respectability, cricket ritualised the politics of an endemic
struggle for social inclusion and by extension the contestations
of imperial white supremacy ideology.
C.L.R. James' dialectical analysis of
this process suggests that West Indian cricket, as a metaphor
of the social relation of Empire and post-colonialism, must
be understood as a contradictory action of subversion and accommodation.
For him, cricket culture in the West Indies possessed:
(a) an internal social contest for class and
ethnic equality;
(b) an intense national desire to challenge at the level of
ritual and defeat the imperial centre; and
(c) a deep-seated recognition of cultural affinity and identification
with England that promotes sentiments of shared experience and
solidarity.
Obviously, point (b) is the ideological force
which generates so much delight when the colonials wallop England
at their own gentleman's game ...
C.L.R. James also wrote: "I haven't
the slightest doubt that the clash of race, caste and class
did not retard but stimulated West Indian cricket. I am equally
certain that in those years social and political passions, denied
normal outlets, expressed themselves so fiercely in cricket
(and other games) precisely because they were games. Here
began my personal calvary. The British tradition soaked deep
into me was that when you entered the sporting arena you left
behind you the sordid compromises of everyday existence. Yet
for us to do that we would have had to divest ourselves of our
skins. From the moment I had to decide which club I would join
the constrast between the ideal and the real fascinated me and
tore at my insides. Nor could the local population see it otherwise.
The class and racial rivalries were too intense. They could
be fought out without violence or much lost except pride and
honor. Thus the cricket field was a stage on which seleced individuals
played representative roles which were charged with social significance."
Is cricket a British art-form that must be co-opted
and reappropriated in order to be a meaningful instrument of anticolonial
resistance? Is it the case that in order to turn a residual
colonial practice into a subversive anti-colonial one, the cultural
practice must first be learned and assimilated according to the
terms of the dominant colonial order. Such a sophisticated
analysis of cricket does not appear to have been made for the
sport of running, much less the more mundane question of how to
choose which running club to join. But if you have read
this journal entry up to this point without quitting, it should
be quite clear that we must be the right club for you ...
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BROOKLYN BRUNCH [3/3/2003]
All runners and spectators for the Brooklyn Half-Marathon this
Saturday are invited to a post-race brunch at Jesse Lansner's
apartment. Please RSVP
so we know how many bagels to buy.
WHERE: 150 Ocean Parkway, Apt. 2C (between Caton Avenue
and Albermarle Road)
WHEN: Saturday, March 8, 2003, 10:30 am
DIRECTIONS FROM BAGGAGE PICK UP:
SUBWAY DIRECTIONS: F train to Ft. Hamilton Parkway.
If coming from Manhattan, exit at the front of the train, at
the Ocean Parkway exit. Walk two blocks along Ocean Parkway.
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DOUBLE TROUBLE [3/3/2003]
Charles Allard, Jr. writes from Japan: After neglecting
to write my race results for over a week I turn to the web site
and find a world record, an American record and two PRs (well
done Jerome). How can I write anything after that??
Especially as I lost the race for the second month running to
the same guy I lost to last month!
Let me explain. On the 22 of February I ran the Kawasaki
Monthly Time Trials. This time, in line with my marathon
training I decided to run BOTH the 5K and 10K race. Theoretically
at the time trials you can run the 1K, 3K, 5K and 10K in one
morning. I ran the first 5K, easily but strong in order
to run the 10K hard and get a good long run out of the morning.
Slowly I ran the 5K in around 19:00 minutes. I then lined
up 5 mintues later for the 10K. And off we went.
I was pleased to find myself running with one other guy for
about 2K when he pulled ahead. It then dawned on me that
this was the same guy who beat me last month. I sped up.
He sped up. I sped up. He sped up. He sped
up again. And thus it stayed all the way to the finish
with me finishing in 37:37, almost exactly :30 slower than the
previous month, and almost exactly :30 slower than the distance
between us in the previous month. BUT, the astute reader
will think as I did, it's actually better because I ran the
5K as well!
I checked the times for the 5K. The same guy who beat
me in the 10K won the 5K race. Oh, misery!
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FUTURE MEMBER [3/3/2003]
Charles Allard, Jr. writes from Japan: On Sunday,
my wife Krysia gave birth to a baby boy, Charlie,
8.3 pounds. He came out in almost record time with just
about three pushes from Mom. Unfortunately he had to go
into the ICU because of build up of fluid in his lungs.
He is still in the incubator for now but getting better.
I knew right away he was destined to be a good track club member.
Why? Every good club member has an excuse why they didn't
run well. From aching feet to too much beer. Charlie
tried to come out in record time, didn't quite do it, but had
an excuse ready to go! ":I tried really hard to beat
the clock but my lungs were full." Pictures will
follow.
- NEAR REAL TIME [3/2/2003]
The beauty of the Internet is that we posted the results for the
distance medley relays at 3:24pm, when the men's event was scheduled
to start at 3:06pm. Yes, we know that you'd say that we
could have lopped a few more minutes off, or that the splits were
not present (sorry, but those usually come via blackberry at the
airport ...).
- WORLD CUP UPDATE [3/2/2003]
England 204-8, Australia 208-8. Australia wins, with a boundary
scored on the third last ball of the match. Very dramatic
stuff indeed. Australia moves into the Super Six round with
the maximum number of points. England will have to wait
for the outcome of the Zimbabwe-Pakistan match. Zimbabwe
will advance if they win. Pakistan can advance if they win
AND with a high enough run rate. This is the time
when England's forfeit of the match against Zimbabwe blows back
when two teams have equal number of wins, the head-to-head
winner advances!
The only world-class player on the Zimbabwe team is Andrew
Flower. He and bowler Thomas Olonga wore black
armbands when they played against Namibia in Harare on February
10, to highlight the "death of democracy" in their country.
As a result, the Zimbabwe Cricket Union may ban them from playing
Pakistan. One source said: "Players are fed up
with the way the ZCU has acted. Either they are rabid supporters
of Zanu-PF [Mugabe's party] or they are cowards who are not willing
to stand up for their players. Either way, it looks bad.
This campaign, against the best interests of the team, proves
that they are the ones carrying out a political agenda."
Peter Chingoka, head of the ZCU, replied in bureaucratese:
"There has been no such thing. We have an employer/employee
relationship and we have instructed both players not to wear anything
that will send a political message. Further details between
employer and employees would not be appropriate."
- BEST TIME UPDATE
[3/2/2003] David Epstein's 1:57:59 at last week's
USATF New England championships moved him into the 7th best time.
- USATF NATIONAL INDOOR CHAMPIONSHIPS RELAYS
[3/1/2003] Actually, the distance medley relays are exhibitions,
not championships. As such, we do not find teams traveling
from southern California to run these races due to the expense
and distance. In the women's DMR on Sunday at 2:50pm, there
are six teams: Lynx Elite, Central Park TC, Reebok Boston Running
Club, Westchester TC, Syracuse Chargers and Greater Boston Track
Club. In the men's DMR at 3:06pm, there are eight teams:
Syracuse Chargers, Georgetown, Athletics East, Central Park TC,
Greater Boston Track Club, New York Athletic Club, Lynx Elite
and Reebok Boston Running Club. These are the regional 'big
boys' and 'big girls.'
- RELAY QUESTIONS [3/1/2003]
Since Stacy Creamer is a celebrity (among other things,
being a well-known elite masters runner), we were asked by quite
a few people about her running in the W35-39 team. According
to the USATF rules, it is admissible for relay teams to be composed
of athletes from different age groups. For classification
purposes, relay teams are assigned the age group of the youngest
member. Already, last year's record-breaking W30-39 4x800m
relay team had Denise Whittaker-Crain, a masters runner
running with three 30-something-year-olds. The admissibility
of an older athlete is premised upon the sad, but often real,
fact that the older you get, the slower you run (or, in Jack
Brennan lingo, the faster you used to run). For the
road races, we cannot imagine where our open men's team would
be without Alan Ruben (M45-49) leading us in so many races
...
Although we have not yet been directly asked about this second
question, we can hear the rustling in the grapevines. The
new world record for W35-39 4x800m stands at 10:23.5. At
the Boston Indoor Games of 2002, Regina Jacobs set the
individual world record for 2 miles in a time of 9:23.38, a minute
faster than four women from her same age group could do.
What gives? The situation is this --- the record book shows
a 'soft record' that is attainable by your team, you assemble
your team, you train hard, you find the right venue, you make
sure that you meet all the official timing requirements, you fill
out the paperwork and you get that record. You have earned
that record, 'soft' or not. Alternately, you can say, "Baah,
I am sure that I can do it if I really wanted to, but it is too
much work and besides it is pointless. So I'd rather lean
back in my couch, sip a few beers and watch Joe Millionaire."
It is your choice. The record book
contains a few more 'soft' records, such as the 6:21.80 for W35-39
4x400m and the 25:06 for W40-49 4x1600m. What are you going
to do about it? It is your choice ...
- WEB LOG ACTIVITY
REPORT [3/1/2003] What else except to say that this
February was another good month? We will note that AOL.com
is very quickly being displaced by the broadband internet service
providers, with Time Warner Road Runner-Verizon-RCN getting a
23% share vs. AOL.com's 5.3% share. Do you still own any
Time Warner AOL stock?
- WORLD CUP UPDATE [3/1/2003]
As much as we would like to portray the Australia-England match
tomorrow as the mother-of-all-matches of this tournament, the
majority of the cricket world begs to differ. Today, India
played Pakistan. Based upon the tumultuous political history
between these two countries, it is rare for them to play each
other. In the 1999 test match held in Calcutta, 90,000 plus
Indian fans were roaring in the stands and tossing garbage at
the visitors. The riot police had to clear all the spectators
out and the match was completed in an empty stadium. For
today's match, every theatre showing the satellite broadest in
the New York City metropolitan area was sold out last night with
standing room tickets being hawked for $35 apiece as were the
tables at all the Indian restaurants which had bought the game.
The pressure on the players is immense. For the world's
fastest bowler Shoaib Akhtar of Pakistan, "You can
lose the World Cup - but don't lose to India." The
losers can expect to have their effigies abused back home.
Yet the players themselves are genuinely cordial with each other,
as one veteran said, "You may be quite friendly with the
odd Australian or South African player and exchange pleasantries
with a lot of others, but the camaraderie and kinship between
Indian and Pakistani players is real."
Final score: India 276-4, Pakistan 273-7. India wins
by 6 wickets. For India, as for all six matches of this
tournament so far, the star was the little man Sachin Tendulkar,
acknowledged as the greatest batsman of the contemporary era,
with 98 runs from 75 balls. Pakistan's opener Saeed Anwar
outdid Tendulkar with 101 runs.
In the other match today, Kenya beats Bangladesh by 32 runs (217-7
to 185 all out) to clinch a spot in the Super Six round.
Australia and India are the other teams that have clinched spots.
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400,000 [3/1/2003] At the
beginning of this week, we had projected that we would reach
this milestone at the beginning of next week (Monday?).
Instead, with 800 home page hits on the day after those record-breaking
relays, we got there a couple of days earlier. That extra
piece of action is the perfect illustration of the reason of
our success --- if you have fresh and interesting content, they
will come; conversely, if you have stale and uninteresting content,
they won't come. It is that simple. It should
not have had to take billions of internet venture capital dollars
to re-discover that principle.
In the past some of our readers have sent in screenshots of
the counter at various milestone
numbers. Some have even gone so far as to refresh
the home page dozens of times in a row in order to claim the
dubious honor of being the 100,000th or 200,000 viewer.
So far no one has come forward to claim this latest milestone.
With our own excessive viewing of the site while we update it,
we figured there was an outside chance we would be the lucky
viewer, but it was not to be, as our first glance at the page
this morning was a few minutes late.
Of course, we thought about editing the photo
for our own glory, but that would compromise the honesty and
objectivity this site is known for.
That this website should arrive at this 400,000
figure was, and still is, unthinkable. After all, we are
just a club of about 200 team members and this website is notorious
for its self-absorption/self-indulgence. So what interest
can the rest of the world conceivably have in us? Our
answer is consistently, "Who knows? But we don't
care!" Whatever the motiviations of people are, we
know that we will inexorably roll towards that 500,000 mark
around September of this year. See you then!
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USATF NATIONALS [3/1/2003]
Due to recent budget cuts, the Central Park Track Club website
will not be able to send a reporter to cover this event.
So we will have to rely on the participants to inform us about
the happenings. Actually, compared to our current crop
of workout reporters who are trying to outdo each other in weirdness,
David
Epstein is a real reporter who writes well.
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BIKE
SUMMER [3/1/2003] This winter has been depressing
but the warm weather will be here soon ... we think ...
This weblink leads to a list of cycling events in New York City
from June 27 to July 26, 2003. Can't wait, eh? Eh?
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WORLD CUP UPDATE
[2/28/2003] In their second last game of the preliminary
round, Australia set a few records. Against the Australian
attack, Namibia was bundled out for 45 runs, the second lowest
score ever (earlier in the tournament, Canada tallied only 36
runs against Sri Lanka). Even those 45 runs were mostly
unintended nicks that flew over the slips (in baseball terms,
'seeing-eye pop-fly singles'). Glenn McGrath of
Australia collected 7 wickets for 15 runs in 7 overs, for the
best bowling statistics ever. For the Australians, Darren
Lehmann collected 28 runs (two sixes and four fours) in
the final over for the best World Cup score. Australia's
winning margin of 256 runs was also the best ever. At
this point, Australia is guaranteed a position in the Super
Six round. For their last game, Australia will face England
which is in a must-win situation. There is zero chance
that Australia might throw this match away, like the infamous
favor that Peru did for Argentina in World Cup Soccer play.
The Independent writes about England's chances: "If Nasser
Hussain's boys were watching Australia, who had already
qualified for the Super Sixes, on television it is to be hoped
that there were some sturdy sofas in the room behind which to
hide. It was not viewing designed to offer any semblance of
hope to a team already midway to the floor."
The five-day test matches can make for dull entertainment (except
for the aficionados). By comparison, the ODIs (One-Day-Internationals)
are exciting because the mathematics is obviously tight (as
in, you need to score 14 runs from the last 6 balls of the match).
So it was with the thriller between Sri Lanka and the West Indies.
Sri Lanka compiled a modest 228 runs when they batted first.
West Indies came back and fell short with 222 runs (needing
14 runs from the last 6 balls). But not before some heroics
from batsman Ramnaresh Sarwan, who was fell by a rapidly
rising delivery, went to the hospital for stitches, got out
of bed and went back to score 36 more runs not out. If
only he could have slogged those six more runs, it would have
been a true fairy tale.
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CORRECTION [2/28/2003] At
a recent Thursday night race, Zeb Nelessen commented
that his splits didn't reflect his time (see Famous
Saying 1461). Had he made the same claim today he
would have actually make sense. It took the sharp eye
of mathematician Paul Bendich to notice that, while the
Clockwork Orange team's listed time of 10:08.1 worked
out to an average of 2:32 per 800m, no individual runner had
run slower than 2:26. Where did the extra time come from?
Since all four members of the relay had run the mile only a
few minutes earlier, it's possible that they ran even slower
than they thought, but there is no evidence to suggest that
any of our timers had any problems. The only possibility
is that we wrote down the wrong time, and then, while posting
the results, were too tired to notice that the numbers didn't
add up. The correct result should be 9:34.2. We
apologize for the error.
- THURSDAY NIGHT AT THE RACES WRAP UP
[2/28/2003] The night began with a large number of heats
in the mile race. We had seventeen entries among the hundreds
of milers. Yet, somehow, this fourth and last meet of the
series was not as exciting as the previous ones. One major
reason was that our attention was turned to our main event, the
4x800m. And after the relay, the interest seemed to have
waned for the rest of the evening.
The 4x800m relay was a late addition to the program. There
were seven teams entered in the race, of which five were composed
of Central Park Track Club members. The addition of this
event, which was going to take just over 10 minutes to complete,
provided the opportunity for two of our teams to go after some
records in the book.
You all know by now that our two teams did break those records.
Record-breaking events like these happened not by chance, but
through careful planning. It must have all begun some time
ago when coach Devon Martin began to read the record book
and compared the listed records against the current personnel.
There may be some 'soft' records in the book, and we may have
some obvious candidates. To arrive at a team of four runners,
it may be necessary to identify, persuade or otherwise cajole
others who may be running the first track race of their lives.
Then it becomes a matter of preparing the teams with warm-up races.
For the men 35-39 team, the American record was 8:51.9, which
worked out to be 2:12 pace on the average. During this indoor
season, we have these results for our four runners: Paul Groce,
2:05.0 at the last Thursday Night At The Races; Chris Potter,
2:07.83 at the NY Elite Invitational; Glen Carnes, 2:11.0
at the second Thursday Night At The Races; Armando Olivera,
56.8 at 400m at the first Thursday Night At The Races, 55.4 at
400m at the second Thursday Night At The Races, 3:09.84 at 1200m
at the Armory Collegiate Invitational, 4:08.4 at 1500m at the
MAC Last Chance Meet and 4:27.81 at the mile at the NY Elite Invitational.
All these times are faster than the required 2:12 average pace.
For the women 35-39, the world record was 10:29.15 (2:37 average)
and the American national club record was 11:01.44 (2:45 average).
During the indoor season, we have these results for our four runners:
Kim Mannen, 2:24.7 at the last Thursday Night At The Races;
Darlene Miloski at 2:40.0 at the last Thursday Night At
The Races and 2:40.65 at the MAC Last Chance Meet; Sue Pearsall
at 2:44.0 at the second Thursday Night At The Races and 2:45.4
at the third Thursday Night At The Races; Stacy Creamer
at 2:39.0 at the previous Thursday Night At The Races. Before
the race, it would appear that the American national club record
was easily within reach but the world record would come down to
a matter of seconds.
We have several people taking 200m splits for all the teams, which
can be framed into a 'running' commentary on the race.
For the men, we have
Paul Croce, 30.09, 1:00.17, 1:30.95, 2:03.31
Chris Potter, 28.66, 1:00.61, 1:34.19, 2:08.37
Glen Carnes, 30.65, 1:02.91, 1:35.91, 2:11.37
Armando Oliveira, 27.28, 56.50, 1:28.68, 2:04.82
For the women, we have
Kim Mannen, 34.5, 1:10.4, 1:43.9, 2:27.1
Darlene Miloski, 36.5, 1:14.1, 1:54.4, 2:34.9
Sue Pearsall, 39.6, 1:20.1, 2:02.2, 2:43.2
Stacy Creamer, 37.6, 1:17.0, 1:56.5, 2:38.3
For the men, there would in fact be little suspense as every runner
was expected to and did deliver the better-than-target pace.
The American record was taken down from 8:51.09 to 8:28.3.
For the women, we used our fastest runner to build a big cushion
in the first leg and then our second runner came through with
a big-time effort that was 5 seconds faster than her season best
so far. By the third leg, the suspense was removed.
The world record was taken down from 10:29.15 to 10:23.5.
For both teams, there was a 'youthful' exuberance effect as when
the runners started out too fast and paid dearly at the end.
We believe that if these people get another opportunity this season,
they will better those records through better pacing. They
may get another chance at the Front Runners Track Meet in a few
weeks' time.
The eight runners on this team are home-grown products in the
sense that we did not recruit an all-star team for this purpose.
Some of these people joined our club with aspirations of running
marathons before we straightened them out. In the case of
Kim Mannen, it took many years of lobbying and it was only
until she threw up six times during her last marathon in Houston
that she saw the light. Their accomplishments tonight were
therefore all the more sweeter. In the case of Stacy
Creamer, she could not have imagined this moment when she
joined us in 1987 and not even over all those years since until
the idea was proposed to her recently.
As we told you, this race had five Central Park Track Club teams.
Among the other three teams, there were also some very fast runners
(Isaya Okwiya, Craig Chilton, Adam Manewell, Kira Morser
(who became our 6th all-time best 800m after tonight), Alexandra
Horowitz, to name a few). And of course anyone familiar
with our team would wonder just where Charlotte Cutler,
Devon Martin, Jessica Reifer, Evan Zeisel,
David Epstein, Oliver Martinez and company were.
But on this night, those other runners did not get a chance to
set records because of age-group/nationality requirements and/or
resting for the distance medley relays at the USATF National Indoor
Championships this Sunday. We began this report by saying
that these records come opportunistically due to the presence
of the right personnel for the right occasion. But those
opportunities would not be realized without the depth and organization
(which means, especially, coach Devon Martin) of this club.
- RECORD SETTING NEWS [2/27/2003]
At the Thursday Night At the Races meet, two Central Park Track
Club 4x800m teams set new records.
New American Record for Men (35-39), 8:28.3
Chris Potter, Glen Carnes, Paul Groce, Armando
Oliveira
New World (and American) Record for Women (35-39),
10:23.5
Stacy Creamer, Sue Pearsall, Darlene Miloski,
Kim Mannen
The first installment of
photos is available. More to come.
- 4x800 RELAY TONIGHT [2/27/2003]
At the Thursday Night At The Races, there will be a special 4x800m
relay event added right after the mile races. We will be
fielding two teams, with a reasonable chance to break American
and/or world records. This is all the more remarkable because
these are fully home-grown runners (as opposed to a collection
of people assembled purely for this purpose) who will get their
chance for a moment in history. Come out and cheer them!
Tonight's lineup:
American Record for the Men (35-39): 8:51.09 (2:12
per leg)
Central Park Track Club Relay Members In Order:
Paul Groce
Chris Potter
Glen Carnes
Armando Oliveira
World & American Record for the Women: 10:29.15
(2:37 per leg)
American National Club Record: 11:01.44 (2:45
per leg)
Central Park Track Club Relay Members In Order:
Kim Mannen
Darlene Miloski
Sue Pearsall
Stacy Creamer
From the website: http://nationalmastersnews.com/relays_indoor_2002.html.
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TRAVELING VIOLATION [2/27/2003]
Our attention is mostly turned towards the World Cup in Africa
these days, but some old stories have begun to pop up again.
Our friends at the United States Olympic Committee had been
relatively quiet lately, as public strife had given way to backroom
negotiations and talk of blue-ribbon panels to reform the committee.
Then, on Tuesday, USOC executive committee member Herb Perez
made a motion to fire CEO Lloyd Ward. Ward kept
his job (the motion was not voted upon, since Tuesday's conference
call was not an official meeting), but things don't look good
for him. First he lost his $184,800 performance bonus
for violating the USOC's ethics code. Now he is under
new scrutiny over $115,464 in travel costs that he and his wife
billed to the committee in 2002, and $35,000 in relocation costs
(on top of the $50,000 relocation bonus she had already been
granted) that he approved for a former staff member who never
actually relocated to the USOC's headquarters in Colorado.
Ward has said that he will step down if asked, but refused when
he actually was asked to quit by acting USOC President William
Martin. Martin and Vice President Bill Stapleton
were part of the pro-Ward group that tried to oust former president
Marty Mankamyer last month (Mankamyer resigned when her
out ethical lapses came to light), but now they are both trying
to get rid of their former ally. Even by the USOC's low
standards, Ward stands out as an embarrassment, but he seems
determined to cling to his office, despite his claim that "This
isn't a job. This is in service to athletes."
If he really cared about being of service to athletes, he would
have resigned long ago.
-
FAIR WEATHER FRIENDS [2/27/2003]
It is a well-established rule of the Central Park Track Club,
laid down by Sid Howard, that the only weather unsuitable
for running is a rainstorm that includes lightning. Fifty-four
of our members raced in Saturday's pouring rain, and our workouts,
even in the snow or in temperatures so low that Alan Ruben
and Jerome O'Shaugnessy wear tights instead of shorts,
usually draw at least half that number. Most public officials,
alas, are less hardy. On Tuesday Murray Bergtraum High
School dedicated their newly-renovated track, but school officials
decided it was too cold for an outdoor ribbon-cutting.
Instead, using a photograph of the field with a red bow tied
around it as a substitute, they held the ceremony in the school's
auditorium, to the disappointment of the Education Department's
head of strategic partnerships, Caroline Kennedy, who
wore her running shoes in hopes of trying out the new track.
-
CLUBBING [2/26/2003] One
of the purposes of the NYRR Club Night was to give recognition
to individual runners for their performances in the past year.
Equally important is the fact that this is the night when all
the local clubs party together.
In today's Runners World, Allan Steinfeld wrote
about the NYRR Club Night: "The rivalries among local
clubs are perhaps even stronger. They're seen most vividly at
the annual 5-mile Club Championships race, for which teams bring
out their top runners, all in prime shape. In 2002, 15
men broke 26 minutes on a sweltering August morning. More significant
than the caliber of the front runners, though, is the opportunity
for any runner, no matter what his or her fitness level and
aspirations, to wear a club singlet and be part of a well-organized,
meaningful, and incredibly vibrant competitive system.
We work hard to maintain the scale and organization of our club
system. We believe it's important to give individual runners
and running clubs the opportunity to compete over the course
of a year outside of a school setting. The program represents
a lot of hard work on the part of our Club Council, made up
of NYRR board members and club representatives. It also
shows great commitment on the part of both the clubs and the
individual runners who support our races."
If you don't belong to a club, you are probably missing a major
aspect of running. In this city, there are many running
clubs that serve various speeds, distances, sizes, geographical
locations, genders, age groups, nationalities, ethnicities,
etc. You can probably find a club to your liking in the
NYRR
club directory.
- WORLD CUP UPDATE [2/26/2003]
Ooops! England ran into a hitherto unknown Indian seam bowler
who notched the third all-time World Cup best result of 6-23.
This match was always going to be unpredictable, as it takes place
in Durban. The cricket ground there has these characteristics:
"Of all the venues hosting matches during this tournament,
Kingsmead is perhaps the hardest. This will be a day/night match,
so you will almost certainly win the game as darkness closes and
the ball loses its sense of decorum and begins to act as erratically
as a late-night reveller on the sauce. The pitch looked
a good one on the day before the match, hard and with a good grass
covering due to be cut back this morning. There will be the bounce
much loved here by pace bowlers, and movement in the air too.
The tide is said to have an effect, with Kingsmead resting on
sand and the water table only a few feet below the surface. When
the tide is in, it is said, the pitch greens up and the ball moves.
Then there is the wind. Three years ago, when England last played
a Test here, Andy Caddick produced a remarkable bowling
spell at a time when the wind was coming from the south-west,
only for the wind to shift to the north-east for the remainder
of a game in which scarcely a ball got past the bat. It can be
humid all day, or not at all. Maybe, in the end, it will prove
to be a toss well worth losing."
Today, India won the toss and, to no surprise, elected to bat
first. Their final score was 9-250, with the last four wickets
falling in four consecutive balls including a hat trick for Andy
Caddick. This was certainly not an impossible target
to catch. Instead, the fast-medium seam bowler Ashish
Nehra found pace and, most crucially, movement that, for the
most part, had eluded England's bowlers before the daylight went
and the pitch greened up in the evening air. The most impressive
part of this performance is that Nehra was bowling on a heavily-taped
sprained ankle and was in such physical discomfort that he threw
up on the pitch for the whole world to watch. This defeat
means that England will have to beat Australia in their final
match on March 2nd in order to advance to the Super Six round.
The Australians have won their last 13 ODIs (one day internationals)
against England, and they are also not known to be kind.
What are the odds?
- MISCELLANEOUS COMMENTS [2/26/2003]
In less than one week's time, we expect to exceed the 400,000
mark for home page visitors. During this time, we have fielded
thousands of inquiries from people (note: our Outlook folder has
6,800+ items related to the Central Park Track Club). Here
are some examples:
Question: Can you tell me about where to run in Central
Park?
Answer: You can buy a detailed aerial photo of Central
Park from http://store.yahoo.com/centralparkposters/index.html.
But if all you need are the routes, we have a park
map with distances marked down to 1/10,000-th of a mile.
Question: Is there any chance of you changing the background
to some color that is not orange? Here at the office, everyone
who walks by knows that I am not working because they know that
orange website ...
Answer: ... yes, but then what happens to our identity
and our essence?
Question: Is there any place to leave my belongings
during the Thursday workouts?
Answer: Unfortunately, there is no real place to leave
belongings. Quite a few people live in the immediate neighborhood,
so this is not a problem for them. The others will simply show
up 'ready to run'. There are some who would leave their
belongings in the bushes, but this is not a good idea as the local
denizens are aware of our pattern and will come around to beat
around the bushes. So we suggest that you come 'ready to
run' too.
Question: Why is there an asterisk behind my name
in the race results?
Answer: Because you forgot to put down 'Central Park
Track Club' in your application!
-
SOY POWER [2/25/2003]
From Etsuko Kizawa:
SOY just celebrated his first
birthday.
It's been a great healthy year
for him. He's had so much fun meeting all kinds of people!
Now he just began to walk.. Watch
him grow!
Now through the end of this
month, mention this email and get a free croquette or cookie
with your dinner purchase.
For those of you who still haven't,
enter the SOY sweepstake at our website: www.soynyc.com
-
MIKE HAS FRIENDS
[2/25/2003] For the NYRR Club Night photos, we originally
published one with the caption, "... and who are they?"
Since then, we have a number of people identifying the man as
Mike Sarnoff of the New York Harriers. We should
probably think about offering a service for people to find out
how well-known they are ...
-
DUMB AND DUMBER [2/25/2003]
Australian spin bowler Shane Warne was sent home after
diuretics were found in his system. These are his words
during a television interview: "In early December I was
doing a lot of wine promotions... and I'd had a few couple too
many bottles of wine and had a few late nights and I took a
fluid tablet then ... when Mum told me. It was the first time
she gave it to me ... it was to get rid of the double chin."
So was he guilty of stupidity? "Stupid's a harsh
word, I don't consider myself stupid. I consider myself probably
very silly, should have checked ..." When asked if
he had attended various Australian Cricket Board seminars on
drug education, Warne said: "You're told about drugs."
"Didn't you listen?" asked the interviewer. "No,
I didn't. The same as when I was at school. I was always seeing
the headmaster every week and he was practising his golf swing
on my behind. Whether, rightly or wrongly, mate, whether
you hate me, you like me, you love the way I play or whatever,
the facts of the matter are that I don't read much, I don't
take a lot of interest in the outside world ... I just play
cricket ." Warne conceded the drug ban would cost
him between $2 million and $3 million. But he revealed
he had been offered a cameo role in a movie.
Yes, this is the sort of thing that gives dumb jocks a bad reputation
...
-
(EXACT) RACE PACE
[2/25/2003] Steven Paddock explains his half marathon
time: "In the interest
of fair and accurate reporting, the actual time was 1.18.35
(5.59.933333333 min/mile) as I missed the start due to a bathroom
line. This is a PR and much more enjoyable than the Brooklyn
Half last year. But don't panic because the half marathon
next week will be the last one this year."
-
MONDAY TRACK WORKOUT REPORT
AND SKELETON KEY TO LAST TUESDAY'S REPORT [2/25/2003]
OK, we've heard some complaints about last week's report, centering
mainly around its alleged nonexistence. Philistines.
Look, we didn't think we'd have to explain this, but:
last week's report was embedded symbolically in different parts
of the website. So, for example, the number of people
at said workout (38) could be found in the binary encryption
of the one of the famous sayings from the previous week.
And the fact that the workout was 6x600, 3x300 was symbolized,
in the first place, by the prescience of six races in the Results
sections, and in the second place, by taking half of that number.
Really, we've all read the Bible Code, haven't we?
If you just invent your code system after you've already decided
on the relayed message, then really anything can me made to
symbolizes anything else, the universe in a nutshell, as it
were. Do we really have to spoonfeed such a truism to
you lot? Rest assured the rest of said report is still
somewhere within the website, with the decryption left as an
exercise to the reader.
This week also involved a bit of symbolism, namely a Monday
that stood in for the role of a Tuesday, due to the scholastic
track meet that has usurped our normal track day. Still
32 flexible souls suffered the change in routine and showed
up for the workout, which began, after a bit of delay, at 8:20.
The usual groups were a bit fractured this time, owing to the
two different workouts, 4x1200 for "non-racers" and
3x800 for "racers." As a result, we got the
odd sight of Zebulon Nelessen stalking the A group
racers, which judging by recent results, may be where he's headed
permanently. Some things remained consistent, though:
the phrase "43 seconds," when uttered by Margaret
Schotte, means, clear as day, "between 41 and 42 seconds."
Providing a bit of comic relief was the pole vault pole, which
did its best to grievously injure several runners and timers.
Poor Stuart Calderwood, sitting by the vault mat, was
made to suffer several dreadful puns relating to the pole.
For that the club issues an apology. As always,
the main action was on the train ride home. First, Audrey
Kingsley made an early foray into the race for Least Helpful
Transit Employee of the Year by informing everyone in sight
that "there's no 1/9 service now" and then "there's
no A service now." For some reason we believe her
every time. Finally, coach Tony Ruiz gave Margaret
Angell a free Spanish lesson. He also did some delightful
impressions. That's really all we can say. We can't
report just any piece of idle gossip; we're hardly the New
York Post.
[Editor's Note: Our intrepid report somehow failed
to mention last Tuesday's train ride home, in which the two
Margarets started a conversation at 168th Street regarding the
upcoming Snowflake race, boarded separate trains at separate
times (Angell on the express, Schotte on the local),
arrived at 125th Street at the same time, and continued their
conversation across the platform until both trains closed their
doors.]
-
MONDAY TRACK WORKOUT REPORT
[2/25/2003] We regret to report that last Tuesday's track
workout report is still nowhere in sight. So we decided
to employ the Armory panopticon to look for our reporter.
We regret to have to say that we did not seem to find him there;
more precisely, we did not see anyone who puts his hands on
his head after each set. Meanwhile, we did recognize many
others – Margaret Schotte, Alayne Adams, Harry Lichtenstein,
etc. The overall attendance count seems to be lower than
usual. For example, the alpha males seemed to consist
solely of Kevin Arlyck chasing Alan Ruben, and
the betas have Chis Price chasing Joe Tumbarello
and Margaret Angell.
Having the workout shifted from Tuesday to Monday is a good
thing, as it gives enough time to recover for the track meet
on Thursday. By the way, there will be an additional event
(4x800m) added to the program on Thursday, supposedly because
a certain club would like to have a shot at some records.
Do you know about that?
-
CLUB
NIGHT PHOTO ALBUM [2/25/2003] The club
night photos were taken by Bola Awofeso, who paid $70
for the right and the pleasure to do just that. We could
not publish all of the photos taken, as some had that dreaded
red-eye effect from the indoor flashbulb. Not all our
runners attended the party to be photographed for the awards.
For the record, we will remind everyone of our scorers during
the year (note: the number in brackets are the number of races
in which they scored).
Open Men, 3rd place: Alan Ruben (11) Kevan
Huston (7) Craig Chilton (7) Erik Goetze (6)
Toby Tanser (4) Kevin Arlyck (4) Armando Olivera
(3) Josh Feldman (3) Steve Paddock (3) Isaya
Okwiya (3) Peter Allen (3) Richie Borrero
(2) Jonathan Pillow (1) John Prather (1) Graeme
Reid (1) Adam Manewell (1) Michael Rymer (1)
Eric Boucher (1) Andy Merrifield (1)
Masters Men, 1st place: Alan Ruben (11) Graeme
Reid (7) Peter Allen (6) Tom Phillips (3)
Victor Osayi (3) Stuart Calderwood (2) Ricardo
Granados (2) John Prather (1) Andy Merrifield
(1) Jerome O'Shaughnessy (1) Paul Stuart-Smith
(1)
Open Women, 1st place: Alayne Adams (9) Margaret
Angell (6) Ali Rosenthal (6) Stephanie Gould
(4) Lauren Eckhart (4) Margaret Schotte (2) Kate
Crowley (2) Yumi Ogita (1) Sonja Ellmann (1)
Audrey Kingsley (1) Stefani Jackenthal (1).
And before Stacy Creamer writes to complain, we will
dutifully point out that our success is also due to the numerous
other runners who show up in force and push the runners from
other teams further down the placing.
Speaking of number one teams, we are of course the undisputed
number one running club website. Looking at the visitor
counter, we are projecting that we will surpass the 400,000
visitor mark in less than a week's time.
-
TRACK RESULT UPDATES
[2/25/2003] A couple of additions here. The official
results for the last Thursday At The Races (2/13) have been
published. Thus, we have added results for the final event
of that evening (2 miler), plus the previously unlisted Naomi
Reynolds and Ardian Krasniqi (56.0 in the 400m).
Then we also have Ardian Krasniqi in 54.93 in the 400m
at the MAC Last Chance Meet.
-
WORLD CUP UPDATE
[2/25/2003] In a shocker, Kenya upended favorite Sri Lanka
in an upset that is begin slotted into the top 10 all-time upsets
in World Cup history. On a slow pitch that provided no
help to the bowlers, Kenya mustered only 210 runs. That
should have been an easy target for a top team like Sri Lanka.
Instead, the Sri Lankan batsmen self-destructed by giving easy
outs to a modest Kenyan bowling attack. The Kenyan spin
bowler Collins Obuya, previously a total unknown, ended
up with a 5-24 that is among the top ten all-time best World
Cup performances. This brings us to the amazing situation
in which Kenya is at the top of the group table with two matches
left --- against West Indies and Bangladesh. Their strategy?
Win the Bangladesh game against the most disappointing team
in the tournament so far. If not, they better pray for
rain against the Windies.
Kenyan bowler Collins Obuya being presented
the
Man Of The Match gold watch by track legend Kip Keino
(note: photo was forwarded by our own Kenyan Isaya Okwiya)
By the way, Australia won their fourth game straight.
Of course. The opponent this time was Zimbabwe and the
location was Harare, where England declined to go to.
According to the Australian captain Rick Ponting, the
subject of security never even came up for them.
WEEK OF FEBRUARY 18, 2003 - FEBRUARY
24, 2003
-
NO HIGH JUMP [2/24/2003]
Steven Paddock reports from the great town of Swindon
(UK):
My 3000m time was faster than the required
9:20.4 but only just so --- 9:15 which is about as useless
as a hole in a bucket after numerous sub 9's in training,
but I suppose that's competition for you. I was so terrified
before the race with a crowd of 1500+ and numerous Olympians/World
Record holders warming up around me that I just went out too
slow and then remained that way. Always a next time.
'The next time' was in fact the next morning,
when Steven ran a half marathon in order to prepare for another
half marathon next week. When our coach Tony Ruiz
reads this, he will undoubtely be shaking his head in dismay
and muttering, "Kids! They're out of control ..."
By the way, Steven did not tell us about the half marathon.
Rather, the information came from a (formerly?) trusted friend,
who was truly a high jumper ...
-
CLUB NIGHT 2 [2/24/2003]
We imagine that the morning's Snowflake 4M and the afternoon's
team party at The Parlour left most of our members too tired
to attend Saturday's NYRRC Club Night. Those who did attend
more than made up for their teammates' absence, dancing and
carousing into the wee hours of the morning. Among the
attendees was Bola Awofeso, serving as official CPTC
photographer. Unfortunately, we haven't received his photos
yet, which means we've been scooped by a rival website, which
posted this picture featuring a CPTC member who seems to show
up more often on other sites than on this one.
-
HIGH JUMPERS [2/23/2002]
We still have no news if Steven Paddock managed to complete
his 3000m race in under 9:20.4 or else to take up the high jump
in his next career. Actually, we will confess to having
a great fondness in our hearts for high jumpers (example
1 and example
2). So all will be fine, Steven, one way or the
other ...
-
WORLD CUP UPDATE
[2/23/2003] Canada was beaten by West Indies, as expected.
But the remarkable event of that match was when Canadian-born
Australian citizen spin bowler John Davidson went to
compile the fastest century in World Cup history. All
he needed was 67 balls. Davidson scored 111 runs for Canada,
and the rest of the team scored 91 runs. In reply, the
West Indies comfortably scored 206-3 to win by seven wickets.
Whereas Davidson took 30 balls to reach 50 runs, the West Indians
Wavell Hinds took only 24 balls and Brian Lara
took 23 balls to reach the same mark. Davidson said, "I
was thinking the air is pretty thin there if the ball is travelling
so far." Another record was set when Pakistan's Shoaib
Akhtar delivered a 100.2 mph ball against England, the first
time that a 100+ ball was officially recorded.
Whereas England forfeited their game against Zimbabwe on grounds
of security, New Zealand forfeited their game against Kenya
also on the same grounds. Whereas England had cited the
immediate death threat that the team had received, New Zealand's
claim was that Kenya was unsafe due to the terrorist bombing
of a tourist hotel in Mombasa last year. Be as it may,
New Zealand got a black eye when their team players was involved
in a brawl in a Durban nightclub after the players were asked
to leave because of 'loud behavior.' Yes, they did have
four of their own security guards to shepherd them to safety.
There are still a few more games left in the preliminary round.
At the end, three teams from of the two groups will move on
to the Super Six round. Right now, it looks like Australia,
England and India in Group A and Sri Lanka and West Indies
and either South Africa or New Zealand in Group B. If
India or South Africa do not make the cut, there will be riots.
-
NYRR
CLUB NIGHT AWARDS [2/23/2003]
Alan Ruben was the M45-49
Runner of the Year and Sylvie Kimché was the F55-59 Runner
of the Year.
Teamwise, the Central Park Track
Club received awards for 3rd open men, 1st masters men (for
the fourth year in a row) and 1st open women. We are the
only team with two first place awards this year. Great
job!
Our other individual nominees were:
Tom Phillips, M45-49
Alston Brown, M50-54
Sid Howard, M60-64
Margaret Angell, F20-29
Alayne Adams, F40-44
Yumi Ogita, F40-44
Irene Jackson-Schon, F55-59
-
SNOWFLAKE WRAP-UP REPORT [2/23/2003]
Completely miserable weather. Last week, it was 20 inches
of snow. Somehow, we think that we could handle that.
Today, it was just a heavy cold rain, so everyone and everything
was extremely wet and cold. Getting warmed up properly?
Forget it. It was no fun running, it was no fun watching
the race, it was no fun taking photos. It was no fun.
For this first scoring race of the year, the team results are
open men 3rd, masters men 1st, senior masters men 4th, open
women 2nd, masters women 1st, senior masters women 6th.
Our results are perhaps less than ideal, due to a host of things
– a strep throat, a track meet on the same weekend, a
case of bronchitis, a stress fracture, a delayed subway train,
etc. But there are still eleven more races to go in the season.
Individually, the men were led by Alan Ruben, who had
a most satisfactory result of being first among all masters.
On the women side, Margaret Angell won the race by reducing
the race to a mile race at the end, which is good practice for
the USATF National Championships. On the NYRR results,
the winner was initially listed as someone else, but the race
number switcheroo will be corrected momentarily.
-
MAC 'LAST CHANCE' MEET [2/22/2003]
Armando Oliveira (4:08.24) and Kira Morser (4:52.4)
moved into 8th all-time bests on the men and women lists.
Of course, when someone moves into the list, someone else gets
displaced out of the list. On the endangered list is Lauren
Eckhart, who is in 10th place at 800m, 1500m and mile.
Time to get some insurance buffer, Lauren?
All published results so far are reported directly to us by
the individuals and coaches. Since this is a MAC meet,
we may never see the official results posted. If you have
times, please tell us.
-
ARMORY SCHEDULE REMINDER [2/21/2003]
As a reminder, the Eastern States High School Championships
will take place on Tuesday. This means our regular Tuesday
workout has been bumped to Monday instead! Of course,
you can still show up on Tuesday, but you will only get to watch.
-
NEW YORK CITY TRIATHLON [2/21/2003]
Premier Event Management, organizers of world-class triathlons,
and the New York City Sports Commission, today announced that
registration has opened for the 3rd Annual New York City Triathlon,
to be held Sunday, August 10th. The course will consist of a
1.5-kilometer swim in the Hudson River, a 40-kilometer bike
ride along the Henry Hudson Parkway and a 10-kilometer run in
Central Park - the same as in previous years. Non-elite participants
can register by visiting www.nyctri.com.
The cost for registering is $125 per individual.
-
WORLD CUP PICS [2/21/2003]
England vs. Holland: Who's got the nicer uniforms?
Some Dutch guy whose first name is Roland lands
on his back against Australia!
-
SNOWFLAKE
ADMIN DETAILS [2/20/2003]
Number pick-up
Numbers, chips, and special NIKE race souvenirs may be picked
up prior to the race at NIKETOWN, 6 East 57th Street, between
Madison and Fifth Avenues, NYC, on:
Thursday, February 20, noon-7:00 p.m.
Friday, February 21, noon-7:00 p.m.
On race day, Saturday, February 22, numbers, NIKE race souvenirs,and
chips can be picked up from 7:00 to 9:00 a.m. at New York Road
Runners.
Race day
Day: Saturday, February 22, 2003
Time: 830am for men, 930am for women
Start/end: East 99th Street/East Drive, Central Park, NYC
-
THURSDAY ROAD WORKOUT REPORT [2/20/2003]
Ahem ... this is 36 hours before a road race that everyone is
supposed to be running, so why is anyone even here? In
this case, 'everyone' refers to thirty-three people (not including
Yves-Marc Courtines, Frank Schneiger and Carol
Tyler). So this was the case of people who showed
up wanting to be told to go home, were told to go home and then
went home. We love these predictable and obedient kids
(of course, there is always that one bad apple ...).
For those who made up excuse not to run the Snowflake race,
they got the same workout as last week: once around the lower
loop and once aruond the four mile loop. Amazingly, even
though there was 20 inches of snow falling on Monday, it was
not cold at all tonight in spite of the piles of white stuff
still sitting around. Indeed, this may be the warmest
Thursday of the year so far.
Complaint Department, Log Entry #1: Frank Schneiger:
"Yes, someone took a photo of me that is better than any
that you have ever taken. This one was taken from my right
side, and it even shows that one of my feet is off the ground
..."
Complaint Department, Log Entry #2: Unnamed runner that
you all know: "Suppose that you have raced flat out for
one whole mile on a track, you cross the finish line, you put
your hands on your hips and you bend over ... what do you think
is going on? Do you even have to ask?"
Complaint Department, Log Entry #3: "Will
this past Tuesday's track report ever appear?" Sorry,
we didn't know you cared ...
Free Advice Department, Log Entry #1: Zeb Nelessen:
"If you want to go home early, I think you better head
north to intercept them and get them to run back fast.
Otherwise, they may be yakking forever on their way down ..."
Speaking from experience, no doubt?
Free Advice Department, Log Entry #2: Suso Montero
and Harry Morales ... well, never mind, you really don't
want or need to know ... (hint: about whether a certain medical/religious
procedure is essential ...)
Free Advice Department, Log Entry #3: Mel Washington:
"If you want to take photos on Saturday, please bring a
large umbrella. It will be raining hard!"
-
ORANGE ALERT [2/20/2003]
Stacy Creamer: "With the Snowflake Four Miler coming
up this Saturday, it's perhaps fitting that orange is the color
on everyone's mind. For evidence, just check the latest issue
of New York magazine. I discovered three mentions of
our hallmark color in less than a minute of perusing. "We're
on orange alert, so I expect we'll be seeing a lot of orange,"
Jimmy Fallon is quoted as having told Marc Jacobs in a write-up
on Fashion Week. The model featured is sporting a bright orange
and blue outfit that would make superb if unaffordable apres-Snowflake
wear--if only for CPTCers. Then there's a piece titled Agents
Orange." While its subject could be the CPTC masters women
who are planning to dazzle in 2003, it's actually about the
mundane subject of police issuing more traffic tickets than
usual. Finally, and a bit bafflingly, there is an ad for Benetton
featuring a man in a red sweater with the words "sunset
orange" emblazoned on it. What can this mean? The color
red is green with envy, a mere orange wannabe? Homeland Security
Czar Tom Ridge may have officially demoted our national
alert status to GNY yellow, but orange clearly remains the color
of the day. But of course the proof will be up to us this Saturday."
-
WORLD CUP UPDATE [2/19/2003]
The subject of today's discourse is the Duckworth-Lewis method.
Test cricket is played over five days, which is pure joy for
aficionadoes and absolute tedium for the rest of the world.
For the World Cup now going on in southern Africa, the games
are shorted to a series of ODI's (One Day Internationals) played
over 44 days among 14 nations. For each match, each team
gets to bat for fifty overs and the highest score wins for ten
wickets (or less). Over the course of the tournament,
there will be days when play is shortened due to rain.
The Duckworth-Lewis method is a mathematical method of projecting
one team's incomplete innings to a final score. The formula
includes consideration of the run rate so far and the strength
of the remaining batsmen. For further details, please
see Duckworth, FC & Lewis, AJ "A fair method of resetting
the target in interrupted one-day cricket matches" Journal
of the Operational Research Society, (Mar 1988) Volume 49, No.
3 pp 220-227.
So far there has been one major Duckworth-Lewis upset.
In their game against New Zealand, South Africa compiled a comfortable
306-6 in their innings. This would seem enough, but Kiwi
Stephen Fleming played the game of his life and carried his
team to 229-1 in 36.5 overs before the rains came.
That run rate with nine wickets in hand was sufficient to win
the match by the Duckworth-Lewis method.
England won its second match, beating the amateurs from Namibia.
But not before it faced another Duckworth-Lewis scare.
England had soared to 272 in their first inning, which is seemingly
unreachable. England did win when Namibia compiled only
217-9 in their innings. But somewhere between the 25th
and 31st overs, a human resource management student named Jan
Berry Burger brought the run rate up for Namibia to win
if the Duckworth-Lewis method were operational. Fortunately
for England, the rains never came and the run rate fell off
after Burger was dismissed.
As for Canada, they ran into the first strong team of the tournament
and set a new world record low by scoring only 36 runnings in
their innings. Sri Lanka took 4 overs to surpass that
total, and the whole game was over in less than 2 hours.
The previous lowest ODI record was also held by Canada, for
45 against England in Old Trafford, 1979.
On a brighter note, after India's disastrous loss to Australia,
the country goes into mourning. In captain Sourav Ganguly's
home city of Calcutta, fans took out a mock Hindu funeral procession
to mark what they said was the death of Indian cricket.
An effigy symbolising India's national obsession was wrapped
in white cloth and carried by mock pall bearers, who later consigned
the "body" to flames amid Hindu religious chants.
All of this is tolerable, except there is now a national boycott
campaign through SMS (Short Messaging Service) against all products
that are endorsed by India's crickets. Ouch! Now
that is really going to hurt ...
-
KIDS STUFF [2/19/2003] A
correspondent points out that Dr. Jordan Metzl will be
a panelist discussing how to keep perspective in kids sport
on Thursday night. There is also a detailed article in
Newsday
about this event.
Event: Keeping Perspective on Youth Athletics
Location: 92 Street Y, 92nd Street at Lexington Avenue
Date & Time: Thursday, February 20th, 2003, 8:15pm
Moderator: Rick Wolff
Panelists: Calvin Hill, Ken Holtzman, Jordan
Metzl, Robin Wagner
Our correspondent obviously knows Dr. Metzl. She has heard
of Sarah Hughes, the Olympic gold medalling high schooler
who is coached by Robin Wagner. But she professes
ignorance about the other two illuminaries on the panel.
Well, Calvin Hill was a running back at Yale University,
the alma mater of Stacy Creamer. Calvin had the
distinction of being the number one draft pick of America's
team --- the Dallas Cowboys. His greater legacy to sports
may be his son, Grant Hill, a Duke University all-American,
a number one NBA draft pick and an NBA all-star. Here
is one of Calvin's famous sayings: "I always thought it
was important to be civil and not to embarrass your opponent."
And another one: "At
the time, Yale was undergoing a tremendous social upheaval.
There was the war in Vietnam, and there was civil rights, urban
unrest, and the question of whether to admit women. And yet,
no matter where you were on these issues, everyone could set
them aside for a while and rally around the football team."
As for Ken Holtzman, he was a baseball pitcher most famously
associated with the champion teams of the Oakland A's and New
York Yankees. The miracle was how someone with so little
apparent talent can accomplish results as good as his more flamboyant
teammates such as Catfish Hunter, Ferguson Jenkins, Blue
Moon Odom, Vida Blue, Ron Guidry, Don Gullett, Rollie Fingers
and Goose Gossage (for you youngsters, these are real
baseball players!).
Our correspondent adds a social note: "By the way,
you mentioned Jeremy Bentham some time last week.
I attended University College London, which was founded by Jeremy
Bentham. According to the legend, he had one proviso
--- that his body be preserved and that he attend the annual
general meeting every year following his death. So his
preserved body sits at one end of the cloisters, the main campus
building, and once a year he gets wheeled into the meeting.
Unfortunately, legend has it that a few years ago, the UCL students
stole the Kings College (our nearest rivals, and known to the
UCL students as "Strand Polytechnic") mascot, and
before it was returned, the Kings students retaliated by stealing
poor old Jeremy's head and playing soccer with it. So,
apparently now Jeremy sits in his glass case in the cloisters
with a wax head, the remains of his own head in a box somewhere.
Of course, this could all be UCL myth, but it is a fact that
there is a fine pub called The Jeremy Bentham in which
I passed many an hour when I should have been studying."
And in spite of mssing her studies, our correspondent still
somehow collected a Doctor of Philosophy degree in between.
-
KISS 'EM TO THE FINISH [2/19/2003]
That 1-2 finish down in Florida is in fact Ana Echeverri's
first road race win. Congratulations!
-
BE ALERT [2/19/2002] From
today's Daily
News:
Park jogger robbed
A woman jogging in Central Park was robbed at gunpoint last
night, police said. The 41-year-old victim was running
near W. 103rd St. and the West Drive when three teenage thugs
confronted her at 6:30 p.m., cops said.
One bandit shoved the woman to the ground, whipped out a handgun
and stole her MetroCard and $20, police said. The woman
was not injured.
Crime in Central Park (and New York City in
general) remains at very low levels, but we remind all our readers
to be careful while running in the park, especially after dark.
-
LAY YOUR HANDS ON ME [2/19/2003]
Eve Bois writes: "I'm looking for a massage
therapist who does specifically "cross-friction" massage
– the kind of massage one gets 3-4 times per week for
10-20 minutes per session. I don't need a sport massage
therapist, a physical therapist, a doctor, or a sports internist,
or anything else. Simply someone who specializes in cross-friction
treatment. Any referrals appreciated! Email me at
evbois@netscape.net."
-
LOST & FOUND [2/19/2002]
Jonathan Cane writes: "I found a pair of women's
Asics 2070, size 8.5 at the track tonight. They are in
my possession, and the owner can call me at 646-621-4495 or
write to jonathan@citycoach.org"
This has been a public service announcment from your favorite
website ...
-
FREE MARATHON LECTURE [2/19/2003]
On Wednesday (2/19), at the Robert Wagner Middle School, 220
East 76th Street (between Second and Third Avenues, there will
be a free lecture on getting started to run the New York City
Marathon. The three featured speakers are:
. Gordon Bakoulis, running coach, 5-time Olympic Marathon
Trials qualifier, and author of How to Train for and Run
Your Best Marathon
. Toby Tanser, running coach, personal trainer, elite
marathon runner, and author of Train Hard, Win Easy: The
Kenyan Way
. Lauren Wallack, MS, RD, registered dietitian, nutritional
advisor to the New York City Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's
Team in Training and Columbia University's swim team, ACE personal
trainer, Ironman triathlete, and experienced marathon runner
-
TEACH
FOR AMERICA [2/18/2003] Central Park Track Club
members Shula Sarner, Larry Thraen,
Stacia Schlosser, Jerome O'Shaughnessy and Sandra
Scibelli are involved in fundraising for the Teach For America
project. They are the key drivers to form Teach For America's
first marathon team, named Team TFA (of course). Shula
and Larry are the coaches, Jerome is leading long runs, Stacia
is on the steering committee that organized the team and Sandra
is one of the founders of the team and is helping in all capacities.
At the Snowflake Party at the Parlour on Saturday, they will
be addressing the team about their volunteer efforts and how
the rest of us can support their efforts (checks and credit
cards accepted).
-
NEW
YORK FOUNDATION RUNNING BUDDIES [2/18/2003] Sandra
Scibelli is working on another project, this one is to get
members of our team involved in the running buddies program
that the NYRRC offers. They don't have applications on line
but she will be bringing some hard copies for interested members
to The Parlour as well as some literature from their website.
The email link for somebody to have a hardcopy of the application
mailed to their home is foundation@nyrrc.org
.
In the past, people as diverse as David Pullman and Paul
Stuart-Smith have been running buddies. How about
you?
-
THIS WEEK'S EVENTS [2/18/2003]
Friday Evening: MAC "Last Chance" Meet
For those who are not inclined to travel far, this Armory
meet has 200m, 1500m, 400m, 800m events. This is the last
MAC meet before the MAC championships on March 9th.
Saturday morning: Snowflake Run in the park.
This is our traditional club race of the winter. What
this means is that every fit or semi-fit or even unfit person
should be out there running in the race (unless you have an
excuse such as having to take photos). So we hear that
Frank McConville will be making his club race debut.
Ah, that's interesting because we have no idea what to predict
for him. By reputation, he is the man who has won Corporate
Challenges on zero training. We have great expectations
for him --- namely, regardless of his race time, Frank is expected
to enjoy a good time out there. Insofar as the scoring
is concerned, this is the first race of the series this year.
Our women are the defending champions, and this year the scoring
will be based upon the first four runners. Our
masters men will be looking for a 5-peat.
Saturday afternoon: The Parlour
The Parlour,
West 86th Street between Broadway and West End Avenue, from
12pm to 4pm, basement.
This is our traditional winter party.
Saturday evening: NYRR Club Night
Apart from the partying, we have 9 nominees up for awards:
Tom Phillips, Alan Ruben, Alston Brown,
Sid Howard, Margaret Angell, Alayne Adams,
Yumi Ogita, Irene Jackson-Schon and Sylvie
Kimché.
Sunday, USATF-NE Championships, Harvard University, Boston,
MA
We will have a large contingent traveling up for this meet.
Now is the time to tune up those DMR teams!
-
OBED MUTANYA UPDATE [2/18/2003]
Obed Mutanya had his first outing in a Central Arizona
College vest on Saturday. He won a 'very' low-key local
10,000 in 30:51.50. Second place was 35:57.60! These early
meets are nothing more than training sessions and he is likely
to do a 1,500 next week. Training is going well though,
and he may do more 10,000s further down the line. The JUCO record
of 28:35.00, held by Britain's Mark Roberts from 1987
and who also attended CAC, could be under threat in April or
May.
Academically, he has settled into his studies very well and
is mainly concentrating on a variety of English classes this
semester. Because of his studies, Obed may not go to the
World Cross this year. The decision still has to be made but
rather than take a week out of classes to go to Lausanne, at
a crucial stage in his first semester and after being out of
school for a year, he may stay in Arizona. The targets
this spring are good performances on the track in April and
May.
WEEK OF FEBRUARY 11, 2003 - FEBRUARY
17, 2003
-
SNOW DAY [2/17/2003] Oh
the weather outside is frightful but the fire is so delightful
and since we've no place to go ... Ah, but we did
have a place to go this morning, and that place was the office.
Yes, the banks were closed. And the post office.
And pretty much every office in the city. Even our own
office was technically closed, but there's always a minimum
level of staffing, and we usually volunteer to help make up
that minimum. We don't do this out of any love for our
job (we have none). Rather, we like the fact that there
is usually nothing to do all day, and we can earn an easy paycheck.
Plus, we prefer to take our vacation days at our own convenience,
so we work on Presidents' Day, but take off, say, the third
Monday in April, or a Friday in June so that we can participate
in a race.
After a weekend spent carrying boxes from the old place to the
car and from the car to the temporary place (to be repeated
in a few weeks when we move everything from the temporary place
to the new place), we looked forward even more than usual to
a day where we could take a nap at our desk and nobody would
even notice. And then, last night, the snow started.
Having failed to pay attention to We got up early to shovel
the sidewalk, but didn't plan for the inevitable subway delays,
and spent an extra hour as a guest of the MTA. We were
still the first – and only – person in our department
to arrive, but for some reason there was a lot of work to do.
Instead of a relaxing day watching the snow fall outside our
window, we spent the whole day staring at a computer screen.
Only occasionally did we get the chance to look out at Central
Park, a quarter of a mile and an entire world away. Who
was out there? Were any of the orangers brave enough to
run today? Might they instead be skiing or sledding or
having snowball fights? Alas, we may never find out.
- REMEMBERING JACK [2/17/2003]
One year ago, Jack Brennan,
a founder of the Central Park Track Club, passed away.
What did Jack miss during these past 12 months? Above all,
Jack missed the 30th Annual
Awards Party for the team that he founded with Dave
Blackstone and Frank Handelman. While it is true
that Jack had watched the progress of the team over the years,
that party was the formal occasion when everybody paused and took
stock of the accomplishments in the historical context.
And what a history! On that occasion, Jack was indicted
into the Central Park Track Club Hall Of Fame. Surely, he
must have missed the honor conferred on him, but we suspect that
had Jack been there, he would have grabbed the microphone and
launched into a long discussion about how Frank Handelman
was also inducted into the Hall Of Fame without ever being able
to break 2:30 for the marathon.
And how did we miss Jack? That surely must depend on the
individual, as some of us know him very well and, given the flux
in membership, others hardly or not at all. Regardless of
our individual responses, the spirit of Jack Brennan is
alive and well. At the end of the year 2002, the Central
Park Track Club women won the NYRR championships, and the masters
men team (of which Jack was a part) won the NYRR championships
for the fourth year in a row. Our collective reaction is
the legacy of Jack Brennan --- strive for excellence, fierce
competitiveness, absence of vanity and a sense of humor.
And may we keep this in mind, now and forever ...
And a note from Peggy Brennan Bermel, the sister of Jack
Brennan:
On Monday February 17th it will be one year
since Jack suddenly left us. When you run on Monday, think
of Jack, and if that causes you to run just a little faster,
then you know he is running along with you. For Jack, running
was not just about running, but more importantly about the
runners. He just loved the camaraderie. The "loneliness
of the long distance runner" was a myth. He always knew
what was important in life, and one aspect of his life that
he valued tremendously was running and talking with his friends.
He loved the CPTC, and was proud of the accomplishments of
the team--his friends. There is a simple Irish blessing "May
you live every day of your life". Jack lived every day
of his life fully, and it was our blessing that he shared
his days with us.
Best regards,
Peggy
- FRANKLY SPEAKING [2/17/2003]
From Noah Perlis:
In your write-up of the results of
Thursday Night, Jan 30, you missed the following observation
:
Giving credit where credit is due:
Frank Handelman, 2:16.9
1. Frank is now 57 and his time represents am improvement from
his 7th place at last year's Indoor Nationals of almost 9 seconds!
The winning time in that race was 2:19.75, so Frank is in great
position with almost 2 months to go before the Nationals.
2. His age-graded performance is a 90.42, which means it is
the equivalent to an open age runner doing a 1:52.5!
3. For all of 2002, Frank's time is approximately 1 second from
the best time in the U.S. rankings in the 55-59 age group, including
outdoors!
4. 2002 represented a comeback year for Frank after foot surgery,
and he is now getting to a prime, without any speed training
yet that we have observed. His pre-race statement last
Tuesday "was that he was just going to go out and see what
he can do and what shape he is in" - this was his first
race of the indoor season! Goes to show, how much you
can trust an attorney to understate!
Way to go Frank!!!!!!
- WESTERN COMFORT [2/17/2003]
Sympathetic note about the snowstorm from John Prather,
our teammate in Arizona: "I have not needed to wear a shirt
the entire winter while running in Arizona. Although not a pretty
picture, it's quite comfortable!"
... wish you were here ...
- SNOWFLAKE HISTORY [2/17/2003]
Since there is a foot of snow out there with more snowflakes fluttering
around, we know that y'all are snowbound inside your homes with
nothing to do except surf the web. This is therefore the
time when we dump a large amount of content for your diversion.
For this coming Saturday, there will be the Snowflake Run to be
held in Central Park, hopefully under better weather conditions
than now. This race is important because it is a scoring
race and, most of all, because it is our club's designated winter
race (scoring race or not). The tradition of Snowflake began
for us when a young Dan Glickenhaus won the race in the
early 1980's.
Back in 1993, the race report in the club newsletter was penned
by Claudia Malley, who has since gone on to become the
publisher of Runners World.
February 6, 1993 --- It was cold, it was blustery
cold. There was a strong wind that seemed to turn into
a headwind in every direction. And did I mention snow?
Well, it is called the Snowflake Run, so what did we expect?
Runners huddled together before the start wondering
whether it was worth it to even do a warm-up or wear racing
flats. But snow or no snow, the competitive runner is
inside us all the time. And besides --- this was a team
scoring race.
The Snowflake has a split men/women start, which
meant the women had to try to keep warm for 10 minutes longer
than the men. Even with the snow on the ground and more
coming down, both men and women took off at a pace appropriate
for a dry spring day: fast. The corners were slick and
the footing was poor, but as long as hands and heads were covered,
the four-mile circuit was relatively painless.
Coach George, situated in the middle of the
72nd Street transverse between ice slicks, cheered on this tough
runners with words of wizdom. He was almost invisible
in the heavily falling snow.
At last Cat Hill was in sight; only one more
mile of the strong north wind to battle and the race would be
over. The 90th Street finishing area was empty, with only
the time clock, some officials and frozen water cups to prove
there had been a race. Everyone had already headed away
from the park to get out of the cold. [According to
Nathan Klejman, many showed up at the Sports Bar "and
proceed to party wildly."]
Well, what's winter without one race like this
...
Women, 4th place
Claudia Malley, 25:03
Stacy Creamer, 27:46
Stephanie Gobbo, 28:02
Jacqueline Cortez, 28:15
Jane Kenney, 30:48
Sylvie Kimché, 32:30
Jessie Lea Hayes, 33:00
Betty Marolla, 33:01
Barbara Tsao, 34:18
Bunny Franco, 37:05
Men, 3rd place
Peter Allen, 21:33
Alan Ruben, 22:17
Tony Ruiz, 22:35
Rick Shaver, 22:47 (1st age group)
Casey Yamazaki, 23:29
Ricardo Granados, 23:50
Tim Robinson, 23:55
Phil Vasquez, 24:12
Mike Batista, 24:16
Adam Newman, 24:17
Zachary Miller, 24:22
Bob Vogel, 24:45
Augustine Garcia, 24:47
Oscar Rojas, 24:52
Sid Howard, 25:00
Dan Hamner, 25:01
Efrain Gonzalez, 25:30
David Pullman, 25:35
Paulino Santana, 25:39
Manny Rial, 25:41
Roland Soong, 26:01
Michael Robinson, 26:09
Peter Ernst, 26:10
Bob Howard, 26:14
Ben Wilbur, 26:43
Nathan Klejman, 27:14
Theo Spilka, 27:15
Craig McCulloch, 27:35
Dan Glickenhaus, 28;13
Bob Laufer, 28:31
Ed Coplon, 29:01
Clarence Roman, 29:42
Michael Wallop, 30:30
Fred Lebow, 47:39
- ROAR, LIONS, ROAR [2/17/2003]
Some of you may not be familiar with the new names that appeared
at the Armory College Invitational. But there is a lot that
you can learn about new and old members from the records at the
Columbia University website:
Top
Cross Country Times At Van Cortlandt Park
Men #2: Mike Grant, 24:40, 1998
Women #1: Devon Martin, 17:49, 1989
Women #9: Kira Morser, 18:41, 2000
Men's
Track
Outdoor
#5 400m, Evan Zeisel, 48.15, 2001
#9 10,000m, Mike Grant, 30:24.66, 1998
#10 4x400m, Zeisel, Bezamat, Epstein, Schroeder,
3:19.8, 2000
#1 DMR, Gibbons, Zeisel, Jagodzinski, Rossi, 9:50:15, 1999
#9 DMR, Nash, Zeisel, Schroeder, Krug, 9:58, 2000
Indoor
#1 200m, Evan Zeisel, 22.50, 2000
#1 400m, Evan Zeisel, 48.87, 2001
#1 500m, Evan Zeisel, 1:03.65,2001
#6 5000m, Mike Grant, 14:31.57, 1999
#2 4x400m, Schroeder, Moncur, Edwards, Zeisel, 3:19.15,
2001
#4 4x800m, Galgano, Moncur, Edwards, Zeisel, 7:41.02, 2001
#1 DMR, Gibbons, Zeisel, Jagodzinski, Rossi, 9:49.31, 1999
#3 DMR, Nash, Zeisel, Gibbons, Biersbach, 9:55.19, 2000
Women's
Track
Outdoor
#3 800m, Devon Martin, 2:16.13, 1990
#1 1500m, Devon Martin, 4:18.04, 1990
#2 3000m, Devon Martin, 9:31.61, 1990
#2 5000m, Devon Martin, 17:12.24, 1990
Indoor
#2 800m, Devon Martin, 2:14.41, 1990
#1 mile, Devon Martin, 4:53.24, 1990
#1 3000m, Devon Martin, 9:43.64, 1990
#2 4x800m, Smith, Oki, Martin, Kuo, 9:47.5, 1990
#1 DMR, Ruddock, Henry, Martin, Thompson, 12:17.8, 1988
-
BROOKLYN VALENTINE [2/16/2003]
CPTC Victory Again Snatched Away by Big-Money Interests
Brooklyn NY - February 16, 2003
Less than six months after their heartbreaking
"loss" to the Hutchens ASICS running team in the Reach
the Beach relay in New Hampshire, the plucky orange underdogs
from Central Park have again been denied their rightful place
on on the victory podium by the champions of corporate America.
Kevin Arlyck, a CPTC member who ran for the Orange Crush
relay team on that fateful September weekend in New Hampshire,
set out in the bitter cold this morning in hopes of bringing
greater glory to the Orange. Though wind-chill temperatures
hovered around the 0 degree mark at start time for today's Valentine's
5K Run, Arlyck bravely donned his orange singlet in hopes of
adding an early-season notch to the CPTC victory list for 2003.
He recognized that the cold would discourage many redoubtable
local harriers, perhaps opening the door for a victory. A brief
survey of the miniscule crowd at the start confirmed Arlyck's
suspicions, as the usual Brooklyn-based opponents were nowhere
to be seen. How right, and wrong, his aspirations would prove
to be.
At the first mile mark, Arlyck was running comfortably in the
lead, despite a blazing sub-5:00 downhill effort, with what
sounded like one or two challengers sitting behind, letting
him do all the work. Soon, however, Arlyck heard someone approach
on his left, and looked over to see a runner he did not recognize
pass him rather easily, apparently untroubled by the fast pace
and weather conditions. Accelerating smoothly, the runner proceeded
to drop Arlyck like a bad habit over the course of the next
mile, and disappeared from view entirely as the runners climbed
the "big hill" on the Prospect Park loop course. In
fact, the only reason Arlyck caught another glimpse of his nemesis
was when he stopped and started jogging in place at the Grand
Army Plaza entrance, unsure of how to proceed. Ever the gracious
competitor, Arlyck directed him with a orange-gloved wave, and
the interloper quickly reestablished his gigantic lead.
After the race, the unknown opponent introduced himself as "Jerry"
(an alias, perhaps), and asked if Arlyck had participated in
the RTB relay. Jerry explained that he was on the ASICS-sponsored
team that had been mightily crushed by the Orange team that
day, only to be awarded first place in the aftermath of the
infamous Brownie incident. A triathlete and pro duathlete living
and training in New Hampshire, he was visiting his girlfriend
in New York and discovered the race via the Internet. Having
underestimated the subway ride to Brooklyn, he arrived at the
race literally as the horn sounded, and ran the race without
a number. Despite the snafu, he was justly awarded the victory
by the good people of the Brooklyn Road Runners Club, leaving
Arlyck in second place with only the small consolation that
Jerry is actually a very nice guy. The ASICS man assured Arlyck
that they would be fielding another team for the RTB this fall,
and would welcome a rematch with CPTC, having greatly enjoyed
the competition in last year's race. Suffering doubly from the
cold and disappointment, Arlyck winced and responded "We'll
see."
-
BOOK SALES [2/16/2003] If
you have been keeping track of the
List of Books, you will have noted that there was a
relatively large surge in sales this month. Of course,
the total revenues do not even cover our operating expenses,
much less retirement to a villa in southern France. This
is a free website which we created and maintained out of the
love of doing it. We do not seek anything in return, but
certainly those book sales are tokens of appreciation from our
users. More importantly, we are avid list-readers and
that list is certainly interesting material to us.
Although our primary affiliation is with Amazon.com, we also
have an affiliate partnership with Barnes & Noble.
In the latter case, there is the advantage of fast same-day
delivery within Manhattan. Is there anything you want
to buy right now while you are snowed in? Click below
..
-
WORLD CUP UPDATE [2/16/2003]
Looks like we have been negligent in not providing you with
daily updates (and aren't you glad!). Plenty has happened
in the preliminary round, but we will just tell you about the
highlights:
(1) By refusing to play in Zimbabwe, England has forfeited all
four points in the match. More significantly, there will
be a financial penalty that theoretically could be as much as
10 million pounds. Yes, cricket is big money elsewhere
in the world. In their debut appearance, England overran
non-cricket-playing Holland. The big test will come later
as England is in the same group as Australia, Pakistan and India.
(2) The good news for England comes from Australia, as the Aussies
thomped the two other powerhouses Pakistan and India in their
first two matches. Australia took India out for 126 runs
in only 41.4 overs, and came back to surpass that total in 22.2
overs in under 2 hours for the loss of only one wicket.
This was just too easy. Australia will meet England on
March 2 in their last match of the preliminary round.
(3) Canada blew their chance for a second victory in a row when
Kenya chased them down with 4 wickets in hand and only 9 balls
left. The opposition now grows stiffer for Canada, as
they will face the powerhouses in their group: Sri Lanka, West
Indies and a very angry home team South Africa which has two
unexpected losses already.
(4) The most astonishing feat of the World Cup came from Chaminda
Vaas. Against Bangladesh, the Sri Lankan left-hander
became the first bowler to take three wickets with the first
three balls of an international match. This is equivalent
to a baseball pitcher getting nine outs with exactly nine pitches
in the first three innings of a League Championship Series.
A more significant sports score: Arsenal 2, Manchester United
0 in the fifth round of the FA Cup.
-
JERSEY SHORE RELAY [2/16/2003]
I would like to invite the Central Park Track Club to participate
in this Year's Jersey Shore Relay. The relay has a wide range
of teams both competitive and just fun runners. The event benefits
Special Olympics. Information is at: http://www.jsrc.org/relay.htm
We enjoyed competing with you guys at the NYRRC Club Championships
all year in Central Park and other events in the City as well
as at the Millrose Games. We also share a common thing
- we have the same team color - Orange. Please get back
to me if you have any questions - would really like to see you
all down at the Jersey Shore.
Bob Both
Race, Director, Jersey Shore relay
Jersey Shore Running Club
-
UNDER THE WEATHER [2/16/2003]
Is the weather getting you down? This has not been a very
nice winter so far (and you can read all about it in our cyclists'
workout programs). Just to cheer you up a bit,
we show a photo of our people engaged in non-snowbound activities
to remind you that the good times will return eventually.
Meanwhile, you brace yourself for that 12 inches of snow that
is in the forecast for tomorrow ...
Mary V. Rosado, Sylvie Kimché, Lauren Eckhart, Stefani Jackenthal
Ross Galitsky, Aubin Sullivan, Kim Mannen, Jessica Reifer
-
TRACK EXCITEMENT [2/15/2003]
The last two days were pretty exciting, with the Thursday Night
At The Races on (of course) Thursday and the Armory Collegiate
Invitational on Friday. On Thursday, we had a large representation.
On Friday, we had a visible representation as both our men and
women qualified for the DMR at the USATF National Indoor Championships.
Let us step back for a moment to reflect on how all of this
had happened. A couple of years ago, Devon Martin,
Erik Goetze and Isaya Okwiya determined that there
was a need to form a middle-distance group to meet their training
needs, which are different from those of Brian Denman's
sprinters and Tony Ruiz's road runners. In the
beginning, that group list consisted of five names only.
Fast forward to last week's Tuesday workout which lists these
names:
Millrose relay: Mary D and Mary R
Group 1: Craig C, David, Mike G, Ken, John C, Tony,
Stuart, Paul G, Chris P, Armando, James O
Group 2: Tom P, Nick, Price, Paul B, Devon, Frank H,
Doug, Sid, Janice, Alexandra, Kim, Charlotte, John A
Group 3: Craig L, Sue P, John G, Lawrence, Jessica, Marty,
Chris S, Jerome, Harry, Patrick C, Darlene, Laura
Group 4: Marie, Ana, Jim M, Brian, Norman, Jim O, Mindy,
Sara, Jim A
Others: Charles, Melissa, Pat L, Bola, Eve, Noah, Sue
K, Kira
That makes 56 names on the list. Pretty exciting stuff,
eh? Of course, this did not just fall from the sky for
no apparent reason --- it was a lot of hard work by Devon and
others.
-
THE ARMORY COLLEGIATE INVITATIONAL PRELIMINARY
REPORT [2/14/2003] The panopticon did not provide
a clear story. We have no final times as such, so we will
have to wait until the results are published. First, in
the women's race, we could identify Devon Martin in the
leadoff leg on account of her hairstyle; we could not identify
Melissa Tidwell because all the 400m runners were going
too fast; we could not identify Jessica Reifer because
we don't know what she looks or runs like without a soccer ball;
ah, but we know what Margaret Angell looks and runs like.
When she got the handoff, she was in sixth place and she moved
into second place at the finish just behind Syracuse University.
The announcer even named her (although the name was mis-pronounced
with the emphasis on 'An' rather than just the plain 'angel'
that we know her as). Then, in the men's race, we could
not identify anyone other than Armando Oliveira in the
leadoff leg. Why? Because they all run too fast!
Even the announcer could only identify the first two teams (College
of New Jersey and St. John's).
Late news: Results are in! Women in 12:05.73 (automatic
qualifying time for USATF Nationals; standard is 12:20) and
the men in 10:29.0 (provisional qualifying time for USATF Nationals)
Estimated splits for women
Devon 3:45.21
Melissa 63.04
Jessica 2:18
Margaret 5:01
Estimated splits for men
Armando 3:09.84
David. 50.18
Evan 1:58
Mike 4:30
Melissa, Jessica, David and Evan all had times that put them
into or improved their positions in our all-time best lists.
-
LOVE IS IN THE AIR [2/14/2003]
As we're sure everyone knows, today is the 74th anniversary
of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, when four members of Al
Capone's South-Side Chicago gang disguised themselves as
police, raided a garage being used by "Bugs" Moran's
North-Side Chicago for a bootlegging transaction, and shot the
seven men they found there several times at point-blank range
using shotguns and Tommy guns (named for General John T.
Thompson, the inventor of the guns, and not to be confused
with Thomspon Financial Services, sponsor of last weekend's
twosome race).
For most people, though, Valentine's Day is a holiday of love
and coupledom, although whether one thinks of this as a good
day or a bad one often depends on whether one is part of a couple
or not. For our own part, we usually forget about Valentine's
Day (as well as almost every other holiday that doesn't involve
either a family gathering or drunken bacchanal), and most years
the day has no more effect on our life than such holidays as
Arbor Day or St. Crispin's day. Over the last week, though,
we've spent so much time listening to our roommates and their
friends try to outdo each other in finding ways to avoid the
holiday, that we started desperately searching for stories of
men and women who actually like each other's company.
We found them, of course, in the sports world (you didn't think
this story would be completely irrelevant to running,
did you?). First, Annika Sorenstam - who currently
dominates the LPGA in a way that Tiger Woods can only
dream about - announced her intention to play in the Bank of
America Colonial in Fort Worth on May 22, making her only the
second woman to play in a PGA tournament (Babe Didriksen
Zaharias did it in 1945). The reaction from the male
golfers (who have spent the last few months trying to avoid
having to comment on whether Augusta National should allow female
members) has been almost completely positive, with several even
predicting a top 20 finish for Sorenstam.
In College Basketball, Tennessee State athletic director Teresa
Phillips became the first woman to coach a men's Division
I team last night, when she filled in for acting coach Hosea
Lewis, who was serving a one game suspension he earned in
a brawl during Monday's game. Although Tennessee State
still lost 71-56, it was one of the best showings the 2-21 Tigers
have made all season, and the players have asked Phillips, who
coached women's teams for many years, to continue working with
them for the rest of the season.
But is it all just work, or is there any romance out there?
Once again, the sports world comes through, with a piece in
Sports Illustrated on top athletic couples. While
local pairs like Alan Ruben & Gordon Bakoulis
and Stuart Calderwood & Stacy Creamer are
glaringly absent from the magazine, an interview with Lori
Bowden (married to fellow Ironman champion Peter Reid)
has this quote: "It's pretty shallow, but I took
up the sport to meet cute boys." We took up running
(and later triathlons) with far nobler goals: to stay
in shape, to feel the thrill of competition, and to test our
limits further than we ever would otherwise. But that
wore off pretty quickly, and we've kept at it mostly in the
hope of meeting cute girls.
-
THE PANOPTICON [2/14/2003]
The Tuesday workout report refers to something called the penopticon.
As is typical of much else that is published on this website,
this is yet another egregious typographical error. However,
we admit that the original word is sufficiently obscure that
it is not in the standard Microsoft spellchecker. While
graduate students who have had to read Michel Foucault
as the essential core of their education knows the term panopticon,
the rest of the world deserves an explanation.
The Panopticon
project was theorized in the mid-1780s by the British social
reformer Jeremy Bentham. This was a utopian scheme
for social reform -- one equally applicable to the penitentiary
house, mad-house, house of industry, or school (and we can now
add: track workouts). The word panopticon is a
Greek neologism that signifies the 'all-seeing place.'
The architectural specifications of Bentham called for a concentric
building whose periphery was divided into non-communicating
cellular enclosures, in which confined inmates are held in isolation,
invisible to each other. At the center of the annular
design was a tower which housed the omniscient observer. An
asymmetric system of lighting and wooden blinds ensured that
the individual inmate was constantly visible, identifiable,
and classifiable to the observer -- who was a kind of secular
version of the all-seeing God's-eye.
But while the inmate is seen by the observer,
he himself cannot see. Foucault wrote: 'He is the object
of information, never a subject in communication.' The
Panopticon's power was 'visible and unverifiable' -- that is,
the inmate could not see the observer, only the looming tower
and he would never know when he was actually under surveillance
at any moment. This uncertainty, along with the inmate's
isolation and loss of privacy, is the means of coercing his
compliance and subordination.
So now you know the philsophical meaning of that one-eyed monster
that hovers over your workouts and races ...
-
THURSDAY NIGHT AT THE ARMORY [2/13/2003]
Once again, this series is proving to be popular as the meet
ended well after 10:30pm due to the many competitors.
The official race results will be published in a few days' time,
but we have copied down our people's times. We have taken
a bunch of photos which should show up in a day or so.
The following picture shows the coach Devon Martin encouraging
Stacy Creamer and Darlene Miloski in the 800m
race.
We have been remiss about updating our Best
of Times list the last few weeks, so we will remind
you of these developments:
- Jessica Reifer moved into 5th place for women's 400m
with the 63.7 at the USATF-NJ Open Championships. We note
that the Fairleigh Dickinson track is one of the slowest around
and also she was hand-timed at 61.9 in this race. We expect
Jessica to move further up the list very shortly.
- Jessica Reifer has also entered 6th place for women's
800m with a 2:23.9 at an earlier Thursday Night At The Races.
We suppose that playing those 90 minutes soccer games and being
the league scoring champion gave Jessica
both strength and speed!
- Lauren Eckhart held on to 10th place for the women's
mile, but improved her time to 5:21.2 at an earlier Thursday
Night At The Races.
More pertinent to this Thursday's proceedings, there were a
couple of dramatic breakthroughs. First of all, Kim
Mannen ran a personal best of 2:24.7 for the 800m with a
courageous piece of running and thus moved to 7th place all-time
best. The best performance of the evening came from Evan
Zeisel, who ran 48.8 for the 400m to move into a tie for
2nd place all-time best.
Therefore, the Armory College Invitational on Friday night will
be even more interesting, as we believe Evan Zeisel (with
the 48.8 warmup from the 400m tonight) and David Epstein
(with a listed 1:53.39 for 800m in 2002) will move into the
top ten lists. Furthermore, Jessica Reifer and
Margaret Angell may also be able to improve their positions
in the 800m and 1600m respectively.
-
ANNUAL SNOWFLAKE PARTY.
On Saturday, February 22nd, after you've run in the first NYRR
scoring race of the 2003 season – the Snowflake 4-miler
– you, your lazy teammates who didn't run and your friends
are invited to CPTC's Annual Snowflake Party at The
Parlour, West 86th Street between Broadway and West End
Avenue, from 12pm to 4pm, where we will have the downstairs
cash bar to ourselves.
-
TUESDAY NIGHT ROAD WORKOUT [2/12/2003]
Well, we were going to berate ourselves for being so late with
this report, leaving the mass public with no evidence of
the Tuesday workout group's existence, but we see that
the Penopticon has already done our job for us. Apparently there
is now an objective historical record of the workout happenings,
displayed in fuzzy yet perfectly viewable technicolor, rendering
our poor black-and-white (well, really, orange-and-black, by
the time it's formatted, but it's a common cliche and we are
certainly not above that sort of thing) subjective mutterings
perhaps less than essential. And yet we may console
ourselves with the fact that the cold eye of the camera can
only record the surface features of the workout, like the fact
that some fool puts his hands on his head after every interval;
it cannot provide narrative background for what it
sees, like the fact that he is worried that his head might
fall off after chasing Margaret Angell and Christopher
Price around a track too many times.
Really, we aren't too concerned about our new
rival: the silly camera seems able only to record one small
area of the track, completely ignoring, for example, the corner
where 29 people assembled to start the workout. And the camera
also seems to have neglected to record the clock at the start
of the workout; so you'll have to content yourselves with our
authoritatively stated 8:21 claim, with no possible appeal to
another source. The camera also failed to make out individual
faces, like the recently returned Joe Tumbarello, choosing (fair
to speak of volition here?) instead to present us as one continous
blur of color under the harsh yellow glare of the Armory's lights.
Ah well, we could always take refuge in the
scary individuality of the subway ride home. There coach Tony
Ruiz instructed us all, many of whom had displayed less
than completely dignified finishing technique on those quarters
(oh yeah, the workout was 12X400 with 200 meter jog recovery,
you didn't know that didya, our "all-seeing"
friend? [note: this epithet could be applied equally to either
the camera or Mr. Soong]), on the Box technique of sprinting.
Why, that's really "thinking outside the Box!" [canned
laughter, credits roll]
-
NEW MEMBER BIO [2/13/2003]
This month's new member Paul Carbonara is a member of
the Century-SBCG team (see team
bio and race
pic). More importantly, Paul is a current member
of the rock band Blondie
(see Paul in action
behind Deborah Harry).
-
ARMORY COLLEGIATE INVITATIONAL
[2/12/2003] Come cheer our DMR (Distance Medley Relay)
teams this Friday at the Armory. The women will compete
against several college teams and the Westchester Track Club
at around 8:00 pm. The men take on college teams and Warren
Street at roughly 8:50 pm. Both teams are hoping to qualify
for Nationals. Our racers are:
Men's DMR
1200m Armando Oliveira
400m David Epstein
800m Evan Zeisel
1600m Mike Grant
Women's DMR
1200m Devon Martin
400m Melissa Tidwell
800m Jessica Reifer
1600m Margaret Angell
If you can't make it up to the Armory, you can
still catch all the excitement on the Armorycam.
-
BOSTON
UNIVERSITY FASTRACK INVITATIONAL [2/12/2003] At
this Saturday meet, we have three entrants
1. Epstein, David - Men 800 Meter Run Developmental 1:53.39
2. Martinez, Oliver - Men 400 Meter Dash Developmental
52.23
3. Okwiya, Isaya - Men 1 Mile Run Developmental 4:25.44
Late news: All three have scratched.
-
WORLD CUP DAY TWO [2/12/2003]
Three shockers, really! First of all, the world's all-time
greatest spin bowler Australian Shane Warne was sent
home after he was detected to have used diuretics to lose weight.
By the time he reached the airport with his bags, his teammates
took to the field to face Pakistan in a replay of the final
of the last World Cup. This game matches some of the world's
fastest bowlers. When Australian batted first, they encountered
some 'hostile' bowling. Pakistani captain Waqar Younis
was prevented by the umpire to complete his bowling spell after
two consecutive beamers and will face a disciplinary hearing.
A collapse by the the top of the Australian batting order was
saved by a career best of 143 runs not out by substitute Andrew
Symonds. In reply, Pakistan was dismissed for 228
to Australia's 8-310. Thus ended the trash talk that the
Pakistani team doled out for the whole week.
Second, after much anguish and handwrining, England has decided
to forfeit the scheduled game in Harare (Zimbabwe) on the grounds
of security. This has always been a political matter,
even if people want to pretend that sports and politics do not
mix. The cited security threat came from the nebulous
Sons & Daughters of Zimbabwe. For the rest of the
tournament, England can expect a hostile reception from the
South African crowds. By the way, New Zealand has decided
to forfeit the game in Kenya also on security grounds.
Meanwhile, the South Africans say that they too are reconsidering
their future games in England — also on grounds of security,
which is suitably illustrated by the 450 heavily armed troops
sent out to protect London's Heathrow Airport just today.
Third, the best piece of news is that Canada (ranked 14th out
of 14 teams) beat Bangladesh in their first game! Canada
was all out for a relatively low score of 180, but Bangladesh
could muster 120 runs all out in only 28 overs in reply to lose
by 60 runs. Bangladesh is a country with test status (which
means that they play in international match series that 'mean
something') and Canada does not. The top run scorer for
Canada was Ian Billcliff, who was raised in New Zealand.
The Canadians had a simple wish-list in the preliminary round-robin
games — minimize the damage by the top teams South Africa
and West Indies, make it competitive against Sri Lanka and New
Zealand, and aim to beat Kenya and Bangladesh. So the
first step was a successful one.
-
TUESDAY TRACK WORKOUT SPYCAM REPORT
[2/11/2003] The Armory
website contains a webcam (ArmoryCam) that overlooks
the finish line and is constantly working. On this day,
we decided to drop in on the workout, metaphorically speaking.
This is our view of the situation, as captured by our digital
camera.
The early session begins at 6:30pm. Our sprinters and
middle-distance runners are supposed to warm and stretch at
6:30pm, do drills at 6:45pm and then start the intervals at
7:00pm. As show in the next photo, we did not spot anyone
at 7:10pm! Yes, we know that we need to lighten up ...
Eventually, we got our act together. Do you recognize
anyone in these photos?
And then (promptly) at 8:18pm, the long distance group showed
up on webcam. Although we have broadband access, the general
quality of the transmission was poor in the sense that it is
difficult to identify specific individuals in a given frame.
Ah, but once they start moving, it was easy to spot people like
Margaret Angell, Paul Bendich (note: he puts his
hands on top of his head after each interval), Alan Ruben,
Lauren Eckhart, Andrea Costella, Joe Tumbarello,
Margaret Schotte and Stacy Creamer on account
of their individual styles.
As a reminder, the Central Park Track Club is sending a women's
and men's DMR team to the Armory Collegiate Invitational on
Friday, February 14. 8:00pm for the women and 8:50pm for
the men. (DMR stands for distance medley relay and is a team
of four runners running 1200m, 400m, 800m and 1600m.) Let's
try to have lots of CPTC runners to cheer us on as both teams
try to qualify for the Nationals. $10 tickets are available
on the Armory website www.armorytrack.com.
And if you can't go there, you can always catch it on the ArmoryCam!
-
WORLD CUP PREVIEW [2/11/2003]
Sorry, but this is not about the 2006 Mundial for soccer.
This is about the gentleman's sport, otherwise known as cricket.
The World Cup has just begun in South Africa, with 44 days of
play to follow. As befits the hype that accompanies these
matches, the opening game saw West Indies beat home favorite
South Africa through a magnificent performance by living legend
Brian Lara. In the second match, another living
legend Sanath Jayasuriya led Sri Lanka to a victory over
New Zealand.
Our attention is focused on three other teams
that have yet to play. Obviously, our favorite is the
world's number one ranked team, Australia. In their last
one day match against England on January 24, the Aussies won
by 10 wickets in one hour's time. The match between Pakistan
and Australia will feature the world's two fastest bowlers —
Brett Lee and Shoaib Akhtar — in a game
played in Johannesburg. Will one of them finally break
the 100mph mark for the fastest pitch ever recorded? At
least now our readers know what will be reported on these pages
for the next month and a half.
The second team of interest is England.
Apart from the wipeout of their recent tour of Australia, England
has been cornered into an impossible situation with the Zimbabwe
debacle. Originally, this was a political decision about
whether England should play a match in a country whose leader
used economic power to starve his own people. Now, it
has become a security issue. Just yesterday, the English
team was debriefed by administrators, lawyers, advisors and
security experts for half a day on mundane matters such as how
to jump out of helicopters or disarm lunatics with knives.
If England bails out at this point, they face the loss of the
first round points as well as a heavy monetary fine.
The third team of interest here is Canada, the
home of many Central Park Track Club teammates. In this
tournament of fourteen nations, Canada is ranked number fourteen.
With due respect, Canada is not a cricket country. This
sport is played on natural grass, with a pitch that has to be
meticulously prepared by professional groundskeepers.
In most of Canada, cricket cannot be properly played most of
the year. This Canadian team exists through the many Asians
and West Indians who immigrate there, plus an Australian Cricket
Academy graduate who discovered that he was born while his parents
were traveling in Canada. You can read more about the
Canadian underdogs.
In a single one-day match, one might get lucky. In a tournament
that runs for a month and a half, luck does not run that far.
WEEK OF FEBRUARY
4, 2003 - FEBRUARY 10, 2003
- EVEN MORE FAR EAST MEMORIES [2/10/2003]
From Charles Allard Jr: "Wait a minute! Hong Kong
is also the city of my youth, too. The first school I went to
was in Hong Kong. My parents lived in Hong Kong longer than
any other city of their adult life. My youngest brother took his
entire secondary education in the city. Enough of the bona fides.
I did enjoy much of your report on Hong Kong. But, you have not
given the British a fair shake. Yes, the island was seized in
the Opium War, but one must also balance that with the 99 years
of exemplary rule that gave haven to Han Chinese fleeing war and
destruction, Jews from Shanghai, Mongolians, Uiguihers, other
various elements of humanity in Asia and gave them the opportunity
to enjoy human rights and freedoms not enjoyed any where else
in Asia (with the possible exception of neglected Macao) until
well into the 20th century. Wasn't perfect but a lot better than
living in China proper. But we won't discuss history.
I did enjoy the report, but The Star Ferry! How could you forget
to mention the Star Ferry? The greatest ride in the world for
a few pennies. And the food! Certainly like any good Chinese you
spent an enormous amount of time eating. Alas reading your
report also reminded me that much of Hong Kong of my youth has
vanished. The dives of Wanchai are now fancy apartments and offices,
the water front has been changed vastly, Repulse Bay is no longer
a sleepy back water and the airport is now on a separate island
miles away."
Why not talk history and politics? The political history
of the British rule in Hong Kong was marked by a series of events
in which the government showed the ability to adapt to new situations.
These events were all triggered by seemingly innocuous incidents.
Instead of sending in the shock troops for suppression, the government
analyzed situation and dealt with the underlying root causes.
Case #1: October 1 is the national day for the People's
Republic of China (usually referred to as Mainland China) and
October 10 is the national day for the Republic of China (usually
referred to as Taiwan). Loyalty to either nation used to
be demonstrated by displaying the national flags on the respective
national days. Once upon a time, a flag-ripping incident
caused a major riot by the followers of Taiwan against the followers
of Mainland China. The problem was not just suppressing
that one riot but to insure that Hong Kong would not become the
battleground between the partisans. Ergo, the politcal agitators
were 'discouraged' from further action.
Case #2: Once upon a time, the famous Star Ferry
announced that it would increased its fare from one cent to two
cents (or something like that) and a major riot erupted.
Again, the problem was not just suppressing that one riot but
to realize that it was a protest against the general economic
conditions. Thereafter, the government embarked on a series
of ambitious social welfare projects.
Case #3: Corruption had been a major problem to the
point where the government set up an independent commission against
corruption. Immediately, a major riot occurred in which
policemen sacked the building in which the commission was housed
and destroyed files. This must surely be one of the
most bizarre episodes in the history of law enforcement worldwide.
Again, the problem was not just that one incident. The government
stayed its course and the public system is probably one of the
cleanest in the world (note: you can't tip anyone unless they
are in the service industry because 'greasing the palm' is illegal;
also owning 'unexplained wealth or means beyond your known salary'
is sufficient evidence for corruption).
- ARMORY TRIVIA QUIZ [2/10/2003]
Submitted by Stacy Creamer:
Question: If you're running the 200 in a 500-400-300-200-100 relay,
which teammate would be more likely to inflict bodily harm?
(A) Craig Plummer, finishing a 300m, powering down his
final straightaway, baton in hand
(B) Yves-Marc Courtines, waiting to take the baton from
you to run his 100-meter anchor leg.
Answer: (B) The gallant Yves-Marc who not only didn't give himself
a running start but who actually took two steps toward me just
before I reached him so that I "wouldn't have to run any
farther." As a result of his chivalry (and my failure to
take stock of the situation and slow down) I have what may be
one of the first cases of severe road rash in track and field--or
at least Armory--history.
- THOMSON VALENTINE'S TWOSOME WRAP-UP
[2/9/2003] In the words of our Canadian weatherman, this
was perfect weather — "invigorating, but not cold (in
the Canadian sense)." To be more precise, it was 23
degrees fahrenheit out there, with no wind. In the two-mile
race, Toby Tanser won the race and also won the coed division
with partner Amy Fredericks. The Calderwood-Calderwood
team was third overall, and 1st in their combined age group division.
In the 10K race, Ramon Bermo was 7th overall and also third
in the coed division with partner Catherine Roberto.
David Howard was 6th overall and 13th in the coed division
with Michelle Santomassino. The Borok-Quinones
team was 18th coed. Somehow, we think that this race is
not the same without the participation of the Ruben-Bakoulis
duo ...
- A FAR EAST STORY [2/8/2003]
From Paul Bendich: "To supplement what you said in
your Far East Report, here's a fine piece of Orientalist reportage
from my old schoolchum Coco Downey. She's a math
and Russian major who's doing a term in Beijing (try and guess
her future career!). Please note that her reliability as
narrator, while less than watertight, certainly makes it over
this website's threshold. Also, she includes a quasi-food
review, so that's most definitely relevant . . .
The Man has decided to shut down our access
to all American news starting last week. Woo-hoo! So if
you guys have a war or anything, and you think of it, let me
know.
China is treating me fine. She's like a mother,
and I'm like a babe nursing at her teat.
I haven't gotten sick yet (I drank too much
and threw up, but no food poisoning or anything of that sort).
I'm loving all the Chinese food. The almost-constant fireworks
(ILLEGAL!!), explosions. i I was eating lunch at a restaurant
that we students (and our professors) affectionately have renamed
"Sketchy" (in Chinese, the literal translation is
"Not 3, Not 4" and this place is certainly neither
3 nor 4)-- anyway, I was eating lunch, and a woman wearing only
underwear ran in to the restaurant. Then, all of the cooks
ran out. Then they all ran back in, with the woman. Then
they all ran out. then all of the other customers left.
No one said anything to us. so we left. It turns out the
building was on fire. Gotta love China. They let the foreigners
burn.
- LOST SPIKES [2/7/2003] A
pair of Nike Zoom Waffle Spikes (size 10.5) were left at the armory
last Thursday night, Jan 30th, after the NYRRC meet. Nothing has
turned up after 2 searches in the Armory lost and found.
If anyone happened to pick up the spikes please contact Marty
Levine @ 212 692-2873 or (917) 648-9385. He would greatly
appreciate their return.
-
THURSDAY ROAD WORKOUT REPORT
[2/7/2003] It was unseasonably warm relative to the first
few weeks of January, enough to attract 36 people to show up.
Alas, good times were not to last with snow in the weather forecast.
The substitute coach was Stuart Calderwood, which means
that the workout will include a couple of passes over the Stuart
Mile. Our regular coach Tony Ruiz was reportedly
up at the Armory, preparing for the Millrose Games relay tomorrow.
It is obviously too late to sharpen speed on the night before
the race, but baton-passing practice is perhaps even more important.
For anyone who has been away for a length of time, the first
words that he/she will receive upon returning are undoubtedly,
"Oh, you missed all the gossipy items." Maybe
... maybe not ... maybe ... maybe not ... There are some
things that we know missed for sure, such as the track debut
of Audrey Kingsley. Someday, we may see her in
a track race again, but that would not be a debut, would it?
And then there are some other things that we don't know about,
but so be it.
Somewhere along the reservoir (and don't ask why we were on
the reservoir when the workout route does not include it!),
we encountered Ramon Bermo who was coaching one of his
many teams. Here is how he fine-tunes his athletes: "...
hey ... you are nearly at the end of the pick-up ... relax a
little ... eh ... I don't mean relaxing that much! ..."
Señor Bermo promises to visit the orange people if and
when he is free.
The Central Park Track Club is a collection of runners of different
abilities, such that the workouts are divided into groups which
run at different pace. On the track, people can still
observe everything (with the exception of one runner who does
not seem to be able to see the soccer balls coming at her!).
On the road, the groups barely see each other except for once
or twice in passing. Therefore, the workout reports (to
the extent that they actually talk about the workouts themselves)
tend to skew towards the particular group in which the workout
reporter was running with. But our teammates are always
helpful in providing reports from the other groups. Of
course, that is premised upon the veracity of their 'stories.'
Case in point: the alpha males in tonight's workout.
The known facts are the following: At
East 72nd Street (1.3 miles into the workout), the alpha and
beta males were running together in a pack of one dozen people.
At West 86th Street (4 miles into the workout), Kevin Arlyck
and Stuart Calderwood were leading the alphas, Alan
Ruben was about 20 meters behind and Josh Feldman
was trailing with his tongue sticking out in his first workout
since last spring. These are observed facts and not
subject to dispute.
After the workout, the following was offered:
SC: "Alan Ruben was so slow tonight that we had
to jog in place to wait for him to catch up to us ..."
AR: "... and you can write on the website ... BUT THIS
WILL NEVER EVER HAPPEN AGAIN ..."
We can readily accept this corroborated version of the workout,
except an alternate version was immediately offered by the
same two people:
SC: "Alan Ruben is not a big man, but his footsteps
are exceptionally loud and his cadence is exceptionally high.
Why would anyone wear wooden clogs to run a workout?"
AR: "This is to let you know that I am right behind you
and that there are still a few more downhills left in the
workout ..."
Of course, the workout reporter takes comfort
at the thought that he will just chuckle and then disregard
the inevitable complaint note "... but we did not say those
things ..." Never for a moment should our readers
believe that news is for information it's all about entertainment.
- MILLROSE
GAMES PROGRAM GUIDE [2/7/2003] Friday, February
7, 2003
EVENT 1 - MASTERS WOMEN'S 4x400m RELAY - 5:20pm
A Bohemia Track Club Bohemia, NY
B Central Park Track Club - A New York, NY
C Central Park Track Club - B New York, NY
D Genesee Valley Harriers Rochester, NY
E Shore Athletic Club Spring Lake, NJ
F Syracuse Chargers Track Club Syracuse, NY
CPTC A
Sue Krogstad-Hill
Mary V. Rosado
Sylvie Kimché
Kellie Quinones
CPTC B
Stacy Creamer
Yumi Ogita
Mary Diver
Alayne Adams
Alternate: Mindy Solkin
EVENT 2 - MASTERS MEN'S 4x400m RELAY - 5:30pm
A A.U.R.A.- A Bronx, NY
B A.U.R.A.- B Bronx, NY
C Central Park Track Club New York, NY
D Shore Athletic Club Neptune, NJ
E Sprint Force America - A New York, NY
F Sprint Force America - B New York, NY
Central Park Track Club
Alston Brown
Tony Ruiz
Alan Bautista
Craig Plummer
- THE
ARMORY COLLEGIATE INVITATIONAL [2/7/2003]
The Central Park Track Club is sending a women's DMR team as well
as a men's DMR team to the Armory Collegiate Invitational on Friday,
February 14. 8:00pm for the women and 8:50pm for the men.
We are hoping lots of CPTC runners will cheer us on as both teams
try to qualify for Nationals. Remember how great our
women looked at last year's Nationals!? $10 tickets
are available at the Armory website. At a minimum, you should
be able to watch the race on the Armory webcam.
- MORE FAR EAST MEMORIES [2/7/2003]
Bethany Aquilina: "Reading your recent comments about
Hong Kong (note: see the start of this week's journal further
down this page) brought back a lot of memories! I lived on Hong
Kong Island, in midlevels at the edge of Central and Sheung Wan,
and I worked at City University in Kowloon Tong. Although I do
not miss the humidity, this New York winter has me missing the
Hong Kong heat!
I had the to opportunity to do a lot of training
and racing in HK, and was a member of the Hong Kong Ladies'
Road Runners Club. Most of my training runs took place up on
Victoria's peak, and sometimes on Bowen Road. On weekends, we
would run on trails in the New Territories. I ran three half-marathons
in HK, the Macau marathon, and the Hong Kong marathon. I will
never forget the Macau race, because they ran out of water on
the course at about mile 20!! Although the race took place in
the beginning of December, it was a very hot and humid day,
so a lot of people came across the finish line extremely dehydrated!"
Andrea Ostrowski: "I have been to Hong Kong and
I have eaten at the Jumbo Floating Restaurant. I can say
that your assertion that there is no bad food in Hong Kong is
false, because the food at that tourist trap was really BAD!"
- RUN-UP WRAP-UP #2 [2/7/2003]
At the Thursday road workout, the substitute coach Stuart Calderwood
praised Toby Tanser for his third-place place finish
at the Empire State Building Run-Up. This was most impressive
because it was Toby's debut in this race. We understand
that it will be a finale as well. As a piece of trivia (which
Toby may not even remember himself), he was scheduled to do a
World Trade Center run-up race in 2000. But four days before
that race, he made the mistake of making a debut in the Backwards
Mile, after which he was unable to walk up stairs for
days.
- TRIVIA SOCCER QUIZ [2/7/2003]
From Noah Perlis: "What is the name of the club member
who was a professional soccer player for 5 years
and also still plays semi-pro?"
No prizes will be awarded and the answer will not be provided
here — you are supposed to work for it, eh?
Hints: (1) Torrance, California; (2) Hartford University; (3)
Switzerland; (4) New York Magic; (5) New York Power; (6) Thursday
Night At The Races (1/16/2003). Shame on you if you can't
figure it out with so many hints!
- BELATED TUESDAY TRACK WORKOUT REPORT(S)
[2/6/2003] It's a truism that any recent college graduate
will be able to recognize as holy writ: "there is no
such thing as an objective report; any report will necessarily
depend on the place that the reporter holds in society."
(Here we quote from our dreadful Sociology 101 textbook, but you've
no doubt encounter similar sentiments elsewhere). And this
is certainly true when it comes to the Tuesday Night report.
Usually, we hold the position of "runner" within a particular
class (the 'C' group, if you've been keeping, er, track), itself
within the Distance Runner track community, and so our report
inevitably focuses on events that affect us in that position,
often to the exclusion of other things that may well have objectively
happened (very rarely do we report on world events, though they
certainly do happen during the Tuesday 8-10 slot). Furthermore,
since our information gathering happens while we are "running,"
the tone of the report is often breathless, scattered, wanting
of oxygen (even "insane," as some of the tabloid critics
will have it).
However, this Tuesday, our position changed. We were in
fact a Timekeeper, a position that demands a calm mien, a steady
hand, an all-seeing eye. This will no doubt be reflected
in the report (though I wouldn't bet the house on it). Now
why were we timekeeping? Because we have in fact changed
statuses entirely; we have been "re-textualized" as
a runner in the earlier Middle Distance workout. Thus, this
report will also include a previously marginalized (because under-reported,
thus non-extant) community, the Middle Distance runners.
For those unaware of this strange tribe, they undergo a most peculiar
form of workout ritual indeed. Pace Sid Howard, The
Jog is not kept alive here one bit; in fact, the Jog between intervals
is very much dead, they (perhaps it is 'we' by now) stand and
do nothing until the next interval. Well, that's not true:
in fact, we usually spend these breaks saying "too fast"
between breaths (see Frank Handelman, our good self, and
many others), then running the next one faster. And rather
than running 3x200 to warmup, everyone does these odd "strides"
down the middle of the infield, at a very fast pace indeed.
Stuart Calderwood, it seems, has his own method of preparation
for the workout: he runs up the Empire State Building (using
the stairs, we hope and trust).
After this workout, our former tribe, the road people, begins
filing in, with their now (to-us) foreign cultural rituals.
For example, rather than gathering in the infield, they seem to
circle up by the bleacher to hear their chieftain Tony Ruiz
recount the weekend's conquests (mighty they were: Glenn
Carnes ran a 2:11 in the 800 (not a PR, but one since high
school), Zebulon Nelessen ran a 2:12 in the same
race, Margaret Angell won the Al Gordon 15K, after promising
to run slow, and Fred Trilli PR'ed in the same race.)
There seemed to be 34 of them (no longer counting ourself, of
course, as we have defected) beginning to do their thing around
8:13. The distance workout was probably hard, but of course
we can't say for sure, for we certainly weren't out of breath.
What we mainly did, rather than run (which is a silly endeavor
when you come to think of it, so late at night, come now), was
scream out numbers at the top of our lungs. This may well
be what we will do for the rest of our career. We also,
given our non-running status, had time to reflect on the following:
Regina Jacobs set a record last week, as we all hopefully
know. She was also, the week before that, running at the
Armory at the same time as our team. Is the connection as
obvious as it seems??
- RACE SCHEDULE [2/4/2003]
The New York Road Runners Club has made changes to the scoring
race schedule. The new schedule has been posted on our home
page. There are 12 points races for men and women.
The final score will be based on our best 10 races.
- ONE DOWN, ONE TO GO [2/5/2003]
United States Olympic Committee president Marty Mankamyer
resigned last night, four days before the USOC's executive committee
was to consider a no-confidence vote against her. The non-binding
vote reflected the deep divisions within the organization between
supporters of Mankamyer's and allies of USOC chief executive Lloyd
Ward. The final straw, however, was no points
for guessing this one charges of ethical violations.
The Denver Post reported this week that Mankamyer, a real
estate agent, had demanded, and received, a $10,000 referral fee
from Ward's real estate agent, Brigitte
Ruskin. While the payment was legal, the fact that Mankamyer
had played no role in Ward's housing search supports Ruskin's
description of the payment as unethical.
Mankamyer made no mention of the ethics charge in her resignation
letter, although she claimed in an interview that the payment
was suggested by Ward. Ward, who has been under his own
ethical cloud for several months, had no comment. In her
letter, Mankamyer said she was resigning to "make a positive
difference" in the USOC. If Ward wants to make a similar
"positive difference," he should follow Mankamyer's
lead.
- YOU OUGHTA BE IN PICTURES [2/4/2003]
For all you aspiring movie stars, a feature film shooting in New
York is looking for a white male runner, late 20s - early 30s,
approx. 5'10" - 6' tall. This person would simply be running
in the park, but the director has requested that they use a real
runner as opposed to an actor running. This scene is scheduled
to shoot very early (sunup) Monday, February 10th. The runner
chosen will be compensated for the day's work. For more
information, contact Kristan Keck via email at kristankeck@yahoo.com
or at her production office, 212-941-7204.
- RUN UP WRAP UP [2/4/2003]
Paul Crake easily defended his title at this morning's
Empire State Building Run Up, winning by almost one and a half
minutes, but last year's top woman, Kristin Harbich, was
unable to repeat, finishing 11 seconds behind Cindy Moll.
More importantly, at least as far as we're concerned, was the
number of Central Park Track Club members racing through the stairwells
(eight, plus one in the Preliminary Run). Toby Tanser
took third overall, Chris Solarz won first in the 20-29
age group, and our lone female climber, Stacy Creamer,
was fourth female, first 40-49, and beat Olympic triathlete Jennifer
Gutierrez by 24 seconds.
- NEW MEMBERS [2/4/2003] The
following new members were accepted at the Executive Committee
meeting on February 3, 2003:
Stuart Alexander
Paul Carbonara
Recruitment points go to Stacy Creamer,
Devon Martin, Frank Schneiger and Roland Soong.
Check out the full recruitment scoreboard
for more info. This was not our most efficient month,
as it took two members to convince each recruit to join.
- THE EX-PAT IN THE FAR EAST [2/4/2003]
Stacy Creamer wrote: "Thanks for the great report
from Hong Kong. I love your photo essay. I
spent a weekend in Hong Kong back in '91 and always wished that
I'd been able to visit for longer. When I was there, I stayed
with a friend who lives on a boat in the harbor across from Jumbo,
the — I'm told — famous if touristy restaurant.
I also visited friends who lived in a posh area on Victoria's
Peak. They assured me that they had great views, but it
was so foggy the whole time we were there, I never got to see
them!"
The Jumbo
Floating Restaurant was famous for having been burned
down once before. You can re-live that experience vicariously
through the tv mini-series Noble
House. Although we have lived in Hong Kong for
decades, we have never even seen the floating restaurant.
But then we were not tourists.
According to information and belief, there is
another person on the Central Park Track Club who has had an
extended stay in Hong Kong. You will be very surprised
to learn that this is the young (23-year-old) Bethany Aquilina.
Her interesting experiences are published in The Daily Princetonian:
In
Hong Kong, an alumna's interactions with her students changed
her perspective on the attacks (12/04/2001)
East
meets West: Spending a year in Hong Kong (12/06/2001)
Journey
matters most in education (2/07/2002)
Americans are called 'ugly Americans' because
they are superficial, crass, materialistic, arrogant, overbearing,
think Canada is a state in the USA, believe that the United
Kingdom is somewhere in the Middle East and are otherwise indifferent
to other people's aspirations and sufferings. A
long stay outside the country would be a good antidote.
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