WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 30 - OCTOBER 6, 2003

• Staten Island Half [10/06/2003]  The Staten Island Half Marathon (Sunday 10/12) is a scoring race for men and women.  Due to various marathon committments, a number of the usual suspects on the men's side will be absent, and we are looking for a few good men to step up.  The SI Half is a fairly flat course, usually in good running weather — a good set-up for the NYC Marathon, and just a good race for anyone else.  Plus, the view of New York harbor from the ferry is incomparable.
  
  Please note that the NYRR has changed the race course so that both the start and finish are near the ferry dock, making it much easier to get home than before.  Please let Kevin Arlyck know if you are planning on running.

• Cross Country Trip [10/06/2003]  Remember a few weeks back we wrote about the first cross-country automobile trip?  Well, tonight at 9:00 on Channel 13, there is a Ken Burns documentary about that trip called Horatio's Drive:  America's First Road Trip.  If, for some completely inexplicable reason, you are not watching Pedro Martinez and Barry Zito battle it out in game 5 of the AL Division Series, you might want to check it out.  Of course, programs on PBS tend to be rerun on occasion.  A playoff series as dramatic and crazy as this one may not come around again for a while.

• Chi Running [10/06/2003]  We have been invited to a Chi Running workshop on October 18.  According to their website, ChiRunning "combines the inner focus and flow of T’ai Chi with the power and energy of running to create a revolutionary running form and philosophy that takes the pounding, pain, and potential damage out of the sport of running while addressing the needs of the whole person; knees and ligaments, body and soul."  If you are interested, please contact Alan Ruben or Jeff Klein (VP at ChiRunning).

• Rock 'n' Roll Part 2 [10/06/2003]  We've had no takers yet for the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon registration, but now John Prather has added a few perks.  He writes:  "Assuming I'm still here, I can sweeten this offer with free floorspace and a ride from the airport.  I'm 30 minutes from the start and 15 from the finish.  I have a pool and we live right next to a big park (if I lived in Manhattan, my address would be something like "12").  Bear in mind, however, that Daniel Miles Prather will be 21 months old at that time, and we do have a cat, in case you're allergic to either one.  On the plus side (?), my wife is from Valley Stream so she's skilled at good ol' fashioned New York yammering."
  

• Norway Run [10/06/2003]  The NYRR has yet to post results for the Norway Run 5K, which was designated a "fun run" this year — unfortunately so, because a new route made this the first year in living memory that the course wasn't long by about a tenth of a mile.  (See Craig Chilton's 2nd-place "16:40" in a tough field last year, when he was clearly in 16:10 shape, and replay, if you were an ear-witness as we were two years ago, the winning woman's under-her-breath remark — "Long course" — as she crossed the line in the high 17's after running the Broadway-to-Broadway 5K a few weeks before in the high 16's.)
  
  In keeping with this theme, our own Alexandra Horowitz entered this race mainly because the short course of last week's Wall Street "5K" had robbed her of her first sub-18-minute clocking.  (She was well under that pace when the finish line appeared 400 feet early.)  But while she stood at the starting line yesterday, she heard an announcement that drew slightly more attention than the usual encouragements, well-wishings, and enjoinders to stay in the rec lane:  the male and female winners — of the Fun Run! — would be rewarded with round-trips for two to Norway and back!
  
  Thus, Alex's concentration may have been a bit stronger as she went up Cat Hill in second place, and her excitement a bit greater as she took the lead near the mile mark.  But we feel confident that her pursuit of a sub-18:00 clocking would have been sufficient motivation; as it happens, she broke that barrier with two seconds to spare, notched her first-ever road race victory, and won the trip to the Land of the Fjords and Nine-Time NYC Marathon Winners.  Indeed, Alex was presented with her award by Ms. Waitz herself.  (We'd like to take this moment to remind Alex about all the wonderful things we've written about her on this site, and about those really embarassing race photos that we've graciously refrained from publishing.)
  
  The lesson?  "Persistence is rewarded" seems too generic to follow the ups and downs, longs and shorts of this particular pursuit of excellence; and "if you run enough NYRR races, you'll eventually find an accurate course" is probably too specific.  Somewhere between them, like the 5K found at long last between the 3.05-milers and the 3.3-milers, is the hidden lesson that scoops up unsuspecting runners and deposits them in Norway.

• The Lost Weekend [10/05/2003]  Another one of those weekends where we're home just long enough to make it to our bed before we fall asleep.  We did try to update the website, but all that happened was that we fell asleep on the keyboard instead.  Just one more thing we're atoning for right now.  This won't happen next weekend, since we'll be away from Friday afternoon to late Monday night, and we're putting the likelihood that we'll even have e-mail access (let alone the ability to update this site) at about 3%.  If anyone wants to fill in for us for those four days we (and your teammates) would greatly appreciate it.

• Thursday Night Road Workout Report [10/03/2003]  Fire Chief John says that the weather in October is a good indicator of what the winter will be like.  If that's true, we're not looking forward to the next few months, since so far October has been pretty chilly.  Good running weather, but not so good standing-around-waiting-to-run weather.  Jerome O'Shaugnessy disagreed, and showed up in his usual singlet and shorts.  Shula Sarner suggested that the upcoming winter might be harsh enough that Jerome will have to wear a long sleeve shirt before Christmas, but he just laughed at that.  Alan Ruben probably won't put on a long sleeve shirt until hell itself freezes over (which may still happen this month, depending on how the Cubs and the Red Sox do), but he wasn't at the workout so that's not really relevant.  There were one or two other people in singlets, but most of the rest of the 45 runners who showed up looked like they didn't want to stand around very long, so we had another quick start, and were off and running at 7:08.  The workout was two of the small lower loops (72nd Street and below) followed by an upper 5-mile loop, for a total of 8.3 miles, 6 of which were done as pickups.  Except for the middle distance runners, who all turned around and went home after about 4 miles.  We don't know if this was planned or just a coincidence.
  
  We don't remember anything else interesting from the workout, but that might have something to do with the fact that we went out with the New York Harriers afterward for their "First Thursday of the Month" dinner.  Our friend Jen S. (the initial is to distinguish her from the other 18 Jennifers we know and may mention in here while still preserving some of her anonymity) accused us of being a "running team slut" who will go to any party for any running team.  This is completely untrue.  We just have friends who invite us to their parties, and it happens that most of our friends these days are on running teams, so we end up at a lot of running team parties.  Really, that's all there is to it.  And, just in case our loyal readers on some of those other teams are still unsure:  we go to your parties because we like hanging out with you, not because we're scamming on half the chicks on your team.
  
  Anyway, this dinner was at a Russian restaurant in the west 50s, so good beverages— like Russian vodka — and not so good beverages — like Russian beer — were flowing rather liberally.  And we were happily going with the flow.  And that may explain why we felt so unpleasant at work this morning.  It certainly didn't have anything to do with the workout, since we made up for all those times that we ran the workouts too fast by doing this one slower than planned.  But only because we didn't feel like running fast, not because we got no sleep Wednesday night after watching the Red Sox-A's game until 3:00 am or anything like that.

• Corrections [10/02/2003]  Jonathan Federman writes:  "1. I did the entire workout on Tuesday.  I may have been calling out split-times as we were running, but I was not so disoriented that I could not follow the workout.  2. You have a note on the front page to photos from the Philadelphia Distance Run, but there are no photos posted."  Okay, so we make stuff up sometimes.  As for the photos:  they were there, but there was no link to the page.  Interesting that it took four days for anyone to notice.

• Groupies [10/01/2003]  Well, it seems we do have a couple of groupies.  First, Red told us "I've been a CPTC groupie for years, and I've been reading the CPTC site everyday since you took over, so I guess that makes me a groupie for you, too."  Then the Webmistress wrote:  "I'll be your groupie, but I expect quid pro quo!  I think I have a few groupies.  At least, a few people give every indication of being groupies ... except no one has thrown a hotel key at me yet.  Too bad!"  No one's thrown a hotel key at us, either (although one woman threw a beer at us last week).  Not that we're that demanding; we'll settle for our groupies taking us out and getting us drunk.  Or are we supposed to be getting the groupies drunk?  We'll have to look into that.

• Rock 'n' Roll All Night and Run Every Day! [10/01/2003]  Thought that discount for the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon sounded good?  Well now we have a free entry to offer!  The organizers have offered the club one free registration (worth $85), good for either the marathon or the half-marathon, both of which take place on January 11, 2004, in Phoneix, Arizona.  Anyone interested should e-mail us.

• Tuesday Night Downtown Track Workout Report [10/01/2003]  Oh, it's getting cold!  And dark.  And, as usual, there's that nice stiff breeze off the river.  That last one is new, but as a result of the other two conditions, Coach Tony insists we'll be starting on time for the next few Tuesdays, and he'll be skipping most announcements.  Last night's only announcement was a recognition of Jonathan Federman's nice showing at the Dutchess County Classic Half-Marathon.  This was one of those rare occasisions where Jonathan ran a race that didn't involve climbing mountains, fording streams or following rainbows until he found the finish line.  It was such an odd experience that Jonathan was still too confused to run last night, so he served as the sole timer instead.
  
  And the workout.  The e-mail said 1x1000, 2x600, 2x400, 2x600, 1x1000, all with 400m recovery.  Well, that doesn't sound too hard.  But then Tony said "You know I would never give you guys that much rest!  I meant to write 200m recovery."  So, short recovery.  Fast intervals.  It's cold, let's go home and watch the Cubs.

• Milestone [9/30/2003]  Our self-appointed website historian wrote:  "Officially, we have reached the half-million mark on the visitor counter on our home page.  This is an astonishing figure that many commercial websites would have killed for.  Who are our visitors?  We do not collect registration information, so we only know that most of them are named Audrey Kingsley.  Quite apart from that, we don't know and we don't care.  All along, we have said that we built and maintained this website out of self-indulgence, and we would not have minded if we got only one visitor (and that would be us, the only person that counts).  Ah, but you do recognize that this piece of apparent indifference is available only to those who are in positions of strength.  When Bill Gates says he doesn't care about money, he sounds convincing or snotty but never hollow.  In any case, let us focus on the next big goal:  1,000,000!"
  
  [Editor's Note:  We have been affiliated with this site for more than 100,000 of the half-million visitors.  While the official policy remains that we don't care whether anyone reads this or not, unofficially we're not opposed to large numbers of people reading this page and liking it and telling us how great we are.  We also would not object to having some groupies.  Are there any web editors with groupies?  That's okay, we don't mind being the first.]

WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 23, 2003 - SEPTEMBER 29, 2003

• Mistakes Were Made [9/29/2003]  An article in today's New York Times asks whether blogs should be edited.  What a foolish question.  Anyone who's ever read a blog will tell you that most of these writers are crying out for a good editor.  Alas, the debate centers only on blogs written by reporters and hosted by newspapers.  Here, journalistic standards would seem to require that editors exercise at least a minimal amount of oversight, while any major editing would probably be unnecessary, since these are, after all, professional writers.  Still, it's always good to have someone read over your work, and we discovered again today, when our chief copy editor e-mailed us.  It seems that in yesterday's update on new world records we confused the names Tergat and Lagat (don't bother to look for it, since we've fixed the error).  Paul Tergat and Bernard Lagat are both Kenyan runners, have names that are slightly similar, and, like all humans, share about 99% of their DNA, but after that the similarities end.  Paul Tergat is the former 10K world record holder, current half-marathon world record holder and newly crowned marathon world record holder.  Bernard Lagat is a miler who appeared in ads for the Nike Spiridon where he said "Many people want to know why I am fast, but they can't figure it out."  And then they did figure it out when Lagat tested positive for EPO before this year's World Championships.  You can bet a lot of people at Nike were upset about that, although probably not as upset as all the runners who've lost races to Lagat in the last few years.  So, Tergat = good, Lagat = bad.  That should clear up any confusion we may have caused.

• Baseball Wrap Up [9/29/2003]  Twenty years ago, W.P. Kinsella wrote a short story called "The Last Pennant Before Armageddon," in which it is revealed that the world will end if the Cubs ever win the pennant again.  It's time to start flipping through The Book of Revlations to see what other signs we need to be wary of, since the Cubs won the National League Central, and could very will be NL Champs in a fortnight.  (The Cubs aren't the best team out there, but in a short series unexpected things can, and usually do, happen .).   And if the the fates are truly kind, they'll be facing the Boston Red Sox in the World Series, and the World Series will be played in the two remaming cathedrals of baseball.  (Yes, I know all you Yankee fans think of that stadium in the Bronx as some kind of classic, but it's a classic that was gutted and remodeled in the 1970s, which was the absolute low point in terms of stadium design.  It's one of the few stadiums left that makes Shea Stadium look good.)  On the other end of the spectrum, the Detroit Tigers ended the season with a record of 43-119, one loss fewer than the 1962 Mets.  We're not sure which is more pathetic, breaking the record for losses, or failing to break it.

• Winners [9/28/2003]  John Kerner racked up three road wins in the New York Times Running Club's Media Runs this summer, but only 'fessed up to them this weekend.

• New Records [9/28/2003]  Kenyan runner Sammy Korir ran as a pacer in today's Berlin Marathon.  While pacers normally drop out, or at least slow down towards the end, Korir did neither, and finished in 2:04:56.  This is 42 seconds better than Khalid Khannouchi's world record, and would have been the first sub-2:05 marathon in history, had his countryman Paul Tergat not finished one second ahead of him.  This is Tergat's third world record (he lost his 10k title to Haile Gebrselassie, but still holds the half-marathon record with his 59:17 finish in Milan in 1998), and — rather amazingly, given their dominance of the sport — makes him the first Kenyan to hold the world record.  And our older members have a new goal to shoot for, as Mexican Andres Espinosa set a new masters' record of 2:08:46.

• More Marathon [9/28/2003]  Ever wish you'd had the chance to run the NYC Marathon back when it was four loops of Central Park?  Really?  Okay, you're weird, but we've got the race for you!  It's the More Marathon, on March 21, 2004.  Just one catch:  since the race is sponsored More Magazine, the magazine for women over 40, it's only open to (1) women over 40, or (2) women under 40 running half the marathon as part of a team with a woman over 40.  The rest of you will just have to organize your own event.

• Member Website [9/27/2003]  We added Marty Levine's website to the home page, but then we remembered that a lot of readers never look at the home page, so we're mentioning it here.

• Wild Weekend [9/26/2003]  Actually, we expect our weekend won't be wild at all, just very busy with all the family stuff going on for the New Year.  And, of course, with the baseball season winding up with the NL Central still up for grabs.  Go Cubs!!!  Don't worry, we'll still find time to update the site.

• Race Distances [9/26/2003]  A member of the NYRRC Race Quality Committee wrote us:  "The problems with having races in the Financial District of Mahattan is that never ending street repairs and blockages cause the routes to be changed."  We do appreciate all the work these guys do, and all the problems they manage to deal with, but we're still going to complain every time they're not perfect.

• What's the Point? [9/26/2003]  Another mistake on our part.  We didn't mean to step on anyone's toes, but the Recruitment Points Monitor (aka Sarah Gross), send the following notice to Frank Handelman:  "You were misdirected when the Editor suggested that you consult with the Club Historian on being awarded points for past recruitment efforts.  As part of my oversight responsibilities (see bullet point 11 under Head Hunters Scoreboard), I regret to inform you that there are strict rules and conditions regarding eligibility for points.  The period in which you were eligible for points has expired and the filing of this complaint exceeds the statute of limitations."  Sorry, Frank, but this is out of our jurisdiction.

• Thursday Night Race Report [9/25/2003]  We skipped the workout tonight to do the Wall Street Run 5K.  We like it when Road Runners gets out of Central Park, but we wish they would bring their measuring equipment with them.  The 2000 Wall Street Run was about 5.3k.  The 2002 race was closer to 4.8k.  The Downtown Dash earlier this year was planned as 2.5M, then reported as 2.7, 2.6, and finally 2.66.  We didn't have high expectations for this race, and the organizers didn't disappoint.  The race was back on the West side this year, but the course was short again, probably by about one-tenth of a mile (as measured by Stuart Calderwood; we'll see if NYRRC provides a new measurement when the post the results tomorrow).  Too bad for us, since we might have had a PR on a full course.  (For this we skipped Bob Murphy Appreciation Night at Shea?)  Alexandra Horowitz definitely would have run a PR, but she'll have to settle for finishing 2nd overall.  And she gets an apology from us for our comments in Monday's journal.  She's right; comparing television executives to monkeys was unfair to the monkeys.

• A Strange Land, Indeed [9/25/2003]  The musical satirist Tom Lehrer once joked that "Political satire became obsolete when Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize."  Those who believe this are operating under a misconception of how the Nobel Committee works.  The Peace Prize is awarded "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between the nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."  The committtee has often been happy to reward specific actions that lead towards peace (in Kissinger's case, the peace accord with Vietnam) by people whose net contribution to peace is questionable.  Just look at early winner Theodore Roosevelt, who was honored for his role in ending the Russo-Japanese War, ignoring his nearly single-handed responsibility for starting the Spanish-American War.  (For those wondering about our policial views, we like Teddy a whole lot more than Henry.)
  
  No, satire still exists, despite the world's continual attempts to become so bizarre that all fiction will one day be seen as lacking the imagination of reality.  The lastest example:  An attempt by several parents of students at the Science Academy of South Texas (the 8th best high school in the U.S., according to Newsweek) to remove two books from the 10th Grade Pre-AP English class' reading list because they "may lead to inappropriate sexual arousal of young teens."  The books?  Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, and Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land.  Yes, Texas parents are worried that their 16-year-old children might be thinking about sex, and they've decided that science fiction is to blame!  (Brave New World actually ranks 52nd on the American Library Association's list of challenged books, but we suspect many of those challenges are based on the book's drug-related passages rather than it's sexual ones.)
  
  Thankfully, the School Board disagreed, and at a meeting Monday left the books in the curriculum.  (In a coincidence to make even the tritest Hollywood hack wince, this is all taking place in the middle of Banned Books Week.)  Not to trivialize the parents' concerns, but, since the other titles on the required reading list are J.R.R. Tolkein's The Return of the King and Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End, we think they should worry more about their children turning into total geeks than into sex fiends.  Okay, so maybe that is trivializing the parents' concerns.  We really don't care.  Teenagers think about sex, and they watch TV shows and movies that encourage those thoughts.  If we're lucky they turn off the TV once in a while and read a book.  And if the only way we can get kids to read more is to assign what one parent called "pornographic literature," we'd gladly add Erica Jong's Fear of Flying, D.H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterly's Lover, and even Pauline Réage's Story of O to every high school English class.  We'd even consider Harlequin Romances.
  
  Of course, one of the best ways to get people to read a book is to try to ban it.  If the students of South Texas end up with a greater appreciation for Huxley and Heinlein as a result of their parents' complaints, then the parents will have actually done their kids a favor.  If only they'd meant it.

• Shaver Point [9/25/2003]  It's true that Rick Shaver has run every NYC Marathon since 1977, but what counts is that, between us, he and I have run every five-borough marathon.  I ran the first two, in '76 and '77 (my last marathon of any stripe), and he has run all the rest.  So we share the club record.
  
  And I recruited Rick for the CPTC, whilst we stood looking at the results of the 1977 race as posted a few days later at the West Side Y, so I would like my recruitment points posted, please.

— Frank Handelman

[Editor's Note:  We're happy to give you the recruitment points, but you should probably talk to the Club Historian if you want it to be official.]

• A Man Among Women [9/24/2003]  For a few hours there, we had another road race winner, when Armando Oliviera was listed as the first female finisher at Sunday's Fred Lebox XC race.  Um, is there something we should know here?  Apparently not, as his gender was soon corrected, establishing him as the second male finisher.

• May the Farce Be With You [9/24/2003]  Polls in California suggest that Republicans Arnold Schwarzenegger and State Senator Tom McClintock may split their party's vote, handing the election to Lt. Governor Cruz Bustamante.  This has greatly perturbed Rep.Darrell Issa, the San Diego Republican who spent more than $1.7 million financing the recall effort, who now says he will urge a "no" vote on the recall if one of the GOPers doesn't drop out, in order to prevent the election of Mr. Bustamante, whom he called worse than current Governor Gray Davis.  And we thought tonight's debate would be the silliest thing happening in the recall election.  Of course, with 13 days left before the election, there's plenty of time for things to get much weirder.
  
  Our prediction:  The recall fails, but by fewer than 40,000 votes.  Since 40,000 is the number of votes the ACLU estimated might go uncounted because of outdated punch card ballots in six counties, this opens up the result to a host of lawsuits.  To make things even more fun, Bustamante's lead over Schwarzenegger in case the recall succeds will be equally slim, so that will end up in court, too.  We don't know what the courts will do, but they'll probably want the whole thing to go away as quickly as possible, which means accepting the outcome as is, without a recount.  (This may even be the correct legal result, although we don't claim any expertise in election law.)  Republicans then appeal to the Supreme Court, which shows uncommonly good sense and refuses to get involved.  Gray Davis remains as governor.  In six months, another Republican (or even Issa again) gets the brilliant idea to try another recall.  An angry mob carrying torches and pitchforks descends on his house and drags him into the street, where they tar and feather him.  Then, as added punishment they make him attend every Los Angeles Clippers game.

• Tuesday Night Downtown Track Workout Report [9/24/2003]  It was raining all morning, but the forecast said it would clear up by evening, and, lo and behold!, by late afternoon it was perfect running weather.  It wasn't exactly perfect running conditions, though, since there were a number of large puddles in the first lane.  Still, we had a nice turnout, possibly due to all the runners who planned to go ou to Two Boots afterward.  We got there a bit late and missed the announcements, catching only Coach Tony's description of the workout:  "It's a lot of running, but on the plus side it's also very little recovery."  Or, to put in in numerical format, 1x1600m, 2x1200m, 1x1600m, all at 5k pace with 400m recovery after each interval.  We passed on the workout, and instead timed the D group.  Tony took the A's, and the B's and C's timed themselves.  Timing doesn't provide much opportunity for chatting, but there was plenty of that to do at Two Boots after the workout.  Fifteen people headed over to Avenue A for dinner, including Frank Handelman, who refused to eat any pizza involving anchovies, and Harry Lichtenstein, who set a Two Boots record for most complicated order.  We took a bunch of photos, but our camera is cheap, and doesn't work well indoors, so none of them came out well enough to post here.

• Eloping [9/23/2003]  Rumors are swirling in the tabloids that Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez may have secretly gotten married.  This is causing a major headache with our divorce pool.  Do we count from the day of the wedding or from the day they admit it publicly?

• Records [9/23/2003]  Updates to the Philadelphia Distance Run include four new PR designations, and results for Rick Shaver.  On a not-so-related note, Rick has run every New York City Marathon since 1977.  (Thanks to Frank Handelman for bringing that to our attention.)

WEEK OF SPETEMBER 16, 2003 - SEPTEMBER 22, 2003

• Two Boots! [9/22/2003]  Remember, dinner at Two Boots at 37 Avenue A (between East 2nd and East 3rd) after Tuesday's Downtown Track Workout.

• Every Second Counts [9/22/2003]  Regarding George Robertson's team's 4th place finish in the Balance Bar 24-Hour Adventure Race, Yves-Marc Cortines observed:  "Notice they held off another team by 1 minute 40 seconds.  That would be like winning a 5k by 1.19 seconds.  Pretty tough to do over the course of 21 hours."

• Monkey Business [9/22/2003]  From Sunday's New York Times:

  Researchers at Emory University reported last week that capuchin monkeys have a sense of justice, at least as applied to themselves.  They trained monkeys to trade pebbles for food.  If a monkey saw a researcher giving her neighbor a grape in return for a pebble, but she herself received only a slice of cucumber, she would signal her displeasure by slamming down the pebble instead of handing it over, or refusing to eat the cucumber.

  Today it's just pebbles for food, but we have a feeling that within a few years monkeys will have achieved a complete understanding of finance and economics, and will begin taking over various large corporations (the networks' new fall lineups suggest that monkeys may already control most media companies).  Then, in league with the apes, they will establish domination over the entire world, driving humanity into the jungles and forests, keeping only a few humans around as pets or slaves on giant banana plantations.  On the plus side, the damned dirty apes will probably destroy a lot of computers when they stage their coup, which will save us from the killer robots.
  
  We may yet pevent this bleak future if we can keep the simians happy.  The first step would probably be to stop Universal Pictures' current attempt to remake King Kong yet again.  Have they learned nothing from the worthless 1976 remake and its forgettable 1986 sequel, King Kong Lives?  And the various Japanese copies, such as King Kong vs. Godzilla?  And basically every other Hollywood remake of the last 30 years?  You maniacs!!!  God damn you all to hell!!!

• Tuesday Night Uptown Workout Reports [9/21/2003]  The Uptown Workout Reporter has been unable to attend most recent workouts, but he will be resuming his updates soon.  In the meantime, he offers the following report for the last five weeks:  "Some came, they ran intervals, they left."

• Rock 'n' Roll Marathon [9/21/2003]  The organizers of the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon and Half-Marathon on January 11 in Phoeniz, AZ, are offering a special $5 discount on registration.  To get the discount, simply enter the coupon code "runningclub" while registering online.

• Around the World Update #7 [9/20/2003]  Dear all,
  
  We are right now in a Cybercafe in Lima airport, Capital of Peru.  We will be taking the plane to Paris in less than two hours.  The last days have been less hectic than in the last weeks; we deserved a rest.
  
  Ballestas Islands
  We first visited the Ballestas Islands, nest of thousands of sea lions and birds.  The sea lions came and played with the boat, jumping in the sea, shouting, fighting against each other.  A word from Olivier:  the sea lion's fate sounds pretty good when you are a male, as male sea lions often have 6 to 8 females.  However, the sea lions´ father, jealous of potential competition, systematically kills the baby males, so being a human male may not so bad, after all...
  
  Nazca
  The Nazca lines are huge drawings made in the desert by the Nazca civilization (and a couple of other groups).  They can only be seen from the air, so we took a 3-passenger plane for a 30-minute flight.  Nobody knows how these lines were made, let alone why.  Some say it was a calendar, others say they were used to communicate with the gods, and for others the lines were made by some kind of extraterrestral ships.  Some drawings are over 100-meters long.  Most of those we saw from the plane represent animals and humans, but there are hundreds of them, of all kind of shapes.  Some were discovered too late (a few were cut by the Panamerican highway).
  
  Huacachina
  Huacachina is a small oasis lost in the desert.  It used to attract thousands of people for its special water, supposed to heal all kinds of illnesses.  Currently, it is only visited by backpackers wanting to rest on their way to Lima, or sandboarders of all levels.  Not disgusted by his surf experience in Brazil, Olivier tried to sandboard some huge dunes.  With no notion of turns or slow down, he came back at the hotel with kilos of sands in his shoes, pockets and hair, but nothing broken.  Conclusion:  sandboard is easier than regular surf but harder than snowboard.  Also, it is the least fun of all:  15 minutes to climb the dunes under a cooking sun for one minute of surf, the ratio is the worst of the three sports.
  
  Lima
  Peru is a vast country (twice as big as France) with a very rich history.  Everybody has heard of the Incas, because, among other things, they were the reigning group when the Spanish arrived on the American Continent.  However, they have been dozens of different civilizations before that, the Nazcas, Moches, Chimus, etc., and some archeological museums in Lima display fantastic pieces of arts and architecture of these groups.  Also, Lima's main colonial places were restored and some buildings are resplendiscent.
  
  This is a country that deserves much more time than five weeks (two weeks six years ago and three weeks this time).  For example, we chose to emphasize on trekking and did not put a foot in the North of the country, nicknamed the Egypt of South America, filled with architecture masterpieces Incas and Pre-Incas.
  
  We will be sending our next e-mail from Indonesia in a month.
  
  Take care,

  — Anne Lavandon & Olivier Baillet

• Thursday Night Road Workout Report [9/19/2003]  There's no sound system at the statute, which is too bad, because we really should have started the workout to The Scorpions' Rock You Like a Hurricane.  Lacking that, everyone stood around and talked about the weather, but nobody did anything about it.  Not that there was anything to be done, since there wasn't much evidence of any hurricane nearby (not surprising, as Isabel was still over 200 miles south of the Mason-Dixon).  Well, there was some heavy wind, but not enough to keep 35 runners from showing up.  Not exacty at 7:00, of course, but they were there by the time the workout started at about 7:08 (plus Prez. Alan Ruben who showed up about two minutes later, but still caught up with everyone).
  
  Brief annoucements this time.  First, another apology from Coach Tony to Victor Osayi regarding the moose (see Tuesday's workout report).  Then, recognition of new dad Craig Chilton (when Craig commented that "'Elizabeth has mostly been sleeping through the night, but I don't think that will last," Alayne Adams responded, "Don't worry, running on no sleep is good training for Reach the Beach.")  And lastly, a warning to be careful while running, and to try to finish before the weather turned bad (hence the quick start).  As it happened things were fine, if windy, until we had about one mile to go when it rained briefly, then stopped.
  
  So, the workout, itself.  Very similar to last week – two counterclockwise four-mile loops.  This time the first one was at marathon pace, and the second at half-marathon pace.  Alayne tried to run off with the C group, but was dragged back by Margaret Angell, which was good for us, since Alayne can usually keep within about three-tenths of a second of the assigned pace.  She may not have factored in the wind this time, since we were a few seconds slower than marathon pace on the first lap.  The B group not running too fast?  This can't last!  And it didn't, as the second lap was a little too fast.  We can't blame Alayne for that one, since, going through the 102nd street tranverse she told us she was skipping the end of the workout and going home.  Of course, 30 seconds after we got back to the statue, she completed the 8 miles, said "I wanted to drop out because I was so dehydrated, but I've never failed to finish a workout," and turned around to run 2 miles back home.  And that's why she's so fast.
  
  For those of you disappointed about the lack of a hurricane, we suggest two substitutes:

1. Mix 1 oz. light run, 1 oz. dark rum, 1/2 oz. passion fruit juice and 1/2 oz. lime juice.  Stir.  Pour into a cocktail glass.  Drink. 

2. Find a good World War II themed video game (we recommend Battlefield: 1942) that allows you to pilot a Hawker Hurricane, a valuable part of the RAF's arsenal.  Shoot down lots of ME 109s and Ju-88s.  Quote Churchill.

We'd go for the video game, since we usually stick to real drinks.

• Sports Losses [9/18/2003]  A bad week for sports:  the WUSA (women's soccer league) was shut down, Saturn has dropped sponsorship of their cycling team, and the Pittsburgh Marathon may lose its sponsor.  That's a league featuring the best players in the world's most popular sport, the top cycling team in the U.S., and, well, a nice race that did manage to attract some high-level racers among its 2000 finishers.  The WUSA has been caught in a tough Catch-22.  To survive they need to become more popular and bring in more revenue from their TV broadcasts (having fans show up in person helps too), which was difficult since their broadcasts were stuck on low-profile networks like PAX.  Unfortunately, they couldn't get the games shown on better channels or in better time slots until they could establish more popularity.  Yes, even though the 1999 Women's World Cup drew incredible ratings and had 80,000 fans at the final game, even though Americans either stayed up all night or got up before dawn to watch the Men's World Cup last year, and even though Bend It Like Beckham has been seen by several million people in the U.S., the consensus among network executives is still that soccer can't succeed here.  Of course, these are the same people who gave us the XFL and Whoopi!, so we're not suprised.  Still, the WUSA's losses decreased each year, so some new corporate backers may be willing to step in with the expectation that the league may start to break even or maybe even show a profit within a few years.  And we're pretty sure someone will step in to fund the Saturn team.  And Pittsburgh?  They're probably in trouble.

• Lost Glasses [9/17/2003]  Sarah Gross left a pair of glasses in a blue case at the East 6th Street Track on Tuesday, September 16th.  If anyone picked them up, please contact her at sgross@marakon.com.

• Two Boots! [9/17/2003]  Next week, after the track workout, we're having dinner at Two Boots (Ave. A between E. 2nd and E. 3rd).  For those who've never been to one of our team trips there, the two boots are Italy and Louisiana, so the resturant serves Italian and Cajun food, including lots of interesting pizzas.  They also serve drinks in boot-shaped glasses.  Be there or be hungry!

• Tuesday Night Downtown Track Workout Report [9/17/2003]  So we were all standing around in the rain last year at the start of Reach the Beach waiting for the runners to finish their first leg.  That's the leg where you run straight up a ski trail in Bretton Woods, turn around, and run straight down the twisting service road, for the hardest 5k you'll ever see.  The Bucknell guy from the winning team came tearing down the mountain, and then Noah Lansner with Ali Rosenthal 30 seconds behind him.  But Victor Osayi was nowhere to be seen.  We're all getting into our vans to race over to the next transition area, and Coach Tony is yelling "Where's Victor? Did he get eaten by a moose?"  All through the race, and most of the next month, and quite a bit of the next year, Tony never let up on Victor and the moose.
  
  A year later, and it's the Tuesday night workout, and again Tony's shouting "Where's Victor?"  But this time Victor's right there, and he gets up on the bleachers and Tony gives a little speech:  "Last year I kept making fun of Victor and the moose that ate him on the first leg of Reach the Beach.  So this year, they made me run the first leg, and I owe Victor a big apology.  First, the same moose ate me.  Then a bear jumped on my back and stayed there for the whole race.  I could barely move during my third leg!  That hill was tough!"
  
  And Victor?  He just laughed.  He's such a good sport about it that he didn't even mention that last year construction forced a detour in the first leg, adding an additional mile into the middle of it.  So, a little more Reach the Beach recap (apparently Peter Allen won the "Ugliest Feet Award" in Van 1), and on to the workout.
  
  About 35 people, nice weather (although a bit windy, like it always is by the river), and no real interference from the soccer players.  Another workout geared towards longer races:  1500m, 3x600m, another 1500m, all with the usual not-quite-long-enough recoveries in between.  The B group somehow learned to pace themselves, possibly thanks to Group Captain Yves-Marc (in the service that would be a commissioned rank; here it's just an honorary title).  It could always be due to the return of Brad Weiss, back from his travels on the Iberian Peninsula, including a few days in Ibiza.  He didn't have time to give us any good stories, so we'll just assume everything was like E!'s Wild On Ibiza episode, and that he ought ot be ashamed of himeself.  (Some people might say that we ought to be ashamed of ourself for watching Wild On..., but we're not.)  Jeff Wilson, Tony Ruiz, and the recently shorn Jonathan Federman did the timing, with Sid Howard timing his group while he ran.
  
  After the workout Sid led the gang in a bunch of exercises where we all walked on our toes, then our heals, then like a duck, etc.  Luckily it was getting too dark for the anyone to make out our faces, and we escaped into the Super-Fast Delivery truck with only mild embarassment.  Sid may run fast, but he drives incredibly slow.  We could easily have walked to the subway faster, and some of the other passengers might have gotten home faster walking the whole way.  Ah, who cares.  The van's not about speed, it's about hanging out with your teammates, and letting DJ Sid spin some silky sweet sounds.  We don't know what CD he'd popped in this time, but we want a copy of it!

• French Toast Again [9/17/2003]  In the current edition of Slate magazine, Brendan I. Koerner tracks the history of French Toast, and it appears the Gauls may be to blame for it after all:

  Extending an olive branch to France, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, wants the House cafeteria to go back to listing "French toast" on the menu; the breakfast staple was rechristened "Freedom toast" last spring, in protest over France's opposition to Gulf War II.  But is French toast really French?
  
  Culinary historians disagree over whether French toast has exclusively Gallic roots.  The simple concoction of bread, eggs, and milk likely dates back to Medieval times, when the battering process was used to make stale loaves more palatable.  The question is whether the French were truly the first to dip and fry their bread, or whether other Europeans stumbled upon the "invention" on their own.  For example, a similar dish called suppe dorate was popular in England during the Middle Ages; it's unclear, however, whether it was brought over from what's now France by the Normans, who may have delighted in something called tostees dorees before toppling King Harold II in 1066.
  
  According to promotional literature produced by IHOP, the first written mention of the delicacy comes from the court of Henry V of England.  It was called pain perdu, or "lost bread," perhaps a reference to the fact that the battering rescues bread that would otherwise be discarded as too old.  (Residents of Cajun country are quite familiar with pain perdu, as that's the local slang for an especially rich version of French toast.)  Vernacular texts from around the same time refer to virtually identical dishes called either "nun's toast" or "poor knights of Windsor."  In Spain, it was called torriga; in Germany, arme ritter.
  
  The Oxford English Dictionary cites 1660 as the year "French toast" first made an appearance, in a book called The Accomplisht Cook.  That preparation, however, left out the eggs, in favor of soaking pre-toasted bread in a solution of wine, sugar, and orange juice.  The Dictionary of American Food and Drink contends that the first egg-based recipe in print didn't appear until 1870; throughout the tail end of the 19th century, similar recipes appeared under the monikers "French toast," "Egg toast," "Spanish toast," and even "German toast."
  
  A contradictory, though highly dubious, creation myth holds that French toast owes its creation to an Albany, N.Y., innkeeper named Joseph French.  Legend has it that French whipped up a batch of the golden-brown treats in 1724 and advertised them as "French toast" because he'd never learned to use an apostrophe "s."
  
  Another unlikely story is that French toast was always called German toast until World War I, when the change was made for patriotic reasons.  Though French toast certainly gained nationwide popularity during this era, it's generally agreed that this tale of disrespecting the Kaiser via toast-renaming is apocryphal.

  So, if this dish was common across Europe, why did Americans end up calling it French Toast?  Beats us, but at this point we might as well stick with the name.  We suggest that Francophobes focus more on more substantive disputes with Europe, and that any Frenchmen (and Frenchwomen) who resent being blamed for the existance of French Toast worry about more serious issues, like why people hold them responsible for French dressing.  By the way, sauerkraut really was called "Liberty Cabbage" by a lot of Americans during World War I, but the new name was dropped later on.

• Hurricane Warning [9/16/2003]  This comes from that self-appointed historian currently in the middle of nowhere:  "For those of you who are not sure if you
  should show up for the Thursday workout together with Hurricane Isabel, you can read the workout entry of September 16, 1999.  Please remember that the reputation of this club is at stake here ..."  Of course, Isabel is predicted to be somewhere in North Carolina on Thursday evening, so the decision to come to the workout should be an easy one.

• Annus Horribilus [9/16/2003]  The Mets have been in last place all year, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays have yet to have a winning season, and the Texas Rangers can't win even with the best player in baseball.  But the players on these teams (not to mention those stuck on the Cleveland Indians, Milwaukee Brewers, Cincinatti Reds, etc.) can still hold their heads up high and say "At least I'm not on the Detroit Tigers!"  It hasn't been a good year for one of baseball's oldest franchises, to put in charitably.  In frank terms, it's been an awful year.  Pitcher Mike Maroth became the first 20-game loser since 1980 (a feat which required Maroth to be good enough to stay in the rotation, but not good enough to actually win), and teammate Jeremy Bonderman may join him before the season ends (he's got 18 losses so far).  Meanwhile no pitcher has a chance to reach 10 wins, and no hitter will break .300.  They've already lost 112 games, with 12 left to play, giving them a good shot at breaking the Mets 120-loss record from 1962, and an outside chance of having the worst winning percentage in history (the distinction currently belongs to the 1916 A's, who were 36-117, for a .235 winning percentage).  [These are all post-1900 records, of course, since nothing before then is ever counted in baseball.  Anyway, the Cleveland Spiders' 20-134 record (.130 winning percentage) seems a pretty safe record.]  And with all that, their season may have hit it's low point tonight when right fielder Bobby Higginson was ejected when he angrily tossed his shin guard away after striking out in the sixth inning and almost hit the home plate umpire with it.  On the bright side; at least most people aren't focusing on the team's poor play today.

WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 2, 2003 - SEPTEMBER 8, 2003