Sunday, October 2, 2011

Wow Wael's Half Marathon - Caesars 10/1/11

Winning!  Wael embodied the wolf spirit yesterday, completing a half marathon through the rugged terrain, against the cold & windy conditions, and without walking or complaining.  Fantastic!  The sandbagger has never run above 7miles before.

This is a major milestone in the Safi-Hogben saga of one-upmanship in the battle of the fastest slowest big man of the pack.  After weeks of strong showings by Peter, we weren't sure whether Wael would answer.  Clearly he has.  Pete best rest-up from his wedding and be prepared to battle.

Saturday started early and cold at 8:30am (note the # of crossed arms in the pic).  Our group of 8 found themselves heading out from the Visitor Center ahead of an official half marathon event starting from the Beach at 9am.  Upon reaching the Lodge (2.5-3mi), the pack split in two with the 3 Winklers & Paul heading back and the Matts, Iron and Wael intent of completing the half marathon course.


The event coordinators had added helpful red flags along the course but the trail still had many branches obstructing passage.  So the Pack took on the challenge to clear what we could.


So we felt a clear conscience partaking of the drink stops.


The long course took us across creeks, over bridges, through the woods, and past 50 Springs.




We ended rather cold but found solace in some high alcohol content beers, followed by a trip to Chipotle.


PS - Another rivalry is coming to light.  I thought Dave was fond of his Iron handle, but he appears to be trying out for title of Mayhem again.  Recall, Dave was the first to fall during the initial Rowe Woods run.  During today's run, Iron fell through a decrepit wooden bridge and later was grabbed by a root.  Breaking his streak of falling ever other run, Malloy came away unscathed.

2 comments:

  1. I had forgotton IW's fainting spell at Rowe. By my count, we have a tie atop the leaderboard for the Mayhem Award. The season is a long one, however - plenty of time still for others to beat us out.

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  2. Yes, the first fall was clearly due to the conditions/environment (SPEED contributing most [ha!], angle and wet/mossy conditions, and unstable bridge). The second fall, much later in the run, was probably from being slightly delirious from trying to keep up with the 2 Matt’s. It was a good but cold day. I don’t think I got rid of the chills from the cold weather til about 2 pm…. Iron (for now ). PS. Kudos to Wael, an awesome showing and it should be noted that we caught the end of the ½ marathon group that was going on and Caesar’s Creek.

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