Great way to kick off this week is by congratulating our mate Pete Kostelnick on his overall win at the Psycho Wyco 20 Mile on Saturday. Pete’s recap:
“Psycho Wyconess for sure. I did the Psycho Wyco 50k last year in KC just south of 5 hours, so thought 3 hours should put in me a good place to compete for the 20 mile win. For me, the course in normal conditions would add 2 minutes per mile to a flat road course, but with nearly a foot of powder snow covering the 80% ascending/descending technical lakeside course, it was now more like four minutes per mile. I started off “fast”, keeping a lead pack of four 50k guys in my sights as the lead 20 mile guy. Matt Flaherty lead the way in the 50k to the end–his winning time of 4:48 was over 9 min per mile. He ran the JFK 50 miler recently in a 6:53 mile pace ahead of the great Mike Wardian. Perspective. I got caught by another 20 mile guy near the end of the first 10.35 miles, but was more shocked by the 1:44 reading on the clock. WOW. I regained the lead with fellow Nebraskan Jeremy Morris joining me for some miles on and off before I wished him luck on his 3rd place finish in the 50k as I began my 3 mile push to the finish in a winning time of 3:30:51. Times be damned, in the spirit of the Winter Olympics, bringing home the gold in this cross country [ski] race felt great.”
Running for fun, competition, and money, it doesn’t get much better than that!
I have to take a moment and say what a JOKE the Opening Ceremonies were for the Sochi Winter Olympics. How many “athletes” marched in the parade due to patronage? Too many. “His wife’s mother was originally from (insert country here), he petitioned for dual citizenship, embarked on a fundraising campaign for the president and was awarded a spot on the Olympic Team.” With no talent or intention of competing. Buying their way into supposedly the purest of sporting expressions. Sham and a shame.
So much more to get to this week but will proudly announce that the Ni-Bthaska-Ke 12K Trail Run has been named as the USATF Nebraska Association Championships. Thanks to Michael Rathje for the nod. This will be the 8th consecutive year that we’ve hosted the champs for this distance/discipline. In order to show support for our association athletes I’ve set up a special registration category of only $25 for those with current memberships, a $20 savings.
Putting my money where my mouth is. I’ve also offered our association athletes a deeply discounted rate to this weekend’s Two Rivers Twosome 10K. A mere $10 instead of the regular $25. Not a championship race (this year) but an opportunity for some fast racing to be sure.
There were 2 race management paradigms discussed at our LDR meeting last month. One was a strictly for profit model. The other, seemingly foreign and less popular model, was the one I presented, caring as much or more about the competition than how much folding money the race generates. Another thing that makes me a dinosaur.
I’m hoping the other race directors on our championship series will take note and make similar discounts available to our USATF association athletes. You with me?
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