PAUSATF LDR Awards Celebration 2018: they love beer!

3 months have passed and I'm only reporting about this award ceremony, I'm surely going to lose my press pass on this one, if not already. I've never studied journalism but I used to at least be more timely at covering the ultra events I attended since I started this blog in March 2007. If not on the same day, at least just one or two days later. Oh well, who cares anyway... ;-) But thank you for reading, still... And, like I enjoy coming back to old posts as my memory fade, who knows, maybe someone will enjoy reading this in a few years so... better late than never as we say...

Looking back at that weekend of February though, I may have had a few good excuses, you decide... First and foremost, I almost didn't even make it to the event which was at 5 pm on Sunday in San Francisco. Indeed, the previous Saturday, I was competing in the 100-mile Road Nationals in Las Vegas. Yet, I still managed to break the M50-54 there, get a few hours of sleep, attend the award ceremony at 11 am on Sunday, drive to the airport, fly to SFO and get to the brewery at 2 pm, early enough to start working on my race report and help setting up the room. All that after an exhausting conference in San Francisco until Friday afternoon, phew... Then, on the following Tuesday I flew to Singapore and Malaysia for 2 weeks there. Then right away to New York (new M55-59 American Record at the 50K Road Nationals) and Europe in March and the 8-race series in April and May... Ok, bad excuses, I could have squeezed an hour... At least, 14 posts later, here it is, credit to the Memorial Day break and some long overdue rest for my gluteus!

Sunday February 17, 2019 it was then, at the Laughing Monk Brewery in San Francisco; what is not to love in such a name, right? The celebration was organized by our LDR Committee Co-Chair, Angie Longworth, from the club of the speedy Impalas. To attract younger generations and a new audience, Angie favored a casual setting over the traditional formal banquet format. Did that work? There were a few new faces but ultimately, everybody expected to be seated at the table, both for dinner and listening to the keynote speaker. Unlike most of my ultra running buddies and Quicksilver club mates in particular, I don't run for a beer at the finish line, but I have to admit they had quite a few original and tasteful beers to enjoy. Anyway, the only tradition of this banquet is that one of the clubs competing in the LDR Grand Prix, either cross-country, road or MUT (Mountain, Ultra, Trail), step up and organize the celebration the way they want so we are looking forward to who will take the baton for next year.

The Mexican food was catered by the parents of one of the LDR athletes and was fresh and copious, allowing for a second run. Again, I'm not a beer expert, more into wine, I assume you don't have to be too picky for food and beer pairing.

These celebrations have three key purposes: gather our LDR community, recognize the best accomplishments and get inspired by one of the legends in our LDR sports. It's my pleasure to report that we achieved all goals again this time. First, we had a packed house, and not everybody got a chair to sit but there were stools at the bar too.

A few other changes this year, like:

1. our LDR chairs, Andy (Crawford) and Angie decided to cut on the litany of award announcements, inviting every Age Group champion and awardee to grab their plaque upon getting in;
2. noticing that Hollis Lenderking wasn't attending, I had prepared some notes for the special MUT awards but Andy handed them over anyway, to save time; I will admit that I will miss Hollis' special toasts and kind words, a talent I saw him perfecting in the previous 10 celebrations I attended;
3. as for the plaques, I stepped up to save the concept as a few of our LDR Committee members felt that they were not necessary, especially with the recipients which had not been claiming their trophy in previous years. It took me quite a few hours, and many email reminders, to figure out who wanted one, versus not. We saved a few plaques eventually, all better for the planet!

While I'm talking about awards and before I move to our guest speaker speech, a few words on the MUT side:

1. A few new Age Group champions this year: Kristina Vogt Randrup (W30-) from Excelsior, Simone Winkler (W30-39) also from Excelsior, Jin Xiang (W40-49) from Excelsior again, Pen Perez (W50-59) from Pamakids. On the men side Samuel Clinton (M30-) unattached, Karl Schnaitter (M30-39) taking over the title from his Excelsior clubmate, Chikara Omine, and Dan Aspromonte stealing the title from his Quicksilver teammate Joe Swenson in the M60-69: quite some friendly competition and emulation out there!
2. A few returning champions: Karen Bonnett-Natraj (W60-69, Quicksilver), William Dai (M40-49, Pamakids), the tireless Jim Magill (M70-79, Quicksilver) and myself for the 12th consecutive Age Group title, sticking to it! ;-)
3. On the team competition side, the change we've seen over the past 10 years keep going, toward the largest and healthiest clubs managing a generation shift: when I started running ultras in 2006 our local scene was dominated by Buffalo Chips with a Grand slam (3 team awards out of 3) in 2006 and 2007 after Tamalpa and BAUR (Bay Area Ultra Runners) traded the top honors between 1994 and 2004. Then my club Quicksilver took over, culminating with 4 team awards in 2011 and 3 in 2013 and 2014. Then Excelsior took 3 in 2015, and sharing equally with Pamakids in 2016 and 2017. What happened in 2018? Pamakids won the Women, Men and Overall divisions, Excelsior keeping the Mixed one. Proving that the competition remains open and healthy!

Here with my fellow club mates (Quicksilver): Jim Magill (M70 champ), Nattu Natraj, Karen Bonnett-Natraj (W60 champ), Dan Aspromonte (M60 champ).

Let's now switch to the special yearly awards, these coveted awards unveiled during the evening.

First, the MUT Volunteer of the Year (VoY): for 2018 we awarded John Trent for his decades of support of our Pacific Association MUT community in various functions: through its Board of Directors, John has been very involved with the iconic Western States Endurance Run which serves as a benchmark throughout the world for 100-milers. John has also directed the Silver States ultra races (50K and 50-mile) for more than 10 years. John is also a renowned voice of our MUT community, exercising his talent for journalism in vivid articles in Ultra Running Magazine in particular. It took a few weeks before we found the opportunity to meet so I could hand him this well deserved plaque at Quicksilver 100K, where both his daughters ran the 50-mile and his wife the 50K. Some serious ultra family business!

Note that VoY candidates have to be a Pacific Association member during the season they are considered for an award. I'm mentioning this because many ultra volunteers are not and therefore excluded from this consideration.

On the Women side, the Ultra Runner of the Year (URoY) went to Diana Fitzpatrick, from Tamalpa. At age 60 (!) Diana finished 13th at Way Too Cool, 3rd at Ruck A Chuck and 23rd woman at Western States, setting a new Age Group course record and finishing under 24 hours (Silver buckle)! Meghan Law was co-nominated again this year, also with impressive marks well in her 50s.

And on the Men side, we had three nominees: Karl Schnaitter (Excelsior), Cole Watson (SRA Elite) and... myself. Being the MUT Chair, and further extending what Hollis Lenderking had worked on for more than 20 years, I had to come up with a framework to better formalize the selection criteria, which I'll share for the sake of transparency and so everyone knows what we are looking at:

Criteria	0	3	5
Body of Work	No race result	5 significant MUT achievements	10 or more significant MUT achievements
International / National	No result in international or national competitions	Significant results at international or national level	Podium at international competition
Pacific Association MUT GP focus	0 PA race/result	4 or more PA GP results	7 or more PA GP results
Performance range	Single distance / format	Significant results in two distinct formats / distance ranges	Significant results across sub-ultra trail, and 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 ultras
Historical performance (CR, AGCR)	No CR setting	Some CR setting, or CR-worth/close performances	Consistent setting of CR / AGCR across body of work
Age graded performance	Too old to get close to the podium, or too young for age being a factor (20-35)	Rocking the Masters division	Still killing it enough to make the podium or top 10

We look at results within our Grand Prix of course, but nationally and internationally as well. We look at ITRA rankings for the ultra and trail side, USATF records, recognitions. Our committee is certainly not as large as the 40 experts voting on the Ultra Running Magazine runners of the year, but we aim at applying as much professionalism.

For the men, we considered these athletes: Jon Olsen, Chikara Omine, Karl Schnaitter, David Roche, Cliff Lentz, Jean Pommier, Lance Doherty, Scott Trummer, Tim Comay, Gaspar Mora Porta, Thomas Reiss, Cole Watson. This list is a testament to the vitality of our MUT community in North California and Nevada. And if you feel we omitted someone for 2018, please let me know so we don't commit the same oversight this year (comment on this blog post, or in Facebook Messenger).

In other words, we don't just look at one dimension and the Pacific Association perimeter in particular. But participation in our local Grand Prix is still an important criteria too. Hope that helps everyone understand the process, and motivate many to push the envelope in all these areas.

Based on all this, our small MUT award committee elected me as the recipient again this year, that has been quite a year indeed for me. Cole is in another league from a purely competitive standpoint but had very few MUT races overall while Karl shined not only in his age group in our MUT Grand Prix but also with the most finishes of all participants, 9! To my wife's dismay, 2 more plaques on the shelves in my office... ;-)

And a very rare opportunity to see me wearing a trucker hat, in honor of our evening's sponsor and provider of gift certificates, the Runner's Mind store (Burlingame, San Francisco, Los Altos).

Forgive me for mostly covering the MUT side of this celebration. As a matter of fact, the Road side gets twice as many awards, with a short and long version, and there is Cross-Country (XC) of course. If you click on this picture below, you'll see the special awards in these categories (the first picture at the top, with masked plaques, was the one I prepared for Angie to promote and build some excitement before the event).

A few volunteers were also honored, like Mark Winitz, who officiates at most of our Road and XC events.

And now to the third key element of the evening, the motivational speech from our guest, Coach Greg McMillan (see his bio on his website).

I'm not going to aim at a transcript of the 30-minute speech, especially 3 months later, but here are a few notes I took during Greg's exposé on his decades of impressive coaching experience.

1. Sorry, in coaching, there is a lot of "it depends..."
2. Do the training so you can... do the training so you can... finally do the training. In other words, ask yourself: Are you fit enough to do the actual needed training? This requires a ton of patience. Like a good paint job requires the appropriate prep work.
3. Figure out what is your runner type (why do run, what motivates you like pressure, pleasure, rewards).
4. Learn to listen to your body so you can train at the level of your musculoskeletal system (and not beyond), your cardio-vascular system (note to self after my 2016 TIA...), your mental system, your respiratory system (another note to self...). (And, personally, I would add other systems such as family support one, or work.)
5. Balance the ever changing press and rest cycle.
6. Design your training and racing plans for success, build in some wiggle room.
7. Maintain, and grow, motivation and build confidence. Confidence is a game changer, through the positive manipulation of your own brain.
8. For coaches, empower you athletes to make decisions on their training.
9. Keep working on and raising your racing IQ (e.g. pacing)
10. Work on your self-limiting factors. E.g. being afraid to fail or feeling comfortable by doing less will protect you but may limit your performance.

Then a few other great points were raised during the Q&A session, engaging the audience even more:

1. On aging...
1. Be more gradual, especially with speed training
2. Spread the stress
3. Take much more care of your body (nutrition, stretching, recovery)
2. On technology (the use of gadgets in particular)
1. It's nice to have useful information
2. But don't get in overdrive mode, feeling first!
3. Cross-training? Oh yes, to remain healthy
4. Diet? Favor clean food, and healthy base. Hint: think of your grand-parents' diet.

Et voilà, finally some coverage of this great event, very special thank again to Angie and her Impala Racing Team for stepping up this time, we had a great time mingling around our favorite LDR topics and we look forward to next year's 24th celebration!

Bay Day 2018: celebrating with yet another 50K!

I'm really proud that IBM has stepped up to support our local Save the Bay organization, and sponsor this year's Bay Day! Being headquartered in New York, we are challenged to compete with local companies in our philanthropic efforts, but this time, we are next to Facebook!

Per my blog of last night, I celebrated this special day by running another 50K (well, I ended up logging 32.5 miles, so more than 52 kilometers), from Cupertino to Palo Alto and back.

My first stop was at the Baylands Nature Preserve center where I zipped through the exhibit. I've run many times by this yacht club-looking pavillon on weekends over the past 15 years but first time it's open so I can visit.

As I exited the center, I was looking at a canoe with two people and a large dog, just as it... capsized, oops! The water is shallow enough that it wasn't much of a danger, the bottom quite muddy and the water cold. What $10 can buy you as an unforgettable experience! ;-)

At the preserve center, a volunteer pointed me to the Lucy Evans Baylands Nature Interpretative Center, stating that they had a live bald eagle on display. Unfortunately, she (that eagle) had arrived at 10 am but it was noon already and her keepers had left already.

I visited all the stations setup by the Save the Bay volunteers on the other side of the slough

A group doing the guided walk passed by.

Here is an idea to display the effect of pollution.

A couple of Save the Bay volunteers noticed my shirt, making the connection with the volunteering projects our Silicon Valley Lab site has done with this organization, since July.

On my way back, a picture in front of the pelicans.

Then this gigantesque project on NASA's Moffet Field ground, probably from the opulent Google.

And a status on the Mountain View landslide, still not repaired after a year...

Great excuse to run a 50K again today, my 6th in 6 consecutive weeks. Now time to get to the airport for my flight to Singapore, with the peace of mind of knowing the Bay is well taken care of, although there is so much to do to preserve such an amazing but fragile natural wonder. To the San Francisco Bay!

Stevens Creek 50K/30K 2018. And an alternative.

[For the runners just looking for my pictures, here is the Google Photos album.]

"Did you run it again this year?"
Me -- "Nope"
"But you where there, no?"
Me: "Yes, but manning a water-only aid station"
"Ah, so you didn't run 50K then?"
Me: "Actually, I did!"

Thus can I summarize this confusing situation. After running and winning this race 3 times (4:15 in 2011, 4:32 in 2012, 4:17 in 2013), I've been helping out at the aid station hosted by my running club, Quicksilver. If you add that the club organizing this race is the one I initially joined in 2003 if I recall, that makes this event very special to me and, since I was in town, I didn't want to miss it. I might have to enter soon to take a stab at the M50-59 course record (the one I set at 4:15 was for M40-49) but, with all the racing I do, it's really cool to see the face of runners when they see me helping out on the sideline. A nice way to give back to a community and sport which gave so much to me these past 12 years!

Since I still wanted to squeeze in some training in, I decided to run up to Skyline from home, via the Stevens Creek Canyon Road, 13.5 miles with some gradual uphill in the second half. I had planned to leave the house by 6:30 but left 10 minutes later. Our aid station captain, Stuart, had asked me to be around 8:30 at the water-only aid station the Striders now ask us to setup at the confusing intersection of Charcoal Road (trails in 5 directions), about 1.3 miles from the Saratoga Gap main aid station. There was no such aid station when I ran this race but I remembered that I was reaching Saratoga Gap, around mile 9, at the bottom of the hour, so I thought the first runner might go through Charcoal 10 minutes before, therefore I should be there by then.

9.5 miles into my run up to Skyline, I reached Route 9 at 8:05, with 3 miles to go to the top. I really didn't want to be late so I decided to hitchhike, something I had never done before in my life! The minutes passed, and so were the cars too, without stopping, I had to wait for 5 good minutes for someone to stop and, of course, it was a runner, Michael Florence, from the Striders, who hadn't even recognized me but was going to stop anyway to help a runner looking in distress.

We passed Saratoga Gap at 8:15, said Hi to Stuart, whom I found really relaxed with no aid station ready yet (more on my timing mistake below), then Michael dropped me at the Charcoal intersection so I was all set at 8:20, as planned, phew!

Well, 8:30 and still nobody coming though... 8:40... 8:50... 9:00, not a single soul. I started thinking that maybe they had delayed the start, or that my watch was off an hour, when I saw Marty, from our club, coming in at last, at 9:08. I wasn't expecting him in the lead and he immediately said that he had gotten an early start at 7 am. That's when I realized that the aid station was between 9 and 10 miles and that the lead runner would then get though around 9:20, not 8:20! Duh, I could have taken it easier and completed my run earlier in the morning instead of stressing it out...

Right on target, another teammate, Gaspar Mora, who won in 2016 then placed 2nd last year in the 50K in 4:22, came in at 9:18.

Finally, some work to do on my end, between indicating the right trail and proposing some water to those in need before the main aid station, then indicating the mileage to that next aid station. Actually, I had something else to do as one runner dropped at the station so I had to find a volunteer and a car to get him back to the start area. Thankfully, and to my great surprise based on previous years' experiences, I had great cell coverage and was able to find Stuart's cell phone number in an old spreadsheet in Google Drive. That runner had had a bad fall on the left side and, with a bleeding and swollen knee, he preferred to quit as quickly as possible. Thanks to that new cell coverage in this area, that worked out very well.

Like last year, I was unimpressed with this participant running without a bottle, or a reusable cup for that matter. While getting your shirt dirty is kind of a badge of honor in trail running as it usually goes with a fall, getting yours dirty for laying down in the dust, not so much in my opinion...

Let's move on...

Although both races, 50 and 30K, started at the same time, the combined field was rather small, I'd say between 50 and 60 max. Many familiar faces with one I'm going to attribute the Oscar for the Most Emotional return on the trail today. The competition for this award was tough and deep (think Chris Garcia after his terrible bike accident which broke his back, Jim battling the years, Chau Pham, Peter, Peggy, Randy, Loren, or many I can't name because I don't know their personal challenges behind their commitment to trail running).

The special recipient? Charles Stevens who was himself so happy yet surprised to be back to trail running. Charles was President of the Stevens Creek Striders when I joined. He is the one who taught me so much about ultra running, starting with the fact that there were some crazy runners covering 50K or 100 miles in one go! ;-) He is the one who taught me not to waste time at aid stations, that every minute counts. He is the one who told me that Way Too Cool wasn't hilly (to this day, and after running 10 consecutive ones from 2006 to 2015, I still consider that a friendly lie! ;-). He is the one that gave me the 2008 Western States entry he had won in our Club lottery, when he estimated he wasn't in his best shape and I could make a better use of it. By the way, he finished Western States 6 times! Then, in 2012-2013, he disappeared from the ultra scene because of serious issues with his pelvis. It was so moving to see him back, and smiling despite the fatigue, half way in his 30K today. Welcome back, Charles, what an inspirational story of will and resilience!

Speaking of Stevens, are you wondering if the race was named after Charles (and same for the nearby creek, and the canyon, and the reservoir)? Of course not, the creek has had this name for more than 150 years, and it's actually a funny coincidence that Stevens comes from a typo, just read this:

As for the creek, which the race is named after, it is still flowing at the end of September, but really not much, as you can see in this video:

At least, there still is this soothing sound, so relaxing when running up and down Stevens Canyon Road, in addition to the shade. What a great place we live in!

With this tiny flow, no wonder why the Stevens Creek reservoir is so low. When you think of the surplus of water they have on the East Coast, we are going to have to build serious pipelines through the Rockies to balance the situation at some point...

Back to the race and the runners, I think I captured everybody although I'm quite disappointed with the quality of the pictures overall. Besides, I heard there was a professional photographer elsewhere on the course, so you probably got a much better shot of you already! Anyway, here is the album (link).

After the last runner, Christina, passed through my mini aid station for the second time, just after noon, Stuart released me so I could run back home. As I was leaving, Mandie was sweeping the course, collecting all the little colored flags used for course marking (instead of the traditional ribbons).

Earlier, Anil had done the same on the first 9 miles of the course.

I decided to go down to Table Mountain and Stevens Creek Canyon. After a 2.5-mile long descent to to Table Mountain, it got very sunny and exposed so I decided to put my sun glasses on. Oops, there were not over my cap and I realized I had forgotten them at the aid station when changing top. It was 1 pm and, after a 5:30 am wake-up call and just a few of my own GU Blocks mid morning, I was quite tired but decided to run back up to Skyline to get my glasses. By the way, the detour wasn't a complete waste because I had found 2 remaining yellow flags at the Table Mountain trail intersection (Hugo, I took them back home, like last year).

From the top, this time I went on Skyline Boulevard then retraced the morning route back, adding my local 5K loop in Cupertino to make the run 31.5 miles. Much more cumulated elevation that I need for my October race, and a tough run overall with 4 hours standing at the aid station in between, then the heat. But, at least, that makes my 4th 50K run in 4 weeks since my 90K at TDS. And a 2nd 100-mile week, back to back.

I hope the elegant Christina didn't feel too much pressure from the course sweepers and was able to complete her 30K.

Same for all the other runners, except the injured one we gave a ride to.

Thank you to the Striders, and Race Director Hugo de Groot in particular, for perpetuating a tradition set by Steve Patt several decades ago. And very glad that our Club returns the huge service you provide to our Club by manning the busy Bull Run aid station at our 100K and 50K Quicksilver races in May!

Speaking of which, many big and sincere thanks to our own Stuart for directing these races, plus the September trail ones, and captaining this aid station, and cooking for all of us at the annual picnic, and sitting on our Club Board, and, and, ... You rock, Stuart, have a great run at Rio del Lago in November!

4 hours to serve about fifty runners going through twice, there has been a lot of idle time, some of which I used to script a couple of upcoming blog posts, stay tuned! ;-)

And see you maybe on the other side (of the sideline!) next year, who knows. In the meantime, Run Happy out there!