5th Annual Grant-Pierce Indoor Marathon

5th Annual Grant-Pierce Indoor Marathon
Thomas Jefferson Community Center
Arlington, VA


Before we get to the race, lets start off with the day before.  I drove the boys down to VA to see Tommy and Susan Graham.  We then hopped on the Metro and took the kids to the National Zoo in Washington (a first for us Bugeys).

A nice lesson in elephant poop.  This was Nathan's favorite part of the day

Race day at The Thomas Jefferson Community Center in Arlington.  I had surgery 25 days prior to this race.  I couldn't run for the first 18 days after it.  I had no business doing this, but my nemesis was running, and I couldn't back down.

43 of us started the race.  Some were running the marathon, some the 50 k (250 laps).



Perrice - my lap counter

They did away with the chip timing because they couldn't get it to work, so we each had lap counters.  Mine was a young man named Perrice (pictured above).  The first half of the race went fine.  I ran 13.1 miles in about 2 hours and 34 minutes.  That was fine by me considering I hadn't been able to train as much as I wanted to.  However, after three more miles, I really started to fade.  I was aching all over, and I still had 10 more to go.

Sure enough, Barry the Juggler came up next to me at lap #135.  He asked me what lap I was on, because he thought he was running about the same pace as I was.  I smiled and kept on running.  It had been the first time we ever spoke, my nemesis and I.

The race finally dwindled down to two people.  Myself and The Juggler.  I thought he was ahead of me, and I was right.  He finished lap 211 while I was on lap 204.  I had just 7 more laps to go (7/8 of a mile).  I was hurting, and we had now gone past the 6 hour mark.  The race was only supposed to be 6 hours, so I wasn't sure if they were going to let me finish (which would really suck to run 25 miles and not be allowed to finish).  Sure enough though, as they were packing everything down, they kept the timer up for.  As I did my last lap, there was a group of 6 or 7 cheering me on.  As I crossed the finish line, there was somebody standing right there with my finisher's buckle in hand to give to me.  It was a great way to finish.

I immediately went up to Jay the race director.  I thanked him for allowing me to finish (at 6:08).  I told Jay how I had just had surgery 3 weeks ago, and it meant so much to me to run this race.  He told me he was glad I did, and thanked for coming down.  So I am walking out of the gym, and sure enough, The Juggler comes up to me and says he overheard me telling the story to Jay how I had surgery 23 days before.  He told me he was amazed that I ran the race despite that.  He also told me that when it got down to just the two of us, he knew the only way he could beat me was to go from juggling 5 beanbags to 3 beanbags.  That means I got inside his head.  I felt like a winner.

Barry and I



Dedication:

"Of course, rivals do affect athletes mentally, but if you are competing with top-notch athletes, you will push each other, you will encourage each other." - Liu Xiang

Because if anybody can say it best, its a Chinese Hurdler. There have been many great rivalries where two people have pushed each other to excellence.

Chamberlain and Russell
Borg and McEnroe
Balboa and Creed/Lang/Drago/Lips
Burgandy and Mantooth

None though have been as prominent in the last few years as the rivalry I have had with "The Juggler." To beat my opponent, I simply had to run 26.2 miles faster than he could. I failed at this (again). However, to gain true victory, I was able to turn my enemy into my friend.

Marathon #7 is dedicated to my friend Barry Goldmeier. I have raced against Barry probably 5 or 6 times in the past 2 years, and it is absolutely remarkable to watch what he does. If he wasn't juggling, he could easily run a marathon in 3 hours. He is in incredible shape, and runs about 2 marathons every month. It is ri-god-damn-diculous.

Finisher's Belt Buckle