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Post by gitagoing on Oct 31, 2007 21:14:07 GMT -5
thanks prez and your team
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Post by gitagoing on Nov 4, 2007 9:55:34 GMT -5
does anyone have a clue of what is happening at BRMM 50K??? All E-Mails and phone calls are not getting a response.
Let us know if you know anything.
Thanks!
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Post by colonel on Nov 4, 2007 14:00:04 GMT -5
I haven't heard anything since they emailed me a week or so ago. The RD sent me an email with a race application and directions on 10/25. Then a couple of days later he sent me an email to let me know I forgot to put a check in the envelope! Doh! A "masters" moment! I sent him the check but I haven't heard anything since. (and the check hasn't cleared yet.)
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Post by colonel on Nov 5, 2007 11:22:29 GMT -5
Hey Larry, I was just looking at the directions that Ron gave me. His directions say to drive all the way to Blue Ridge and then he has some backroads to the race. According to the computer map thing it is an hour and twenty minutes to Blue Ridge. Ron says his portion of the map is about 30 minutes (the computer map says about 40.) But if I put a "pushpin" on the computer map where it lloks like the race starts and then tell it to give me directions, it has me turn onto the backroads at Elijay. Accordning to the computer, going that way is a trip of one hour 54 minutes. So even though Ron's directions look like you go the long way around it might be about the same amount of time. (although both ways seem to have the same distance on the backroads so I don't know why going all the way to Blue Ridge would be just as fast.) I'm leaning towards using Ron's directions since I figure he knows what he is talking about, at least better than the computer! Which way do you think is best?
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Post by GUTS Admin on Nov 5, 2007 12:53:04 GMT -5
Colonel, Maybe he's assuming you'll be driving in FROM Blue Ridge, not from your house? Could you please email the directions to me sarahtynes at gmail.com please BTW, this is all the info I can find on the race: 2nd Annual Blue Ridge Mountain Masters 50K Trail Run Age 40 & Over Only 60 Runner Limit Saturday, November 10, 2007 Blue Ridge, GA 8:00 AM Start Race Start & Finish Location Noontootla Creek FarmsRon Zadroga, Race Director Friday Night Pasta Dinner 6PM & Trail Briefing 7PM At United Community Bank Pavilion (Behind Chamber of Commerce) Hot & Cold Beverages & Pastries at Start 4 Well-Stocked Aid Stations on Course Longest Distance Between Aid Stations – 8 miles Hamburgers, Veggie Burgers & Beverages for All at Finish Line Awards Ceremony After All Eligible Recipients Have Finished – Not Later Than 4 PM 10 hr. Cut-Off Awards 5 Deep for Men, 5 Deep for Women Other Awards Depending on Turn-out & Age Distribution Promotional Give-aways to All Entrants Finishers Award to All Finishers Special Prize Drawings at Finish Line $60 Entry Fee Prior to Oct 27; $70 Thereafter For Application Call Ron at (706) 632-6829 Or Email ronzadroga@tds.net Lodging info available through Fannin County Chamber of Commerce (706) 632-5680 www.blueridgemountains.comThe address for Noontootla is 123 Newport Rd, Blue Ridge, 30153. Online directions are available here
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Post by colonel on Nov 5, 2007 14:55:02 GMT -5
Thanks! I'll send you an email in a sec.
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Post by gitagoing on Nov 5, 2007 18:00:31 GMT -5
its best to listen to ROD's directions. i'll be there to do pre-race and maybe run in the hills for a while can you really get lost in the Blue Ridges?? the back roads look easier but trust the RD do a profile and you may understand hope to see you there. ok eeers the truth, the back roads are slow and hilly and curvy and may be out of commission due to a tree falling on the road which may be cleared when they want them cleared
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Post by GUTS Admin on Nov 11, 2007 16:47:49 GMT -5
Race # L Name F Name Age Sex City State Finish Time Place 163 Strayer Jonathan 47 M Beaverdale PA 4:48:02 1 1st Male 168 Barker Jon 41 M Roswell GA 5:32:31 2 2nd Male 164 Trainor Lisa 48 F Maple Grove MN 5:35:11 3 1st Female 157 Newcomer Robert 48 M Decatur GA 5:49:15 4 3rd Male 143 Dover Gary 47 M Murrayville GA 6:01:55 5 4th Male 138 Cassiday Doug 41 M Maysville GA 6:04:58 6 5th Male 148 Hendrick Spurgeon 48 M Marietta GA 6:12:32 7 134 Blackford Doug 60 M Todd NC 6:16:42 8 154 Moser Michael 40 M GA 6:31:14 9 161 Schick Richard 58 M Marietta GA 6:31:57 10 132 Baum Gary 57 M Raleigh NC 6:40:41 11 149 Judd Pat 57 M Pennsacola FL 6:43:40 12 150 Jolliffe Kevin 49 M Caledonia MI 6:45:27 13 131 Apple Rob 46 M Murfreesboro TN 6:48:28 14 167 Wilson Mark 56 M Loganville GA 7:01:33 15 133 Binienda Pat 53 M Smyrna GA 7:20:36 16 135 Border Barbara 46 F Blue Ridge GA 7:20:36 17 2nd Female 155 Murphy Terry 53 M Atlanta GA 7:24:06 18 140 Cutrara Phil 61 M Hudsonville MI 7:34:19 19 142 Donnelly Susan 44 F Oak Ridge TN 7:36:52 20 3rd Female 158 Pschandl Jim 56 M Gulf Breeze FL 7:40:21 21 162 Schoen Mark 41 M Geelong Australia 7:44:11 22 165 Tynes Sarah 41 F Decatur GA 8:20:19 23 4th Female 137 Burns Kenneth 72 M Hudsonville MI 8:42:39 24 159 Pringle Joe 47 M Atlanta GA 8:42:40 25 160 Santos Jen 49 F Maineville OH 8:43:03 26 5th Female 139 Cutrara Barb 54 F Hudsonville MI 8:43:53 27 166 Warfel Timothy 53 M Tallahassee FL 9:02:23 28 152 Maas Steven 48 M Grandville MI 9:05:19 29 156 Mustari Mike 59 M Tucker GA 9:19:15 30 136 Burgess Steve 53 M Brandon MS 9:57:49 31 144 Edwards Dan 63 M Ridgeland MS 9:57:50 32
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Post by mikem on Nov 11, 2007 18:54:05 GMT -5
Hi Sarah and fellow runners, It was nice to see you on the trail and congratulations on your strong time. The BRMM was a lot of fun and certainly challenging. I found the Benton Mackay trail beautiful and tough on the feet. I actually brought up the back end this year again as the two last finishers missed a turn and ran extra distance. The race director, Ron Zadroga, puts on a quality event. It was very nice to arrive at the finish to hot food before the drive back to Atlanta. GUTS members that are in the 40 and up age groups might want to consider this even for next year. MikeM
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Post by GUTS Admin on Nov 13, 2007 20:28:04 GMT -5
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Post by colonel on Nov 14, 2007 17:46:35 GMT -5
Here is my race report. It is long and boring to probably anybody but me. Well, ok, it is even boring to me. I wanted to make it short and sweet but, once I started writing, the frustration just came pouring out of my typing fingers. Plus, anybody that has run with me knows that I am a Chatty Cathy and not very succinct. If y'all want to use this report in the newsletter you might want to edit it down to realistic length.
RACE REPORT - Blue Ridge Mountain Masters 50K - Saturday, November 10th. This race runs over trails and "dirt" roads through the mountains of North Georgia. This time of the year the trees are in full Fall color so it was beautiful up there. The field of runners included 26 men and 6 women. The weather the race was a little chilly at the start but the skies were clear and the day warmed as the hours passed.
The race starts along a small creek with a “creek crossing” shortly after the start. As long as you stayed on the stepping stones it was a dry crossing. I saw a couple of people slip. Their crossing wasn’t so dry. The first six miles or so to the first aid station were mostly uphill on a dirt road. Due to the wait at the creek crossing I was behind most of the runners. I settled into a comfortable pace and soon found myself gaining ground on a guy that I thought was in first place. I caught up to him a mile or two before we reached the aid station. The runner was Jon Barker, last year’s champion. He told me that the leader was a guy who had taken off like a rocket and was way out in front. I ran with Jon through the dirt roads that led to the next aid station. After that the road gave way to trails. On the roads, Jon had been pulling ahead of me on the hills and I had been catching him on the downhills. When we reached the technical downhill trail section he stepped aside and told me to go ahead.
I'm not sure what came over me. I felt great!! So I start flying down the trails. How I did it, I don't know. The trails were covered in leaves so it was hard to see potential hazards such as roots and rocks. But I ran with abandon and didn't have a problem. Well, let's just say I didn't have a problem such as stumbling or falling. What I did have a problem with was my total lack of intelligence. I made a huge mistake and it ended up screwing up my whole race. The trail made a very sharp U-turn. I missed it. I was going so fast down the trail that sweat was running into my eyes. I wiped some sweat away and the next thing I know I don't see a trail ahead of me. I had run off into the woods!! So I stop, turn around, and walk about 20 yards back to the trail. I look up and see the orange streamers hanging from a branch. The trail! I take off running again. The problem was that I was going back the way I came!! After running for a couple of minutes I see Jon running towards me. I say, "I must have taken a wrong turn!" He says, "No, you're going right. There is only one trail." and he keeps running. Because I have the mind of a two year old, I thought he meant that I was going the right way as I passed him. So I continue running, the wrong way, and the whole time I'm thinking that maybe I missed a turn and that this part of the trail was a loop and that I went the wrong way on the loop. Now I don't know if I am running the right distance since I didn't run the loop right ... I'm thinking I need to tell Ron to DQ me when I get back since I didn’t run the loop. Then I see a woman running towards me. I say, "I guess I took a wrong turn back there." She says, "Did you ever reach the aid station at the turn around point?" Aid station? Turn around point? She tells me I screwed up and that I need to turn around. I probably only lost about five minutes with this goof, maybe a little more. She tells me to go ahead of her, so I start flying down the trail again, thinking I might catch Jon if I hurry. That was my second mistake because I got so far ahead of the woman that she wasn't able to see me to correct my next mistake.
Shortly after I made the correct U-turn the trail went through a clearing and became a small Jeep trail. This trail went down a very steep trail. As I'm flying down this trail I'm thinking that I doubt even a Jeep could climb this thing. Then I also start getting a bad feeling that I screwed up again. I don't see any markings. I stop and decide to walk back up the hill, retracing my steps. I am almost back to the top ... I'm not sure how far down I went but it was pretty far ... I see two guys coming at me. I tell them we have made a wrong turn. They tell me that I did not turn wrong and that I should follow them down the hill. I ask them if they saw the woman that was right behind me. Nope. They didn't. At this point I should have known they were wrong. But one of the guys said he knew the course and this was the right road. I guess in my fog of stupidity I thought the woman must have turned wrong. So down the hill I go again. We get almost to the bottom when the guy who "knew the course" says, "This isn't right. We missed a turn." So back up the hill we trudge, while turning several more guys around that had just missed the turn too. Near the very top of the hill was the turn that we missed. It was marked with several small flags stuck in the ground. I think I missed it because I was watching the road to make sure I didn't trip and didn't see these small flags because they were off to the side and were the same color as many of the leaves on the ground. To give you an idea of the magnitude of my adventure down and up the hill (and down and up again!), it was a little under two miles from this point to the “turn around” aid station. The lady that had put me on the right course earlier was just coming back out as we entered the trail. Jon had already been down and back so I never saw him. I did see a couple of other guys coming up from the aid station that had obviously not missed the turn. So, while I was screwing around going down and up that hill (and down and up again!), I fell about four miles behind where I should have been!! And, dagnabit!!, all of this suffering might have been avoided if I had understood what Jon had meant and had turned around when he told me that I was "going right". The trail that I missed was fairly close to that point and I probably would have still been running with him and we would have made that turn together.
On the way back I struggled. My feet have been bothering me alot lately and when we got back to the "dirt" road I had a hard time picking up the pace. The road at this point was covered in a ton of golf ball sized rocks. Every time I stepped on a rock it felt like knives sticking up into the balls of my feet. On the trail to the aid station and back I had calculated that I was now in sixth place, fifth male (top five men and top five women got a nice plaque - I wanted a plaque!). But when I got to the rocky road I couldn't maintain my pace. I was passed by two guys (one who asked me if I was the one he heard yelling - Ok, I'll admit that stepping on all of those rocks at first had me moaning in pain, then grunting in pain, then shouting every time a rock was especially painful, and then finally yelling four letter words about every fifth step) Anyway, they passed me. I tried to pick up the pace a little but the pain in my feet was joined by cramps in both of my hamstrings. I stopped and stretched a little, took another S-Cap and kept moving. After a few minutes the cramps went away and the road smoothed out a little. Finally I was able to pick up the pace.
I had not planned on being out this long and I had run out of GU and MoonPies. I needed fuel. I reached the last aid station and grabbed a banana and some potato slices. This seemed to help and I got a second wind. The road was now far less rocky and mostly downhill, so I felt like I was flying. I had not seen the two guys that passed me in awhile but finally one of them came into view. This seemed to fuel my new found energy even more. I ran by him and offered him some encouragement. Down this road I felt like I was going faster and faster. I knew the end was near. But for some reason doubt started creeping in. I had passed an orange marker a mile or so back. Was that an indication of a turn? Did I miss another one?! I suddenly had a wave of despair wash over me. "Oh Lord, please tell me I didn't miss another turn!" I almost felt like crying. I stopped. I don't remember this road being this long. I turn around and start running back up the hill. After a minute or two I see the guy that I just passed turn a corner in the distance. He yells down to me that this is the right road. So back down the hill I go... but not with the same vigor that I had before. I find the turn and run through a cornfield, and the small creek and then along the side of the creek to the finish. I'm not sure what was better, the finish line coming in to view, or the smell of hamburgers being grilled at the finish line! (By the way … That last turn had a big red arrow indicating where to go!! My only suggestion for next year’s race is that they have a sign like this where that small trail turns off the Jeep road!)
Final results: I finished in 6:12:32 and I can't wait to do this race again next year! The guy that won the race ran it in 4:48:02. Jon came in second with a time of 5:32:31.
I have been in races before where I have just run out of steam at the end and finished poorly. These races don't bother me. I know that all I have to do is work harder, train harder, maybe eat better, and I can prevent that from happening in the future. What kills me about this race is that I was just totally stupid. I could have finished so much better if I had just been paying attention to where I was going or if I had listened to the right people. I can train harder to prevent fatigue but what do I do about stupidity? As they say, "You can't fix stupid." And THAT is why this race is dang discouraging!!!!
And, to add insult to injury, I took a bunch of pictures at the start with my Pocket PC camera phone and then took more pictures of the mountain in all of its Fall glory as I was leaving. I wanted pictures to post in the GUTS forum. On the way home my battery died and all of my pictures were lost. When it rains it pours.
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Post by gitagoing on Nov 14, 2007 18:24:50 GMT -5
;D a lost bag sand in the woods hahahahahahah ;D that is why they call it the BRMM didn't you know that all the markers are wrong that is part of the TESTat least you found an aid station but they move those also gotta really be prepare for those tricky North Georgia Hills nice race report and funny !!!!!! enjoy that cup
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Post by Sally on Nov 15, 2007 8:59:31 GMT -5
Chatty Cathy...reminds me of an old Turner Classic Movie: Five Little Peppers in Trouble. "What's a chatty cathy?": a little girl who talks too much! Maybe a little less chatting next time!!!!
Great report and very funny!!!!! Great plug for moon pies!!
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Post by gitagoing on Nov 15, 2007 12:30:11 GMT -5
;D next year tell gitagoing where bag of sand found the aid stations ;D last year gitagoing spent 7:30 wardering around and never saw one but never got lost that much best not worry about those shoes but directions Springer Mountain is great this time of year
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Post by GUTS Admin on Nov 15, 2007 14:49:28 GMT -5
Words of Wisdom: NEVER follow Colonel ;D
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Post by Sally on Nov 15, 2007 15:25:45 GMT -5
Used to think that rule was only in relation to Richard Schick and Andrew Hackett....now I have to add Bag O Sand to that list as well! ;D
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Post by colonel on Nov 15, 2007 16:04:35 GMT -5
Maybe a little less chatting next time!!!! HAW HAW!!! Actually, if I had stayed with Jon and chatted more I wouldn't have gotten lost!! And the only chatting I did on the way back was with the rocks on the road. And no matter how loudly I dog cussed them, they wouldn't chat back .... not even an apology for the abuse they were giving my feet! As for the MoonPies, I am now officially sold on the benefits of that Southern Treat during a long run! Every time I ate one I felt a nice boost in energy.
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Post by gitagoing on Nov 15, 2007 17:04:42 GMT -5
;D please tell us which aid station you found the MOON pies at ;D those rocks are my friends quit cussing them
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Post by colonel on Nov 15, 2007 17:24:52 GMT -5
I carried the MoonPies with me from home. They were the Mini's and I could only fit four in my waist back thing. Special thanks to Bob! At the Tuesday run he suggested that my lost pictures might be on the storage card. His suggestion led to me realizing that the power outage had reset the defaults ...etc etc. ... Anyway, I found the pictures!! Here are a few: The road leading to the starting line: Sarah and a very cold me .... The runners are ready to go! ... BTW - the guy in the dark turtleneck shirt was the winner. The guy behind him (white shirt with dark sleeves) came in second. I think the women's winner is the person with the knee-high white socks that is bent over, stretching, in the background (but I'm not sure) Ron prepares to fire the gun! (sorry, this one is a little blurry) A couple of pictures of the mountain (unfortunately the colors didn't come through too good on my camera phone) ...
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