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Pacing Pirates
Six months, 11,492 miles, 2,288 push-ups, seventy-two gallons of Gatorade,
four gallons of beer, one gallon of wine and two bottles of eggnog later the
Katyfit pirates were towing the line of the 2005 Houston Marathon. We had
rejoiced in our hot and humid long runs, all the hills we could find, 40-mile
bike rides, scores of races (especially Sunmart and the Muddy-Buddy) and cold
rainy workouts; for our motto was Hard-Core! We began as sixteen individual
runners with varied running resumes, but we now towed the line as one, a band of
pirates. All fall we had woven our bonds of brotherhood ever tighter with shared
meals, outings and parties. We now all wore our skull and cross-bones shirts and
we all immediately respond to any human contact with a frightening Argh! It was
really heady stuff at the starting line as the whole band was poised for PR
plunder!
We did not lightly speak of our oneness, we let our legs do the talking as six
of us paced the other ten towards some magnificent, marathon treasure. The crew
called me Captain Jack, as I was their coach. My plan was to be a pirate pacer
too, running with each one of them for a few miles. I was excited in that I
would get to share just a little bit in the new chapter each one of them was
writing in their marathon book. The perfect weather conditions added to our
excitement. Our treasure map was the same one we used in training, run faster by
focusing on the food right beyond the finish line!
Motivating pirates with their lust for food and plunder was easy, managing to
pace them was a trickier proposition. It is a lot like telling them that they
could only have one bottle of rum per day! My first assignment, Steve Brammer,
was to prove most troublesome. Having a 3:12 PR, he had his eye’s set on one of
marathoning’s holy grails, a sub 3 hour finish. We found each other at the very
front of the starting line and we were soon sprinting down Crawford. Pirate
Steve, was a little crazier than most of the mates, having once climbed every
water tower in Cooke County, Texas. His eyes had that green gleam to them as we
had gone five blocks at sub six-minute mile pace. I hollered at him: “Steve!” He
turned and said, “I guess we are going a little too fast.” I managed to gasp
out, “yeah!” It worked just a little, as the elites were finally starting to
pull away from us.
Despite my pacing pleas, we hit mile one in 6:29. Since I forgot to bring some
rope and an anchor to moderate his pace, I used a little guile on him. I wasn’t
Captain Jack for nothing! I introduced him to Jeff Eisele and Kevin Regis, right
next to us and said, “You should hang with them as they ran 2:58 and 2:56 last
year.” It was a waste of what little breath I had left. Steve very cordially
said hello to them with an other worldly look upon his face, and then pulled
ahead of us. By mile two he was easily 50 meters ahead of me and my wheels were
coming off. So I cruised into the fifth mile marker at 6:41 pace and waited for
my next pirate to arrive. Throughout the race reports of Steve filtered back to
me. Jeff Clark had seen Steve at about mile eight still on 6:30 mile pace. I was
worried about his chances of breaking 3 hours, but amazingly enough he finished
in 2:58! He did indeed slow down the last two miles, but his blistering pace
paid off. I have learned my lesson, next year I will just encourage him to hang
with the front runners!
Back at mile five, I caught my breath and Mark Coleman found me. Like Steve,
Mark is also as tough as nails. He was maintaining a perfect pace to meet his
goal of breaking 3:30 and qualifying for the Boston Marathon. We ran together,
side by side all the way to mile fifteen. Mark kept a perfect 7:47 pace, looked
relaxed and had a very pleasant smile on his face. There was a lot to smile
about too as we pumped up the crowds in the places where they were thick. I was
using the upward sweeping arm motion to lift them up and their cheers lifted all
of us as well. I had fun messing with the fans and shouted at them that “you
look good!” I also kept asking them for beer to no avail.
Of course we were both wearing our pirate shirts and the crowd response was
fantastic. They said, “Go pirates” or go “skull and cross bones!” We just gave
them our biggest Arghs and they would Argh us right back and then laugh. These
marathon fans (mixed with concerned relatives) intuitively knew that a pirate
was a quintessential metaphor for a marathoner. Like pirates, us marathoners
risked our health while operating outside of all sedentary laws, scanning the
horizon for that ever elusive treasure. I said farewell to Mark after mile 15,
but man did he look strong as he just kept parting the waves off into the
distance! He went on to run a 3:28 and capture a Boston qualifier.
After a quick port-a-potty break, in which mate Dennis passed me, I did some
stretches and felt my sea legs getting a little tight. In just a minute I found
Floyd Trevino moving at a very steady 8:04 mile pace. He too was after the
Boston standard. He was officially part of a different Katyfit training group,
but he had trained with us and was hard-headed, hence he was also a pirate! As
Floyd was looking fine at 16, I bade him farewell. He went on to capture a nice
PR of 3:41, but missed Boston by six minutes. He is already planning to get
Bostin in Austin!
Just a few minutes later, I spied mates Nancy Husby and Mike Dodson, and I
joined them for a mile. They were a smooth running machine! Mike was giving of
himself to pace Nancy towards her goal of qualifying for Boston. He was doing a
marvelous job being really positive, but also using a woman with a green top to
motivate her. He kept track of her splits every mile so she just could relax and
"enjoy" the race. While they worked as team, I just goofed off and continued to
work the crowds. Saying bon voyage after mile 17, Nancy went on to qualify for
Boston with a nice 3:48 time.
Just a minute later, I came across another pacing pirate, Rene’ Reynolds. She
was a captain too, but of the mighty Champion’s Fit yellow group. She was pacing
a still coherent runner through his first marathon. I didn’t ask her where the
other fifty runners on her team were, but I bet they were behind her. She was
leading by example!
I stopped right at mile nineteen and went through my entire stretching routine
and sensed that my right IT band was about to snap off of my peg leg. At this
moment I spied two more pirates, Mark Bauman and Ray Schmidt, right on nine
minute per mile pace. Ray had been pacing Mark and Pat, who had fallen back, to
break four hours. At mile twenty, Ray started to fade too as his knee was
hurting him. Mark and I ran together to mile twenty-three. He was strong the
whole way and kept up a smooth shuffle. Helping Mark was a extra special for me
as we both were formerly teammates on the championship Pines Basketball team in
the mid-nineties. He was loaded with basketball genes and had led his former
high school team to some St. Louis city championships. So it was great to see
Mark move his big 6’2” frame so well in a marathon. He went on to break his four
hour goal time by 4 minutes. I just wished I had and extra basketball on me so
he could dribble it around all the runners that he passed!
I ran back against the flow for the runners for the first time as I was now
afraid to stop on extra stiff legs. I soon found Pat Foley. I could tell that
Pat was OK, but that he was reaching the breaking point. I was very proud of him
from mile twenty-three to twenty-five for toughing it out. I knew he would be OK
as he could still laugh, a pirate’s second best friend. We were both blessed
with a very rousing cheer from the coaches of Katyfit at mile twenty-four. Our
first-mate Paige also gave us the loudest Argh of the entire day, as she was
going back out to pace more pirates. Pat was out after the same treasure as
Mark, to break four hours. He went on to miss it by only one minute, but PR’d by
seventeen minutes.
I circled back and found mate Karen Broyles at about mile 24.5. She was looking
extra strong and could even talk in complete sentences! We ran just past mile 25
up the hill into downtown, where you can just smell the finish line. She was
passing more runners as I turned around again. She ran across the finish line in
4:10, a 36 minute PR! I made my first mistake of the day by missing mate Randy
Peters, but he went on to rake in a nice 4:13, a 45 minute PR! It was clear to
me that some of our swifter pirates were going to have to get a lot swifter next
year!
Running back to mile 24.5 again I found first mate Paige and Christy Coleman,
the wife of Boston bound Mark. Paige handed Christy off to me and went back to
find more of our crew. I decided to run Christy all the way to the finish line,
before the medics had to run me to the infirmary!
Christy was hurting a lot. At one point she hollered out in pain as her calf
cramped up. It only took her to few paces to walk it off and she moved steadily
through the streets of downtown Houston. As we neared the finish line, one of
our smarter half-marathon pirates, Donna Crocker, joined us (mates Ralph Kaplan,
Kevin Schnyder and Greg Nunn also PR’d in the half). Donna and I worked both
sides of the street pumping up the crowds. The three of us ended the marathon
flying across the finish line with our arms stretched out, as airplanes! Christy
finished in 4:17, a 42 minute PR. Candice Trimm came in next pacing some of her
friends and Charlotte Harris completed her run with a 43 minute PR.
The pirates had all finished gloriously with loads of treasure: sub 3s, Boston
qualifiers, sub 4s and huge PRs, while the rest of their mates helped pace them.
I felt fantastic in helping others as we ran as one body, the Katyfit pirates.
We all shared in each other’s treasure by sharing ourselves, and created a
richer treasure composed of friendship and love.
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