Our fine friend, Raymond Lampard, got his Ironman on last weekend. For those under the illusion that 'Ironman' is simply a moniker given to some multi-displinary event of arbitrary distance, know this: the Ironman consists of a 2.4-mile swim (about 3.8K), a 112-mile bike ride (179.2K) and a 26.2-mile run (42K or a marathon). Rayzo completed the sucker in Nice, France on the weekend. Gidiup, great man! Here's a considerably complete report from a man of few words:
Le Ironman is over!
1400 athletes ventured into the French Riviera at 6.30am for the start of Ironman France 2007.
I had a reasonably good swim, a 1400 person start going around one buoy, a few kicks to the head, goggles ripped off, all makes for a good day. Unfortunately a somewhat long transition and long run follwed to actually start the bike leg. The transition was over 250m long and my
bike was at the end!
Onto the bike and the field started to spread out. After the first 20km the climbing starts, 11% followed by a 7-8% climb, various switchbacks for the next 20km. Then you start decending and start the major climb of the day. Just over 20km up to 1400m, a long arduous process with no rest. That climb alone took 1.5 hours. Don't know why but my back was causing some grief, could have been the extra tyre and weight I was carrying in my back pocket.
The next section was up/down and played with my head a little. You had two more mountain passes, one at 900m and the next at 1000m. After seeing a few guys come off, you had to really concentrate.
The best part of the ride was passing through a quaint little village with the road wide enough for one car. Rammed earth buildings on both sides. AMAZING. Only lasted 2 mins but it got me through the rest of the day. The other thing was seeing 4 french girls, potential ooh la
las cheering on the cyclists in their French summer attire. You could class that as a distraction.
The last 50km was dangerous. Swithbacks are common in France and given you have to descend from 1000m quite dangerous. Two major incidents. Got hit by another cyclist as he cut across my line and the second hit a pothole wich temporarily lost control.
Scared the crap out of me!
My back became progressively worse especially when I came to the last 20km which was flat.
So, onto the run and legs weren't going anywhere. Hamstrings were tightened from lower back. Lost it a little bit for the next 10km and realised the back was the main cause for frustration. On the 3rd lap had a nurofen and that numbed the pain. In the end did a slow marathon time but at one stage was gonna do a plus 5 hour marathon.
So the last 5.5km back into the finish were tough and long. Knowing I was 30mins away from another Ironman was the thing that kept us going. 2km from home and a few tears remembering the people who have helped me on the journey.
Ironman is a surreal experience. Afterwards you are left questioning why you push your body to those endless limits, the answer: because you can.
So now it's onto the rest of my holiday—2 more weeks in Europe to find a suitable ooh la la, followed by a week in Cambodia and Malaysia. My sister joins me in a couple of days time.
Looking at heading to the Bordeaux region for some wine tasting. This region is known for their great red wines.
Ray
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
The Occasional Ensemblee Series:
No shame about Ray
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Running for Enlightenment?
So a few of us got together—Johnson in Accounting, Jenkins in Dispatch and a couple of the guys in Sales—and we've devised a little test for you to join our club.
It's going to take you about 7 years but here's what we're thinking: run 40km per day for 100 consecutive days in the each year for 3 years, then up it to 40km per day for 200 consecutive days in years 4 and 5, in the 6th year run 60km per day for 100 consecutive days and cap it off with 84km each day for 100 consecutive days in year 7.
Too easy?
Well, if the thought of 900 marathons over 7 years doesn't fatigue you at all, then perhaps you wouldn't mind doing them in straw sandals, on a light vegetarian diet, while carrying books and reciting a mantra?
Meet the Buddhist Tendai Marathon Monks who seek to attain enlightenment through running, alot. Since 1885, only 46 have completed the 1,000 day spiritual challenge.
Is there anything we can learn from the marathon monks?
Friday, April 27, 2007
You're Tops:
Dean Karnazes (Running Banshee)
Dean 'Karno' Karnazes is not a normal person.
Dean, based in San Francisco, left a successful marketing career to go for a bit of a run. It's been a few years now, and he's still running. Plenty. And I'm not talking about your 45 minute gasp around the suburbs. He's done a bunch of crazy runs including the Western States 100 Miler, the Badwater Ultramarathon and last year he ran 50 marathons in 50 days in 50 states. He published a book about some of his shenanigans called Ultramarathon Man. It serves to chronicle the fact that he is certifiable. One anecdote from the book pretty much sums him up.
There are a few team-based relay runs out there. Dean entered one, but instead of completing it with all the blokes from the Sales Department, or the golf club, or the myriad of ways running teams are formed, Dean was running by himself: Team Karno. In order to fuel the furnace that drives this running machine he had a pizza company deliver some pizzas to him at an obscure intersection late at night so he could eat them as he ran. Which he did. And if memory serves me right he washed them down with a thermos of coffee...
Most recently, Dean has been nominated as one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People. You can vote for Dean to be included within the final 100 here. I'm into people who are into their thing––be that spelling, obscenely long runs or geo-politics. There's something about the obsessive and relentless pursuit of mastery and enjoyment in a field that's inspiring. Karno makes me want to have a go, to push things a bit, to turn what can be the suburban-treading-water posture to which I can so easily entropy into an adventure. And he's done it with a pair of shoes and a healthy disregard for self-applied boundaries. Go Karno, go!
Sunday, February 18, 2007
You're tops: Steve Prefontaine
Ok, I'm buzzing a little at the moment. Partly because I've just come home from church, but also because I just had a freak encounter with a guy at Riverview called Ben Fields.
But I'll back up the bus a little before I get there.
I run. I'm a runner. I love running. I began when I was about 13 and since that time, barring ugly injuries (of which there have been a few) I've run pretty much constantly for the last 25 years. Sometimes up to 140-150km a week, these days a more sedentary 40-50km a week. Long distance running's my bag and as you go along, you grab a few heroes along the way.
Locally, I can't go past Herb Elliott (no relation), John Landy, Ron Clarke, Rob De Castella and Steve Monaghetti.
Beyond these shores though, I've got five big heroes: Sebastian Coe, Said Aouita, Haile Gebrselassie, Emil Zatopek and Steve Prefontaine. Each of these runners were renowned as much for the way in which they ran as for their accomplishments. I'm only going to talk of two of them for now...
Emil Zatopek, a Hungarian, won the 5000m and 10000m at the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki and then decided he'd give the marathon a shot. He'd never run one before so at the 20km mark, when he could stand it no longer, he asked Jim Peters (England) who had been the pre-race favourite whether the pace was 'a bit slow'. When Peters looked at Zatopek as though he had been smoking something strange to be asking such an insane question, he made his own arrangements. He won a third gold medal in the Helsinki Olympics, cleaning up the all the long distance races in process. And he did it looking ugly. That's one reason why people loved him. He ran with a contorted, almost demented head tilt as though ever sinew was stretched and he was about to burst something. But he dominated. Actually he crushed other runners; grinding them into a pulp with withering bursts that were powered by pioneering interval session that are emulated to this day.
Steve Prefontaine never won an Olympic medal. He did run in the 1972 Munich Olympics but finished fourth in a race that he wished he could erase from his memory. At one point, Steve held practically every American distance record from 1500m to 10,000m (that's 1500m, 1mile, 2000m, 2-mile, 3-mile, 5000m and 10000m if you're wondering). The guy was a freak. He reckoned that anyone who sat on the shoulder of another runner to let them do the work before running to victory was a whimp. Steve's philosophy was that every time you get to a start line, you pull out you're very best (he held the same thinking on many of his training runs too!). You run hard. Not surprisingly, Steve was a front-runner. As much as his coaches tried to convince him otherwise, he always led from the front and basically said to everyone else: 'catch me if you can'. If you're good enough, you'll beat me...but you'll have to catch me first. Steve said: 'A lot of people run a race to see who is fastest. I run to see who has the most guts, who can punish himself into exhausting pace, and then at the end, punish himself even more'. He ran to see who had the most guts.
The crowds loved Pre. They wore 'Go Pre' T-shirts, they chanted 'Go Pre' in the concluding stages of most of his races (which was usually a chant to victory). Adding to the folklore, Steve's coach at the University of Oregon, Bill Bowerman, used Steve as a guinea pig for some running shoes he concocted using his wife's jaffle iron. We now now those shoes as Nike... Steve was part of the genesis of all that.
Steve died tragically in a car accident on the evening of May 30, 1975. He'd run in a meet that afternoon and was perhaps a little ticked off. He'd had a few to drink. But what probably killed him was an insatiable love for speed. On foot and behind the wheel.
Steve once said, 'To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the Gift'. He believed that if you're given an extraordinary gift, with it comes the responsibility of stewarding that gift and not wasting it.
He was full of great one-liners (like the one on the poster just here). He once said: 'Some people create with words, or with music, or with a brush and paints. I like to make something beautiful when I run. I like to make people stop and say "I've never seen anyone run like that before." It's more than just a race, it's style. It's doing something better than anyone else. It's being creative'.
The guys cult-status and legend was phenomenal when he was alive. It has only grown since. As with anyone cut off in their absolute prime there is a sense of loss and frustration about the unanswered questions of what he might have gone on to achieve. Yet all this fuels the legend as well. How he ran, why he ran and his attitude towards running.
If you're still with me, all this is both a homage to a hero and a preamble to why I'm buzzing.
I was singing at Riverview tonight and happened to be wearing one of two 'Pre' t-shirts that I recently purchased.
So, the service is over and a guy called Ben Fields walks up to the platform and says 'I couldn't help notice your t-shirt, I went to school with Steve'. At this point I just about fell off the stage. Ben went to Marshfield High School with Steve Prefontaine. They ran together in the track team. I told Ben about my other 'Pre' T-Shirt. This one is a replica of a shirt that used to be awarded to guys on the team who racked up 2000miles in a season and has on the front 'Pirate 2000 mile Club'. Ben excitedly told me that he had that t-shirt. The legit version. I asked Ben what his event was. Ben was a mile runner with a PB of 3'59!! Yep, a bloke walked up to me at Riverview knowing I must have been a runner to be wearing a Pre t-shirt and let me know he was a 3'59 mile runner who ran with Steve Prefontaine. Yikes! Ben seemed a bit excited too! I don't blame him!
I could go on, but I'm tired. I hope this isn't the last of our 'You're Tops'. I doubt it will. There are a whole lot of incredible people out there. For very different reasons. Steve's just one of them...
Friday, February 2, 2007
Label me Elmo
So... a portion of the creative genius that comprises The Cacophony Ensemble have colluded to define some broad creative parameters for the labels/categories/genres that combine to form the writings you'll find from the ensemble. Believe us, they're plenty broad.
Above all, the intention is to shed some light (however filtered, misguided or well-informed) on the noises that surround us. Sometimes as amused onlookers and reporters, sometimes as curious participants, sometimes as participants, sometimes as frustrated folk and sometimes as people with a thought for a way out of the noise.
So, the labels/categories are thus:
JESUS_is more than alright with us
RUNNING_the simplest and most efficient form of physical exercise
LEADERSHIP_without followers is merely taking a walk
REVIEWS_movies, music and literature
THE CHURCH_gentle observations and thoughts about Christ's bride.
TRIVIAL PURSUITS_random gear and curious fun
SPIRITUALITY + THEOLOGY_God in the cacophony
CULTURE_the cacophony that surrounds us
YOU'RE TOPS_there's been some fine people who've walked this earth. We pay homage.
STUFF'N'THINGS_have you seen the iPhone yet?
CULTURAL ICONS_Chuck Norris et. al.
STRENUOUS WHOLENESS_getting tidy at being a well-formed human
VENT YOUR SPLEEN_step on to the soapbox and let rip
TOP5+_FOr lovers of lists, order and clarity
PHILOSOPHY_a bunch of words to confuse, bewilder or illuminate
All of us have our different inclinations and passions. That'll be pretty obvious as we get going.
It's what we're thinking. Thoughts?