Disposable version of ChampionChip?

Ran a 5K race today. Came through in 20:39. Splits was 6:43, 6:50 (1.1mile - 6:12 pace), and 7:04. Just over two minutes slower than my PR back in April. Got some work to do ahead of me.

One interesting aspect was this electronic tag that they gave us. We had to tie it to our shoe and it would register the time as we crossed the finish line. This is what it looks like from the front:



and the back:


Pretty neat stuff. Small, unobtrusive, and disposable. No more worrying about losing your tag and having to shell out 20 or 30 bucks.

I was able to make out "UPM Raflatac" on the back. A web search took me to this company that makes RFID devices: http://www.upmraflatac.com/northamerica/eng/. Wonder how this will affect the usage of ChampionChip tags? On one hand, the ChampionChip tags cost money, but on the other hand, they are environment-friendly in that that they can be used multiple times.

Running in Yosemite

The last weekend, we stopped by Yosemite National Park on our way from Death Valley. We came in through the east entrance (from Tioga Pass) and stopped for a hike to Gaylor Lakes. The trailhead is right there at the entrance. It took about half an hour to get to the lakes from the trailhead. Once up there, the weather was perfect and I just had to go for a 5-mile run even though I hadn't really planned for it. Absolutely beautiful. It's just a different feeling running in the grandeur of Yosemite, at 10,000+ feet with not a single soul in sight. Top it off with dipping your feet in the lake and you have a great run. The best thing is that since the hike is less than half an hour, you could just get a water bottle and get up there and go running to your heart's content. No need to lug your heavy backpack up there. On the way down, you can see a bunch of lakes/ponds on the other side of the road. We saw at least half a dozen.

Mark this as one of those hidden beauties of Yosemite.

How much can premature celebration cost - part 2

This weekend was the World Athletic Championships in Berlin, Germany. The women's 10,000m final was very interesting if you read this post at letsrun.com. Meselet Melkamu started celebrating a bit too soon (6 inches according to letsrun) and Linet Masai squeaked by for the win - by 0.1 second. Gold medal gone, just like that.

A couple of years I posted a link to another case of premature celebration. That one made the difference of bragging rights to the Chicago Marathon and an extra $60,000.

Moral of the story - unless your last name is Bolt, you better not start celebrating until after you've crossed the tape.

Prefontaine Classic 2009

We went to the Prefontaine Classic a couple of weeks ago, on June 7th, 2009 in Eugene, Oregon. This is our third consecutive year enjoying this event. The day was beautiful albeit a bit warm to permit any world records from falling. Below is a shot of Hayward Field, from Section A which is right in front of the finish line for the races. You get a side shot of the winners as they break the tape. Last year, we were in Section U, which provides you with a front-side shot as they finish. (Click on any of the pictures below for a larger version.)


The national anthem was the first item on the menu. This was followed by antipasti of a medley of field events - men's pole vault, men's long jump, women's discus, and women's hammer throw. Then started the main course, aka the track events, the first of which was the men's 400m hurdles. At this point, the announcer told us that we were now live on NBC TV, which was greeted by loud cheers all around. Bershawn Jackson comfortably won the hurdles in 48.38. This gave way to the highly anticipated women's 1500m with a field that read Gelete Burka, Nancy Lagat, Anna Willard, Jenny Barringer, Shannon Rowbury, Shalane Flanagan, Erin Donohue, among others.



The race didn't disappoint. Burka barely beat out Barringer by 1/100 of a second - 3:59.89 to 3:59.90. That's them finishing. Barringer had a great run down the homestretch where she almost caught up with Burka. You should've seen the expression of overjoyed surprise on her face - she was elated.

Then came the men's steeplechase with last year's winner Paul Koech being the favorite. That's him (below) winning in a comfortable time of 8:13.44, almost 8 seconds ahead of the second place.



It must have been an exhausting race, judging by these runners below. This is right after the race ended.



In the background, the field events contined to progress. The shot below is that of Dwight Phillips finishing his 8.74m jump that ultimately got him the first place. This broke the Hayward Field record of 8.49m set by Irving Saladino in 2007, who finished second this time with 8.63m.



Then followed the men's 3000m race with a field of Eliud Kipchoge, Bernard Lagat, Saif Shaheen, Alistair Craig, Matt Tegenkamp, Chris Solinsky, seen in order from right to left below. (There were others but they are not in this shot below.)



Lagat and Shaheen fought it out in the last couple of hundred meters. Shaheen pulled into the lead around the 200m but soon Lagat switched gears and with around 100m to go, he took the lead. He won in 7:35.92, almost a second ahead of Shaheen.



All this while, the field events continued. At some points, you could see three or four athletes in action simultaneously - someone running, someone jumping, someone throwing. It was pretty exciting, almost like a fast-paced video game. The above picture shows the lineup for the men's shot put, with a guy getting ready for the high jump in the immediate background, and another guy getting ready for the pole vault in the far background.

I don't mean to downplay the field events vis-a-vis the track events. Indeed, they have their own unique, inimitable moments. Below, Irving Saldino shows how to chat with the photographer while still jumping an 8.63. Perhaps that was the reason he lost to Phillips.



Or better yet, take the woman jumper below. She seems to be from the kung-fu school of long jump, unveiling here, for the first time ever, the soon-to-be-famous Flying Dragon style. This esoteric style is a few centuries older than the Fosbury flop technique in high jump. Unfortunately, I don't remember who the athlete is. If you do, please drop me a note.



Reese Hoffa won the men's shot put with a 71ft 10in throw. Here he is on his way out of the stadium, with a smile that seems to fit a persona of a gentle giant. The announcer reminded us that Hayward Field is the home of the 70-foot throw, there have been more such throws than anywhere else in the world. Adam Nelson, who won last year, fouled on all six of his attempts.



Sanya Richards (below) won the women's 400m easily in 49.86 seconds. Later she was in the Nutrilite tent signing autographs.



The men's 800m was won by Nick Symmonds in 1:45.86 beating last year's winner Alfred Yego. That's Symmonds in the pic below with Elijah Greer, a Oregon high-schooler following closely. Though he finished last here, he's supposed to be one of the up-and-coming stars with a lot of potential. A few days after the race, I was talking to someone in the little town of Tillamook, Oregon and he knew about Greer.



This was followed by the women's 800. Maggie Vessey, pictured below, won comfortably, beating out the favorite(?) Pamela Jelimo who finished dead last. The expression on her face after she won was worth a Mastercard commercial, though Visa being the main sponsors of this meet might not take too kindly to that. Check out this video; you can hear her say "Oh, my God!" She's the one behind everyone else at the completion of the first lap.



Then followed the women's 2000m with a field consisting of Vivian Cheruiyot, Maryam Jamal, Linet Masai, Kara Goucher, Jen Rhines, Sara Hall, among others. Cheruiyot won in 5:31.52 beating Mary Slaney's Hayward Field record and better yet, setting the fastest time ever on US soil.



As the winner started on her the victory lap, out came the athletes for what is arguably the grand finale - the men's Bowerman mile. The field - Asbel Kiprop, Alan Webb, Lopez Lomong, Leonel Manzano, Belal Mansoor, Shedrack Korir, etc. Kiprop won in 3:48.50 barely missing out on the Hayward Field record of 3:48.28 by Daniel Komen. If had hadn't done a Bolt by waving kisses to the crowd more than 50 meters from the finish, he might have had the record. Below is a picture at some point in the race, with all but the guy on the left with their feet in the air. Incidentally, that guy on the left went on to win.



Here's Kiprop doing a Bolt, albeit a bit restrained in comparison to Bolt.



The results showed up one by one on the scoreboard. They were hoping for a sub-4:00 finish by all. It looked good as the screen below shows. Alas, as the results scrolled by on to the second screen with more 3:XX.XX's, the last one burst the bubble - 4:01.09. Nevertheless, it was pretty exciting - 13 sub-4 finishers.



That was it for the races. The final event was the presentation of the Maria Mutola award. Last year was the inaugural one - won by pole vaulter Brad Walker. This year it went to long jumper Dwight Phillips. Here he is below, after being presented with the award by Mary Slaney.



A great end to a great meet. Best of all, it didn't rain! I think the announcer said something like 12,000+ was the stadium attendance, which if I recall correctly is slightly lower than last year's record of 14,000+. Everything was well-organized. The bib numbers that the athletes had, matched those in the booklet that we bought, which made it much easier to follow the races and also to compile this post. Though, I still don't understand why they have a hip number in addition. Nutrilite, one of the sponsors, had a tent set up and a little kiosk with cool stuff. We even got free T-shirts, energy bars, energy pills, and a carry-sack. There were a bunch of athletes signing autographs in the Nutrilite tent - Sanya Richards, LaShawn Merritt, Bryan Clay, etc.

We then headed out the gates and took a hop, skip, and a jump across the street to some absolutely fantastic ice-cream at Prince Pucklers.

(If you're interested, here's a link to my post from the 2008 meet and the 2007 meet.)

Another step closer to a sub-18 5K

Ran a 5K race in 18:38 this weekend. That's a new PR. Old one was 18:59, set exactly a month ago. No idea about mile splits; didn't see any mile markers. It was an out-and-back course and the splits were 9:29 and 9:09. I've been running a pretty consistent 30-35 mpw and a couple of tempo runs a week. I had been planning to start speedwork after last month's PR, but a friend in an online newsgroup suggested that mitochondria generation in response to increased mileage can last up to six weeks. (Which reminds me I still need to read up more on that.) So, I postponed the launch into the world of speed then. It got me 21 seconds. At this point, I think I'm sufficiently overconfident to make a sub-18 5K my next goal. I do plan to sit down and craft a good long-term plan, however, I'm leaning towards starting fartlek and/or hill workouts now.

Mt. Everest Climbers Measure Lowest Blood Oxygen Levels on Record

Here's the link to the story:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health_medicine/4298495.html

An average person at sea level has about 13-14 kilopascals (kPa) of oxygen in their bloodstream, University College of London medical researcher Dan Martin says. When his intensive care patients drop to around 8 kPa he gets very worried, and a normal person with 6 kPa of oxygen faces almost certain death. Imagine his shock, then, when he and three colleagues on the top of Mount Everest measured their own blood oxygen level to be between 2.5 and 4 kPa, the lowest ever measured in live people.

I tracked down the original article at the New England Journal of Medicine. Here's a link to the abstract:
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/abstract/360/2/140

and an excerpt:

PaO2 fell with increasing altitude, whereas SaO2 was relatively stable. The hemoglobin concentration increased such that the oxygen content of arterial blood was maintained at or above sea-level values until the climbers reached an elevation of 7100 m (23,294 ft). In four samples taken at 8400 m (27,559 ft) — at which altitude the barometric pressure was 272 mm Hg (36.3 kPa) — the mean PaO2 in subjects breathing ambient air was 24.6 mm Hg (3.28 kPa), with a range of 19.1 to 29.5 mm Hg (2.55 to 3.93 kPa). The mean PaCO2 was 13.3 mm Hg (1.77 kPa), with a range of 10.3 to 15.7 mm Hg (1.37 to 2.09 kPa). At 8400 m, the mean arterial oxygen content was 26% lower than it was at 7100 m (145.8 ml per liter as compared with 197.1 ml per liter). The mean calculated alveolar–arterial oxygen difference was 5.4 mm Hg (0.72 kPa).

For the full article, you'll need a subscription.

According to the article, the scientists also took tiny biopsy samples of their muscles while they were there and froze them; now they are studying them, primarily the mitochondria. I'm not a doctor and I don't really understand the implications and ramifications of all this, however, this stuff could perhaps be useful to runners one day. As it is, the benefits of training at high altitude are already well-known. Though I doubt you could, would, or should really run at 29,035 feet, maybe this study might provide us with a better insight that could make runners stronger and faster.

New year, new PRs

This weekend, I ran a 5K followed by a 10K. New PRs in both races - 18:59 and 41:20. Old PRs were 19:49 and 45:16. The old 10K PR was soft and that's why the big DOW-like drop. Pleased with the 5K time. The big difference has been the miles I've been putting in. I've been getting an even 35 miles/week for the last 5 weeks leading in to the race. Throw in a few tempo runs and it's good. I anticipate cutting it down even further once I start doing interval type speedwork. Current goal is sub-18 5K by the end of the year.

Prefontaine Classic unveils a new look

The Prefontaine Classic has a new look on the web. The site used to be http://www.preclassic.com, but now it redirects you to http://www.runnerspace.com/PreClassic. The site looks good with lots of info and video and what not. Much better than the simple text-only site they used to have until recently. The only problem is they haven't updated the records on their page. Check out this screenshot that I took today. The men's 100m and 200m world records are from the pre-Bolt era. Hopefully, they'll get to fixing it soon.

active.com - the new search interface is in a recession

I used to use active.com for searching for races. But over the past few months they've been migrating to a newer search interface. Problem is the new one isn't working half as well as the old one. Like the current economy, it seems to be in a recession. This is what has happened. First, they removed a link to the old interface which they used to call the "classic event search". This means you are forced to use the new one. However, the problem with the new one is that it doesn't do what you want it to do. I tried a search for races in San Diego, California in the time period from today (Dec 7, 2008) till Dec 31, 2008. This is what it gave me.



You'll notice two things wrong with the picture. One, there is no date listed next to the events and that means you have to click on each event to find that piece of information. Two, and more importantly, it shows events from Independence Day and Thanksgiving Day both of which are a few months out of the range I specified.

This is disappointing given that they do have all the information but just that it's not being displayed correctly. Hopefully, this is just a matter of time and they will resolve this issue soon.

How to become a wear tester for running shoes

Here's a simple two step process to becoming a wear tester for running shoes.

Step 1, you go to this site - http://weartest.newbalance.com/ - and sign up. This involves inputting some detailed information about your height, weight, foot widths, sizes, your running routines, etc.

Step 2, you wait. Patiently. Just because you signed up doesn't mean that they are going to start sending you shoes right away. It might be a few weeks, or even a few months. Their initial testing is primarily targeted at men's 9.5D and women's 7B and you have a better chance if you happen to be one of those.

The cool thing is you get to wear and test out shoes before they are available publicly. You get to keep them for a few days and run in them. At the end of the test, you return them, along with a detailed questionnaire about the shoes and your experience with them.

This is specifically for New Balance since that was my experience. I got to wear test the MR805. This is a lightweight trainer and meant primarily for interval training and speed work on the track. I liked the grip very much. Tested it on both the track and on wet roads and the grip was excellent. It's lightweight shoe and I'd definitely recommend it, based on my limited experience.

Dragging myself to a new PR

This weekend, I ran a 5K. Finished in 19:49 - a new PR. My old one was 19:55, set way back in 2004. The race was a bit blah. Got there about two minutes after the scheduled start time. Saw some runners already on their way and figured I'd probably missed it. But, found out soon enough that it was the 10K start and that the 5K had been delayed by 10 minutes. That worked for me.

The race itself was tough - for me. At a couple of points after the half-way mark, I felt like stopping. Legs were quite beat up. A cup of water at mile 2 definitely made a big difference. Mile 1 was in 5:54, the next 1.1 mile in 7:04, and the last 1 mile in 6:47. Notice the gradual slowing down.

Even though it was a PR, I never really felt strong during the race. Part of it was probably the start where I thought I was late and part of it was probably to a 15-hour day on the day before the race when we went to the re-opening of the California Academy of Sciences, which, btw, is a great place to visit. I was on my feet for over 9 hours.

After mile 1, I could hear footsteps behind me. For some reason, mistaking myself to be Haile Gebreselassie (who had set a new world record in the marathon the same day in Berlin) I put in a little surge to break away from them. Needless to say, reality caught up with me and so did those footsteps, and pretty soon I was passed by them - one of whom was a heart-attack survivor. I didn't know if my mouth was agape from amazement or just from the lack of breath. There was even a little 11 year old kid that was always ahead of me and ultimately finished in 18:12 something. Very impressive.

Comparing it to my 2004 PR was interesting. Fours years older and four pounds heavier, yet the time remains the same (19:55 vs. 19:49). Weekly mileage is/was the same in both cases. However, back in 2004, my usual runs were around 3-4 miles and I used to do speedwork once a week. Now, my runs are usually 5-8 miles but with no speedwork. Some of them are hilly, which is "speedwork in disguise." I figure with a bit of speedwork I should be able to go sub-19. However, what I think is more important is to work on my lactate threshold which is what was responsible for entertaining my feeble mind with thoughts of stopping during the race. We'll see what the next race brings.

Prefontaine Classic 2008

Last weekend, I went to the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Oregon. This year the meet started a bit early - at 9:30 a.m. with two specially arranged races. The men's 10,000m race where Kenenisa Bekele was to attempt to break his own world record. This was to be followed by another world record attempt, in the women's 5000m by Meserat Defar whose previous record had been broken by Tirunesh Dibaba only a couple of days before the meet.


That's Bekele in the pic above, with two of the guys that paced him. The race started off with great anticipation in the air. The meet commentator was great. He would tell us at the end of each lap what Bekele's current time was and compare it to his time in his world record run. Pretty much throughout he was behind by about 5-10 seconds.



In the end, he came close but didn't quite break it. 8 seconds was the difference. Nevertheless, the fastest time on American soil beating the previous best by 38 seconds. It was a great race. Lots of support from the crowd in general especially from a couple of Ethiopian contingents who showed up with their vibrant flags and colors and sounds. I think he might have made it if it were a bit cooler. Sitting there in the stands, I could feel the heat on my back.


It got hotter by the time Meseret Defar began her WR attempt. You could tell before even halfway through that this wasn't meant to be it.


She was off by a huge margin. However, she did set a new Pre Classic record. That's Kara Goucher above with Defar's time in the background. Goucher had a lot of support especially from this one woman sitting a few rows ahead of me who cried herself hoarse cheering Kara with each lap. Goucher looked exhausted for more than a few minutes after she stopped running. Similarly for Abdi Abdirahman - the local crowd was very enthusiatic for him.

Next was the women's 400m race that Sanya Richards (below) won quite easily.


The men's 100m followed - won by Darrell Brown in a not so exciting 10.07. No Bolt, Gay, or Powell though. Asafa Powell was in the Nutrilite tent signing autographs however. Then came the women's 1500 meters which was won by Gelete Burka in a new Pre Classic record of 4:0.44. Alfred Yego of Kenya set a new Pre Classic and Hayward Field record in the men's 800m with a time of 1:44.01. That's Yego below, at the finish line.


This was followed by the women's 100m hurdles. (As an aside, does anyone know why it's only 100m in the hurdles for women whereas it's 110m for the men?) Joanna Hayes won this race inspite of tripping over the last hurdle. This is how she did it.


While the races were on, Adam Nelson was helping set a new Hayward Field record. Hayward Field now has the maximum number of 70+ foot shot-put throws in any single stadium. This tidbit was courtesy of the commentator. (Wish I knew what his name was. He was excellent.) That's Nelson below on one of his throws. He even did a little victory lap in the shot-put pit - probably the shortest victory lap in athletics ever.


In another field event, Brad Walker won the pole vault setting a new American record of 19 feet 9-3/4 inches. He then attempted to go for the world record. The display shows 20 feet 2.5 inches which would've broken Sergey Bubka's world record from 1994.


The crowd was filled with anticipation yet again. Alas, yet again, they were disappointed. Nevertheless, it was a great performance. There was even a minor accident in the event when someone's pole broke in mid-air after he had just lifted off the ground. Thankfully, he hadn't gained much altitude and was able to safely come back down to earth. No pic though since I wasn't anticipating a pole breaking.

Next up was the one of the highlight events - the men's 2 mile race boasting a field of Bernard Lagat, Craig Mottram, Alan Webb, Saif Shaheen, Paul Koech, Rachid Ramzi. That's the field below.


Bernard Lagat won the race. Look at his Happy smile at the finish.


Then came the men's 200m. Wallace Spearmon won in a new Pre Classic record of 20.14. Below is the field coming onto the final stretch.



Next up was another highlight event - the men's mile. Among the field were Alan Webb, Daniel Komen, and Nick Willis. Shedrack Korir won, with the entire field coming in under 4 minutes. According to the commentator, there have now been 208 sub-4 minute performances.


There was even a Prefontaine lookalike - lane 1 below. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to map his bib, or rather hip number, to his name.



This brought us to the grand finale - the 800m womens race starring the crowd favorite - Maria Mutola. That's her below lining up for the start. The commentator was cool - he started the introductions lane by lane but when he got to her lane number, he said he'd skip it for a moment and then went on to finish the rest of the introductions. Then he came back to introduce Mutola and what an ovation she got. You had to be there to experience it. This was her last appearance at the Pre Classic and she had won this 15 times before.


She didn't disappoint her fans and won comfortably beating off a challenge from the young phenom Chanelle Price who actually took the lead in the first lap.



Right afterwards, the commentator announced the inaugural Maria Mutola award. This one went to none other than Brad Walker - with his new American record in the pole vault. Check out the swarm of photographers around them.



At some point they even introduced Prefontaine's mom and sister who were in the stands. They got up and waved. The crowd gave them a nice round of applause.

Overall, this was a great experience. A world record or two would've made it even better :) But, hey, that's not something you get to see everyday. Next year perhaps. If you're interested, this is my report from last year's meet.

Lineup for Prefontaine Classic 2008

What's the lineup for the Prefontaine Classic 2008? That's what I've been wondering too for the past couple of months. Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I decided to send an email to the organizers. I went to the main site - Prefontaine Classic and shot off an email to the id listed on that page. A week later I did get a response, telling me that they will be announcing the lineup this week. It also confirmed that Kenenisa Bekele will be running. If you look at their main page, it says Bekele as well as Meserat Defar will be attempting to break the men's and women's 5000 meter world record respectively. That's going to be something.

I was fortunate to get to go to the 2007 meet. Check out some pics here.

London marathon 2009 - 80,000 applicants in a day

I just happened to be browsing the London marathon website and this is what I found:

Due to an overwhelming response Phase 1 of the Flora London Marathon 2009 online entry ballot has now closed. The limit of 80,000 applicants was reached at 10pm on Monday 14 April.

Incredible. This is just a day after this year's race on April 13.

Hitting the wall

This is from yesterday's Osaka marathon. The lady in the Youtube link above is Kayoko Fukushi who was making her marathon debut. She fell down thrice in that last lap inside the stadium before finishing in 2:40:54. Just incredible. The video says it all.

Just for perspective, her half marathon best is 1:07:26.

How much can premature celebration cost?

How much could it cost you to celebrate too soon? Well, in this case, $60,000 and the rights to a marathon title.

This year's Chicago marathon apparently had an exciting finish in the women's race. Adriana Pirtrea had been leading Berhane Adere for miles. With less than a 1/4 mile to go, Pirtrea had a good lead of 80 yards. Unfortunately, she took the win for granted and started celebrating a bit too soon - jogging towards the finish and high-fiving spectators. Little did she realize when Adere caught up with her and blew past her and went on to win by 3 seconds. First prize - $125,000. Second prize - $65,000. Seems like the ingredients for the making of a Mastercard commercial.

On another note, the race director closed down the course after about four hours due to the intense heat (topping 88 F) and humidity. One person died on the course, about 50 had to be hospitalized, and 300 odd were treated on the course. Sure sounds like a tough one.

Chasing Kimbia

Came across this interesting site last week: chasingkimbia.com. In their own words:

chasingKIMBIA is a blogumentary that documents the lifestyle and training of some of the world's best marathon runners. In the fall of 2006 Matt Taylor lived with the athletes in their Boulder, Colorado apartment as they prepared for the Chicago and New York City marathons. The daily coverage was unprecedented for athletes of this caliber. Taylor's unrestricted access allowed him to provide a personal touch and a unique perspective into the lives of these otherwise super-human athletes.

Check it out. It makes for some interesting reading, especially if you are a runner. I found the entry for September 23rd very intriguing. It talks about the differences in the way Kenyan and American marathoners approach their goal. He gives the example of them trying to run a 2:08 marathon. The Kenyan goes out at a 2:08 pace on his first try and goes as far as he can. First time, maybe he gets to 25K at this pace. The next time, he gets up to 35K. On his third try, he might do 40K. Finally, he gets to his 2:08. On the other hand, an American starts off running a 2:16 marathon on his first try, a 2:13 on the second attempt, a 2:10 thereafter, and finally the 2:08. One is distance-based and the other is time-based.

Running through the seasons in merino wool

Has it ever happened to you that you put on a warm shirt to go running outside and discovered that it was a bit too warm? Maybe you put on a lightweight shirt and later found yourself staying out for an extended period of time and starting to feel cold? Surely there must be an easy solution to this problem than having to wear or take off multiple layers? Yes indeed, there is and it's called merino wool.

I discovered the joy of running in merino wool last year when I picked up a merino wool running shirt from REI. It's been a year, running through four seasons (or however many you can categorize California weather into) and I've been using it on a regular basis. Based on that experience, I can say that it's probably my favorite type of running shirt.

The cool thing about merino wool is that you can wear it when it cold outside or warm outside and it'll still maintain a comfortable temperature.It dries fast and doesn't hang to to sweat like cotton. I've used it in the 40F to 80F range with nary a complaint. Often, I might go for a hike/run combo and sometimes, I end up going elsewhere after the run, e.g., grab a bite to eat. The body tends to cool down after a while and it's in these moments that I find my merino wool shirt very convenient - I don't need to put on another layer. Then, of course, there are other benefits such as not having to worry about the shirt shrinking due to repeated wash-and-dry cycles and that it doesn't itch unlike some other materials. For temperatures below 40F, a lightweight shirt might not be sufficient depending on how you deal with cold. Likewise, once it gets above 80F, you might want to look at something even lighter such as some technical shirts made by Sugoi.

REI is a great place to buy merino wool shirts. Another good place to snag some bargains is Sierra Trading Post. Keep in mind that merino wool shirts typically cost more than a regular polyester shirt, but trust me, it's worth the extra money.

Dude, where's the track?

If you are a runner, chances are that, when faced with an upcoming move or planning a vacation to a new place, you might asked yourself - where is a good place to run near [insert your favorite place here] or is there a running track there? There are many ways to find an answer, but in today's age of Web 2.0 (or is it 3.0 yet?) where should you go first? But, of course, the web. With online mapping tools like maps.google.com, maps.ask.com, maps.yahoo.com, maps.live.com, and others, the quest for running places becomes much easier. If you are looking for running tracks, simply go to your favorite maps site and switch to the hybrid mode, input your intended location, and adjust the zoom level. Presto! Tracks are very easy to spot because of their oval shape with usually a patch of green in the middle. Also easily recognizable are running trails. This can also be used if you happen to be hunting for an apartment or house on craigslist. Most of the listings on craigslist have a link to a map. Click on it, switch to hybrid mode, and you can even measure distances from your intended location to the nearest track or trail.

If you are picky about measuring distances (like I am sometimes) then go to gmap-pedometer.com and zoom down to the level where you want, click "Start Recording." You can mark your entire route using a series of clicks on the maps and at each point (i.e., each click) it tells you the total distance. I use this quite regularly when I run new routes. This is especially useful when I want to figure out the distance between two points along my route where I know I can run fast without having to worry about traffic lights. Keep in mind, though, that this won't work as well if your route is hilly since the site doesn't account for elevation change. So, if you happen to be running up a mountain, it will tell you the distance in as-the-crow-flies terms, which invariably will be less than what you will be running.

Tools are cool, nevertheless, the good old method of asking people - in person or online - still remains useful, particularly if you want to know specific details about the neighborhood and other stuff that an online map site won't be able to tell you. Another good resource would be a running store in the neighborhood. Typically, most running store employees are runners themselves and have a good knowledge of places to run nearby.

Do you have any favored recipes for hunting down tracks and trails that you would like to share? Send me an email.

Good luck and happy tracking.

Prefontaine Classic 2007

Last weekend, I was at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Oregon. This is an annual invitational meet of the top track and field athletes in the world and is named after Steve Prefontaine, one of the greatest American runners of all time. This year's field was especially stellar - Maria Mutola, Craig Mottram, Alan Webb, the Bekele brothers, Bernard Lagat, Daniel Komen, Asafa Powell, Jeremy Wariner among others.

The meet started at 12:30 in the afternoon, but we got there at 11:00. Surprisingly, the best seats are in the general admission section AA which is right in front of the finish line. You just have to get there a bit early; it fills up quickly. When you go to buy tickets at the website, look at the layout of the track and the seating arrangements before buying the tickets.

The first event was the women's javelin throw, followed by the women's 400m hurdles. Then came the men's long jump. Here's a pic of the eventual winner Irving Saladino in action.



The men's 100m followed soon after with Darrel Brown winning in a relatively slow 10.42 seconds, probably because of the 2.1m/s headwind going against the field.

The men's 3000m steeplechase was next. Paul Koech (seen below) won in a time of 8:08.08 - a new Prefontaine Classic and a Hayward Field record.



Yuriy Borzakovskiy of Russia, the 2004 Olympic gold medal winner was the favorite for the men's 800m race. He's known to sit back and kick it in towards the end. Even with about 1.5 laps gone, he was quite some ways behind the rest of the field, but then, true to reputation, he surged all the way to the front.



However, Nick Symmonds of the USA had other ideas and matched him stride for stride and beat him by width of a shoe - 17/100th of a second - in a new Pre Classic record of 1:44.54. He got quite an ovation on his victory lap.

All throughout this, the other field events were in progress - shot put, javelin, triple jump, long jump, high jump, and pole vault. At some points, I managed to see both the high jumper and the pole vaulter in the air at the same time.

Liu Xiang, the current world champion won the men's 110m hurdles and Torri Edwards won the women's 100m race. This was followed by the men's 400m dash and then the women's 1500 which was won by Gelete Burka of Ethiopia in a new Pre Classic record of 4:00.08.

Sanya Richards of the USA won the women's 400m in 50.74 giving way to what was probably the most anticipated event of the day - the men's 2 mile race. Among those lined up at the start : Craig Mottram (Bib #104 below), Tariku Bekele (#101), Alan Webb (#103), Matt Tegenkamp (#109), Dathan Ritzenhein (#102), Ben Limo (#105). Kenenisa Bekele dropped out at the last minute.



The race lived up to its expectations. Mottram and Bekele found themselves leading the pack quite soon and that stayed so till the end. Alan Webb was trailing behind and he never caught up. As they came down the final 100m stretch, with more than 30-40m to go, Mottram started celebrating, turning to the crowd and raising his right arm in victory. Bekele just didn't have it in him to catch up.



Mottram finished in a new Pre Classic and Hayward Field record of 8:03.50. Apparently, he gave quite the interview afterwards. Bekele was second, followed by Matt Tegenkamp in a new American record of 8:07.07. Here's Tegenkamp posing for the pictures after his finish.




Next was the women's 800m. Maria Mutola of Mozambique won it 1:58.33 and got the loudest ovation of the meet. Below is a picture of the field during the race.




Apparently, she used to live in Springfield, near Eugene, and the local folks love her. This was her 15th consecutive win at the Prefontaine meet. In terms of consistency, she is one of the all-time greats. Check out the pictures on my photo blog of her surrounded by photographers after her finish.

Next was the men's 200m which was supposed to be a match-up between the world 100m champion Asafa Powell, the 2004 Olympic gold winner in the 400m, Jeremy Wariner, and the 200m winner in the 2004 Olympics, Shawn Crawford. However, Xavier Carter decided not to play by the script and was the eventual winner, with Powell finishing in the third position and Wariner a distant sixth.

The last race was the men's 1 mile - the Bowerman mile, named after Bill Bowerman. Daniel Komen of Kenya won quite easily in 3:48.28, a new Pre Classic and Hayward Field record and the fastest mile ever on US soil. Bernard Lagat finished second.



Just like that, it started pouring heavily. The sun had been playing hide-and-seek behind the clouds all day but it was nice of the clouds to hold their rain till the end. This is what it looked like throughout the three hours we were there.



As we walked out the announcer started saying something about the Olympics trials next year on this field and out come a bulldozer and scooped up a giant chunk of the earth in the middle of the green field. Apparently, Hayward field is undergoing a multi-million dollar renovation for the Olympic trials.

Eugene is a great place. I saw lots of runners while driving around. Lots of people including young kids and youth showed up for the meet indicating the strong support in the community for running. If you happen to be there on a Saturday, check out the Eugene Saturday Market. If you are driving you could stop by Crater Lake National Park which is about 140 miles away or Portland, about 110 miles away.