Post-Marathon Video Captures It All

In honor of Jimmy, Emil, Jay and Melissa, Alfredo and all who competed this weekend, I present, once again, a salute to endurance athletes.

Salute to Tri Wildflowers

Congrats to Jay and Melissa Carlton and Alfredo Cacho for finishing the Wildflower Olympic distance triathalon: swim, bike, run and they did all three. Alfredo will continue training for a half-ironman, while Jay and Melissa will probably eat a lot.

Eugene Recalled, Surgery in Sight

Eugene Marathon - the high water mark of my running career...so far. You couldn't ask for better weather - 40s to start - or terrain - net downhill along a shaded path beside a river.

Meanwhile my arthroscopic surgery has been approved by the HMO. I meet my doc next week to sign various releases promising to allow mediation should he accidentally remove my back. But why not believe the best?

Emil "The Machine" Cheng finished the Palos Verdes Marathon yesterday in four hours and fifty-two minutes. This is a very hilly course and he battled cramps along with flu-like symptoms. Even a seasoned runner like Emil gets caught up in the excitement and goes out too fast. There is a penalty for such giddiness. Emil's race report is up on his blog.

Miwok Madness

According to Jimmy Dean Freeman: "...62.4 miles; 9:50 per mile average in the worst race conditions I have ever run..." That included fog, wind and rain, plus the aforementioned 10,000 foot elevation gain. But congratulations to Jimmy. Obstacles overcome made the triumph better.

Miwok A Lot

Running zealot Jimmy Dean Freeman is bounding along the heights of trendy Marin County, battling 10,000 feet of net elevation gain and a bad back at the Miwok 100K.

Twittering the race today, Jimmy informs us that Advil has done the trick, easing back pain as he reaches mile 28 in 4 hours and 27 minutes.

More later.

Equal Time

While mentioning Vietnam, I neglected Cambodia. The Khmer Republic fell on April 12, 1975. U.S. helicopters airlifted out our embassy staff, a few Cambodians, and the press. We didn't bother telling the Cambodian government we were leaving. And while we spirited away the man who'd been prime minister for the last three days, several members of his cabinet refused evacuation, staying to suffer the fate of their people. Prince Sisoweth Sirik Matak, Long Boret, and Lon Non were executed by the Khmer Rouge. What a grave that country became. They still haven't unearthed all the Killing Fields.

Every April, around Buddha's birthday, I send an email to a Khmer friend whom I met in Cambodia. She was five when the communists took over. Her father was taken to the grounds of a factory and shot. She and her mother were forced to work in the rice paddies. Starving, they ate bugs. Nowadays, her teenage daughter doesn't believe things were so bad. ("Bugs! Why would you eat bugs! That's so gross.")

And for all that, the Cambodians were remembered in a film - The Killing Fields, which twisted itself into intricate yoga poses to mitigate Khmer Rouge savagery.

Hollywood's good for a couple of Nazi films every year. But no one's made a movie yet on Darfur, or North Korea or Mao's butchery of 60 million Chinese. I guess some slaughters are more equal than others.

Jason and Tiffany's Wedding

Mostly current Team in Training folk at tonight's nuptials down in Whittier. Most will run 12 or 18 miles tomorrow. Being young helps.