‘That’s a Washingtonian, that’s a runner’

WRC Vice President Carla Freyvogel, current club member Charlie Ban, and club alumnus Jim Hage are all quoted at length in Jessica Goldstein’s October 25th article in the Washington Post’s Style section (or, “the gateway to the Sports section”, as we like to call it).

The excellent lead photo by Katherine Frey is of the start of our Sunday Distance Run, with Liz Lambert, Gerry Ives, Christine Hackman, Megan Haberle, Mike Manning, Carla Freyvogel, Rachel Clattenburg, Emily Buzzell, Drew Killian, and Kit Wells all visible in the foreground.

Clattenburg and Killian will be competing with their teammates at the 38th Marine Corps Marathon on Sunday.

That it appears Gerry is being chased by a hoard of very fit and accomplished women is no accident.

Works Cited

Goldstein, Jessica. “City of the Long Run.” The Washington Post Oct 25 2013. ProQuest. Web. 25 Oct. 2013 . <Link>

Every Cloud DOES Have a Silver Lining

FLASH NEWS: WRC scholar-athlete Daniel Yi, and his doping liability spreading idea from 2005, gets a mention in today’s New Yorker (“Tyson Gay and How to Clean Up Track”, by Nicholas Thompson, online edition). That article is available here, and Daniel’s original paper for Legal Affairs is available here.

Clattenburg and A Unicorn Go Forth and Win at Go Fourth 8K

Six WRCers and two compadres gathered early on Independence Day, at the historic Vienna Town Green. Hosted by our friends of the PVTC, together we sweetly sang the lyrics of the Star Spangled Banner to the accompaniment of an MP3 file played back on a BlackBerry held up to a P.A. mic.

In fact, we sang a little too fast for the frugivorous gizmo that symbolizes this Washingtonian life. Were we perhaps nudged out of meter by some magnetic inducement flowing from the extra high voltage 230 kV transmission lines looming above us?

Whatever the case, it was marvelous to watch the B.A.A.’s Jonathan Baker zoom off in a flurry, followed brightly by newcomer Daisuke Ogata, dressed in day-glo orange hat and shirt and mistaken more than once for a distant traffic cone. Rachel Clattenburg in red paced herself wisely, climbing up the ranks throughout the race. We slapped low-fives as we passed along the out-and-back course.

Everyone left the race with some quarry of Stars and Stripes, whether in the form of a beach towel, embroidered flags (both in original and Vermont antiqued flavors), or just the shorts they wore to the race. I offered my own flag to Daisuke as a gift, and he immediately requested to have his picture taken with it in the now-standard USATF display. What a great country, that even our silliest of motifs are accessible to all.

Full results are available here; WRC (& friends) results are below.

Potomac Valley Track Club Go Fourth 8K
W&OD Trail, Vienna VA
Thursday, July 4, 2013

5K  Name               G Age Time    M  F    Award
-- --------------------- --- ------  -  -   --------
1  Jonathan Baker      M  29 27:15   1      M20-29 1 B.A.A #Unicorns
5  Rachel Clattenburg  F  29 33:16      1   F20-29 1
6  Kit Wells           M  36 33:35   5      M30-39 3
7  Daisuke Ogata       M  38 33:51   6
12 Jay Jacob Wind      M  63 36:09   9      M60-69 1
18 Jerold Paulson      M  54 38:23  14      M50-59 2
33 James Scarborough   M  55 43:34  24
41 Benjamin Stutts     M  24 45:47 28:47*  27      M20-29 2
91 finishers
* late start, due to confusing pre-race instructions

UPDATE: A race report by Maggie Lloyd was published on RunWashington.com, here.

A Supposedly Tough Thing I’ll Probably Do All Over Again

Yes, we have most definitely relaunched washrun.org, as part of a broader communications effort this year: to share this club’s marvelous history across the past four decades, to enhance our ability to take on new running challenges, and to accelerate the telling of new and exciting stories. Allow me to point out a couple of new features and design choices that will hopefully work toward those ends!
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