Thursday, October 7, 2010

Thursday

Rough day for me in the mental department. Kind of pissy and I vented for 16 miles. This Saturday is the Hawaii Ironman, the most amazing day in the world to me. 6 times I raced in Kona and it was my passion and motivator and job. I still feel the bitter sweet tug this time every year.

10 comments:

Uli said...

It's not what it was, it probably no longer what it was to you.

I'm here first time since 2002 and don't feel the slightest itch to race. Some many athletes are arrogant and even rude. And frankly, I think the drug abuse is greater than ever.

Lucho said...

Ya, I have heard that from many friends. So maybe I'm lucky that I remember Kona as it used to be? On the drug front... of course. I know age groupers that dope and pros that have always doped. The drugs follow the money!
Cheers Uli! And thanks for the pics on Slowtwitch.

Anonymous said...

I feel the same way. I get sad, maybe alittle depressed, even jealous of the people who are there. I love Kona. Would love to race it again someday. I have heard that it is not the same. Same with IM Canada. It has lost its charm. Even the Hogs breath coffee shop, a mainstay in Penticton, is now a Starbucks. Things move on I guess. Part of the reason I left tri was because of the influx of elitism and attitude. It HAS gotten much worse. I might venture to say there is more drugs amongst the arrogant ametuers than maybe the pros. Totally unfounded but just a thought I have had. Anyway, I still miss going there to race and get sort of down when I am not there. Felt great on my long run yesterday! Thanks. Eric in MN.

Claus Bech said...

Doping in triathlon... Call me naive, but I've always loved to think that triathlon was reasonably drug free, due to it's lack of serious media coverage and money. But I understand that even among the agegroupers it's a growing issue! I mean, I love to watch professional cycling and I'm cynical about the drug issue: it's entertainment and mødt of the guys, managers, sponsors and even the media Knows that drugs are somewhat part of the game. But age group triathlon... Tim, without pointing anyone out in particular or the sport in general, could you elaborate a bit on your impression of the size of the use of drugs in triathlon. We just had a guy in Denmark who got caught for using EPO, but I believe it's very rare in the Danish triathlon community - but then again, I might be naive...

Lucho said...

Eric- I still feel that middle/ front of the pack runners are some of the more arrogant people though. Peruse the Letsrun message boards sometime. Triathletes may be arrogant too but runners can be just down right mean a-holes to others. Hell, Anton Krupicka said Ironman was "retarded" (good word use for a guy with such a costly education). It's that type of judgmental attitude that I get from runners a lot more than triathletes. After Western States Kilian was getting flack for wearing white compression shorts. His clothing was being judged... funny.

Claus- Ugh, this is such a sticky issue. Having been a professional, and a POOR one at that (I say "poor" because a round of black market EPO can run $2000 every few weeks. Or so I hear.) I knew that I was competing against guys that doped, but I also knew that I was competing clean and against other clean guys and that made it bearable. At most US domestic IMs the guys were probably clean. I was drug tested 6 times out of competition and twice at the finish line by the way. I was just a lowly 8:50 guy too. There are guys going a full HOUR faster than I ever could. Marino is my pick to win tomorrow BTW.
As for AGers, you can generally see the results of doping. Look at body fat % and muscle mass. HGH has a tendency to be obvious. Not sure if you saw Nina Kraft in competition back in the day but holy crap! That girl was UNnatural looking on every level. Recovery times in relation to performance... if an age grouper (or pro) is racing 3 Ironmans in one month and winning them all... test him! And that really does come down to the point. Why not have mandatory testing for the winner of every age group and the entire top 10 at Kona? Of course beating the tests is stupidly simple, but it might at least give people some faith and deter the use a bit more. And don't give me the $$$ issue. IM is a billion dollar corporation. In the end I think it's always better to give the benefit of the doubt and to fight the good fight. Karma will take care of the dopers.

Anonymous said...

Yes, I hear you. I have not really been around enough runners to catch that, tons of tri's compared to a handful of running races done mostly for fun I have not had a fair comparison. I do know that the arrogance is high amongst the local road cycling people here though. I have only looked at letsrun a few times and from what ive seen it is very quick judgement and everyone seems to have the answers. Maybe with my focus on the marathon now I will see it a bit more. Sometimes to be fair I think that message boards dont really show the real person as they can hide behind code names and say what they may not have said if people knew who they really are and what they are really capable of, or NOT capable of. I have decided though to try to not focus on THEM and worry about me and mine, in other words don't let others ruin experiences I love. It is a work in progress for me!
Thanks! Eric, oh and how do I get this so I don't show up anonymous, I am not up on this blog thing yet.

Lucho said...

I would always argue that the attitude when posting as "anonymous" is the true person. In public I think we all, on some level, play to the crowd...

I would tell you to avoid the message boards. I'll answer your questions nicely. The blogosphere tends to be a fairly civilized arena.

Brett said...

I currently view ultra running as a sport more pure than others. I could be wrong there too. But hopefully that never gets perverted with drugs like others do. Wait, is beer a drug? :)

Lucho said...

Brett- About the time that an ultra runner can support his/her family by winning 100's you'll see dope starting to be tempting. At what lengths would you go to feed and clothe your children? You have to understand that not all athletes view sport as a pure endeavor. I'm sure that our founding fathers believed that government would never be corrupt. Jim Creighton probably never thought dope would be an issue in his 'pastime'. But with money comes the chance to make a living. Glory of course comes to the table too. The ego is an amazingly powerful thing. If there aren't drugs in ultra running now, there will be.

Claus Bech said...

Yeah, drugs in Sports and in general is an interesting and delicate issue. I guess it's got to do with somewhat basic stuff like honesty, cheating, trust in other people, fairness and sportsmanship. There's lots of motives around and I find the (self) excuses for using drugs really interesting in the inter-athlete communities, while I find it hard to accept the non active spectators harm about the use of drugs in elite Sports, while theyre big consumers of PED's themselves, in order to just living a normal life. Well, enough said, as long as each person can face the mirror in the morning and proudly tell their family and friends about their achievements, it's find with me.