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Lead Stories: Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Josh Cox: Miracles 50
Part II - The End of Faith
(Elite Athlete Blog - Entry #9)

Posted May 18th, 2008 at 1:30 PM by Josh Cox

Section: News & Results, Marathons, Motivation, Trail / Ultra, Elite Athlete Blogs, Josh Cox

Welcome to the official blog of U.S. marathon runner Josh Cox. Every other Wednesday visit http://joshcox.thefinalsprint.com for Cox’s latest blog entry and for more information, also please visit: www.joshcox.com

Faith – noun: strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual understanding rather than proof.

“Those who wish to succeed must ask the right preliminary questions.”
- Aristotle,
Metaphysics, II, (III), I.

Pascal’s Wager
“Belief is a wise wager. Granted that faith cannot be proved, what harm will come to you if you gamble on its truth and it proves false? If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation, that He exists.”
- Blaise Pascal, French Mathematician, physicist, and religious philosopher

The 1997 Mountain Masochist 50 Miler started just before dawn. The leaders and I passed 3 miles in under 18 minutes. Six minute pace, easy, I could do this all day, only 47 more to go.

During “ultras” – that’s runner nerd for “ultra marathon” – there are aid stations about every four miles. If athletes are hungry – they eat, if they’re thirsty –they drink, if they need a rinse – their crew douses them with water. A crew is essential; all the top runners have one. Crews, typically, are buddies who enjoy running but aren’t dumb enough to actually race beyond 26.2 miles. My crewman was Chad Davis, a walk-on from Sacramento, a cool guy – particularly since he rented out our attic.
Through 20 miles everything was going according to plan.

Only 25 more miles before I unleashed my secret strategy, I thought. They won’t know what hit them. (See last blog for secret strategy.)
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Josh Cox: Miracles 50
Part I - A Boy Named Sue
(Elite Athlete Blog - Entry #8)

Posted May 1st, 2008 at 4:00 PM by Josh Cox

Section: News & Results, Marathons, Track & Field, Elite Athlete Blogs, Josh Cox

“I believe in miracles.
I believe in a better world for me and you.
Oh, I believe in miracles.
I believe in a better world for me and you.”
-The Ramones,
I Believe in Miracles

“Son, this world is rough
And if a man’s gonna make it, he’s gotta be tough
And I know I wouldn’t be there to help you along.
So I give ya that name and I said good-bye
I knew you’d have to get tough or die
And it’s that name that helped to make you strong.”
- A Boy Named Sue
(A song written by Shel Silverstein made famous by Johnny Cash. A song about a dad who names his son Sue and leaves - the son vows to exact his revenge for his awful name. He finds his dad, fights him, his dad gets up, smiles, and explains why he named him Sue. )

“The secret of man’s being is not only to live but to have something to live for.”
-Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Russian literary giant & Casino fiend

Somewhere around 41 miles, in the high hills of Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains the race came undone. I could no longer run; a humbling experience for a self-assured 22-year-old college senior who, several hours earlier, had thought running a 50-mile race was a good idea. For the first time in my life I wished I were jogging – oh the horror – anything but the “J-word.” But alas, I was doing the S-word. Shuffling. Shuffling is what we runner’s do, we bypass the jog and enter straight into the shuffle. It’s part of the unwritten code – run slow, shuffle, but never, ever jog.
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Dathan Ritzenhein Named
Visa Humanitarian Athlete
of the Year

Posted November 27th, 2007 at 7:45 AM by Martin Kennedy

Section: News & Results, Track & Field

dathan ritzenhein finishing 2007 u.s. olympic men's marathon trials Two-time Olympian Dathan Ritzenhein has been named Visa Humanitarian Athlete of the Year by USA Track & Field. Ritzenhein will be honored December 1 at the 2007 Jesse Owens Awards and Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony held in conjunction with USA Track & Field’s 2007 Annual Meeting, November 28-December 2, in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Ritzenhein, 24, of Eugene, Oregon, earlier this year won the Healthy Kidney 10K in New York on May 19 in 20 minutes 8 seconds, breaking the Central Park course record of 28:10 set by Kenyan Paul Koech in 1997. Following the race Ritzenhein donated his winner’s earnings of $7,500 to the race beneficiary, the National Kidney Foundation. “I made a pact with myself before the race that if I’m fortunate enough to pick up this course record the least I can do is give back the first place prize money seeing as how this is professional athletics, but it’s a race for charity,” said Ritzenhein.
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Podcast 32: Interview with Susan Loken; the reigning USA Masters Marathon Champion

Posted March 29th, 2007 at 7:00 PM by Adam Jacobs

Section: Special Features, Interviews, Podcasts

Today’s podcast features my interview with Susan Loken; an ageless and elite masters marathoner.

Susan, a mother of three who first began running in her 30’s, is coming off of her third consecutive More Magazine Marathon title and is the reigning USA Masters Marathon Champion.

Her personal best time of 2:41:31 is only about two and half minutes above the Olympic qualifying A-standard time for women; a benchmark she is poised to reach in the coming months.

Download the podcast to hear Susan discuss the More Magazine Marathon; why/how she started running; finding time to train, work a full-time job and take care of her three sons; coaching the Foothills Sports Medicine Running Team; and her advice for others looking to get back in-shape and/or improve their lives through running.

Listen In
[PLAY] (To Download: Right click and select “save as”)

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Host: Adam Jacobs
Guest: Susan Loken
Producer: Greg Cherniet
Music: Ryan Ahlwardt & Darnell Perkins
File size: 7.80 MB
Length: 00:11:21

Check out every episode of TFS’s Podcast in iTunes!

Interested in featuring The Final Sprint Podcast on your site, blog or My Space page? Click here to learn how!

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Quote of the Day: 2/14/07

Posted February 14th, 2007 at 6:00 AM by Adam Jacobs

Section: Motivation, Famous Quotes

The Final Sprint and I wish you a very Happy Valentines Day!

In honor of this special day, I have decided to replace The Final Sprint’s standard Quote of the Day with a poem entitled: “Don’t Quit”

The author is unknown, but it was sent to me by the strongest person I know: My Mom. She is a loving mother and truly extraordinary woman who has exemplified the power of the human spirit by refusing to ever give up or lose hope. My family and I are very lucky and thankful to have her in our lives.

I hope that you all enjoy this poem as much as I have. I encourage you to pass it along to your friends and families and to read it each morning, before a big race, or whenever you might need a little inspiration.

“Don’t Quit”

“When things go wrong, as they sometimes will.
When the road you’re trudging seems all up hill.
When funds are low and the debts are high.
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh.
When care is pressing you down a bit.
Rest, if you must, but don’t you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns.
As every one of us sometimes learns.
And many a failure turns about.
When he might have won had he stuck it out:
Don’t give up though the pace seems slow –
You may succeed with another blow.
Success is failure turned inside out –
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt
And you never can tell how close you are.
It may be near when it seems so far:
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit –
It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.”

- Author unknown