Wednesday, December 30, 2015

IBEX CUP - WINNERS

2015 

IBEX CUP 

WINNERS

Men's Division
Aaron Nowlin

Women's Division
Emma Liljenback

Iron Ibex*
Greg Fall


*Completed all three stages in one day, along with 30 miles - you crazy Greg!

Congratulations to the winners of the 2015 Ibex Cup and thank you to all who have participated. The trophies and/or plaques are en route for the Men's and Women's Division.  (Greg, I'm skipping giving you a trophy this time.)

While we might not have had an enormous number of runners, great things start small.  Hopefully, in one form of another, the event will continue to grow.  At the same time, the purpose of the Ibex Cup was achieved -- people laced up their shoes and got after it.

The Ibex Cup shows that there is no need for organized races, as the true runners know the only race that matters is the one against themselves, e.g. can you push yourself when no one is looking?

Along the way, I learned a few lessons.  GPS watches can be a bit fickle.  I stood too close to the starting line for one of the climbs while I stretched and got an additional ten minutes added to my time.  As Erik found out, you have to run through and a good way past the finish line to ensure your "position" is picked up as past the finish line.  (Erik - you still finished ahead of me, so no whining.) The GPS might have you twenty feet behind the line, when in fact you're twenty feet past it.

Another issue is corrupted data.  Occasionally the data on my watch gets corrupted and cannot be uploaded.  That didn't happen, but it would be most unfortunate if one were to leave it all on the trail so to speak and not be able to upload the stage.

For me, it was difficult to actually motivate three weeks running (no pun intended).  Even though the last two stages were only a mile each, I had to drag myself to complete those two stages.  Perhaps it had something to do with running the 3.6 mile stage twice.  Ugh!

Finally, I took 4th place, which is all I've ever wanted in my f***ed up life . . . Semi Pro - 4th place