In this month’s Footprints newsletter, we cover the annual CARA race award banquet which had the club well represented and bringing home lots of bling from their running achievements during the 2017 competition. Our feature article is a tribute to Sir Roger Bannister who recently passed. He is of course the man who back in the day, broke the running equivalent of exceeding the speed of light...the sub-four minute mile. Bob Holliday who paid homage to Sir Roger, weaving in a tale on how a group of club runners set out to break their own elusive barrier--the 5 min mile, and his chance meeting with Bannister.

Yup, we’ve also got member news, social events, a special member appeal from our web team, a visit from Frazer san, Quiz night fun, race news, a recap from the Swinging Bridge Trail race donation check presentation to Lake Forest Open Lands and CCL...all this and more.

SOCIAL EVENT CALENDAR

Chilly Chili--compete and eat!

Sunday, March 18 at 1 PM

Get Out the Vote on the best Chili! This will be a yuge event...the biggest ever!

Chili tasting...FEEL THE BERN!

Hosts: Karin and Julian Gordon

307 E Sheridan Rd, Lake Bluff

Karin and Julian Gordon have graciously offered to host this year's Chilly Chili cook off. Make your favorite chili recipe and bring it in a crock-pot. There will be awards for the following categories: Best Overall, Spiciest, and Best Vegetarian. The club will provide non-alcoholic beverages and all the chili fixin's. You are welcome to bring your favorite alcoholic beverages.

PARKING: Driveway is on the south side of Sheridan Road and abuts the intersection with Ravine Forest Drive, which is on the north side. You may park on Ravine Forest Drive as well.

QUESTIONS: If you need further details or have any questions, and we mean any questions please contact Giles Chick, our Chilly Chili Captain supreme. Like what’s a Scoville unit? What can I take as a prophylactic to mitigate chili induced flatulence? What beer pairs best with chili? Is a ghost pepper hotter than a carolina reaper? Should I use hot peppers liberally or be conservative? Or, I just bought something called satan a plant based meat substitute and want to know whether it tastes good or evil in vegan chili?

WINE TASTING

Thursday, April 5 at 7 PM CDT

Courtyard Wines Lake Forest

Wine Tasting Event at Courtyard Wines in LF. Lee Harkleroad, owner of Courtyard Wines and LF Wine and Cheese is a long time supporter of the Club, and has been a major sponsor of the Swinging Bridge Race for all five years of its existence. This will be a great social event with an opportunity to taste some unique wines and showcase Courtyard Wines to our members.

Lee will chose a special theme for the tasting and provide an array of snacks.

Come on out and join us for this cool club social.

Website:       http://www.winestorelakeforestil.com/

TIME IS not ON MY SIDE

A group of club members recently flew down to Naples FL to participate and cheer on runners in the Half Marathon.

First, congrats to Laura Kennedy for winning her age group to bring home $100 in prize money. In Senior Grandmaster’s they gave out cash for 1st and 2nd, but she lost out on 2nd (which paid a whopping $150 vs her $100 winnings) by a razor thin 0.1 sec time margin to Karen Miles of Ft. Meyers. Laura who was very philosophical about the outcome and loss of income said, “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes you get what you need”. Laura added, I told Karen Miles that I'm getting her next year! Way to go Laura! In the two Eds are better than one category, Eddie (the rib) Packel was 2nd in his AG. Eddie Zylka was 47th overall AG in the males, on a steady training diet of downhill skiing and phish food. Jim Sykora was 150 OA, a nice job given his modest training beforehand. And Keith Stewart...well Keith Stewart he, uh Keith he ran too😲!

BOSTON BOUND

Good luck to our runners!

Dave Zeisler, Geoff Wilson, Lauren Sykora, Carol Lundahl, Amanda Macuiba, Andre Bennatan, Brian Wakefield and Mike Marty. This will be Carol’s first time at Boston...wicked awesome!👍

Boston has its own unique traditions

In Hopkinton on race day morning, the BAA Start Line crew, Zack Jordan and

Stormy Jardin put finishing touches on the timing mat while working around

LFLB club member Geoff Wilson.

Geoff tells us he makes this his

pre-race tradition -- being the first (and the only) runner to lay across the start line to take a short snooze while snuggled in his blanket to help him relax. Zack, in his strong Boston accent shared this. "We usually get a couple nut job runners like Geoff every year at the start line and we just work around them." Stormy added, Geoff is so cute and I love tucking him into his teeny little blankey!

Post-Geoff Start in Hopkinton

The 2018 CARA RACE SEASON

The CARA Circuit is getting ready to kick off with the Shamrock Shuffle on March 25. We encourage everyone to join the LFLB team for the Shamrock Shuffle, amd participate on the circuit. There are a series of races from 5K to the Marathon. There are various age groups for competing. For information on participating on team LFLB at Shamrock and on the CARA Circuit, contact one of our Race Directors, Dan Bergeson or Steve Clark.

I QUIZZED MY PANTS...
THE EVENT WAS SO FUNNY!
Our annual event at the Lake Bluff Brewery, was hosted again by our version of Rhys Darby...Giles Chick. Thanks to the lucky 13 that showed up to take part! The upside to a low turnout is that everyone gets a prize! The winning team was The Trivia Dopers (Lori, Liisa, Paul and Sami).

Runners up were Gaytors and Friends (Joy, Megan, Lynne and Scott).
The prize for the best team name went to Hold Me Closer Stormy Daniels (Joette and Dan, Jeff McMahon, Leslie and Kimberly).

As well as having fun, the night raised $100 for the Puerto Rico charity through you caring! https://www.youcaring.com/servepr-96812

MARCH FEATURE STORY

SHATTERED!
Or 'To 4:59 from 3:59’

A Homage to Sir Roger Bannister

By Bob Holliday

Upon learning that Roger Bannister had died, I was prompted to write what follows. In the fall of 2003, I had just come back from my sabbatical at Columbia, having spent both the summer before and after the academic year in NYC, so I had been there for 15 months. I had joined the Central Park Track Club and the twice-weekly speed workouts, Tuesdays on the track, Thursdays on the roads of Central Park, and lots of New York Road Runner’s Races left me in good shape. (I think I raced over 20 times during my stay in NYC—compared with my typical average of one to two races per year.)

Now back in Lake Forest, on the last Tuesday in October, at Greg Domantay’s final workout—always a timed mile to see how far we progressed from the mile time trial of the season’s initial workout back in March—I was thinking about trying to run close to 5 minutes.

Gregg Johnson showed up as a spectator, saying he was there because he heard I was going to try to break 5 minutes. I never said that, nor really thought it. Kevin Koy and Scott Renken also showed and made a wager on my breaking 5-minutes. (I can’t remember who bet I would and who bet I wouldn’t. I think the amount was $5). I was not crazy about all the attention—but Coach Domantay said something like, “Looks like today is the day.” His other advice..."Don’t go out too fast." (Pretty obvious) adding, "But don’t go out too slow on that first lap or you won’t even have a chance.” (Really good advice).

We were running on a 400-meter track—so 4 laps. But that’s 1600 meters, so to make it official, Greg always backed us up to the mile marker on the track (just over 9 meters back from the start/finish line). It was important to keep this in mind because it’s not so much fun to do too much calculating when one needs to stay focused on the running. Trying to average close to 75 seconds per lap, if the first lap goes in slightly under 75 seconds, then you know you’re on pace as well as already having run those extra 9 meters. The last three laps will be just that—exactly one lap each.  

Off we go—Greg makes sure that I am in the front to avoid any traffic jams.  Immediately, a pack of four forms: Adam Cortright, Dave (The Big E) Engelke, Chuck Wathen, and me.  First lap in 74 seconds. Second lap in 73, so halfway in 2:27. Good news and bad news: ahead of pace, but a sneaking suspicion that this is too fast.  Third lap in 76—still under 5-minute pace, but slowing down by 3 seconds is definitely not good news.

Coach screams: “You can’t wait—you have to go now.” Chuck, one of the smoothest runners I’ve ever seen, moves to the outside and on the backstretch moves into the lead. I stay as close to him as I can, hoping I don’t clip his heels. I feel good on the final curve, but on the final straightaway, I feel awful. I don’t remember who finishes where in our group of four—I may well have been last.  But my fourth lap is another 76 for a mile time of 4:59.

I worry that Greg has slowed the time down as he’s calling out the seconds at the finish so I would break five minutes. He assures me he didn’t, and both Kevin and Scott did their own timing (since they had a bet), and there was no argument about who owed whom, so I’m happy to believe everyone.  

Was this a big deal for me? You bet. In 1980, as a grad student in Southern Illinois, I tried to break 5 minutes for a mile on my old high school track. My timing friend was anything but kind and was adamant that I had run 5:01. The experience was so painful that I didn’t try again until the summer of 1992 at the Lake Forest/Lake Bluff Summer Track Meet at Lake Forest High School track (a tradition that I believe no longer exists). On this date, I did break 5:00 (running 4:57). I ran with Craig Dean (who also broke 5 minutes but had done so many times) and a young high-school freshman named Colin Young (son of Rick Young). Colin also broke 5 minutes for the first time that evening. That’s an experience we’ll always share. But Colin did this many more times. Seven years later, he is a senior at North Central College in Naperville. It just so happens that North Central is hosting the Division III NCAA  National Track and Field Finals, so I’m able to watch this in person. Colin is entered in the 10k—that’s 25 laps on the track. He is expected to compete but isn’t the favorite. He runs away from the field, is the national champion, and each of his 6 miles is faster than 5-minute pace.

I joke that I didn’t measure up to the standard Colin and I set for ourselves back in 1992. But I always wanted to break 5 minutes one more time—so that evening back in 2003 is quite special. The second—and certainly the last time—I would ever do that.

Back to the summer of 2004, I’m teaching summer school at Columbia in NYC. On a Thursday morning I get an email from the Central Park Track Club saying that Roger Bannister is in town and is signing copies of his book, “The Four-Minute Mile”, at Paragon Sports, a long-time store way down on E 17th St, beginning at 4:00 pm. Bummer—I’ve got to teach class at 5:30 pm at W 116th St.  But wait—unlike at Lake Forest College, I have graduate students as Teaching Assistants—they grade homework and hold help sessions. Why couldn’t they sub for me if I’m a little bit late for class?

So I head downtown, get to Paragon at 3:30, hoping I’ll be first in line.  I’m not, but I’m in the top 20. Roger Bannister’s “handler” is a prickly young man who loves giving us directions:  

1.  You will call him Sir Roger.

2.  Just hand him the book(s) and wait for him to sign—don’t ask for special inscriptions.  

3.  Don’t make conversation.

4.  Don’t shake his hand.

As I work my way through the line, I can see that Sir Roger is not quite as prickly as his handler—he’s smiling, talking, and clearly enjoying himself. So that’s good news. But the line is moving pretty slowly because of his chattiness.  Even though I have my TA standing by, I’m still nervous about being late for class (one of my traits I wish I could get over).

I have the allowable limit of books and plan to get simple inscriptions for each of them.  And even though I see him being chatty, I’m such a rule follower, that I plan to follow the handler’s instructions.  As I get to the table, I watch him sign my books. When he gets to the last one (the one I’ll keep), I decide I want it personalized in some way. But I’ve not even thought about what he should say.  I’m ready to ask for “To Bob”, but that seems awfully boring. In what I’d like to think is one of my more inspired moments, it comes to me at the crucial instant:

“Sir Roger,” I shyly say, “could you inscribe this 'To 4:59 from 3:59’? He genuinely chuckled, said he would be glad to and then said: “There must be a story here. What is it?”  Fortunately for him, I didn’t drone on like I did at the top of this email. But I did give him the gist of the story in just a few seconds—and he was gentleman enough (after all, he is a knight) to seem interested. And he really did seem to enjoy one other detail that I told him about our Domantay workouts: On the workout closest to May 6 (the date of Bannister’s sub 4-minute mile in 1954), our workout was simple. Coach Domantay would start us off and when his stopwatch read 3:59.4, he would yell “Bannister”. We were to stop and take stock of where we were on the track, and naturally,  contemplate how far we were from completing a mile. We did this four times. It was a tough workout and we certainly got some appreciation of what Sir Roger accomplished.

He then asked me what I did in New York—I told him I was teaching summer school at Columbia and was maybe going to be late for class. “You’d better go then,” he said.  And even though I followed the rule and always addressed him as Sir Roger, I decided since I’d already broken two of the handler’s rules, I would go for a third one. I said, “May I shake your hand?”  “It would be my pleasure,” he replied.

The subway connections were kind to me on my trip back uptown, I was early for class, and I’m guessing I actually taught something that evening, I really don’t remember.

--Bob

The Iffley Road Track

Club members Ron Thomas and Tighe Magnuson took some spins on the track made famous by Roger Bannister where he shattered the 4 min mile mark.