[This article was submitted by Len Goldman]
The 55th annual RRCA Convention was held in Albuquerque from May 2 to 5, and for me it was kind of "deja vu" as the first convention I attended in 2001 was held in the same city. Also attending from LMJS were Karen Andrews and Jeanine Holmlund. This was Jeanine's first convention and I believe Karen has been to 4 or 5 conventions in recent years. I need to preface my remarks that sadness accompanied us to Albuquerque as our friend and club member, John Momper, was seriously ill at the time and passed away upon our return, May 6.
This was my 13th consecutive convention and up until about 6 weeks before the convention I was not intending to go, feeling it was time to do something different. However, I was selected by the RRCA as the 2012 Browning Ross, "Spirit of the RRCA" award recipient. This is one of the most prestigious RRCA awards as it is named for a long distance running pioneer, one of the RRCA founders, and its first President. The funny thing is that when I first received the e-mail about my selection, I thought it was an early April's Fool day joke, but the RRCA assured me it was for real. I would like club members to realize that this award would not have been possible without the support of LMJS, that it reflects well on all of you, and that our club has a national reputation for its myriad of activities and offerings. In the past 13 years, our club has received seven national awards from the RRCA, which I believe is the most of any running club during this span.
The RRCA Convention is all about a multi-day immersion in running. It starts from the day of your arrival and ends when get on your airplane to fly home. It is a unique experience and I still find it a lot of funafter all these years.. Each day is filled with fun runs, presentations, inspirational talks, camaraderie, reunion, eating and non-stop talking about running. Its a real test of endurance because you are on the go from early morning to late at night, with a little down time in-between to relax and sleep. Both Karen and Jeanine arrived on a Thursday to take advantage of the welcoming reception and taste of Old Town, while I arrived mid-morning on Friday. This allowed me to meet up with the rest of the attendees at the Western Region breakout session. It was followed by a luncheon in the Grand Ballroom with guest speaker Bob Julyan, who spoke about the history of New Mexico. Friday afternoon consisted of more seminars, followed by the RRCA business meeting and board elections, with some free time to walk around the Old Town section. That evening, we walked over to the nearby New Mexico Museum of Natural History for a buffet dinner of Mexican food cuisine and dining among the dinosaurs complete with disco music and dancing. Jeannine showed a few moves on the dance floor that are not usually part of her dynamic warm-up drills.
The next morning we got to sleep in a bit and myself, Karen, and Jeanine did an abbreviated version of the scheduled fun run since we would be racing a 10K the next morning. We met the rest of the runners at a nearby park and had a New Mexico favorite, a breakfast burrito about the size of a small torpedo. Thoroughly stuffed from it, we managed to waddle back to our hotel and get ready for a morning of more seminars on running, coaching, and club management. The luncheon speaker was Olympic medalist and well known runner Meb Keflezighi. He spoke about his career as a runner and what keeps him motivated. Meb's has a foundation whose purpose is to promote health, education and fitness. In addition, a 2nd guest speaker was Chester Nez, one of the original Navajo Indian code talkers during WW II.
That afternoon, there was just one set of seminars to attend and then we had a part of the afternoon to relax or sight see a bit. I choose to relax as I knew it would be a long evening with the gala awards dinner, guest speaker, and the awards themselves. The evening started around 6:00 p.m. with a live auction of big ticket items and the closing of the silent auction with smaller value running related stuff. Those activities ended around 7:30, with dinner being served in the hotel ballroom and over 300 people were in attendance. The guest speaker was a young man, Bryan Boyle who had survived a near fatal car accident, came all the way back from it to run marathons and finish Ironman competitions. His talk focused on the resiliency of the human spirit.
The 2012 RRCA award presentations were next and each of the award recipients had the opportunity to make some remarks in accepting their award. I tried to emphasize the values that Browning Ross represented and how they are just as important now as they were when he and others founded the RRCA in 1958. The values are vision, leadership, and determination and these traits are critical to the success of any organization. It is a very humbling experience to stand before your peers and address them. At the end of the awards ceremony, it was time for picture taking and it was great to have my fellow LMJS'ers standing with me during the photo op time. The evening finished a bit after 10:30 and we still had to get up fairly early for an 8:30 a.m. race start.
Every convention has a race as part of the proceedings and it was the "Zoo Run" which features a half marathon, 10K, 5K and kid's fun run. All three of us chose to do the 10K, running at altitude presents an additional challenge. This race was part of the Convention in 2001 and it seemed like the course was pretty much the same. In addition to the altitude, the morning of the race the desert winds were blowing. The course has a gentle elevation gain on part of it and in one section we ran on a dirt road, with the remainder on concrete and asphalt. We started and finished at the Albuquerque Zoo and the race went through a corner of the of the zoo, residential areas and a bike path. It was a very well supported race, clear mile markers and frequent water stops. My goal was to run 7 minute pace, a concession to the thin air, knowing that going out too fast would result in an oxygen debt I probably couldn't fully recover from. The plan was for Jeanine and I to try and run as much of the race together as we could. Since she hadn't been able to train as hard as she usually does, she thought a more modest pace for her was realistic. Our first mile through residential streets went right on pace, a shade under 7 minutes, but as we transitioned to the bike path, we hit the headwinds for the first time. Fortunately, we only ran into the wind for a short distance before turning around and running on the other side of the bike path, but our 2nd mile pace was a little over 7 minutes. Mile 3 continued on the bike path with the wind at our back during this stretch. Jeanine and I were still together, hitting 3 miles right around 21 minutes and we soon reached another turn around that took us back into the wind, but still on the bike path. Our mile 4 split was a little over 28 minutes and at this point Jeanine fell back a bit off the pace, while I tried to keep it going. At about 4 1/2 miles we turned into a residential area, and that would be our surroundings for the remainder of the race. I continued running 7 minute pace hitting 5 miles at a little over 35 minutes and tried to hold things together for the final 1.2 miles. I managed to finish in 43:30, 7 minute pace and was very pleased with the result plus finishing first in my 5 year age group despite the fact that Ross Bolding, the 2012 RRCA master runner of the year, was also running in the 10K and is in my age group. Jeanine's placing was even better as she was declared the first female master age group runner, and won the "gold medal" and a gift certificate to a local restaurant. Her time was 44:27. Karen had a good race also and finished 7th in her age group in 52:53. So it was a successful end to the convention for the LMJS representatives.
The 2014 RRCA Convention will be in Spokane, WA. The convention race will be the
Bloomsday 12K, one of the more famous races in the U.S. and one I have been interested in doing for a number of years. I know the convention organizers personally and I think they will do a fantastic job, so mark you calendars for May 2-4, 2014.
