Race Reports and Other Anecdotes
Cynthia Loynd's Comments on the Sam Elpern Half Marathon, 9/13/2008: Thanks, the half marathon was a great race! Lightfoot runners are wonderful hosts.
Thanks, the half marathon was a great race! Lightfoot runners are wonderful hosts.
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Richard Kurtzman's Comments on the Norwalk Summer Series, 9/13/2008: Don, I just wanted to say "Thank You" to you and all the Lightfoot Volunteers who offered their time and effort to make this year another enjoyable Summer Series. Results were always posted in a very timely fashion, and awards were quickly, yet efficiently, given out. I first ran the Norwalk Summer Series back in 1982, and after all these years, it continues to be the very best summer series around. Thanks again for your dedication to this year's Summer Series. Richard S. Kurtzman
Don, I just wanted to say "Thank You" to you and all the Lightfoot Volunteers who offered their time and effort to make this year another enjoyable Summer Series. Results were always posted in a very timely fashion, and awards were quickly, yet efficiently, given out. I first ran the Norwalk Summer Series back in 1982, and after all these years, it continues to be the very best summer series around. Thanks again for your dedication to this year's Summer Series. Richard S. Kurtzman
Don Capone's Catskill Mountain Relay report, 8/10/2008: A very awesome day and I'm still flying high and have not come down yet. Emmy got us there in fine fashion with her usual 85-90 mile per hr. driving. She is amazing. Among other things we’re going to start calling her “Miss Multi Tasking” because she’s usually got 7 things she’s doing while she’s driving. I don’t know how she does it but she does and quite well I might add. As with any first initiative our primary shortcoming was timing. We were 15 minutes late for Franks leg (#4) and Pam had to start it for him after having run leg #2 & 3 consequently. Frank had to literally jump out of the car after 2 plus hrs of driving and attack the worst leg on the course. And I mean worst. The hills would bring tears to your eyes just looking at them and Frank had to do them with no warm up. As usual Frank is courageous and game but he still had to do a fair amount of walking. Leg #5 I did which was exactly opposite to Leg # 4. It was a net down hill. Only problem was half way thru the leg the weatherman fulfilled his promise for thunder storms and it started raining heavily. The scenery on this leg is really beyond description and you can view the photos to see for yourself. Myriam took the next leg. Courage and guts abounding and got soaked but with an excellent time. Emmy took leg 7 and did real well after having done 2 races on Saturday plus going to dinner with friends after the second. We all get reckless and overestimate ourselves occasionally. Frank took leg 8 and struggled. I’ll let him explain it to you. I took leg 9 and it was quite an experience relighting the fire. Real tight and wondered if I’d ever loosen up but I did. The hills don’t quit in the Catskills. They go on and on and when you think it will end around the next corner it just goes on and on. Finally you stop expecting the hill to end and that’s where the mental break through occurs and you can focus on the road directly in front of you. Expectations suck up your mental & physical energy. As I’m approaching the end of my leg I’m seeing Emmy’s not getting out of the car to start the final leg and I knew she was having a tough time getting restarted as we all did. She did “take the baton” for the final leg and finished in fine fashion. A couple of beers and some food smoothed out and rounded out the event at the end. Moral of the story: All’s well that end’s well. We all learned a lot.
A very awesome day and I'm still flying high and have not come down yet. Emmy got us there in fine fashion with her usual 85-90 mile per hr. driving. She is amazing. Among other things we’re going to start calling her “Miss Multi Tasking” because she’s usually got 7 things she’s doing while she’s driving. I don’t know how she does it but she does and quite well I might add. As with any first initiative our primary shortcoming was timing. We were 15 minutes late for Franks leg (#4) and Pam had to start it for him after having run leg #2 & 3 consequently. Frank had to literally jump out of the car after 2 plus hrs of driving and attack the worst leg on the course. And I mean worst. The hills would bring tears to your eyes just looking at them and Frank had to do them with no warm up. As usual Frank is courageous and game but he still had to do a fair amount of walking. Leg #5 I did which was exactly opposite to Leg # 4. It was a net down hill. Only problem was half way thru the leg the weatherman fulfilled his promise for thunder storms and it started raining heavily. The scenery on this leg is really beyond description and you can view the photos to see for yourself. Myriam took the next leg. Courage and guts abounding and got soaked but with an excellent time. Emmy took leg 7 and did real well after having done 2 races on Saturday plus going to dinner with friends after the second. We all get reckless and overestimate ourselves occasionally. Frank took leg 8 and struggled. I’ll let him explain it to you. I took leg 9 and it was quite an experience relighting the fire. Real tight and wondered if I’d ever loosen up but I did. The hills don’t quit in the Catskills. They go on and on and when you think it will end around the next corner it just goes on and on. Finally you stop expecting the hill to end and that’s where the mental break through occurs and you can focus on the road directly in front of you. Expectations suck up your mental & physical energy. As I’m approaching the end of my leg I’m seeing Emmy’s not getting out of the car to start the final leg and I knew she was having a tough time getting restarted as we all did. She did “take the baton” for the final leg and finished in fine fashion. A couple of beers and some food smoothed out and rounded out the event at the end. Moral of the story: All’s well that end’s well. We all learned a lot.
Joe Handleman on the Lightfoot 3-miler, 6/14/2008: Hi Don - Just a brief note to tell you how much I enjoyed the 3-miler and how much I am looking forward to the next five races. You are doing a great job with the summer series. As you know, I was rushing off to a wedding in Princeton right after the race. The ice cream hit the spot - then the rapid scoring enabled me to get to the wedding on time. I ate my fresh bagel while driving and then enjoyed the rest of the day. I didn't get home until 1:00 AM, driving in a heavy rain storm. So THANK YOU again for handling the race so efficiently. Your running friend, Joe
Jeff Steadman on Al Nirenstein: DON: I'm looking forward to the runs this summer and expect to get back to Connecticut in time to see you Saturday morning. I have a thought that I meant to share with you earlier but neglected to so so. I believe Al Nirenstein (hope I've spelled his name correctly) passed away last winter. My thought is that you might consider some special recognition for him this year, either by dedicating the 2007 series to his memory or naming the 11-mile race in his honor. Most of the current runners probably don't recognize his contribution to the series over the years or recognize him for the hero he was and for his sacrifice in Vietnam. I remember years ago a number of times that I ran neck and neck with him and tried to beat him (while he was trying to beat me) without considering that he was in a wheel chair; we only considered that we were competitors. I could run faster than he could on the up-hills; he was faster down-hill; and we were fairly even, I recall, on the flats. I also remember the time that an abandoned or stolen car was left on a narrow bridge which I believe was on the 11-mile race course the night before the race, and Al removed it before the race by himself. From his wheelchair he hooked a chain to the car and his van and towed it out of the way. Today, when so many people seem to be so self-absorbed with their own enjoyment, I think it's more than appropriate that we take a moment to think about someone who made such a sacrifice and never to my knowledge complained about anything. GEOFF
Al Toth on Gus Stepp, November 25, 1931 - August 7, 2007: My friend Gus has let me down. First time, though. He was supposed to help me out at the first water stop on the Lightfoot 11 miler. From now on water stops and running Sunday 6 a.m., walks, and poetry readings and jazz performances will have a pinching void for me. He was from Detroit. His father worked shifts at Chrysler and died at 42 from cigarettes and rye whiskey and working shifts. His mother, Gus told me, was a true saint, and he still believed that even when she gave his new leather shoes to a barefoot kid in the neighborhood. Gus learned the art of stuffing just the right amount of paper in his old shoes, and maybe that carried, over into his shoe-gooing the hell out of old running shoes. He actually tried out for football in high school and didn't start running seriously until he was in the Air Force. You could get out of KP and cleanup if you were on the battalion running team. He was in Korea during that war, in the signal corps, and that got him into studying electrical engineering at Syracuse, on the GI Bill. He worked for GE, and he was most proud of his contribution at Cape Canaveral in guidance tecnology for GE. He got an MBA and moved to Wilton, getting a job at Stauffer Chemical in Human Resources. When that company left, he consulted for Pitney-Bowes, and moved on to become a full-time employee. He retired three years ago and stayed very busy with running, poetry groups, reading to children in Bridgeport schools, sitting on the board of Renaissance. And of course helping out at races for Pequot, Wolfpit, and Lightfoot. At the seven and nine milers he tried in vain to correct my handing left-handed water cups to right-handed runners and other defects in my aid-station techniques. And I never lost the opportunity of trying to get him to swear off watching boxing, of which he was pretty knowlegeable. I'd say our back and forths ended in a draw, which is the way it should be with friends. And that's it. A life. A life of a classy man who never raised his voice and always tried to help out his fellow man and fellow runner.Goodbye, Gus. It was an honor to have known you. Al Toth
Knickerbocker 60K - November 25, 2006 - Emmy Stocker (click to read) Kate's piece
First New York City Half-Marathon, by Don Capone. Alarm went off at 4:27 having slept very little. Totally forgot that my Quads would keep me up all night from the Westport race and that's exactly what they did. Picked up Frank and Emmy at 5:37 in Scarsdale and headed into the City. I was told they closed out the race at 10,000 runners but the announcer said between 10 & 12 K. Anyways it was a mess of people. By the way I felt, I was doubtful I could finish. The race started in Central Park and it looked like the same ole boring Nyrrc race course of loop de loop the park but this time we did one and a quarter loops and then took a left turn onto 7th ave. WOW. Like hearing the bridge of a funky rock tune, you could just feel the lift of inspiration plus AC/DC was blaring some rock tune over the load speaker. Once on 7th ave. it started to rain but nobody cared. We were all into it big time. We ran right through Time Square (nothing boring about that) then took a right turn onto 42nd St. and headed for the West Side Drive. Took a left onto the WSD, ran past Ground Zero and finished in Battery Park. Baggage Claim was not good. Took over an hour and a half to get my stuff and a subway ride back to the car. Seventh Ave was unforgettable. Felt like an American in a great American city with great American people. "Crossing the Border" by Emmy Stocker (in the third person). She was on her way to Canada on a family trip right about the time they caught the terrorist whack jobs in London so security was in a heightened state so there was a longer then usual line trying to get across the border, so what does Emmy do. She jumps out of the car and decides to go for a run leaving her husband and children in the car. I kid you not. Anyways long story short...after she finishes her 5 miles she finds her husband has already crossed the border with the children and the car and she must try to walk across running shoes and all. She had to do some very fast talking to make it happen but she won the customs guy over. Press release:Geoff Etherington, 78 years young, drove 60 miles for over 1 hr 20 minutes from Killingworth, CT to participate in the Lightfoot Summer Series 11 mile race at Silvermine School Saturday morning August 11 and establish a new course record of 1:35:18 at an 8:40 pace per mile. The old record was established by William Bell in 1995 (1:43:29). Excellent Work, Geoff.
Press release:Geoff Etherington, 78 years young, drove 60 miles for over 1 hr 20 minutes from Killingworth, CT to participate in the Lightfoot Summer Series 11 mile race at Silvermine School Saturday morning August 11 and establish a new course record of 1:35:18 at an 8:40 pace per mile. The old record was established by William Bell in 1995 (1:43:29). Excellent Work, Geoff.