Mike Wilson
Webmaster & Statistician
Valparaiso
|
Mike WilsonWebmaster & Statistician |
I continue to make changes (improvements?) to the web site. All race results posted this year will include an age graded time based on the work of Howard Grubb. I hope we can eventually add an age graded competition to the Gold Cup Series just like we did for our Overall competition in 2008. I am in the process of re-writing all my software so that it can support multiple clubs. Ron Lynn has volunteered to begin assisting me so one of the challenges will be to segment the various information types such that they can be integrated on the web site with a single version of the home page.
I invested a lot of time last year (over 200 hours) developing an online ability to sell memberships purchased via credit cards. We ran into a couple of hurdles that had to do with PayPal and other credit card processors requiring personal social security numbers in order to process monthly deposits over $500. So far, we haven′t gotten past this.
This winter, it has been especially tough to keep up the training. There seem to be fewer cold weather races in our area so I′ve gone to Illinois for three of my first four races. I′m planning to run a half marathon in Arizona in the spring and after returning from a few weeks vacation, it will be getting back to the training routine. Hopefully, I won′t have "enjoyed" the warm weather too much!
I was honored by the Calumet Region Striders at the Gold Cup banquet with the "2007 RRCA National Volunteer Award" for my contributions to the club as webmaster over the past 4-5 years. (That standing ovation is something I will never forget and will always cherish!) I truly enjoy making our web site an accurate and timely source of information for our members.
However, I will be looking to train one or more replacements for this vital role as I look to step down (or at least back) from this position. If you are interested in participating in this training, please let me know (see e-mail address below). I will plan to conduct a series of in-depth training classes to show what goes on behind the scenes as well as to help plan the course of future additions to the web site and the technology that makes it happen.
We have already added a new competition for this year called "The 2008 Overall Gold Cup Championship". This required creating new web pages and adapting the Gold Cup scoring programs to a non-age group basis. This was completed shortly after the first Gold Cup race in January.
And now - back to my other passion - Running! Why not do some different things this year?
Where have I heard that before (see 2006, 2007 below!)?
This year I′m going to climb a lot of steps in a short time (over 5300 total in 3 events in 29 days).
| Date | Event | Steps | Floors | Time |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1/27/08 | Step Up For Kids Aon Building Chicago IL | 1643 | 80 | 16:48 |
| 2/10/08 | Tackle The Tower Oakbrook Terrace Tower Oakbrook Terrace IL | 680(x3) | 31(x3) | 5:53 5:48 5:42 |
| 2/24/08 | Hustle Up The Hancock John Hancock Building Chicago IL | 1632 | 94 | 17:08.2 |
And, I′m going to run with my daughter as she tackles her first marathon May 24. [We ran the Bayshore Marathon in Traverse City Michigan and it turns out she was better prepared than I. She beat me by about 6 minutes!]
I′m anxious to get my training runs in to see if I can get back to the speed I had before last year′s injury (see 2007 below). But only time will tell if that is now completely in the past. I still haven′t gone to see any doctors. I think my injury cost over $11,500 in medical fees (before insurance) and I still don′t know what was the cause of the injury or the cure. Only time will tell!
In early April, I completed my 30th year of running. I completed my 428th race in December.
I had an outstanding stretch of competition from late May through August. I competed in 15 events and won my age group each time! The last one did me in though as I injured my foot in an off-road race and even after six month, it occasionally bothers me.
I will continue to look for new racing opportunities to continue running as long as my body will hold up. See you at the races!
Why not do some different things this year?
Where have I heard that before (see 2006 below!)? I thought this would be the year to try my first ultra - The Lakefront 50K at the end of March.
I didn′t get my training started when I should have so I decided to do a gradual(!) build of my training miles to over 50 miles a week in about 12 weeks.
Everything seemed to be going great. I had a couple of very good races in March (including a 4th place age group finish at the Shamrock Shuffle).
The Tuesday after the Shamrock Shuffle and exactly one week after a 28 mile training run, I took one step into a short training run and was in mortal pain. Something didn′t want to stretch! Like an idiot, I assumed it would stretch out as I warmed up. I continued the run for 10 miles.
The following Thursday I did about 8 miles but with a lot of discomfort. I couldn′t let myself even think about the injury. The 50K was in 2 days!
I went to the Lakefront 50K thinking I could tough it out and at least finish. But, that was not going to happen. As I completed the first of the 3 loops, I couldn′t even start running again after taking a short break. I was heart broken. I got in the car a drove home.
I decided to take it easy for awhile but even that didn′t seem to make the pain go away. The strange thing was - it only hurt while running! I could walk with no pain - in fact I did a 9 mile walk with no difficulty.
I finally went to see my doctor and he checked me for a hernia. He sent me to a surgeon for more checks. The surgeon did not think I had a hernia.
So, I went of a "sport medicine specialist" at a local clinic. After an MRI which showed nothing, I continued to try to run and actually ran the Spring Fling at the end of April. I wasn′t able to run again for 4 days so I went back to the specialist. He said to stop running and get some physical therapy. Ouch!! That really hurt! In 30 years of running, I had never had an injury that caused me to completely stop running.
The month of PT actually did help! (Or was it the month of not running?) In any case, the strain in the upper right leg seemed to be getting better. So, I ran a race in early June. I had a great time if the course was really a 5K. But.... it was another 3-4 days before I could run again.
As the pain in the right leg dissipated, it became more obvious that there was another problem. The groin area was in some amount of pain almost continually while running but at no other time. I finally went back to the surgeon again in August. He still found no hernia indication but did order a full bone scan of my body to make sure there was no stress fracture that we couldn′t see through other techniques. I was also concerned that somehow cancer might have entered my body again (prostate cancer January 2000). I also had a lingering suspicion that the scar tissue from the prostate surgery might be the source of the pain.
Well, the bone scan showed nothing. So I decided to continue my training program to get ready for the Chicago Marathon on October 10. I also decided to not see another doctor until after the marathon. In any case, I seemed to be slowly getting better although my racing pace was still a long way from where I would have liked to be.
As luck would have it, October 10 was a very hot day. I had hoped to run a Boston Qualifier (4:15:59) that day but I didn′t really know what to expect - both due to the weather and how much pain I could endure. And, as luck would have it, I felt absolutely no pain as I started to run. I felt that if I could make halfway in 2 hours, I would have a good chance to meet my time goal.
Did I mention it was hot? It turned out to be the hottest Chicago Marathon ever - over 85° and high humidity. I carry a bottle with me while running marathons and I made up my mind early that I was going to fill the bottle at every aide station and make sure I consumed the liquid before the next aide station. I didn′t make two hours for the first half so I decided to make sure I could finish. I continued my fluid strategy and at no time was I unable get the fluid I wanted at each aide station. I think I heard about the closing of the course when I was around 20 miles. But I kept going. I wanted (I needed!) to finish in under 5 hours.
There were so many people walking after about half way that it was impossible to maintain any target pace. I made sure I walked through the aide stations and then continued my jog to the finish line. I finished in 4:53:07. I have to say that I actually felt better after this one than I did in 2005. Like I said, "As Luck Would Have It!". And it was my slowest marathon by almost an hour! (Also speaking of luck, a photo of me in the 1983 Chicago Marathon was included in the 30th Anniversary Poster of the Chicago Marathon!)
As I was winding down my training for the year and taking a rest after Chicago, I was continuing to feel improvement. By late November, I was running with no pain. In late December, I recall going for a nice crisp run and feeling how great it was to be out there - running!
Why not do some different things this year? Can I get out of my running "rut"?
The answer is an emphatic YES! It′s January 30, 2006 and yesterday I did my first stair climb. I took the big "step" and climbed the (former) Amoco Building - now the Aon Building as part of the Step Up For Kids event.
On the Friday night before the MidWinter Cruise 5K, I checked the Step Up For Kids web site and found that I could still enter. I was immediately "inspired" to see if I could do it so I signed up.
I have to say that I haven′t felt that kind of "high" from an athletic event in a long time. After looking at last year′s results, I thought I might be able to complete the 1643 steps (80 floors) in about 25 minutes (3 stories per minute or 60 steps per minute) based on a little training on a Stairmaster and a stepper. It may have been the fact that I had worked in the building for 18 years, but I felt inspired.
I finished in 18:18 and I felt great at the finish. I can hardly wait to do another one. As soon as I got home, I signed up for the Hustle Up The Hancock waiting list. There′s probably not much chance of making it. Now I′m looking for the opening of registration for the Go Vertical Sears Tower Climb.
2006 promises to be an interesting year!
Pinch Me! I can′t really believe it′s happened. I started this year with a goal of vigorously competing on the CARA Circuit with, I hoped, an outside chance to make it to the top three and thus qualify for an award. Along the way, I hoped I would actually be able to get an award at one of the circuit races. Never in my wildest dreams did I think it would come at the Chicago Distance Classic Half Marathon. With a target registration of 10,000, I felt I had a better chance in one of the smaller races (say 600-800). I have to admit that I have really been on cloud nine for a couple of days - I′ve been telling all my friends and family. And, at least momentarily, I will be in first place in the CARA Circuit Standings Male 65-69 going into the Park Forest Scenic 10.
The Chicago Distance Classic has a special place in my race history - it′s the first race I ever ran back in 1978 when it was a 20K. I learned a lot that day (went out way too fast! I did manage to finish in about 91 minutes). Since I had met John Bingham (The Penquin), the race director, a couple of years ago, I searched him out and he was gracious enough to sign my third place award. I′ll have a special place for this award in my trophy display case.
This year has seen the web site undergo major revisions a couple of times.
All pages are generated (via Visual Basic and JavaScript routines) based on information stored in Excel spreadsheets. Over the year, I have moved more of the data to spreadsheets to enable more flexibility in changing the appearance of the many web pages. I have tried to simplify the directory structure to be based on information type and then by year. This will eventually make the archiving of information by year more efficient. All of the Visual Basic routines I have written to produce the various web pages have been revised to reflect this directory structure. As the links to the older years are phased out, the programming will begin to simplify.
Late in the year (during my 4 weeks of rest and recovery from a long, hard and fun year of running), I decided to convert all of the new web pages to xhtml, and to validate each page with the W3C (an international web language standards organization) validation software. This was completed just before Christmas.
A major addition this year was the various calendar features. The central calendar on the home page highlights the events of the current month while the Event Calendar (under Events on the home page) provides a two year calendar of all scheduled club events (Gold Cup Races, Sponsored Races and various meetings or other events). The generation of the Sponsor column on all pages is now dynamically generated via JavaScript and hence will be current throughout the year with all sponsors.
I also added a page of links to Other Race Calendars - I′m always looking for a new race or a race to fill an idle weekend. Also new under Member Info is a page called "Incredible Feat!". I′m always amazed at the incredible things our members do so I added this page to tell a few of these stories.
New this year are "Junior Striders" and "Beginner Runner Programs" under Events. Sue Brown, Misty Chandos and Sommer Watts have been instrumental in bringing many new members (including many under age 19) into our growing running club.
I truly enjoy designing and maintaining our website. I probably average 10-15 hours a week either updating infomation and changing something to see if I can add some value to the web site. I processed results from over 285 races this year to display the accomplishments of our members. In 2002, only two "Other Races" were displayed - in 2005, 261 were displayed (plus the Gold Cup Races).
I also had a tremendous year running in 2005. I competed in 64 races (I′m 64 years old), I ran all the Gold Cup races (second year in a row for a Jim Cox award) and I passed the 300 race mark in career races. I finished in the award level for 47 of the 64 races. More than 35% of these race were run for the first time. I also placed 3rd in the 60-64 Gold Cup standings.
I also competed in the Chicago Area Runners Association (CARA) circuit and placed 6th in the 60-64 age group. Next year, I will be in the 65-69 age group and hope to win my first CARA circuit award. I again qualified for the 2005 CARA Participation and the CARA Long Distance awards.
In addition to attending 10 of the 12 board meetings in 2005, I was also a member of the Gold Cup Committee.
2004 was been a fabulous year of running for me. I set a number of goals for this year and by the end of the year, I will have accomplished all but one. In the course of this running, I have met a lot of new friends. I truly feel privileged to be able to say I am a Strider. And, two of my adult children started running this year so I now have even more encouragement to run.
2004 Goals:
This year has seen major changes to our web site. My intent is to make our information useful, timely and interesting so that the web site is a resource for our members. In addition to keeping the Gold Cup Results and Standings current, I have scanned the results of over 150 Other Races to display the accomplishments of our members outside the Gold Cup series.
I have also added more than 35 photo galleries of our members enjoying being runners. The daily birthday update gives us all a chance to send a greeting to our fellow runners on their special day. The Member PR page and the Boston Qualifiers page provide additional information on member accomplishments.
The newly revised Home Page provides improved focus for club activities (highlighted notes in each area as well as notes of general interest) and club members/activities in the slide show.
This was my first year as a Strider. I happened to be sitting behind President Sue Brown at the Flurry Scurry in January and overheard her talking about the Gold Cup Series. She said the first race would be the Mid-Winter Cruise in Park Forest, IL in a couple of weeks. I had run that event many years before and thought it would be interesting to do it again.
It didn′t take long for me to become "hooked" on being a Strider. I started meeting some very interesting and engaging people.
About mid-year, I volunteered to help Diane Arias with the web site. I began working with Pete Klaeser, Strider statistician, to see what I could do to automate the production of the Gold Cup race results and also the Gold Cup Standings pages. Late in the summer, Diane announced that she was expecting twins so I quickly learned as much as I could about the whole Strider web site in anticipation of doing a lot more.
I was able to complete 22 of the 26 Gold Cup races and actually won the 60-64 Male Age Group. I also volunteered at the Chicago Marathon aid station and that inspired me to prepare for a couple of marathons in 2004. And, I set my sights on becoming a Jim Cox award winner.
Contact Information:
E-Mail:
Updated: 2/25/2009
 | Calumet Region Striders, PO Box 225, Griffith, IN 46319 |  |
| Copyright ©1999-2009 Calumet Region Striders. All rights reserved. Version: 8.09.17.01 | ||