Friends,

Sunday Nov 4 is the NYC marathon...also the date of my mother's 55th birthday. The nihilist female athletes of my family have decided to run the marathon again.....and based primarily on a two year long guilt trip laid upon me by the birthday girl, I have the exciting opportunity to be a part of this fantastic event. For those of you that will be along the course cheering,leering and jeering the pack of runners, please be sure to look for the three following individuals.

My Sister Kim

- If you are unfamiliar with what she looks like.....watch the movie Terminator 3. Now imagine they made successive Terminator movies along the same lines of the first three...with each new terminator being exponentially stronger than it's predecessor. Somewhere around Terminator 14, you would be in the ballpark of what my sister's current physique is, along with her current attitude towards "her time" . If the aforementioned is still not enough to pick her out of the crowd....look for the person with blurred circles centered around her hips .... Kim is projected to finish some time 20 to 21 minutes after the start.
My Mother Randi


The svelte and gorgeous double fiver birthday fox out there for her 5th or 6th time to tackle the beast that is distance running. Often likened to Elle Macpherson.... but hot ....Randi will be out there with her name and birthday-shirt on clocking in somewhere around 4.5 to 5 hours. Give her a cheer or a high five...she will be out there loving life and kicking ass.
Me - Rj.

In the early miles it will be hard to pick me out of the crowd. I will be smiling and enthusiastic, happy to be alive and healthy with a crowd of people running around me. This will end some time before the completion of mile 1. From mile 2 on, I will deteriorate at a rate negatively correlated to the amount of encouraging cheers I receive. Sad to say, I am not the titan I once was. A man that often complains of a stiff back, warm rooms being too drafty, and ownership of shy erections...I will gently fade from the lead pack of runners settling somewhere out in the 4 to 7 hour pace group. I expect nothing less than colossal failure and exhibition of inadequacy. I have trained for about 4 weeks in total for this race....most recently running 10 miles 3.5 weeks ago when I decided it was time to start "resting" the legs. I probably have a better chance of inventing time travel by Sunday than actually finishing.


That being said, I offer the following promises in return for coming out to support any of the above mention individuals.
I WILL NOT

1.I will not ask you to do anything. Period. Have a blast or sleep in...whatever.

2. I will not try and convince you that you should run along with me, run the marathon next year, run anywhere in general or even hint that you should exercise a little more.

3. I will not invite you to come "check out" the marathon expo. Will not require your attendance to any type of pre/post race pasta party, runners cotillion, forum discussion on strategic shoe tying or powerbar gang bangs .

4. I will not ask you to strategically position yourself on any street corner, intersection or location with any type of food fuel, ,steroid drink or motivational item that would detract from you holding your own beer, beers, friend's beers, bag of wine or beernoculars.

5. I will not ask anyone to listen to me talk about my training schedule, the meals I am going to eat in preparation for the event, the hard runs I did, the hard runs I did that I thought were easier than they should have been or how my training buddy is really cool even though he was a townie from a state school.... and how we should all hang out sometime.

6. I will not finish the marathon and start saying "ya it was fun....but i'm thinking tri-athalons are more my thing"
I WILL

1. Give myself a 30% chance of finishing....possibly less if anyone wants to put some cash on the table and give the gamblers some better odds.

2. Give you a chance for a great photo op of me chugging a budweiser tall boy at miles 19 (ish) and 23 (ish).

3. Give you a chance to watch me fail miserably covered in realization of physical limitation and tears.

4. Sneak in my sisters website for a donations since you probably did something horrible to someone this year and this is a good way to mentally write if off. http://www.active.com/donate/rwp07NYCMARATHON/kimberlyons



Whatever happens, I will be drinking beer like a pregnant viking starting some time early evening on sunday...so at least make it out for that. Hope to see you all out there...give me a call and lets get it going.

Rj