Sandrat Trail Run, 1st Sunday in October, 2005  (by Ben Holmes)

 

The Sandrat Trail Run was a real fun time in ol' Lawrence, Kansas on the

first Sunday in October.  It was very humid and fairly muddy, due to the

rains during the night and early morning. The mud wasn't as bad as Steve

Riley (the RD) made it out to be, though, because this course drains well.

(Or maybe I'm just used to training in a lot worse).

 

Matt Brisch, fellow homebrewer and an incredible runner, smoked the course

in 1:09:32, to take 5th overall.  He finished with race director Steve

Riley, at the same time.

 

My little trailrunning training group did well:

"Good Ben" (Reeves), Jason Crosby, and Shane Jones ran a strong and fast

race, and came home with first and second place age-group hardware.  The

awards consisted of painted plastic rats. Kyle Amos was recovering from

an "elective injury" and couldn't run. I was recovering from a hilly 18-

mile Saturday training run, and was happy to finish within the century.

Alex Kovalev is back to running after a tough year, and cruised/lumbered

through the course just fine. Jeff Perry followed, and then passed

his "tantric mud vision", (a good-looking, young, mud-covered woman), and

finished strong. Eric Tiffany, back from his first road marathon, had a

very decent finish. "Marko" Jacquez had to run, recover, and then run off

to work (at the local running store). It was nice seeing Jason Daniels and

Paul Sidwell at a trail event, again.

 

Larry Miller, once again, made his annual (or anal) pilgrimage to run the

Sandrat from his home in Lafayette, Indiana. It was nice to see Ed Payne

and Dick Lipsey (from Lawrence), again. It was also wonderful to meet and

talk to (during the run) young Cara McPeak, of Manhattan, Kansas. It passed

the time well for me.

 

I provided the libations for the race, this year. I had promised Steve Riley that if he directed and held the race again, I would provide the traditional "Breakfast Beer", free of

charge. On tap for after the run were the following homebrews: Sandrat

Trail Ale, Siren's Song Fantasy Ale, and Gute Träume Kölschbier.  The first

two were "sipping beers" that required the utmost respect, otherwise you

would find yourself somehow on the ground and rolling in the mud.

 

Be sure to put this race on your calendar for next year, if you're in the

area. It's 9.6 miles of intense fun, followed by even more casual fun and

fellowship.  Where else can you get muddy with a buzz, before breakfast?

 

Kyle Amos has posted some photos of the finish area of the race at:

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/amos_k@sbcglobal.net/detail?.dir=/f4c3&.dnm=e047.jpg&.src=ph