Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Pictures from the weekend

Pictures from the weekend are online here. Some of the highlights are below:
At 6,000 feet above sea level
mmmmm...sandwiches
And they're off!
Kane gives us the TP salute. Nothing like a little Oregon sunrise to create some awesome running.
The 34th (and last) handoff--Nathan to Matt
The end is in sight
At 0 feet above sea level.
A great weekend! Thanks to Google for supporting the team, the race organizers, Kerry and Kat (our drivers) and the whole team.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Race Recap

Post-race notes: Nathan claims ownership (and somewhat rightly so) of entire blog and its contents. Google 1 finishes (unofficially) first in the Corporate Men's Open Division and 7th overall. Weather was fantastic and with 11 men managed a stellar finish time of 19:41, 13 minutes under the projected pace. We dubbed the 4th leg trio (read: those who "volunteered" to run 4 legs to compensate for non-runner 12) Ghost of TP. We enjoyed a noble feast at Irving Street Kitchen in Portland, which I highly recommend. After another very, very early morning, we're all home safe and sound, albeit exhausted. Guys, as always, I'm proud of you. Thanks for another fun relay

6am @ PDX

So very, very early. Time to go home.

Results are in!

The (unofficial) results are in and it looks like Google1 has finally won the Corporate Men's Open category at Hood to Coast, placing seventh overall in a time of 19 hours, 41 minutes!

We ended up a good ten to fifteen minutes under our original projections, mostly due to some roaring opening legs that were quite fast and, well, unprojected.  Great job Van 1!  And great job to those who filled in for our missing 12th man!

Team dinner

The team finally had some real food -- some really good food -- at the irving st kitchen, before heading to crash for a few hours before flights back in the wee hours of the morning.  The sleep schedules remain crazy.

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Van 1's all done

Van 1 finished up their last set of legs in excellent form. While Mike chased up a steep hill on leg 29 in ridiculous 6:13 pace, Ben enjoyed an estimated 100 kills on his last downhill leg. After refueling with burgers and coffee at the exchange, we're currently headed to the finish line in the coastal town of Seaside, OR. Let's hope we get there in time for van 2's arrival.

At the van exchange

We had a chance to take some inter-van pictures in the two minutes before we had to roll on.  Traffic is getting really bad.

Eddie tears it up after daybreak

Not sure exactly when this will post since phone reception here is really non-existent, but shortly after daybreak I handed off my second leg to Eddie, who tore it up for the next five miles.  I captured some of it with my camera, including the tailend of his superman pose.

At the van exchange

We had a chance to take some inter-van pictures in the two minutes before we had to roll on.  Traffic is getting really bad.

Eddie tears it up after daybreak

Not sure exactly when this will post since phone reception here is really non-existent, but shortly after daybreak I handed off my second leg to Eddie, who tore it up for the next five miles.  I captured some of it with my camera, including the tailend of his superman pose.

4 a.m.

Mike is out on the road. Ben is getting ready. Loren and I are passing out. Courtney is chilling. Grant and Kat are expertly navigating and driving us throughout the great state of Oregon.

Meanwhile, van 2 is passed out with no cell reception. Looking forward to seeing them again soon - and sunrise.

Nap time.

-Devin

Got pizza, get sleep

Van 2 having finished its first legs in excellent time, Kerry tracked down some late night pizza for Nathan. And while the pizza place had tempting beer and billiards, we opted to head for the columbus county fairgrounds where we'll meet up with van 1 again about 35 miles north and west of Portland just inland from the Columbia river.

I should also add that we'll have plenty of sleeping room in our spacious van, since we're short a man. Will rolled the extra leg for the first segment, and Eddie and Matt are taking on the other two extra legs.

N

Pizza

Stopping for what has become a google1 tradition. Averted catastrophe and tracked down a late nite pizza place for nates pizza fix. Said I wouldn't have any but will b hard to resist
Matt

Van 2 Progress

Van 2 is wrapping up our first legs. Unless you're will, who is
finishing his second run. He's the first of our three journeymen
runners who will be running 4 legs during the race.

Kerry is doing an awesome job with the driving. Now its time to get a
little shuteye because 4:08am will be here before you know it.

--
Sent from my mobile device

Friday, August 27, 2010

1/3 of the way done...

So we had a brief 'debate' in van 1, on whether we were 1/6 of the way to the coast or 1/3 after having completed our first round of duties in the race.

Distance- and leg-wise, we certainly would have to say 1/6 of the way finished, which turned out to be a bit depressing of a notion, seeing as most of us have been up for 16 hours, have run a pretty hard leg, and haven't had a square sit-down meal the whole day*.

Each one of us quickly agreed that we should consider ourselves 1/3 of the way to the coast, as we don't have to do any extra work before we pick things up at leg 13. Definitely a more optimistic way to look at things, even if it's less accurate.

On our way to the second van exchange, and hopefully a little shut-eye as well. We'll be stopping right by the Willamette river

1/3 of the way done...

So we had a brief 'debate' in van 1, on whether we were 1/6 of the way to the coast or 1/3 after having completed our first round of duties in the race.

Distance- and leg-wise, we certainly would have to say 1/6 of the way finished, which turned out to be a bit depressing of a notion, seeing as most of us have been up for 16 hours, have run a pretty hard leg, and haven't had a square sit-down meal the whole day*.

Each one of us quickly agreed that we should consider ourselves 1/3 of the way to the coast, as we don't have to do any extra work before we pick things up at leg 13. Definitely a more optimistic way to look at things, even if it's less accurate.

On our way to the second van exchange, and hopefully a little shut-eye as well. We'll be stopping right by the Willamette river, and get ready for our set of industrial/urban legs. Loren just had the bright idea to go bar hopping in Portland, seeing as it is 11pm. Have fun out there Loren. I'll be passed out on the front bench.

*I just have to assume this is the case for everyone else in the van, as they flew in from SF this morning. I luckily got in last night (though had a very long flight from Boston), and had a great meal at a laidback diner in Portland called Fuller's. Check it out next time you're here. I highly recommend the french toast.

Van 1 - done with our first legs

We're all done, 10 minutes ahead of schedule. Just a couple hours until our second legs. A tough decision now - stay awake until 2 am or take a nap?

Oh yes, a brief note about the first leg of the race. The one that starts at the top of Mount Hood and then drops 2000' in 5.6 miles. I can now personally confirm you don't run that leg, you survive it. The 4 Ibuprofen, 2 ice packs, and 3 massive blisters confirm this.

Van 2 - it's your time to shine.

-Devin

And we're off!

The very last starting wave is off, and Google One's own Devin is rolling down the 6.7% grade from Timberline Lodge on the middle of Mt Hood.  He busted to the lead at the start, we'll see him in 5.64 miles.  Enjoy the ridiculous view Devin!

And we're off!

It was a long and anxious wait up at the lodge on beautiful Mt Hood, getting colder and crisper by the minute, but worthwhile to soak up all the great views (and let all the bad food I mistakenly ate the last 24 hours digest just enough to make my run somewhat comfortable).

The 'gun' - the starter yelling 'Get out of here!' to the runners at the line - went off right at 6:45, and Devin took off in 1st, leading the fastest flight of the race. Flying down the hill as I write, he'll hand off to Loren who will continue down the mountain, then to me not too long after that. Hopefully it'll get a touch warmer as we drop in altitude...

Hood to Coast 2k10 is officially underway for Google 1 - see you on the flip side!

Grant

The final countdown


Only around an hour before kicking off our relay, everyone's getting changed in the van and the excitement's mounting!

The weather is beautiful up here at the start and lots of pumped up runners are very happy at the moment!

KC.




Hanging out at the Hood



We've made it to base camp. Currently hanging out at the start and painting our vans. Weather is gorgeous, we can't wait to get started.

Groceries...check.

I'm not sure how many calories we purchased but we're fuelled to survive 198 miles of running. And in the distance you can see why we will each burn so much fuel--mt. Hood

On the train

The team is headed to pick up our vans (read: chariots)

6:45am on BART

The team is awake (barely) and beginning the long journey to the top of Mount Hood.

sent from my nexus one

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Blogger

Is it just me, or has Blogger gotten way better since Calistoga? Way to go, team with the embedded widgets and graphics.

18 hours to the start

The last weekend in August--we look forward to it every year. With it comes fall (or summer if you're in San Francisco), Labor Day (almost) and Hood to Coast.

This year though, the thoughts of the team are with Chris and his family. Chris has been our relay stalwart for 4 years and we'll miss him on the course.

Thanks for following us for another 200-mile ride!

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Final Leg and Final Thoughts



So I'm a little late in getting this up to date... that's what sleeping 1 hour on a High School Gym floor, followed by more running and one heck of a post race party will do to you.

Van 1 truly shined in our third leg. Terence received the baton from Eddie at around 6am and charged (mostly uphill) 7.5 miles. One of my favorite moment from leg 3 happened while Terence was in mid run and went as follows:

Me: "Damn, I wish I had another coffee at that last exchange."
Stevie: "I wish I actually trained for this!"

This was topped only by Grant wearing Esther's (tiny) coat as a warmup while waiting for Peter to arrive. Grant did not disappoint, attacking the hills in his final 6.9 mile leg.

Clearly we were getting tired since we starting dropping the baton at exchanges -- yep, we were definitely ready to call it a day.

We arrived in Dobbs Ferry at close to 11am to wait for the arrival of Van 2. Lucky for us the Ragnar folks were ready for us and were serving up burgers and beer.

Will closed it out sprinting to the finish just past noon. We were about 30 minutes off our goal for a 185 mile race. Still waiting for the official results, but it appears that we checked in at 2nd place out of 200 teams losing out only to a team of College Cross Country runners from Union College, while capturing the top Corporate prize. Not bad for a team that was plagued by injuries and last minute replacements over the last two weeks... including being one man down with less than 48 hours before the start (thank you Terence for jumping in last minute!).

I consider my lucky to be a member of such a talented and fun team. Big thanks to Eddie for bringing us all together (especially for getting our former Captain and team leader Tom Phillips back). And an even bigger thanks to our drivers to our drivers, Esther and Kerry. We couldn't have done this without you.

-Mike

Friday, May 14, 2010

Crossing The Hudson

From the second Eddie handed the baton to Terence, we were *flying* for leg 2. Everyone pretty much met or exceeded goals this go around... And picked up lots of road kill. NADS has extended their lead to 25 minutes, but we're keeping at it. 

The highlights:
Terence: "This van is hot and stuffy. Do we have any fig newtons"
Mike: "I'm sure that combination of words has never been spoken before!"

"That can't be Stevie ahead. That runner is wearing pants."

Stevie after leg 2: "I puked into the Hudson River... And felt much better"

Finally Esther was sick of the guys because we couldn't get over the fact that the toll taker at the mid Hudson Bridge was (as Grant claimed) "movie star hot!... Ok maybe a little trashy, but hot!" 

Peter is about to hand off to the ridiculously speedy Grant...
I think we've earned a nice long nap. 

The pursuit

Van 1 has finished their legs and van 2 is underway. Eddie clocked
5:50s on his first leg and Nathan is really blazing out there.
Holstrom is waiting on deck.

--
Sent from my mobile device

Trucking Along

Greetings from Catskill State Park. Team Google1 is 20 miles into our 185 mike trek from Woodstock to NYC. Terence G (the new guy) led us off in speedy fashion followed by spirited runs by Mike A, Stevie D (on her first relay!), a hellish hilly run by Erin M and now Peter M (another Google newbie) is about to hand off to relay vet Grant -- the king speedster of van 1. We've got a ways to go to catch the first place team... Union College's North American Distance Squad (get it?... those wacky college kids!). Stay tuned...

And they're off

Terence led us off at 4:00pm from beautiful woodstock ny. The weather
looks to be holding for us and mike just took the baton. 34 legs to
go.

--
Sent from my mobile device

And We're OFF!!!

At the stroke of 4:00, the speedy Terence G led us off in our 185 mile trek from Woodstock to NYC.

The gorgeous Hudson River Valley

Before setting out on a 185 mile journey down it's spine, it's worth it to consider the history of the river valley we'll be running.

The valley was originally settled by the Mahican indians (later made famous by the author James Fennimore Cooper--and still later by Daniel Day Lewis). The Dutch established trading outposts and Fort Nassau (just south of Albany) in the mid-seventeenth century.

The valley featured prominently in the French and Indian War as the bulwark of British defenses against a French invasion from Lake Champlain. The new American state recognized this fact as well and established West Point on the banks of the river.

The completion of the Erie Canal in 1821 led to a dramatic increase in the traffic seen on the river, but the scenic beauty continued to inspire those who built their homes in the valley and the early American artists who became known as the Hudson River School of art, chief amongst them Thomas Cole (1801-1848).

So think about that when you're running down this beautiful valley at 3:00 in the morning.

Ateam Bos ready to race

Sleep now, run later!

-- Sent from my Palm Prē

Thursday, May 13, 2010

Will and Eddie are at the airport

...And fired up for this redeye. Also, its possible that the latitude
location widget will continue to show our location as san fran. That's
what happens when you try to get the last little bit of juice out of
the cell charge...you forget it.

--
Sent from my mobile device

The final team

The final roster for the race is:

Eddie Higgins
Erin McMahon
Will Nicholas
Nathan Stoll
Grant Burgess
Mike Anderson
Susan Ashlock
Peter Mattis
Chris Holstrom
Stevie DeGroff
Tom Phillips
Terence Gerchberg

Also, we owe a huge thank you to our 2 drivers Kerry and Esther and our three volunteers, Rachel, Kristin & Duffy.

T-minus 24 hours!

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Last year's photos

While we prepare for the race, you can take a look at last year's performance with our photo album below

Last year's photos

While we prepare for the race, you can take a look at last year's performance with our photo album below

Other following options

We're 4 days out from what promises to be a very fun race.

A few ways to follow the team: of course there's the blog, but we'll also be posting on Buzz under goog.1.relay and to the Twitter handle google1relay.

Finally, you can see where the active van is at any time with the Latitude widget to the right. We'll be handing off at each exchange the phone linked to the Latitude profile, so it should always be the van currently running.

Monday, May 3, 2010

Team Photo

That's a funny joke, Nathan. What he means is that we got to the start with time to spare before the gun went off.
 I'll add a slideshow from our team's new Picasa alias in just a sec.

Results and roster

We should have probably taken the time at the beginning of the race to take a team photo, and share it along with a roster of who was running. Given that we made it to the starting line with about 1 minute to spare, I think we have a reasonable excuse. Team photos were taken at the finish, so those will be shared soon, but here are some links to results and a brief roster.

We beat our 2009 time by 17 minutes, although the weather was much much better this year, and were nearly an hour in front of our nearest competitors by the finish.

2010 Results Google 1 wins: 21 hrs. 9 min. (200 miles)
2009 Results Google 1 wins: 21 hrs. 26 min. (200 miles)
2008 Results Google 1 wins: 20 hrs. 22 min. (199 miles)
2007 Results Google 1 wins: 20 hrs. 43 min. (199 miles)

As for the roster, here it is by leg assignment (there are 12 runners, and the course has 36 legs -- see The Relay 2010 course route on Google Maps -- so each runner has 3 legs, and runner #3 would run legs 3, 15, 27):

1 Scott Milagro-Fotre
2 Paul DuPuy
3 Ben Liebald
4 Jeff Czyz
5 Devin Anderson
6 Andrew Tibbits
7 Mike Brandell
8 Grant Burgess
9 Matt Kane
10 Eddie Higgins
11 Nathan Stoll
12 Chris Holstrom

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Finished!

We've finished and we've successfully defended the Google titles, fourth straight win!

Just got our medals -- they're for all finishers though, not anything unique for the victory.

Van 1 hanging out at the farm

sent from my nexus one

Bringing LA to SF

Matt Kane night ninja

We now have a van full of 4 relay finishers! Devin is on the road and Andrew's on deck. I hve the weirdest food cravings. After eating half a bag of beef jerky I scarfed down a bagel with peanut butter. Food of the gods.

On the road again

After a few winks of sleep, we are ready to take over after van two's diligent work on the night shift. Feeling a bit sore, but ready to finish our last set of legs. No sitting pretty though. DSE is likely still within striking distance. Time to get to work.

SF Office

72 minutes of sleep over! Crusing down 280 for our last leg.

More than just running

Standing out on skyline blvd, helping direct runners through a series of turns in the course that at 3am are very easy to miss, I'm reminded about how much more than running these relays are about. 

Many other teams runners were helped by us being in that intersection. Would they have missed the turn? Perhaps not, but if they had it would have added a very large toll on the athlete and team time, and is very demotivating.  We were there to try to be there to help our athlete, for whom thinking can be a huge struggle, from exhaustion and adrenaline.  Its what great teams do to increase their chance s of getting through unscathed.

My first leg was a great example -- I wasn't sure of a turn's street sign, one I was even expecting, had trouble reading it, and Kerry was there with the rest of the crew to help me correct sooner. Instead of losing a minute or two, I was back on track in seconds.

All of this is in addition to emotional support, which is even more important. There are eight mile slogs uphill in debilatating heat, when the team being there for encouragement is all that keeps the runner going.

Competing in these relays is truly a team effort.

SF office

72 minutes sleep starting now.

The men from the boys

Van 2 woke up at 1:39am right next to the golden gate bridge on the sf
side. Brandell will have the leg through the sleeping city, cruising
through seacliff and legion of honor then heading down the great
highway, feet from the pacific. Grant will take us from sea level up
skyline, which matt, chris, nathan and I will also traverse.

--
Sent from my mobile device

Paul gearing up for leg 14

Catching up

Van 1's combined kill count on our second legs: 77!

1 mouse, 2 skunks, 1 raccoon ... really want that coyote

Golden Gate

Saturday, May 1, 2010

It feels so much better to run at night than during today's ridiculous heat. This was my first night run ever and it was definitely an experience. Lots of time to yourself to think and admire the stars with no city lights. A few animals rustling here and there scared the crap out of me but probably for the best because it got the adrenaline going. It was great to see Van 2 if only briefly. They managed to pull ahead of DSE during their six legs. I got 8 kills during my leg and I'm looking forward to a power nap before doing it all again.

Nathan's healthy snack

Van 1 driving through some sweet Marin countryside

sent from my nexus one

Delayed photo log due to blackberry being craptastic.

Van one headed to the van exchange two!

Update: Jeff is alive and well in Van 1.

First casualty of the race

We just left Jeff at the sixth exchange

First casualty of the race

We just left Jeff at the sixth exchange while heading to our set of rest legs. Turning around now to pick up our castaway of a teammate.

Heat and staples

Wow. Scott here. Thanks to the beautiful weather and the Napa traffic, we made it to the race in the nick of time. Chris stapled my bib on last minute and once the gun went off I ran onto the wrong side of the road. Oops! Otherwise it was a great first leg. It's hot as hell out here but there's a great breeze coming in. When I finished we were in third. Paul overtook Stanford and Ben caught us up to about a minute behind DSE (Dolphin South East) and now Jeff is on the road. Great job guys. 200miles will be here sooner than you know it.

Started!

Scott had a solid warmup (alongside the van), got to the start with ample time to go (one minute), his bib on his jersey (stapled), and right on course (well, one wrong turn 2 seconds after the start). And in case anyone was concerned, we've all gotten our sandwiches (a few of us more than one). Solid.

Hey Aardvark: anyone know who the mystery Stanford team is?

Headed to the start!

We stocked the vans with all of the obvious necessities, like pop tarts, aspercreme, and bandages (also bananas, bagels, and beverages, but we'd get by with just the pop tarts if we really needed to). We're seeing some of the earlier teams and runners come by on the Napa highway as we head for the starting line. Hopefully we'll arrive in time to get Scott a warm-up, although he can probably just use the first mile through town, it'll be slow enough going.

Friday, April 30, 2010

Get some rest tonight fellas!

Pictures from 2008

We'll be updating the blog with pictures from the road, but here are some of the shots from 2008

Thursday, April 29, 2010

The first post

39 hours to go before the start of the Calistoga relay. The weather looks pretty good along the course; hopefully we won't face any of the drizzle from last year: