From: "Joe Kowalski" <jwk@fuse.net>
To: <ultra@LISTSERV.DARTMOUTH.EDU>
Subject: the Barkley
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2003 14:51:36 -0500


Well folks,

If there is one race where there is no exaggeration it is the
Barkley. The chicken was bloody, the weather was 100% strange
and wet and cold, and the course was near vertical.  Laz said,
"All you have to do is NOT quit. It is really that simple."  Laz
does nothing to make your life miserable. He calmly sits back
and lets the course do the work for him. He actually gives you a
map, with directions that are easy to follow.  Seeing him
"operate" is amazing. It is like seeing someone who is 100% sure
of the outcome, a soothsayer or prophet.  He knows the future.
Never was there a doubt in his mind that the weather and the
course would beat us into submission - but it would do so slowly
and methodically.

It is a weird feeling having completed only one pathetic loop
and bailing on the second loop.  I don't remember the pain and
misery, I just remember allowing logic to creep into the
equation - logic causes disaster at Barkley.  If you ever are
unlucky enough to find yourself there: don't eat the chicken and
do not allow logical thoughts to enter your mind.  Make the fear
of stopping greater than the fear of going back "out there".
Prepare yourself to understand that BAD things happen out there,
but VERY BAD things happen when you stop - and hopefully you
won't stop.  Don't succumb to weakness.  DO NOT QUIT.....but I
know you will.....and so does Laz.

Training has begun for 2004
...................................... bring it on Mountain
Flower !

joe kowalski
cincinnati, oh