email from Turkey #3

Sorry for the delay. The internet was scarce in the places I've been
recently. I'm home now, and I just slept for 10 hours. Much better.

The race went well, I thought. Results are here:
http://www.wmrt2006.org/ (they have fixed the senior men's link). I
finished 122 out of 147 I think, so beating 25 people is better than
the 6 or so I beat last year. As a team we did well, I think,
considering our inexperience, and considering our most experienced guy
had a horrible race. Jason Loutitt finished 110th and he only went
past me at about 8k. He was 38th in Italy, I believe. Stefan Jacobson
had the best race, beating that American, Paul Low, and finishing
60th. Morgan was 93rd, Simon was 120th. We were 21st as a team, out of
26. I think though, that everyone is keen to continue as mountain
runners, and that will show in the next two to three years. For Morgan
and Stefan to do as well as they did with almost no uphill experience
is really great. If Jason can get himself back on track, he will be
an asset to the team, and I think Simon's prowess lies more in the
up-and-down. Anyway, since I'm in charge now (insert wicked
world-domination-type laughter) we are going to start moving up the
charts. If the 2009 up-down championships are held in Vail Colorado,
as expected, I think that would be a good year for Canada to break
through with a podium finish. If the American women managed to do it
(and their senior men got third) then so can we, because we have about
the same topography.

The women did reasonably well, finishing 14th out of 19. Katrina
Driver was 56th, Amy Golumbia 61st, Shannon Elmer 73rd and Michelle
Cormier 76th. Not a great day for our most experienced runners
(Michelle and Jason), but for reasons I won't get into. They will be
back, there is no question.

The best result was Shaun Stephens-Whale, who was 41st in the Junior
men's race. He was actually further up for a while, but he suffered a
cramp. It is not a good course to go out too hard on, but I think in
Shaun's case it had more to do with the food this week, as he has
alergies and the turkish delights, so to speak, weren't agreeing with
him. He is only going to get better, though.

The reason I say it was the endofanera is that because Jonathon
Wyatt of New Zealand lost the uphill race for the first time in 6
tries, I think, to Rolando Ortiz, a Colombian. Jono was attacked by
wild dogs on Friday, but he refused to use it as an excuse. It came
down to a great kick, apparently. Also, the Eritrean team beat Italy
in the senior men's race, the only team ever to do so. The streaks are
over. Ana Pitchrova was 7th in the senior women's race, and her Czech
team lost by two points to the Americans.

It was a great and exciting year for mountain running. We had 36
countries participating, and medalists from all five continents.
Mountain and trail running is the fastest growing sport in the world
right now, with more than 40million adherants (or addicts, if you
prefer). Danny Hughes, our president, was relentless in all his
speeches, pushing Otto Klappert of the IAAF to make the trophy race a
true IAAF championship. Otto is very supportive, but of course, in the
end it comes down to money. Still, the sport is growing.

The trip was great, though I got kind of sick at the end, probably
from running uphill all-out for 12k or something like that. I'll have
to go to the doctor to make sure it's not something worse than a sore
throat.

I spent Monday night in Paris, and took some cool photos. I'll post
lots of photos here:http://www.flickr.com/photos/47977673@N00/ in the
next few days. I think I took over 200!

Finally, I was really sad, shocked, I don't know what to say, really,
to hear about Emilie Mondor's passing on the weekend. I was on the
plane back from Paris and I saw someone reading La Presse, and I saw
that her photo was on the front page. I thought maybe she had run on
the weekend in the Montreal half or something like that. I asked the
flight attendant for a copy, and when I got it, it took me about three
reads to figure it out. It's pretty hard to believe. I suppose there
is no good way to find out that someone you know has died, but let me
tell you, being on a plane with a bunch of strangers is not ideal. I
was just looking around, wondering if any of these people knew her.
I'm sure some of them knew of her. When I got back to the office at
Concordia, I mentioned it to Sheila, and she had heard, so I was glad
at least that her life was being celebrated. It's just really sad. For
those of you who don't know, Emilie is one of Canada's best distance
runners.

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1157925009905&call_pageid=969907740050&col=970081602428

She was going to do the New York marathon, and I had emailed her about
it in the summer. I think we were both shooting for the same time
(2:30--me at Toronto) and I was hoping to better her time. I wrote to
her about the kind of shape I was in, thinking I might be able to run
around 15:30 for a 5k. She said "good to know that now the men in
quebec start running in the 15:30 and under. should be that way."
Indeed it should.

So, the endofanera in another, sad, way, too.

I'm home now. I hope to see you all soon.

John