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2007 BISHOP HIGH SIERRA ULTRA-MARATHON PICS II

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2002	2003	2007

	Marie Boyd is the race director of the Bishop High Sierra Ultra who, upon listening to my introduction, had a look of recognition and asked me if I was the one who crapped on a snake years ago. Will I ever live this down?
	Here I am at Millpond about 10 minutes before the race started. Notice the utter glee in my face.
	I'm a little happier with my kids flanking me. They got up at you-gotta-be-kidding early to watch me start. Then they went back and crashed for a few hours while I took a stroll through the Sierra Nevadas.
	My friends from the Saturday morning running group. From left to right, Tomo, Wendy, Jodie, and me. I think Joanne was somewhere vomitting. Note my fist which shows how nervous I was before the race.
	I wandered to the start line to get this pictures. Notice all the real ultra-runners around me. I migrated to my rightful place in the back immediately after this picture was taken. Notice how everyone is making last-minute adjustments to their gear.
	Badwater Ben Jones getting shots of the crowd. You can see all his pics of the race here.
	Ben takes a final shot of the start line.
	And here is what it looked like. I'm in the back next to the camper, talking to my friends.
	Carrie caught this picture of me crossing the start line. An adventure of epic proportions awaited me in the next dozen plus hours.
	Yes, I was walking up this hill but when I saw Ben sitting at the top with a camera, well, just like every other runner, I started running for the picture. So!
	I turned to give the thumbs up to Ben and as I was talking, he raised his camera to catch this picture.
	A photographer took this on the route and sold it to my wife for $10, showing it to me as I was ~~thrashing in pain~~ laying down after the race. "Look honey, I spent $10 for a shot of your bloated gut. Isn't it great?"
	I trained a few times with Wendy but this new-grandmother ran juuuuust a bit faster than I did and I had no illusions of keeping up with her. She came in just over 13 hours.
	Joanne is another friend from my running group. Her and Wendy ended up running most of the race together and finished side by side.
	These pictures are not exactly in chronological order because this is Tomo Eguchi who is also in the running group and who started, stayed, and finished well ahead of all of us. He wanted to crack 11 hours on this race to qualify for the Western States 100 and despite rolling around on the ground for a half hour in brutal agony along the course due to a muscle problem, he finished in just over 10.5 hours. So it looks like he's on his way to Western States!!!! Freak.
	This is Bill who emailed me right before the race. He's a Marine going through NPS and brought his family like I did. He finished a few minutes after I did into the adoring arms of his family. Congrats, Bill.
	Remember two weeks ago when a lady startled me by coming out of nowhere at mile twenty-something and blowing past me like I was running backwards at the Wild Wild West? Yeah, she beat me on this one too.
	This is Michelle Barton. Michelle is fast. Michelle wins a lot. Take the WWW two weeks ago for example, she won first female, second overall. I think she ran a Pacific Crest Trail run last week, probably won it, and of course she won the Bishop, women's division. She is identified by her long red hair and the looks from people like the runner in the background who can't believe she is already on her way BACK!
	Here I am coming in at 13:23 which is ten minutes better than my best time on this course. Pretty good considering I ran 52 miles due to a course navigation problem I had.
	What kind of gay-ass pose that was, I'm not sure. I think I was reaching out to slap-shake Chris Rios' hand.
	My daughter took a picture of this strange sweat/salt pattern that appeared on my Camelback.
	As weird as it is disgusting.
	Aftermath.
	If you are sharp, you will notice that I have different clothes on than what I had at the start line. I changed shoes, socks, shirt, and hat at the 41 mile mark.
	Oh, and my will to live. I left that with my first set of clothes at the third trip through Edson Loop.
	I was not aware these pics were being taken. It was just that bad at the end.
	But this is what I earned.
	And this. Was it worth it? You bet your ass!