A Wild Ride on Penn State's Cross Country Course!

But not as wild as any of those rides with Coach Groves behind the wheel!

The Mid-Atlantic Regional Qualifier for the NCAA Cross Country Championships will be at Penn State next weekend. 

Jogging Shirtless Horse-Head Man and Presidents Meeting Presidents

Sandy didn't dent the spirits of everyone.  This guy got his 15 minutes of fame.  Which one of you idiots was this?



And here's 2 examples of photos of Presidents meeting future Presidents (although the one is a bit of a stretch).

Here's Bill Clinton meeting President Kennedy in 1963:

And here's a photo of the funeral procession of President Lincoln in NYC.  That's a 7 year-old Teddy Roosevelt hanging out the window with his younger brother Elliot.

"MISTER CHRISTIAN!"

The Storm of the Century, Sandy seems to have wiped out lower Manhattan, but group supporter and all-around good guy Phil Passen is safe, having apparently been evacuated from his building next to Battery Park AND the Hotel he fled to in New Jersey.  I hope to get word from him on the aftermath of the storm.  He has been an ardent supporter of our efforts at the blog and my thoughts and prayers are with him often.

Also wiped out is the Atlantic City Boardwalk and the entire town of Ocean City, New Jersey, my vacation spot for the last 20 years.  Not only is it underwater, but there were scores of fires overnight without the ability to fight them.

Another high profile loss was the HMS Bounty, the ship built for the filming of the classic Mutiny on the Bounty. The Captain of the ship has been lost at sea and a direct descendant of Fletcher Christian, the instigator of the mutiny, was rescued from the sea many hours after the sinking, but failed to be revived.  The first 2 photos are from Shawn Whalen, a prolific masters runner in New England and friend of Martha (White) Collins, a great Friend of the Group and namesake of my daughter.  The last photo is from the Coast Guard.

Sandy Gave Me a Day Off Work! Maybe 2!

I hope everyone is safe and sound on the East Coast.  I've had contact with several people in the direct path of the storm and everyone seems to be well prepared. There will be effects felt over as large an area as I've ever seen.  The Great Lakes area need to be prepared.  And the Canaan Valley in West Virginia is bracing for 3 feet of snow! I used to XC Ski there in my younger days.  And here's my reminisces of another storm during "the best week of my life".

Coworkers decided it was better to be safe than sorry, so I actually called off a day of work.  I'll run extra on the treadmill as long as the electricity grid holds up (sorry Ron!), but will have to venture outside in the maelstrom if the power goes out like one year ago.

As the storm is predicted to be right on top of my house on Tuesday, I possibly will miss two days of work, which will take me weeks of horribly extra work to catch up, but c'est la vie.

Here's a great photo of the B1G Cross Country Women's start on Sunday from our friend Patrick Davey, a Tennessee alum and as good a photog as I've ever seen.  I'll send him this hat-tip as a way of consoling his frustration on another football season going awry!  It's not like PSU alums don't know about football travails.

 

Still the Ladies Man

Blog Muse and all-around Best Man Rob Whiteside took his daughter Phoebe to the Ivy League Cross Country Championships, better known as the Heptagonals. Look who they happened to run into!  I've always said he was everywhere, so be sure to mind your p's and q's.

I'll update the results of the B1G Championships here later. Go Lions.

Women finish in 3rd Place with Rebekkah Simko taking 5th place overall.

The Men end up in 6th with Robbie Creese placing 23rd.  


 

Dogs Have No Need for Physics

Judging by the lackluster response to the previous post centering on cats, I figured I'd come back with a post on Man's Best Friend.  These two are the working dogs of adopted PSU Track Alumni Golfer Luke Watson. The two beauties are added to the PSU Track Alumni Dog Slide Show.

His Facebook post also made me think about the early days of my running career, when I would flush out at least two pheasants during every run I took.  The local young runners today tell me they have never seen one.

It's B1G XC Championship Week (and Feline Fysics!)

The Big Ten Cross Championships are finally upon us. Check out the preview and news from the teams at the link.  Good Luck at Michigan State.

And many of you know my love of dogs (send me a photo of yours to be included in the PSU Track Alumni Golf Dog Archives).  But if you must know, I have 6 cats and only 5 dogs.  Since cats live only partially in our Universe, there must be different Laws governing their presence.  Maybe these are the Laws that  "explain it all", a Unified Theory of Cats, as it were.  I've thrown in some photos of my cats doing what they do best.

Feline Fysics Laws (from Funny2.com)

Law of Cat Inertia
A cat at rest will tend to remain at rest unless acted upon by some outside force such as the opening of cat food, or a nearby scurrying mouse.

Law of Cat Motion
A cat will move in a straight line, unless there's a good reason to change direction.

Law of Cat Thermodynamics
Heat flows from a warmer to a cooler body, except in the case of a cat, all heat flows to the cat.

Law of Cat Magnetism
All clothing attracts cat hair in direct proportion to the degree of color difference between the cat hair and the fabric color.

Law of Cat Stretching
A cat will stretch to a distance proportional to the length of the nap just taken.

Law of Cat Sleeping
All cats must sleep with people whenever possible, in a position as uncomfortable for the people involved as is possible for the cat.

Law of Cat Elongation
A cat can make its body long enough to reach just about any countertop which has anything remotely interesting on it.

Law of Cat Acceleration
A cat will accelerate at a constant rate until he gets good and ready to stop.

Law of Rug Configuration
No rug may remain in its naturally flat state if a cat is present.

First Law of Energy Conservation
Cats know that energy can neither be created nor destroyed and will, therefore, use as little energy as possible.

Second Law of Energy Conservation
Cats also know that energy can only be stored, by a lot of napping.

Law of Refrigerator Observation
If a cat watches a refrigerator long enough, someone will come along and take out something good to eat.

Law of Dinner Table Attendance
Cats must attend all meals when anything good is served.

Law of Fluid Displacement
A cat immersed in milk will displace her own volume, minus the amount of milk consumed.

Law of Cat Disinterest
A cat’s interest level will vary in inverse proportion to the amount of effort a human expends in trying to interest him.

Law of Electric Blanket Attraction
Turn on an electric blanket and a cat will jump into bed at the speed of light.

Law of Comfort Seeking
A cat will will always seek, and usually take over, the most comfortable spot in any given room.

Law of Bag / Box Occupancy
All bags and boxes in a given room must contain a cat as soon as possible.

Law of Cat Embarrassment
A cat’s irritation rises in direct proportion to her embarrassment times the amount of human laughter.

Law of Milk Consumption
A cat will drink his weight in milk, squared, just to show you he can.

Law of Pill Rejection
Any pill given to a cat has the potential energy to reach escape velocity.

Law of Equidistant Separation
All cats in a given room will locate at points equidistant from each other, and equidistant from the center of the room.

Law of Cat Composition
A cat is composed of Matter + Anti-Matter + It Doesn’t Matter.

Law of Furniture Replacement
A cat’s desire to scratch furniture is directly proportional to the furniture's cost.

Law of Cat Landing
A cat will always land in the softest place possible.

Law of Cat Invisibility
Cats think that if they can’t see you, then you can’t see them.

Law of Cat Probability (Cat’s Uncertainty Principle)
It isn't possible to predict where a cat actually is, only where it “might” be.

Law of Selective Listening
Although a cat can hear a can of tuna being opened a mile away, she can’t hear a simple command three feet away.

Law of Concentration of Mass
A cat’s mass increases in direct proportion to the comfort of the lap she occupies.

Law of Cat Obedience
As yet undiscovered.

In Praise of My Roommate

In another iteration of the often-asked question "What NCAA Cross Country team was the best ever?", the 1981 UTEP team came out on top.  The entirely foreign team of East Africans placed first, second, third, fifth and sixth in the team standings to score an astounding 17 points.  Only one American runner broke up a perfect team score, (although two other individuals also sneaked in  ahead of UTEP's fourth scorer also.  They didn't count in the team scores.). That runner was Penn State's own Alan Scharsu, my former senior year roommate.

1. Mathews Motshwarateu, Texas-El Paso, 28:45.6
2. Michael Musyoki. Texas-El Paso, 28:46.4
3. Gabriel Kamau, Texas-El Paso, 29:19.3
4. Mark Scrutton, Colorado, 29.22.1
5. Graeme Fell, San Diego State, 29:30.4
6. Alan Scharsu, Penn State, 29:30.5
7. Suleiman Nyambui, Texas-El Paso, 29:32.6
8. Gidamis Shahanga, Texas-El Paso, 29:33.6
9. David Taylor, Arkansas, 29:35.6
10. Richard Tuwei. Washington State, 29:36.7

I have previously extolled the virtues of another PSU roommate, Dudley Doo-Right (aka Doug Kent).  Alan was also a great roommate.  We also lived next door to Don Skerpon that year.  Another pair of people as fine as them would be hard to find.  My only quibble with Alan would be his choice of music, but today's versions temper that quite a bit!

A Fast Blast From the Past

I came across this great pic from the days of yore, which brings back a whole bunch of smile-inducing memories.

That's former State College star and High School Mile State Champion Dave Felice in the lead. Dave was a Tasmanian Devil with the baton. (Sorry Ryan, is that racist?) Memories of the many spirited interactions between Dave and Coach Groves still make me giggle.  It's even better when you realize that Dave went on to coaching at State College High, where he had one 800 M runner named Matt Groves, the fastest of Coach Groves' progeny.  The world has a nifty sense of humor, doesn't it?  I'll bet Matt didn't give Dave the least bit of trouble however.

Dave was also a firefighter in Midland Texas after college and helped in the rescue of Baby Jessica from the well.  Dave's face plastered across all the national magazines and newspapers also made me smile from ear to ear!

In second place is Friend of the Group Malcolm East of Allegheny.  My memories of him are of the back of his head, but even they make me smile. 70's hair was wonderful, wasn't it?  I came across this photo as a suggestion for "friends" on Facebook.  I'm sure many of you have memories of the Allegheny teams back then, and of Malcolm.  I have made him an honorary member of the Group just for making me smile.

A Great Weekend in State College

It started with a rainbow with 2 pots of gold in Happy Valley.  It continued with a great victory for the Women's Volleyball team, a tie that clinched the B1G Title for the Women's Soccer team, and the Men's Football team thumping of an always pesky Iowa.  My bet is the luck holds until this weekend's B1G Cross Country Championships at Michigan State.

Additions to the Last 2 Posts

Here's Kevin Geesaman demonstrating that I really don't know how popular fishing is!

And there were PSU Track Alumni Singlets at the Hershey Half-Marathon! Matt Groves looks to be in good shape, and the newly married Ryan Foster doesn't look too bad after conquering the distance. PSU is 800 U

PSU is 800 U: Half-Marathon Division

Yesterday was the Hershey Half-Marathon and a couple of ex-PSU "half-milers" jumped in and stirred up the locals.  Not sure if any PSU Track Alumni Singlets were involved, but I'll put out feelers to find out. Our growing list of spies are everywhere!

It's quite a wide range of talent to run well at 800 Meters and 13.1 Miles, especially when the real world has turned you into a working stiff following the embracing cocoon of PSU.  Congrats on good efforts from Matt Groves (16th) and Ryan Foster (9th) on the difficult course.

All results from spies anywhere in the world with word of PSU Track Alumni (Golfers) are welcome here!