Boston, Day 1: It's Been a Long, Crazy Road...

After a comedy of errors in our long trip from LTOB headquarters to the heart of Boston, we have decided to lay our head down for the night. Since we didn't make reservations in a hotel, "laying our head down for the night" really means its time to get serious about finding some chick to hook-up with.

Needless to say, the Puma party exceeded expectations for white guys and percentage of guests sporting running shoes with their jeans. It also was the setting for a wicked break dance battle between letsrun's brojos and a team of NYRR prez Mary Wittenberg and Chasing ______'s Matt Taylor. All I'll say about it is that one spectator described Ms. Wittenberg's worm as "tasty," whatever that means.

We'll be back tomorrow, I just spotted some low-hanging fruit teetering over a cosmo at the bar. Wish me luck.

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Ritz Out of 8k; Wittenberg Has Plan

It came out yesterday afternoon that Olympian Dathan Ritzenhein has decided to drop out of the USA 8k Championships this weekend citing a sore IT Band. He will also sit out the much anticipated IAAF World Cross Country Championships later in the month.

This news comes in the wake of Mary Wittenberg and the NYRR announcing a star studded field for the annual Central Park-held 8k including Alan Webb, Shalene Flannagan, Jorge Torres, and many others.

At one point, road stud Abdi Abdirahman was on board too but ended up being the first star to withdraw from the race. Just a few short weeks ago, it was the best non-marathon American road race of the year.

All of that went out the window yesterday when Ritzenhein made the announcement from his anti-gravity, anti-pollen, anti-sunlight, anti-hyperbaric chamber in what can only be assumed to be Eugene, Oregon, or the moon.

With the high profile race field significantly diminished, one would assume the NYRR CEO would be a bit down and out. Not so. Apparently she has a plan.

Normally, Mary Wittenberg limits her powers to assembling strong road race fields, but it was reported earlier today that she has decided to actually heal Dathan Ritzenhein's actual IT band.

"Certainly, I wouldn't do this under almost any other circumstance," said Wittenberg on a conference call Tuesday night, "but it's Ritz vs. Webb, baby! This shit is gonna be sick!"

So no need to fret race fans. We are in good hands. Good, solid, healing, German hands.

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Webb: NYRR 8k Now, Marathon Inevitable

Here's a simple distance running analogy:

Professional distance runners : New York Road Runners::

(A) Bee : honey
(B) The working man : morning coffee
(C) 20 minute videos : Flotrack
(D) People who are good at what they do and want to be treated as such : People who are willing and excited to treat them that way
(E) All of the above

Cultural inequality be damned, I'm going to do everything I can to get that on next year's SAT.

Allow me to drop a fact bomb: NYRR has successfully wooed every elite distance runner in America to simultaneously run in their races and fall all over themselves in praise of the organization.

Is it an accident that they keep getting elite runners like Alan Webb to not only run in their races, but to run in races that are out of their comfort zone (i.e. Webb in an 8k and mile road race)? Is it an accident that they successfully put on hugely popular mass participation events in conjunction with their professional races with a very notable emphasis on the professional races? Is it an accident that they have a very lame and poorly put together television show that airs regularly on a New York cable sports station?

None of these are accidents. They get the job done. It's clear that Mary Wittenberg and NYRR have something going on and I think I know what it is:

The lead car at the ING New York City Marathon.

Something goes on in this car (actual car may not be one pictured above). Look at all of the athletes that have admitted to doing whatever unChristian activity that goes on in this vehicle: Ritz, Hall, Meb, Abdi, and most recently, Mrs. Adam Goucher!

Webb is undoubtedly next. There is no way he can resist the lucious marathon fruit that Wittenberg dangles in front of all of these runners' (apple?) pie-eyed faces. All she needs to do is invite Alan into that lead vehicle next November and BAM! Our top Anglo-American (not that it matters) mid-distance track hope is slogging through 20 milers in August instead of blazing through European 1500s. Wittenberg is a genius at these things. Hell, she once convinced me to run the New York City marathon by slapping me in the face when I got too close to her saurkraut.

So get used to it America, no one can resist the NYRR: mid-distance runners are no exception. Wittenberg and her crew are the cream of the crop, le creme de la creme, das sahne des getreides, if you will. And for good reason. I've been in the lead car. I know. Trust me, I know ALL too well.

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