Posted by Monetta Roberts on March 21, 2007 at 05:04:51:
This one's actually a few years old, but I've just been informed that I've been telling it wrong for some time. Here then is the corrected version, which is at least as funny, if not more so......
Guys,
I've just gotta share this correction (below) to the most wonderfully hysterically funny (at least to me) story that I've recounted to about one million Mobile Team in Training athletes about my two great (and race obsessed) Mexican friends who followed my tried and true marathon race strategy in the NYCM a few years ago. For those of you what don't know the story, they followed the strategy just right and were faster in the 2nd half than in the 1st and had all-around great races. Arie, the nephew of Jorge, then studied all of the post-race statistics and was quite impressed with the large number of runners he passed in the 2nd half of the race, once he began to speed up (and the people that didn't know what they were doing began to slow down). Then, curiosity got the better of him and he just HAD to go and search for how many athletes (out of the 30- or 40,000+) managed to pass HIM in the 2nd half....... well, I say it's due to age, but in my telling of the story, I've had the nerve all of these years to say that 4 (four!) athletes passed him (mea culpa, Arie!) but now Jorge has set me straight and it was only TWO---and both females at that. But here's where the story REALLY gets good!
Arie wasn't content to know that just two females passed him. Oh no. Because, you see, ONE of them did not have ALL of her chip times showing in the results! What in the WORLD could explain such a thing?!? Being the resourceful man that he is, Arie soon tracked Ms. Missing Chip Time down and CALLED HER ON THE TELEPHONE. Claiming to be a newspaper reporter doing a follow-up article on the marathon (please, don't try this at home!) he asked her about her race experience and, if I am remembering this correctly, let her go on and on and on about what a great experience it was, how life-affirming it was, etc., etc., etc. When the "interview" was nearly over, he casually mentioned that, oh, there was just one more thing: She seemed to be missing one itty bitty chip time along the course and did she have any idea how that could've happened? Why yes, she eagerly explained: Her husband was running the race too, and was ahead of her, and there was a place where the race doubled back just a block or so over and so she SHORT CUTTED the course to meet up with him!
And THAT is how Arie, my friend from Mexico City, was finally able to sleep easy at night, knowing that only ONE person REALLY and TRULY passed him in the 2nd half of his NYCM while HE was busy passing 6,000 athletes!
Jeez, I love that story! ~~Mo