"Dumpster Dave" (62 1/2 years old) beat Carrie (mid to late 20s or early 30s?) Thursday night in the first Dumpster Dash race of the 2008 season.
It's most appropriate, for Decatur, that the 2008 season start with a cross-gender race between two people of very different ages. Hopefully, the diversity will magnify as the season goes on. The Dumpster Dash is an equal opportunity challenge. There are no restrictions, other than one has to be human (not a race horse, a greyhound, a puma, or something like that).
For anyone not familiar with the Dumpster Dash: You must run 100 yards downhill, touch the middle dumpster, then run 100 yards back uphill, finishing at the start-finish line. It's a 200-yard sprint, complicated by the grade of the track. Oh yeah: You must have drank two adult beverages within one hour before running [a rule which scares off professional runners and helps the Corner Pub recoup the $10 "Dash Cash" prize for the winner in advance -- something Dave will have to receive later, as Angel couldn't find any "Dash Cash" certificates.] As is customary, Dave bought Carrie a Sweetwater 420.
Dave's time was 36.9 seconds, considerably off his best time of 34.5 seconds last year, and well over the record time of 27.5 seconds set by Tate (30 something) last year. (He's out of shape, and really didn't need to shovel in the coals toward the end.)
Carrie stopped at the steps before ever making it back to the finish line, so we have no official time for her.
more details in the continuation, if you're that interested
Luke the Landscaper (left) is the standard starter. Alaina (Carrie's friend) was standing in the middle.
As usual, some Corner Pub patrons (most notably Chrissy, Happy, and Dale) observed the race from the observation deck a the top of the steps. You can hear some of their comments in the video.
____________
Carrie and some spectators (none of whom will ever run the DD) just after the race
Carrie stated, before deciding to run, to her friend Alaina (seen at at the start of the race) she'd really be embarrassed if she lost, but she's not the first youngster the old man [currently 17 lbs. overweight, out of shape, already on SS and 2.5 yrs from Medicare] has surprised. If she'd visited the Dumpster Dash site beforehand, she'd likely not have made such a disparaging remark. Dave's yet to be beat by anyone within a dozen years of his age, of any gender. But, in the interest of fair reporting, he's definitely been blown away by a couple of guys in their thirties (not much more than half his age). Age does take it's toll. We can never know how he'd fare against them if we could transport them back in time about 30 years, or him forward in time about 30 years, so the two were the same age.
Carrie is normally dressed up in her dressy work clothes and shoes, which would be inappropriate for running the Dumpster Dash, when she stops by the Corner Pub, but on this day, she was dressed for some physical activity (don't remember the details - a soccer or softball game, perhaps).
Spencer J and Brian K were also appropriately dressed, and in appropriate shoes, but both declined the invitation to run, which just goes to show men can be wimpy too. Come on, the race takes about 2/3 of a minute and one barely works up a sweat.
A car (the same one we let in after the false start) backing out into the race track (as it searched for a parking place) was a first, but it hurt Dave more than Carrie, since it backed into his side of the track, and it really wasn't much of a factor, since it backed into the space at the corner of the building (just off the track) before the runners headed back.
Thanks for Carrie for giving it the old Agnes Scott College try. A woman has yet to cross the finish line, but we're still hoping, and we know a woman will win one day. The biggest challenge is getting one to run. [Here's looking at you, Bethy.]
Sensing an opportunity, Opal (very early 40s) challenged Dave to a race right after he'd won, but Dave said he needed some time to rest, and she was wearing shoes which could injure her ankles. She offered to race him later, but he declined, again sighting the shoes, but said he'd be glad to run her anytime she came appropriately dressed (meaning not in dress work clothes) and with appropriate shoes.
A few technical details:
This was the first race for Dave's new Saucony ProGrid Paramount sneakers, selected based on online research as optimum for the Dumpster Dash. They performed very well, in the sense of not being noticeable and not losing traction on the specially coated asphalt at the lower end of the track (which makes car tires squeal even in low-speed turns). Shoes only make a minor difference [maybe a percent or two], all other things being equal, and all other things are rarely equal.
It was also the first use of Dave's Panasonic "Lumix" 9 megapixel, 10X optical camera for recording of the video. [Theoretically, the video is good enough to be shown clearly on an HD TV. We'll have to try that on the roughly 42" plazma HDTV in the Corner Pub, and see how it looks.] Dave didn't mention to John, the operator and a professional photographer, that he could zoom in (using the 10X optical zoom). But, in some ways, a recording with no zoom provides a better representation of the distance involved, so maybe it was for the better.
Let's always remember it's just for fun.
Comments