Thursday, May 1, 2008
Porpoises fare well at Durango meet
By Stephen Williams
Special to The SUN
The Pagosa Lakes Porpoises swim team placed fifth out of 12 teams at a Durango meet last weekend, finishing behind two teams from New Mexico, and teams from Durango and Montrose. The meet included more than 200 athletes.
Pagosa came away with eight first-place finishes. The team was led by Emily Bryant who took first in her age group in the 50-meter freestyle, 100 free, 50 fly, and 50 back.
Trevor Bryant took first place in the 400 free, setting a team record. James Berndt also won his age group in the 400 free while Joey Berndt had three second-place finishes.
Other first-place finishers were D.J. Brown, in the 100 back, and Samara Hernandez, in the grueling 400 IM.
The youngest swimmers representing Pagosa were Erin Monkiewicz and Michael Brown both 6. Both came away with personal bests in all their events for the Porpoises.
Everyone who participated placed in at least one event. Swimming their first official meet for Pagosa were Skyler McIver, Maddie Hundley, Makayla Garcia and Rebekah Bahn. All four placed in the 8 and under girls competition. Other top finishes were contributed by Devan Monkiewicz, R.J. Hernandez, Mason Vrazel, Ryan McGinnis, Braden Higby, Samantha Cronin and Rosie Graveson. All swam personal bests in at least two events.
Austin Miller, Dane Murdock, Mitchell Higby and Keegan Caves led the older boys. All four placed in at least one event, led by a second-place finish in the 200 fly by Miller. Caves, swimming his first meet in almost four years, finished sixth in the 200 breaststroke.
The Porpoises will compete at Delta this weekend, and at the Farmington Invitational after Memorial Day.
For information on the swim team, contact Coach Stephen Williams at 903-1432 or swilliams@ra-ae.com or Marky Egan at 946-9274. Or, stop by the Pagosa Lakes Recreation Center Monday through Thursday, 4-5:30 p.m., to check out the team during practice. Swim lessons are offered by Egan for children of all ages.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Sting to sponsor British soccer camp
The Pagosa Sting Soccer Club is bringing the British Soccer Camp program to town this summer.
Challenger British Soccer Camps is a nationwide organization that will coach 91,000 players around the U.S. this summer.
The local camps will take place June 16-20 at the Pagosa Springs High School fields.
Instruction will be available for:
• Players 3 years old, 11 a.m.-noon. Cost is $69.
• Players 4-5 years old, 9-10:30 a.m., 5:30-7 p.m. Cost is $85
• Players 6-18 years old, 9 a.m.-noon, 5:30-8:30 p.m. Cost is $109.
Register online at www.challengersports.com before May 2 to receive a free soccer jersey ($30 value).
For more information call Lindsey Kurt-Mason at 731 2458 or go to lkurtmason@pagosa.k12.co.us.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Women’s golf association opens season
By Sue Martin
Special to The SUN
The Pagosa Springs Women’s Golf Association will open its 2008 season Tuesday, May 6.
Coffee, pastries and a welcome to return and new members and guests will be at the Pagosa Springs Golf Club at 9 a.m., followed by an 18-hole round of “Pick Your Best Nine.”
Sign up at the golf club by noon May 5 to participate in this opening day event.
The Women’s golf team will resume competition Thursday, May 29, at Hidden Valley Golf Club in Aztec, N.M.
Seven additional matches will be held over the season at different area golf courses.
For more information on team play, contact Cherry O’Donnell at 731-4767.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Photo courtesy Morgan Murri
What runs across the Sahara with supplies on its back? A camel ... and Pagosa’s Morgan Murri. Murri saddles up with a friend before running the Marathon des Sables earlier this month. The race took Murri across 152 miles of the Sahara over seven days.
Photo courtesy Morgan Murri
A fatigued Morgan Murri still manages a smile at the finish line of the Marathon des Sables. Murri braved the sand and grueling sun to place 51st out of 747 finishing competitors.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Pagosan completes ‘toughest footrace in the world’
By Sarah O. Smith
Staff Writer
For most people, the Sahara is completely remote and alien, nothing more than sand and blank horizons. But, for those seeking to test their willpower, fitness and endurance, the Sahara may be the perfect spot.
Just ask Pagosa’s Morgan Murri, who recently completed the Marathon des Sables, a race across the Sahara dubbed “the toughest foot race in the world.” From March 30 to April 5, he spanned 152 miles in six stages over seven days.
“So it’s essentially six marathons in a row,” said Murri.
But the race wasn’t simply a test of Murri’s endurance; he used the opportunity to raise money and awareness about the local charity he founded with his family: Leadership Education Adventure Programs (LEAP). Every mile Murri ran was sponsored, and all the funds will go towards scholarships for youth adventure education for local children.
The Marathon des Sables — that’s Marathon of Sand, in French — changes course every year. This year’s race was the longest in its history, and in many veterans’ opinion, the hardest. The race kicked off with a trek up the highest sand dune in the Sahara, and runners beat a path through sand, washes, rocky hills and salt flats all the way to the finish line.
Of the 801 runners who began the race, 747 crossed the finish line. Murri placed an incredible 51st overall, and earned the impressive title of the third American to finish. He completed the race in 29 hours and 14 minutes.
Besides the obvious danger of heat and sun stroke (the coolest day was 108 degrees, and the hottest 126 degrees), Murri said the sand is “notorious for getting into shoes,” where it grinds and creates blisters and other nightmares. Murri was fortunate enough to escape with a few small blisters and a sore on his back from his backpack. However, others weren’t as lucky.
“I saw things that were horrible,” he said. “I literally saw things on people’s feet that you’d never want to see.”
Murri trained for the trek this winter in Pagosa. He often ran through the snow to simulate running through desert sand. However, since Pagosa’s winter climate couldn’t be farther from the Sahara’s 120 degrees plus temperatures, Murri used ingenuity to prepare himself for the desert clime: he ran for hours on a treadmill wearing four layers of fleece plus a rain jacket to trap the heat.
He also trained with a 15 pound backpack. His backpack during the race started at 19 pounds — pretty light, by most standards — although he said it still felt like “absolute torture.” Murri and the other runners had to carry any and all supplies needed on their backs: food, clothes, a sleeping bag, toilet paper, medical kits, and more. Murri carried a small titanium stove with him, so he could heat up his freeze-dried meals, and, “most importantly, to have coffee.”
“It’s not great food in the first place,” he said. “I knew I was going to want really warm comfort food at the end of the day.”
The race is wholly unsupported, and the only luxuries supplied are water (and that’s rationed) and tents that “barely qualified as tents.”
The tents were shared by seven or eight people, and were promptly torn down at 6 a.m. On the first day of the race, Murri awoke to a raging sand storm (luckily, the only sandstorm he encountered) when his tent was removed.
“Out of the 101 tents, they came to tear down ours first,” he said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re naked, or if you’re freezing — it’s coming down.”
The tents were also organized by language spoken, and locations moved every day, so Murri encountered people from all over the world. “It’s a very international race,” he said.
As an American in this international group, Murri found that in addition to representing the ideals and values of his charity, he had also become an ambassador for his nationality.
“We’re not the country that everybody loves anymore,” he said.
Murri spent a large portion of the race reflecting on these representations, and he certainly had ample time to think during the run, especially when he found himself in what he calls “No Man’s Land,” somewhere in the middle with no other runners in sight.
One day Murri wandered off the race course — something that’s not hard to do, he said — and found some unexpected help.
“These kids pop up,” he said, “with no villages, no towns, anywhere in sight.”
The children spoke French, but they signalled to Murri that he needed to veer back. They then ran with him for ten minutes until he started seeing the tracks of the other racers.
“They were barefoot, just cruising alongside me,” said Murri of the children. Even when off course, he said, he never worried. “You know there are 700 people somewhere behind you,” he joked.
Murri has been racing regionally for years, running many races in the Four Corners area. He won the RATS (Run Across the Sands) race that took him from Grand Junction to Moab in 2005, and he’s a devotee of the endurance events in Leadville. He said when he first met his wife, Nancy, she told him she’d love to meet a guy who she could run a marathon with.
“I woke up the next day and thought, ‘I’d better go for a run,’” he said. “I made it two miles.”
But the next time, he made it three miles, and so on. He progressed from 10k runs to marathons, from marathons to 50-mile runs, from 50-mile runs to ultramarathons.
“She (Nancy) says she created a monster,” said Murri.
For Murri, running for charity was the next natural progression.
“It’s fun. I love pushing myself,” he said. “But I wanted to find a reason to give it more meaning.”
Murri started LEAP to emphasize the importance of exposing children to nature and outdoor activities. “We focus on how important it is to get kids outside. In Pagosa we’re a little spoiled because we’re right in the middle of it.”
But, said Murri, despite local children’s advantage, the temptation remains to sit on the couch, and LEAP is trying to negate that temptation. LEAP encourages kids (and adults) to think globally and act locally, and Murri hopes to send two kids from Pagosa on an adventure program to instill leadership, individual thinking and environmental consciousness. He also plans to start a family-friendly race series in Pagosa.
Running to raise funds for LEAP turned “the toughest foot race in the world” into an emotional and reflective event for Murri.
“Emotionally, it was a really great experience,” he said.
Murri has already set his sights on the infamous Badwater race, a 135-mile run through Death Valley in July that also claims to be the toughest foot race on earth. Murri said that’s most likely an accurate claim.
And, as far as advice for novice runners who may want to join him next year, Murri keeps it simple.
“Go. Just run,” he said. “The hardest part of being a runner is getting out the door.”
For more information about LEAP, visit www.goleap.org.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Photo courtesy Four Footed Fotos, Inc.
Recapturetheglory, a horse bred by Charles Jacobi of Pagosa, races to the finish line April 5 at the Illinois Derby. Recapturetheglory won the race and will compete in the “most exciting two minutes in sports” at the Kentucky Derby May 3.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
A Pagosa link to the Run for the Roses
By Sarah O. Smith
Staff Writer
It’s the zenith of any horse breeder’s career to have a horse entered to race in the Kentucky Derby.
And, as local Charles Jacobi puts it, with 37,000 thoroughbred foals born every year and only 20 qualified for the derby, “your odds are pretty lean.”
But despite the odds, a 3-year-old colt bred by Jacobi will race in the “Run for the Roses” in this year’s derby on May 3. The horse, Recapturetheglory, won the Illinois Derby on April 5.
“It’s the absolute pinnacle of the profession,” said Jacobi’s wife, Annie. “I can’t even equate it to anything else.”
Recapturetheglory’s current trainer and co-owner, Louis Roussel, III, named him in honor of his horse Risen Star’s 1988 bid for the Triple Crown. Risen Star won the last two legs of the Triple Crown — the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes — but placed third in the Kentucky Derby. A horse has not won all three legs of the Triple Crown since 1978.
The Jacobis will be in the audience of the Kentucky Derby to root for Recapturetheglory. “We have a box right on the finish line,” said Annie.
Jacobi has been a horse breeder for 25 years, and he and his wife are thrilled to have reached this milestone. “This is something you work towards,” said Annie. “Something you strive for.”
So, now that the pinnacle has been reached, what’s a proud horse breeder to do?
“Just cross your fingers and hope he runs like the dickens,” said Charles.
|
