Excuse my little disappearance... we decided to drive up to Seattle to watch the Pac-10 cross-country meet. We did not take the RV. I did not take my laptop. It was a last-minute kinda thing.
We arrived in Seattle (a 3+ hour drive) around 4 o'clock Friday afternoon and went directly to the Pike Place Market to fill our little cooler with smoked fish, so we could bring it home to our freezer.
We like to buy our fish from Pure Food Fish Market. Yes, I know there are more famous fishmongers in the market. I know they put on quite an entertaining show for the tourists. But I just wanted alderwood smoked salmon and the folks at Pure Food really do a great job of smoking King salmon.
See? I told ya.
Look at the size of these monsters - over three feet long!
Hello, Gorgeous!Fresh King Salmon is $20 per pound.
They ship!
Room with a view... of Interstate 5
Next we checked into our downtown hotel, had a cocktail and went to dinner with the Oregon track coach and his lovely wife.
This morning we were up early, checked-out of our downtown hotel, and were over to the Jefferson Park Golf Course to watch the Pac-10 Cross Country Championships. It was cold. It was raining. The earth was soggy and slippery.
My camera was not happy and I am sorry to report my photographic skills were just not up to par (pun intended) on the golf course this morning.
Duck women (far left in yellow) were picked to win the Pac-10 Championship
My Ducks started out strong
Sophomore Jordan Hasay won the race... but the Duck women finished tied for 3rd with the University of Washington. Tied. For Third. So sad. Stanford University won. See the results here.
This is just another unnecessary photo of senior Alex Kosinski, just because I think she is really pretty. Miss Kosinski finished in 4th place today!
Then it was time for The Men of Oregon to race. Cross country is an interesting sport. The men run 8000 meters/about five miles (women run 6000 meters/about 3.75 miles) over a grassy course (usually in a field or over a golf course). Racers wear long spikes on their shoes for traction. Usual basic rules: each team can have up to 10 runners and the first five members of each team across the finish line score for their team. (The other five just get in a really good workout.) The first over-all finisher is awarded one point, the second finisher is awarded 2 points and so on... so the team with the lowestcumulative score wins. (Seriously, it's easy... just go to a meet and you will become hooked.) Strategy is involved. Team work. You will see some blood - as I said, they are wearing long spikes. The racers are covered with mud and grass after the race.DT ran cross country in college and much-preferred it to racing on a track. This says a lot about My Driver. It is the team-work element he loved so much. DT lost his voice cheering for the Duck harriers today.
Cross country runners are called harriers.
You will share your Jeopardy winnings with me, right?
Stanford looked strong from the start, but the Ducks (yellow tops, green shorts) stayed right with the leaders.
GO DUCKS!
Derrick, Riley & Heath power on for Stanford
Stanford University won the meet with the ridiculously low score of 25. Their top five finished 1, 2, 3, 9, & 10. Fabulous team, I must say.
Luke Puskedra was the first Duck finisher, coming-in 4th place over-all
Matt Centrowitz, Jr. finished 7th over-all and was the second Duck finisher. (Matt's dad ran at Oregon with DT in the 1970s.) I rewarded young Matt with four dozen Snickerdoodle cookies. Home made (by me) and, of course, organic. You can't put chemicals in a fine-tuned machine.
After the meet, we were soaked to the skin. My camera was drenched. We were muddy. We hopped in our car, cranked the heat up to "INFERNO" and drove back to Portland where we met our friends at a sports bar to watch the #1-ranked Duck football team beat USC (in Los Angeles) 53-32.
Can you believe the Duck football team is 8-0? Think the BCS people will show us any love come tomorrow?
GO DUCKS!!!
Until my next update, I remain, your "I'm sleeping-in tomorrow, then going for a 6500 meter run" correspondent.