Yes, we know, we used this title two years ago in a Bluenose article, but to be honest, can you blame us for using it again? After the mass-DSQ (or not DSQ, depending on who or where you were) two years ago, poor course-management came back to haunt the Bluenose again last Sunday.
The TA saw all the course from an athletes' point-of-view (we pace-bunnied the half and carried on to do the full). To be fair, some stuff they did well, better than in previous years. The finishing chute was much better managed and Shubie was very well marked and marshalled. However, yes, we did see some weird stuff out there, not all of which can be attributed to advanced states of fatigue, hypoglycaemia and hyponatraemia. Let it just say, whatever weird s**t we saw before 21 miles (a cross, marshaling "on the fly") was probably real, whatever we saw afterwards, well how many pink bunnies have you ever seen on a race-course?
Well, apart from that one.
The TNS member-tracking software suffered a severe case of hunger-knock last Sunday, but this is what we saw. The TA itself managed to hang on to it's top-ten finishers streak in the full marathon, clocking in at 10th (9th male, but we got girled big-time by Mylene Sanscousy). One Cookie Monster finished with us...
....whilst the other one (#338), seen here with Sean Merrett (#175) was just behind us with a stonking 3:11.
Of course, it should be mentioned that lead bike Michelline McWhirter had a bit of a moment in the finishing-chute and nearly bought Cookie down with her bike!
Former Provincial Champ Suzanne Ferrier clocked a sweet 3:26 in her debut marathon and was by all accounts smiling at the finish. We saw Penny Hart on the course too.
As usual, the big TNS action was in the half. The big news of the day was Brooke Brown's (or B2 as we must now call her, apparently) first-place finish in the ladies, the second year in a row a TNS lady has won the half (Laura Reardon-Keefe taking top-honours last year). The local papers said she was training for "World Triathlon"; let us know when you find out what that is B2! The first TNS guy we see in the results is Kevin Conley, with a 1:32. Interestingly, finishing with Kevin we also see the muppet who backed into our car a month ago. We know BTC's Janelle Knickle ran a half-marathon PB with BTC club-mate Steve Saunders finishing in around the same time before riding home to Blockhouse from Halifax! Shane Hawkins put in a solid 1:33 in what may be his final NS race for a while and may have been in a sprint-finish with John Gillis (guys, the race is 90 minutes long, isn't the finishing straight leaving it a bit late?). TA commenter Ian Loughead ran a 1:42; we're pretty sure this is a PB and he achieved his goal of finishing in-front of the 1:45 bunny, Charles Paradis, who himself was 3rd AG at the Greenwood Aquathlon. Anyway, the list is long and our eyesight is weak, so here's a link to the results for you to peruse at your leisure.
Over in the 10K, Laura Reardon-Keefe was second lady in 40:30 and just ahead of the familiar names of Dan Utting, Mike Juurlink, Charles Verge (PB Charles?) and Liam Patterson. Full results here.
We also saw some familar faces on the course, and seeing Kerry Copeland running the finishing chute bought a smile to our faces, especially when we were suffering.
Plus, she looked the coldest person out there; thanks for staying on post all morning and getting us all home safely.
Speaking of safely, we saw something with "don't try this at home" written all over it on nyvelocity (the wikileaks of cycling!) this morning whilst self-medicating our still-aching muscles with coffee. Is Di2 worth drilling out a P3? Watch, wince and discuss......
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