8:24.87

Matt Hughes, you are a BAMF.



Letsrun user 'The Stache' sums up his performance in the most perfect way;

"That is a manly win with a manly time from a man with a manly stache and a NASTY mullet. Like Sampson and his magic locks, Matt Hughes' dirty porn stache and nasty ass redneck mullet gave him the power to stomp those little boys he was running against."

Amen brother.

Now if the live feed didn't only show the last 800m, I would be a little happier; I want to watch that race, many times.

ofsaa 2011

Stopping at a native smoke shop on the side of highway 69 and picking up bbq corn nuts and seasoned spitz halfway into our journey halfway up the province of ontario put into perspective ofsaa track 2011; cottage country edition. Time for competition for the class of 92' ended in london one year prior, the time for hanging out at the track, watching some races and shooting the shit with the province's best up-and-coming athletes was what we had in store. It was a little weird; nervousness, anticipation and mild sickness, feelings that were once as intertwined in the ofsaa experience as was lining up at the obnoxious nike tent, were absent from the ride up to sudbury, replaced with a feeling of frustration at the lack of decent radio stations in a 100 km radius of parry sound. Nonetheless, me and Proudfoot were excited to see firsthand which race would be the race referenced in threads on TnF for years to come.

Things have really changed since I first caught glimpse of bright blue track at ofsaa 2007 in ottawa. Sully once said that the next best thing to an olympic medal was an ofsaa medal, and although (i'm pretty sure) he was joking, it's starting to seem like the ofsaa organizing committee took his words as motivation. For instance, I watched my sister run her steeple heat. We were still on the 400. I tethered wifi from my phone to my macbook and watched a high school track meet. This boggles my mind (and scares me to look at my phone's data usage for june). OU's didn't have a live feed. CIS didn't have a live feed. Canadian Senior Nationals didn't have a live feed! ofsaa did. This fact alone demonstrates the prestige that ofsaa is held in the eyes of athletes and organizers alike, and the direction that it is headed in the years to come. In making ofsaa more accessible to people through runnerspace and social media (my sister got a retweet from @ofsaa), the meet is setting itself up to reach more people. I think it's a great thing for the sport. More people aware of track and field makes more people interested in track and field. The more professional the meet gets in its illustrious check-in procedures and strict athlete control centres the more exposure young athletes get into how meets at the national and international level are run; a definite possibility for many of the kids i witnessed run/jump/throw this weekend.

And run/jump/throw they did.

Of the many, varied types of events that occurred over the weekend, some highlights would definitely include:

• A midget boy from my old high school winning the triple jump on his last jump in what what one of the most precise displays of the slow clap i have ever seen a track audience execute
• King "winning" the 1500m, but only getting bronze. (4th race of the weekend and still managed make his way from right at the back of the pack to a medal position over the last 300m, kick of the week for sure and the real winner of the race in our eyes)
• Junior boys/girls sprinting records being smashed on an hourly basis
• Hearing the story of a dine-and-dash executed by an entire team on Wednesday night
• A ridiculous fartlyk session with Proudfoot on what was supposedly the nossa cross country course between the steeple and 15 finals on friday... there was at least a 50% gradient on "the wall" as well as at least a 50% chance of having our ankles turned during the workout
• The same midget boy from my alma matter trying to pick up our waitress at the Keg
• Learning and subsequently failing at one of the greatest (and only) things to come out of Sudbury, SlapCup
• Mcbride and King ensuring the victory lappers didn't get their victory laps
• The sheer girth of the lineup at the only food stand on Saturday afternoon

And many more that I am probably missing but will soon become apparent in the months of analysis on our favourite message board.

That is if they haven't already started the 2012 predictions yet.

That's it for now, off to go die in the heat.