Memphis

St. Jude's Classic -- Memphis, TN

State #32

Noble and I travelled to Memphis for the St. Jude's Classic Half Marathon in Memphis this past weekend.  

The long and short of it is that it was a good race.  I did not get another PR, but was still under 1:40:00 and I am happy with that.

                                Memphis has certainly changed, but at the same time, it has remained exactly the same.  I went to college and dental school in Memphis somewhere around a hundred years ago.  I have not been back there since 1996.  Noble and I had an opportunity to walk around the University of Memphis campus.  We went into the old athletic dorm where I lived for three years.  I showed him some of the classrooms and places I used to hang out.  We went over to the Tiger's practice facility and saw where I used to go for football practice every day.  It has changed a bit, but brought back a great number of memories, fond memories.  We had a $75 lunch at Houston's.

But that was mostly because we HAD to have the spinach artichoke dip and he insisted on having the prime rib.  As usual, Houston's was PACKED.  Even add odd times, that place is completely full.  We had a 30 min. wait.  But the food was very good, and we had a nice time together. After lunch, we went to the expo and got my race packet.... no, it was actually before we went to lunch.  I remember now because we had to wait at the expo to get in because it was just before noon.  Memphis is on central standard time and my watch read 12:38 pm, so I thought we were good, but it was only 11:38 am there.  It was a long line to get in after that, but it went quickly enough and then we went off to lunch.  I drove Noble by the house I lived in while in dental school.  I had a hard time remembering how to get there, but once I found the right turn, I found the house.  It was a nice house that served me well while I was studying.

Since we had eaten a late lunch, neither one of us were hungry for dinner, so we just went to the grocery and picked up some snacks for the night and breakfast the next morning and went back to the room to watch a movie.  We had a bit of an early night, in bed by 9:30pm.

I woke up about 5:00 am and got some breakfast and made sure I had everything in good working order, then began to look at the weather.  It was raining and it was lightning.  They had already pushed the race back 30 min, and by 6:00am they had pushed it back another 30 min.

  It finally stopped raining about 8:00am, which the original start time of the race and looked like we were all good for a clear race... and it was.  The course was wet, but it did not rain.  I had a pretty good race until about mile 9, then struggled again about mile 12.  I was running about 7:15 per mile, but there were some pretty hefty hills toward the end that really zapped my energy.  There was lots of fan support and cheering and people thanking all of the runners for running.  This was a charity event for the kids of St. Jude after all.  All of the cheering was motivating and the scenery was very familiar.  I knew all of the roads and exactly where I was throughout the race, which actually was a bit of a negative because I knew how far I was going and how far I still had to go.  Noble walked around the course and was able to see me, and I was able to see him several spots on the course and at the finish.  That was a nice treat.  He also got some pictures of me struggling... er, I mean running.

I think his photos with my iPhone are just as good as the race photos from the professional photographers.  Of course they are all just boring pictures of me running, so maybe it is the subject rather than the photographer or medium.  

   

After the race, we went to another hotel and that is when we toured around the University of Memphis and I took him back downtown to the dental school and showed him around there as well.  Then we went to Corky's BBQ.  He has been to the Rendezvous already with his mom and siblings, so I took him to the "other" BBQ joint in town.  It is all about the food ya know.

Look at all of those ribs!!!  They were super good.  He did not actually eat them all, but he put a huge dent in them.  I had the Sweet Tea Fried Chicken Sandwich.  It was pretty good.

Later that evening, after all of the touring around Memphis, we went back downtown and had dessert with a friend from dental school, Dr. Joe Ruder, who also ran in the race and his wife.  It was a nice evening and good to see him again.   We had a great time in Memphis.  I do not feel the need to go back.  I like it there.  It holds a lot of good memories for me, but I have no need to go there for anything.  I am happy that I was able to spend the time with Noble.  He is a fine young man.  We had some great conversations.  

My next Half is not until Jan.  I have two races, one week apart. Although, thanks to Tommy Medlin I am running a 10k this weekend in Daytona... on the Daytona International Speedway.  Two laps around the track.  Tommy is racing the triathlon 70.3.  Good luck Tommy and thanks for the race entry.  Should be fun, although I am certain to get smoked by the super speedy Craig Shimkus.  :)  

Next up, Oregon and Alabama.