{"id":2229,"date":"2022-11-02T21:48:17","date_gmt":"2022-11-03T04:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/?p=2229"},"modified":"2022-11-02T21:53:23","modified_gmt":"2022-11-03T04:53:23","slug":"martinez-xc-october-31-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/?p=2229","title":{"rendered":"Martinez XC – October 31, 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Art, Sal, and I were the only SPARTANS able to make the short sojourn to Martinez for the Matt Yeo Memorial Aggie XC Challenge, but the \u201cThree Spartaneers\u201d were determined to toe-the-line in what the Aggie Website waggishly calls \u201cthe greatest cross-country race in the world, or at least America, or at least one of the top-10 in Martinez . . . .\u201d<\/p>\n

If the Aggies were, perhaps, a tad snobbish in the description of their event, who could blame them? The Hoka Aggies\u2013\u2013who were formerly the \u201cAsics Aggies\u201d who were formerly the \u201cReebok Aggies\u201d\u2013\u2013are arguably the premier running club on the PA\/USATF XC circuit. What other club can boast three Olympians, seven National record holders, a National Club XC Championship (Women 2019), perennial victories at the Bay to Breakers 12K 13-man Centipede run (setting a world record in 1991 with their 26-legs snaking through the course in 37:40), and a running shoe sponsor! I\u2019ve asked Jerome to see if he could get a sponsorship for the SPARTANS, but thus far he has only received some mild interest from a start-up company selling stool softeners and incontinence underwear at ReadySetGo.com<\/p>\n

The old-timey SPARTANS will remember when this race was initially run on the Hoka Aggies\u2019 home turf in Davis. It was moved to Shoreline for many years, and the SPARTANS were pleased to have a XC race in their own neighborhood. I wasn\u2019t happy when the race was again moved because then my only knowledge of Martinez was the grimy site of the Shell Refinery visible from 680 with its massive, Roman Candle towers spewing billows of smoke and pitch over a hellish landscape. I imagined running through a veritable Valley of Ashes while sucking in the noxious fumes of the petroleum-tainted air.<\/p>\n

Imagine my surprise, then, when the freeway turnoff eventually rolled into the bucolic village of Martinez, a little gem of a town nestled between the Carquinez Strait and the Alhambra Valley. Martinez was the home of renowned naturalist John Muir, the birthplace of Joltin\u2019 Joe Dimaggio, and remains the source of pure Alhambra water. The city is one of the oldest in California, and even the occasional melancholy moan of the Amtrak train that runs along the edge of town adds to the homey atmosphere. Back in the day, this was a favorite race of SPARTAN Francisco Verduzco who would coax the team into lingering in town long enough to have lunch and savor its old town charm. Fond memories . . . .<\/p>\n

But I digress. The XC run is a 4.2m, two-loop course around, over, and through the meadows, ponds, creeks, and marshlands of the Radke Martinez Regional Park. The pretzel-twisting path has some grass and paved-path running, but it is primarily a single-track trail run that is, fortunately, well guided with arrows and course directors. (I did manage to veer off course once, but was quickly corrected by a then-trailing Sal and Norm Cantwell.) Of great humor to the SPARTANS was one course director who acted like a teenage girl at a Taylor Swift concert every time he saw a SPARTAN runner: \u201cHere come the Spartans!\u201d he would yell. \u201cSpeed City! Tommie Smith! John Carlos! Go Spartans! Go Speed City!\u201d We didn\u2019t have the heart to tell the guy we\u2019re not really connected to \u201cSpeed City\u201d; instead, we just raised a fist in salute and jogged on.<\/p>\n

The Martinez run is a flat, sea-level course, and one long stretch runs so close to the edge of the Bay you can hear the little waves lapping the shore. Well, in truth, the course is not totally flat; in fact, it has perhaps the most peculiar obstacle in XC racing: a steep, wooden arch bridge over Alhambra creek. When I saw this obstacle the first time I ran Martinez, I thought, \u201cOh look. A Japanese tea garden bridge. How adorable.\u201d Then I reached this pace-busting, hump-of-a-bump and quickly renamed it, \u201cPuto Puente!\u201d The arch bridge is an echo of a once flourishing Martinez fishing village, and when the city was creating trails through the park in 1979, it had to install an arch bridge over Alhambra creek to allow the last active family fishing vessel to travel to and from the Bay. For Harriers, this is a bridge too far that creates troubled waters.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Well, it was a cool, gorgeous day to run underneath a blue-bird sky, but if Kurt, Art, and Sal were part of a centipede, they would be the butt-end of the bug. Nevertheless, they finished and picked up their Hoka hat swag bag at the finish line, and they could also say that they once raced against the 2010 U.S. National Marathon champion. Yes, leading the field was 41-year-old Sergio Reyes who last January won the USA Masters Cross Country title by nearly a minute. Sergio pulsed through the circuit like an electron, setting a new course record, covering the 4.2 miles in 19:43 (that\u2019s a 4:42 mile pace!). That\u2019s just a wee bit faster than the Three Spartaneers: Sal (40:46); Kurt (41:11); Art (46:34).<\/p>\n

The Three Spartaneers returned to their cozy green-lawn encampment to watch the Open Men\u2019s race, chat with familiar harriers, and listen to the Aggie tunes pumping from the loud speakers. It was another great day filled with memories, or, as the Buzbee Boys are fond of saying, \u201cIt\u2019s a celebration of Life!\u201d<\/p>\n

And speaking of \u201cThe Buzbee Boys,\u201d the following day was the Senior Track Meet in Hayward and both Mike and Pat were there scooping up heavy medals along with me and SPARTAN Brian Conroy. It was especially heartwarming to see Pat running the track once again. Maybe we didn\u2019t put a scare into the Hoka Aggies in Martinez, but we sure kicked some ass in Hayward!\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Vamos a Correr,\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 reported by Kurt Gravenhorst<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Art, Sal, and I were the only SPARTANS able to make the short sojourn to Martinez for the Matt Yeo Memorial Aggie XC Challenge, but the \u201cThree Spartaneers\u201d were determined to toe-the-line in what the Aggie Website waggishly calls … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pUWdT-zX","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2229"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2236,"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2229\/revisions\/2236"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gospartans.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}