Day 1 - Thursday

Dave and I got up for an early morning run then hit the not so Super 8 breakfast room for some toast and coffee. mmmmm.....

We left the motel an 9:00am and headed for Spokane Community College where the meet was being held...or so we thought. We drove around the campus and could only find an empty track - no sign of any runners at all. It was now less than 3 hours to race time and we still had to pickup numbers and check-in. I was getting a little worried now as I hate to rush around just before a race and wanted to have a really good warm-up. Kim was cool and calm in the back seat but then she didn't have to race until tomorrow.

Since we all assumed this was the venue, none of us had bothered to look at a map or get an exact address. I tried to fire up my laptop and see if I could find a wi-fi hotspot (being on a campus I figured the chances would be good) but the battery was dead - not so good. Fortunately, a very nice student came to our rescue and logged into one of the computer lab PC's and let us find our final destination. We should have gone to "Spokane Falls Community College" - doh! Apparently we weren't the only ones to have made this mistake so we didn't feel too bad.

Temperature at the track was around 30C and it wasn't even mid-day! As our 800m race times approached the wind picked up and the clouds ominously darkened as the thunder storms that were forecast rolled in. Fortunately nothing came of it and it remained dry . As there were only 11 athletes registered for the M40 800m it was decided 30 minutes before race time there would be no heats at all and we would run a straight final on Saturday. All that warming up for nothing! Actually, I was quite relieved as it gave me a few more days to rest up the injuries and recover from the long drive yesterday. We'd had a great warm-up and I was feeling the best I had in a long time and felt more confident than I had in quite a while.

Dave's race went ahead and he came in 4th in the first heat in 2:12 (66 sec split) qualifying comfortably for Saturday's final.

We all then headed downtown for lunch and Starbucks then back to Super 8 for some R&R.

Well, Dave decided to cook his dinner in the motel room microwave. Salmon and rice. At first I wasn't sure if the smell was from our running shoes or the bathroom. Ugh!!! Even George woke up from his sleep because of the stench. Time to get some fresh air.

Woz