Arkansas Runners- McDonnell Era

hi doug,

thanks for responding--dminer gets his wish for other legendary hogs chiming in. "gums" was an appropriate nickname. i really enjoyed training with him and hanging with him occasionally--when i said he was goofy, it was meant as a compliment. i thought he was from louisiana, as someone else confirmed here; he definitely had some "southern boy" in him. also, when i said he appeared out of nowhere, it was no exaggeration. NO ONE knew why he suddenly appeared with our training group, but as you've alluded to, he had great sales skills and a million dollar smile and enthusiasm, so who was going to tell him he wasn't invited?

as for the tough crowd: joe was, at least for a short time, a god among men. perhaps a poor analogy, but i've always wondered at the usually-slightly/sometimes-explicitly derogatory term "one-hit wonder." isn't that one more hit than most of us? that does not mean joe is above criticism, but to use another cliche: until you've run a mile in his shoes...

Doug- I heard you were working with the Rogue Team in Austin. Any truth to the rumor?

Cus:

Old Geeg was from Metarie Louisiana just west of the big easy. Rummel high school. My wife is from New Orleans and ran for Loyola there. Keith is still a legend. He used to go down, win the "local resident" division for the crescent city 10k, take the 1K prize and blow most of it on a huge party! Anybody that know Keith, knows that when we describe him as funny, quirky, unique, we are doing it in a loving way!

Back in the 80's, we had the unwritten rule that you NEVER went fast on the Sunday long run until the first big hill, at about 4 miles. The whole team would just tell stories at 7 minute pace for these 4 miles. Keith always had the best "Saturday night" stories and he knew how to tell them with incredible flair. He could tell you a simple story of just getting a girls phone number and make it so interesting it was better than some other guys story who closed the deal.

Keith also was a great runner. Going into Penn Relays we always had 3 spots on the 4x1500m locked up and about 7 guys gunning for the 4th spot. His last two years he made that spot by beating all those guys at the home meet the week before ( 85 and 86 years). He beat out Taylor (Matt), Byrd, Looney, Falcon, Efurd, etc. He still is on the team that holds the NCAA record running 3:42 a leg in 85 He also was on two of our NCAA cross teams beating out a bunch of us including me for the last spot to go to nationals in 86 and I was a 3:38 guy then.

Great guy!

Consig let's not get carried away now.....GG was a great guy, goofy as hell and always had a smile on his face, but....but never ran under 3.47 at Penn. He always led off and came in mid pack pissing Gazza of so bad he'd run 3.35 and 3.38 to get us back in front. BTW those are the top two fastest 1500 splits ever at Penn

Were you there at the airport when Byrd spotted Seka (the porn queen) word got to GG and he transformed from a hungoverd sleepy daze to bird dog chasing the porn queen down. Got her autograph and pic with her too. Quite a character

Consiglio does at times, have a loss of details.

Iovine ran 3:48.8 at Penn that year, so you are just 7 seconds off.

-Keith Iovine (3:48.8) 10.01.63

That's 6 seconds faster than you ran at Seoul, right Doug?

Doug Consiglio, I was watching a video of the 1987 DMR at Penn-what a race. On the anchor leg you, Kip Cherouyiat, Mike Stahr, and Mark Deady close together. Plus you had run 3:36.0 the week or two before.

One thing I was always curious was where was George Mason and Abdi Bile for this race? This was the year Bile broke the NCAA meet record and ran 3:35.

I forgot Gerry O'Rielly as well from Villanova.

And I always wondered with all the great 1500 runners at Arkansas how Iovine mangaged to get on those Penn relay squads. That opening leg is tricky. If you get boxed on the last lap you really screw your team.

Doug seems to be the master of ceremonies of the tales of Arkansas. Knowing many of the stories first hand and many of the great stories second hand, I assure there is an element of "trying to hard."

For instance, the Geech was the local champion, winning $1000 one time- not multiple. He did, infact, get drunk after the race where he ran into the team at the connecting airport. He did blow it on his own party, not throwing a party as he Doug describes. Not to take anything away from the Geech, as he would give the shoes off his feet.

I just want to help out with the validity of Consiglio's stories. He obviously wants to be "the man" being statesman of Arkansas Track. From the stories I know that are true, they are unique and great ones. Let's not sugar coat something that is already sweeter than mollases.

what we got, is failure to communicate! number one way to succeed in life, sales, relationships etc, is to make people feel good. it has been my gift in my limited success in sales.

what i see here, as in most forums, is a bunch of guys subliminaly trying to make each other feel insecure. whether it be becasue they ran faster 20 years ago or boasting that they know more important people.

reading these forums is like watching a bad crash. you hate to see it, but it is hard to look away.

just like i tell my fellow cyclists (which are the worse when it comes to degradation) "the next time you want to talk down to a less superior rider or name drop, suck it in and talk about the other person" it is incredible how good one can feel at the end of the day when they added value to someone rather than taken a peice away from a friend or fellow contributer on a forum.

next time you think you want to make the sale or add value to something, do everything you can to make the other feel good, rather than like a beaten dog.

SALES 101!

Don't knock on the dead man! I said he was on a team that averaged 3:42 a leg, which he was. He just happened to run the slowest leg, didn't think that was worthy to note since he is dead. I know first hand how he ran as on that 86 team I was waiting around to anchor while he led off. If anybody has a problem with Keiths lead off it should be Gary Taylor, Espen Borge, Paul Donovan, David Swain or me. So, if you are not one of those people, be nice if you acknowledge that 26 years later Keith is still on the NCAA 4x1500m record setting team. The guy is dead, have a heart.

So, to summarize, I was anchoring when Keith led off and I am fine with it. What is your perspective?

As far as for those who want to comment about me, go right ahead. Fire away.

One thing though. If you want anybody to respect or put in perspective as to what you have to say, grow a pair and use your real name. I always found at Arkansas that the guys who talked the most shit, were never the ones towing the line. Put your real name out here, otherwise we will just assume you are some non sub 4 transfer guy...

I was enjoying the later part of this thread....not too much hating going on and remembering some fun stuff about GG. But alas there are always some people who want to stir the pot. I think Consig's recolection of his stories has been true to form to date. I did misinterpret your post Doug, about GG's split...sorry. Now,see if you can guess who I am....I'll give you a clue..I was the person who gave GG his name; it happened on the bus on the way home from Mtn Home his freshman year(1982)

Whatch this space...

Hmmmm. I think I know who you are. You and I flew down to Texas for thanksgiving 1984?

You got it....come up to Fay for the SEC indoor meet and I'll buy you dinner; you can stay at my house if you like. Trying to get Matt down for the meet too. If not I plan on being at Texas Relays this year; you can buy me dinner. BTW I have some great photos of you from Texas Relays. I'll get them out the on FB some time soon

Won't be in the nam sadly this indoor. But will be at A M for ncaas. And I will buy you diner for the relays for sure! Just had Borges whole family and Egan here staying with us for a few days! E mail me, my name at gmail.com.

Tow the line ? Doug, how many times were you all American. ?

How many not in a relay? I believe that's how we defined tow the line.

It is "TOE the line", not "TOW"!!!

Enough of this bickering and dinner scheduling and post some Hog workouts!

I hate to rain on everyone's parade but you've probably seen the bulk of John's workouts posted on this thread already. That was the great thing about John, consistensy to a fault. If you went to his office to find out what the workout was he'd lean back, reach down into his file drawer, and look at what we did the same time the previous year. No super secret magic formula; just solid hard work and an uncanny ability to make most of his athletes believe in themselves.

I will say this...in the early 80's there was some friction between some of the guys; who was the heir apparrnt etc. It would mannefest itself during the mile intervals where we'd start of doing a sub 4.20 and John would loose him marbles, shut the workout down and make us start again. He would not stand for any kind of racing during training. All the players would have there ego's clipped and we'd be back together as a team.

John's vetting process weeded out most of the egocentric recruits; any that did come to AR were knocked into shap pretty quickly. Perhaps thats why we have so many Joe Falcon stories; it took a lot of chiseling to get that square peg in the round hole of the hogs....

You may have already seen this footage but if not enjoy. The best part is at the very end where "Gags" lets us all know how he feels about Gerry O'Reilly. Might be painful for Gazza and Consig but we get to see (well almost) Rodie Haley run a 44.3 split in the rain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CexhVbuBrwk

Enjoy..

Ha Ha! I thought that was Gags! Epic race.