Your claim to fame

I ran against Rickey Harris(second in NCAA's this year in the 400 and won the 400 hurdles) and Alan Webb in the same heat of the 400 my junior year at districts. I was ranked second in the heat behind Rickey, ahead of Alan who jogged a time at a dual meet. I was supposed to make the finals but freaked out and ran like crap. Rickey went on to beat Alan. In indoor senior year I got third to Richard Smith(800 junior champion) and Alan in the 500. Again ran against them in outdoor in the 400 final at districts, pr'd but again got third to Alan and Richard. Living 5 minutes away from South Lakes, the guys on my team and I had to go through 4 years of racing and losing to him.

One more thing, this isn't that big either, but it's something. My team and I were also in the DMR race at AOC(Adidas Outdoor Championship) when South Lakes set the National record. We ran rather poorly, we all peaked way to early, but it was a great experience.

Hey that had to be a blast! Its cool to say I ran against him!

My claim to fame:

5th place behind Noah Ngeny in an IAAF GP in 1999. Had no idea he would win the Olympic title the next year, but have a cool photo beside him with 150m to go.

Hilly, who are you? How were you running in an IAAF GP?

I snuck into a few IAAF Level 2 GP Meets in the late 90's (1500m and mile). Also did some racing here in the US - Penn Relays, Maine Distance Festival etc. So I've had my ass kicked by many good runners in addition to Ngeny!

Daniel Hill

I have had about 15min of great TV time (a LOT more footage that is usually alotted to a 5K race - and had post race interviews each year to boot) on ESPN for winning an annual race for 3 consecutive years. WOOHOO!!!!

My team was at AOC in 2001 and we were warming up for the 4xmile, when we ran by dathan ritz who was playing a the old school game boy. He was out in the sun laying on a tarp in 95 degree heat while playing this video game. His coach says Dathan you might want to get out of the sun. Dathan goes yea probably pauses the game gets up and walks under a tent. When we get back from are warm-up, Dathan's coach says Dathan you got to turn off the game and go warm up. And he says man I've never gotten to this level before does anyone know how to save this game. We looked at each other and said we might not be fast like him, but atleast we don't look like video game nerds. He went on to take secound that day in the 4xmile and we did bad. But still to this day atleast I'm not a Gameboy nerd.

Hey, what's wrong with being a video game nerd? Albeit Gameboy is a bit old-school, but come on....Playstation 2??

Now this isnt my claim to fame, but it's about a friend of mine. He's a steepler, and he's run at nationals the past two years, but he's not going to Europe anytime soon.

Anyways, he was out at the US Open this year at Stanford, just laying on the infield grass waiting for his race to come around, when Gail Devers comes up and sits down a few feet from him. She's sitting there for a minute, looking at the crowd, and this is their ensuing conversation:

Gail: "Man, this crowd is just nuts. Reminds me of those crazy fans at the European meets."

My friend (who, like i said, has never been to Europe): "Um, yeah...kinda like Zurich and those soccer hooligans."

Gail: (pauses for a second...) "Yeah, yeah. Kinda does remind me of Zurich..."

I think they went on talking about it for a few more minutes, and the whole time my friend never said a word about never racing in Europe. I doubt Gail even knew who he was...

This sucks pretty bad, but whatever. 1978, Ontario Indoor Track Championships in Toronto, at the Pig Palace (anyone remember it?) I won the Bantam race, breaking 10 minutes for the first time. One of the official timekeepers was none other than Canadian marathon record holder Jerome Drayton (2:10). I go up to him and ask him to sign my race number. He doesn't even look at me, signs it and turns his back to me. I realize that he'd signed the back, and I wanted him to sign the front. I reach for his arm to stop him from walking away. He turns and says 'what?' in as cold a voice as you've ever heard. I ask him to sign the front and he does while muttering 'Jesus Christ I hate you kids'... He was a helluva runner though...

It was my last indoor high school 800m, the day before I ran the New York State Champs(Cornell University) and place third Brad Sumner (villinova) was 4th behind Dennis Webster believe he went to Dartmouth and Paul Whitiker..Georgetown Alum in the 1000m. The next day I had to go to the National Scholastic Indoor Champs (Yale University). It was on ESPN I was soooo tired. I ended up 7th. it was a blast

In the fall of 1981, I was working retail in a Consumers Distributing store in Westwood, NJ. This couple comes in looking at stuff, and they end up ordering some non-descript jewelry & stuff. They're both dressed in sweatsuits and adidas's, so I think maybe they're runners, and I ask the wife. Well, she says her husband is the real runner and a marathoner, and I ask what his best time is. She says, "2:10", and I roll my eyes and ask where he did this. She says, "Fukuoka". They walk out......three weeks later I'm at the Diet Pepsi 10,000 in Purchase, NY, and guess who's there? Same couple...it ends up that it's Rob DeCastella and his wife. She is having trouble with her 35mm camera, so I lend her a hand loading the film or sumptin'. My little "claim to fame".

This isn't exactly a claim to fame, but it seems to be in the spirit of this thread:

It's 1988, and I'm at the starting line of the San Diego International Marathon, up front with the other invited runners. As I usually do at the start of a race, I look around at the runners near me, trying to avoid being near anyone who appears to be a slow runner and will just get in the way after the gun goes off. There's a fat black guy with a big belly standing right next to me. He's wearing training shoes. Oddly enough, though, he's wearing a really low number. I figure that he's some local celebrity -- maybe the mayor of San Diego -- and he doesn't know that he shouldn't be up here with the fast guys.

The race announcer is welcoming the runners, and starts talking about some of the great athletes we have in this race today. He then says something like this: "Finally, we're especially pleased today to have in our race the only man in history to simultaneously hold the world records at 3,000 meters, 5,000 meters, 10,000 meters, and the 3,000 meter steeplechase. Ladies and gentlemen, the greatest distance runner in the history of the world . . . ."

The fat black guy with the big belly, standing right next to me, is Henry Rono.

Two stories from a very mediocre runner. Early 90s in Albuquerque, NM, I'm warming up on a side street for the Duke City Half. I wore glasses, but didn't need them super bad, so I wasn't wearing them so they wouldn't fog up, rub a raw spot, etc. I also cross paths with a black guy several times, but by the time I figure out who he is (because of my sub-par eyesight), he's gone. Of course, he was my absolute all-time idol, Henry Rono.

Secondly, I lived in Lexington, KY, for a year after college. Working in American Eagle Outfitters. Mark Nenow walks in. I try to impress him with some inane questions which he answered politely. Probably came off as a total dork. P.S. When I went to ACU, we had a SA dude named Freddie Williams who I grew to know pretty well because we worked together. Because he was South African, he was banned back in the day, which was quite ironic because he was "colored" i.e. of mixed race like I believe Plaatjes to be. Anyhoo, he ended up marrying a Canadian and running in two Olympics (I think) as a Canadian. 1:45 guy.

My claim to faim, or my teams, is making an ass out of ourselves during a post race banquet with tons of Pro's at the Adidas Midwest Indoor Track Classic. See the Most Valuable Relay team got to go eat dinner w/ all the Pro's there. So we brought along our trusty video camera, and went to every one of them (about 60 in all), interviewed em and got their autographs while they were eating. Then after most of the people were gone except about 1 table (10 people or so) we decided we'd take the big ice sculpture of the Adidas logo back to our room. So we pick it up, and the thing is plugged into the wall... Well anyways it was pretty cool having a bunch of Pro's sitting there laughing at a bunch of scrawney HS kids trying to jack an ice sculpture. Well we couldn't get it because it had a light in it that was plugged in to something, so we just proceeded to take all the desert trays instead.

Then, my friend proceeded to ask Jenny Adams to prom. That is my claim to fame. Oh ya, and at the same meet, we were talking to Senneca Lassiter before his race, and he needed some water, so I gave him mine, so Senneca drank outta my water! lol yep there's one of my claim to fames.

1981. World XC Champs in Madrid. With the team managers offering a day tour to an old dusty castle in Toledo (which no one signed up for because it would have meant an all day strength-sapping bus ride) Mike Maguire and I organized a little horizon expanding night out to see a "live sex show" - at least the sign on the street advertised it as such.

We rounded up the crew, which included Junior stars such as Keith "broken arm" Brantly and George Nicholas. The only chick to be brave enough to go was Betty Jo Springs. So anyhow, we get a table at the club and order a few drinks for the crew, the curtains open and two Spanish dudes with guitars start playing traditional Spanish songs. After each song the curtains closed and we politely applauded and waited to see what would happen next. For the next hour these Spanish troubadours played a song, the curtains closed, and we politely applauded.

Well the team tourists weren't too happy with our promise of a "live sex show" and all the while they kept looking at "Mack" and I with disappointment in their eyes. Then those two dudes came out, this time there was a scantily clad woman with them and she proceeded to strip to the Spanish folk songs. Not bad, but not good either. The curtain opened and another woman came out and stripped and danced for us to that fiddle and banjo crap. Mack and I resigned to the fact that it wasn't what we expected but at least the Junior team got a few thrills and, holy heck, we convinced Betty Jo Springs to go to a strip show with us. Mission accomplished - sort of.

The curtains opened again, the lights were low except for a spotlight in the middle of the stage, the Spanish guys were playing, but this time one of the women comes out and does a headstand - naked, butt-naked - with her legs spread at ninety degrees and balanced like a gymnast. The other women came out of the darkened back stage and then proceeded chow down like a rat takes to cheese! Now the whole crew was grinning ear to ear!!!! The curtains closed and we congratulated ourselves for a well organized tour.

The curtains opened one more time.

This time they brought out the toys...

That's my story and I'm sticking with it.

good stories guys.

i guess my best form a few years back is thus. i was living in teddington in london and training quite hard. i lived with a few runners too and we'd found this cool picture from when komen had run 7.20 for the 3 k.

a lot of kenyans do stay in teddington but we hadn't seen too many. anyway a couple of days later i woke up and saw this skinny black guy leaving the house out the back of ours. looking closer it was dk himself! he'd bought the house to train in teddington.

So it's my junior year of highschool,i'd just started training hard, and the confidence was rising a little too fast. My team goes down to Ann Arbor to run in a little indoor track meet, my first indoor meet, and i'm blowing my wad. So i put down a altogether too fast predicted time and landed my self in the fast mile. As i go to line up i am lined up in the same lane as Andy Marsh, Tom Greenless, and....Dathan. So now i think i'm a little over my head and i start off real slow. All the way in last place till the last 2.5 laps where i just start taking off and passing guys like wild. As i am on my last .5 a lap the announcer mistakes me for dathan and everyone starts cheering for me like crazy even though dathan just finished. Right after the race i got two autograph seekers, four college coaches approach me, and another newspaper guy, all come up to me thinking i was dathan, damn it hurt to say i wasnt. But then dathan saw this happen and we had a good laugh about it.