9 Lousy Seconds

That was how far I finished behind Candis on Saturday evening. Candis finished in 27:41, shaving 2 full minutes off her 5K PR. What the hell? Sandbagger! I finished in 24:50 which is not a PR but that’s quickly becoming tired meme on this blog so I won’t pursue it any further. Congrats to Candis for destroying her old PR, I wasn’t planning on her being able to go sub-28, but it turns out that her desire to beat me is a pretty strong motivator. I actually think she’s been employing the rope-a-dope against me. Remember that Triathlon she just finished, the one where she shaved 10 minutes off her previous time? She ran a 30+ minute 5K in that. Also, at the Granby Gut Buster she conveniently ran with our 6 year old so I wouldn’t know how fast she was. I can’t remember the last time she actually tried in a 5K.

I gave it my all during the final downhill stretch of the race and couldn’t catch her. I didn’t even see her until she made the final turn towards the finish line. At that point she was no more than a block away from finishing and I was still a couple hundred yards behind her. I was still gaining on her but it became apparent pretty quickly that I wasn’t going to catch her. As we crossed the line we were funneled into overly congested chutes so that they could tear the tags off our bibs (it was not chip timed) and somehow Candis managed to get into the most congested chute. I was through the chutes at least a minute ahead of Candis and was hoping worried that they were going to mess up the official times and show that I had beaten her. They did mess up the official times, adding between 15-20 seconds to our times, but still had her 3 seconds ahead of me.

The after-party is somewhat of a meat market as they try to cater to the singles crowd with fashion shows and dating games and the like. They’re still foisting Dale’s Pale Ale (which is not good) on an unsuspecting crowd, but they also gave us Chipotle Burritos and Mad Greens salads, so I suppose the beer faux pas can be forgiven. We were fortunate enough to meet up with Simon (from RunColo) & his wife Kelly after the race and they were gracious enough to not tell us their times and pretend that ours were impressive. That façade quickly faded though when Kelly had to go up on stage to collect her 3rd place prize. Yes, 3rd place overall. Congrats to Kelly and Simon who are both obscenely fast.

Congrats again to Candis. She is getting faster by leaps and bounds and I’m proud of her. 90 percent proud and 10 percent annoyed. Well... maybe 70 percent proud and 30 percent annoyed. Okay, okay, 25 percent proud, 75 percent annoyed. Fine, if this happens again we will NOT be on speaking terms.

Today is the Skirt Chaser 5K

In about 3 hours Candis and I will be running the Skirt Chaser 5K in Denver which means that our house has been filled with more trash talk than a garbage symposium. For those of you not familiar with the Skirt Chaser race series the ‘skirts’ get a 3 minute head start over the ‘skirt chasers’ which is going to make things interesting. At the Bolder Boulder 10K I beat Candis by 5 minutes, which would seem to translate to a 2½ minute advantage in a 5K, meaning that she would beat me. Of course I’m still confident that I’ll prevail but only time will tell.

I wanted to get this post up today because there have been numerous attempts at sabotage this afternoon and I am pretty sure that Candis might resort to poisoning me. So if I don’t show up with a gloating post on Monday then you’ll all know that it’s because Candis poisoned me, call the police.

Thus far today I’ve brought Candis a piece of cheesecake, added slow romantic songs into her running playlist, attempted to drain the battery in her Garmin and engaged in some psychological warfare by telling her that she’s really looking old. I’ve also advised her that her race strategy should be to start out nice and slow and then finish slower, but I don’t think she was buying it.

For her part, Candis has made me lunch which turned out to be a little spicy and has left my favorite pair of running underwear at the bottom of the dirty laundry hamper. The joke is on her though because I’m still going to wear them.

In the vein of equal time for opposing views I offered that she could add anything to this post or even write a post of her own. Her response was “Just tell them I’m going to kick your a$$!” Yes dear, that’s a pretty good joke, I’ll be sure to include it.

The only thing left to do is figure out what the loser has to do for the winner. Naturally I’ve got some ideas, but feel free to leave your suggestions in the comments.

So I Married a Triathlete

This past weekend Candis and 6 friends all completed the Tri Babes Sprint Triathlon. A feat that required them to swim 750 meters, bike 12 miles and then run a 5K. I completed the much more impressive feat of toting two kids around a triathlon course, taking pictures of their mother and cheering loudly. Why is my feat more impressive? Well... it’s not, but I did mine without a lick of training and set a new Personal Record for the number of times I lost track of where my children were. Ta da! Unfortunately they always found their way back to me thanks to the friends and relatives who were in attendance cheering for Candis and the other ladies.

Enough about me. Candis. Rocked! The night before the tri Candis indicated that a good time to shoot for would be 25 minutes on the swim, 45 minutes on the bike and 35 minutes for the run for a total time somewhere around the 1 hour 45 minute mark. I countered with 20 - 45 - 30 because Candis always underestimates her abilities when creating race goals, and a 35 minute 5K for Candis would be downright shameful. I’m not sure what we decided on but here’s the way it worked out!

Swim (750m): 15:39 (A full 4 minutes faster than her best training times!)
T1: 1:52
Bike (12 mi): 46:36
T2: 1:06
Run (5K): 32:11
Total Time: 1:37:22

Most impressive was clearly the swim and T1 time. I was so excited for Candis when she came up out of the water in 15 minutes and headed into T1, she was doing great! T2 was an entirely different story, and not because it was slow. Candis came in on the bike, hung it on the rack and headed out as quickly as she could. She’d been gone a few minutes when I saw her bib still lying in her transition area. (For the sensible readers among you who don’t do triathlons; you have to put the bib on for the run.)

In an ironic twist of fate you’ll notice that in Candis’ last post before the tri, the only item in her Race Plan that suffered from excessive exclamation points was “BIB ON !!!” Perhaps it needed more exclamation points or a larger font. Springing into action, I illegally leapt into the transition zone and snatched up the bib. I could either head to the finish and try to hand her the bib a couple tenths of a mile prior to the finish line or I could try to chase her down. I knew that she would be upset about leaving the bib if she realized what she’d done and I was worried she’d come back to get it, so dressed in jeans and a cotton t-shirt I took off for a little 5K jaunt. Not long into my impromptu run I rounded a corner and saw Candis running back towards me, tears welling up in her eyes. I handed her the bib and she turned around and headed back in the right direction. I paced with her for another quarter mile until she was able to settle down and get into her groove, at which point I went back to the finish area and thanked Candis’ aunt and uncle for watching the kids.

Hey look, no bib!
The run course as measured by a friend’s Garmin actually turned out to be 2.7 miles (a 4.4K instead of a 5K), but by coming back to get her bib Candis managed to run an extra half mile, making her run a fraction longer than a 5K. I suppose you could say that Candis was the only one to finish the course because everyone else stopped shy of running a 5K, in fact if I was her I’d be telling everyone that I was the only one who was able to run a 5K after the grueling swim and bike. That’s the way I roll, dishonest and boastful are two of my more attractive qualities. Sorry ladies, I’m taken.

I can’t even tell you how proud I am of Candis so please try to suppress your praise and adulation of me and tell Candis in the comments that she did great, just for today. Tomorrow you can go back to telling me how awesome I am because let’s not forget that I’m the one who’s running a marathon.


Don’t let her catch you!
Candis takes my 3 year old’s advice and shows her Battle Face!
Also of note I ran into Ross Hadley from agegroupers.com and he took a whole bunch of pictures of the event, you can see them here. All of the girls from our group are wearing the same pink hibiscus shirt that Candis is and there’s even a group shot of the husbands and kids that were there supporting Team Hibiscus. Many thanks for the pictures Ross.

Congrats on a great time C. “It’s a shame I’m going to have to destroy you.”

Hydration Made Easy

I’ve finally solved the age old problem of how to hydrate on a run without having to wear a fuel belt (which just looks awkward), or carry a water bottle (which just freezes your hand and tilts your kilter). This past week Candis and I found ourselves without our children on several occasions thanks to their grandparents, who unimaginably seem to enjoy spending time with the dirt-covered, balls of energy that we’ve produced. It was on one such peaceful afternoon that I decided to head out for a run, and since we are one of those annoyingly cute couples that still enjoy each other’s company, Candis decided to tag along on her bike.

I took full advantage of this situation and loaded Candis up with water bottles, Clif SHOT Gels, and anything else that I thought I might need on my run. It was fantastic. Whenever I needed a drink I just snapped my fingers and barked “Water!” I’d douse myself with cool water like an Olympic marathoner and then toss the bottle to the side of the road, because if the Olympic marathoners can do it, then I can too. Of course since we had a limited supply, Candis would jump down from her bike, scurry off to the side of the road to pick up the water bottle and then catch back up with me. Being the loving husband that I am I never once complained about how long it took her to do this.

After a couple of miles I was really getting the hang of running with a cyclist and I was demanding assistance like an entitled actor with an oversized ego. “Hold my sunglasses,” “give me a SHOT Gel,” “take my hat,” “give me back my sunglasses and hat,” “no, no, no, hand me the hat first and then the sunglasses, are you trying to make me slower?” “Go on ahead and push the button for the crosswalk and make sure you time it so that I don’t have to slow down.” I even considered asking her to wipe the sweat from my brow, but she looked so wobbly with all those things in her hands that I was worried she’d accidentally hit me with the handlebars. Perhaps once she gets a little better at this we’ll give that one a shot.

It was a good run, and I think that we both enjoyed my company. It’s really nice to have water available without having to figure out how to carry it, and I plan on doing many more runs with my wife at my side. I highly recommend this method of carrying water on runs for those of you with spouses or children who can ride bikes. It’s time to put your family to work for your benefit, you won’t be disappointed.

The Dual Runner Family

There are a number of benefits in having a spouse who also runs, we motivate each other, neither of us has to explain why we’re spending so much money on race fees or Clif SHOT Gels or running attire. We understand the eccentricities that come with running, the time spent analyzing splits, the carb loading, the time spent analyzing how clear one’s urine is. “Hey, honey! Check this out! You wouldn’t even know that I pee’d in here if I didn’t tell you!” I’m such a romantic.

All in all, I love that Candis is a runner. However, this weekend we came across one of those times when it was disadvantageous for us to both be runners. The temperature was going to be in the high 90s/low 100s all weekend and we were both looking to get in a long run. Both of us decided that the ideal time for this was early Saturday morning before it got too hot. Sunday morning was eliminated as we would both be at church, and the evenings really don’t cool down that much and are reserved for other social activities (read: drinking). We can’t both go on Saturday morning because we have these two little people living with us that apparently can’t be left alone at the house. Come to think of it maybe it is not disadvantageous that we are both runners, maybe it is disadvantageous that we are both parents... Anyway, this situation led to the following conversation:

Me: I’m going to get up and run first thing Saturday morning.
Candis: Um, when am I supposed to go run?
Me: I don’t know. Maybe you could run on the treadmill?
Candis: You expect me to run 10 miles on the treadmill?
Me: Sure.
Candis: No way. You wouldn’t run 10 miles on the treadmill. Why do you get to run on Saturday morning?
Me: Because I have a race coming up much sooner than you do.
Candis: Oh, I see… You’re going to play the ‘race card’ huh?

And then we both cracked up laughing. We did find a suitable compromise, I went for my long run (11 miles) on Saturday morning and Candis cut her run down to 6 miles with some intervals and did it on the treadmill. Contrary to what you may have heard, marriage is not all about making compromises, it’s about making your spouse make compromises. In that vein, I will continue to play the ‘race card’ until the Georgetown to Idaho Springs Half Marathon, after which I’ll need to find a way to discredit the ‘race card’ theory because Candis will surely be looking to use it.

A Different Kind of Motivation

The following is a transcript of last night’s conversation between me and my ever supportive wife. Candis had just finished up her run, and I was trying to avoid mine. We have an unspoken agreement wherein you are allowed to say almost anything to your spouse to encourage them to go run. Here’s how that played out last night:

Me: I don’t feel like running tonight.
Candis: How come?
Me: I don’t know.
C: You really should go run though.
Me: [Dismissively] Yeah...
C: [Tilting her head a little to the side] Have you gained some weight?
Me: Ha ha, very funny. Actually, I think I’m down a couple pounds, so no I haven’t gained weight thankyouverymuch.

Moments later:
C: Hey I was looking at the running log you posted the other day and I think you may have copied it down wrong.
Me: Really? Why?
C: Well some of the times that you posted looked a little... you know... SLOW!
Me: I know what you’re trying to do, and it’s not going to work. I’m not a child. I can’t just be goaded into going running.
C: Alright, come here.
[She hugs me, I debate trying out a pick up line but before I get the chance...]
C: Are you sure you haven’t gained weight because you feel a little flabbier.
Me: I don’t think that’s a word. (According to Merriam-Webster it is. Great, just one more thing I’m wrong about.) And you smell a little sweaty.
C: That’s because I ran.
Me: Well maybe I don’t want to smell sweaty like you do.
C: Well maybe I didn’t want to be flabby like you are.

Yes, I went and ran. My wife for her part went and showered. Without me. :(

P.S. Today is your last chance to register an entry in the Great Bike Giveaway. Be sure to tune in tomorrow for the announcement of the winner. It could be you! Odds are it won’t be, but it could be.

The Difference Between Men and Women

On Sunday my wife and I decided to run together, but since we have two young kids she jumped on the treadmill and I went outside in the beautiful sunshine. I got to go outside on account of my awesome Rock-Paper-Scissors (Rochambeau) skills and I'll let you all in on the secret to always winning at RPS. You should always throw the secret 4th option: Fire. (Note: the Fire move is not officially recognized by the World RPS Society.)

When I returned home from my run in the beautiful outdoors I went down into the unfinished basement to check on my wife. She too was done with her run, had taken off her shoes and socks and was walking around the basement picking up toys. I immediately noticed that her foot was bleeding. “Do you realize that you’re bleeding all over the basement floor?” I asked, hoping that she didn’t catch that the concern in my voice was clearly for the basement floor. She stopped and looked at the floor around her. Sure enough there were bloody footprints all around, revealing exactly where she’d been since she took off her shoes and socks. It was almost cartoon-like.

It became even more cartoon-like when she shifted her weight to her bloody right foot and picked up her left foot to look at it. “Uhhhh, I’m pretty sure those are right footprints on the floor Babe,” I said as she stood balanced on her right foot in a puddle of blood. “How much blood did you lose?” I asked, my concern starting to switch away from the unfinished basement floor.

All of a sudden it occurred to us both at the same time that maybe she’d lost her first toenail. “Hey, check your toenails” I said excitedly. We both eagerly looked at her toenails to see if one had come off and even tugged at a few that were caked with blood but alas, no luck. All 5 toenails were securely in place. The only thing we could find was what looked like a very small blister that had rubbed off.

We went back and looked at her shoes and socks and not surprisingly the toe of the right shoe was stained a deep crimson red color. I’m not sure how she missed it when she took her shoes off but somehow she managed it. This is where I guess men and women are different. I saw the blood on the shoe and was overcome with jealousy. I looked down at my nice new white Asics and wished I could see some evidence there that would prove I could run through pain. My wife saw her nice new white Asics stained with blood and was disappointed that they were ruined.

After we had both showered and changed it occurred to me that I needed to post about this and I grabbed my camera to capture what would have surely been a Pulitzer Prize winning photograph of the bloody shoe. I found the shoe clean and drying in the tub. Ruined! If this would have happened to me there would be multiple pictures accompanying this post. I would have told the story to everyone I met on the trail and it would have been bigger and better every time. “You see that. That’s not Gatorade that I spilled on my foot, that’s blood. My blood. It’s from this one time that I lost a toe, not a toenail, a toe. I guess I was going too fast or something.” Also, I would have definitely written “K ALCS” somewhere on the shoe.

My Much Anticipated Morning Run

At five o'clock this morning my alarm sounded. SCREW. THAT. I leaned over and hit the snooze button, perhaps a little harder than necessary, but certainly no harder than a snooze button deserves or is used to. Six minutes later the alarm clock again started begging for more punishment. I turned it off. What idiot thought this would be a good idea? But then, just when I thought that I couldn't be any stupider I found my feet on the floor and I was getting dressed to go run. At five o'clock. In the morning. In spite all of YOUR negativity in the comments of yesterday's post and in spite of my ever supportive wife, who said to me last night as I was getting into bed: "You know, it would be funnier if you failed."
"Excuse me?!?"
"Your blog. It would make for a funnier post in the morning if you failed." Awww, thanks honey. I love you too.

In a state of semi-sleep, I pulled my shorts on, laced up my shoes, and went to go check on the coffee. I had pre-programmed our coffee machine last night so that it would be ready for me this morning. Great thinking right? Except for one little oversight. Some idiot forgot to put the coffee grounds in it. Can I interest you in a nice hot pot of water? No? How about a new coffee machine to replace the one I just threw across the kitchen? This is not looking promising.

As I am about to head out, I observe that my shorts are on inside out. Nice work genius. I guess that's what happens when you dress yourself in a sleepy stupor. I remedy the problem and start out for my run. The first thing I notice is that the picture I posted yesterday of the morning runner is full of crap! It's still pitch black out. There's no beautiful sunrise like the one in the picture. Even the sun is not stupid enough to be up at this abominable hour. Undeterred, I continue with my run. It was actually a pretty good run, all things considered. I ran 4 tempo miles (9:00 goal pace) with a warm up mile and a cool down mile. I don't imagine that you're particularly interested in the splits, but you're getting them anyway because I'm a little cranky.

Mile 1 - 9:45 (warm up)
Mile 2 - 9:00
Mile 3 - 8:30
Mile 4 - 8:44
Mile 5 - 8:25
Mile 6 - 9:47 (cool down)

So the actual running part was good. The getting up early, not so much. I've already had two large cups of coffee here at work and I'm still as tired as a Lindsay Lohan excuse. Another good thing about the run this morning was that there was no one else on the trail, and that made me feel like I was a hardcore runner. The bad part was that there was no else on the trail to see me being a hardcore runner. You will all just have to take my word for it. I was hardcore this morning.

The jury is still out on whether running in the mornings is good or not. It's supposed to get up to 97 degrees today so I guess it's a plus that I got my run in early. We'll see how tired I feel for the rest of the day. The real payoff will come tonight when I get home from work and don't have to run. I'm already looking forward to getting my couch potato on. Oh, and the sun did eventually rise. I took a couple of pictures (below) of the sunrise as proof and because I don't know if and when I'll ever see another one. Sunrises are really, really spectacular! Who knew?

Click pictures to enlarge.

I'm a Positive Thinker

What are your favorite mantras? What helps you get through that tough interval or climb the hill ahead of you? Most runners have mantras that they tell themselves while they're running and I'd like to hear yours in the comments. A fellow runner just told me that his is "screw it, run through it!"

I find that the mantras I like to use are mostly positive things. Things like "I am a freakin' machine" and "I don't feel no hill!" My wife is a negative thinker. She tells herself things like "get your lazy butt moving" and "hurry up slow poke" and "sure, I guess I'll settle and just marry this guy." Negative thoughts.

My conclusion from this is that men, with our over-inflated egos tend to use positive mantras, "I'm an animal" while women, who are conditioned by society to think they're not skinny enough or not pretty enough tend to use negative mantras. Granted, my scientific research on this matter consists of surveying only 2 people (me and my wife) but so far it's 100% accurate. I'm going to attempt to post a poll below so that you can vote and we can have a bigger sample size. I figure if all my readers vote we could get upwards of 10 votes! Normally I'm not a big advocate of women voting but in the interest of science I'll let it slide today, so you gals don't worry your pretty little heads about it and vote.

After you vote let me know in the comments if you think that I'm right. If you think that I'm wrong, keep it to yourself. No one likes a negative Nancy.

That's all I got for today, I'm off to go get my run on. Oh, and I'm just kidding ladies.

Running Dad

Last night my wife had to go run some errands which meant that I was watching the boys and could not go outside for my run. I tried telling her that the oldest one is capable of babysitting, but she insists that he's too young (he's 4). Whatever. I ended up getting on the treadmill and telling David (my 4 year-old) to keep an eye on Graham (my 2 year-old) so it all works out the same either way.

I recalled reading somewhere that it is easier to run on a treadmill (no hills, no wind resistance etc.) and that you should set the incline to 1% to simulate running outdoors. I decided to give this a try, but my ego got the best of me and I turned it up to 2%. It didn’t feel like too much of a difference so I kept plugging along. Somewhere around 0.21 miles I heard Graham crying, and not wanting to lose my rhythm or start over I yelled for David to come tell me what had happened. As it turns out "nothing" had happened. I guess he was just screaming bloody murder for the fun of it, I made a quick mental note to discipline him for that after my run.

If you know any 2 or 4 year old boys you know that they're all afterburner and no rudder, so it was only a matter of minutes before there was more yelling and loud banging. Not being someone prone to worry, I quickly came up with a solution. I grabbed the remote control for the iPod speakers and turned up the volume until I could no longer hear said yelling and banging. I enjoyed the remainder of my run in the peace and quiet of my eclectic 'running' playlist consisting of heavy metal, hip-hop and alternative.

Towards the end of my run I began to feel a little discouraged, this was supposed to be an easy run at a 9:30 minute mile pace and I was really struggling. My breathing was harder than usual, my calves were burning more than usual and I was seriously considering slowing down. What on earth was wrong with me? It was during this conundrum that I remembered that I had been running up hill the whole way. I completely forgot that I had set the incline to 2%. What can I say? I'm a genius.

As I was finishing up both of the boys came down to the basement. Both a little sweaty but, no blood and no new bruises. They were exhausted from whatever they had been doing upstairs and quietly sat down at their coloring table. It was at this moment that my wife came home, took one look at our quiet children and me finishing up my run and exclaimed “how did you get them to behave so well?” I merely shrugged. She continued “they NEVER let me run on the treadmill without interruption!” I smiled at her. Some of us are just good parents I guess, and by ‘some of us’ I am of course referring to my wife.

We gots da' Shizzle!

For those of you that aren't hip enough to understand the title of this post I'm trying to tell you that we got the shirt in the mail yesterday. If you don't know what shirt I'm talking about then you haven't been reading this blog regularly and you're surely not going to start after seeing the awful title at the top of this post.

Every now and then I like to pretend that I'm 'down' with the younger crowd, but I'm a 31 year old white guy who just tried to drop the word 'shizzle' in his blog. If that doesn’t scream geek then I don’t know what does. In fact, if I tried any harder I'd be an ESPN TV personality, so please don't encourage this behavior by leaving me any comments.

On a running note (imagine that on a running blog), I'm beginning to taper my running in preparation for the Bolder Boulder and probably won't get in any more long runs. Two weeks might be a little far out to taper for a 10K but I've struggled on my long runs lately and have had some minor knee pain that I'm leery of.

Here's my running schedule for the next two weeks:
Today: 8 total miles including 6 tempo miles.
Thu 5/17: 5 miles easy
Sat 5/19: 3 miles easy (may bump this up to 4 or 5)

Mon 5/21: 5 total miles including 3 tempo miles
Wed 5/23: 3 miles easy
Thu 5/24: 3 miles easy

UPDATE: Here's a picture of my better half modeling the shirt (click to enlarge)

We have a Winner!

Updating a previous post in which I had asked for your votes on which running shirt to have made up for my wheezing, asthmatic wife who is running in her first road race (the Bolder Boulder Memorial Day 10k), I am pleased to announce that we have a winner, and also a runaway sentence that just won’t quit. Also, since I don’t want to sleep on the couch tonight, I should mention that my wife never “wheezes” on runs any more and rarely even needs her inhaler. Take that Asthma!

Here’s the breakdown of your votes from the comments:
* Kiss my Asthma! 3 votes
* You’re Losing to an Asthmatic! 2 votes
* Blow me, I’ve got Asthma! 1 vote
There was one write in vote each for fo’ Sheezy I’m Wheezy and Asthma is Sexy!

Voting was Chicago style so if you or your late grandfather voted multiple times, they were all counted. Also of note, my better half liked the “Kiss my Asthma!” idea so in reality that one had 4 votes and none of the other votes mattered one iota but it sure is nice that the votes matched the pre-determined outcome. I guess it’s kind of like an Olympic figure skating contest in that regard.

The image that you see here is the graphic that we sent to Running Banana superimposed on the shirt, it is purple to match her running skirt. I know several people mentioned that they wanted one, so if you’d like a high-res copy of the image let me know and I’ll e-mail it to you so that you can order your very own from Running Banana. Actual pictures of the shirt will be posted when it arrives.

Olympic figure skating? Running skirts and color-coordinated matching outfits? I need to stop now. Expect a more testosterone filled, manly post tomorrow.

Breathin' Easy

My wife, an asthmatic, just recently took up running and will be running her first race in May, the Bolder Boulder 10K. When she began running, she could barely run one mile and would take more hits off her inhaler than Ricky Williams at a Pink Floyd concert. Last week she went for a long run of 8 miles, but the point of this post is not to inspire you to conquer asthma or whatever other ailment you may suffer from, although it should. I am having a T-Shirt made up for her at Running Banana to wear during the race and I need some suggestions.

Thus far the leaders in the clubhouse are:
* Asthma Shmasthma!
* What Asthma?
* Kiss my Asthma
* Blow me, I’ve got Asthma! (Too Risqué?)
* This is Kicking my Asthma!
* You’re Losing to an Asthmatic!

That’s it, that’s all I got. Vote for your favorite in the comments or better yet, post your own superior suggestions in the comments.