Steamboat Pilot & Today | Section C
Sunday Sports
SPORTS COMMENTARY
Galaxy, MLS dropping the ball with Beckham Billy Witz
LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS
CARSON, CALIF.
The arrival of David Beckham presented Major League Soccer with the rarest of opportunities — a second chance to make a first impression, a platform from which to show the American sporting public that it was ready for prime time. A month into Beckham’s arrival, the Galaxy, the league and its partners have played that opportunity the way Kyle Veris played a long, looping ball that started the Galaxy on its way to a 3-0 defeat Thursday night to Chivas USA — off the side of his foot. On and off the field, there has been little indication anyone associated with ushering in the Beckham Era has been well prepared for it. The latest came Thursday when Beckham, fresh off playing 90 minutes for England the day before, flew back to Los Angeles and was on the field from start to finish against Chivas. By the end of his third full game in six days, Beckham hobbled and winced on a stillhealing left ankle. Galaxy coach Frank Yallop said afterward he felt sorry for Beckham and regretted playing him, even as he indicated the decision to play belonged to Beckham. Which begs the question: Just who’s in charge here? Consider the incoherent approach to dealing with Beckham’s injured ankle — let’s think short-term, then long-term; hey, what day is it? Or the reconstruction of the team. Beset by injuries and a slow start, Galaxy president Alexi Lalas blew up the roster in June, adding five new players — Pavon, Chris Klein, Edson Buddle, Abel Xavier and the injured Kelly Gray. The end result has been a team whose performance — the Galaxy is 3-9-5, the league’s second-worst mark — has rarely equaled the sum of its parts. Or as goalkeeper Joe Cannon said after Thursday’s loss: “We’ve got good individuals, but we don’t have a good team.” Chivas midfielder Jesse Marsch has watched the Galaxy from down the hall, and Thursday he saw a team whose players largely sat back and waited for the delivery of “a magic ball” from Beckham. “It just seems like they lack a little bit of understanding with each other in terms of what it should look like on the field and how to play with each other,” Marsch said. “That’s going to happen when you’re going to make so many changes. They’ve had so many changes this year it’s been hard for them to find the chemistry.” It might be interesting to see what Beckham thinks, but he hasn’t spoke to the American media in a week. Near the end of Thursday’s game, a Galaxy official announced in the press box that Beckham wouldn’t be talking afterward, never mind what MLS’ interview policy is. Pressed for an explanation, and told it would be nice to hear from Beckham given his return from England and his involvement in the scrum that was the key moment in the game, the official was unmoved. He thought the focus of the stories should have been the two goals scored by Chivas’ Maykel Galindo. Which pretty much explains the problem right there.
MLB ROUNDUP 3C
Sunday, August 26, 2007 • www.steamboatpilot.com
Sports Editor: John F. Russell • 871-4209/jrussell@steamboatpilot.com
Blending talent
Sailors’ senior ballcarrier Jay Hanley, right, breaks past a cadre of Sun Devils defenders during Steamboat Springs’ game against Kent Denver in Denver on Friday afternoon. The Sailors came away with the victory, 23-14.
Seniors, sophomores lead Sailors to win Luke Graham
PILOT & TODAY STAFF
STEAMBOAT SPRINGS
BRIAN RAY/STAFF
There might not be a more valuable game of the 2007 season than Steamboat Springs’ 23-14 victory against Kent Denver. In terms of what it means to a team as dynamic as Steamboat, the win can’t be underestimated. For the handful of sophomores and first-time starters as well as the seniors
demonstrating just what it takes to win, Sailors head coach Aaron Finch said Friday’s win — although against a nonleague opponent — can’t be judged solely on the scoreboard. “That gives you hope for what kind of football team you can be,” Finch said. “To learn as much as we did and still get a win, that’s something that’s extremely helpful.” It’s especially important, Finch said, considering just how the game went. See Football, page 7C
Outdoors Extra
BRIAN RAY/STAFF
Steamboat Springs High School sophomore Jordie Bernard returns a volley during a doubles match against Colorado Academy at the Steamboat Tennis Center on Saturday afternoon. The Sailors tennis team won, 5-2.
Another day, another win Sailors’ tennis celebrates back-to-back victories
“Once you leave the starting line, you will be tested, forged, ground, splattered, ripped, tempered, and then refined and regenerated.” — LEADVILLE TRAIL 100 RACE FOUNDERS
INSIDE: Pages 4C and 5C
Quinn leads Browns past Broncos Arnie Stapleton
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
DENVER
Preseason games don’t count and neither do touchdowns that are erroneously ruled incompletions, as Brady Quinn discovered Saturday night. Quinn was efficient and effective for the second straight game, leading the Cleveland Browns past the Denver Broncos, 17-16, although it probably wasn’t enough to win him the starting job over Charlie Frye. Quinn threw a pass in the left flat that Joshua Cribbs turned into a nifty 20-yard touchdown to break a 10-10
tie in the third quarter, but the rookie from Notre Dame was robbed of another apparent TD toss on Cleveland’s preSATURDAY’S vious possession. GAME: Although Joe JureBroncos 16 vicius hauled in Quinn’s Browns 17 perfectly thrown 39-yard pass in the end zone, the nearest official ruled he didn’t get both feet down before going out of bounds — replays showed otherwise, but Cleveland coach Romeo Crennel didn’t challenge the call. That was against Denver’s frontline defense, too — although that
may not be as impressive as it sounds. Slow Saturday’s to adapt to new boss football scores Jim Bates’ scheme, the See page 7C Broncos’ starters have allowed six touchdowns and three field goals in 15 possessions this preseason. Quinn, whose TD to Cribbs came against backups, completed 7 of 11 passes for 81 yards. The Broncos made it 17-16 on undrafted rookie Selvin Young’s 9yard rumble with 2:56 left, but linebacker Chaun Thompson tackled Young shy of the end zone on the 2-point try.
For more
Luke Graham
PILOT & TODAY STAFF
STEAMBOAT SPRINGS
It was one of those matches we’ll look back at in two months and say, “Matt Gadbois is a better player for playing it.” Gadbois — who spent last year playing No. 3 doubles for the Steamboat Springs High School tennis — lost a hard-fought, three-set match to Colorado Academy’s Tony Karner at No. 2 singles. But Gadbois showed something coach John Aragon’s been looking for. Gadbois fought back from being down, 4-1, in the third set to close within one game, at 5-4. After Karner went up, 4015, in the final game, Gabois pushed it to deuce. He then fended off match point four times before a Karner cross-court shot fell just out of a sprawling Gadbois’ reach. “This is one of the best matches I think I’ve ever played,” Gadbois said. “I wouldn’t trade it for anything. I mean, I wish I would have won, but I’ll see him again in regionals.” Gadbois’ match was just one in several highly competitive ones Steamboat and Colorado Academy waged. While the Sailors won, 5-2, three of the seven matches went to a third set. Only Steamboat’s No. 1 singles player Ramsey Bernard, No. 2 doubles team of Keegan and Jack Burger and No. 3 doubles team of Alex Gibbs and Zach Valicenti finished off opponents in two sets. “I played pretty solid,” said Bernard, who beat Thomas Sisk, 6-4, 6-2. “I’m pretty happy with my game right now.” No. 3 singles player Jeff Lambart and the No. 1 doubles team of Charlie Smith and Jordan Bernard also scored wins for the Sailors. Considering what a young team Steamboat has, Aragon said the competition — especially this early in the season — will help them achieve the team’s main goal of winning a 10th consecutive regional title. “This was huge, because every match was tough,” Aragon said. “There weren’t any freebies out here. It was good to see some of these young kids step up and play under pressure and win matches.” The Sailors are now 2-0 on the season. They next play Sept. 6 at Fruita. PAGE DESIGNED BY NICOLE MILLER
4C |
Steamboat Pilot & Today • Sunday, August 26, 2007
OUTDOORS EXTRA
Betsy Kalmeyer says some inspirational words to Steamboat Springs Leadville Trail 100 participant Jennifer Schubert-Akin on Aug. 18 at an aid tent set up at the Winfield ghost town. Kalmeyer, an avid Steamboat runner herself, was Schubert-Akin’s pacer during the next leg of the race.
‘Raw courage’
S
An ultra trail runner’s gut check crucible at Colorado’s classic 100-mile odyssey
ometimes you can beat the mountain. Sometimes. Long before the sun rises and hits the corner of West Sixth Street and Harrison Avenue on August 18, a field of 472 willing participants sets out with little more than LED flashlights and running shoes to test themselves against a mountain course that has humbled and elated the world’s toughest ultra-distance trail runners for the past 25 years. The route is 50 miles out and 50 miles back. Runners gain, and lose, nearly 15,000 feet of elevation running from and back to the highest city (10,152 feet) in North America. The time is set at 30 hours. By the next morning, when Leadville mayor Bud Elliott fires off his rifle to signal the end of that time, only
210 of those runners have made it back. Welcome to the Leadville Trail 100. “Once you leave the starting line, you will be tested, forged, ground, splattered, ripped, tempered, and then refined and regenerated,” reads the ominous race overview penned by race founders Ken Chlouber and Merilee O’Neal. Before running the L.T. 100, Jennifer Schubert-Akin decided to start with a 5K. “I just started running to get fit in 1990,” she said of what led to longer 10Ks and, three years later, a marathon in Big Sur, Calif., that got her hooked on distance. Jennifer moved from Austin, Texas, to Steamboat Springs in 1995, started an accounting business — she owns Marathon Accounting Services — and heard about “L.T. 100.” This led to
SUNDAYFOCUS STORY BY DAVE SHIVELY prolonged training, pacing other runners and eventually five cracks at the race. “It is so hard to fathom when you hear about it, but now a 20-mile training run seems short,” Jennifer said. “It is the ultimate physical challenge … you’re expanding what is possible in your mind and can learn a lot — once you do it, a lot of everyday stuff and problems seem possible.” In Jennifer’s third attempt, in 2002, she finally finished in 28 hours, 40 minutes. In 2005, she did it again, four minutes off her previous time. “By mile 80, it’s cold, you’re at 11,000
feet and everything hurts,” Jennifer said. “But then the sun comes up, and you cross that finish line — you know you are self-reliant at that point.” Jennifer turned 50 on Aug. 14. She thought another shot at the race after a summer of training seemed right, especially as the perfect means to raise pledged funds for Mike Wilkinson, a close Austin friend suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig’s disease).
Over the woods, through the river Jennifer’s husband, Rick Akin, has rounded up a couple of his buddies and his old college roommate from the University of Oklahoma, David Stringer, to help him undertake the
effort to “crew” Jennifer’s race. A daunting task in its own right, crews have to be ready at four aid stations in each direction in addition to the turnaround point — around the clock, ahead of their runner, and with the right mix of gear, edible fuel, medicine and moral support to keep runners in the hunt. Akin could easily teach a seminar on how to crew an L.T. 100 runner, and he has, with a 17-page packet of crew notes prepared for all contigencies, down to the exact calorie and PowerBar Gel pack for each station, living by the motto that “it never hurts to be early, but it is catastrophic to be late.” See Outdoors, page 6C
Watch videos on Steamboatpilot.com Also on the ’Net:
Medical aspects Leadville Trail 100 race physician Dr. Tom Maino was asked about the pounding a human body takes during a grueling 100-mile race. “I guess the question is, ‘What does this race not do to somebody’s body?’” he said.
Jennifer’s journey Follow Jennifer’s journey through the eyes of her husband and support team member Rick Akin. It was clear at the 40-mile mark that Jennifer was in pain. “If we get these cramps cured, we’re fine,” Rick Akin said. “If we don’t, we’re in big trouble.”
About the race In the midst of an economic depression in 1982, Leadville Trail 100 co-founder Ken Chlouber started the race with an economic objective. The race continues to grow and is credited with keeping the town alive. “This is all we’ve got to bring people into our community,” Chlouber said.
The winner Anton Krupicka crossed the finish line just before dark Saturday with a time of 16 hours, 14 minutes and still had the energy to talk about the race. “It was the easiest 100 I’ve ever done,” Krupicka said. “I just trained so hard this year.”
View a map of the course, an elevation profile and an audio photo slideshow.
OUTDOORS EXTRA
Steamboat Pilot & Today • Sunday, August 26, 2007
| 5C
Luke Graham
PILOT & TODAY STAFF
I’ve never run the race, but I’m from Leadville
I
was 10 years old and kicking around Leadville on my bike when I saw them. They were white with blue designs and, strangely enough, they were brand-spanking new. I wasn’t sure what to make of the brand-new Rockport shoes in the trashcan. I figured there had to be something about them that would make someone discard them. Then I got home later that afternoon as my mom was preparing for her ambulance shift on the Leadville Trail 100. She enlightened me — there were several Tarahumara Indians in town running the race. See, this was when the race was big. Big, as in it got national attention. Big enough for the highly reclusive Tarahumaras to venture away from the Copper Canyons of Mexico and run “The Race Across the Sky.” Running to the Tarahumaras is like breathing to us. But apparently, these Each of the runners who complete the Leadville Trail 100 within the 30-hour time period receives a silver medal. top-of-the-line, Americanmade shoes weren’t for them. So, instead, they ventured a little south of town to the local landfill and made sandals out of old tires. That year — 1994 — Juan Herrera of the Tarahumara tribe won the Leadville Trail 100 in what was then a record time. It’s still a story I tell when I talk about Leadville. Leadville’s got three things people know about: its elevation (10,230 feet), the mining history (believe it or not, Leadville once was an option for the capital of Colorado) and the Leadville Trail 100. It’s funny that that’s what most people know about the town, because all three are deeply intertwined. The elevation is self-explanatory. It makes the race brutal. The lowest elevation runners encounter is 9,000 feet. The highest is more than 12,000 Above: Former Steamboat Springs feet. resident Matt Karzen, left, runs along But the mining and the Turquoise Lake with his pacer Brian beginning of the race are quite Widmann. Karzen finished in 29 hours, 28 a story. Leadville was the minutes. (Photo by Dave Shively) molybdenum capital of the world for a good portion of the 1900s. Then prices dropped, mines in South America became cheaper and Leadville faced the gloomy future fellow Right: A 100-mile race can take mountain towns Winfield and a toll on a person’s feet. Duct Tape is a Vicksburg already had experipopular method to deal with blisters durJennifer Schubert-Akin jogs down a rocky hill just before reaching the 40-mile enced. ing the race. mark aid station. Insert quasi-crazy miner and state Sen. Ken Chlouber. Chlouber’s quite a character with a horse-like head, long hair and a rugged face that looks like leather. He doesn’t A runner hold back either. makes his way through a Despite concerns the race swampy section would kill someone, Chlouber of the course pushed for it, and the first at the 40-mile one took place in 1983, a year mark near the after the Climax Molybdenum town of Twin Mine closed down, turning the Lakes. Leadville economy around 180 degrees. Chlouber would contend the Leadville 100 saved the small town. That’s probably partly true, but Leadville would have been OK with budding ski towns like Vail, Aspen and Breckenridge within driving distance. The pay’s good there, while the rents are low in Leadville. Still, the race brought attention to the town. But with other ultramarathons popping up and the Tarahumaras not returning after a mysterious dispute, the race has lost some luster. However, the Trail 100 — much like Leadville itself — still has a mystique about it. It’s rugged. It’s rough. It’s tough. But most of all, it’s got a P H O T O S B Y M A T T S T E N S L A N D / S T A F F unique soul about it.
6C |
Steamboat Pilot & Today • Sunday, August 26, 2007
OUTDOORS EXTRA
Race finisher: The run is a celebration of the individual spirit of adventure Outdoors continued from 4C Akin watches his wife from the 4 a.m., Leadville start with clear skies and temperatures in the low 40s, one he calls “the nicest I’ve ever seen.” At the first aid station, 13.5 miles out, and the second, 23.5 miles out, Jennifer makes it through to the projected minute Akin had established based on previous times. By the next, she is falling a few minutes behind. Each aid station has a designated “cutoff ” time that, if missed, race organizers at the station literally cut off the racer’s wristband in a symbolic end. Cutoff at the outbound Twin Lakes aid station is 2:30 p.m. At 1:30 p.m., the crew begins to get antsy, seeing Jennifer slip a half-hour off her estimated arrival. Suddenly, Jennifer radios in, citing stomachaches and cramps as she nears the steep switchbacks down to the station. After she passes through the station — number and time relayed to headquarters and an impromptu medical check that includes a weigh-in and a few quick questions (“What’s your name? When have you peed last?”) to note mental and
kidney condition — Jennifer greets the crew. “I guess it’s good that my stomach hurts — it’ll take my mind off my legs,” Jennifer manages to muster, obviously in pain. Akin finds some ibuprofen pills. Stringer swaps a Snickers Marathon bar and four gels, two in each pocket, with empty wrappers in Jennifer’s waist pack. She knows the bar is not much use because she can’t keep any solid food down. But she pets her dog Boomer and kisses Akin, telling him, “I’ll do the best I can,” as she departs. Her best is what she needs for the next leg. She must cross the swampy delta of Lake Creek’s entrance to the Twin Lakes Reservoir, through a mile-long lattice of streams and mud bogs, searching out pink trail markers attached to a maze of bushes and shrubs. Then there’s the creek crossing itself. Afternoon showers have brought high flows to the icy, teal-colored creek that is now thigh deep at the crossing. This is the low point of the race at 9,200 feet and, in the next five miles, the runners must climb to the highest, over Hope Pass at 12,600. All this with soaking feet as dark thunderheads rumble above and begin pouring rain. Just after Jennifer embarks on this crux section, the various packs of crews at Twin Lakes are caught off guard by the first runner coming the other direction. Anton Krupicka, a 24year-old Colorado College paraprofessional, sheds a layer as he heads up the steep trail back toward Leadville. He is nearly two hours ahead of the next-fastest runner, running 9.5-minute splits.
Mind, body and energy gel Stringer runs out from the mining ghost town of Winfield to see if Jennifer is coming. She’s cutting it close. Winfield is the turnaround point. Crew
MATT STENSLAND/STAFF
Leadville Trail 100 founder Ken Chlouber, left, congratulates Steamboat Springs finisher Mike Ehrlich after he completed the race in 29 hours and 17 minutes Aug. 19.
cars going to and from the aid station share the road with the weathered outbound and returning runners. It’s 5:30 p.m. and still no sign of Jennifer. Cutoff is at 6 p.m. Steamboat’s Betsy Kalmeyer is ready to run. On the returning 50 miles, runners can have pacers, and Kalmeyer will take Jennifer back to Twin Lakes, where Stringer, Kalmeyer and Steamboat’s Jenna Gruben will divide up the remaining legs to bring her in the rest of the way. Kalmeyer did the L.T. 100 as her first 100-mile race in 1988. She’s completed it four times since. 2007 would’ve been her 20th anniversary of racing 100-milers, but having already completed the equally as grueling Hardrock Hundred Mile Endurance Run in July, Kalmeyer is content to help pace her training partner and friend. “You’re there for moral support,” Kalmeyer says. “It’s good to remind them to be eating and drinking and just always telling them, ‘you’re looking good.’” At 5:38 p.m., the familiar face of racer Brenda Geisler arrives at the station. The 46-year-old Steamboat Springs friend and personal trainer jokes that she “blames” Jennifer for inspiring her to try her hand at ultramarathons. She completed the 2003 race and in 2004 was crowned as an elite “Leadwoman” for having completed the Leadville race series’ five events. But halfway up Hope Pass, she had hit a wall. “My body just started shutting down — when you pinch the back of your hand and the skin stays up, you know you’re dehydrated,” says Geisler, who opts out of the race at mile 50. Halfway up the pass also
is where Geisler says she was used to Jennifer passing her in previous races. Maybe Jennifer has the same stomach bug as Geisler — when Jennifer arrives at 5:43 p.m., she looks pale and cannot chew a handful of saltine crackers. “I’m just nervous — I’ve never had my stomach like this,” Jennifer tells Kalmeyer, who immediately fires back encouragement. “That’s what happened to me at Hardrock, but I felt awesome on the last 30,” Kalmeyer says. The pair leaves to head right back up the pass next to a pair of homemade signs that read “Legs get you the first 50 miles. Heart gets you the second 50.” At this point, the only thing driving Jennifer is the basic mantra that she says focuses her during the most painful stretches: “You have to keep ‘relentless forward progress’ in your mind.”
Boom or bust With just a few gel packs to fuel her 10-mile run back over the pass, fatigue sets in. The darkness of a nearly moonless night that falls at the pass summit only compounds problems. “If I can get back to Twin Lakes before dark, that will psychologically be helpful,” Jennifer had said before the race. The descent becomes an eerie sludge she compares to skiing down a mudslide. Kalmeyer calls it “four-wheeldrive running.” Nine minutes before the 9:45 p.m. cutoff at Twin Lakes, Jennifer radios in that she still has a couple miles to go. She arrives a half-hour later at the station. Jennifer knows she has missed the cut, so she spends
some time catching her breath and chatting about the journey, prolonging the inevitable — the scissors to her wristband, which officially is cut at 10:30 p.m. “We passed a lot of people on the way up,” Jennifer says after her 60 completed miles. She is most disappointed knowing she had invested the necessary preparation time to train for completion. “My cardio and lungs were good, but when you get behind the eightball, time-wise, it’s really hard trying to compensate on a 21 percent grade hill where you can’t make up a lot of time … I guess sometimes you conquer the mountain, and sometimes the mountain conquers you.”
A lasting finish The sun hits the highest point in the state at Mount Elbert’s peak and the adjoining Mount Massive backdrop long before its rays cover the fog-coated waters of Turquoise Lake. A bobbing line of flickering headlamps moves along the wooded north side of the lake to the Tabor Boat Ramp. Crews huddle in lawn chairs and blankets and cheer on runners who have made it through the night and have only a 7.5mile home stretch to the finish. No one in the crowd knows, or is concerned with, the score of Saturday’s Broncos game. Bigger things are happening. Steamboat’s Josh Karzen has finished pacing his older brother Matt, a former Steamboat Ski Area patroller and 1984 Lowell Whiteman School graduate, in the loneliest night stretch from the Fish Hatchery at mile 76.5 to the May Queen aid station at mile 86.5. “Running at night has a whole different quality all its own,” says Josh Karzen of
the pacer’s job to find the trail from one marked glowstick to the next. “If things are going to get weird, that’s when it’s going to happen.” Now Josh and Brian Widmann, a law school friend of Matt’s, must wait and hope Karzen will make the push so the entire crew can rejoin him for “the whole Chariots of Fire deal” on the final mile, together to the finish. As they wait, Mike Ehrlich, a 44-year-old structural engineer from Steamboat, passes through the boat ramp in a sleepless daze. Aside from Mike Valenta — a friend planning to run his seventh L.T. 100, but who decided to help crew Ehrlich after a complication with his foot — Ehrlich’s run has been a solo endeavor, one of the few without pacer support. At the finish, tearful runners accept their medals and collapse on the nearby Lake County Courthouse’s sunsoaked lawn. The 24-year-old Krupicka’s 16-hour, 14-minute finish (the second-fastest ever) at dusk the day before has been long forgotten by the crowd there to cheer each of the 50 runners who reach the finish in the final hour before the 10 a.m. gun. Ehrlich and Matt Karzen are among them. These emotional finishes are what race director Merilee O’Neal calls “raw courage just coming up off the street.” She hugs each one and presents them with a hard-earned silver belt buckle medal. “Merilee puts that medal on and gives you a hug you hadn’t expected, and you feel the sincerity and rush of accomplishment,” Karzen says after he’s recovered. “Then 20 seconds later, every cell in your body is screaming in pain.” “It’s so good to be done,” Ehrlich says after finishing his ninth race. He had put the training time in, as well, arriving Monday before the race and climbing Mount Elbert three times — in one day. “In 25 years, we’ve learned to remove limits and change lives,” Chlouber says as he gazes at the silver anniversary of his event while already thinking about next year’s race. Chlouber’s statement rings true for Karzen, who had never seen the course prior to the race, or even completed a run of more than 50 miles. “It’s a celebration of the individual spirit of adventure, and everyone comes together for that,” Karzen says. “You get to bond with your brother and your friends, in the cold, struggling in the middle of the night. I’ll carry this with me for the rest of my days in ways I didn’t even think about.” — To reach Dave Shively, call 871-4253 or e-mail dshively@steamboatpilot.com