Verona Man Continues Mission Of Mobility

The following link is to a local Madison news story that was posted yesterday regarding the upcoming 200 Mile Trail Run that starts this Thursday at 6 PM Eastern.

http://verona.channel3000.com/news/community-spirit/verona-man-continues-mission-mobility/51625

Beautiful Explanation of Death

Like many of you, I often get chain e-mails (most of the time sent from my Mom) that I often just delete without even reading. But, yesterday the e-mail that she sent me really touched my heart. A good friend of Christina (my wife) and I passed away last week. Her name was Rita Pabst. She dies of cancer at the young age of 56. My first date with Christina nearly 12 years ago was actually a double date with Rita and her husband Karl.

Christina posted the following in the Guest Book of Rita's online obituary: "I called Rita and Karl my "2nd parents" and I will forever feel that way. Rita was such a role model for how to live life. She brought joy to everyone that knew her and I feel blessed to have spent time with her. I will never understand "why?" - Heaven must have needed an Angel back. She will be missed dearly. My deepest sympathy to all of you."

Like many of you, I have questions about death. My Mom's chain mail provided some assurance that death is not the end:


A sick man turned to his doctor as he was preparing to leave the examination room and said, 'Doctor, I am afraid to die. Tell me what lies on the other side.'

Very quietly, the doctor said, 'I don't know.' 'You don't know? You, a Christian man, do not know what is on the other side?'

The doctor was holding the handle of the door; on the other side came a sound of scratching and whining. And as he opened the door, a dog sprang into the room and leaped on him with an eager show of gladness. Turning to the patient, the doctor said, 'Did you notice my dog? He's never been in this room before he didn't know what was inside. He knew nothing except that his master was here, and when the door opened, he sprang in without fear.

I know little of what is on the other side of death, but I do know one thing... I know my Master is there and that is enough.

2011 McNaughton Trail Runs

The McNaughton Trail Runs are run on a 10-mile looped course in Pittsfield Vermont (www.peakraces.com/mcnaughton). How many times you want to run the course is up to the individual runner. Officially, the McNaughton Trail Run event is a 30 Mile footrace, 100 Mile footrace, 150 Mile footrace, 200 Mile footrace, or a 500 Mile footrace. So runners will repeat the loops 3, 10, 15, 20, or 50 times. Each loop has 2400 vertical therefore the 30 miler will feature 7,200, 100 miler will feature 24,000, 150 miler will feature 36,000, 200 miler will feature 48,000 and 500 miler will feature 120,000 elevation change.

The 500 Mile race starts this Saturday, April 30 at 12:00 noon Eastern and has a 198 hour cut-off. The 200 Mile race starts next Thursday, May 5 at 6:00 PM Eastern and has a 72 hour cut-off. The 150 Mile race starts next Friday, May 6 at 6:00 AM Eastern and the 30 Mile/100 Mile races starts next Saturday, May 7 at 6:00 AM.

There are currently 4 people signed up for the 500 Mile race! I can't wait to see them out there in person - AMAZING!

Last May, I competed in the 200 miler. A short video can be seen at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnGVhGYmRR0

In addition to winning the race, I also raised nearly $12,000 for the Free Wheelchair Mission - enough to donate 200 wheelchairs! I am going back next week to do it again and have an awesome crew of 12 to help me in my attempt.

The reason for this post is two-fold:

(1) I would love it if you could pray for the competitors during this event. As ultrarunners, we are constantly pushing ourselves to see what our personal limits are. There will be many individuals pushing themselves to new limits starting this weekend and running into next weekend. My crew will be updating via TWITTER - although this is a dedicated feed for the 200 mile race - I'm sure they will post updates of all races once we arrive in Vermont next Thursday. You can follow us during the event via TWITTER at http://twitter.com/dexterpunisher

(2) I am again trying to continue to raise money for the Free Wheelchair Mission. I have no fundraising goals to achieve - but wanted again to put it out there. I know that there are a lot of needs in this world, but if you are moved, inspired, or feel anything toward making someone's life better by providing them with mobility please donate. Let's see how many more lives' we can change through these legs. You can donate securely online at: http://fwm.kintera.org/dexterthepunisher

200 Miler Training Update - Less Than 1 Month Away

We are officially less than a month away from the start of the McNaughton 200 Mile Trail Run in Pittsfield, VT.

A few updates on my training - Last Thursday, I finished my 600th training mile for the month of March. That is 100 more miles than I have ever run before in a month. Currently I am at 1,364.9 miles for the year (over 13.5 mile/day average). Last Saturday, I ran the Trailbreakers Marathon in Waukesha, WI. I have run this race 4 times before. My time this year was nearly 7 minutes faster than last year's race and I finished 2nd overall in 3:19:39. I ran a very solid race and negative splitted the second half passing 2nd place at the last mile. The following is a photo from the finish line:

This Saturday, I will be running in the Mad City 100K National Championships in Madison, WI. Darren Fortney from my 200 Miler crew will also be participating in this event. This will officially be my 50th marathon or ultramarathon race. We will be running 10 laps through the Arboretum (10K course). Looking to just take it slow and easy - a training run that will cap off my 9th straight 100 mile training week (I'm averaging over 99 miles/week so far this year). If you are in town , feel free to come out and see us. They are very strick about running with us or anything, but we would love to see you. The following is a link regarding this race in the Milwaukee paper: http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/lifestyle/119331804.html

I have set up a page to continue raising money for the Free Wheelchair Mission. Please fell free to pass this link on to any of your friends or family that want to support our effort: You can donate securely online at: http://fwm.kintera.org/dexterthepunisher