Obsessively watching for low-hanging fruit

Just an update on yesterday's post.

One of the automatic bids for the US 24 hour team is winning the national championship race (assuming at least 135 miles). Mike Morton is signed up for 24 the Hard Way in a couple of weeks in Oklahoma, which should guarantee his position. Also signed up there is Brian Tewson, who's run 139 miles at 3 Days at the Fair - and he's 52 years old, which means he has a shot at the US age-class record of 144 miles.

If you can find the Minnesota age-class records, the ultras haven't been updated since 2004. The all-ages 100 mile record is not listed, but I think Kurt Decker's time was 16:08:34 (I'm within a minute on that). The state over 50 record for 100 is listed as 17:12:41 and I've just scoured the FANS records - some of which are spotty or difficult to find - and that seems to stand. The 12 hour record for men over 50 is listed as 66.6 miles, but it's now John Maas' 84.74. The MN 24 hour record is Mike Henze's 147.41, but the record for a Minnesotan is still Danny Ripka's 136.0. The MN 24 hour record for men over 50 is still 121.8 (120.1 by a Minnesotan). The US over-50 records appear to be 100 miles in 15:18:48 (on road; track is 13:57:29), 84.985 miles in 12 hours (87.24 on track) and 144 miles in 24 hours (137.55 on track).

Not that I'm thinking about those now that my achilles rehab is over....