2000 Pikes Peak News Archives

12/12/00 Tim Hicks mailed me the 1982 results after he input the 1,117 runners from that year. This brings the results archives up to 36 years! [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015] Also Steve Gaulke e-mailed me the women’s races from 1980. He is still working on the men’s races.

12/06/00 35 Pikes Peak short stories from the 2000 races were added. For these stories runners were asked to list what did and didn’t work for their race.

12/02/00 Patrick Hollenbeck’s 2000 Ascent report was added to the first person race accounts section. Patrick is from Ohio but he did not let that stop him! He set a goal and did the necessary homework to achieve that goal. He relied a lot on his heart rate monitor and the pace calculator and it paid off big time for him — take note!

11/17/00 I have put up the Pikes Peak Forum — a www based message board for peak runners. Because it is new it is of course empty so please drop by and help the forum grow into a valuable resource!

11/16/00 Jill Gainer’s 2000 marathon report has been added to the first person race accounts section on the main peak page. She also provided two links to picture slide shows of the Ascent and Marathon taken by members of the Austin Runners Club.

11/13/00 Two very interesting stories where added to the first person race accounts section on the main peak page. Bill Wright’s account is super detailed with pace charts, heart rate graphs and analysis of his race. In the other story, Ron Horton took some 43 photos on his trip up and down the peak.

10/25/00 Another 5 years, 1963-1967, were added to the results archives bringing the total count up to 35 years. [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015] I am STILL looking for the results from 1968-1970 — let me know if you have them and can send me a copy.

10/12/00 The 434 runners from the 1976 races were added to bring the results archives up to 30 years. [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015]

10/7/00 The 624 runners from the 1978 races were added to bring the results archives up to 29 years. [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015] As we go farther back in time the races are smaller so they can be input much faster:-) Steve Gaulke is inputting 1980, Tim Hicks is inputting 1982 and Keith Grimes is inputting 1983.

10/1/00 Keith Lonnquist e-mailed me 1981 and 1986 after he input the 2,589 runners from those years. This brings the results archives up to 28 years! [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015]

9/4/00 I input the 1,608 runners from 1984 bringing the results archives up to 26 years! [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015] Keith Grimes is inputting 1983 and Keith Lonnquist is inputting 1981 and ’86. As always let me know if you want to help.

8/30/00 I got another (see 8/25/00) Pikes Peak package, this one from Ken Young. It was a trade actually, he sent me the package after I sent him some information he was after. Ken is known in running circles as Mr. Stats. One look at his www site (link removed after it became a porn site!!!) and you can see why. What many don’t know is that Ken also is a past winner of the Pikes Peak Marathon. In 1978 Ken got to the top in 2:23:13 during a 3:50:44 marathon (a time that would have won the 2000 race by 4 minutes!) Ken’s best time was the year before when he ran a 2:19:22 ascent during a 3:47:40 2nd place marathon. At any rate, Ken sent me a box of Pikes Peak memorabilia including ALL the results from 1972 - ’83 with the ’77 - ’83 results being originals and not just copies:-) I am particularly excited about the 1972 and ’73 results because I was missing those years from my collection. Thanks to Ken I am now only missing 1968 - ’70 — just 3 years! Along with the results were program guides, entry forms and press clippings for many of the those years — incredible stuff! One of my favorite pieces was a letter responding to a bunch of questions from Chris Reveley (1979 winner with an awesome 3:39:08 after a 2:20:56 ascent and one of the fastest descents ever of 1:18:12 and 1980 winner with a 2:21:11/1:24:41/3:45:52. He also got 19th in the 2000 race with a 3:03:53/1:42:56/4:46:49) for a story he was writing. Chris asked “What do you consider to be the future (if any!) of mountain running. Where it’s going as a pursuit independent of the mainstream running “boom”.” and Ken replied in part “Mountain running represents a challenge beyond the marathon. With the tremendous increase in marathon running, many of these runners will begin looking for something more challenging. Once the average runner has achieved a time goal (e.g., 3 hours, running Boston, etc) what else is there? It is a long way from 3:00 to winning races. Does the aspiring runner continue to chip a few minutes off his/her marathon PR or does he/she look around for something more rewarding.” Way back in the late ’70s these guys had it nailed!

8/25/00 Harald Fricker (co-author of the book America’s Ultimate Challenge: The Pikes Peak Marathon) sent me a treasure chest of information on Pikes Peak races past. It would appear that after Walter Stack passed away he had left a box of stuff in the crawl space of his house. The new owners, not knowing what to do with it, tracked down Harald who passed it on to me. Walt, as some of you may know, was the man behind the women of the Peak Busters. There is a lot of stuff (newsletters, press clippings etc.) on several groups including Peak Busters, Arne’s Army, Oklahoma Pikes Peak Club, and the Peakcocks along with some hand written letters from Walt and Rudy Fahl the race co-founder and director in the days of old. Some of the original race aps are suitable for framing:-) Tucked in amongst it all were the results from the 1971 race leaving me just 5 years to go to complete the race results collection — 1968-70, 1972-73.

8/23/00 Official results are now posted in the results archives. [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015]

2000 race coverage
Pre event:
Racer's motto: Walk, don't run
Entrants in Ascent are a worldly bunch
Big races' winner is Manitou Springs

Ascent:
Current and former champions ascend
A natural obstacle course
No weather worries expected for Marathon

Marathon:
Marathon finishes with repeat performances
Runner with a cause
Finishing last has its own rewards
Race notes

8/19/00 The following forecast was prepared by Incline Club member Tony Eckel

2000 Pikes Peak Marathon Weather Forecast
Partly cloudy skies with some high clouds (bases at 13,000ft).
Winds out of the west at 10-15mph on the Peak. Upper atmospheric
pressure will be below normal (O2 level 1.5% below normal).
--------------------- Temperatures ------------------
Location                  Time
           07  08  09  10  11  12  13  14  15  16  17
Manitou    61          74  76  78  79  80  80  79  77
Barr Camp      51  53  55  57  59  60  58  57
Peak               35  36  39  40  40

8/18/00 The following forecast was prepared by Incline Club member Tony Eckel

2000 Pikes Peak Ascent Weather Forecast
Partly cloudy and cool at start time. Expect sunny skies in
the AM but clouds building back in by around noon with bases
around 12,500ft and tops well above the Peak. Top 1500ft of
the mountain will be in and out of the clouds from 12:00 on,
with visibility dropping down to 1/4 mile at times. Chance of
showers starting early afternoon. Winds near the Peak will be
out of the west-northwest at 15 mph. Upper atmospheric pressure
will be below normal (O2 level 1.1% below normal).
----------------- Temperatures --------------
Location              Time
           07  08  09  10  11  12  13  14  15
Manitou    59
Barr Camp      52  54  55  57
Peak               34  36  38  37  35  35  35

6/12/00 As of today there is no snow left on the Barr Trail:-) This is over a month ahead of last year when the snow lasted until July 19th!

5/18/00 SO CLOSE! Two different people sent me copies of the 21-page summary of the results for the years 1956-1975. Since I was only missing 1968-1973 this almost completed those years. However, while most of the results are in the summaries they are missing some of the slower finishers in the age-groups. Therefore I am still looking for original results for the years 1968-1973! Please let me know if you can help.

4/30/00 The Marathon filled yesterday and the Ascent waiting list is already filled. See the 1/1/2000 post for some thoughts on the waiting list.

4/28/00 The Ascent filled yesterday and the marathon will probably fill tomorrow. It looks like the waiting list is pretty much filled also.

3/28/00 I took a look at the average race times over the last 10 years to see if there were any trends. It’s not hard to spot folks:-( The Ascent has gotten a LOT slower over the past 4 years undoing the opposite trend of the 5 prior years. In the marathon a slow leak is now flooding the neighborhood.

    Average race times
Year    Ascent     Marathon	
1990    4:20:47    6:33:33
1991    4:19:44    6:36:16
1992    4:17:05    6:38:53
1993    4:18:24    6:43:10
1994    4:16:23    6:45:05
1995    4:19:33    6:42:44
1996    4:29:33    6:56:17
1997    4:37:22    6:58:46
1998    4:30:43    7:10:51
1999    4:35:59    7:04:47

3/24/00 I like dominos and today I got to live through the domino effect. In 1987 a runner ran the marathon but unlike in his other years (’78, ’79, ’80, ’82) he got a company, Pike Ind., from his hometown of Tilton, NH to sponsor him with $100. As it turns out he finished the race but was not listed in the results. The runner wrote the TCR back then and got an apology letter. Further, as it turns out, he is shown on the race video finishing the race and even had his comments about the race aired! I watched the video and sure enough there he was so I put him in the results with the time as listed by the TCR letter. Now, thanks to the video, a perplexing mystery has been solved. The ’87 marathon is the only race year in the Skyrunner results archives that does not have Ascent times. Those that read through the news archives will note that I put a lot of effort into the tracking of course and age-group records. Someone has to do it — the TCR missed 3 last year alone!!! I had always thought that Gail Scott’s excellent 1987 marathon time of 4:26:59 had the potential for an Ascent record in the 40-44 age-group. But I also knew from her ’88 race just how fast of a downhill runner she was. The video put it to rest. I got her Ascent time and she missed the Ascent record by only 2:04 but it brought to light just how fast she ran down — 1:33:02! The fastest downhill time of the 1575 women marathoners in the Skyrunner database!!! I was also able to fill in the blanks for the top men that year too. Thanks for getting skipped that year Fred Ross:-)

3/9/00 Two more years were added to the results archive bringing the total to 24 years:-) [PPA/M results moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015] Tim Hicks sent me the 1979 results via e-mail. He did a lot of work on this one because the results I sent him were very bad copies. This is the 2nd year Tim has input. Also I combined several sources to put together the 1962 race. These are small races but every source has different ages and often different times and often did not list the women finishers.

3/9/00 The results are now REALLY searchable!!! [PPA/M results and search moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015] After seeing the potential from the general search (see below) I dived into my first ASP (Active Sever Page) code and used the ODBC (Open DataBase Connectivity) features of the Microsoft SQL (Structured Query Language) Server. Which is just a bunch of techno mumble jumbo to say [PPA/M results search moved to pikespeakmarathon.org in 2015].

2/26/00 Skyrunner.com is now searchable.

2/18/00 Started a survey on the Pikes Peak Central Page.

1/26/00 After being down for several months the Pikes Peak Cam is back:-)

1/22/00 Verne Carlson mailed me the 1978 results on paper and Tim Hicks mailed me the 1979 results on disk:-) I will get Tim’s work added to the archive soon. Let me know if you would be interested in helping with the input of the 1978 results.

1/14/00 All 100 copies of the book America’s Ultimate Challenge The Pikes Peak Marathon that I had found have been sold. $806 was raised for the Pikes Peak Trails and Open Space Coalition and $771.81 was raised for Friends of the Peak. Those numbers may rise slightly if anyone else makes extra donations with their payment. Here are the details.

1/6/00 75% of the Pikes Peak books are sold:-)

1/3/00 Incline Club member Kevin Ash became the first person to solve my new Pikes Peak Challenge game.

1/1/2000 Last month (use the 1999 link below) someone brought up some interesting points about the TCR’s new refund policy. This morning I got a 2nd e-mail from the TCR president on the subject. It will be easier for you to decide for yourself the outcome of my inquiry into that matter but at least for me it has become painfully obvious that there is not a lot of communication going on between the board members of the TCR. Here is the e-mail exchange.

1999 Pikes Peak News Archives