Gasprilla Marathon
Tampa, Florida
Sunday, March 1, 2009

Sunday, March 1, 2009 was not the best day weather wise to race the Gasprilla Marathon in Tampa, Florida. The winds were 20 or more miles per hour and gusty and there was an 80% chance of rain and thunder showers. At least the temperature was not bad as it varied between 62 and 64 degrees. Fortunately there was no rain for the first hour and the thunder showers stayed away from the course completely. It began raining intermittently with varying degrees of intensity for the next three hours. The last hour or so had no rain and even possessed about 30 minutes of sunshine. The volunteers and police were wonderful as they braved the miserable weather to man the water/Gatorade stations that were located every 1.5 miles and control the extremely flat course, keeping it closed to traffic. I really appreciate their efforts. In spite of the weather I still enjoyed myself.
The Gasprilla event is actually a two day event with a 15K and 5K on Saturday and a marathon and half marathon on Sunday. Since it is possible to do both events on Saturday and one of the events on Sunday, there were several people that did three races. I was not one of them. Ryan Hall who was running his first sanctioned race since the Olympic Marathon won the 15K by almost 4 minutes.
There was another interesting event that occurred at the Tampa Airport on Monday. While I was waiting for my flight to Key West on the little 19 seat Continental Connection at gate A1, I noticed that Florida Governor, Charlie Crist, was waiting for a flight to Tallahassee at the same gate on the same type of aircraft. After he finished talking on a cell phone, I asked if I could take his picture and he agreed. One of his aides took the picture so that the Governor, my wife Gerda, and myself could all be in the picture. After the picture we talked for a short time. He used the commercial transportation to save taxpayer money.