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Friday, February 11, 2000
When the starting gun goes off for this weekend's
Oahu Perimeter Relay Race, Mothers on the Run
will be among the teams of long-distance runners
By Linda Aragon
Special to the Star-BulletinSome people think a family drive around the island is a big event.
Try lacing up those running shoes for a 134-mile jaunt around the island's perimeter. Remember, Oahu is not round and the roads do not always line the island perfectly. In key spots the road stops and a trail run commences.
The Oahu Perimeter Relay Race begins tomorrow evening at Kapiolani Park and circles the island throughout the night to finish at the same location around 2 p.m. Sunday. The race is split into 35 relay legs shared by a seven-member team.
This is the 29th year runners have changed their sport's solitary image to join together for a team event. Many of the runners are used to competing in long-distance events, but a race of this length is something that most would not dare or even want to attempt solo.
"There's not many places where you can go and say you ran around an island. I had a blast last year," said Bonnie Campbell-Kaufman.
This year Campbell-Kaufman is again competing in the race with her team, Mothers on the Run. As the name suggests, the team is composed of seven mothers from 27- to 45-years-old with 18 children between them.
READY! SET! GO!
What: Oahu Perimeter Relay Race.
The moms last year took first place in the Military Women division with a time of 17 hours, 43 minutes. The team, composed of two members of the military and five military wives, plan a repeat of their victory.
Like many distance athletes, members of Mothers on the Run enter the race as part of their overall marathon training. They run together several days a week at 4:15 a.m.
While the children, and some husbands, are still in bed, the mothers meet up with their team captain, Naval Cmdr. Sue Talwar, at Ford Island to do a quick 10-mile run. Then it is back to their homes to wake up the family, get them fed and off to school and work.
It can be a grueling schedule but Campbell-Kaufman, Talwar and teammate Deanne Emmons all agreed that their motivating factor is, "Being able to eat anything you want."
"You really do build a sense of team," said Air Force Lt. Col. Jim Eastman.
In 1998, his first year to do this race, Eastman's all-male Air Force team completed the course in 13 hours,18 minutes to take first place.
Since then, all of his former teammates have left the island. This year, Eastman has been asked to join last year's defending champions, a team composed of Navy, Army, Air Force and Marine members with many first- and second-place finishes between them.
Known as Team Armed Forces, the group will be setting about a 6 minute-mile pace throughout the event.
The starting times are staggered six hours apart, allowing the slower teams to start at 6 p.m. and the first-place contenders to start as late as 11 p.m.
Hurtin' for Certain is one team that will start the race earlier in the evening. Our Mascara is Faster Than Yours, an all-women team, will start the race at the 11 p.m. final starting time.
Eastman, an elite runner who finished 42nd overall in December's Honolulu Marathon, said he has been the starting runner for his team the past two perimeter relays.
"I love to be part of the start," he said. "You run through Kapiolani Park, up Diamond Head Road and out to Hawaii Kai."
The different legs of the race vary between 2.5 and 5.8 miles, with the starting and the finishing leg being among the longest. Then there's the approximate 5-mile Kaena Point leg, which is a trail and rugged cliffside run. Those who round the rigorous trail can count that portion as two of a runner's required five legs.
Unlike a circle-island drive which offers an opportunity to view the scenery, this long-distance trek will compel the runners' senses to experience in far greater detail the changing island terrain.
In the late evening, competitors run over the sand-blown Kalanianaole Highway fronting Sandy and Makapuu beaches. Then runners head through the night along the Koolaus where they will have to cautiously tread the moss-covered portions of the frequently wet Windward roads.
After passing North Shore beaches and then turning onto Farrington Highway at Mokuleia, the runners will arrive at Kaena Point around daybreak. Race officials will not allow competitors onto the Kaena Point leg of the race until sunrise.
Most of the top teams do not reach the northwestern point of the island until several minutes past sunrise. But once they cross over to the Waianae side, a critical point of the race begins.
"Waianae, that's the one place where all the teams are there at one time," Eastman said. "Even though we might be hours ahead of them because we started later, that's where you get to see the other runners, and the spectators. That's where the race begins," he said.
As the sun rises on the Leeward side, the runners will then make their way to the streets of Pearl City and downtown Honolulu just in time for the midday heat. Some 13 to 20 hours later, the runners are expected to cross the finish line at Kapiolani Park.
The actual distance covered by each racer is approximately 19 miles, shorter than a marathon, but just as mentally challenging.
"You have to be willing to stick with it," said race director Bob Doleman. "You do get tired. You run and then you sit in the van."
In the rotation of runners, team members can be sitting in the escort van for almost two hours awaiting their next turn to run.
"By the fifth or sixth leg of the race, the sun has already risen and fatigue begins to hit," Eastman said.
This is exactly why Doleman said the race is started in the evening, to get the runners out of the sun for the maximum number of hours. Though that means at times through the night runners are spread out over the course running down dark, lonely stretches of highway.
Since the escort vans cannot follow closely behind the runners, some teams have support crews on bicycles riding alongside teammates in need of motivation.
"Last year at night I asked them to sing to me," said Campbell-Kaufman, who was escorted by a two-member bicycle team.
Most of the runners agreed that they push themselves much harder when they know their efforts are contributing to their team.
"It's fun. People on teams just have fun being with each other," said Doleman.
"We're competitive, but it's a nice competitive," said Emmons, a mother of two young boys. She said running helps relieve the stresses of motherhood, but more importantly, "You're clothes fit better."
In addition to being a mom, requirements to be on Emmons' team are, "You gotta have a real good attitude, and you have to be a fun person," she said.
"And you can't be pregnant," said Talwar, citing their experience three weeks before the race last year when a team member found out she was pregnant, and still wanted to race.
To keep it safe, race officials require all participants to wear a reflective vest at night. For the day and evening portions of the race, runners are advised to run on the bike paths and sidewalks and stay off the road as much as possible.
