hup all night!

this weekend was the 61st annual ausable river canoe marathon. all year my dad has been training for this race. the big kahuna. they start saturday night at 9pm in grayling, and they paddle through the night 120 miles until they reach oscoda sometime the next day.

in '05, my dad and his partner, garth, finished last in the race and barely made the final cutoff of 19 hours. but they finished. sore, tired, thrilled just to finish. it was my dad's first finish for the marathon, and he had been dreaming of that day for a while.

in '06 they partnered again with high hopes. they started out ok, but early in the morning it was obvious that garth was very sick. he tried to keep going, but the sickness slowed them down and they were disqualified.

in '07 my dad entered as a last minute idea with rejean. rejean is from quebec, so they never paddled together for practice. that was a pretty big hindrance to start out with. they didn't make it.

in '08 my dad partnered with tim. let me first describe tim. he's wicked smart. he is very thoughtful.....not as in, "oh, you're so thoughtful to think of me. how sweet."......more like, he thinks very carefully and speaks with purpose. i have to say this..... he reminds me of rusty the pipe wrench on handy manny. not b/c he's a 'fraidy-cat like rusty.....just b/c his voice sounds like rusty to me. seriously. watch handy manny sometime and you can meet tim.

anywho......

tim is local, so dad and tim paddled tons on tuesdays and thursdays. they practiced like crazy, worked out, trained, set a goal time of 16 hours 30 minutes. quite a jump from my dad's last time of 19 hours, and a whole hour faster than tim's previous attempt. they wanted to take the river by storm...... and they did.

they started out great navigating through the first twists and bends of the river with all the traffic around them. that in and of itself is a big chore. as i made my way back to the cabin with the kids i was glued to the radio listening for updates and trying to get a good enough signal on my cell to text my sister. then i heard it, "here's the list of canoes now officially through stephan's bridge......blah, blah, blah, and canoe 15 grant tally and tim feldkamp." this was amazing! i had never been able to hear dad's name that early in the race .....they were flying! after i got back to the cabin i couldn't get a signal, so i didn't get any updates throughout the night.... let me tell you, THAT stunk big time. so i get up the next morning and i wandered around the cabin with my phone in the air until i got enough of a signal to retrieve the texts nathan had sent throughout the night.

finally, my mom and nathan came by the cabin. it was way earlier than i expected. they got some brefix, freshened up a little and they were off. by the time i got the kids ready and got back on the road, dad and tim were only about 2 hours from the finish line. we stopped one more time to see them and just yell as they went by, and then it was off to oscoda to see them finish. and they finished well! their official time was 16:38:40.

the best part was a continuation of a tradition started by my good old bro-in-law, michael sherf. when dad and garth finished they were dead last, and there weren't tons of people left to cheer them as they crossed the finish line. (sorry, i don't mean to rub it in, dad, but come on....this year's race kicks that races butt anyway so it really doesn't matter). so as they were coming around the corner we were all talking about it and saying they should have a good song playing for their last push. (they were 10 minutes from the cutoff so they needed a boost). well, our resident alabama boy, mike, went over to the dj and requested a little lynard skynard for my dad....he's a fan of "sweet home alabama" so it was a perfect choice and a good idea by mike.

well, this year nathan went up to the dj's tent and said, "man, i've been up all night. any chance i can put in a request for boat 15." the guy said sure and as they came around the corner he started it up. it was classic. perfect timing and a cool ending for the race. but this year, there were bunches of people cheering them on. it was a great weekend. connor loved it. i'm convinced he's gonna want to paddle as soon as he is big enough. so now, we're home....tired, but home. sweet home.....allen park. well, it's no cabin, but it's good enough until next year's race.

the intro in grayling

and they're off......

almost done

the big finish