This was a doubleheader weekend. Yesterday was the Ostrich Festival 5k and today was a 3.8 miler at a movie studio. Old Tucson Studios is know for being a filming site for many a John Wayne movie, as well as, many other westerns.Here's just a few movies made there.
1940: Arizona
1945: The Bells of St. Mary's
1957: 3:10 to Yuma
1957: Gunfight at the O.K. Corral
1958: The Lone Ranger and the Lost City of Gold
1959: Rio Bravo
1965: The Great Sioux Massacre
1966: El Dorado
1967: Hombre
1970: Rio Lobo
1972: The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean
1974: The Trial of Billy Jack
1976: The Outlaw Josey Wales
1981: The Cannonball Run
1986: ¡Three Amigos!
1990: Young Guns II
1993: Geronimo: An American Legend
1993: Nemesis
1993: Tombstone
1994: Lightning Jack
1995: Hard Bounty
1995: The Quick and the Dead
2005: Seven Mummies
2007: Legend of Pearl Hart
It was almost a 2 hour drive for me. My kids and wife passed at the chance to get up at 4 am. The question was, would I be dead by the time I got to Tucson?
Look familiar? This is one of the sets that we ran past. My legs felt great and I was ready to run, but not as fast as yesterday. One, it's my first trail race with a lot of single track. Two, I brought my camera. The race director, who was pretty funny told us it was around 3.9 miles, unless you get lost. This race had lots of turns, as you can see on the map. One loop around the studio streets, then out into the desert, past the start line with a final loop around town. He warned us about rattlesnakes. He said, "the first runner scares the snake, the snake scares the second runner and the third runner gets bit. So make sure you're the fourth runner." Or something to that effect.
I was running and taking pictures and ran mile splits of around 11 minutes each for the first three. The final .8 was in town and I had already taken pictures there, so I ran my fastest. a 9:48 mile split. I finished in 41:27 and was happy with that.
This was put on by the Southern Arizona Roadrunners (which I am now a member) and they had a great awards ceremony. Lots of door prizes for adults and kids, AG awards and the Old Tucson Sheriff added some levity. We had a trail breakfast (scrambled egg burritos).
Here we are running the streets and below is Horse Poop Alley. Yeah, it's where they dump the waste and we got to run right thru it.
Old Tucson Studios is in the Saguaro National Forest. SA-war-o. And it is a forest, as you can see. The drive is majestic.
Now, it's time to send "A Shirt That Races" to another state. Our goal is to have a different runner in all 50 states and Canada run in this shirt. I'll write on the shirt about the two AZ races, wash it (promise) and then mail it to . . . you?
11 comments:
Outstanding Pat, you sure make every race seem like the place to be! I shoulda gone with ya... :)
I have to know if the "Horse Poop Alley" stinks!
Great report, and nice times considering all the pics and a race yesterday!
What a beautiful run!
Nice job, Pat. :)
That looks like a really fun race! Love the "Horse Poop Alley" sign - reminds me of some of the trails around here.
What a fun race Pat!! I loooove Saguaros... thanks for sharing all the pics!
Wow, that looks like a really fun race. I'm going to have to remember it for next year. Nice job going back-to-back with races this weekend.
Ohhhh man that looks like an awesome race! Dang!
Dang! So many races there, I'm totally jealous.
Haw hard are the trails in AZ? Are they very uneven?
Great race. Is this a PR for 3.8 miles?
When I was a kid, we went to Tombstone, AZ and I remember my grandparents telling me about the movies they did there. Is this the same place?
Tombstone is a couple hours further south. It's a cool place to visit and it's a real town. Old Tucson has no inhabitants and it's strictly a studio.
I guess this would be a PR for 3.8 miles. I was hoping it was going to be 4.2 miles, since I have a race of that length next month.
Wow thanks for all the great photos! So you felt fine after the 2 hour drive in the early morning? I was thinking about doing the same thing at another Tucson race, I wasn't sure how my body would react. Glad to hear it worked for you.
And that is too funny what they said about the rattlesnakes. I'm scared to death of snakes. Would have really freaked me out!
Great job!
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