My Cleveland Experience

Back in December, after getting the internship with Mid-South Conference, I came to the unfortunate conclusion I couldn’t run the Derby Festival Marathon in Louisville, as it fell on the same weekend as the MSC track and field tournament. I had already started P90X, was getting into great shape, and knew this could be my year to run an amazing marathon time. After doing research on flat and fast races taking place in early May, Cleveland seemed to be the only one anywhere near Kentucky.

Now, anyone who knows me knows my disaffection for the city of Cleveland. I’ve never been there and really enjoyed my experience. Sorry If I offend by saying this, but it really is the armpit of America. But being my only chance to potentially qualify for Boston, I signed up and began the 16-week training process.

Along the way, my training kicked into high gear. P90X provided a solid fitness base, and the Insanity workouts (which really are insane) supplemented my running well. I PR’d in all three of the Louisville Triple Crown races, both thanks to my training and my increased focus on a healthy diet. I stayed injury free, and went into this weekend assured I could run the necessary 3 hour, 10 minute marathon required to qualify for Boston.

I left on Friday with my parents, making the drive up there a day early to not have to be confined to the car all day Saturday (the day before the race). The marathon expo took us to a shady part of the East Cleveland (pretty much the whole thing), but was a great chance to stock up on free samples and a new pair of cheap Brooks running shoes.

On race day, I woke up confident but worried about the weather. It was foggy, about 54 degrees, and showed a lot of potential for rain. I toed the line in my tiny running shorts and singlet, ready to give it my best shot. My aim was to run a 3:05, which would make it easier to get to Boston through priority registration. I started off fast, clipping off the first 10K in 42:58 and half marathon in 1:30:42. That was almost a half marathon PR, and I felt great I was not only running strong, but had found another guy to run with who wanted to run a 3:05. It allowed me to keep the pace conversational, yet competitive.

We hit a nice downhill at about 17 miles that lasted the next 3 miles, and I was able to keep the 3 hour pacer in sight. My 30K time had me on pace to finish in under 3:02. But at about 20 miles, I started to feel it. I kept it strong for 2 miles, but began to really feel it at mile 22. The crowds of support thinned, as did the number of runners around me to provide a little pacing. I was running solo, and paying for it.

With about 2 miles left, I knew I could do it. If I didn’t walk, I was going to finish strong and qualify for Boston. As I ran the home stretch (a downhill, fortunately), I looked at my watch to see sub-3:05. I crossed the finish line in 3:04:39, crushing my PR and earning me a BQ (Boston Qualifier)!

After lying on the floor of the Cleveland Browns stadium for what seemed like hours (in reality, about 20 minutes), I made the trek back to the hotel (again, only half a mile that felt like another marathon) so happy with what I had accomplished. My 6-month journey had culminated in a successful Cleveland Experience. Boston, here I come.

Me at the beginning of the race, still smiling and bandana in place.

At about the halfway point, drafting off the guy in front of me and alternating who took the lead with these 2 guys. It kept us right up there with the 3 hour pace group until about mile 17.

Coming down the homestretch, trying to not look at miserable as I felt.

Pretty pumped to cross the finish line.

 In the hotel room after the race, complete with my medal and bib.

the past year in photos

 So I know it’s been a while since my last post. And when I say a while, I mean almost a full year. In that time, a lot has happened in my life and the lives of my friends. While I am no longer in Spain, that doesn’t mean the adventures haven’t continued. Yes, there have been less weekend getaways to exotic cities. And there are less frequent cultural blunders to report. In an attempt to sum up this past year for those out there I don’t get to talk to as regularly as I’d like, I’ll now take you through a year in pictures.

After getting back from Spain, my first adventure was a family road trip to northern Ohio, where we went to Cedar Point and the great city of Cleveland. In Cleveland, we toured the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Timothy admired the clear Lake Erie.

While I enjoy time with my family, I had to move out of the house. I moved in to a nice two-bedroom apartment with one of my best friends and former fraternity brothers, Nelson. Even though we’ve had our fair share of water leaks while living here in Camden Prospect Park, it’s been a great place to live.

In August, I began my first year of graduate school in sport administration. While I had planned on attending George Washington in DC, the University of Louisville offered me a last-minute graduate assistantship that was too good to pass up. My first exciting grad school journey took me to Lexington to be a mystery shopper at a UK football game with 3 new grad school friends. We were basically customer service spies, but got some cool perks like on-field access, where I met Tayshaun Prince.

The next graduate school adventure was actually for class, at the World Equestrian Games at the Kentucky Horse Park. For an event management class, we worked for Gameday Management to help operate bus transportation for people coming to WEG. While I spent most of my time working with the volunteers in the bus mall, we were able to spend some of our downtime exploring the Horse Park and seeing some of the Games.

As it was an election year, Louisville had some exciting visitors in 2010. One of those was my hero Bill Clinton, who visited the UofL campus to show support for Jack Conway. Conway ended up losing, but I won by getting to hear Clinton give an excellent speech (per usual).

While it may have been exciting to live in DC and attend graduate school, I quickly saw the numerous perks of UofL and was reassured I made the right choice. One of those was touring the new $220 million KFC Yum! Center in downtown Louisville. It’s an amazing arena, built specifically for UofL basketball. Timothy and I took a tour of it with my friend Michelle before the arena opened.

To keep the tradition alive, I had to throw a tacky Christmas party. In December, I put in the tackiest sweater vest/turtleneck I could find, shaved the no-shave November beard into an awesome mustache, and hosted a tacky Christmas party to coincide with the UofL soccer team’s national semifinal match. My dog Archie tried to ruin the party by eating a whole tray of brownies while I went on a quick beer run, but it was a big success. Here is a picture with my three best grad school friends and me: Per, Kristina, and Emily. Kristina left us in the spring to move her adventure to Colorado, but we had some good times.

Christmas break was the time for weddings. First, my fraternity brother and my brother’s former roommate Ryan got married to another good friend Sarah in Morehead in December. It was a great chance to see many college friends I hadn’t seen in a while and celebrate with Ryan and Sarah. Then in January, we did it all over again for my brother’s wedding to Mandy. I was definitely “that guy” at the wedding, as can be seen in the picture of me enjoying the dance floor.

Another Christmas break adventure was the new New Year’s Eve tradition at the Bush household in Frankfort. It was a great time ringing in 2011 with my closest friends, even more special as my great friends Tyler and Sara had just gotten engaged. So happy for the two of them. Here they are posing with the Halloween funfetti cake I made for them, which tasted a lot better than it looked.

The spring semester started off with a big UofL sport administration victory. Myself and three other grad students competed in the National Sports Forum Case Cup against 8 other teams from top national sport admin college programs. We were given a challenge, which in this case was to come up with a marketing campaign for the Ali Center, and had to present our solution 24 hours later. It was a long 24 hours, complete with a 5 am Kinko’s run, but our team worked really hard. We managed to make it to the final two, then just squeaked by the University of Oregon to bring home the NSF Case Cup.

As if I hadn’t had enough of Mid-South Conference athletics while running at Georgetown, I went back to the MSC to do my internship this spring. I was able to organize the men’s and women’s basketball tournament, as well as the track and field tournament. Both were extremely successful, and gave me the chance to work with some great people.

Along with organizing running events, I was able to participate in a few along the way. After completing the grueling P90X workout, my fitness reached new levels as I competed in the Louisville Triple Crown of Running. I was able to set PRs in all 3 races (17:12 in 5K, 36:46 in 10K, and 1:03:07 in the 10-miler) to come in 24th out of 2100 runners. This was just the stepping stone to my third marathon, which I will run in Cleveland on May 15 (just a week away!). My goal is to run under 3:10:00 to qualify for Boston.

Now that the semester has drawn to a close, I’m excited for a little relaxation this summer. There’ll be time in between summer school for some more adventures, along with celebrations (including one’s for new engagements of four of my best friends: Ryan and Jesse, and Jordan and Layne). But first, I’m working the 2011 Senior PGA Championships at Valhalla. It takes place May 24-29, but our operations team has already started working out on the course. It’s my first foray into golf, so we’ll see how it goes.

Munchen Fun!

Our last stop on the European tour was Munich. We took a 6-hour, un-air-conditioned train all the way there from Prague, making it into the city at about 5 pm. We checked into our hostel, and immediately headed out to see the city. We walked all the way over to the English Gardens, this big park where thousands of people were out enjoying the sunshine and great temps. It was crazy how many people were out there, some of them even nude. Hey, it’s Europe. In the gardens, there was a large beer garden that was showing the first World Cup match of the day. We caught just the end of it, but there were so many people there watching it on a big outdoor screen. It was really nice, so we sat down for a massive pretzel before heading out for some more sightseeing. We continued to walk the streets, and I mean walk nearly all of Munich. We went back across the city to check out the hotel we were switching over to for the next two nights. Then, we made our way to the Augustiner beer hall to watch the US soccer match.

The English Garden beer hall after Uruguay's World Cup win. So cool!

This beer hall was really cool. We had some good typical Bavarian food, sat with some pseudo-Americans (well, they were Canadian, but close enough), and endured a brutal defeat of the US by Ghana. But hey, the beer and food was good, the atmosphere fun, so no complaints here.
The next day, we woke up and switched over to our other, nicer hotel. We then made our way down to Marienplatz, the main plaza, to take a free tour of the city. When we got there, there was a finish line set up in the plaza for a half marathon that took place in the city. If only I knew about it sooner. And was in shape. Before the tour started, we changed our mind at the last minute and went out to Dachau to see the concentration camp while it was open. This was a great experience to have, very moving. We walked the entire camp, bought audioguides that told us the history and tragedy that occurred here, and saw some intense sites. I had seen the concentration camp in Berlin, but this one was even bigger. I’m glad that my two brothers got to see one while they were over here, and I feel like everyone should see them to know even more about the atrocities that occurred there.

Dachau gates, which read "Work makes free."

After leaving Dachau, we headed back into the city to go see Germany play their first elimination match against England. We went to the Lowenbrau beer hall that was over by our hotel, and watched it was hundreds of other Germans. It was such a crazy experience to have. When they scored, the people went crazy. Luckily, Germany won and it was a crazy night.
After the game, we regrouped back at the hotel before going out to see Munich’s Olympic Park. It was a really modern facility, with an amazing stadium and many other nice complexes. It was also right next door to the BMW factory, so we got to see a lot of cool buildings while we were out there. Although nothing was open, it was a great place to walk around.
The next day was our last full day in Munich, so we took advantage of it by going out to the Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau castles about 2 hours outside of the city. They were the boyhood home and adult home of King Ludwig, the crazy king of Bavaria. Neuschwanstein was a castle that Ludwig built, but died a mysterious death (found drowned in a lake with his psychologist) halfway through and it was never finished inside. But its claim to fame is that Disney used this castle as inspiration for his Disney castles. After seeing it, I can see why. The castle and all its surroundings were very picturesque.

The amazing lake in the castle town. The water was so pure, you could drink it.
Us in front of the Hohenschwangau castle with Neuschwanstein in the background.Matthew on the bridge with an amazing view of the castle.

When we made it back into the city, we walked some more around the center until we found the Hofbrauhaus. Unfortunately, it was extremely overpriced and hot inside, so we went to a pizza place by our hotel where they served Hofbrauhaus beer! Great compromise.
The last day in Munich, we were only there for the morning before beginning our long journey home. We decided to go on part of a free city tour to hear a little of the history, then took the train ride out to the budget airport we were flying out of. From there, we made our way back to northern Spain. When we got there, we found out that we had to wait about 5 hours in the little Spanish town of Reus for a bus back to Madrid. There was a huge parade going on in the town, but we were able to find one open place (Domino’s, of course) to watch the Spain game before boarding the 6-hour night bus ride. After hours and hours of travelling on trains, planes, and buses, we finally made it back to my apartment in Madrid at about 6:30 on Wednesday morning. All in all, it was a great trip and one that I’m glad I made with my brothers.

The sunset in Reus as we waited hours for our bus.

From Paris to Prague!

After Paris, we boarded an early early flight from Paris Beauvais airport (don’t fly from there! too far out of the city) to Prague. We made it there at about noon, finally found our hotel, and had a relaxing day napping and doing a little city touring. We also watched the World Cup game on a big-screen TV in the main town square with thousands of others, which is an experience we’ve been fortunate to have in 3 different countries.

Our first full day in Prague, Matthew and I went out on another NewEurope free tour while Robbie caught up on some more sleep. We got to see pretty much the whole city, which was extremely well-preserved and amazing. We then went back to the hotel to pick Robbie up and head over to the Prague castle. Unfortunately, the castle was closing right when we got there at 6, but we were still able to see the amazing St. Vitus Cathedral and walk along the castle grounds. All without paying for entrance, which was nice. The castle is located up on a hill across the river, and provided great views of the city and great views within the castle quarters. I see why so many people say the castle is so nice.

Matthew and I in front of the river and the castle.

The castle gates.

The three of us in front of the castle.

The next day, we made a trip that most tourists don’t really make—to the Prague Zoo. It is in Forbes’ list of top 10 zoos in the world (#7), and it was obvious why. The zoo itself was huge and in amazing condition, plus it only cost 4 euros to enter. We spent 4 hours seeing the numerous animals and taking in great views from Prague. We concluded with lunch at the zoo. Normally you would think that would be expensive, right? Nope. The food at the zoo was just as cheap, if not cheaper, than in the city center. It is definitely a place I recommend visiting if you are going to be in Prague. We then spent the night walking around the city some more until we made our way back to the big-screen in the Old Town plaza to watch the Spain soccer game. Luckily, they won, and I was able to celebrate with the numerous other Spaniards that made their was out of the woodworks to watch the game.

Matthew at the zoo.

The castle at sunset.

We woke up early the next morning to catch a t rain to Munich. But more on that to come later.

While Prague was more low-key than Paris, it was one of my favorite cities I’ve visited so far. Full of history, cheap, and small enough to navigate with ease.

Off to Paris

June has come and gone, which means my time here is nearly complete. But of course, I couldn’t go out without a bang. To assist me in this, I had cameo appearances from my brothers Robbie and Matthew. They made their first voyages over to Europe to make our own “O’Doyle rules”-style Euro trip.
The first one to arrive was Robbie, who made it to Madrid on June 14. He was in Spain while I worked my last week of school. Let me just say, it was sad to say goodbye to my teachers and students. They were a great group, and made my job both fun and easy. And my favorite class of seventh grade hellions even gave me a little going away shirt and flag that they all signed. I’m really going to miss them.
But anyways, back to the brothers. Robbie got here, but of course my last week of work was also one of my busiest. In my downtime, we were able to explore Madrid, see Santiago Bernabeu stadium, catch many-a World Cup football match (including watching Spain play with thousands of others outside of Real Madrid’s stadium), say goodbye to the great Rebecca Westlake, and enjoy a little Madrid life.
By the end of his week in Madrid, it was time to move on. And move on we did. All the way to Paris. We boarded a plane early Friday morning headed to Paris, where we spent the next 5 days. When we first got there, we took a free city tour (NewEurope tours, highly recommended, in many European cities), walked around the center, then settled in to watch some World Cup action. The next day, we walked around our hotel area before I had to leave to pick my little brother Matthew up at the airport. After getting to the airport and waiting for about an hour, I collect call my house in the US to find out Matthew’s plane from Louisville to Memphis was cancelled and he wasn’t going to arrive into Paris until Sunday morning. Sucks, but I made it back into the city and Robbie and I set out for Notre Dame.
When Matthew finally did arrive on Sunday, we hit the ground running. We bought these museum passes that gave us 2-day access to all kinds of museums in the city, and you bet we put them to use. The first day, we went to the D’Orsay and Orangerie art museums where we saw a lot of great impressionist work, Napoleon’s tomb, Rodin’s museum where we saw his famous thinker statue, and of course the Paris Sewer System museum. Yes, there is a sewer museum. And yes, it did smell terrible. We were also able to enjoy some fine French cuisine along the way, too. Many croissants were eaten. Many a baguette were also consumed. Needless to say, Matthew was extremely worn out after traveling and a full Parisian day.
The second day, we didn’t let up on the museum hunt. We woke up early, grabbed a croissant and coffee, and headed to the Louvre. We got there right when it opened, made it right in, and spent about 4 hours exploring the massive structure. In my opinion, it wasn’t as cool as the D’Orsay museum, but still nice. We got to see the Mona Lisa (which is a lot smaller in person) and many other masterpieces. The sheer size of the museum was overwhelming, so I was proud of us for making it as long as we did. After that, we made our way back over to Notre Dame, but didn’t brave the long line to climb the tower to the top. Instead, we made our way by metro over to Montmartre, an area of the city that is not only the Red Light District, but also one of the shadiest/dirtiest areas we visited. We got some good views of the city from the hill with the Sacre Coure church, saw some pretty bad breakdancers, got asked for money about 85 times, and got to see the Moulin Rouge. From there, we made our way (walking, of course) back into the city centre to go to the Pompidou modern art museum. Weird. It was one of the strangest museums I’ve ever been in. But hey, it was free. We called it a night after that.

Me in front of the Louvre.

Tuesday was our last day in Paris, so we again made the most of it. We took a train out to the Palace of Versailles. We were able to tour the palace, the gardens, and everything else on the premises. It was a huge complex, but we had perfect weather so we saw almost all of it. Oh, and a small Asian woman with a bedazzled neon pink visor almost get pickpocketed in the palace, at which point she started yelling and punching the pickpocketing woman.

Us in Versailles' gardens.
The gardens were awesome, and this is one of my favorite pics I've ever taken.

From Versailles, we made our way back into the city to the Eiffel Tower. After taking a few pictures from outside and taking a break to watch the France soccer match with about 2,000 other Frenchmen on a big screen outside the Eiffel Tower, we made our way to the stop. By stairs. We didn’t actually go all the way to the top because it was a really long line, but we went up to the second of three levels. It provided great views of the city, and allowed us to say that we had climbed the Eiffel Tower. We called it an early night because we had to catch an early-morning flight to our next desitnation: Prauge. But more on that later.

Of course I had to jump here!
All the brothers in front of the Eiffel Tower.

In all, Paris was a great place. It was a lot more expensive than Madrid, and of course we didn’t understand the language, but we still had a great time. There were so many famous sights and amazing experiences we were able to have here, and I’m glad I was able to have them with my brothers.