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Waldo Lament – A song by Gordy Ainsleigh

Guest Author 09/10/2015
Guest Author 09/10/2015
722

I got a ride up to Waldo 100K with Joe Condon, who was driving up to crew for Veronica Fujisawa for 43 miles, and then pace her to the end. It didn’t take me too long to figure out, since I was starting at 3 AM and Veronica was starting at 5, that if I could stay ahead of her for 43 miles, Joe could also crew for me for most of the race. So the race to 43 was on. As it turned out, Veronica pushed so hard between 37 and 43 that her stomach went into reverse and she got her first DNF, while I raced on, shuffling exuberantly, to the finish, averaging ever-so-slightly over 4 mph. 

Joe decided to throw a DNF party for Veronica, and I decided to sing her a song. When I told an old girlfriend what I was planning, she said, “But you can’t sing!”   “That’s not true,” I told her. “I can sing badly.” You can hear the results on Veronica’s FB page. I think your readers may get a kick out of the tortured job I did on Jim Croce’s old song, Lover’s Cross. Here they are the lyrics in their altered state:

 

WALDO LAMENT

(Sung to the tune of Jim Croce’s old song, Lover’s Cross)

 

DNF was bound to happen, t’was just a matter of time

So now I’ve come to an epiphany, and it won’t make you feel fine

Seems you wanted to be Nikki Kimball, or a clone with Ann Trason’s heart

But baby you can’t catch me when I’ve got a 2-hour head start.

 

Well I really got to hand it to you, ‘cause girl, you really tried

But for every time that you spent barfing, I had two on a downhill glide

It must have been that trickster Thornley who cast you in a tragic part

‘Cause baby you can’t catch me when I’ve got a 2-hour head start.

 

Stomachs are meant for churning, and toenails are meant to turn black

Gu gels are meant for hurling, when the feet and the stomach aren’t on the same track

 

And so I hope that you can find a race without downhills around the next bend

It will have to have a climb like Maiden and be uphill from there to the end

‘Cause I never was much on the uphills, but on downhills I’m smooth as a fart

And baby you can’t catch me when I’ve got a 2-hour head start.

 

I composed this in my head during the darkness before dawn while camping at “The Willows” on the west shore of Pyramid Lake in the Paiute Indian Reservation, and got up to write it down when it got light. My wife, of course, asked me what I was doing, so I explained the task and read the new lyrics to her. She immediately started trying to add to my masterpiece, so I told her to write her own piece… and she did. Here it is:

 

ULTRA CHICK’S LAMENT

By Paula Ainsleigh

 

Her gaiters they were dusty

Her thighs rubbed raw as meat

Her tongue as dry as sawdust

Raw blisters on her feet

 

Her hands and feet looked like old steak

From places she went “splat”

Her butt was wet with muddy flakes

From the last place that she sat

 

As she paused to toss her cookies

(While admiring the awesome view)

She vowed to never run again

Or suck down another Gu

 

“A couch potato I’ll become

Ass bigger than a house

No more will I run ultras

I’ll retire and become a souse.”

 

“Ultrarunners are mad!” she cried

Her toenails turning blue

“I will retire; my quads are on fire

From the last hundred miles or two.”

 

“Ultra runs are for the birds!”

She rasped as she stepped over fresh horse turds.

“I vow to quit, and sit, and knit,

I’ll drink straight gin and never quit.”

 

Then…

 

Like a blast from the past, Gordy Ainsleigh flew past

(On downhills his feet never doubt)

And he couldn’t be bolder, throwing over his shoulder

“Better hurry ‘cause time’s running out !”

 

As she paused to sink on the very brink

Of surrendering to sloth

Another runner flew by, his endorphins high

Feet light as the wings of a moth.

 

So she started down the trail again

With a sigh and resolve anew

With a change of heart and a silent fart

Down the trail she flew.

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