Was it something in the air? A reawakened sense of adventure? Temporary insanity? 

It all started - like our 30-year reunification itself - with an e-mail from CJ Spence. He just got in from a morning run, felt good, and had to share his endorphin-induced euphoria with the rest of us. Let's run a marathon, he suggested. Shipp jokingly responded that he couldn't do a marathon on a motorcycle, but would be amenable to a relay. He'd even take 500 meters and a beer.

Will we ever learn? Next thing we all know, Gidmark is on the line, telling us about the Edmund Fitzgerald Ultramarathon, a 100-kilometer race run down the north shore of Lake Superior to Duluth in October, which could be run as a …relay. The die is cast.

Over the next couple of months, this appears to get serious. Gidmark is obviously pumped, spending a lot of the state of Minnesota's time planning (plotting?) a strategy that would get us into this with an 8-man team. Despite the "Of course this will never happen" disclaimers, you can sense a deadly seriousness in his posts. And gradually, one by one, members of the company sign on. Spence, of course. And Gidmark. Corrigan. Storbeck. Vogelsang. The big legs. Then Easterling gets his doctor's OK. Shipp decides he can probably survive 5K and moves from support crew to runner. And when Bud Park makes contact through the website, the team is set. 

Now we're in serious preparation. Everyone's in training. Campbell and Music enlist as the support crew. A van is booked to accompany the runners down the course. Gidmark survives some harrowing days looking for accommodations and lines up two log cabins at a beautiful new lodge resort on the lake. And he keeps up the enthusiasm though the injury reports with promises of fun, beer, beautiful scenery, beer, camaraderie, beer and smoked fish. And beer. 

October 12. The first wave arrives in Minneapolis. Gidmark introduces us to his favorite Italian restaurant and we wonder if maybe we should stay here for the weekend and take in the charms of the Twin Cities. 

Next morning (Friday the 13th), everyone is there and we roll up the road to Duluth. All of us practice our excuses, tell our horror stories about injuries. We're all a little in awe of Storbeck for his record of marathons (casually mentioning that he'd actually won one!) and training regimen that has him 20 pounds lighter than the last time we saw him in March. Our expectations tempered with reality, we know we'll take at least 5th place in our category. Unless, of course, a sixth team enters at the last minute.

We arrive in Duluth about 4, get briefed and registered, and pick up our shirts. Somehow the authorities had put us in the "senior competitive even mixed" category, which means half the team would have to be female. Tempted as we are to leave it alone and take first place (we're the only team in that category), we decide that someone would probably notice, so we get corrected into the proper slot. The day that had started sunny and mid-70s has quickly turned to rain and 50. We walk around in the rain for about a half hour looking for a place to eat (table for 10 on a Friday night with no reservations? Sure). Storbeck by now is very focused, ready for a training meal, and a little pissed. Get pizza and beer at a cavernous sports bar, and make it to the Grand Superior cabins about 9:30.

October 14. Now it's race morning. We're in two cabins at the lodge. One of them awakes at 5 to get Spence to the bus he'll take to the starting line. The other wakes at 5 because the rain is pounding on the roof of the cabin. By dawn it's subsided to a cold drizzle, with whitecaps on the lake. Lovely. The crew is cabin 301 is thankful that the rain slows (and that they're taking the less challenging part of the race). Spence, Storbeck and Gidmark are running the top end (19K, 25.9K and 25K). Vogelsang follows with a 9.9K, Shipp with a 5K, Park with a 5.1K, Easterling with a 5K, and Corrigan brings it all home with the final 10K. Campbell will drive, and Music is the vehicle commander and chief timekeeper.

At about 9:30, the morning crew shows up at cabin 301 reporting a successful start. Spence ran his leg in under 2 hours, and handed off to Storbeck. Now we all pile in the van and head to the race course.

What we see is, frankly, ugly. John had to start his tour running uphill for a mile or so. After that, the road is a constant series of fairly steep hills, unpaved washboard surface, and puddles. What the hell are we doing here anyway? We catch Storbeck near the end of his leg, and move to the transfer point where he hands off to Gidmark. Walking back to the van he's wet, muddy, and relieved to be finished.

With Storbeck in the van praying for Gidmark not to go lame (the rules require the previous runner to take over if someone falters), we follow the other John, leapfrogging ahead about every mile to lend moral support. He takes a fall early in the run, but it's caused by fumbling with the number vest and not the tricky ankle. From the driver's seat, Campbell is especially encouraging to a woman who's running ahead of Gidmark and having some leg trouble - we're all concerned that she'll have him picked up for harassment, but she's a good sport about it. Eventually we get out of the woods and onto a paved highway, into the town of Two Harbors, and Gidmark hands off to a shivering Vogelsang.

From this point, the relays come pretty quick, and the percentage of wet and tired people in the van rises swiftly. The road veers off the main highway to the "scenic highway" by Lake Superior, which we had expected would be flat. Uh, no. Not the extremes of the mountain legs, but still a constant series of gentle swells.

Shipp is next up, the first of the 5K runners. He watches with surprising detachment as a red stain spreads across the top of his left shoe, and he knows a toenail has torn loose, but can't feel a thing. Meanwhile the support crew in the van has found a smoked fish shop and is stocking up for the evening.

Park takes the number at the 85K mark, and lopes off down the road in a smooth and steady pace. By now the van is driving ahead to the next transfer point, and the runners are spread pretty thin along the road. It's an especially scenic road now, although some of the beauty is lost when you're running in a cold drizzle. 

Easterling is next, gets a good start to his 5K. The van pauses periodically to take in the view, and once to retrieve Jack's jettisoned hat and gloves. Corrigan is getting pumped for the glory leg, which starts with the handoff at 95K. If we finish by 5 o'clock, that will mean completing the run in under 10 hours - not a winning time by far, but everyone agrees it would be a damn fine time. 

Corrigan is off and running, and after a check at the 1-mile point the van heads for the finish. Anyone expecting the crowds that show up for marathons would be disappointed in this one. The only people on the road appear to be race officials and the families and friends who provide support crews. Failing to find a clear path to the finish, we park the van and wait. Finally someone suggests that Corrigan would probably prefer not to finish the race alone, so we run Campbell through one last u-turn, park the van and move out through the woods to Kitchi Gammi Park. We're about 50 yards from the finish when we spot Corrigan, motoring down the hill. Now we're afraid he'll outrun us, so we break into a trot to get to the finish with him.

Corrigan sprints through the finish. We all cheer. Someone is heard asking "Who are you guys?" and then the public address loudspeaker announces the arrival of the Antique Eltees. 

One more tradition - a photo op on the rocks at the lake edge. We stand on the slippery stones and recruit someone to record the event on our various cameras.

And it's done. There is an evening ceremony in the Duluth Convention Center, with the awarding of prizes, projections of slides of the race, and beer. We've gone to the center to try to pick up a few last-minute souvenir t-shirts (and wind up rummaging through boxes in the back room, since there is no one there to sell them), but decide to forego the evening's festivities. The prospect of a hot shower, a good meal, and perhaps a beverage, impels us back to the cabins.

It only takes a little dead reckoning to find the beverage store we'd scouted the previous day, where we provision ourselves for the evening. Gidmark reminds us Minnesota frowns on open beers in moving vehicles. We thank him for his concern. 

Back at the lodge, through the welcome warmth of a hot shower, we head to the bar. Initially we'd hoped for a bonfire on the lakeshore. Not tonight, thanks. The bar and dining room at the Grand Superior Lodge are a lot more inviting. The lodge is new - unfinished, in fact - and the staff at the bar is friendly, if a bit frazzled to be the center of our attention. But we manage to get the desired result. Dinner is the hearty training-breaker Storbeck has been dreaming of. We pose for a picture, and think we're pretty cool.

Back in the cabin, the evening is relaxation and remembrance. There's smoked fish. Park had brought a bottle of something that warms the insides. Shipp has packed his mandolin, Gidmark his guitar. Songs are sung. Cigars are smoked. Old friendships are reinforced.

October 15. Sore old muscles and joints are limbered by the walk to the dining room for breakfast. We marvel that we actually did this thing, talk about the next reunion, pose for a team picture on the lodge balcony, and pile back in the van and Gidmark's Jeep for the ride back to MSP. Thoughts of a grand goodbye at the airport give way to the reality of getting people to the gates on time.

It was a great team effort, but we all owe a special debt of gratitude to John Gidmark for his planning, organization, persistence and hospitality. To the ground crew of Campbell and Music. And to CJ Spence, who once again planted the seed of an idea that sprouted and grew into a helluva memory for ten Antique Eltees.
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Vital statistics (dazzle 'em with statistics):

105.2 kilometers = 65.4 miles
Team time: 9:38.19 
Team average mile: 8:51.62506732 (I'm prepared to carry this to as many decimal places as it will go) 

Individual times (supplied by statistician Bill Music):
Spence: 19.3 km, 1 hr. 53 min. - 9:25/mi.
Storbeck: 25.9 km, 2 hrs. 9 min. - 8:01/mi.
Gidmark: 25 km, 2 hrs. 25 min. - 9:20/mi.
Vogelsang: 9.9 km, 56 min. - 9:06/mi.
Shipp: 5 km, 29 min. - 9:20/mi.
Park: 5.1 km, 24 min. - 7:34/mi.(!)
Easterling: 5 km, 28 min. - 9:00/mi.
Corrigan: 10 km, 54 min. - 8:41/mi.
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More pictures on the photo pages.  And the lyrics to the Wreck of the Antique Eltees.