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Dirty Deeds Run Dirt Cheap
The Aroostook Dirty 30
by Gary Allen
Part 4.
Most races go something like this. The faster runners get a lead and eventually they do one of two things, they either win or they don't. The Aroostook Dirty Thirty is a little different. By now Susan and I had become close. Not close like kissy face close, but the inseparable closeness that only athletes get when they are working hard and working together. We didn't say much, and didn't need to, but you could feel it in the air. We were leading and every step was getting us closer to our destination, the finish line. Suddenly, there they are again the TMBs. One who I would later learn is Boyd ordered us to stop and he started screaming at us, DOOOOO IT NOW! Get on the effin ground you dirties! You see the TMBs didn't seem to like it that we were the race leaders and that we seemed to be having fun, so they exacted their wrath on us. I quickly deducted that Boyd either drinks too much coffee or he is just super hyper. He had us sprinting in place...HIGH KNEES, DOOOO IT FASTER! Drop to the ground. COME-ON! Up down, Up down...hey, wait a minute I'm not a yo-yo but this guy seemed like he might be!
He shouted with the force of a boot camp drill instructor. I wondered was he one? ( I would later learn he is US Border Patrol. Remind me to not try and sneak into the USA!) I'd pay to see Boyd terrorize some border jumping Al Qaeda dudes with his extreme Jane Fonda workout. They'd go invade someone else pretty darned quick.
This however, was war on race leaders. It was time to jack in some more bullets into our physiological shotguns. Susan and I didn't say it but we knew what we had to do. If we made this crazy person seem like he was hurting us it would likely only give him impetus to hurt us more. In the middle of one nutty exercise. I shouted, DOUBLE TIME! Boyd looked me square in the eye and screamed back, DOUBLE TIME? DOUBLE TIME! NOW! in his best Marine Corps rebel yell.
They held us there maybe 20 minutes into the following pack caught us and then we were allowed to run on. We had maybe gone only 2 or more 3 miles when we were stopped again by Boyd and his happy band of dominatrixes. (They were on bicycles) This time they stopped us near a wooden bridge where an old car tire laid in the mud. It didn't have a steel rim, just the worn out tread of many miles covered. I wonder how a old tires get out in the woods? Do kids who are making out get a lot of flats? Anyway, the TMBs made Susan and I play catch with the tire. Not catch like we were gently tossing an egg but catch like we were throwing heat in Fenway Park. Every time we made a successful reception they made us step back. Now, throwing a car tire hard at a pretty girl goes against every basic instinct in my body. The tire would loft toward her and she'd hook her bare arm thru the center and somehow stop it's momentum. I could see her arm getting red whelts from the repeated abuse.
We made about a dozen successful catches then pretty boy Boyd shouted, THE FIRST TO DROP IT IS OUT, wait, they way he said OUUTT sounded like Hedi Klum sending a wanna be designer packing on Project Runway? Cool! Reality shows are all the rage. Suddenly this event felt quite real. I dropped the tire with a failed but valiant diving effort to save it. Boyd suddenly was hovering over me and quickly had me doing leg raises, SIX INCHES! he shouted, meaning he wanted me, laying there in mud, to hold my legs out in front of me, exactly a half a foot off the ground. I have the tightest hamstrings on any living homosapien. If archeologists ever find my bones, as I did Bullwinkle's. They'll probably say this one clearly suffered much abuse over his lifetime. What they will never know it that I loved all of it! You see, I can't really straighten my legs as they just don't bend that way. My legs are always cocked into a grasshopper like ready to spring running position. Boyd didn't seem to enjoy my best effort at leg raises and yelled even louder, YOU CALL THAT 6 INCHES! he bellowed.
Suddenly the storm ended almost as quickly as it began and Susan and I were allowed to run. Thank God! What a freak. After a few miles Boyd showed up again and asked us to sing and started asking us a battery of questions as we ran. I quickly figured out he was trying to befriend us so he could then further destroy us and hopefully cause our exit from this event. The TMBs don't really want participants to finish and if they do they want to make damn sure you earned it.
Susan and I turned right and suddenly we were on pavement. I wondered what the passing motorists thought of a spartan and an an attractive woman both covered all in mud running down the road so early in the morning? The paved road felt good under foot. It was a happy time to place your foot and know it would stay exactly where you placed it. Susan and I ran along with an upbeat bounce in our step. I could feel the pace pick up. Kale drove past and gave us a thumbs up and traded directions with Susan who seemed to know where to go next. The road pitched up and we climbed in silence. I had met Susan once briefly at a July 4th Relay event held on Mount Desert Island. This event also encourages costumes and fun. Her team was the Maine Road Hags and mine was Crow Athletics. I wore a rock star outfit that I had used in an all night 200 mile team relay from Woodstock NY to NYC (Yes, that Woodstock!) My get-up featured plenty of black eyeliner. Susan wore a sheer skirt. We got along perfectly and climbed the long grade ahead not worrying about what might be waiting for us at the top.
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