MEDALS, AND LOTS OF THEM

I have been running for a long time and over the years I have collected a lot of medals!!! So many I don't really know what to do with them!!!

In fact I don't take a medal any more, for years I would take a medal and, well they just ended up in a box:

Just too Many

Now the only medals I take are "special" ones, ones I have earned... A couple of years ago I came 3rd in a race and the young lady at the end handed me a Gold Medal, I looked at it and thought a bit... then asked her if there were any bronze medals, I had come 3rd after all! She told me it was Gold for top 10, Silver till 100 them Bronze, I took a bronze.

I also keep medal I get from the couple of overseas races I have run, and a couple of races I think I have earned. So what do I do with all these medals? Well I hang them around my head!!

MINE ARE ON THE RIGHT

2 Oceans Medals? No they don't hang round the neck, they have a place all of their own, Oceans is a special race, and back when I ran my first one I was going to run lots of them, and all in sub 4, I had dreams of running 20 silvers in a row... But running the 2nd one with an injury, I couldn't make the silver cut, my total sits at 11, plus a couple of Oceans Trail medals:

Should have stopped at 10!

Now back in the early 90's I picked up a medal at WP champs on the track, but it was in steeplechase, and to be honest I wasn't really that fast, it's just that back then every few people race steeple! So I still wanted WP medals, and turning 40 had opened the door again...

Injury had kept me out of the medals the first couple of years, but (as you know) I ran a good race in the wind at WP half marathon champs and brought home the silver:

Silver looks nice

Then this weekend past was WP CCC and again I was in the mix... With the wind blowing and the threat of rain hanging over us it was going to be a great race. I have only run 1 of the league races and that was after a 29km mountain run in the morning, so I didn't know if I would have the better of the other guys, but I went out hard and let the race unfold...
I'm not going to give you a step by step account of the race, but I will tell you that Graham got away and then Sean was just to fast, but Rusta from Gugs and I had a great race with him catching me with the wind behind and me pulling ahead into the wind! That was till the last lap when I got ahead and stayed ahead for the BRONZE. Sorry I don't have a medal to show you, but I didn't stay 3 hours after my race to wait for prize giving. Don't worry I'll get it sometime.

So just how many medal would I have if...

You know about the 200 x 10km races
then what about the 159 x 15km races
and we also have 188 x half marathons
40 x 30km races (last one was on Sunday after the Cross Country Champs on Saturday)
15 x red hill 36km races
only 60 marathons (2 at the end of an IRONMAN)
11 x 2 Oceans 56km
2 x Comrades +_90km (an up and a down)

what about the:
41 x 16km
13 x 8km
5 x 7km
11 x 6km
110 trail races, but most of them don't do medals, and some have been 5 day races.
I don't have records of all the track and CC races I've done, but they would add to any medal count...