does anybody need some last minute motivation?

Just a real quick post, for some motivation/intimidation. All of a sudden, the Chicago marathon is less then 3 weeks away and time seems to be flying. 3 SLG-ers ran a marathon this pat weekend. The Minnesota terrorists, Larry Eberhard and Steve Goldade (if I cannot run the Chicago marathon, it will be because I am being detained at Guantanamo Bay because the Bush administration is reading my e-mails and I have used the word terrorists. Oh well, it is a better excuse then runners butt, NO?) ran the "MOST BEAUTIFUL SUBURBAN MARATHON", aka the Twin City marathon this past Sunday and the supercoach, Clem, was a pace coach (for which he earned the formidable sum of 25 euros) in a marathon held near the Belgian sea shore (from De Panne to Oostende). He was supposed to bring in a group of runners under 4 hours and he told me that it was very hard to keep the group in check. They consistently ran 10 seconds per kilometer (which would be about 16 seconds per mile) faster then they needed to reach their goal. Out of 30 male and 4 female runners, 9 of them finished in 3:52:55 and about 10 other runners who had dropped back a bit finished in their goal time of 3:59.
Larry and Steve ran a 4+ marathon but it seems to me that they were doing their last long training run to get ready for Chicago.
I think in the meantime, everybody has gotten an e-mail about the merchandising and signing up for the official SLG t-shirt and everybody must have gotten an invitation for the post-marathon party at Petra and Philippe. I think it is fair to say that the excitement for this race is really starting to kick in and in all fairness, I am starting to feel the consequences of my own running motto for this year : "Catch me if you can!" I can feel the hot breath of MANY competitors in my neck. Keep your eyes peeled for a posting by a founding father about the intrigues surrounding the "catch me if you can" motto!!!