Ah screw it, here’s who won the contests during the live blog:

PREDICTION CONTEST:  “Drew” — Despite doubting LoLo and Lagat, Drew correctly picked the most Olympic qualifiers.

COMMENT CONTEST: Jesse, sometimes known as “j-bird” — “It’s nice of them to interview the donkey from shrek.”

HONORABLE MENTION COMMENTS:
** Andrew: Am I the only one who thinks that Spearmon has an uncanny likeness to Ice-T?

** el duderino: there’s going to be a hooker on the usa team in china

** H-Dawg in Brimtucky: The U.S. needs a male Jordan Hasay equivilant, but with a “rat tail” instead. And he would wear L.A. Lights.

Congratulations to all, and thanks for participating — you guys really made the Live Blogs better than they would have been with just the two of us.  In short, you guys were the pine-tree-shaped air-freshener in the abandoned-car-that-a-hobo-had-died-in that was our Live Blog.  For that… thank you.

We didn’t have the will to drive back, and frankly, Ben was starting to smell.

We LITERALLY just walked into our apartment from the airport and our flight back to the East Coast.  So before I have a warm milk and some chocolate chip cookies and hit the hay, let me tell you that there is warm milk and chocolate chip cookies waiting for you as well: in the coming days, we’ll be posting some “Best Of Eugene” videos showcasing all that we gleaned from our stay in the Pacific Northwest.

So keep checking back here, and also at LessThanOurBest.com where we will be posting some “deleted scenes” and outtakes from the project.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some batter to go make.

–Jeremy

This trials has been quite a doozy.  We’ve had highs and lows with friends and foes, cheers and jeers over burgers and beers (that might be the dumbest thing I’ve ever written). Regardless, there is one last thing to take care of before we go: this Live Blog.

This Live Blog is going to be EXTRA special as we will be having two contests.  With PRIZES!!!!  The winner of each contest will receive a special 3000 Miles Eugene08 prize pack.
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A heads-up: We will be live blogging from the Eugene08 festival grounds on the final day of the Olympic Trials tomorrow.  It’s going to be, like, super fun and lucrative for you.

For those of you who don’t know what a live blog is, it’s a series of real time comments from both myself and you the viewer, that string together and provide “commentary,” “race updates” and “fart jokes”.  You know, media.  This time, we will be having contests throughout the two plus hour session where viewers can win all sorts of great prizes from the world of running and Eugene08.

So, if you will be sitting at home Sunday watching the meet and thinking, Larry Rawson is not making enough obscure pop culture references and I wish Dwight Stones would make fun of how Carol Lewis is always yelling, then you are in luck because I will be doing all that AND MORE!!!

Tune in tomorrow at around 3:30 Pacific, 6:30 Eastern time.  It will be like a party on your computer.  So, way better than a “real” party.

–ben

We come out here with no tickets.  We get tickets.  We decide we should give away tickets.

Don’t ask me.  But if you’re in the Eugene area this weekend, or know someone that is, we are raffling off tickets for the final two sessions of the Trials, to benefit the American Cancer Society.  Enter at the Running Film Festival today or tomorrow — going on at 13th & University in Columbia 105 on the U of O campus — it’s just $10/chance for two seats (together) for Saturday and Sunday, or $5/chance for a single seat for the final day.  That includes the 1500m finals ‘n shit.

We’ll be announcing the winner before the Saturday session.

Come on now guys, this Goucher thing is getting a little ridiculous.  What is everyone so upset about?  So the guy gets into the 10k with a little home cooking from Nike Oregon Salazar inc.  No biggie.

All of you little guys that are up in arms over the “shady” or “suspicious” nature of the acceptance process need to realize you are “little” guys for a reason, you don’t schmooze.  Salazar schmoozes.  If you don’t schmooze, you lose, and this situation has illustrated that fact perfectly.

Aside from GoucherGate, the two days off have been a good respite from track action but I think everyone is once again ready to turn their attention away from “enjoying each other’s company” and back to the track.  Where you don’t have to worry about saying stuff and listening to things.

The upcoming events of note are thus: M & W 1500, M 10k, M & W Steeple, M & W 400.  There’s other stuff going on, I suppose, but I’m only one man.

The men’s 1500 is going to be the bee’s knees for sure where we all can follow the walking soap opera that is Alan Webb’s career.  Whether he does well or poorly, this trials is going to be a turning point in his career.

Also, the men’s 10k will be scintillating with, presumably, a strong Oregon crowd for the Ruppinator.

–ben

Allegedly, there was some sort of racing/event/musical children’s celebration going on at Hayward today.  Anyone who was anyone doesn’t bother with that bush league nonsense, they go to “the coast” to “relax” on their off days from the trials.  Real typical of these white collar track snobs.

Jeremy and I, of course, were hard at work all day while those fat cats traded in their precious credential laniard for a pair of board shorts and an unbottoned hawaiian shirt.

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“Hip Hop dance crews” are one of those things in life where, when they are really good, they are super cool and everyone in the “crew” seems like the coolest person around. They make you want to dance and think that, if you practice really really hard, you just might be able to do what they are doing and totally change your image and be the uber cool guy at your next dance party.  But, when a crew is not very good: an absolute car wreck. One of those car wrecks where your not only horrified by the wreckage but you’re also embarrassed for the victim because they are so bad at driving.

There is no in between, either super-cool-life-of-the-party or cover-your-eyes-and-cringe-while-slowly-walking-away.  Dancing is a very risky activity.

The first half of this trials has lived up to the hype.  And there was a LOT of hype.

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Tonight is the night folks. Men’s 800 final and 5000 final. Hit it. I’ve been listening to my Young Jeezy Let’s Get It: Thug Motivation 101 album on repeat since 5 o’clock this morning and I’m both pumped for these races and I kind of want to grind a g pack. I guess we’ll just have to see where this night takes us.
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Jeremy and I decided to have a taste after a long day of shooting stuff (I’m not a big gun nut, but Jeremy loves it for some reason). What Eugene lacks in big city charm and “stuff to do”, it more than makes up for in variety of craft brews.  There are a lot of different beers to choose from no matter where you go.  We will be rolling out our best of Eugene beers in a few days in video form, but for now let’s just say they all managed to get me a little drunk, which is nice.

We headed to the Villard Street Pub in what might be referred to as downtown Eugene.  It was crawling with track people.  Most notably, we spotted Larry Rawson, of  the always entertaining announcing team “Dwight Stones, Carol Lewis and Larry Rawson.” I really wanted to ask him how many beers he thought I drank based on my turnover.  I’m not really sure I know what that would have meant, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.

I’m off to bed now in preparation for tomorrow’s LIVE BLOG EXTRAVAGANZA, and an extra special surprise that might be happening after the super sick 5k final tomorrow night.  Peace, I’m outta here.

–ben