Half Marathon Update

As of today 6 of the 8 Men have signed up for the Rock and Roll San Diego Half Marathon. Johnson and Jeff are both conceding defeat at this point.

The Half Marathon is scheduled for June 5th.

Sidenote: An interesting plotline is developing. Man Challenger Pistol Pete has recently signed up along with his GF Caster Troy, who by all accounts is quite the little runner. The big question is will the Pistol be bested by his lady friend? Right now she's a 5-1 favorite and we'll be accepting wagers at Club Grand up until race day.

Good luck Frosted Flake....you're gonna need it.

SOM 3 Bowling

"You mark that frame an 8 and you are entering a world of pain."

-Walter Sobchak

Don't look now but a new bowling world record may have been set late Tuesday night in the small neighborhood of Kearney Mesa. A man (I use this term loosely) bowled three of the shittiest games in the history of the sport (I also use this term loosely), a feat that will most likely never be matched again. At least not by someone over the age of 6. Early reports coming out of Kearney Mesa Bowling Lanes is that on average most middle school pizza party bowling groups bowl higher than one Jason Johnson of Pacific Beach California. Johnson averaged a raggedy andy 91. In basketball, golf or in a ridiculously awesome football game that would be a good score. In bowling it's the equivalent of watching a kid with down syndrome compete on Jeopardy.

According to the internet (and as we all know if it's on the internet it's 100% true) the average bowling score for men is 150 to 160 (Women are closer to 130). I give you now the average score tallied by the 8 men competing in SOM 2011 where we bowled three games, dropped the lowest score and averaged the remaining two. I'll let the numbers do the talking (and yes, I scored like an average woman, don't rub it in).

Couls 200.5

Bing 172

Taka 161

Sean 158.5

Pistol 157

Jantz 131.5

Klemo 128

Johnson 91

Bing and Pete were fairly consistent bowlers, each putting up exactly the same number in the first two games (172 and 157 respectively). They both fell off the pace in the last game though which most likely cost Pete two spots, falling to Sean by a mere pin and a half. Sean bowled out of his mind in the first game with a 181 and then followed that miracle by notching a 112 and a 138. Jantz ended up being the most consistent bowler (129, 125, 134). Unfortunately for him he was consistently shitty, garnering a sixth place finish. Jeff, the wild card, again showed why he was a strong addition to SOM 2011 by throwing bullets and finishing in the top three. With his game faltering (after starting out with a 178, he quickly put up a 144 and then a 106) he ended the second game with four straight strikes (and started the next game by throwing his fifth straight strike) which saved him from totally choking away a great start.

In the end, Couls won back the first place watch from Pete being the only bowler to touch the 200's. Johnson was never a factor and for his trouble he was rewarded with the last place supergay bracelet (which honestly needs to be supergayer...Lush would no doubt be stoked to wear the High School Musical piece of jewelry). I'm predicting right now that Johnson is the proud owner of the last place talisman for, at the very least, the next month.

Next up on the calender is a big 16 Point Dia de Futbol....SOM 4 &5: Football (Punt, Pass & Kick) and Soccer. Futbol and Futbol Americano if you will. We'll be at the OB Rec Fields at 9 AM on Saturday if anyone would like to come by a watch a bunch of high school heroes reliving the glory days.

The Numbers:

Couls.....200/165/201

Bing.......172/172/129

Jeff........178/144/106

Sean......181/112/138

Peter.....157/157/128

Jantz.....129/125/134

Zach......115/109/141

Johnson...77/82/100

It appears that Johnson was out of his element.

SEAN WINS AN EVENT

Oops. Meant to post that on April Fool's.

One day late. My bad.

SOM 2 Poker in the Front...Liquor Everywhere

Every sport has them. They're what makes us watch, cheer, brag and curse. ESPN wouldn't know what to do without them. It's what makes the sporting world go round.

Great rivalries.

Yankees/Sox, Bears/Packers, Celtics/Lakers, Duke/UNC.

With them you have storylines. You have rabid fan bases that spend millions of dollars to be a part of a club, a nation, a team. Without them you have meaningless matchups. Who wants to watch the a Bucks/Timberwolves game?

Up to this point in Summer of Man we've had all the typical sporting storylines. The Underdog vs. The Favorite. The Darkhorse (we literally have nicknames because of this). The Upset (Bing losing bowling last year). The Cinderella (zVirus making a deep run in the pool tournament that nobody saw coming). But the one vital storyline that was missing from an otherwise perfect competition was The Hated Rivalry.

Although you may be able to make the case that Jantz or Pete could be considered hated each time they battled anyone, a specific concrete head to head hatred between two competitors never arose.

Until now.

SOM 2 was a Texas Hold 'Em Tourney replete with dark shades, cocktails galore and a short skirted wench to serve them. The tournament also featured a bit of controversy but we'll get to that soon enough.

The night began innocently. Jantz was **gasp** late and so by the time he arrived the bottled of Jameson had already been put to bed. The metaphorical chip leader Couls showed up 13 shots (so says he) deep and by the end of the competition had relinquished his first place status after holding it for all of three days. Jeff took the unfavorable position of being bounced out first and had to shuffle cards until we let him slink out the back door to go make questionable moral decisions in PB. Our cocktail waitress finally arrived (blacked) and Jameson turned to Jack turned to Jerry. All in all a terrible metamorphosis. Jantz was next on the killing floor, followed by Sean. It was here that emotions began to run hot.

Getting bounced out of a competition will piss a person off. Add to the mix that the person doing the bouncing isn't technically in the competition and simply being pissed off revs up to outright f@#ing angry real quickly. In the beginning of the competition Timbo (the owner of the makeshift casino we staged SOM 2 in) wanted in. We are competitive but we are gentlemen and who is going to deny a man the right to play poker in his own house. No big deal right? Maybe he gets a couple good hands but really how much was he going to affect the outcome of the game? We were naive.

Who bounced Jeff? You guessed it....the celebrity contestant, Timbo.

Who bounced Couls? Yep. Jantz next? Uhuh.

And down the list we go. Every single time somebody was pushed out, on the wrong end of a bad beat, bounced from the game, the person doing the beating was Timbo. Irony doesn't capture it but comes close.

So one can imagine why the rage level in the room went from yellow to red in a flash. From what I'm told (Caz, the fellow who takes over for me when I've decided to check in early, was in control at this point) Bing was going all Hulk slamming chips down, Sean was yelling at us to stop yelling and Johnson was yelling about Sean yelling about us yelling. Alot of yelling going on. What happened was unclear but things were said and what resulted was Sean calling Johnson to the front yard to throw some fists around. When Johnson took the bait a heated rivalry was born and thus our competition feels a bit more complete. A fight did not follow, but I can only imagine there is no love lost between the two. The only thing that I'm upset about is neither one of these turds have a cool nickname so calling it Sean vs. Johnson sounds real fucking lame. But I couldn't be happier that a full fledged Rivalry has emerged. ESPN cue up the tape. I'm gathering footage of Sean and Johnson staring angrily at each other and dubbing over sound bytes of Sean mocking Johnson's hair and Johnson calling Sean a gay. We can only hope that one of them bites off the other's ear and threatens to eat each other's unborn children and I can die a happy man.

THE OFFICIAL RESULTS

1st place Johnson

2nd place Zach

3rd place Bing

4th place Pete

5th place Sean

6th place Couls

7th place Jantz

8th place Jeff

SOM 1 Golf

We couldn't have asked for a better day to kick off Summer of Man 2011. The sun was shining, birds were chirping, Bingaman's new shoes were gleaming. By looking at us, with our creased slacks and sharp polos, you would never have guessed our average round by the end of the day would be a cool 100. The favorite going into the first competition was Couls, but unlike last year when the favored challenger choked until the 8th week, he stepped up and delivered.

Bing, the reigning champ, struggled on the front nine shooting a 61, but regrouped nicely to post a 52, good enough for a 5th place finish. Couls was not the only rookie to do well in his man challenge debut. Jeff shot a 109, good enough for a third place finish. Sean and Johnson, the other neophytes, didn't fair as well. Sean faded in the back 9, posting a 64, and finished last among the men competing. Johnson notched the first SOM no show and was rewarded with a big fat zero. Pete and Jantz were the most consistent golfers, both shooting one worse on the back than on the front (49/50 and 55/56). By far Bing and zVirus were the most inconsistent on the day (Bing inking a 9 stroke swing...Zach a whopping 15 strokes between a front 52 and a back 67).

In the end, the day played out pretty much the way the experts predicted. Coming up on Tuesday...SOM 2 Poker.

By the Numbers:

Kris......Front....44....Back....51.....Round 95

Pete......Front...49.....Back....50.....Round 99

Jeff.......Front...52.....Back.....57....Round 109

Jantz....Front...55.....Back....56....Round 111

Bing.....Front...61.....Back....52.....Round 113

Zach....Front....52....Back....67.....Round 119

Sean...Front....56....Back....64.....Round 120

Best Rounds

Front.........Back

Kris 44......Pete 50

Pete 49......Kris 51

Jeff 52........Bing 52

Zach 52......Jantz 56

Jantz 55.....Jeff 57

Sean 56......Sean 64

Bing 61.......Zach 67

Kris 6 pars 6 bogies

Pete 1 birdie 1 par 9 bogies

Zach 2 pars 2 bogies

Jantz 1 par 6 bogies

Bing 1 par 4 bogies

Jeff 0 pars 9 bogies

Sean 0 pars 4 bogies

Worst shots of the day....Jantz 11 on hole 12; zVirus 14 on the 18th; Pete 10 on the 13th; Couls 10 on the 18th

Details for SOM 2

SOM 2 Tomorrow night at Sean's house...I know it isn't as great as Club Grand but he does have a table that can accommodate all 9 of us.

20$ buy in...no rebuys...first person out deals the remainder of the game.

Bring a bottle and mixer or beer and cash to tip your cocktail waitress. Don't be a Jantz...we all know what that means.

Winner take all and last place has to wear the "Supergay" yellow bracelet.

Word on the street sounds like 8:30 start showing up and greasing wheels, talking shit, etc and once Jantz breezes in with his two Newcastles we can get started.

First Favorite

ESPN.com just reported....Kouls is the favorite to win SOM 1. We all know what this means from last year....the favorite curse is back in action. A favorite didn't win a competition until Bing won Mini Golf in SOM 8 last year. Watch out Kouls...it's just as serious as the SI Cover Curse.
In other news Sean Bayhorse looks to be butt naked last coming out of the first challenge. Ladies and Gentlemen, the first darkhorse candidate