A Happy Marathon Monday to All
- Humpday
- Apr 24, 2019
- 5 min read
Happy HumpDay!!
Happy HumpDay!
Happy HumpDay! HumpDay hasn't had a holiday issue since christmas so in honor of one of the best holidays around, Marathon Monday, we present to you a all marathon monday themed newsletter. Some readers may still be sore or hungover from their marathon monday. Why not kick your brain back into action with another edition of HumpDay! If this newsletter isn't enough to get you through to Sunday night, check out the HumpDay website here and read all of the issues of the HumpDay Newsletter.
TWO FREE AUDIOBOOKS FROM HUMPDAY!?!?
HumpDay is still partnered with Audible to offer our readers more content with less reading. Try audible for free using the HumpDay link here and enjoy two free audiobooks courtesy of HumpDay!
Holidays
Patriots Day is a Massachusetts holiday that commemorates the start of the American Revolutionary War through the Battle of Lexington and Concord. On April 19th, 1775, British forces sailed into Boston Harbor on a “Secret” mission to capture and destroy the American weapons and supplies. American militias assembled to meet the British as they marched through the Boston suburbs. The two forces met in the town of Lexington where they squared off against each other.
Initially, the British commander ordered the American rebels to lay down their weapons and disperse but the Americans refused to surrender their weapons. Not looking for a fight, the leader of the militia, Captain John Parker, ordered his men to disperse but not surrender their weapons. Due to a lot of yelling and Captains Parker’s raspy voice, the order to disperse caused some confusion and the Americans continued to hold their ground. After a few minutes of a tense standoff, the American militia began to leave very slowly until a sudden gun shot rang out. Shocked, the American forces began to retreat and the British forces charged the rebels with bayonets, killing 8 Lexington natives.
The origin of the first shot is one of American history’s greatest mysteries. Both sides claim that the other fired the first shot and began the conflict that would grow into the American revolution. The British had one soldier who suffered a gunshot wound which they used to prove that the Americans fired first while, the Americans have records showing that none of their muskets were fired at the end of the battle. On lookers to the battle claim that neither side fired the first shot but rather, some uninvolved party fired a shot from a tavern window.
We will likely never know who fired the first shot of the American revolution, known as the “Shot heard round the world”. If you ask us, we think it’s a time traveler situation where a great American patriot went back to spark the war for American independence. Kinda like Harry Potter 3 or Terminator but for America!
Sports
On April 21st, 1980, the sporting world was shocked by one of the most surprising upsets in sports history. A relatively unknown Cuban American marathon runner named Rosie Ruiz won the Boston Marathon, the most prestigious distance race in the world. Not only did Rosie win the marathon, she also set the women’s course record with a time of 2:31:46. But how did an unknown runner come out of nowhere to win the biggest race of all?
Race officials for the Boston marathon asked themselves the same question and couldn’t immediately find the answer. Rosie didn’t have the body type of an elite runner (thin with strong legs) and she couldn’t recall any details from the race like her pace, the crowd or her competition. Even worse, she was never seen running the race until just before the finish line. When she finished, she was barely sweating and not even out of breath.
An investigation was launched in to Rosie’s race and it was discovered that she did not fun the full race and that she jumped onto the race course near the end of the race. She had pulled the same trick earlier in the year at the NYC marathon by taking the subway to the finish line and faking that she finished 11th. This time, Rosie accidentally won the marathon by joining the race to early and her plan was discovered and she was disqualified.
Rosie Ruiz went on to commit a number of crimes in her personal life including embezzlement and drug dealing. Her marathon times are stripped from the record books but to this day she continues to claim that she ran the entire Boston marathon and is the true winner.
History
The marathon race was first run during the very first modern Olympics in 1896 because the organizers of the Olympics wanted to have an extreme distance challenge to test the competing athletes. The organizers named the race “Marathon” after a story of a Greek soldier who ran 26 miles to announce a great victory. Unfortunately, that story likely isn’t true but the true origin of the marathon is much more interesting and more like a prequel to the movie 300.
In 490 B.C. the largest army in the world, the Persian army, set sail across the Aegean sea to invade the eastern coast of Greece on their way to the major Greek city of Athens. Seeing the Persians coming, the Athenians sent messages to the rest of the armies of Greece asking for help but received no answer. Knowing that the Persians would easily destroy Athens if they weren’t stopped, the Athenians decided to march out and meet the Persian forces head on.
The Athenians and Persians met on a battle field next to the Bay of Marathon, about 25 miles away from Athens. The 10,000 Athenian soldiers wearing heavy armor and carrying heavy shields stood against more than 100,000 Persian soldiers and horses. Outnumbered 10-1, the Athenians did not retreat, instead, they charged at the Persian hoard, running nearly a mile in full armor to crash into the Persian forces. The Persians threw wave after wave of soldiers against the Athenian army but each attack was turned away and more and more Persian soldiers fell on the battlefield. When the battle ended, 192 Athenians were killed compared to 6,400 Persians.
The Persians were defeated at the Bay of Marathon and retreated to their ships. They quickly loaded their men into their ships and began sailing around the Greek peninsula to try and attack the city of Athens from the other side. Understanding the Persians’ strategy, the Athenian soldiers, dressed in 70lbs of armor, marched 25 miles from marathon to Athens before the Persian ships landed. The Persians, seeing the Athenians waiting for them on the shore, turned around and fled back to Persia, effectively ending the first Persian invasion. The Athenian army successfully defended the city of Athens (and Greece as a whole) by attacking their enemy against outstanding odds then traveling 25 miles as fast as possible to make sure they never came back.
The origin of the marathon race may be attributed to one man running a long way but the real inspiration is the high-speed race for survival that 10,000 soldiers in full armor made to save their country. Looking forward to seeing this story in the third 300 movie.
HumpDay Healthy Helpings
Eating is great but doing dishes is lame. Try this healthy meal that only requires one pot and saves you the hassle of overloading your dishwasher.
Calories Per Serving: 310 I Servings: 6 I Cook Time: 48 Min
This Week in History
On this week in 1947, a giant explosion occurred at a shipping dock in Texas City, Texas, killing nearly 600 people. The explosion was caused by a shipment of fertilizer made with ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive chemical that is also an ingredient in military grade explosives. Although smoking was banned at the dock, a worker lit a cigarette next to the shipment of fertilizer and triggered a massive explosion. The blast was so large that it was heard 150 miles away and the cargo ships 1.5 ton (3000lb) anchor was found 2 miles away.
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