UltraBrit

Monday, March 23, 2009

Spring Equinox 8k - New Canaan, CT - March 22, 2009

The Spring Equinox race was almost forgotten this year with all the craziness with the bad weather or forecasts of such resulting in the postponing of some Boston Buildup races. With no other local races on the schedule for the weekend, a few of us e-mailed Jim last week to suggest that he put on this race. Jim was nice enough to grant our wishes and put it together at last minute. I'm not much of one for running an afternoon race, but I did want to show support and thought it would be nice to get off the couch for a little while on a Sunday afternoon. I had run 16 miles on the Trumbull rail trail with Jill, Joe L, and Cindy on Saturday so it was another race with no real expectations.

It was probably about 10 degrees colder at the race site than in Norwalk. The sun had gone behind some clouds and a bitterly cold wind was blowing. I had elected to wear a running skirt, but was happy that I at least had on a long sleeved running shirt. Slowly people were starting to roll in. I talked a little with Andrea, who was there to volunteer and also chatted with John, Don and Rob. Emmy showed up about 5 minutes before race time and told us that she had won her division in the 15k in New York that morning. Frank decided not to run to the race since he was drained after a long morning in the city.

The race started out on Oenoke Ridge and then went along West Road, Turtleback Road and then back to Oenoke Ridge. I started out at a reasonable pace in the first half mile, but felt like I was stuck in the masses with us all running single file on the side of a busy road. I decided that I wanted to get away from the pack despite the benefits of the people ahead blocking the wind. I passed a group of runners and set my sights on Don, who was a little ahead of me. I continued to run with him in sight, but he gradually got far enough ahead that I figured my chances of catching him were slim to none. I ran most of the first half right behind a guy called Luis, but after the hill on Turtleback I passed him and tried to push the pace a little. Roy passed me and made a comment about whether or not we had a hope of catching youthful Don. The race was mostly downhill after Turtleback with a slight uphill in the final stretch. The sun made an appearance and the wind died down at times too. My mile splits were 8:03, 8:09, 8:26, 7:48, 7:03 (7:16 pace) for an average pace of 7:57. I finished the race in 39:29 (my watch time) right behind Roy. As I crossed the finish line Ronnie told me that she thought I was the 3rd woman to finish! What a wonderful surprise.

Emmy was nice enough to run the race with John who is just starting to ease back into racing for the season. He was struggling with some cramping in his legs, but managed to tough it out and finish the race.

We all hung out for a while after the race. We ate bagels and talked about the 30kms coming up this weekend. I'm so glad that I decided to run this race since I had such a good time. The long sleeved shirts that Jim made up for it were really cool too.

Course map:
http://www.clubct.org/Races/Equinox/Equinox.GIF

Results:
http://www.clubct.org/Results/09Results/09EquinoxRes.html

The cool race shirt

Emmy coming in after sticking with John for most of the race.

John

John crossing the finish line

Don

Neil and Andrea

Ronnie and Julie

Roy and Rob

Don and Emmy

Don, Emmy, Rob and Roy

Don, Emmy, Rob, Roy and Kate

Ronnie, Jim and John

Jim, John, Kate, Don and Emmy

John, Kate, Don, Emmy and Roy

Sunday, March 15, 2009

St. Patrick's Day Classic 5 Miler

This is one of my favorite short races of the year. After running many longer hilly races in the Boston Buildup series it is nice to have a short, flat race to try for a fast time. However, I was not expecting to go that fast this year since I haven't done any speed work lately and I have been working more on just increasing my weekly mileage to get ready for some 30ks and a marathon. I had run a 14 mile training run on Saturday, which is not my usual routine for the day before a race.

I met up with several of my friends and some of my co-workers from Commonfund before the race. I spent a decent amount of time catching up with John and chatting with Kellie. The temperature was a little chilly at the beginning, but I knew that it would warm up pretty quickly. It was my first race wearing my UltraBrit running shirt that Jill had made up for me for Christmas. I thought that a St. Patrick's Day race was the perfect opportunity to bring it out! ;o)

Kellie, John, Sean and I were lucky enough to get a place towards the front of the pack so that we didn't get slowed down by the masses in the beginning. We started about 25 minutes late due to some mishap in the 1 mile race that went off shortly before ours was scheduled to start. Much to my surprise, once the horn sounded I jumped out to an immediate fast pace. The adrenaline from running in a race must have out trumped the tired legs from the prior day's long run. I had heard about Amanda from my work as being a runner who ran in high school and college so I was expecting her to pass me along with Brian from our Compliance department. Sure enough, Amanda passed me very comfortably around the 2 mile mark and pulled a little ahead. My goal was to keep her in my sights and try to fend off Brian. I was able to accomplish both goals with Amanda finishing only about 20 seconds ahead of me and with Brian never passing me. Allison finished right behind Brian and Kellie finished pretty close behind her. I ran the first mile in 7:38, the second mile in 7:50, the third in 7:46 and the fourth in 7:36 for a total of 30:50. This was a course PR for me by 2 seconds, which is my second fastest 4 mile time. The race had 765 finishers and I finished 187th and 4th in my age group.

The thing I don't like about the course is the gravel section right as you head towards the finishing stretch. This is the time that I want to start my sprint, but I couldn't get any traction. Amanda later told me to run by the fence on the grass to get better speed through that part. It was also frustrating for some runners because the walkers (many with strollers) were taking up most of that pathway. However, right after this section I was able to pick up the pace and pass several people.

I just looked over the race results again and see that 3 of the people I passed in the finishing stretch were women in my age group, which resulted in my 4th place finish instead of 7th! I'm so thankful to have a good finishing kick! ;o)

Race Results:
http://www.hitekracing.com/results09/fair0315.htm

Amanda:
http://www.printroom.com/ViewGalleryPhoto.asp?evgroupid=0&userid=JMcCoy1454&gallery_id=1472104&image_id=169

Me:
http://www.printroom.com/ViewGalleryPhoto.asp?evgroupid=0&userid=JMcCoy1454&gallery_id=1472104&image_id=184

Brian:
http://www.printroom.com/ViewGalleryPhoto.asp?evgroupid=0&userid=JMcCoy1454&gallery_id=1472104&image_id=215

Kellie:
http://www.printroom.com/ViewGalleryPhoto.asp?evgroupid=0&userid=JMcCoy1454&gallery_id=1472104&tcount=777&scount=224&sku=1

John:
http://www.printroom.com/ViewGalleryPhoto.asp?evgroupid=0&userid=JMcCoy1454&gallery_id=1472104&tcount=777&scount=329&sku=1

John

Dawn and Brian (AKA Unknown Sweetheart)

Some of Brian's running group

The Commonfund Gang - Me, Brian, Debbie, Sarah, Katarina, Amy and Amanda

Kellie and Paul

Me and Kellie

Vivian

Sarah and Vivian

Sarah, Vivian and Kate

Commonfund listed on the race poster

Sean and Ikuko

Don

Sean and LuAnne

LuAnne and Ikuko with their trophies!

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Boston Buildup 25k - March 8, 2009 - Norwalk

This has been a pretty busy week for me. I wanted to write up a race report much earlier in the week, but time would not allow. Since the race I went to see UConn women play in the Big East Tourney in Hartford on Monday and Tuesday evening, I worked out at the gym late on Wednesday and stayed late at work on Thursday to finish my taxes. I have also logged in quite a few miles of running between morning and lunch time runs.

The 25k was postponed from the previous week due to the predicted bad weather that never actually materialized. With the new date the race now fell on Don's 60th Birthday. With it being one of his favorite races it seemed very appropriate to celebrate it there. On race day morning I arrived pretty early despite having a late night out the night before and having lost an hour's sleep on the time change - Spring forward. Later Frank and Emmy showed up and asked if I'd seen Don, but there was no sign of him. She had made up a card for everyone to sign and had made a poster to display on the door of the school. We took several photos of each other and then lined up for the pre-race announcements by Jim. Jim also took the time to mention that it was Don's birthday, but there was still no sign of him anywhere.

Emmy ran with Jill and I for the first half mile, but I wanted to slow down a little so she went ahead. I felt very tired and had no energy for this race and even felt that if Jill wasn't there I would have dropped out after about 2 miles. This was very unlike me since I can usually make it fine with one bad night of sleep. However, I continued to feel sluggish and ran the course pretty slowly and took walk breaks on some of the hills. It is a very hilly course, especially for the first half so it was tough going. I did get some energy back after I took a gel at about mile 6 so after that I felt much better. And no matter how sluggish I felt it was still wonderful to run with Jill.

So after posting a bunch of PRs starting with the New York marathon and for the first few races after that I was now on a roll of getting PWs for each race of the buildup series! When I mentioned this to Jill we both laughed about it since we are both just grateful to be able to run lots of miles with out pains or injury so the PRs can be put on hold for now.

Once we finished the race we got word that Don forgot to change his clocks yet again (he did the same thing before the Danbury half recently) and had started the race about half an hour late. We all laughed about it, but were also thrilled that he had made it so that we could wish him a happy birthday. We all cheered for him as he crossed the line and then we hung out with him for a while and took lots of photos.

It was a wonderful day spent with great friends.

Roy and Brian (AKA Unknown Sweetheart)