5/16/19 – Corporate Cup

Waving with both hands. As one does.

As regular readers of this blog will have gathered, the Corporate Cup was a milestone race for me. It’s a big deal in Montpelier – 2,500+ runners alone, and another 1,500+ walkers – and in our office, where we regularly enter six or seven (three-person) running or walking teams. It was the first 5K race I ever ran. It was the first race I ever ran while injured. And it was the race I had been training for for several months.

I have never been what one would refer to as a “fast” runner. Even when I was a kid, I was a little pudgy and quite slow. My race goals, such as they were up to this point, were never to be the fastest, but rather to not be the slowest.

That being said, I actually am competitive. I want to improve my times, and I want to not be simply “not the slowest.” I don’t think I will ever be competing for the podium in my age group, but I want to at least be higher up the list. I finish at or near the bottom in my AG an awful lot.

This is a big race, and I knew from experience that there are a lot of people (like me the first two that I entered) who aren’t really runners, but they do the Corporate Cup because it’s fun to do with your team. So I knew that I wouldn’t be near the bottom in the Male 50-59 category. But I wanted better than that. I wanted to be in the top half, and I figured I needed to run under 28:00 to do that.

Leading up to the Paul Mailman, I was running times in the mid-9:00 minutes per mile pace, albeit at longer distances than 5K. Following that, I set my sites on shorter, faster runs. Other than a couple of sluggish days, my times quickly got down close to 8:40, a pace that would get me over the finish line at just about 27:00. So that was my new target. Actually, figuring I should be able to go faster in a race, my goal became 26:30.

Then race day came, a perfectly sunny spring afternoon, and I just didn’t have it. I find the start of this race confusing. On the one hand, if you start even a little bit back in the pack you have to pick your way around slower runners. (And even people who are walking a quarter mile into the running portion of the race! Why don’t they start at the back?). At the same time, the adrenaline of the moment and the pace of other runners leads me to run faster than I want at the start. I did start out fast – 8:17 the first mile, and even faster for the first half mile – and it seemed to just sap my energy. Halfway through I was looking for another gear that I didn’t have, and I even slowed down to take water, which is unusual for this distance. 26:30 was not going to be in the cards.

Yet I was still able to keep a sub 9:00 pace according to my watch. And the last tenth of a mile is downhill than flat, a great finishing stretch, during which I was able to find a kick. My finishing time was 27:00 flat, a new PR by 1:00. A new PR for this race by almost four minutes. And given where I had been just a few weeks earlier, not a disappointment at all.

Phil, Eve and Joe. The Raven Ridgerunners.

As for our team, we did OK. Phil, Eve and I, aka the Raven Ridgerunners, finished 23rd out of 111 non-profit mixed teams. And even cooler is how close we all were in time. Phil ran a 26:39, Eve 26:53, and me 27:00. Consistency!

The next day I drove to Montreal to take a flight to Italy for a vacation. This was the last race I would run for awhile.

RACE SUMMARY
Distance: 5K
Time: 27:00 (PR)
Pace: 8:42
Place: 753/2,533
Age Group: 65/162

4/27/19: Paul Mailman 10 Mile

Empty bike path washed clean by all the rain.

Because I am writing this months later I can’t really pinpoint the time, but somewhere along the way in the late winter/early spring of 2019 this definitely became about more than just running some 5Ks. The 5K gave way to the 10K, which then got me thinking about the next race on the list, a 10 miler. And if I could handle that, maybe a half marathon.

As I may not have mentioned in the first post, my college roommate Brock sometime in the past decade or so started running half marathons. I’m not sure why, but he does a few every year. After I started getting into the races, I had this crazy thought that he and I could do the half-and-half relay at the Vermont City Marathon in Burlington. I spoke with him about it and he said it would be cool, but he wouldn’t be able to make it this year (it’s Memorial Day weekend). I didn’t think I’d have time to get in shape for it regardless. A half marathon is, after all, more than twice the length of my longest run. And I had run that distance exactly once as of late March.

Which brings us to the Paul Mailman 10 Mile race, scheduled for the latter part of April, right here in Montpelier. Because I don’t know anything about training for running, getting from six miles to ten in five weeks seemed like a stretch. But I thought I would give it a shot. And so the week after the Sap Run, I did a training run of 6.75 miles. My new longest run. And a hair faster than the Sap Run, though with no hills.

And so it went over the next few weeks, with 1-2 runs per week of 5-7 miles, though it was difficult for me to find the time (or make the time) to go longer. Finally, the Sunday before the Mailman, I ran what I thought was an 8-mile loop. It turned out to be 7.5 miles. But it also had a couple of hills, one fairly substantial of over 1/2 mile up Northfield Street.

The hill obviously isn’t that steep. But it was pretty steep.

And it was HARD! The first couple of miles I ran in a sub-10 pace, mile three was obviously slower because of the uphill. Mile four was faster because of the downhill. But then I just hit a wall. The last 3.5 miles – they weren’t walking, but they weren’t much faster, especially when I met even the slightest incline. My hips were in a lot of pain. Ultimately my final pace was 10:42.

I wrote on Strava, “it’s hard believe I am pushing it to 10 miles in just six days!”

But after six days passed, there I was in the parking lot behind the Vermont Department of Labor, signing in to the Paul Mailman 10-mile race. It had rained hard the night before, and it would continue to rain, sometimes hard, throughout the race. Most of the race was on dirt roads, by which I mean mud. It’s a simple course – out the bike path and down River Road (flat). At 2.5 miles, take a left on to Jones Brook Road, and then uphill for the next 2.5 miles – over 200 feet of elevation gain. Then turn around and go back; downhill for 2.5, flat for 2.5.

My goal for the race, per usual, was to run all the way to the finish. My secondary goal was to keep it under a 10:30 pace, under 1:45 total time. One thing I realized during the Sap Run was that I actually had no idea how fast I was running. So in early April I got a simple Garmin Forerunner watch that could monitor my pace and heart rate, and track my run on GPS. (Bonus – no need to carry a phone for this). I figured if I could run the flats in about a 10:00 pace, 10:30 would be achievable.

Less than one mile in and I am already in the last group, and by quite a bit. That’s John Martin on the far right. Three of those people would finish after me.

And that’s basically what happened. I kept a pretty steady pace throughout.

Pretty steady as she goes.

One of the people in the last group was a guy named John Martin, who I would get to know later in the year when I started integrating more with CVR. He was doing a 9-minute run, one-minute walk pace, and he was ahead of me throughout after we started going uphill, but I wanted to keep him in my sights, which I mostly did. (And which turned out to be good practice later in the year.). Ultimately I finished the race in 1:43, a pace I was happy with, and I never felt like wasn’t going to finish. There was a water stop just a mile or so before the end (so situated due to the concurrent 5K race), and I was in good enough spirits to rebuke the offer by saying, “ there’s so much water falling from the sky!”

And when it all was over, I decided my goal would be to run a half marathon before the season ended.

RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 10 miles
Time: 1:43:01
Pace: 10:19
Place: 47/50
Age Group: 5/5
CVR Points: 62.5950 (I would learn the name of Tom Thurston in this race. He’s super fast!)

3/24/19 – Kaynor’s Sap Run

Conditions not so bad for a mud season run.

After a couple months break due to the fact that it was winter, the next race in the CVR series was the Kaynor’s Sap Run in Westford, Vermont. This was a five-mile race on dirt roads, longer than I had ever run before, at least outside. In the weeks leading up to the race, in addition to doing a lot of downhill skiing, I did a couple of runs per week on the treadmill, getting up to six miles for my longest run, with a pace a little under 10:00/mile.

The day of the race turned out to be a beautiful, sunny day, with temps in the 30’s. Pretty good running weather. The race itself was an out-and-back on a dirt road. There was some snow on the road, and some mud, but the traction overall was pretty good. The joke I was going to make was, “note to self, double check if the race is five KILOMETERS or five MILES! But as I was walking up to the start line, I noticed a six-mile marker. The joke was on me: this isn’t a five-mile race, it’s a 10K!

My goal for the race didn’t really change, though. It was to get to the end. I didn’t have a pace goal. I had been running sub-10’s, but this was going to be a lot hillier. I simply tried to find someone running a comfortable pace and follow him or her.

I did end up following a woman who was running a good pace on the flats, but gained on the hills, and then pulled away during the second half. But I managed to keep a pretty steady pace throughout. I was a bit overdressed – I had a hat and gloves on at the start that I had to take off and carry, and I might have taken off my pullover if my bib wasn’t attached. I learned why some people pin their bibs to their pants on that day! But I found myself with enough energy to overtake a couple of racers in the last mile, with maybe a hint of a kick at the end.

And since it was still ski season, I hit the slopes at Bolton Valley to get in a few more turns before the winter was fully over!

Near the end of my longest run to date. Lesson later learned – smile when you see the camera!

RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 10K
Time: 64:51
Pace: 10:17
Place: 86/113
Age Group: 16/17
CVR Points: 72.4235

12/31/18: NYE 5K

Pre-race milling about on Court Street

The running became Running on this day, I think. Unlike the year before, the weather on New Years Eve was very favorable in Montpelier, with temps in the low 30s and the streets fairly clear of snow and ice. I had the day of and so walked downtown to the Pavilion to sign up for this race, which I thought would be a great way to do something healthy during the holiday season.

During sign up, I was asked if I was a member of CVR (Central Vermont Runners), and if not, did I want to be? (No and no, not right now.) I’m just here for the race. I am not a runner. But afterward, in checking out the results, I checked out the CVR website. I discovered that they have a race series, where you earn points running races and compete with others in your age group for an award at the end of the year. While I made no pretense about being able to win said prizes, there are few things I like better in this world than looking at the standings. This intrigued me, and after thinking about it for a few weeks, I signed up in March. (The annual fee is $15 – not sure what the issue was for me).

As for the race itself, it was a decent-sized field with 142 finishers. I didn’t really have a time goal. I had been running mostly on the treadmill a couple times a week, and had managed to get outside for a nearly five-mile run the week before, at about a 10-minute pace. I knew there would be a lot more elevation gain than I was used to – about 300 feet – and wasn’t sure what to expect. So my goal, as was the case of all my previous races, was to run the whole thing and not finish last.

The course itself started near the State House on Court St. in Montpelier, down Taylor to the bike path, then over to Bailey and then uphill on Terrace St. The uphill lasted for a mile before we turned around and came back down, finishing with a run in front of the State House and then a left-hand turn on Gov. Davis St. and a short uphill to the finish.

It wasn’t bad. I wasn’t used to that kind of uphill run, so my pace there was slow. I passed a guy on the way who it turns out was my baseball teammate Dan Winters. After the turnaround I picked up a fair amount of speed on the downhill, and had some kick at the end. As with the previous race, I saw the clock and had a goal of reaching the finish before the next minute ticked. I thought I made it, but I was recorded at exactly 31:00. Much slower than the flat 5K in October, but not bad.

RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 5K
Time: 31:00
Pace: 9:59
Place: 91/142
Age Group: 11/13
CVR Points: 70.4839

I was never a runner

Ever. I loved playing sports as a kid; baseball, football, basketball. I got fat as an adult and then unfat. I like cycling and hiking and skiing. Not running.

I moved to Vermont in 2014, and in 2015 took part in my first Corporate Cup. It’s a 5K race in Montpelier, running and walking divisions. Nearly 4,000 people take part. I walked. But also finished ahead of some runners. And the same again in 2016

I also got divorced in 2016. That same year 2016 I met Tracie, and she liked to run. I didn’t like to run, but I ran with Tracie a few times. As the 2017 Corporate Cup approached I thought, “what the hell.” I decided to run. First goal was to run the whole thing without walking. Second goal was to not finish last. I was more confident about the second. But I ran the whole thing in a little over 32 minutes. Slow. Not last place.

In the fall of 2017, Tracie signed up with a co-worker to run the Shelburne Farms 5K. I decided to do that, too. I trained a little, and finished in 33:09. I even passed somebody at the end. It wasn’t so bad. And then I kept running.

Shortly afterward Tracie and I broke up, which was an unhappy time for me. But I continued to run, determined to have a better showing in the next Corporate Cup. There was a 5K in town on New Years Eve that I considered running, but it was really damn cold that day so I said no. I was running 2-3 times per week through the winter and spring, on the treadmill until the sidewalks became safer, in preparation for the Cup with a goal of breaking 30 minutes.

The night before the race, walking home, I found a pothole in the sidewalk. By stepping in it. I heard a pop come from my ankle. I was concerned, because I had never heard a pop come from my ankle before. (And also because it hurt like Hell!) I hobbled the rest of the way home, but it wasn’t good. I called Kirsten, a Nurse Practitioner who I was dating at the time. We determined that it wasn’t broken. The prescription was for RICE.

I chose to walk to work the next day, consoled by Ibuprofen. I popped into Rite Aid on the way and bought a compression sleeve for my ankle. I decided that I would try to walk as much of the race as I could. As the day went along, my ankle was feeling less bad (but still sore). I modified my strategy to “run as much as you can, and then walk.” I ended up running the whole thing, in 30:58. Faster than the previous year, and providing my first “running” story.

I continued to run a few times a week, with the only goal of doing better in the next Corporate Cup. Somewhere along the line I signed up for Strava to track my runs. By the fall I was dating Katie, and she discovered a little 5K in Montpelier, the Fall Frolic, and we decided to sign up. My goal was again to break 30 minutes, which would require 9:40 miles. My last couple of runs were sub 9:30, so 30:00 was feeling pretty achievable. I modified my goal to 29:00.

This was a small race. Katie is a faster runner than I, and I was hanging with her at first, but couldn’t keep up and dropped back about halfway in. But I still pushed. I was again aiming to get to the finish. Coming down the stretch I saw the clock, and it was still in the 27s. So I found a kick, and came in right at 28:00. A new PR by over 3 minutes. And I won my age group, possibly by being the only person in my age group.

At this point I was still someone who ran a little bit, with a goal of being respectable in the Corporate Cup every year. I intended to run a 5K Turkey Trot in my hometown on Thanksgiving, but it was really damn cold that day so it didn’t happen. But in December I saw an ad for the NYE 5K again, and I decided to run that this time if I could. And I discovered the Central Vermont Runners, who organized the race, and checked out their website. And those two things are where this story really begins.

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