Joe's Running Blog

Tonight’s Run: 8/19/21

Today I decided to take the day off from running. It’s not a decision I came to easily, because I have fanciful thoughts about making Thursday speed training days. But I felt cruddy all day – sort of like the vaccine hangover, only without a vaccine shot – plus it was raining all day and work was being a drag. Gotta listen to your body.

I worked late, and made a big salad for dinner while I was finishing up. After the salad and closing up my computer, I was feeling better, and also feeling bad about basically being a slug all day. The night air was warm, and the rain had died down. I decided I could go out for a shortish run, 3.5 miles or so. I have a loop that goes through the Meadow, around the State House, then back on the bike path to Main Street. From there I head back to Elm Street and home. That would be enough to get the blood pumping.

Outside for my walking warmup, the air felt really good, and when I started running my body felt good, too. I decided I could cross Main Street and go up and over Hubbard to add just a little more distance. By the time I got to Bailey Avenue, I decided I wanted to poke down the bike path by the High School, and double back through the Department of Labor parking lot. That’s about 3/4 of a mile.

I was enjoying the quiet running. There were very few cars and only a couple of pedestrians. By the time I had gotten back to Main Street, I decided that instead of Hubbard I would keep going on the bike path, then hook back to College Street. There is a Strava segment called Sibley, Sabin, Kent – so named for the three streets (I call it SSK) – that is a nice little uphill jaunt and avoids the really steep part of College. There’s another side neighborhood further down College, starting with Arsenal Drive and a couple of other streets I can never remember the name to. Honestly though, it could just be one street because it’s just a loop. Call it Arsenal Circle. Maybe that’s what I will call it from now on.

Back onto College, then I took a right on Woodrow so I could run up the tastefully-named Merrill Terrace. This is a short but steepish street that takes me to the high point of the run. Maybe I will come back and do hill repeats here some day.

After Merrill, it’s left onto Main Street for a half-mile downhill. I got a little nervous on this, as the dark made it difficult to see potholes and the general ups-and-downs of the sidewalk, and the poor visibility was only exacerbated by the headlights of a couple of oncoming cars. I had a blinky light around my arm so others could see me, but I did not wear my headlamp, which would have been great for my own visibility. Because there were so few cars, I was able to run mostly on the street pavement, which was better than the sidewalk but not a lot.

Halfway down the hill my watch buzzed the five mile mark. I swung back through the Meadow on the way back, and reached six miles just as I reached home. 6K had become 6 miles. I missed the rain, but the humidity left me drenched regardless. But the evening air was fabulous, and I felt the best I had all day. Not bad for not running!

RUN STATISTICS:
Distance/Elevation/Time: 6.07 miles/298 Feet/59:49
Weather: 70 degrees. Very humid.
Vaguely threatening barking dogs in the distance behind me: One
Puddle splashes: three
Other runners seen: zero
Overall Rating: 9/10

8/12/21: Berlin Pond 5Miler

This day brought the opportunity to relive another race that I had only done once before, and under less-favorable circumstances. The Berlin Pond Five Mile Run was the first race I ran in coming back from my broken ankle in 2019. My modest goal for that race was to finish in under 50 minutes, or a sub-10:00 minute pace. I managed that, but not by a lot.

Last year I ran the virtual version of this race by myself. My goal for that race was 45:00, and I finished in 44:02. Breaking 44:00 felt like a good baseline goal for this race, though with temperatures in the mid 80s and high humidity, I was prepared to be okay with whatever time I finished with if I got too hot to push hard. My A goal was to break 42:00, though I think, based on what I’ve seen from other folks I have run with, that I should be able to break 40:00 under better conditions.

I was sizing up the field at the start. I saw Mack Gardner-Morse there, so I knew I wouldn’t win my age group. I also saw Kari Bradley, who I know is much faster, but I finished ahead of him at Bear Swamp when he was pacing his daughter. She was with him again for this race, so I figured I should keep my eyes on them. Then there were some of the regulars I run with: Jeff Hope, Sal Acosta and Mark Howard. Mark also is in the 50-59 age group.

Because I run with these guys on Tuesday nights and/or Saturday mornings, my mind wants to think I can keep up with them in a race. I mean, I know I can’t run as fast as Sal, but I think Jeff and Mark should be in the ballpark. But when we started, Sal took off and Jeff with him. I was next to Jeff for about 100 yards before I realized that trying to keep up with him would be folly. I let him go and settled into a comfortable pace.

Based on my previous attempts at this run, I was thinking something along the lines of 9:00s for the first two miles and 8:00s for the last three miles to get to 42 minutes. The first two miles are uphill, but really the climbing is a pretty small part of it, as there is a lot of flat/downhill grade in the mix. Mile three has a big downhill at the start, but then the last 2.5 miles are pretty darn flat. I’ve done a 5K in a sub-8:00 pace, but with the heat and the big climb that still seemed like a best-case scenario for the second half of this race.

Things sorted out pretty quickly after the start. The speedy folks took off and the slow folks were behind me. I found myself behind a woman in a white tank top. Somewhere on the first climb Mark Howard caught up to me. We were pretty comfortable running at the same pace and not killing ourselves on the start, so we hung together. Katie had biked to the top of the first hill to cheer people on, so we were happy to see her. On the second hill we passed the white tank top woman, then as we got to the top Mark moved ahead a little.

I found myself surprised to be approaching the turn onto Mirror Lake Road and the downhill just after the two-mile mark. In my mind I was thinking 2.5 miles of climbing, but I was sadly mistaken. I enjoy running downhill, so I passed Mark, and he said “boy, you really take advantage of gravity, don’t you!” When things leveled out, he pulled in front of me again and we stayed that way for quite some time.

I had done the first two miles in 17:30, so I had some time banked against a 42:00 goal, but the downhill is just a little too steep for me to really let it fly, and I finished that mile in 8:07. I’d have to run the rest of the way in just a few seconds over 8:00s to break 42:00. (Editor’s note: that’s if the race was exactly five miles, but it’s actually a few yards longer.) I almost had that in me, but not quite.

To be honest, the second half of this race was very uneventful. Mark was ahead of me by 15 seconds or so, and I knew that if I caught up to him he would probably have more to finish with at the end. Kari and his daughter were still in sight ahead of Mark, but they weren’t giving away any ground. I looked back and the white tank top woman was nowhere to be seen. The only thing that “happened” was that somewhere on the back stretch we came upon Sal walking. He had started out fast, but now was hanging back to let his 12-year-old son catch up so they could finish together.

So I was basically racing against myself, trying to get under an 8:00 pace but not quite doing so. Having Mark basically pacing me may have helped my time a little. With about a half mile left I could hear Katie cheering on the other side of the pond as runners were finishing. I turned the final corner to the final .3 miles to the finish. Both my watch and the clock ahead of me told me I wasn’t quite going to break 42:00. According to my watch my final time was 42:10, but my official time was a few seconds slower because I did not start up front with the fast runners. This was almost two minutes faster than last year, so overall another really good result. Perhaps more speed work will get me under 40:00 next year!

RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 5 miles
Time: 42:15
Pace: 8:27
Place: 29/48
Age Group: 5/8

8/10/21 Training Update: Speed as a Goal

It’s been a minute since I’ve written a training update, but we are getting into a pattern of more frequent races with CVR, and there are a couple of more challenging races in September that suddenly aren’t so far away. So instead of just eating miles I am starting to plan my runs with a purpose.

Okay, that’s a bit hyperbolic. The “purpose” behind most of my runs is still a bit vague and not written down or anything. But I am planning to have a plan. The first planned plan I had was that I probably should be doing some speed training.

When I first started running a few years ago, I treated everything as speed training. That is, I tried to get faster with every run. Eventually I started running longer distances, so I could take on some longer races. But still: the goal was to run those longer distances faster than the last time I ran them.

I’ve learned since then that there is virtue in and benefit from just running the casual miles. I will occasionally go for speed on a segment here and there, but I haven’t done anything that I would truly characterize as “speed training” since I did some hill repeats on Liberty Street last winter. I’ve been thinking about it for a few weeks, however, and last Thursday I decided to do my first-ever track workout.

In addition to the 40+ people I follow on Strava, I also check out the activity in the Central Vermont Runners group. There are always people doing things like “strides” and “tempo runs” and “intervals.” I’ve done some reading, but I’m not fully versed on what the benefits of each are. Last Thursday, which was a good opportunity for speed work, I decided to do some intervals on the high school track. That choice could be characterized as “winging it.”

I chose the track for a few reasons. One: uniform surface (in this case, dirt). Two: no traffic other than maybe some other runners. Three: I know how long it is. Four: at two miles from my house, it’s easy to get a good warmup and cooldown in.

The Montpelier High School track is 400 meters long, with an outside chance that it’s actually 1/4 of a mile long. Close enough. I decided that a good entry into intervals would be to do 2x200m, 2x400m, 1x800m, 2x400m and 2x200m, with 200m – 400m jogging rest in between, depending on the length. 200m is half the track, so I kind of eyeballed the midpoint of one side for the start point, which I marked then with a trash can, and tried to line up with the can for the midpoint on the other side at the end of the first 200m.

At first I wasn’t going to time the intervals, because my watch can’t actually do that, but because other people do so and because it’s data I decided to use the stopwatch feature on my phone. It’s not perfect – it would be great if you could toggle it on and off with the side buttons, but you can’t – but not bad. I fumbled with it a couple of times, mainly because I was not running with my reading glasses and couldn’t see while running if I had restarted the timer. But again, we aren’t sending humans to Mars here. “Close enough” will do for my purposes.

I had some general trepidation about this, because I doubt my stamina for running fast, but the 200 meter intervals at the start weren’t too bad. I finished them in 51.7 and 50.4 seconds. I was feeling okay at the start of the 400m segments, though I had my first stopwatch problem on the first one of those. My splits were 110.3 seconds and 105.1 for those. A slower pace, which makes sense for the longer distance.

So far so good, but I had the 800m segment next. That’s two full laps around the track. By now I was 3.5 miles in, which is actually generally when I start feeling real good during a run, but at the moment seemed like a lot of energy spent before sprinting for half a mile. It wasn’t so bad: 218 seconds, or 3:38. That’s a 7:16 pace, which is a fast mile for me. But I was definitely feeling it starting the next set of 400s, the first of which I also had trouble with the stopwatch. Those I did in 109.4 and 113.8 seconds. That last one felt as ugly as the time looks.

Did I mention that it was hot out? 82 degrees at game time, and the track is mostly in the sun. I brought water and was drinking between each lap, which helped for sure, but was starting to feel drained. I was gearing up to just get through the final two 200s at whatever pace that I could muster. The first lap felt surprisingly good, and I was able to kick it at the end for a 50.3, which was faster than either of the first two. The second lap, with really no reason to save my energy, I ran as fast as I could, and finished at 45.4 seconds, which is a low-6:00 pace. Super fast for me!

And that was that, other than the slow jog home. I had plenty of energy for this workout, and felt a sense of accomplishment. I built my speed up just in time for the Berlin Pond race this week, though it might take more than one workout for me to become truly competitive.

7/31/21: Barre Heritage Festival 5K Trail Run

There was no Barre Heritage Festival again this year, due to Covid-19, but Central Vermont Runners did continue the live racing season with a return of the 5K trail race at Millstone Hill. Last year I ran this as a virtual race with Katie and Tara. That was a comedy of errors, as Tara and I (mostly me) continually took wrong turns and waited for Katie to come by and clean us up. My final time, 34:10, wasn’t all that inspiring, but it was a fun challenge.

I was fairly optimistic heading into this race that I would be able to break 30 minutes, just by virtue of not getting off track every half mile. I studied previous year results and saw some familiar names, Darrel and Manny, in the 28-minute range. But then Kim and Matt Caldwell were both closer to 30 minutes, and they should be faster than those guys. It was difficult to figure out where I should land, so my only real goal was sub-30:00 but hope for better. I also didn’t know what my splits should be. The race starts out gaining elevation for the first couple of miles, but it’s also wide double track, some of it on old rail bedding, that I thought would be fairly fast. But how fast? I didn’t have a clue.

There were several friends running this race: Kim and Matt, along with Mark Howard, who does a lot of the Saturday morning trail runs, along with Scott Widmer, who does most of the Saturday runs as well as the occasional Runderachievers. I recognized a few other faces, but in general the field of 43 wasn’t the normal crowd.

The weather at race time was good. We’ve been having a lot of rain, but it was clear and sunny, with a temperature of 56 degrees at race time. I did a 1.5-mile warmup on the road. At 9:00 we were off!

I started middle/back of the pack. There was a young couple, a man and a woman who both looked to be around 20, and he had been coaching her up before the race. She looked to be in good shape, but obviously was new to racing, so I didn’t want to start behind them. The pack took off pretty fast. The start goes through some woods and briefly into an opening before entering the woods for most of the rest of the race. The trail was a little narrow in the woods, but people were moving around.

At first a lot of people were passing me. People who, no offense, did not look like they should be beating me in a 5K. My watch said we were running a pace under 8:00, though, which seemed too fast. I decided not to push it too hard. The money is won at the end. After a couple tenths of a mile there was a little downhill, which is my scene. I took back a few position on the descent. The young couple was ahead of me, but I was gaining on the woman. The man ran a little ahead then turned around to wait, then again. By the second time he did this I had passed the woman and then I passed him.

Now in front of me I saw Tim Hogeboom, who is 70 but who beat me in Adamant by a two minutes. However I had spoken with him on a couple of Saturday runs and knew trail running was new to him. Maybe I had a chance. Regardless, I passed him as the course settled into the wide opening mile. Because the terrain was fairly tame, I was surprised that my heart rate started to race about a mile in. I otherwise felt good, but I also didn’t dare to push myself harder at this time.

About a quarter mile later the race moves into thicker woods and onto single track. This is where the real racing begins. Mark Howard signaled that he was right behind me by saying “I got your back.” I figured he would be faster than me, so I told him to let me know if he needed to pass. He was okay for the time being. I started to notice Scott Widmer in front of us. There is a little climb onto the Serenity trail, and he was walking up it. It’s the trickiest hill on the course, narrow, rooty and rocky, and I decided Scott had the right idea. Immediately thereafter was an opening with a water stop before going back into the woods. My heart was still elevated by I passed on stopping at this time.

The course doubled back toward the start at this time. It wasn’t quite the half way mark, but the return is much more winding. It’s also a lot more technical terrain, more roots and rocks, fun for mountain bikers. Mark decided it was time for him to make his move, and he passed me and then Scott. Scott continued to walk some of the little climbs, and I gained a few seconds as a result, but otherwise he was running a little faster than me. That changed when he missed a turn. Luckily for him I was right behind and let him know, but he had to retrace about 20 yards and was now behind me. I could tell this took the wind out of his sails, but by now my body was feeling right again and I quickly opened up some distance.

Up ahead my friend Jeff Hope was monitoring one of the trickier intersections, and when he saw me he said “Mark is just in front of you, go catch him!” But I couldn’t catch him. I blame this on the fact that he’s probably 8 inched taller than me and has long legs, but he’s probably just faster than me. With a half mile to go the final descent begins to the start/finish line. It’s still single track at first, but then opens up to the wide, smooth double track for the last three tenths. It was all sprinting from here, but I didn’t have a great sense of urgency, as neither Mark ahead of me or Scott behind me were anywhere to be seen. The only objective now was to get in under 30 minutes, which I also managed to do with some time to spare. My official time was 29:43, 4 1/2 minutes faster than last summer. Another guy got between me and Scott, and Tim Hogeboom was right on Scott’s heels at the finish.

It was fun to look at the results and see that almost everybody I knew finished within a two minute window, from Matt at 28:18 to Tim at 30:04, with Kim, Mark, me and Scott in between. The results showed me in 18th place, but three guys at the front of the pack missed a turn and ended up DQing. My official position was 15th out of 40 finishers, which is another really good race for me. So far the trail races have been my best results this year, even if I know I can beat Mark one of these days!

RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 5K Trail
Time: 29:43
Pace: 9:34
Position: 15/40
Age Group: 5/8

Today’s Run: Gallison Hill (July 23, 2021)

I made the choice today to get up early and do a longish run. I wanted to do the loop down the new part of the bike path, up Gallison Hill Road, then back via Towne Hill Road and Main Street. I’ve run this loop, in the other direction, as a part of my Montpelier Streets project, but that time I added all of the side streets as well, which turned it into a near-16-miler. I wasn’t sure what today’s mileage would be, but I figured more than 8 and less than 10. Because I wanted to get done in time to work at 9:00, I set the alarm for 6:00 a.m.

After a couple of snoozes I hopped out of bed, had a bit of toast, and did my warmups. I was out the door by 7:30. It was a little cooler than I expected, the temperature was in the mid-50’s, but it felt great for running. Heading into town I pinged my Meadow’s Edge segment, then headed down Main Street to Barre Street. Once I got to the new bike path, I basically had the place to myself. The teddy bear was still at the start of the “no cars” portion, but it was no longer hugging the sign post. Instead it was now sprawled out on a rock next to it. Honestly, it looked like Teddy had been on a bit of a bender last night.

I’ve never run up Gallison Hill before, but I’ve run downhill and also biked it both ways. Running up is part of my semi-goal of running up all the crappy hills I only ran down during my project. There are a couple still remaining. I remember this hill as being quite steep, but it wasn’t all that bad. The real climb was 300 feet over a half a mile, so not nothing, but also not the worst thing going. The morning sun was in my eyes for much of the uphill. The hill plateaus at U32 High School, and at that point a guy driving by gave me an air fist-bump, which was nice.

I contemplated scoping out the trails in the woods behind the school, but decided to stay on schedule. The run climbs a little bit more after the school, then turns onto Towne Hill Road, which has a couple of rolling hills. The worst was at England Farm, where the road is narrow and twisty, and there isn’t much shoulder, all while running uphill. I had to scooch next to the guardrail at one point, as there was a fair amount of traffic here.

After that, it’s literally downhill for a mile and a half. I saw a guy just bombing up the hill pushing a stroller, which was just impressive. There’s a construction zone on Main Street where they are replacing water pipes, so I got to suck a little diesel. I dipped into the condominiums off Franklin Street, then across Vine into the Meadow and home. I was marveling that I hadn’t seen a single other runner on my whole run (note that I had already completely forgotten about stroller guy, and probably someone else) and was getting psyched to mention that in my Strava post, when I passed a woman coming in the other direction a quarter mile from my home. Woulda been a cool story though.

After I stopped my run, I noticed a free pile a few houses down the street, so I nabbed a candle lamp and and vase. Big win for a Friday!

RUN STATISTICS:
Distance/Elevation/Time: 8.45 miles/648 Feet/1:22:50
Weather: Partly sunny, mid 50s, a little humid.
Wood Thrushes: Zero. They stay in the woods.
Hungover Bears: one
Other runners seen: two, possibly more
Air fist bumps: 1
Overall Rating: 8/10

Today’s Run: July 19, 2021

Today was a good day to run. The weather was favorable, with a temperature in the low 70’s and overcast covering most of the late afternoon sun. The weather tells me that the humidity was 80%, but it didn’t feel oppressive at all to me. After loading up on miles at the beginning of last week, I managed two rest days on Friday and Sunday around a 6.5-mile trail run on Saturday, so I was feeling fresh.

The light miles at the end of the week reflect a recovery phase that I sort of took on without intending to. I mean, I did 30+ miles last week, but the past few days have been light. Today I wanted to keep it flat, but mix it up a little, so I ran to the end of the new bike path and back. I figured it would be somewhere between six and seven miles.

From my house I ran through the Meadow – the Meadow’s Edge Inbound segment. I’ve been trying to regain my Local Legend status, but I keep staying behind because I have old runs dropping out of the 90-day window. However, Pom-Pom Girl hasn’t been running, and today her attrition caught up with her, as did I, and I am back on the top of the list. On Liberty Street I saw my friend Daryl (not Darrel) cross the road ahead of me, but he was too far away to say hi.

There was a new Teddy Bear on the bike path, where Old Country Club Road is closed to traffic. Last year there was a huge, six-foot tall Teddy Bear at this spot. Later that bear was impaled on a nearby tree branch. It was quite disturbing. The new one is still a big Teddy, probably 3-4 feet tall, but nowhere near as big as the old one. It was hugging a sign post. Hopefully things turn out better for this one.

It was quiet on the bike path. I passed two walkers going both ways on my run. I also passed the same runner twice, first about a half mile before the turnaround, and then back near the Teddy Bear. I saw him in front of me with tall compression socks and a knee brace, and I said to myself that I’ve been there. He was alternating walking and running, so I speculated that he was coming back from an injury with a Couch to 5K program. He ran slowly on his running segments, but it still felt good to pass him!

On the return trip I followed the bike path to Taylor Street, then turned back toward home. I ran through the Meadow on the way out as well. On Pearl Street, a guy who looked just a few years older than me, and fairly fit, said something I couldn’t hear. When I asked him to repeat, he said “show off!” I apologized and started a fatigued pace. I asked if that was better and his partner said it was. By then I was at 6.7 miles but still feeling good. It was what I call a rocking chair run, an easy pace on flat terrain, and I felt like I could keep going for awhile. But I was less than half a mile from home, and I stopped there.

RUN STATISTICS:
Distance/Elevation/Time: 7.14 miles/193 Feet/1:09:29
Weather: Overcast, low 70’s, a little humid.
Stuffed Bears: 1
Living Bears: 0
Hecklers: 1
Overall Rating: 8/10

Today’s Run: July 12, 2021

Welcome to a new feature on Joe’s Running Blog: Today’s Run. I find that with races spread out and not a lot of “training” training to talk about, the content is getting a little thin here. My idea with Today’s Run is to write shorter posts, but more frequently. And hopefully to highlight that running actually is fun for me.

Today’s Run was a jaunt mostly through Hubbard Park. I wanted to run at lunch time, so was looking at a 4-5 mile route. I usually start my Park Runs on the North Branch side and finish in Hubbard, but I chose to go the other way today. I ran down to the Meadow so I could nab the Meadow’s Edge Inbound segment. I am in an epic Segment Battle with Pom-Pom Girl, so named because she wears a puffy pom-pom hat in the winter. (Probably not in the summer.) I had her number during the cold months as I hit the segment on almost every run, but now I’m more in the woods so I don’t go there as much. But as of today we are tied at 27 over the last 90 days. She’s still the Local Legend because I have to pass her to take away the Laurel Wreath. Maybe tomorrow.

I doubt she knows she is in a Segment Battle, but maybe.

I ran up the Ravine trail, which I’m not sure I’ve ever done before. It’s steep toward the top, and I had to walk a bit. I decided to not run the Mr. Hubbard Nose segment, and instead went through the Seven Fireplaces and down to North Branch. (Another segment, but I’m not in competition here.) On the Fitness Path, there were some signs carrying the story of Stella and Sam. Stella was telling Sam that she turns invisible by pretending to be invisible things, like the wind. I only read two of the signs.

Crossing over to North Branch Nature Center, and then through North Branch Park, I dispelled any notion of doing more climbing. There was a couple of groups of kids who were at the Nature Center for day camp programs. Two said “hi,” but I think the second one felt obligated. The stretch from NBNC to Cummings Street is another segment, for which I am the Local Legend by a lot. Sometimes if you put your mind to it….

RUN STATISTICS:
Distance/Elevation/Time: 4.72 miles/452 Feet/47:49
Weather: Overcast, low 70’s, a little humid.
Wood Thrushes: Two
Dogs in Hubbard Park: Zero. (Highly unusual for a noontime run)
Noisy Kids Splashing in the River: A bunch
Times Turned Invisible: Just one, but it lasted quite a several minutes
Overall Rating: 7/10

6/26/21: Bear Swamp Race

I wasn’t 100% sure I would run this race, landing as it did just a week after the Gunstock TrailFest, but I was feeling good so I decided to sign up for the 2021 Bear Swamp Run, and Katie signed up with me.

The Bear Swamp is usually run the week after July 4, but because the race director’s daughter is due to give birth on that date, it was pushed forward by a couple of weeks. Unfortunately this date clashed with the Catamount Ultra races in Stowe, Vermont, and a triathlon somewhere, which took some of the CVR regulars out of the mix. Whereas the 2019 race had 45 entrants, the 2021 version had only 24.

I missed that 2019 race, as I was recovering from my broken ankle at the time. The 2020 race was cancelled, of course, but I ran the virtual race by myself on a humid 90-degree evening in early July. My time in that race was 52:46, which I figured could have been under 52:00 under better weather conditions. The temperature on Saturday morning was about 20 degrees cooler, so in setting my A/B/C goals I established 52:00 as my base goal for the race, the one that should be easy to achieve. The B goal was to break 50:00, and the A goal if everything went right would be 49:00.

It’s a 5.7-mile race. The first 2.3 miles are pretty steadily uphill, then it’s mostly flat for .7 miles. Mile 4 goes downhill for the first third and then it’s a flat/slight rise. The last 1.7 miles are all downhill on pretty buff gravel road and a quarter mile of pavement. I was figuring a 9:30 pace for the first two miles, 9:00 for mile three, then 8:00s on the downhills. That’s 27:00 for the first three and 22:00 for the last 2.7, which comes out to 49:00. That would give me a minute of cushion to break 50:00.

I had reviewed the entrant list before the race, and saw two other guys in the 50-59 age group: Peter Luycxz, who has joined a lot of CVR group runs this year, and Kari Bradley, who I know was kicking my ass in the virtual races this year. I resigned myself to finishing last in my age group once again!

With Covid restrictions lifted, this was the first race of the year in which everybody started at the same time. With such a small group, that might have been the case anyway. The field sorted itself out pretty quickly at the start. I found myself behind a guy with a yellow singlet as we turned on to North Bear Swamp Road, about 3/4 of a mile into the race. I caught him on the uphill, but he moved back in front when things leveled out a bit. But I regained my lead on him when the road started to get steep again and never relinquished it.

There was another older-looking guy ahead of me, and I passed him on this incline, too. The road leveled out for a stretch, and I was behind a 20-something guy wearing a Twenty One Pilots singlet. The steepest climb of the race was next, and 21 Pilots walked a few steps a couple of times, allowing me to make up some ground. As with the Gunstock 10K the previous weekend, I decided that this race was short enough that there wasn’t much to be gained by saving energy on the hills, so I ran through them.

At the top of the climb, at the 2.3 mile mark, was the only aid station on the course. I noticed Kari Bradley wasn’t too far ahead of me. He was running with his daughter, and they grabbed some water on the way through. 21 Pilots wasn’t carrying water, but he didn’t stop, which surprised me a little. I was also carrying water so I didn’t stop.

The aid station marked the turn on to Bear Swamp Road, which goes by the Middlesex trail head for Hunger Mountain and White Rocks Mountain, and then turns into narrow Class 4 road. The road here is rutted and there are a lot of big puddles to navigate. A little way down this path a couple of cyclists were coming in the other direction. They gave 21 Pilots some water, which enabled him to keep running without interruption. They were also aiding another runner in the race, as it turned out. After we passed them, I hollered out “it’s all downhill from here,” to which he responded “thank God!” I meant this as encouragement for him to start airing it out, which he didn’t really do. At one point he went way wide of a puddle, while I took a more direct route and shaved a few feet off his lead.

We went like this for awhile. I was right with him as we made the turn off the Class 4 onto the maintained gravel road portion of Bear Swamp Road, then he gained a little on the flat/slight incline. But after we started going downhill again – now on East Bear Swamp Road – I felt like I had more speed, so I started to pour that on. I passed him for good with a little more than a mile to go, and my strong downhill running quickly put some distance between us.

I realize that I haven’t kept the reader up to date on my race goals. In 2020, running virtual races, it was all about beating the clock. In 2021, the clock is important, but it’s also easy to get caught up in beating people. At this point I was racing people, but to bring you up to speed, the first mile was in 9:37, which was in line with the 9:30 pace I targeted, and mile 2 was in 9:51. So after two miles, I had used up half of my minute cushion. I forgot to look at my watch when it buzzed mile three (it was 9:24), but when I remembered to look I had like 20 minutes to run the last 2.5 miles. To be honest, I didn’t think that was going to happen. The 8:00 miles already seemed like a stretch compared to last year’s results (more like 8:30), and I hadn’t hit any of my splits yet. Mile four I finished in 8:05, which was in line, but not fast enough to reclaim ground.

For a moment I was contemplating what I needed to do to get faster. 50:00 didn’t seem like a huge stretch, and I was feeling strong, but I wasn’t getting there. I decided I definitely need to spend some time on speed work. Running hills only gets you so far.

One thing I didn’t realize, however, was that the race was more closer to 5.6 miles, not the 5.75 in my calculations. If I could do 8:00 minutes on the downhills, that translated to another minute of cushion to break 50:00.

The other thing I didn’t realize was that my downhills were going a lot faster than last year. After I passed 21 Pilots, I found myself gaining on Kari Bradley and his daughter. At this point it was clear that Kari was pacing his daughter for the race. I passed them sometime before the 5-mile mark, and I was doing well below 8:00 at that point. He gave me a “nice work!” as I went by. The mile five split was 7:27. Game back on!

The final 6/10 mile features the steepest downhill of the whole race. I realize this is an advantage to me, as I appear to be more comfortable letting it fly on the downhill than other people do. The only problem on this section was that a tiny pebble found its way into my right shoe, and directly below my heel. Every step brought a jolt of pain. Had there been, say, two miles remaining, I would have stopped to get it out of my shoe. With a half mile to go, I made the choice to tough it out. If nothing else, it made me adjust my form to land more on the bottoms of my feet than on my heels, which I should be doing anyway.

The last part of the race is on paved Shady Rill road, which I said above was a quarter mile but in reality is probably half of that. I felt strong, managing the pebble, when I noticed shoe strings flapping around. My left shoe had come untied, despite my double-knotting it at the start. I did a quick assessment that the tripping risk was pretty low, and kept sprinting. As I approached the finish, I couldn’t actually read the clock because someone was standing in front of it. I knew I was in the XX:20s, but I didn’t know if XX was 48 or 49 minutes. I wasn’t going to waste time looking at my watch.

Turns out it was 48. My official time was 48:36, though my watch had it a few seconds faster. My pace on the last .6 mile was 6:30, which is really fast for me even given the downhill. The final time was nearly four minutes faster than last year, and well ahead of my A goal of 49:00 minutes. A very good race for me!

That said, it wasn’t over for everyone. Katie was still on the course, so I jogged back to the car to get my phone so I could get some images of her at the finish. A few minutes later I saw my friend Darrel Lasell, and Katie was right behind him. I hollered out to Katie, “go Katie! You can catch Darrel!!” But then I yelled, “go Darrel, don’t let her catch you!” Katie made up some ground but couldn’t quite close the gap, and finished three seconds behind him. Still it was a victory for her, much faster than she had anticipated, and worthy of an age-group prize because the winner in her group was the top female finisher. A great race!

BEAR SWAMP RUN RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 5.6 miles
Time: 48:36
Pace: 8:32
Overall Finish: 10/24
Age Group: 2/3

6/20/21: Gunstock TrailFest 10K

Day Two of the Gunstock TrailFest was Loop Day. On this day, several races occurred simultaneously on the same 10K loop: 80K, 50K, 30K and 10K. The longer races consisted of more laps around the route. Katie and I, fresh off a 10K climb to the top of Gunstock Mountain the day before, were signed up for the 10K version.

Because this was the shortest race, it started latest in the morning. Whereas the 80K runners started at 6:00 a.m., we had the luxury of starting at 11:00 a.m. This allowed us ample time to have breakfast and pack up our AirBnB at Birch Rise farm. As we were loading out, I had the opportunity to say goodbye to Ken and 5-year-old Henry. (Kate and Hunter were off running a food truck.) Henry asked me if I had Crocs, and then demonstrated how fast one can run in them by running a little lap in his. “You run a lot faster if you have Cwocs!” he said. But then he implored, “but if you do buy Cwocs, don’t tell Hunter. He hates them!”

Now somewhat regretting that I wear Altra running shoes, we set off again for Gunstock Mountain. We arrived shortly before 10:00, which gave us ample time to register and warm up. Unlike Saturday, when nearly 300 people were gathering for the race we were in, the registration line was very short on this day, with many runners already out on the course. Today we were prepared for the heat and both were carrying water, Katie with a new Camelback hydration vest she had purchased the day before.

We ran together on Saturday, but we were running our own races on Sunday. We gathered at the starting line with 100 other runners, and were prepared for the cannon fire to start the race. At the start I had noted a young woman with bleach-blonde pigtail braids and pink compression socks, who I nicknamed Pinky Lonstockings. At the start she bolted with the fast kids. I took off faster than Katie, and soon our group merged with runners who were starting another lap of their longer races. One tattooed guy stood out, as he was yelling out to his friend Mike, who just started our race. The tattooed guy had just completed his fourth lap, so basically had finished one marathon and had another to go, and confessed to already being a bit delirious.

The 10K loop was completely on wide cross-country ski trails, with 680 feet of elevation gain over the 6+ mile distance. The description said the trails were 12 feet wide, but the runnable width was probably 2/3 of that in most places. Still plenty of room to maneuver. It was downhill from the start for the first half mile, before a 150-foot climb. As with Saturday, many runners walked this hill. I decided to run it, not overly fast but with more speed than a walk, with the recognition that I do this kind of run all the time. The trail leveled off for a bit, followed by a similar downhill stretch. I bombed down this, passing many runners, with the confidence built from many miles on the Montpelier trails.

The first aid station was at the bottom of this hill, a little more than a mile from the start. Though I was carrying water, I wanted to be deferential to the heat and sunshine, so I grabbed a cup of Gatorade. The heat, along with this being a second day of racing, was also a factor in my decision to not push the pace too much on the flat bits. I wanted to make sure I had enough energy to get to the finish.

Most of mile two was flat, going through a field and into the woods. I switched positions with a couple of other runners on this part. At mile 1.8 the course began to climb, which it would do in several steps over the next three miles. A woman in a peach top passed me on the flat stretch, but I passed her again as she walked up the next hill. Then there was another woman in a peach top, and we did the same thing. This would be the case with these two women for awhile, I’d pass them going uphill and they would pass me on the levels.

The next aid station was at the halfway point. I decided to go for more Gatorade. Unlike the last one, this time I had to pour my own cup, which took some seconds, but then I realized everybody else who wanted to hydrate was in the same boat. I took off again, seeming to have stayed ahead of Peach #1, but still trading places with Peach #2. Sometime shortly after this, I passed another woman going uphill, tall and wearing a black tank top, and had my only conversation of the race. She said, “nice work,” and I said “you too. It’s hot out here!” When it got to the flat part, she passed me again. As with the others, this would repeat a few more times.

The interesting thing about a race like this is that you don’t know if the people you are racing against are actually in your race. (The exception being the 80Kers, who were moving very slow on hills and looking pretty haggard by this point.) As it turns out, both Peach #2 and the woman in black were running the 30K race, which I discovered when I saw them finish later. I am pretty sure Peach #1 was in my race, and I am certain Pinky Longstockings was. After her fast start, she started to come back into view about two miles in, and I was gradually gaining on her. In every race it’s natural to identify someone specific that you want to finish ahead of, and today Pinky would fill that role for me.

As with others, Pinky was doing a fair amount of walking on the uphills, and I was gradually gaining on her, but she wasn’t taking the distance back on the flats. I did question myself about this no-walking strategy, as I feel like I might have had a better finish at Adamant had I done more walking early, but I decided that this was the race I wanted to run. Even with the heat, there was no reason for me to believe I couldn’t run the whole race given my training.

Somewhere in mile 5 I passed Pinky. At the top of this rise was the final aid station. It was the same place as yesterday, and the course would be the same from here on out. With a little over a mile left, I made a change in strategy. I did not stop for Gatorade, as I had plenty of water, but I did decide to walk the final hill, which was practically the steepest of the day (and steeper than I had remembered from just the day before). Walking would give me plenty of time to drink from my bottles.

Because pretty much everybody else stopped for water and also walked this hill, I was now ahead of my competitors and would stay there the rest of the way. The last 3/4 of a mile is all downhill, and as with the first hill of the day, my acclimation to this type of terrain allowed me to pass several more runners on the way down. Unlike at the end of Saturday’s race, I had quite a bit of life in my legs, and was able to sprint through the finish line. When I started the race, and based on Saturday’s time, I figured I should be able to finish in under 1:10:00, but during the race it became evident that 1:00:00 was a pretty realistic goal. I beat that with some room to spare, with a final time of 58:24.

Sadly, I didn’t have a “race” at the finish line to up the excitement. That was not so with Katie. I took a space at the end of the finishing corral and was on the lookout for her. A few minutes later I thought I saw her, but it looked like she knew the person she was running with as they both bolted to the finish. It was Katie, and she found her top gear at the end, though the other guy had even stronger jets and beat her to the line. Such a strong finish, and such a different feeling from Saturday.

I don’t like to finish a race with quite so much left in the tank. I think my approach was rational, as I didn’t know what the heat and the residual from Saturday would do to me. On the other hand, I am by now used to running longer distances, and I could have chosen to let my body be the guide. I never felt overly taxed on this race, and my heart rate readings suggest I could have worked harder. As Lauren told me last year, “it’s a race, it’s supposed to hurt.” In reality, I might have been able to move up a few spots overall, with an outside chance to shave the 1:20 I would have needed to jump up one spot in my age group. I wasn’t going to hit the podium either way, but it’s still a good learning experience for me.

RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 10K
Time: 58:24
Pace: 9:24
Overall Finish: 26/102
Age Group: 5/9

6/19/21: Gunstock TrailFest 10K Peak-to-Peak

We celebrated Katie’s birthday with a weekend in the lovely Lakes Region of Vermont to participate in the Gunstock TrailFest. There are approximately ten races over the two days. Saturday included a 5K, with or without dogs, a kids run, a 1.5-mile race to the top of Gunstock Mountain, and our race, a 10K Peak-to-Peak race that climbs up Rowe Mountain, crosses the ridgeline to the peak of Gunstock Mountain, and then downhill back to the base lodge.

We arrived in Sanborton, NH, where we had booked an AirBnB at Birch Rise Farm. And to be honest, that might warrant a blog entry of its own. It was fantastic. We stayed in a beautiful apartment above the detached garage, separated from the main home but really welcomed to engage with the hosts, Kate and Ken Osgood, and their kids Hunter (11) and Henry (5). Lovely people and a beautiful spot with lots of chickens, turkeys, pigs, Guinea hens, and sheep that kept us entertained for hours. There was even a terrific firefly show at night.

Because our race started at 10 a.m., we were able to get up and have a nice breakfast of oatmeal (with fresh strawberries) and bagels. Katie took advantage of the farm-fresh eggs to make a bagel sandwich. The drive to Gunstock was about 20 minutes, and we arrived at 9:00. Plenty of time to register, stretch, and get a short warmup run in. Not that we needed a ton of “warming up.” We expected race-time temperatures in the 60s, and cooler temperatures at the peak (elevation 2,300 feet), but it was a “warm” 60-something at the start, with bright sunlight heating things up.

The warm temperatures left us a bit panicked, because we (I) had for some reason decided that we didn’t need to carry water; the water stations on the course would be sufficient. But the map at the base didn’t show the water stops – was there only going to be one? I didn’t remember. There were water bottles for sale, but we didn’t have any cash. Katie convinced one of the volunteers to give us a bottle that was going to be free to all the finishers, some flavored water. It was warm and tasted like mango. But it was wet! Katie decided to dump some and refill at the filling station, to make it less mangoey. We felt ready to go.

This event used to be held at Pineland Farms, not far from where I grew up in Maine, but moved to New Hampshire 2-3 years ago. This was the first time they held the Peak-to-Peak race, and it was much more popular than they expected: nearly 300 entrants! In the starting corral there were a lot of people chatting while race announcements were being made, so we missed stuff about water stations, but figured all of that would be self evident. What wasn’t evident was that the start would be marked with a loud cannon shot (though we heard this when the 5K race started at 9:30). After that shock we were off.

It turns out that the warmup was kind of necessary, because this race started climbing almost immediately. Only 1/10 of a mile in the gravel road we were on started to rise. We would gain 700 feet by the time we reached the cell tower at the peak of Rowe at the one-mile mark. I’m sure there were people at the front of the pack who were running up this hill, but for the masses, including us, it was a power walk. I say “us” because I planned to stay with Katie for the whole race. The 10K the next day we would handle on our own. At one point on the climb Katie told me to go ahead if I wanted to run but, aside from the fact that I wanted to stay with her, running up this terrain had little appeal!

Still, we were fairly fast marchers, passing more often than we were getting passed. The first water stop was at this first peak, but we were packing so we kept going. At this point the trail turned to single track through the woods, fairly rocky and rooty. There were a couple of places where passing was possible, but there was also a fair amount of staying with traffic. The trail was flat/downhill for half a mile, then started uphill again. Over the next mile and a half we would gain another 700+ feet before reaching the Gunstock Peak.

This was a more gradual climb than the first one, so there were a few more opportunities to run. But it was pretty technical and narrow, and chances to pass were less frequent. We were behind a guy with a yellow shirt who I thought we should be able to pass, but weren’t actually able to until things got real steep again. At one point a woman with a purple fanny pack passed us, and then Katie bolted around me to stay with her. I had to make a pass to keep up with them. And we followed fanny pack most of the rest of the way to the top. We passed a couple more groups of people toward the top, including one woman with teal shorts who, although fit, didn’t “look” to me like a runner with her horn-rimmed glasses. And then we passed Fanny Pack when we had a chance before the peak.

The top included a short detour off the trail to a timing station at the peak and another water stop. This was advertised as having the best views on the course, but we couldn’t actually see much from the turnaround, so we went toward the top of the chairlift where there were expansive views of the lake, and I took a selfie there. We hit the water stand and started down.

We had reached the top in 50 minutes, and taken a minute or two for the selfie (during which time a lot of the people we had passed moved back in front of us). Based on my experience with Infinitus I thought we could move down in 9:00 miles, but this terrain was much more tight and technical than Infinitus. Much of the trail looked to have been newly built, if “built” is even the right word. Roots and rocks abounded, and a little rain the night before made some places pretty wet. Job number one was to not get injured, so we picked our way down much of the time. We made way for a few runners who were bombing down faster than us, including Teal Shorts, who was bouncing down with much more agility than she had shown on the uphill.

We eventually caught back up with most of the people we had passed on the way up, including the guy with a yellow shirt, who turned out to be a different guy with a yellow shirt. But just ahead of him was the original guy with a yellow shirt, who was running with a woman in gray. We were obviously moving faster downhill than they were, but they didn’t yield. Things opened up after awhile and I was finally able to get around them.

They stayed close, though. The trail eventually came out on cross country ski trails, and the final water stop was at about mile 5. This was followed by the last hill of the day. It certainly wasn’t as daunting as the big climbs, but it was steep enough to warrant walking. Yellow shirt guy and gray shirt gal caught up, and we had a little chat about Strava and “where ya from?” Then there was another steep downhill, and we left them again. We also passed Purple Fanny Pack and Teal Shorts, so we were having a pretty decent finish it seemed.

At the 5.8-mile mark we came out of the woods and into an open field. It was flat/downhill, though the footing was a little uneven. I was pushing Katie, though I was trying to let her dictate the pace. I wanted to cross the finish line together. Just before the line she pushed a little and got ahead of me, but I thought “that’s not how this is supposed to work!” so I matched her stride. We finished in an official time of 1:32:37, which was solidly middle-of-the-pack (146 and 147 out of 263 finishers – we would have been a few spots higher without the selfie). We were a little beat up by this, but it was a very respectable finish, though maybe not the best warmup for the next day’s race.

Afterward was a party with food, beer, music, and awards. We met some cool people in the food line, hung out on the lawn, in the sun and watched other people collect their prizes. Then there was the two hours spent getting my car fixed, as the engine was misfiring. We still had some time for a nap before Hunter gave us a farm tour and introduced us to pretty much every chicken, duck, pig and sheep on the farm. It was a just the thing for the end of the day before we headed out for dinner.

RACE SUMMARY:
Distance: 10K
Time: 1:32:37
Pace: 14:55
Overall Finish: 147/263
Male Finishers: 96/129