USATF NE 6 kilometer championships
Could there be an odder distance than 6k? Why would anyone want to suffer through “the longest 5k you’ll ever run”? Will we have five masters finish the race? These were some of the thoughts I had before heading to the New England 6km championships in Nashua NH.
Robert the Hunkarian and Dan V joined me for the drive and we were among the early arrivers. We parked next to Dave K and the Whirlaway gang so that we could keep a close eye on them J I felt awful. I‘d picked up a nasty cough and just was not “feeling it” on the quickly warming morning. I hate hot weather and anything over 60 seems pretty hot to me. The warm-up out and back over the first 1.5 miles of the course was one of the highlights of the day. It was a lot of fun catching up with the guys and checking out what lay ahead. We had pretty much every healthy guy on the racing team out there (and a few who were not healthy).
I did another mile with some strides and was feeling tired already, these short races are not for me…I get really nervous and just don’t feel comfortable. Anyway, I found a perfect spot on the left-hand side of the road to line up and hit the second row behind RUN’s Joseph Koech. He’d be long gone after the first 2 seconds leaving plenty of space to navigate. I also chose that side of the course because after the first 30 seconds of the race we’d take a sharp right, so being on the left I could swing wide and not get into any trouble. It worked out well as I got out clean and never really had to worry about getting tripped up. Dan got out unusually fast but I could see some of the other guys I was keying off of and felt I was going at about the right pace. I hit the mile in 5:18 which was a few seconds slower than I’d hoped (based on my splits from 2008). Dan was three seconds up and I pushed as hard as I could to close the gap on him. At the top of the climb (about 1.6 miles) I caught Dan and Mark Reeder went by at the same time. I went with Mark and started working on closing on Mike Quintal (returning from injury).
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| I'm in the middle of this line of runners as we approach 3 miles |
I hit 2 miles in 10:45 (5:27) but I think the mile might have been marked wrong because that seemed too fast. I wasn’t thinking that during the race I was just thinking “go with these guys”. Mike was flying on the downhill parts and coming back on the flats and I knew there would be guys behind us waiting to kick by. I just don’t have a kick so I tried to work as hard as I could. We hit three in 16:16 (5:31?) which seemed slow for the mile with a fair amount of downhill. Mark gradually pulled ahead and I tried to stay with Mike. I didn’t have much left and couldn’t match Mike on the final uphill to the finish. I crossed the line in 20:17 and was totally spent.
We quickly gathered up a group and headed out to re-run the course as a warm-down. I had missed seeing my mom at the mile/2.7 mile (I figured it would be close but I probably missed her by about a minute) so I wanted to catch her coming in. The warm-down is always a great time with all of the pressure off and everyone chiming in on the good and the bad that happened during the race. We caught mom as she was approaching the final water stop and we all cheered her on. After looping the course I headed over and checked in with Steve V to make sure that all of the CMS guys were in the team results. Good news for the teams, the open squad took the win and our masters finished second a scant 9 seconds behind Whirlaway. I was very surprised to find that I’d finished 9th in the 40+. This is my 8th year as a master and before this race I’d only cracked the top 10 in a NE championship twice (a 9th at Bridge of Flowers in 2008 was the last time). This was definitely a pleasant surprise.
The 10th Annual Medical Center 6K
May 8, 2011 6 Kilometers (USATF Certified #NH02001WN) Nashua, NH
1 1/42 M2029 18:27 4:57 Dan Vassallo 26 M 665 Reading MA ADIDA
2 1/60 M3039 18:31 4:58 Justin Freeman 34 M 617 New Hampton NH RUN
3 2/60 M3039 18:37 5:00 Matthew Ely 35 M 516 Natick MA BAA
4 3/60 M3039 18:44 5:02 Bob Wiles 33 M 679 Kittery ME CMS
5 1/106 M4049 18:49 5:03 Joseph Koech 41 M 622 Chelmsford MA RUN
6 2/106 M4049 18:54 5:05 Kent Lemme 44 M 698 Williamstown MA GSH
7 4/60 M3039 18:59 5:06 Jim Johnson 34 M 621 Salem NH CMS
8 2/42 M2029 19:14 5:10 Brandon Newbould 29 M 540 Nottingham NH WRT
9 3/42 M2029 19:16 5:10 Andy McCarron 28 M 624 Keene NH CMS
10 4/42 M2029 19:24 5:13 Edward Breen 29 M 664 Somerville MA GBTC
13 5/60 M3039 19:30 5:14 Chris Mahoney 33 M 623 Haverhill MA CMS
14 6/60 M3039 19:38 5:16 Greg Hammett 33 M 619 Chesterfield NH CMS
15 4/106 M4049 19:39 5:17 Tim Van Orden 43 M 672 Bennington VT CMS
19 8/60 M3039 19:47 5:19 Greg Ward 39 M 682 West Boylston MA CMS
25 7/106 M4049 19:57 5:21 Greg Putnam 41 M 629 Wakefield MA CMS
26 9/42 M2029 19:58 5:22 Matt Clark 28 M 613 Amherst MA CMS
29 11/42 M2029 20:09 5:25 Ben Jenkins 23 M 620 Durham NH CMS
32 10/60 M3039 20:16 5:26 Mike Quintal 33 M 633 North Andover MA CMS
33 9/106 M4049 20:17 5:27 Dave Dunham 47 M 616 Bradford MA CMS
35 13/42 M2029 20:19 5:27 Jeff Goupil 23 M 618 Keene NH CMS
38 11/106 M4049 20:28 5:30 Dan Verrington 48 M 632 Bradford MA CMS
40 13/60 M3039 20:31 5:30 Ben Strain 32 M 657 Beverly MA CMS
41 14/60 M3039 20:32 5:31 Jim Pawlicki 36 M 628 Beverly MA CMS
42 12/106 M4049 20:33 5:31 Rod Viens 43 M 228 Grantham NH CMS
43 13/106 M4049 20:37 5:32 Joe Shairs 42 M 630 Peabody MA CMS
55 19/106 M4049 20:54 5:37 Scott Clark 45 M 316 Gilmanton NH CMS
58 19/42 M2029 20:59 5:38 Scott McGrath 24 M 678 Amesbury MA CMS
68 18/60 M3039 21:24 5:45 Tim Mahoney 31 M 661 Holyoke MA CMS
88 30/106 M4049 22:09 5:57 David Quintal 47 M 662 Salem NH CMS
96 33/106 M4049 22:28 6:02 John Pajer 48 M 430 Leicester MA CMS
MALE OPEN USATF-NE GRAND PRIX TEAM RESULTS
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1. CENTRAL MASS STRIDERS
18:44 18:59 19:16 19:30 19:38 ( 19:39) ( 19:47) = 1:36:07
Bob Wiles, Jim Johnson, Andy McCarron, Chris Mahoney, Greg Hammett,
Tim Van Orden, Greg Ward
2. TEAM RUN
18:31 18:49 19:26 19:42 20:18 ( 20:38) ( 21:37) = 1:36:46
Justin Freeman, Joseph Koech, Jim St. Pierre, Ben Ndaya, David Ndungu,
Rex Radloff, Titus Mutinda
3. WHIRLAWAY RACING TEAM
19:14 19:29 19:46 19:48 19:51 ( 19:59) ( 20:26) = 1:38:08
Brandon Newbould, Kevin Alliette, Joseph Navas, Patrick Ard, Craig
Fram, Joe Donnelly, Jason Porter
MALE MASTERS USATF-NE GRAND PRIX TEAM RESULTS
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1. WHIRLAWAY RACING TEAM
19:46 19:51 19:59 20:26 20:43 ( 20:57) ( 21:18) = 1:40:45
Joseph Navas, Craig Fram, Joe Donnelly, Jason Porter, Scott Anderson,
Reno Stirrat, Michael Platt
2. CENTRAL MASS STRIDERS
19:39 19:57 20:17 20:28 20:33 ( 20:37) ( 20:54) = 1:40:54
Tim Van Orden, Greg Putnam, Dave Dunham, Dan Verrington, Rod Viens,
Joe Shairs, Scott Clark
3. SOMERVILLE ROAD RUNNERS
20:38 20:51 20:52 21:16 22:43 ( 24:19) ( 25:30) = 1:46:20
Jonathan May, Joe Oleary, Robert Cipriano, Christopher Smith, Rory
Fagan, Michael Quinn, Noel Clarke
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| Mom kicking it in! |
1 comment:
Go Mrs. D.
Anybody in the results NOT from CMS??
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