25 years ago

25 years ago – August 1988: I was training well this month and my goal race was the Falmouth Road race. I used the GLRR 2 mile series races as workouts (but raced them!), too bad they don’t do these anymore. I started the month off running the Yankee Homecoming 10 mile in Newburyport. This was the second time I’d run Newburyport and I’ve now run it ten times. Anyway, on that night I felt flat and the 90 degree temps and high humidity didn’t help. I hit 5 miles in 25 flat and came back in 26:02 to take second place in a field of 2,000. I won $300 for the effort. The following week I ran 9:17 at Cawley stadium at the GLRR weekly summer two-mile series. The next week I ran 9:16, closely followed by Artie Demers and Mike Wright (9:19). That was my final tune-up for the storied Falmouth Road race. I joined 6,000 other runners for the 7.1 mile jaunt from Woods Hole to Falmouth. I was pretty happy with the result, just outkicking Bill Rogers (who had recently turned 40) in 33:49. Splits were: 4:45/4:45/4:48/4:52/4:45/5:03. I closed out the month with my fourth win at the 2 mile series with a 9:20.