Looking back - 10 & 5 years ago

10 years ago: December 2003

Two races during the month as I was coming back from some injury or another.  I started off the month with the Santa’s toy run in Merrimac MA.  This is one of the better races put on by the Winners Circle .  It features a 2 mile loop that you do one, two, or three times.  You do not have to declare which race you are doing, you just stop at the appropriate time.  I went with the 6 mile version taking first place in 34:44.

Two weeks later I kicked off the snowshoe racing season with the “I love Woodford” snowshoe race.  I found myself around the top 10 early on and the pack pulled away leaving me running alone.  At about half-way there is a sharp turn, which I knew from having run the course a number of times.  I took the turn and immediately noticed that there were no footprints ahead of me!  There was no one in sight so I just headed on my way and ended up taking first place.  The lead pack rolled in about 20 minutes after I finished.  Ouch!

The top 5

1 Dave     Dunham   39 M        27:34

2 Tom      Parent     27 M        32:08

3 Wayne  Stocker    49 M        32:10

4 Tom      Denny      43 M        32:17

5 Chris     Lanaud    36 M        32:19

                               

The “lost” (blue = CMS)

47 Richard Bolt        33 M        46:05

48 Ben Nephew       27 M        46:06

50 Elijah Barrett      27 M        46:18

52 Greg Hammett    26 M        46:24

53 James Pawlicki    29 M        46:26

55 Ken Clark            41 M        46:33

56 Dan Verrington   41 M   46:38                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

5 years ago: December 2008

I tried to get out and race a bit more during this month, getting in four “races”.  I started with the Assault on Mt Hood XC race in Melrose .  I like this race, I’ve done it a few times and it seems like every time they have a new challenging course.  It was a bit icy out there but I managed to keep my legs under me and take 10^th place in 22:33 over 3.5 (or so) miles.

1 Ryan Gattoni        20:46.9   23M        

2 Joe Shairs             20:51.4   40M         CMS

3 Ben Strain             21:02.3   30M         CMS

4 Henry Scoward     21:07.2   45M         CRC

5 Terry McNatt        21:21.3   43M        

6 Dan Verrington     21:35.8   46M         CMS

7 James Pawlicki      22:06.9   34M         CMS

8 Dave Hannon       22:10.3   37M         NETT

9 Chris Van Cott      22:27.9   28M        

10 Dave Dunham     22:33.1   44M         CMS

 A week later I ran in the very popular BU Mini meet.  I ended up in the second of three heats of the 3,000 meters.  I would have been better off in the third heat as I ran mostly alone and took 16^th out of 17 finishers running a 10:01 (about 10:40 for 2 miles).  Since we had some snow and I was getting ready for snowshoe racing season, I decided to set up a 5k race at Winnekenni.  My guess was that no one else would show up because it was Christmas morning.  I figured out a 3.5 mile loop and did my warm-up setting out flags for the race course.  No one showed up so I went out and ran the loop as fast as I could (26:39).  For a warm-down I went back out and cleared the course of flags.  It was a fun way to get in 11+ miles and winning a “race”.  Three days later I closed out the month with the “I love Woodford” snowshoe race.  I had a pretty decent run finishing in fourth, barely holding off late surges from teammates Tim Mahoney and Jim Pawlicki.

1 Josh Ferenc M27 23:44 

2 Jim Johnson M31 24:32 

3 Mathew Cartier M33 24:50 

4 Dave Dunham M44  25:15 

5 Tim Mahoney M29 25:22 

6 James Pawlicki M34 25:30 

7 Mathew Westerlund M36 26:10 

8 Jay Kolodzinski M29 27:40 

9 Steve Wolfe M44 27:48 

10 Ken Clark M46 28:01 

11 Abby Woods F30 28:08