5k race

Jeanne’s Journey 5k – Somersworth NH

I searched for a race on the long Columbus Day weekend and narrowed it down to a couple of races.  In the end I chose the race with the earliest start time, since I preferred to race early in the day.

I headed up to Somersworth for the Jeanne’s Journey 5k which was held before the big pumpkin festival.  I arrived at 7:30 for the 8:30 race and was happy to see the registration up and running.  The map of the course showed a pretty easy to follow loop with a section of over a mile of out and back.  Warming up on the course is always a good idea so I headed out.  They moved the start/finish slightly due to the festival using the school parking lot entrance.  I wore my Garmin and was happy to see the miles right on.  I wasn’t so happy when I got to 3 miles and could see that the finish line was well beyond a tenth of a mile from 3.  In the warm-up, warm-down, and race I pegged it at 3.2 miles.  Oh, well.  The race was the most important part.

My plan was to again test out my calf, hopefully by running right around 5:40 pace.  Over 200 folks lined up at the start (facing the wrong way until I got them to turn around).  Dave Audet had already won 9 races this year and was looking for number 10.  I wished him good luck and we were off.  One guy took it out pretty hard but I caught him about 300 meters in and then ran unchallenged.

I hit the mile in 5:33, then at the turn I could see I had about 50 seconds on Dave.  It was fun running back through the crowd and I concentrated on keeping the tempo up despite some rolling hills.   I hit 2 miles in 11:15 (5:42) and kept working at keeping the pace consistent.  Three miles was reached in 16:58 (5:43) and I passed 5k in 17:37.  At the finish I clocked 17:53 for the win 1:38 ahead of Dave who took home second place and first in the masters.

Needless to say I was happy with the victory which was my first of 2014.  That keeps my streak alive for another year with at least one win every year from 1979 to present.  I hung out for the awards since they had a huge table of prizes but it turned out the prizes were for the raffle and age groups got a water-bottle (nothing for the overall win).

1 Dave Duham   50         Ward Hill, MA                  17:53

2 David Audet     49         Concord, NH                   19:31

3 Andy Stark       33                                                 20:49

4 Tony Martuni   30         Somersworth, NH             21:43

5 Chuck Mantos  57         Somersworth, NH            21:56

222 finishers