Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Wachusett Mountain race

This was my 20th time running the Wachusett Mountain race, and I was pretty fired up driving to the race.  Maybe I had too much coffee on race morning?  After signing up and bumping into SO MANY familiar faces it was time to head out for a 3 mile “flat” warm-up with a big group of CMS runners.  The group included new member Ed Sheldon who was back on the scene after taking nearly a decade off.  He would be among the top 50+ runners in the race.  The field looked quite strong as I saw teammates Erik Vandendries and Jeff Hunt along with Gate City Strider Brian Ruhm, Dirgio’s Jeff Walker, and Whirlaway’s Craig Fram.  Dang!  That is a solid group of runners!

I quickly changed into racing flats and did another mile over to the start line at the bottom of “Mile Hill road”.  Temps were already in the mid-80s and of course the sun broke through the clouds right before the 344 of us assembled headed off.  Things settled out pretty quickly as we got into the 5% grade.  At ½ mile I was in about 25th place and moving up.  Erik V went out pretty hard (he is a very strong climber) and was a good 10 seconds up already.  I hit the mile in 7:20 after 400’ of climbing.  Soon after I caught Ed Sheldon but was falling further behind Erik.  We turned into the park at 1.2 miles and dropped 30’ over the next ¼ mile.  Jeff Hunt went by me as we both grabbed a cup of water.  It was hot!  Erik was now 15 seconds up in a good back-and-forth race with CMS teammate Tim Mahoney.

I tucked in behind Jeff as the climb got tough again (260’ of climb in ½ mile from 1.5 to 2).  We passed a couple of guys and started making some progress on closing the gap with Erik.  I could hear Jeff Walker behind me (he has a Paul Hammond level of grunting when he runs which is a dead give-away that he is close) as we hit the 2 mile mark in 14:50.  With less than a mile to go we were still looking at another 500’ of climb.  I was getting into a good groove now as the grade steepened (stretches of 15-20% grades).  At 2.5 I pulled away from Jeff and continued to close on Eric and Tim.  On the final turn Erik peeked back and I was only a few seconds behind.  He found another gear and powered in for a senior age-group win 4 seconds ahead of me.  The top 7 50+ all finished within 33 seconds.  Great competition!  Next up: Pack Monadnock 10 mile mountain race (June 5).

Top 10 seniors
1 ERIK VANDENDRIES      51         21:53    CMS
2 DAVE DUNHAM             52         21:57    CMS
3 JEFF HUNT                   51         22:08    CMS
4 CHRISTOPHER SMITH    50         22:15    SRR
5 BRIAN RUHM                51         22:19    GCS
6 JEFF WALKER               50         22:24    Dirigo
7 ED SHELDON               51         22:26    CMS
8 CRAIG FRAM                 57         22:56    WRT
9 DOUG JANSEN              53         23:41   
10 DAVID LAPIERRE         52         24:21    CMS

 Overall
1 BRANDON NEWBOLD                 M          34         19:34    WRT
2 ERIC MACKNIGHT                     M          27         20:18   
3 TIM Van Orden                                    M          48         20:48    CMS
4 TODD CALLAGHAN                    M          46         20:52    CMS
5 CHRISTOPHER CHROMCZAK        M          31         20:55   
6 NICHOLAS RINDENELLO                        M          28         20:59   
7 JON KORHONEN                       M          33         21:06   
8 ANDY MCCARRON                      M          33         21:09    CMS
9 KIM NEDEAU                            F           36         21:11    aR
10 MATT VEIGA                           M          29         21:29    CMS
11 TIM MAHONEY                        M          36         21:53    CMS
11 ERIK VANDENDRIES                M          51         21:53    CMS
13 DAVE DUNHAM                       M          52         21:57    CMS
14 JEFF HUNT                             M          51         22:08    CMS
15 JOSH MERLIS                         M          34         22:14    ARE
16 CHRISTOPHER SMITH              M          50         22:15    SRR
17 BRIAN RUHM              M          51         22:19    GCS
18 STEVE BRIGHTMAN     M          47         22:21   
19 JIM BOULE                 M          49         22:22   
20 JEFF WALKER             M          50         22:24    Dirigo
21 ED SHELDON              M          51         22:26    CMS
22 JAMES PAWLICKI        M          41         22:38    CMS
23 TIM HOPPE                M          35         22:44   
24 CRAIG FRAM               M          57         22:56    WRT
25 TODD BENNETT          M          45         23:01   
26 CRAIG NALE               M          32         23:17   
27 SCOTT MCCUE                        M          41         23:19   
28 VINCENT LYON           M          27         23:28   
29 DOUG JANSEN                        M          53         23:41   
30 MICHAEL NARCISI       M          32         24:05    Sisu
31 UNKNOWN                 M                      24:18
32 DAVID LAPIERRE         M          52         24:21    CMS

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