East Coast Invitational mile

I'm working on improving some of my indoor track times, so I was off to Providence this weekend for the open mile at the East Coast Invitational.  The $10 entry fee was nice and the facilities in Providence are great (I've run the NE & Eastern masters meet here a couple of times).  I arrived extra early and chatted a bit with Mark Capparella (TVFR).  It was nice to see some familiar faces as this is a high school meet with ONE open event.  Teammates Bob Jackman and David Principe signed up and we hit the track for some indoor running (although it would have been okay outside as it was about 60 degrees!).  The track was open since the first event would be the mile heats before our open mile.  It was still a bit dangerous on the track as many high school students seem to have ZERO awareness of what is going on around them (some would randomly stop, others might be just standing on the track).  Some coaches didn't help with that as they had their entire team doing group warm-ups using all of the lanes (poor track etiquette).  Anyway, we avoided getting knocked over and I felt pretty decent after getting in 3 miles.

I switched into my piranha racing flats and did some running outside and some inside to stay loose waiting for our heat.  I was hoping to improve on my 5:26 from last weekend and felt that 5:20 was "do-able".  I'd be aiming for 40 seconds per 200 meter lap.  Our heat was pretty big with 19 entrants.  I had the 6th position on the line and as we headed into the first turn I found an opening on the rail and took it.  The field spread out quickly and as I hit the first split (209 meters since a mile is 1609 meters) in 41.6.  I was right where I wanted to be as some of the faster guys who got stuck went around me in the second lap.  I hit 400 in 80.2 and focused on the youngster from Haverhill right in front of me.  We passed a couple of guys before the half-mile (2:39.5) and soon after I went around the kid (he stuck with me the rest of the way).  I felt okay, although the heat and dryness had me looking for a water-stop by 1/2 way.  :-)   My next 400 was a 78.5 and I closed with a 77.5 for a 5:16.52.

I was very happy with the result, a 10 second improvement over Dartmouth.  Next up will be the "Indoor Insanity 5k" at Bates next weekend.  I'm hoping to run under 17:40.


Men 1 Mile Run Open Open
===============================================
Name                            Age          Team                  Time 
===============================================
1 Bronson Venable        28            Rabbit               4:38.33 
2 Keith McAteer            19            Tuesday Nigh    4:45.07 
3 Trevor Mungeam       18             TVFR                4:49.76 
4 Ross Mungeam          23            TVFR                4:52.15 
5 Adam Courtemanche 19            SNHU                5:00.86 
6 Timothy Maguire                        Unattached        5:04.91 
7 Robert Jackman        35            Central Mass St 5:07.38 
8 Charles Kolie            19             Unattached        5:10.22 
9 Troy Lange                23            Unattached         5:10.81 
10 David Principe         50            Central Mass St 5:12.97 
11 Dave Dunham          53            Central Mass St 5:16.52 
12 Oscar Quinones      16             Haverhill Flash   5:17.01 
13 Ross Anderson        38            TVFR                 5:28.88 
14 Mark Capparella      48            TVFR                 5:31.86 
15 Christopher Melleby 39           Gr. Boston TC    5:34.74 
16 Robert Buttermore   30           Mohegan Stri      5:35.70 
17 Braden Mungeam    23           TVFR                  5:40.86 
18 Jonathan Martley     35           TVFR                  5:49.13 
19 Stephen Sullivan     52           TVFR                   6:14.74