Looking back - 20 years ago (March 2001)

20 years ago (March 2001): I was preparing to take a shot at the USA 50km road record in April so this was my final month to build up.  I had 481 miles with weeks of 120, 94, 104, and 122.  Along the way I raced four times. I started off the month at the Moody Springs snowshoe race (Hawley MA – 03/03/01).  This was a long and tough course of 8.6 miles with over 1,100’ of climb/descent.  Most of the course was slick with powder under and icy crust. I ended up falling 5 or 6 times and cut up my hands pretty badly.  The first 3 miles I ran with Leigh Schmidt then pulled away for the win. 

The next day (03/04/01) I headed to Boylston for the Stu’s 30k which was part of the Hockomock Swamp rat series.  I ran with teammate Kevin Beck over the slick course. Beck let me have the win as he finished 1 second behind me.  We ran 5k splits of 1816/1803/1818/1756/1806/1754, all in all it was a pretty good effort.  I caught a miserable cold the following week (03/11/01) and was out of sorts when I headed to the USATF NE ½ marathon championships.  I was so out of sorts that I forgot my racing flats! Lou Ristaino came to my rescue giving me a pair to race in (he would come to my rescue a couple of months later when I showed up at the Trav’s trail run with 2 left shoes).  I had a lousy run losing the pack at 3 miles and struggling to a 9^th place in the field of nearly 2,000 finishers.  

I finished the month out with a PR at the rarely run 20 mile distance.   I Headed up to Maine for the Eastern States race which ran through NH and finished in MA.  This was my final tune-up leading into the 50k and I was aiming to run 5:30’s to mimic what I hoped to do in the longer race.  I did a 2 mile warm-up with Byrne Decker and Paul low then set out in a fairly big group for the first 2 miles of the race.  I found myself alone in 6^th place through 8 miles when I caught Eric Beauchesne.  We ran together through 13 miles when I moved up into 4^th place, I caught Dave Hinga at 18 (walking!).  I moved into 2^nd place at 19 miles when I passed Matthius.  I could not ease up as Kevin Beck was about 100 yards behind me for the entire race.  I ran a very steady race with 5m splits of 27:04, 27:41, 27:23, and 27:50.