Run for Hope 10k

That's what we will call the race this time around, although we know it has many other names.

This was my 17th time running this race and my 2nd slowest time, but one of my most successful races.

After a long road back to returning to some normal running, including  5 mile week the week after Dublin, I was able to string together weeks of 41.6, 31.6, 42.7, 37.7 and I had my biggest week, the week of the race with a 51.1.

This is not much training, but it was consistent, getting out the door almost every day running on the same borrrrrinnnng roads over and over again.  I am still a fat bastard, but at least I am under 190 almost every day now.

I knew going into the race that this would possibly be my slowest run ever in Newport.  I have not run a mile under 6 mins since June, but thought I would be able to run somewhere around 6:10 pace.

As usual we had a solid group of Turtles and we headed out for a warm up, again on boring roads and then headed down to the start.  It was a beautiful day with minimal wind, so a singlet and gloves it was.

Although, I was thinking I could run somewhere in the 6:10 range, I didn't really have a time goal, I just wanted to run an even pace and I really wanted to be 3rd Turtle.  I knew what the other guys have been running in races lately and thought I would be able to probably pull that goal off, depending on how the race shook out.

A quick broken up recap of the race itself.  One of the slowest years in race history, no one went out very quickly.  I was just under 6 at the mile and only a bit back from the chase pack. 

I went back and forth with Turtles, Nick Fox and Bob Corsi early, but then they faded and I ran most of the race yo-yoing with Fred Campagna; this ended up helping my race tremendously.

At 2 mile I thought I was in over my head, as my legs were screaming and I was hacking up a lung from being sick all week, but I was able to basically hold on to that pace/effort the whole race.

Fred and I kept passing people that start out too fast and at 4 we were able to catch the 3rd place Turtle, Steve Croft.  From that point on I was running scared and got a little gap on Fred.

After the left onto Carroll I was surging telephone polls to keep me engaged and it seem to work.  I saw Jeff Walker ahead and with a cop just standing there doing nothing it looked like Jeff almost took a right at the last turn instead of the left.  The cop just stood there for me as well...

And down the hill to the 6 and up the hill to the finish and it was over.  37:09 right around 6s for my 17th finish.  Full Results

I couldn't have been happier and I am excited to get in shape!

We have a group of 8 or so do a cool-down.....then we grabbed our prizes and headed over to Pour Judgment where we hung out for the next 5 or 6 hours.

All and all it was another good day in Newport.

Bronson in the background, monitoring my finish

Race history....

2018 - 9th Place - 37:09
2017 - 5th Place - 35:17
2016 - 4th place - 34:24
2015 - 2nd place - 34:05
2014 - 4th place - 34:55
2013 - 3rd place - 34:13
2012 - 4th place - 33:49
2011 - 2nd place - 35:02
2010 - 3rd place - 35:29
2009 - 3rd place - 34:04
2008 - 4th place - 33:56
2007 - 5th place - 33:36
2006 - 7th place - 35:11
2005 - 5th place - 34:09
2004 - 7th place - 33:50
2003 - Didn't Run
2002 - Didn't Run
2001 - 18th place - 38:17
2000 - 8th place - 36:24

Still Kinda Running Again

Good news; the Dublin Marathon did not injure me anymore than I already was!  The week after the race I took super easy, basically all off.  I got back on my PT and stretching routine and the 3 weeks that followed, I ran everyday but one, which I took off on purpose.

I am still a fat bastard, but I feel like I am getting range of motion back in my right leg and the pain has gotten more and more bearable.

10/28 to 11/3
Run: 2 days: 28.3 miles, 26.2 mile long run
Days off: 5 day

11/4 to 11/10
Run: 7 days: 38.3 miles, 8 mile long run
Bike: 1 day: 2.7 miles
Days off: 0 days

11/11 to 11/17
Run: 6 days: 32.6 miles, 6.5 mile long run
Bike: 1 day: 7.7 miles
Days off: 0 days

11/18 to 11/24
Run: 7 days: 41.2 miles, 8.2 mile long run
Days off: 0 days

On Thanksgiving I did the TNT run per usual, that was the biggest test my ol' hip/groin has seen yet, 8+ miles but on hilly terrain and I came out of it ok.  I fell off the pace a bit at the end, but overall I felt pretty good.

Hopefully things continue in this direction and I can start doing some work outs and hopefully racing to full capacity in the spring!!

Kinda Running Again

I have been banged up since the last week of May after taking what seemed like a harmless tumble over a log on a group trail run, turned into my longest "break" from running since I started running.  I am also at the heaviest weight of my life...so I need to get my rear in gear!

I still have some pain, but with some help from PT, things seem to be looking up and I have kinda started to run more on a consistent basis.

I was also signed up for some cyclocross races, but I decided to forego those as well, to ensure I get healthy and running again before the snow falls.

Here is a weekly summary of the last four weeks...starting with Sunday of course.

9/30 to 10/6
Run: 5 days: 16 miles, 3.5 mile long run
Bike: 2 days: 15 miles
Days off: 1 day

10/7 to 10/13
Run: 5 days: 18.9 miles, 6.3 mile long run
Bike: 1 day: 8.3 miles
Days off: 2 days

10/14 to 10/20
Run: 4 days: 18.7 miles, 6.3 mile long run
Bike: 3 days: 13.7 miles
Days off: 1 day

10/21 to 10/27
Run: 4 days: 13.6 miles, 6.3 mile long run
Bike: 0 days: 0 miles
Days off: 3 days

10/28/18
Dublin Marathon
3:20:53
1:39:48/1:41:05

Held together reasonably well considering I have averaged 9.33 miles per week the 10 weeks proceeding the race with a long run of 6.3 miles.  Dublin is a great city, the race was awesome.  People love the crowds at Boston...Dublin is better.

Hopefully I did not make my injury worse!  Some rest now and back to trying to train...

ENDURrun 2006

Since it is ENDURrun week and I only started this blog the year before the last ENDURrun I ran, so I never did any posts about it, I thought I would link to Brad Cunningham's blog from 2006. 

It was fun reading these posts during the event that year, getting a story every night from the guy I was racing.

The race has come a long way since that year, which was the lowest turnout ever for the event...

Stage 1
Stage 2
Stage 3
Stage 4
Stage 5
Stage 6
Stage 7

2018 Run with the Beavers Trail Race

The 2018 Run with the Beavers Trail Race has come and gone.  This year the race served as the USATF-NE Trail Championship and was also in the USATF ATR and WMAC Grand Tree Series.  I feel like overall the race was a great success.  Here are a few takeaways.

Yapping away...

•  Lots of people! I had approximately 374 people signed up for the race this year, yet in the results there were only 271 finishers! 176 in the 10 mile and 95 in the 5 mile. I had more than 50 people tell me prior to the race they wouldn’t be there, so that still leaves a whole bunch of no shows. 

• There were 11 states represented in the pre-registrations. Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Virginia. 

• There were 16 teams represented.

• Both the male and female 10 mile course records were broken. As was the male 5 mile record. 

• 300+ flags were put out on the 5ish mile loop. That is an average of a flag every 0.017 miles or every 90 feet or so. (Obviously this # is skewed because of flag clusters on turns) But, there are a lot of flags on the course. 

• We went through around 40 gallons of water. 

• I am still in search for a large inflatable beaver…please find one for me. 

• Josh Fields took over 5000 photos, check them out!

• Check out the FULL RESULTS

See you next year!

2018 Soapstone Mountain Trail Race

I intend to do as at least 6 races in the WMAC Grand TreeSeries this year and the next on my schedule was the Soapstone Mountain Trail Race.  This race has been on my list for a bunch of years, it just has never worked into the schedule.  Before the race, I looked up some old blog reports and looked at Strava data from last year’s event.  The course ended up being changed again this year, which made it over a mile longer than the previous year which was longer than past years.  So, I was looking for around 13.5 miles on the watch and I got just a bit more, which extended the time on the trail just a bit.

The race itself…it started out with Tim Van Orden, Kurt Hackler, myself and some younger dude.  We ran briskly on the downhill dirt road in the first half mile or so and then got on the single track, before even the mile the young dude was making moves for position, it was clear he was probably going to have a long day on the trails.

The pace on the single rack felt a bit too brisk for me and I stopped paying attention to the 3 ahead of me and from there on ran my own race.

By 4 miles, I had gone up the “Wall of Sand” that you had to traverse on all fours and then “Killer Hill” at just after 3 miles which I slogged up at 21 min mile pace, just to get to the top and drop down on a slick technical downhill.  Young dude took a tumble thee and I passed him on the next small up.  The kid that ended up finishing second passed me shortly after that and I ran the last 10 or so miles alone.

The rest of the race had its ups and downs, terrain and energy levels.  I felt like I was running as slow as one could possibly run in spots and I still never got passed.

The turning point in the race was coming out to a road crossing where two people were standing.  They told me I was in 3^rd (a surprised because I WAS in 4^th, but Kurt went off course) they told me I had a downhill coming up…YAY! And they told me there was about a mile and a half to go!  How much?!  Oh boy….  After the downhill you popped out into a parking lot that we were previously in, so now things looked familiar.  I knew we would get onto a dirt road and then there would be one last road climb to the finish.  There was no quickness in my finishing speed.  I simply just got through the last 5 mins of this race.  I finished in 2:06:48  FULL RESULTS

Photo: Scott Livingston

After finished, I traded war stories and watched Ralph finish, I apologized for inviting him to the race.  I drank 1 too many sodas, which really made my stomach unhappy and off to Willimantic Brewing Company for some food and beer.

I am happy I finally got to run this long standing race and it definitely kicked my ass.  I was very sore for days. 

I have a pretty busy June, from when I started this post like a week ago and now, I have decided to skip the next two races in the Grand Tree which I was going to do.  So, next up will be Gaspee Days 5k on June 9^th, Ribfest 5 Mile on June 17^th, my birthday!  Ribfest is the 3^rd race in the USATF-NE Grand Prix Series.  After that I will be running the JP Morgan Corporate Challenge in Boston for the first time.  That is on June 21^st. 

Doyle's Emerald Merrimack River

Two races have happened in the last two weeks, so lets recap them.

The first race was the Doyle’s Emerald Necklace 5 Mile Road Race on April 8^th.  This was my 8th year in a row running this race.  I was hoping to crack 28 mins and came close with a 28:10.  I ran the 2^nd half of the race faster, which is pretty much the norm at Doyle’s with the topography of the course being as it is.  I still felt like I was on edge with the lack of work outs, but was able to keep it together and not crash and burn.  I was lucky that I was caught around 3 miles and had someone to battle with all the way until 400 meters to go.  I lost that battle, but it definitely made my time faster.

Photo by Scott Mason

As usual the after race party was a lot of fun.  It was a chilly day, but the sun popped out occasionally and we had a big group to have some fun with.

The week between Doyle’s and my next race, the Merrimack River 10 Mile Trail race, I took pretty easy.  Just got in some miles and did a light work out on Thursday.  I wasn’t going to do a work out, but Dave wanted to get something in, so I said I would join him for some of it.  It was a bit too close to the race, but I doubt it hurt me much if any.

Race day was a beautiful morning, a little chill in the air, but perfect for racing.  I have only race at Merrimack once and that was back in 2010.  I remember struggling a bit at the end of that race and not being overly happy with how I did.  I ran 1:05:16 that day, so I wanted to run faster than that this year.  I thought I might be able to crack 64.

The race played out a bit funny for me.  I felt like the start was not as frantic as in 2010 and after going under the over pass I settled in in 4^th place behind Tim VanOrden, Kurt Hackler and to my surprise I was right on the shoulder of Brandon Newbould.  We stayed like this quite a while.  My legs felt great, on the little ups my stomach was for some reason unhappy with me, but overall I felt like I was running within myself.  There were a couple spots where I let a little gap grow but without trouble I bridged it.  I could feel that Pat Rich and another runner were on my tail, but had not caught me yet….But then, the damn hill happened.   The hill going up to the powerlines just wrecked me.  I was crawling up that thing.  I made a segment on Strava and I ran 14:32 pace for the approx. 0.10 section.  People I beat by 10 mins in the race went up that section faster than I did.  Pat and the other runner went by me going up the hill and got a pretty good gap by the time we went through the powerlines into the new trail section.  It took me a while to get my legs back.  On the way back I felt like I had some good sections and not so good sections.  I was alone pretty much from the powerlines home, but kept catching a glimpse of the runners ahead.  After the hill at 7.5 I caught up to the runner that was with Pat and passed him, he was not running too well at that point.  Definitely in a world of hurt.  With less than a mile to go, Colin Carroll came up and passed me.  I didn’t know at the time, but I guess himself and Jim Pawlicki and some others “missed a turn” near the new hill section and cut off around 0.1 miles and 50’ of climb from the course.  He ended up ahead of me by 4 seconds in the end.  I finished in 1:04:44. So technically I was 5^th place and not 6^th ;)  But it does not affect the Grand Tree % results, so I am not overly concerned with it.

Photo by Denise Underwood

My take a ways from Merrimack are pretty much the same as my other recent races.  I need to get in more work outs and more specifically for any of these races with steep climbs, I need to start doing some work outs with some steep trail climbs.  They are so different than the big rollers on the road that I am generally good at.  Either way, work needs to be done.

I was happy to get in a decent mileage day with a 2 mile warm up and cool down.  Stuck around for the ridiculous (fun) raffle and then made a bloody mess in my car.  Which reminds me I forgot to mention I almost hung myself on the race course.  I mile in there were some hanging vines and as they got knocked around as we went thru them, somehow it got caught around my neck and actually yanked me back.  I still have some pretty red marked that go half way around my neck!  Good times!!

Frank Nealon Boston Tune-Up 15k

Here is a down and dirty race report for the 2^nd race in the USATF-NE GP.  The Frank Nealon Boston Tune-Up 15k.  A race I have never run and a race it seems pretty much no one I knew had ever run it either.  I read run course previews and I thought the course would be somewhat similar to the Old Fashioned 10 Mile in Foxboro, MA.  In hindsight, I think the course was a tad harder than Foxboro, border lining on Amherst….without the really big hills that Amherst has.

The race itself for me went pretty well.  I was hoping to break 54 mins and get as close as I could to 53:30 if all went well.  I ended up running 53:47.  So, pretty much smack dab in the middle of my goal range.  I felt like I executed the race reasonably.  My first mile was 5:45 right on pace and I raced well against the people that I was around.  I think the biggest take away for me was that I finished closer to a pack of runners that were around a minute up on me at New Bedford and also beat some others that were ahead of me there.

Napping near the start...

I do think I got a bit complacent in the last mile or so, I was OK with breaking my goal time and certainly didn’t give it “all I had” in the last half mile or so, you can see by my "taking a nap photo" You can check out more of Ted Tyler's pics HERE

Napping near the finish...

The next race in the GP isn’t until June, so I have plenty of time to either get in better shape or lose motivation all together!  I have a lot on my plate before then to keep motivation up though.  Next up is Doyle’s Emerald Necklace this coming Sunday, followed by the Merrimack River Trail Race on 4/14/18.

2018 New Bedford 1/2 Marathon

First race in the USATF-NE GP happened.  That’s about all I have to say about it!  Overall, the conditions were pretty good.  It was cold at the start, but felt warm in the back stretch.  The wind was typical New Bedford wind.  It sucked, but it was WAYYY worse last year.

I went in thinking I could run sub 5:50 pace, but it was evident early that I was not running as comfortable as I would have liked.

Miles 1 thru 4 I started well, not getting pulled out too fast and didn’t attack the hills, just got through them.  I was 543-555-605-608.  I was really surprised with miles 3 and 4.  I thought they would be slightly faster.

After 4, you have the fast section of NB.  I still didn’t feel overly comfortable.  I thought it should feel a bit easier than the effort I was putting out.  But, I was able to get into somewhat of a groove and finally felt like I was at least giving it an honest effort.  I was 535-540-532-553-545-554 through 10 miles in 58:12 or so.  I was happy with the 10 mile split, but I definitely had to work way to hard for that time.

Now the fun begins…9 to 10 was already windy and you have to fight it through 11 and then on and off all the way up the hill through about 20k.

The mile 11 mark was put in the wrong spot, but I was 1215 10 to 12 and then 603 for 13. 

Official finishing time of 1:17:19, a tad faster than last year, but still shit slow.

With my lack of any real work outs, I am not overly surprised that the pace felt like it did, I have OK general fitness right now, but I really did not do my self any favors over the last month with neglecting the longer work outs.  I blame the cold and snow.  Yup…that’s what it was.

New GP race is in 2 weeks.  Not much time to help the fitness, but I will give it a whirl!

2018 Old Mountain Trail 5k

Old Mountain Field is a deceiving place. You would never think that these fun little trails are back in this small area. I was pleasantly surprised the first year I ran the race in 2012 and every year has been a little different, between course changes and weather.

December 2012 - 3rd place – 18:57 Fast dry year

January 2014 - 1st place – 23:32 Snow year

December 2014 - 3rd place – 19:08 unmemorable year

December 2015 - 6th place 21:34 Hungover year, TNT Christmas Party the night before.

February 2017 Did Not Run

I felt pretty good going into this race. My training has been uneventful, but consistent. No work outs to speak of, a few solid long runs and a few shorter races.

If I were Eric Lonergan, I would take out every one of these trail races the way he took this one out. FAST. This certainly made me suck wind early, but I said fuck it and went with it. Eric and Greg had a good gap pretty early and I followed Brightman. After about a mile I went by Steve and felt like Greg was coming back a bit, but I think it was just the twisty nature of the course that made him feel closer than he was. I still felt pretty good as we started through the “swamp area” it is twisty and not much of a defined trail. I never felt over my head and was making good progress and then BAM I went down. It was a solid fall but I was up pretty quick, but it definitely took my legs away from me, it took a while to get going again. Once I did I was quickly caught by Garvin and Ronald McTall guy. We headed towards the rock bridge creek crossing, where we were met by the same stupid guy with his two dogs off leash on trail. It was a good thing they were off leash, but this was the second time in the race that these dogs brought us to a crawl, I had to put my hands on the dogs and move them out of the way; fun times. After that we started uphill downhill flat hill who the hell remembers and Garvin and Mr. McTall man went by me. Garvin was passed shortly after. We hit the faster, wider trails on the course and the slick bridges. My new Inov-8s that seemed so sticky and grippy on the ice were basically, as Garvin put it, like roller skates on the bridges. I slid right off one of them. Out onto the field before re-entering the woods, Galoob was yelling at us. I was being caught by Old Man Brightman and Jonny was within distance. There is a hard left-hand turn when re-entering the woods and of course I slipped there too and we head back up the next to lastish hill and that’s when I was just fucking done. Brightman went by me after the stairs and I stayed close, but I was gassed, nothing left.

February 2018 - 6th place 20:18 Wet and muddy year

We did a group cool-down with the WTAC guys and headed over to The Mews. We had a pretty solid Turtle group, plus Brightman and Leslie OD. After that some of us headed up to Proclamation Ale
Company and one thing led to another and it was 7:30pm. A fun Saturday I would say.

2018 Krispy Kreme Challenge

Here is a brief recap of my 4th Krispy Kreme Challenge.

As usual, we arrived on Friday, the day before the race. The day is filled with travel, then eating and drinking in Raleigh. This year we had a couple addictions to our crew. Fellow Turtle Ralph Lufkin came down and convinced his friend Jason Gilmore to travel in from Washington DC. Also, a fellow Toll Gate alum, who had run the race a few times prior to us came down as well.

We ate and drank in a responsible manner (well I did). This made race day morning an easy wake-up and I felt ready to roll. This was by far the coldest year of the race with the starting temp around 23 degrees. No big deal for a normal road race…but at Krispy Kreme it meant for frozen water cups at the donut eating area and very frozen/numb/burning hands for the run back.

The race went out per usual, with the herds of college kids going out like it is a 100 meter dash. I went through the mile in 5:27 and felt good. I was running with the multi time KKC winner Nick Oltman for a minute or so before pulling away, if I could only figure out his donut eating secret, I could be a contender for the W.

After he mile I passed a few more people and then one more around 2 miles to end up in 7th place heading into the eating area.

Same ole, same ole in there. It’s a wet, sugary dough dilled experience. I could see Ralph and Mark whom came in after me eating away. Ralph finished about 10 seconds before me and I took off after him and passed him before leaving the zone, he said I made a lot of grunting noises and I was off to the races.

New for me this year was that I had someone around the same speed leave the eating area at the same time as me. We had an elbow to elbow race all the way back. He would put a few steps away from me and then me from him. With just over a mile to go, we passed one of his friends and it gave him a boost. I think it was too much of a boost for his body to handle though; I passed him shortly after and was able to open up a 4 second lead from there til the finish.

 

I have had a goal since my first KKC to finish in the top 10 and have been pretty close in my previous three attempts. I wasn’t sure what place I finished when crossing the finish line and had to wait a bit to find out as I ran back to the hotel quickly to tend to my frozen literally frosty hands. After I took care of that issue, I ran back to the finish line and met up with everyone and headed to the result tent and got my print out………..drum roll please……9th place!! I was pretty excited. I also ran 4 seconds faster than the previous year, keeping my streak of running faster every year alive!

 

2015 – 19th 37:17
2016 – 13th 35:13
2017 – 18th 34:45
2018 – 9th 34:41 <---official time

The rest of the trip was great as usual, lots of great breweries and food was had. The most amazing part about the 2018 edition, other than getting 9th place was that we had no flight issues. We made it to Raleigh and back to Warwick without issue.

Next year, I WILL be in better running shape and I might….figure out how to eat faster, probably not though!

2018 USATF East Region and NE Masters Championship

Another January and another USATF East Region and NE Masters Championship that I did not plan on running, nor did I train for, yet I ended up at.

I was pretty positive I was NOT going to run this race this year, but I ended up deciding to run it about a week and a half out. I did not decide what to run until about 4 days before the race though

I settled on running the 3000, mile and 800. I have no desire to run the 5000 on the indoor track and will never do it no matter what!

I figured I would give the 800 a whirl, because why not!

Here is a very quick run-down of each race.

3000 meters
First race of the day for me, I felt like I got out well and fell behind a big group of guys that went out behind Scott Leslie. I knew Scott would win and would probably be a minute in front of me. After a couple of laps I caught up to the group that was ahead of me and I settled in. When I felt like my stride was getting hindered, I move by 2 or 3 of them and fell in behind 2nd place. Same deal with 2nd place, after like 3 more laps I went by because I felt I was being slowed. I didn’t want to be the one doing the work, but away I went. I was able to hold on to 2nd place running just under 10 mins in 9:57. Mission accomplished.

Excuse me...

Pardon me...

1 Mile
I was pretty spent from the 3000 and I did not get out too well in this race. Of course I wanted to get as close to 5 flat as possible and went out just over pace in around 38. I went through the half in around 2:33+ and kinda just held onto that running 5:08. I was able to run some people down in the 2nd half of the race, so that was good.

800 meters
Hahaha….yeah. Well. I had a stretch goal of breaking 2:20. It was not that long ago that I would end 800 meter work outs in the low 2:20s….but hey, you are only as fast as what you train for and I don’t train for the track. With that said, I felt I got out great in the first 100 meters. I wasn’t sleeping like I was in the mile. I went through the 400 in around 70/71 and damn my legs hated me. I brought it home in a 2:24 and was happy to not be running around a track again anytime soon.

Overall the day was a success in my opinion. I got the legs turning over and I got to have some “fun” racing. Next year...I will do some work outs prior to race day!

Full Results

Per usual, a big group of us hit Ogie’s Trailer Park for after race food and drinks. It has turned into a pretty nice tradition.

East Coast Mile/Resolution Beach Double

Friday night I was talking to Dave and he mentioned he would be running the Open Mile at the East Coast Invite in the AM. I wasn’t sure what I was planning on doing for a run, so I said what the hell, I will do it too. We were able to talk Bronson into it as well. I knew I am in no shape to run a fast mile and figured I could probably run around 5:10. I really had no pacing plan; I just wanted to get out (not too stupidly) and basically hold on and try to kick.

We bumped into Dave Dunham and also Keith McAteer; whom runs with us on Tuesday nights. We had a decent group for a warm up inside, We could have run outside in the 50+ degree temps, but I don’t think Dave P wanted to get his shoes wet, so around and around we went.

So, after running in circles and waiting for some other races, it was our time to line up and get rolling.  It was a pretty big heat, so Dave P, Bronson and I were in the back row. This definitely got us out a bit slow, but it wasn’t a big deal. I was through the first lap + a little slow, but my body and my mind needed a slap to figured out this wasn’t a 10 mile race, it was a MILE! Pick it up!

The middle part of the race went pretty well, I passed 4 or 5 guys that went out a lot quicker. Going through the lap to go one of those guys went by me and put 3 seconds on me in the last lap! I finished in 5:07. Not fast, but around what I anticipated.

After picking up a certificate for finishing top 8? And an Allie’s Donut because well, we were offered one….it was now OK to go outside and get our feet wet! We ran a 4 mile loop through Providence. It was a bit windy!

The next day was the Resolution Beach and Trail Race. This race was originally supposed to be on Saturday but was postponed until Sunday. It was A LOT colder on Sunday morning. It was around 15 degrees heading down to Scarborough Beach. It was also pretty darn windy on the beach.

Beach :)

We had a pretty good sized group for the warm up, as we headed up (down?) the beach towards the trail area. RD Mike Galoob was there and gave us the rundown of the new loop through the trail section. It personally like the new layout…even with the ice you had to go over in both directions this year. I hope he keeps it like this for future races.

Fast forward to the race…it was windy as always on the beach and after Mike drew a starting line in the sand it was off we go. Not having the out and back section on the beach this year was a nice surprise. As we headed out on the beach, people start taking different lines, but after a bit we all came together before taking the left into the dunes towards the trail. Eric Lonegran led with Jake Cardello and Greg Hammett, I passed Brightman as we made the turn and soon went by Jake. I felt like we weren’t out nearly as fast as previous years and felt good through the new trail area. Eric, Greg and myself stayed pretty close through 2 miles and up the only real hill on the course. When the course flattened out and got on the gravel area, Eric definitely put some ground on Greg and myself. The next mile everything stayed about the same, Greg and I took the un-preferred line back over the ice, I really wish I had gone on the right side, as I may have gotten by Greg, but I am sure the result would have been the same in the end. I was happy to be right on his heels through the house and off the rock wall. Greg’s basketball jumping skills out did mine jumping across the water crossing and he gaped me a bit on the beach, taking second by 7 seconds. Eric was up on me by 26 seconds. I feel that I could have pushed a bit harder, but sub consciously was content with being that close to those guys. Greg beat me by 1:19 at Lil Rhody, so I am cool with being within striking distance. 

Full Results
Scott's Pics

Whalers

After the race, we had a solid crew for the cool down and picked up Mike’s flags. Some beer awards and a change later and it was off to Mews for lunch….and then a trip to Whalers.

The 2017 that wasn't?

I wasn't going to do any "year end" post, but I liked the stat section of Jeff Walker's blog, so I decided to copy him a bit!  This was not a great year of running for me.  I never felt like I was ready to run a good race and just managed to get through the USATF-NE Grand Prix Series!  At least that was the one goal I had for the year and I accomplished it.  Here are some numbers for my year...as close as I could figure!

Grog & Dog win # 8

• Races run: 19
• Race breakdown by terrain: Road - 13, Trail - 2, Indoor Track - 1, CX - 3
• Race wins: 1
• Miles run: 2,494.2 mi - Lowest year since 2013
• Elevation run: 76,398 ft
• Most elevation gain in a single run: 1,669 ft
• Time run: 307h 43m
• Days run: 306
• Lowest mileage week: 9.4 (pneumonia)
• Highest mileage week: 91.3 (S-S) - 90.9 (M-S)
• Highest mileage day: 26.7 (marathon and WU)
• Longest running streak: 39 days
• Longest non-running streak: 3 days
• Number of segment CRs: 5
• Number of states run in: 5
• Number of countries run in: 2
• Run furthest from home: Mexico

CMS @ Ribfest

Me & myself!

TNT Thanksgiving Day Group Run

So what's up for 2018?  I kinda don't know.  I really don't know where to put my focus.  I will be going back to the Krispy Kreme Challnege for the 4th year in a row in February.  The USATF-NE GP starts up in March at New Bedford and then the Boston Tune-up 15k.  I guess right now those are the races I should be gearing up for.

Later in the year there are more GP race.  Dave wants to run a Spring marathon, but I am still up in the air on focusing on doing that.

There may be an adventure run in August and then I am sure I will do a Fall marathon.

I guess in general, I would like to just be in better running shape this year and race more....but race while in shape instead of feeling like I am always fighting to get in shape!

Also....I will be doing more cyclocross races this year.  I am in the process of acquiring a bike and I have been supplementing my runs with some trainer rides.  I am hoping jumping on the trainer after runs will help with some leg strength, help my fat-ass lose some weight and of course get me cyclocross race ready come the Summer/Fall!