No Snow, No Ice…What’s the point
Sunday, January 22, 2006
Greater Derry Track Club, 11th annual Boston Prep 16-miler
The day started with a dazzling ocean sunrise to reveal a cloudless sunny day. This day brings temperatures in the upper twenties.
Not a bad day…if you like that sort of thing.
Me, if its race day in Derry, I want bad weather conditions. Badder the better.
Just enough bad weather though, they don’t shut down the race.
There was a time when this race went off regardless of the weather, blizzards, black ice..
Now, that’s Derry in January. That’s the Derry 16-miler in my eyes.
So with regrets I make my way north to New Hampshire. I know today it’ll be a mild day with no weather.
I make my way to the school and pick up my number, it’s early 8:20am, race doesn’t start till 10. This race does have a neat feature: the “sunrise start” an hour early for slower folks who still want to taste this course.
This race course congers a bad rap to most. Many feel, next to the Mount Washington Road Race or maybe the Covered Bridges 10K, this is the toughest in New England. Perfect to gauge your Marathon training. The event coordinators have even tried to soft peddle it, saying it’s really not that bad. Yeah, if you take the weather out of it…maybe. Its still one mean course.
For me, I’ve been putting in the miles and have mailed in my registration for the Boston Marathon this year. So I was ready. I usually do this course in 2:32 – 2:34 in 4 previous encounters. “The black ice” year and the “blizzard”. Once when the temp hovered at ZERO and once when it was pushing forty. I’m pretty much a back of the pack, 9:30 pace, kind a guy.
So I find Colonials: Tom Yellope, Mark Rothfuss, Jim Conley and Phil Crawley, and speedsters: Marc Blandin and Frank Nelson getting ready. It’s pretty boring really. The only surprise is this is Phil Crawley’s first time here, other than that it just another race.
I tell Phil to do what I do:
Start off slow, and taper off.
“Tens will get you to the finish” I tell him.
Every one else here from the club is a grizzled Derry Veteran and way faster than I. So with that, we quietly meditate, and get ready for another Derry.
The announcer says it time to make our way the ½ mile to the start so the gym empties out. And we all fall in quietly and move to the start line. The race sold out this year with a 600 person cap. I walk silently with Phil, Mark and Jim, lost in crowd. Phil and I seed ourselves at the back and almost don’t hear the start of the race.
It takes us 30 seconds to get the start line and we settle in on the first mile uphill start.
First mile is leisurely10:28 and Phil next to me. We fall in with a pack of wimmin I’ll later regret and subconsciously punish. One of these wimmin is a non-stop talker with a voice that carries. I try to put some distance between us and I find myself with a group of likewise thinkers.
Together we raffle off a downhill 3 mile tear, 8:30s and this lady yapper takes notice and tells her friend to pick it up as well, talking seemingly without taking a breath. There a collective sigh in the group with me leading the charge to lose this girl.
Mile five is uphill: 9:32 for 46:04 by my watch.
Downhill to six: 9:22.
Seven is further downhill: 10:06,
Eight is flat: 8:51.
Nine is where the fun begins and the place where Phil drops out with leg pain. I lean on it to distance myself from these wimmin folk who have taken to walk up the hill: 9:28.
The talker has finally shut up.
At ten three wimmin catch up with me and pass: 9:32 for 93 minutes.
At eleven, I smile to see the steep rise, a chance to lose them for sure. Passing walkers by the bushel, I shorten my strides and maintain my pace and pass them all again.
All I hear behind me is a lot of huffing and puffing.
Miles eleven: 9:52,
Twelve: 9:45
At thirteen I sense the wimmin folks weakness as one draws even with me and I crush them with a 8:53 to leave them all far behind for good.
I pass the half a 2:02, I put the hammer down.
Fourteen: a 9:19 and sensing the finish line nearby,
fifteen: a 9:09
An the last a 9:04 for 2:29:04 by my watch.
With the last hundred yards to go I pass a slower runner who’s friend is waiting for him. They meet up and this guys friend starts coaching him on to the finish and they both pass me with a couple hundred feet to go. “The heck with this”, I steam past them and close the book. Now I usually just head back to change, but today I turn around to see where these wimmin are. One by one they straggle in and with a respectful nod I cheer them on.