Race Report: 2009 Turkey Trot 5-miler

I'm the blue shirt. Thanks to Carl for the photo.

Interesting race yesterday.

As I wrote in the previous post, I finished the race last year with about 60% of the field in front of me and 40% behind of me. My time was 49 minutes.. just under 10 minutes per mile.

So I walked up to the starting area for this race saw 99% of the 2000-strong field standing in front of the 10 minute per mile area. There was nobody - literally nobody - standing near the "walker" sign behind the 10mpm sign. I decided to take an informal survey of the field. The extreme front - the 5-minute-per-mile sign - looked like it had real competitors - and as I started walking back, by the time I saw the 6-minute per mile sign there were folks standing there who obviously can't run the race that fast. I lined up at the 9-minute-per-mile marker, it looked like that was at 60-70% back from the starting line.

Like last year, the race had 20 minutes of sentimental stage-stuff with honor guards and national anthems, all after the 8:30 scheduled start. When we finally did get under way, it was obvious I made a good choice with my position in the field, it appears that most of the people who lined up at 9mpm were actually capable of running 10mpm, like me. However, I was still shocked at who I passed. Not only were there walkers in front of me who were difficult to pass, but I saw strollers, and even a person with a dog on their leash - all lined up in the middle of a 2000-person field!

And, by the way, if you'd ever like to see a case where races are not limited but really should be, check this race out. The two-lane road is impossibly crowded for for first couple of miles, and when we turn onto the one-lane road, it gets pretty crowded again. Even in the last mile, the crowds made it difficult to pass. It must have been much worse in the main part of the pack. One particularly interesting thing was the police car, presumably there for traffic control, parked on the side of the road a few hundred feet in front of the start. In an already-crowded race, I wondered what the cop was thinking when he left his car there.

I also screwed up, and apparently missed the instruction where I'm supposed to pick up a timing chip at the race, even though they had race packet pickup two days before in a different location. I picked up my packet on Tuesday, and just showed up at the starting line on Thursday morning assuming they didn't have chip timing. Oddly enough, I did go through the packet enough to go through each of the ad fliers and throw most of them out, so I can't imagine how I missed it - but apparently I did.

Anyway, my race went well. My main goal was to finish in under 50 minutes, which I did in 49:47 (net, 50:50 gross). My time last year was 48:34, and my secondary goal was to beat that, which I didn't. Can't complain. I ran hard and did fine.

I make this race sound horrible. It's not. There are better races out there but this one isn't that bad and a lot of friends show up to run it, which always adds to the fun. I'll probably be back next year if I'm in town.

New entries for Steve's blog are published every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 10:00am NY time and can be seen at http://www.tursi.com

Race Preview: 2009 Rockland Lake 5-mile Turkey Trot

The largest running event in Rockland County, every Thanksgiving morning, the Road Runners club here produces a five-mile road race at picturesque Rockland Lake. Offering runners a unique course with challenging hills in the first half and a pancake-flat second half, nearly 2000 folks line up at Rockland Lake's parking lot and run five miles before going home and stuffing themselves silly and sitting on the couch and watching football. It has become a tradition for many, and I've gotta say, it's a lot of fun.

Last year when I did this race, it was my first run after finishing the JFK 50-miler five days before. Any race where I average ten minutes per mile or better is good, and I did really well in 2008, finishing in about 49 minutes, much faster than I expected. My goal in 2009 is to meet or beat last year's time, and I honestly don't think it's going to be easy. Concentrating on long slow distances all year, I've found myself conditioned to slowly walk-run all day if necessary, but speed was gone - my ability to go fast had all but disappeared.

To compensate, for the last few weeks I've focused solely on faster, shorter workouts. Completely devoid of hill-work, I've been spending all of my time at the track or on a treadmill, hammering out sub-ten minute miles for as long as I can go or running 800-1200 meter intervals. Progress has been quick; I'm back to the point where I can maintain that pace for an hour, but that's on a treadmill at 0%. - there is a big difference between 6 miles on a treadmill and 5 miles at Rockland Lake.

Another factor, however, is the crowds. Apparently, most of the folks at this race are rather inexperienced - they simply don't know how to line up for a race. I lined up in 2008 as I always do, near the back of the pack with 10-minute per mile runners. I ended up running on the side of the road, in the grass, for the first half-mile as I passed hundreds of walkers and slower-than-me runners who lined up near the 8 and 9-minute per mile markers. I came in 1046th place out of 1726 finishers, but probably started in around 1700th place. It was really frustrating. In 2009, I will have to line up forward of where I normally go and hope I don't go forward too far. Based on the 2008 results, I guess I'll try to pick a spot with about 60% of the pack in front of me.

Have a great thanksgiving!

New entries for Steve's blog are published every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 10:00am NY time and can be seen at http://www.tursi.com

Quick Tip - remembering treadmill workouts

So one of the little interesting challenges I have is maintaining an accurate, up-to-date log of my runs. Distance, time, and pace. I go out, I do my run, then go home and enter the log on the web site. How do I remember what I did?

For trail runs, I use my forerunner. I get home, sync it with the computer, and it tells me. For track runs, I have some sort of stopwatch and just remember the number of laps I did. And for treadmill runs, I used the notes application on my phone.



I'd get home, look at the most recent run, and enter it in my log.

This worked, but was not without problems. After just finishing a hard run, I'm pretty tired. Entering stuff on an iphone's keyboard without fatfingering everything is hard under normal circumstances - doing it while I can't see straight makes it that much harder.

Last week, a simpler idea occurred to me.



I can just take a picture of the treadmill!



I always have my phone with me because, if I'm working out on a treadmill, I'm definitely listening to something. And it's a lot easier to hit the shutter button than it is to enter numbers on that keyboard. I've been doing this for a couple of weeks and it really works well. Give it a try sometime.



P.S. - Another advantage is, in the photo's meta data, the date and time of the workout is automatically saved for you. It's just there with the photo. And, if you use an iphone or other GPS-enabled device, you even have the location. Pretty nifty.

New entries for Steve's blog are published every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 10:00am NY time and can be seen at http://www.tursi.com