BostonBound59

Posted by Mike Merra at 9:28 PM    

Labels: Steamtown Marathon

Posted by Mike Merra at 8:50 PM    

Labels: Granite State Flash, Mont Vernon, Santa Claus

There are plenty of local road races devoted to worthy causes but the St. Charles Children’s Home 5k race has got to be at the top of the list. The St. Charles Children Home in Rochester, founded in 1945 by the Grey Nuns of Canada was originally an orphanage and now serves as a group placement home under the direction of New Hampshire Catholic Charities for children from families in crisis. The home is staffed by Daughters of Mary, Mother of Healing Love. During the summer of 1996, the children’s running program at St. Charles was developed to help the children cope with the stress and anger accompanying placement and separation issues. The home’s philosophy is that running acts as a natural antidepressant and ultimately enables the enhancement of each child’s self esteem. The program has attracted national media attention, here is a short video link to a CBS Morning story on St. Charles back in 2006: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=2042470n&tag=related;photovideo

We’ve run 12 out of the 13 St. Charles races. The race was originally held at Spaulding High School in Rochester but due to the size of the field the race was moved to Pease International Tradeport. The last 6 or 7 years we’ve made it an unofficial mini-family reunion with my parents along with my sisters Anne and JJ, their husbands and eight children usually attending or running the race. Today we also had a number of Granite State Flash runners (Ben Platt, Ethan Platt, Jake Rowell, Brett Quinn) competing led by Justin (pictured above) and Jan Platt. Cathy ran a great race finishing 3rd overall in 18:34 despite running 22 miles Saturday. I do not recover from long runs nearly as fast as my better half as my quads were cooked from the start and I didn't even attempt to stay with her and finished in 19:00. My sister Anne looked very strong (see picture above) finishing 25:51 accompanied by my nephew William (to her left) who ran unofficially as he is competing in his first year running cross country for St. Thomas Aquinas in Dover. Last but not least was my nephew Jonathan Donovan, our Ethiopian speedster (in his basketball high tops) who took it out hard in the children’s race.

Posted by Mike Merra at 11:06 PM    

Labels: St. Charles Childrens Home

I'll be taking a break from blogging for a while starting today. I've enjoyed the blog but today I started coaching with the Nashua PAL school program and will coach the Granite State Flash youth boys from late October until mid-December. I am also running more than 70 miles/week getting ready for my October 11, 2009 marathon in Scranton, Pennsylvania, so, combined with family and work responsibilities, I need to put this blog (temporarily) on the shelf. I hope to pick it up again after the Flash season ends in December and we begin training for Boston 2010. I might however put up a post next Monday after the St. Charles Children Home race in Portsmouth which we've done 11 years in a row as well as a short post after my October marathon.

As I temporarily close up shop, here is a 10 minute slideshow I put together from the 113th Boston Marathon on April 20, 2009. The photos are from a variety of sources including family, friends as well as online sources. I did my best to include our Granite State Flash and Gate City Strider runners. I apologize in advance to those runners who were not included...I literally spent hours online looking for photos of everyone I knew who was running.

Posted by Mike Merra at 10:24 PM    

Labels: Boston Marathon, Granite State Flash, Nashua PAL

The past week has been brutal payback for the cool and rainy summer we experienced here in New Hampshire from late June into early August. I'm a terrible hot weather runner so 4 out of 5 days this past week I (reluctantly) crawled out of bed early, put on my running gear and headed down to Nashua and the Mine Falls trails near where I work to get my run out of the way before the day's heat and humidity set in. Since we were planning to head to Portland, Maine from Friday afternoon until late Saturday and had a New Hampshire Grand Prix Race Sunday, I had to do my weekly long run--this week a 22 miler at 6:00 A.M. Friday.

For this summer's training cycle leading into my fall marathon I'm doing just four 20+ mile runs (vs. 8 for Boston) with shorter 16-18 mile "progression" runs in the alternate weeks. I felt I was flat at Boston and the extra 20 milers didn't help. This past Friday was my 2nd 20 miler in the cycle and quite ugly. When I began at Nashua South High School at 6:00 A.M. Friday the humidity was in excess of 70 degrees and the air temps. close to 80. When I finished more than three hours later the sun had broken through the overcast skies and heat index was in excess of 100. My pace was very slow--about 8:50/mile yet I was working harder each mile than the previous week when my pace was closer to 8 minutes a mile on a much hillier course. To make matters worse at about the 15 mile mark I experienced every runner's nightmare--in an instant I was pinned for close to 5 minutes against a car by a growling 8 month old pit bull (teeth fully bared...inches from my ankles) in a neighborhood near Nashua North High School. He had apparently jumped over the back yard fence when he heard my footsteps. Although the owner was (mildly) apologetic, even he couldn't get control of his dog. Only when a neighbor came over and threatened the pooch with a large tree branch did he run off. As one respected lawyer told me many years ago...forgive and remember.

On Saturday things turned more positive and we had a great 9 mile run along the ocean in Portland harbor and Sunday we returned to New Hampshire and ran the annual Moose on the Loose 10 miler in Mine Falls. Despite being quite sore from Friday's long run I couldn't race but ran a comfortable 7:19 training pace for 10 miles. The course was actually short .25 miles according to my Garmin as the official results had me at 7:11 pace although I did run the 2nd half of the course about three minutes faster than the first half (37:08 vs. 34:11). Cathy's marathon is one week later than mine so she was able to race this week and ran a solid 1:06 to finish 3rd
overall. I've posted some great pictures of Sunday's race taken by Ethan Platt. Here is a link to the whole album: http://plattracingphotography.shutterfly.com/2009mooseontheloose10m/4

Here are the results: http://www.coolrunning.com/results/09/nh/Aug23_MooseO_set1.shtml

Posted by Mike Merra at 9:50 PM    

Labels: Gate City Striders, Nashua

My son Chris is a runner but prefers to juggle. We have the dents on our living room ceiling to prove it. Here is a 5 minute juggling video he put together (filmed in our back yard) a few days ago and posted on juggling tv.

Posted by Mike Merra at 9:30 PM    

Labels: juggling, upper body workout

It has been many years since I’ve run the Cigna 5k race but I decided to give it another shot this year after a nine year hiatus. The race is by far the largest field of any distance in New Hampshire and one of the largest 5k fields in New England with close to 5000 runners. I last ran the race in 2000 with temps close to 90 degrees and vowed it would be my last Cigna. This year I decided to find out what kind of shape I was in after a month of distance training for my Fall marathon. We lucked out with temperatures in the low to mid 70’s as race time approached plus we had a slight tailwind blowing in from the north which would help in the final (always brutal) mile down Canal Street before taking a left and finishing on Merrimack Street.

The field was loaded with elite runners. We had a decent 25 minute warm up but due to the size of the field we needed to get to the starting line earlier than usual just to hold a spot to prevent from getting boxed in during the early going. My goal was to run close to 18:30 (my previous PR on this course was in 2000 in 19:48—just before two knee surgeries) so I knew I had to get out fast to have a chance at 18:30. The gun went off after a long wait and the first mile is a straight shot up Elm Street. I’m not a natural 5k runner and felt very unsteady and out of sync as we pushed away from the start and thought to myself how much easier it would be to just pull up, bag it for the night and go on a long run but after about ¾ mile I started getting into my rhythm and passed the first mile mark in 5:54. I often describe to others that the first mile in a 5k feels like entering a state of semi-shock—you are standing still for several minutes then suddenly accelerating out from the start at speeds I rarely reach even during our Strider track work outs. Karen Long was running with me along with Justin Platt (pictured above) just to my left. I knew Cathy was in my midst but didn’t know for sure. At about the 1.5 mile mark the course swings left from Elm onto Thayer Street where there are two large water stops manned by Gate City Striders and Greater Derry Track Club members. I received many words of encouragement from my Strider teammates which helped immensely and after a slight downhill stretch passed the two mile mark in 5:42. I ran alongside Merrimack Valley High School Cross Country Coach Dave Irving the last mile, who had several of his high school runners with him in tandem and this helped me maintain a fairly steady pace. The last mile is pretty demoralizing as you see the 100 + runners strung out far in front of you along Canal Street making it all look so easy while my 50 year old lungs are literally exploding as I gasped for air trying to just hang on. Finally, I could see the turn onto Merrimack Street at 2.9 miles. As I came up the final hill I could see the clock in the distance at 17:45 so I pushed as best I could and came across the line in 18:05, 5th out of 244 in the 50-54 year old group. Cathy finished in 18:49 winning her age division and was 6th overall woman in the race. The photo above (by Strider Dave Delay) was taken at about the half-way mark showing eventual winner Alene Reta of Ethiopia (left), whose time of 13:53 was the fastest 5k road race time ever run in the State of New Hampshire. He is being closely pursued by Bajo Kiorku (right), the 2nd place finisher (14:03). If you look closely you can see the many Gate City Strider volunteers (in green shirts) manning the water stop.

There were many Striders and Granite State Flash runners and coaches in the race, here are the results: http://www.coolrunning.com/results/09/nh/Aug13_CIGNAE_set1.shtml

Posted by Mike Merra at 10:29 PM    

Labels: Cigna/Elliot Corporate 5k, Manchester, New Hampshire

On Sunday we headed up to beautiful York Golf & Tennis Club in York, Maine for a Merra family golf outing. I’m not exactly sure how this fits into a running blog other than to note I was more tired at the end of this 18 holes (riding a cart no less) than I was running 20 miles on Friday night. We had three groups and played scramble format (everyone hits and you pick the best shot and then everyone hits from that point onward) with the team consisting of my brother in law Dr. Matt Donovan (who is a member at York and our host), cousin Joe Lupica, his daughter Jackie and my son Chris taking the top spot with a 3 under par 67. My father Sam Merra, and brothers in law Morgan Molloy and Dr. Owen McConville along with Matt’s son William (assisted occasionally by Michael McConville) finished in 1 under 69 with our team of cousin Jean Chani, Dr. Jim Donovan and my son Anthony also finishing in 69. It must be noted that Dr. Jim, 86 years young, carried us much of the day on the greens by dropping three long birdie putts to keep our group’s score respectable.

This was a special day for us after a very difficult winter in our family with the loss of my father’s wonderful brother and my Godfather Frank “Gig” Merra who was not only our golf mentor but life tutor. The Gig was very much on our mind this day along with his daughter Fran who lost her long battle with cancer shortly before Gig’s passing, at the young age 46. They are shown together in the top picture above.

Posted by Mike Merra at 9:48 PM    

Labels: Merra Family Golf Outing, York Golf Tennis Club

We took a break* from racing this weekend and volunteered at the 7th Annual Crisman Memorial 5k Race in Amherst, New Hampshire. The race is run in memory of Kyle and Tim Crisman. On the afternoon of November 3, 2002,the two brothers from Amherst (pictured above), then students at Souhegan High School, were killed in a tragic automobile accident on Rt. 101 in Peterborough, NH while returning home from a visit with their grandmother. A scholarship fund was established in their memory and each year two Souhegan High School students benefit from the scholarship fund. Cathy has been involved on the race committee each year and I have set up and managed the race course the last two years. Last year we were able to get the course officially certified with USATF.

It was a perfect day for running and there was a good turnout this morning of 223 runners. Our son Chris Merra (#458 above) ran a PR finishing 4th in 17:37. Fellow Gate City Strider Karen Long also ran a PR in 18:56 finishing as 3rd women overall. Several of our Flash runners ran including Sam Daly (green Flash singlet above) (13th overall 18:49), Tyler Dechane (27th in 20:55), Brady Camplin (36th 21:46), and Jack Facey (53rd 23:21). My running buddy Charlie Lawrence tugged along his mutt (see above) in an impressive 26:38 despite battling some nagging injuries.

*On Friday night we ran our first 20 mile training run on the Hollis Rail Trail (starting in Hollis 10 miles to Ayer, Mass. & back) in anticipation of our Fall marathons. Total running time was 2:44 (8:12 pace) so racing this morning probably wouldn’t have been a wise idea.

Posted by Mike Merra at 10:32 PM    

Labels: Crisman Memorial 5k Race

It’s been more than a week since I’ve posted but I’ll try to catch up. Last Tuesday night (7/28) we ran the 49th Annual Yankee Homecoming 10 Miler in Newburyport. This was our first time running this race and the race drew more than 3500 runners for the 10 miler and 5k combined. Newburyport is an incredibly scenic coastal town and there were more spectators on the course than any race in recent memory other than Boston. It seemed every neighborhood had hoses and water tables set up for the runners and one group mercifully set up a water stop as we crossed back over Rt. 95 in the last 2 miles of the race. I stopped and snapped the above photo of this group in admiration. The second picture is of Cathy taken by JimRhodes and the third is one of the finish I took leading into Newburyport High School. The temperature was over 80 degrees at race time but it seemed cooler once the race started with ocean breezes directly in our face the last few miles. I decided before the start I’d raced enough lately so I ran this one as a workout at a steady 7:25-7:30 mile pace finishing in 1:14. Cathy was 7th overall and won her age group in 1:07.

On Sunday we began ramping up our long runs in anticipation of our Fall marathons with a brutal 19 miler-- this time heading north into Bedford, New Boston and finally back into Amherst. We started at 6:35 AM and the last several miles brought us back up over the New Boston Air Station (about an 800’ elevation climb) finishing in 2:48. The overall pace wasn’t fast but there were seven large hills during the run with elevation grades that at times seemed like we were back running Mt. Washington.

The bottom picture of Anthony was taken tonight. He asked me to set up “something tough” so I laid out a 16 miler on our favorite Boston training run into Mont Vernon. After I had finished my run on the Hollis rail trail I drove up and caught him heading toward Joe English Road.

Posted by Mike Merra at 9:55 PM    

Labels: Newburyport, Yankee Homecoming 10 Miler

I’m not exactly sure why I’m posting the below video today. It's one of my favorite sports videos of all time. I remember watching this race live on TV back in the 1972 when I was 13 years old and I’ve lost count of the number of times since then I’ve watched the re-play. The version I have at home is actually on a video cassette and has an interview of Dave Wottle spliced throughout the clip. I am going to try to upload that version at some point. The clip below is from the live ABC telecast.

The race is the 1972 Men’s 800 Meter Final at the Munich Olympics. The favorite in the race was Yevgeniy Arzhanov of the Soviet Union who had not lost an 800 meter final in four years. Also in the race were Kenyans’ Mike Boit and Robert Ouko. At the time of the race Wottle (wearing the golf cap) was a student at Bowling Green State University, not even ranked in the top 20 in the world the previous year and had battled tendonitis in both knees in the weeks leading up to the Olympics. Over the last eight seasons I've tried to play this video to my Granite State Flash runners the night before our final race of the season to remind them to respect their competition but never be intimidated and regardless of their overall position in the race to never let up until they've come across the finish line.

Posted by Mike Merra at 5:05 PM    

Labels: 1972 Munich Olympics, Dave Wottle

Back in the late 70’s and early 80’s when I was in high school and college it seemed like most of the local road races were 5 milers or weird distances like 5.4 or 7.1 (like Falmouth) with a 10k thrown in once in a while. Somewhere in the late 80’s and early/mid 90’s (what I refer to as my lost weekend from real running) the 5k distance crept in and that seems to be standard fare these days. However the 5k distance is difficult for me (and many others in 50+ set) because the pace out of the blocks is so fast that it takes me 3 miles before I feel like my legs are actually moving. I’ve been able to remedy this somewhat thanks to some helpful advice from fellow Strider Steve Moland who told me a few years ago to start warming up at least 30 minutes before the race and keep moving right up until the gun goes off and that seems to have helped. Nevertheless my favorite distance has remained 5 miles.

Today we headed up to Concord for the 42nd Annual Bill Luti 5 Miler which honors the legendary Concord High School track coach and is one of just a small number of 5 mile road races remaining in the area. I also like the 5 mile distance for a variety of reasons not the least of which is my limited math ability where I actually have some idea during the race of my overall approximate finishing time (“ok, I’m running 7 minute pace that means 5 miles x 7 minute pace = 35 minutes”). That is a challenging but do-able math equation for me. For the 5k (3.1 mile) distance I seem to get continually mixed up with that last 1/10th mile (176 yards or 161 meters) that I have to tack on at the end. I’m hopelessly lost when I’m running a 10k (6.2 miles).

Anyway, since the weather forecast looked decent for this morning and against my better judgment since I have a 17 miler on Sunday I decided to sign up late in the week for the race. At the start it was cloudy after raining all night and still quite humid with temps in the 60’s. Cathy and I both got off to a decent start and she was about 50 meters in front of me for the first 1 ½ miles. I ran the early part of the race with former Flash coach Jim Robinson of Derry and his son Mike Robinson and we gradually caught up to Cathy (not easy) and all 4 of us ran as a pack until about the 3 mile mark which passed through the St. Paul’s School grounds where I was able to pull slightly ahead. The course was hillier than I expected and this year had been certified at 5 miles after having been run previously as an 8k. I passed the 5k mark at 19:30 although I was working harder than I had hoped and ran the last two miles in 6:25 and 6:07 and finished in 31:22 for 31st overall and 3rd in my age group. My previous 5 mile best (post high school/college) was 34:26 back in 2000 at Rojacks so this was a PR for me by more than 3 minutes. I’ll pay for it tomorrow. Cathy was first in her age group and 5th overall with a time of 31:54. Also running from our club was Aline and Terry Kenney who finished 2nd and 6th in their age group. Thanks to Aline who picked up my Margarita's Restaurant gift certificate--I left early because I usually never win anything at races unless its a raffle prize.

The pictures above have nothing to do with today’s race. The top photo was taken last weekend at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City and shows us looking into a thermal imaging camera on display as we entered the museum. The photo below (with Cathy and Anthony in the foreground) was taken at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and is a 9 x 7 photorealistic portrait by American artist Chuck Close. Even when I stood no more than one foot from the portrait I couldn't believe it was a painting! I’m not sure why I posted either photo other than I liked them.

Posted by Mike Merra at 7:10 PM    

Labels: American Museum of Natural History, Bill Luti 5 Miler, Concord, New Hampshire

After more than three weeks of steady rain it seems we FINALLY have broken out of the cycle of clouds followed by rain followed by more clouds and then more rain. Even a hard core cold/rainy weather runner like me hopes the sun peeks out once in a while.
I’ve posted a few pictures above of my friend Roy Seliber of Sammamish, Washington who is training for the Cascade Crest 100 miler. http://www.cascadecrest100.com/course.php These are some recent training pics Roy took on the course. He is certifiably insane for running a 100 mile race (I was with him a few years ago when he made it 78 miles into the Vermont 100) but we will be pulling for him when he toes the line at the end of August. Roy routinely runs 30 + mile “training runs”. Roy is from the Boston area and is a 3:06:59 marathoner.

Cathy and I ran the 12th Annual Merrimack Sparkler on July 4. Unfortunately we couldn't shake the boys out of bed this year. With the exception of maybe one year we have run this race every year since its inception. The race is now directed by our former Merrimack, N.H. neighbors Julie and Brian Hafferkamp. The race started out small in its early days as it was up against the Nashua PAL 5 Miler that finished inside Holman Stadium but now its the big local race on the 4th with over 600 runners. I like this race because it is an out and back course on a closed road….something we don’t experience very often. I like seeing everyone coming in the opposite direction. This year I had a decent warm up and got out fairly quickly but could hear some familiar footsteps on my heels and to my left was Cathy and to my immediate right was fellow Strider teammate Karen Long, last year’s defending women’s champion. We all passed through the first mile in 5:57 and at the turnaround (1.8 miles) I pulled slightly in front of Cathy and Karen and finished the last two miles in 6:07 and 6:06 for 18:48. Cathy was 19:03 as the first woman overall and Karen was 19:21 for a PR and first women 40-49. I was 2nd in my age group behind Souhegan Cross Country coach Jeff Wilson. Here are the results: http://www.coolrunning.com/results/09/nh/Jul4_12thAn_set1.shtml

I’ve decided (98% sure) I’m going to run the Steamtown Marathon in Scranton, Pa. (again). I’m coaching both a school team and Junior Olympics this fall so I’m limited as far as finding a race that fits my coaching schedule. This year’s race is on October 11, 2009 so the long runs are about to start up again. We did a hard and hilly 15 miler last Sunday which actually didn’t feel too bad. Most of my Strider teammates will be running the Baystate Marathon the following Sunday in Lowell, Mass. That’s it for now.

Posted by Mike Merra at 12:46 PM    

Labels: Cascade Crest 100, Merrimack Sparkler 5k

The Gate City Striders is New Hampshire’s largest running club. One of the Club’s most successful community outreach activities over the last twenty years has been its annual “Fitness University” program. Fitness University is completely free of charge, open to all children in the community ages 3 thru 14 and is comprised of a series of eight weekly 90 minute “clinics” centered around running as both a fun and healthy lifestyle choice. The children are grouped together by age and the activities vary by group ranging from games of tag, follow the leader and short relays for the younger children up to more involved stretching and running activities for the older children. At the end of each clinic every child receives a small prize and refreshments with the Fitness University clinics culminating in a “Finals Day”. Finals Day is a special half day event where the children become “graduates” of Fitness University and run varying distances on the track depending on age as well as participate in many other fun Finals Day activities such as face painting, special relays, obstacle courses etc. All of the weekly clinics as well as Finals Day are staffed by volunteer Strider members sharing their love of running for the benefit of children in the community.

You have to see Fitness University in person to believe it. Under the leadership of Striders Leeann and Trevor Ward (Trevor is pictured above--I couldn't catch Leeann as she was in constant motion) the growth of Fitness University has been simply phenomenal. This year’s attendance at the weekly clinics has been regularly in excess of 300 and this past week at Fairgrounds Junior High School in Nashua I would venture to guess there were close to 400 children. Fitness University is near and dear to our proverbial hearts as it was one of the first places our two boys were introduced to running. I often joke with my oldest (who now runs Div. I college cross country and track) that it all began with “Duck Duck Goose” at Fitness U. Both of our boys participated in the weekly clinics and finals day back in the 1990’s and have come back periodically to volunteer when they are available during the summer. This week I was in charge of five year old boys and in between breaking up a few wrestling matches and discouraging the pulling and throwing of lumps of grass we had a great night. I’ve posted some pictures above including the one at the top of Gate City Striders President Michelle Poublon and Strider volunteer Karen Pattelena.

Here is the Fitness U link http://www.runfitnessu.com/

Posted by Mike Merra at 7:25 AM    

Labels: Fitness University, Gate City Striders, Nashua, New Hampshire

Today we headed up to the Shaker Seven Road Race in Enfield, New Hampshire. Enfield is located eight miles south of Dartmouth College. The seven mile race starts at the Shaker Museum located on the shore of Mascoma Lake and loops around a large section of the lake (mostly rustic dirt roads) before crossing back over the Main Street bridge and back to the Village. New Hampshire is the home to several of the nineteen Shaker communities established in the 18th and 19th centuries which at one time had more than 20,000 converts. The last New Hampshire Shaker (Ethel Hudson of the Canterbury, N.H. community) died in 1992 but the communities have been preserved as museums through a combination of land trusts and public fundraising.
We ran a pretty aggressive and hilly 12 miler on Saturday which combined with last week’s Mt. Washington race didn’t leave me in the mood for racing so I decided to run this one as a tempo workout at 7 minute mile pace. Cathy is unable to do anything but go all out so I wished her well at the start and she was out of sight not long after the gun went off. I’ve been having some left hip soreness so was cautious in the early going and passed the first three miles in 21:25 (7:08 pace). I was able to find a group to run and chat with which made it a nice workout. There were a few hills in the 4 and 5 mile sections of the course but then the course flattened out nicely as it passed through “downtown” Enfield. I ran those miles in 6:53 and 7:14 then the course passed over a bridge connecting the two shore lines at a narrow point of the lake before traveling along Rt. 4A back to the Shaker Village. I saw a few slightly balding runners in front of me (you never do know for sure who is 50+ ) so I picked it up a bit and ran the last two miles in 6:13 and 6:21 to finish in 48:09. This was 15th overall and 1st in the 50-59 age bracket. I’ve actually won my age division twice this year (the other Hampton ½ in February) something I never did in high school—having won just one pre-season cross country race in 1977 when several of the real runners on our team were injured. The finish of the race was a thing of beauty as it looped off of Rt. 4A into the Village right next to the Great Stone Dwelling (see picture above). This building, constructed in 1837 was the Church’s primary residence and the central gathering place of the Enfield Shakers. Cathy finished in 46:06 and was the first woman overall. Several other Striders also made the trip to Enfield including Jim Ecke of Merrimack and Andrea Pierce of Hollis. The race had plenty of volunteers, more than enough water stops and the runners encountered very little traffic during the race. In the unlikely event I have not completely destroyed my knees over the next year, I will be back.

Posted by Mike Merra at 10:59 PM    

Labels: Enfield Shaker Village

My blog rarely ventures outside of New England and most of the time focuses on my mundane running exploits. These expolits now seem exponentially mundane when you read about Ryan Johns. Ryan is a recent Columbia University architecture graduate and a friend and teammate of my son Anthony on the Columbia University cross country and track teams. Anthony has related many stories over the last few years about the adventuresome Ryan, but this summer Ryan has outdone himself as he runs from Amsterdan to Athens…. carrying just the bare necessities on his back (see photo of his gear above). He has no hotel reservations, no money for lodging, just 6 lbs. of gear and is depending simply on the hospitality of strangers. He has kept a fascinating blog of his trip with the use of a small hand held device (the reason you will find frequent typos). He has posted many wonderful photos. Ryan’s trip (he is running about 20 miles each day) will take approximately four months as he makes his way through seven countries and 2300 miles. As I type this blog entry tonight, Ryan is in France making his way toward the German border then to Switzerland. Here is his blog which I encourage you to read and follow along on this incredible journey. http://www.ryanlukejohns.com/runseurope/

Posted by Mike Merra at 10:23 PM    

Labels: Ryan Johns

I'm not sure I'll have time tonight to post much about today's race but I thought I would still post a few pictures. This was my first Mt. Washington Road Race and it was much more difficult than I expected. I stupidly dropped my camera at one point and lost more than a minute and had been running ahead of pace up to that point. I ran 1:29:06 and our GCS Seniors team finished 1st out of 12 teams. Cathy finished just behind me in 1:29:22 (2nd NH woman) but I caught her early at the two mile mark where she started walking and told me she was "dropping out" and was going to walk back to the car at the bottom. I told her she should at least walk up to the summit. About 10 minutes later I realized I had the car key so it would be a long wait until I arrived back from the summit after the race if she decided to head back down. Then, not more than 200 meters from the finish I heard someone yell her name and looked back and there she was furiously closing in on me like a scene out of 1968 thriller Night of the Living Dead. Here you can see her trying to sneak up behind me (she's wearing the white cap/red singlet) as I casually check my watch, not knowing I was being stalked. http://www.scottmasonphoto.com/gallery/8630550_UdQTV#569391878_GvmMx-M-LB

The auto road was enveloped in fog for most of the early parts of the race and it was difficult seeing more than 100 meters ahead but as we approached the summit the view was breathtaking with sunny skies and what meteorologists call "undercast" meaning the top of the cloud cover was below the summit. According to the race officials this view was rare and akin to the view from an airplane with 130 mile visibility in all directions and a floor of clouds. Temperatures were 55F with just 5.9MPH winds from the southeast. The top picture was taken by fellow Strider Brian Sanborn whose wife Genia was also running. The second picture above is a shot of the Mt. Washington summit from the center of North Conway at about 6:30 A.M. as we drove to race. The third shot is (I think) a shot of nearby the Mt. Adams summit peaking through the clouds. More later including other Strider results.

Posted by Mike Merra at 9:04 PM    

Labels: Mt. Washington Road Race

This will unfortunately be a short entry as I’m buried in work and have five superior court hearings this week. On Sunday we traveled 1 ½ hours south to Lincoln, Rhode Island for the 10th Annual Rhody 5k. This race is one of the races on this year’s USATF New England Grand Prix race circuit. As usual we were late (my fault) and arrived just 20 minutes before the start but fortunately the women’s start was 30 minutes later than the mens so Cathy was able to grab my number and timing chip as I headed straight for the starting line barefoot with shoes and socks in hand (great race prep). We were joined in Rhode Island by 30 fellow Gate City Striders. Just kidding about the bunny suit, but did set a new PR.

The course reminded me a lot of running at Pease Air Force Base, very flat and circular ending on the Lincoln Greyhound Dog Track (no moving rabbit to chase unfortunately). I had not run a 5k since Thanksgiving and had done no speed work whatsoever since early March so I had no idea how I would run. My goal was to break 20 minutes. I have been trying to get ready for Mt. Washington on June 20 so had done two fairly hard hilly runs totaling close to 20 miles on Friday evening in Mont Vernon/New Boston and on Mack Hill in Amherst on Saturday morning. When the gun went off I felt better than expected so tried to keep pace with fellow Striders Jim Hansen and Steve Wolfe. Jim, Steve and I ran as a group for the first mile. I passed the first mile in 6:07 and was concerned I had gone out too fast. We then passed mile two in 6:03. This was Steve’s first race back after a hip injury that has severely limited his training over the last month so he was holding back as I'm not in his league and normally I can’t even see him after the first mile. The conditions were the warmest so far this year and took a toll on me as we closed in on mile three as Steve and I ran fairly close together but then he put the hammer down and made a strong move at about the 2.6 mile mark that I couldn't match. I ran the last mile in 5:55 and my overall time of 18:48 was a PR (post high school/college) by almost one minute.

Cathy ran 19:10 which was a strong finish and also a PR for her although at least for a day or so I can give up my title as the slowest runner in our house (although Anthony returns home tomorrow from a week of running in Mammoth Lakes California to put us all in our place--he ran a 14:39 this winter indoors at the Heps at Harvard). I can’t even remember the last time I finished in front of Cathy. Other strong Strider performances were Ethan Crain (15:35), Joe Rogers (17:07) Mike Wade (18:15) and Jim Hansen (19:31) on the men’s side and on the women’s side Karen Long (19:52), Karen Pattalena (20:05) and Tammy Gaffey (20:29) . I apologize for not listing all 30 Striders as well as team results which I would do tonight if I had time.

Posted by Mike Merra at 10:33 PM    

Labels: Rhody 5k