Marathon Story

Jim Woodman finishes strong in Burlington

• Khoury's 20K. Looking for a distinctively challenging city run? Every Thursday night, 52 weeks a year, the Somerville Road Runner's stage a stimulating 4.1 mile run through busy neighborhoods, and crosses a six-lane highway at rush hour, twice!! Now try to do it four times in a row. That's what Lionel Kervalla did, finishing 4th in a time of 1:19:50 (6:26). Clearly something happened to Lionel prior to Boston (helicopter beanie) and has carried over to Khoury's. Be on the lookout for Lionel, we need to get him back to some sensible running.

• Chuck Schultz writes: "Lily and I went up to York, Maine to run the annual hospital 5k. A lot of fun with roads and cross country in a short loop. They even throw in a jaunt across a swinging bridge, leaping mud quagmires , and road construction in a scenic tour of York and surroundings. I did a 20:18 (6:33). Lily did 30:28, a massage, two apples, juice, water, chili, and a Baby Ruth candy bar. Not that I was watching."

• Scituate Fire Fighters 5K. Ginny Carlin will undoubtedly run every race on the South Shore. This week she finished as the 2nd Master in a time of 24:44 (7:59/mi).
• Covered Bridges Half Marathon, Woodstock, Vermont. Bob Gillon and Bruce Davie contributed to this report.

  Mild temperatures and lowery skies led to a delayed and rainy start for this New England Classic. Several CRC runners were spotted, but may have dropped out due to injuries. Determined not to fall in this category, Bruce Davie and Bob Gillon had planned to go out at a conservative 6:00 pace throughout the first 10 miles (Fred, don't read this). Propagated by Bruce's desire to top his PR of last year set on the same course, adrenaline turned that plan into a dream as the duo dashed through the first mile at 5:37 and the 2nd in 5:46. As if for punishment, Bob mis-stepped on a tire board while crossing the covered bridge just after the 4 mile mark, and twisted his ankle. He continued to run with Bruce through 6 1/2 miles, but found the swelling too difficult to manage, and jogged to the finish in 1:24:19. Fortunately for Bob, it went on the record books as Peter Gallimore's time, as Bobby used Peter's race number. Congratulations on your PR, Peter!

  That left two un-injured CRC representatives, Missy Mendel and Bruce. Like Bruce, Missy was returning to the scene of her PR, looking to improve on her 2nd place finish in 1997, which netted her some local handmade glassware. This year's field would prove deeper, however, as both improved on their PR, but each finished one place lower. Missy improved her PR by 2 minutes to 1:22:11 (6:17/mile), which would have won in '97 but placed her third this year. Bruce shaved more than a minute off his PR to 1:17:26 (5:55/mile), yet finished one place higher than last year: 16th.

  Ever the engineer, Bruce observes that Missy is on track to beat him in the year 2003 at the current rate of improvement.

  Racing for the 2nd week in a row, Al Nagel completed the course in 1:34:29 (7:13/mi). He offers this perspective: "I appreciate being mentioned as an also-ran at Covered Bridges. I'm sure the time seems very pedestrian next to all the PR's. However, using age-graded scoring (for an almost-57 year-old male), the time equates to a 1:18:15 for a runner in the Open Mens' division. So, by that standard I was trying to chase Bruce down in the closing miles ---- which is exactly how my body felt even if, in reality, that was not what was happening."

• Lionel Kurvella took first place at the Koury's Pub Thursday night run in 24:16.

• Battle Road 10K, Concord, MA. Lionel Kervalla placed 10th in 38:35 (6:11). Not up to Lionel's standards; perhaps he is slowing because of his training at Khoury's.
• South Boston Pop Warner 5K. Marc Rappaport took 8th place in 18:53 (6:07).
• Saugus Lions 5K. Forgetting what it was like to run the hills in Breakheart Reservation after the Wakefield Rotary 6K 2 weeks ago, Bob Gillon returned to do it again. Last year Bob won this shorten race in 15:35 (course director sent the race the wrong way). This year they seemed to add the distance removed from last year to make the course even longer, as he loped into 4th place in 19:06 (6:10). Bob appears to have recovered from his sprained ankle.

• Vermont City Marathon, Burlington, VT. Congratulations are in order to several CRC athletes.

  First, congrats to Jim Woodman on his sensational finish at the Burlington Marathon. Jim needed to run 3:10 to qualify for next years Boston Marathon and he finished in with room to spare in 3:07:53. He finished 143 overall and was quite jubilant at the finish. Jim's training partner George Nicholson was running toward the same goal, but was not as fortunate. Having run with Jim for 25.5 miles of the race, George began experiencing some problems with his legs. About 50 yards from the finish with plenty of time to break the 3:10 qualifier, George went down on the course. His legs just wouldn't carry him any further. He attempted to get up and went down again. After a brief respite he was able to get back to his feet and continued to the finish. His time was 3:10:44. Hopefully this time will be accepted for Boston next year. I think we will see George at the track in the next few weeks as he will want to hone his training for his next marathon. Congratulations also to Amy Otsu. Amy ran with the CRC last year and was a member of one of our relay teams. She ran Burlington as her first marathon and finished in a very respectable time of 3:56:36.

  Jim displays his medal

• USATF Twilight track meet at Northeastern U in Dedham. Our favorite Aussie, Bruce Davie, returned to the track to compete at his favorite distance, the 3,000. "Thankfully," he says, "the race was divided into two sections, so I didn't have to compete against the 8:30 crowd; instead, I had the novel experience of spending a lot of time near the front of the pack, where sharp elbows proved to be quite an asset. The jostling for position was worthy of an Olympic event. In the end, I missed my PR by about 10 seconds, finishing 4th in 9:25.9 (5:03/mile), but was pretty happy with my first track outing of the summer."

• FISK Wet and Wild Triathlon, Marlboro, MA. CRC's newest tri-sport junkie, Scott Duhaime, and 150 of his closest personal friends beat the severe weather served up by El Nino, thanks to an 8AM start time. The hot weather of the week helped raise the temperatures of Fort Meadow Reservoir, as this was the first open water swim of the season. Distances were .25, 11 miles and 3 miles. Reports Scott, "This was the first tri where everyone started the swim together (except for Rick and Dick Hoyt), so you really knew where you stood during the race. Unfortunately for me, that meant in 103rd place upon hitting the beach (8:45)." A long (300m) transition to the bike rack (2:36), then it was on with the new shoes. Deciding to race with clipless pedals on only the 2nd day of trying them proved fortuitous, as he passed over sixty cyclists by averaging 22.4 mph, turning in a 29:28 split (33rd fastest). Rather than messing with tying shoes, he left them tied and just pulled them on, and transitioned from bike to run in an alacratic 35 seconds, and completed the 3+ mile run in 19:42 (6:34/20th fastest), passing ten more runners, finishing this "sprint" triathlon in 1:00:59, in 34th place.