| October 2002 Newsletter |
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Herb Puts In His 5&10 Cents' Worth . . .
My times have been (to put it kindly) so "sub-optimal" for the past couple of years that I have not bothered posting my race experiences. But the 5 & 10, while still pathetic in finish time, was great fun. There were predictions of torrential rains, but conditions were reasonable: 75 degrees with very high humidity, but with only a mist that nicely cooled things off. Old-timers would have loved the return to the past: starting toward Stewart Park then finishing with the discouraging block detour near the bridge (a foot bridge this year as the traffic one is being replaced).
Speaking of old - it was like the 1980's: lining up were 50-year-olds John Saylor, the Rossiter brothers, Terry Habecker, Bob Huddle, Ed Cope, Bob Datolla and others I'm sure I have missed. In the 60s division Don Farley and Chuck Collins duked it out, finishing the third time within four seconds of each other. Chuck won this battle, Don having one the first two. Bob Babcock, at 70*, completed the 10-miler. I decided to go out at my previous 5K pace (6:15), but saw Caleb Rossiter close and decided to hang onto him for the first mile, which we passed in 6:05. I then decided to just stay with him for the second mile, which we passed in 12:20. That worked nicely, so I decided to try a third, but, having run only 5Ks this year, my legs decided they were done after three and Caleb nicely pulled away. I finished in 32:34 in 18th (!) place. Several of us had a conversation afterward that the overall quality of times has dropped severely in the past decade. Whereas in the 1980s about 50 runners would go under 30 minutes for the 5 mile, there were only about 13 this year. And, although I consider the 5 & 10 a better race than Pud's Run, we attracted only half the runners (about 300).
Still, Lorrie Marnell did her usual superb job directing the race. The course marshals were the best ever. Lorrie hired a professional crew to do the timing and seemed to do a good job, relieving our highly competent FLRC crew of the responsibility for the first time in 28 years. There were good eats, emergency crew on hand, unusual awards, gift certificates for age-group awards, a unique t-shirt, free massages, and a place to get in out of the rain. In other words a great racing experience more people should enjoy.
-- Herb Engman
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