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FLRC Newsletter - August 2004 |
| Inaugural Tanglewood 5 and 10 milers | |
First a thanks to Tim and the club for the water jugs and to Nancy K. for doing the timing, it all went too smoothly.
Prerace instructions were the usual, unmanned water stop locations, but I was told to mention the possibility of rattlesnakes. They are on the hill, but you probably won't encounter one. I have seen deer, rabbit, porcupine, turkey, racoon, squirrels, chipmunks, and fox but no rattlers.
The course consisted of 35% meadow, 20% logging road, and 45% trail. As far as the contour, 65% uphill, with the remainder level or downhill.
Just as I predicted, Tim was out in front from the get-go with Roger Learn trailing. I figured a good runner could do one lap in 35:00. Tim's split was 35:40 with Roger 1:16 behind. Roger's 17-yr-old daughter Tricia won the single lap in 38:06. One young lady who will run this fall for Cortland took a spill and turned her ankle, but still ran across the finish line. As she iced her ankle near the finish line she was front and center for a nice surprise. Simon Whitehouse wrote on the back of his shirt, "will you marry me?" His girlfriend, Julie Mourhess, never looked up at the start and consequently didn't read the message. Simon finished ahead of Julie, and as she crossed the finish line he proposed. She shrieked in joy and accepted. I understand they plan to marry at Tanglewood. Can a race director perform a marriage ceremony in NY?
Out of the 61 entrants, 45–50 had never run trails before. I received many critiques from the rookies, such as, you're a masochist, the downhills killed my quads, the uphills killed me. Even Tim remarked that it was a difficult course. I prefer to think of it as challenging. More fun than climbing some silly mountain in New Hampshire and definitely cheaper and closer.
Tanglewood Nature Center enjoyed having us and would like the race to happen again. Looks like Father's Day 2005. I didn't have a lot of time to reference the FLRC and local calendar to avoid conflicts, but if another date looks better we may move it.
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