From 400 Meters to the Half Marathon, and Everything In Between

On June 23rd, 2013 I ran the Scotiabank Half Marathon. When we started off from UBC at 9:30 AM I was with Tilman dressed in his Gingerbread Man suit. We were a lot farther back than we should have been, with people yelling "walk" when the gun went off, blocking those of us who thought that we were supposed to be running. Tilman did a great job in the early part of the race trailbreaking, and I followed him as we proceeded to pass hundreds of participants until we finally reached some going our pace.

 

It was a hot day and I eventually went ahead of Tilman. I wasn't sure how well I'd do as I hadn't been training for a race of this length, but mostly for much shorter track races. I concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other as quickly as I was able, spurred along by the fantastic people cheering us on. The screaming cheerleaders on Cornwall Street at Kits Beach were the ones I remember the most, giving me a big burst of energy that prompted me to smile and wave at them. Then it was onto and over the Burrard Street Bridge, down Pacific Avenue, into Stanley Park, and over the finish line!

 

It was my slowest ever half marathon race, but not exactly a disaster. I finished 430 out of 4076 overall, 30 of 200 in my age group, with a chip time of 1:40:20, and a gun time of 1:41:06. Tilman's times were 1:42:03 chip, 1:42:49 gun (gun & chip were 46 seconds apart for both of us, the time it took us to reach the start line after the race had started).

 

http://www.canadarunningseries.com/results/2013/svhm/half.htm

http://www.canadarunningseries.com/results/2013/svhm/half_ag.htm

 

On June 26 I competed in the Remax Twilight Series # 3 T&F Meet at the South Surrey Athletic Park track. Being the only "old guy" in my races didn't help my placings, but I had some fun and just ran my own race. In the 400 meters I was 5 of 5 in my race with a PB time of 1:17.81. In the 800 meters I was 12 of 12 with a time of 2:48.44, and in the long jump I was 2 of 2 with a jump of 3.45 meters. Another great mid-week meet put on by Ocean Athletics!

 

http://www.oceanathletics.org/results-photos-home/

 

Next up was another busy weekend, starting off with the Jack Brow Track & Field Meet on June 29th at the Apple Bowl in Kelowna. I was 5 of 5 overall in the long jump and 1 of 1 in my age group, with a jump of 3.53 meters, in the 800 meters I was 4 of 4 overall and 1 of 1 in my age group, with a time of 2:47.89, and in the 5000 meters, I was 5 of 5 overall, and 2 of 2 in my AG, with a time of 21:03.67.

 

On the morning of the 30th I ran the 1500 meters, and was 5 of 6 overall, and 2 of 2 in my AG, with a time of 5:41.33. I was registered to run the 400 meters too, but it was scheduled for the late afternoon. I had a long drive back to Vancouver plus a 10K race to run the next morning, so I thought it best to tell them to scratch me from this last event.

 

It was another great, fun meet with a huge amount of mostly young athletes from all over the province competing, as well as a fair sized contingent of young athletes from Australia.

 

http://www.okac.ca/files/jack%20brow%202013%20-%20meet%20%20results.pdf

 

On July 1st at 8 AM I ran the Rock 10K in White Rock.

 I was 11th overall out of 179 and managed to squeak out a medal by finishing 3rd in my age group. My time of 45:10 was less than stellar but it was an extremely hilly course and hot weather so quite happy with that. 

Drew Nicholson won the race in a time of 36:17, and a set diamond worth $349 courtesy of Jose & Co. to go with his medal!

 There was also a 5K run at the same time as our race, and the always fun kids run to round out the festivities. 

A pancake breakfast and Canada Day cakes (chocolate & vanilla) were highlights of the apres-race feast.

 

http://www.tryevents.ca/images/results/2013rockresults.pdf

The Paavo Nurmi Run 5K & FNM 800

On June 21, 2013, I ran the 800 Meter race at the Friday Night Mile, at 6:30 PM at the South Surrey Athletic Park track. Myself and Jay Zhu were the only participants in the shorter race, and he finished well ahead of me with a time of 2:34.27, while I stopped the clock at. 2:47.58. I was quite happy with my race as I'd run a new personal best.

https://www.facebook.com/penrunwr?fref=ts

On Saturday morning at 9 AM I ran the Paavo Nurmi Run 5K at Burnaby Lake Park. It was the same out and back jaunt through the woods as last year, and I went by a young female about a kilometer into the race. As I hit the turnaround I had seen only 2 fellows come back going the other way, one of them a young teenager, so I knew I was in 3rd place overall. As I headed back I saw Len, who I knew was in my age group, coming towards me and the turnaround. This caused me to concentrate on keeping my pace up, because we still had half the race to go and he didn't look like he was giving up on catching me just yet. The next racer I encountered heading towards me was the young woman I'd passed, and she was still the first place female!

Soon we were on a wide path going back through the woods and I was running about 100 meters behind the teenage guy. He was just as determined as I was to retain his placing, so I was unable to gain much ground on him. I saw him turn left up ahead, and as I did the same I saw a woman running with her young daughter down the wide gravel path. He'd already passed them, and the little girl, who looked to be about 5 years old, ran ahead of her mother. I saw that they were both wearing numbers, meaning they were in the 3K race that had started after ours. When I approached the little girl she looked back and moved over to the right to let me pass, and as I went by I shouted a big "Thank you!". If only all of us practiced such great race etiquette!

Soon the finish line loomed and then I was over it, happy to have finished 3rd and won my age group with a time of 21:19. Len showed up next and it wasn't long before the top female came in, and I saw that the young woman had managed to lead from start to finish! I congratulated her on winning the race, and she said thanks, and that it was her first ever 5K. She's a sprinter but she decided to try her hand in this much longer race because her Dad always ran it. Then she said "Don't you remember me? I was jumping long jump with you last week." It turned out to be young Cheryl Chow, who had indeed been jumping at the same time I was in my first ever meet. I'd actually be watching her as she jumped and tried to copy her form, as she is very good at it. She's only 14 but told me she's been jumping since grade 3, so she's the experienced vet and I'm the novice.

And I'd failed to recognize her dad, Alvin, either, but to be fair I hadn't seen him for a year. He was with Mikhail Titov and myself on the podium for our age group last year. 

This time Mikhail ran the 10K, which he won, and instead of only having a 40+ oldest category they created a couple of others, 35-49 and 50+. 

Alvin is still in his 40s, so Cheryl, myself, Alvin and Mikhail all won gold age group medals, plus Mikhail and Cheryl were awarded $25 Running Room gift cards for winning their races! I'd finally done it! After 2 previous silvers I'd finally struck Paavo Nurmi Run gold.

http://vcn.bc.ca/sportvfc/paavo/uploads/1/6/4/1/16414576/pnr_final_results_2013.pdf

After the ceremonies were over, and having refueled with Tim Bits, a banana, and coffee, it was time to head home, for the Scotiabank Half Marathon awaited me the next morning.

Longest Day Weekend

I went in for surgery to repair a ventral hernia on Friday the 13th, so I won't be running for awhile. I've finally decided to try and catch up on my race reports while recovering, which are many months in arrears. Since the number of races is overwhelmingly large I'm going to try to make them brief to start out with, increasing the length as the number shrinks.

 

June 14 was the Longest Day 5K at UBC's Thunderbird Stadium, starting at 6:45 PM. I had the pleasure of finally meeting Zahida Jaffer http://www.runwithzahida.com/ and her boyfriend Cam in person before the race. It was the usual flat fast course, with the usual plentiful great food afterward. I only had one heaping plate this year instead of 2 because I had to compete again the next day.

 

Chris Boulton from my club was 70th overall out of 682, 7 of 28 in his age group, with a time of 19:44. I was 89th overall, 8 of 34 in my age group, with a time of 20:47. Our club coach Greg Anslow, running with his daughters, was 227 overall, 10 of 23 in his AG, with a time of 25:54.

http://startlinetiming.com/races/2013/longestday/age5yr5.txt

http://startlinetiming.com/races/2013/longestday/5k.txt

There was also a 10K race:

http://www.startlinetiming.com/races/2013/longestday/10k.txt

Cindy, my friend Edwin Liu's wife, produced short videos of the start and end of the race. Edwin finished 4 places in front of me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cfDg3My6M
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRBs1h0V4EY

 

On June 15 I competed in the BC Masters Outdoor Track & Field Championships. The 3000 Meters was the first race of the day at 9 AM. I was shocked when we were getting ready to start the race, because the BC Athletics official told me that there were only 2 Masters men running it, myself and Ron Wichmann. We still had a great race, because I was ahead of Ron heading into the home stretch after we rounded the final corner, when I heard him loudly start his kick behind me. The large crowd cheered for us as we sprinted towards the finish, and I hung on to beat Ron by less than 1.5 seconds. He's a few years older than me so we're in different age groups, and we both earned a gold medal. My time was 12:04.03, and I was happy enough with that considering I ran a 5K the night before.

 

Next up for me a couple of hours later was the long jump. We had huge crowds watching us in the races on the track all day, as in addition to our Masters Championships, it was also a huge meet for all the younger athletes from all over the province. Consequently the stands were always pretty full. Events like the long jump took place off to the side of the stadium, so we had a lot less spectators cheering for us. My regular camera had crapped out on me, so I used an old one-use camera to take pictures at the meet and then got them developed and put on a CD at London Drugs. Best I could do on short notice!

 The dearth of spectators proved to be fortunate for myself, because try as I might I couldn't jump worth a shit. My first 5 jumps were all less than 3 meters, and I had jumped 3.49 at the Twilight meet just a few days before. I talked to the other jumpers who told me not to run 5 & 3 Ks and then expect to be able to jump afterward. On my last jump I again sucked but at least was able to barely beat 3 meters at 3.05, and because there were only 2 of us in my age group, this earned me a silver medal.

 

My last race of the day was the 800, and again I was 2 of 2 in my age group, with a time of 2:53.11. Once more I had a great finishing duel with another competitor, almost chasing down 63 year old Mel Doherty from Kamloops, who hung on to beat me by 2 one hundredths of a second!

In between my own events I thoroughly enjoyed watching the other constantly ongoing races and field events.

 

The next morning I ran the 1500 Meters, finishing 6 of 9 overall, and 2 of 2 in my age group, with a time of 5:53:26. We were looking at the results posted in a stadium walkway afterward, and Harjinder Kang was asking me how things worked. He'd finished behind me and so thought there was no way he'd won a medal. I showed him where he was in the 5 year age groupings, explaining that that's how medals were awarded. I told him that he'd won a gold medal in his age group, and I'd won silver. He just silently stared at me for a few seconds, and then suddenly yelled out "Congratulations!" while thrusting out his hand to shake mine. To witness someone going from dejection to jubilation within such a small amount of time was fantastic to see, a definite highlight of the meet for me! 

 

My last race a couple of hours later was the 400 Meters. I got smoked and so was 8 of 8 overall, but 2 of 2 in my age group with a time of 1:18.45.

 

So I picked up four silver and one gold big honkin' Provincial Championship medals, just for showing up and competing my best, and the entire meet was a blast!

 

http://www.langleymustangs.com/uploads/1/0/8/8/10886303/masters_33rd_langley_pacific_invitational_results.pdf

 

 

The Long, Long Weekend

On June 7th at 6:30 PM I ran the 800 meter race at the Friday Night Mile at the South Surrey Athletic Centre track. I finished 3 of 3 with a personal best of 2:49.49. This was thanks to the Jordans, with John running in front of me and pulling me the whole race, and Debbie running close behind me and pushing. On the last straightaway heading into the finish, Debbie hit another gear and blew past me with about 50 meters to go, and as I attempted to answer her pace she pulled me to my PB.

MAGIC 800
1.John Jordan 2:39.55
2.Debbie Jordan 2:45.02
3.Gordon Flett 2:49.49

https://www.facebook.com/penrunwr

The next morning I competed in the Squamish 5 Peaks 6.9K Sport trail race. It was my first time competing in it, and a woman asked myself and my friend Vas before the race what the hills were like. Vas told her that there was an upward climb at the beginning, but it wasn't nearly as long or steep as the Golden Ears race. At 10:15 we started the race, and soon hit a single track mud trail that just kept going up and up for a few hundred meters. Vas said after the race that he realized his error only after we'd gone a ways up the climb, and felt bad because he felt like he'd lied to her. Guess he won't make that mistake again!

The race director had stressed to us all in his prerace instructions about how you should let faster runners by when they were trying to pass, especially since so much of the route was single track. We were over halfway through the race, zigzagging mostly downhill through thick bush, on a rocky and root filled trail. I caught up to 2 guys, and they heard me but just kept going. Very shortly there were quite a few of us lined up running behind them. One of them yelled "Wow, it sounds like a herd of elephants behind us!", and the guy at my shoulder yelled "Yeah?". 

Still oblivious, they kept running in front of us and we couldn't get by them, and finally the fellow behind me asked "Are you guys going to let us pass or not?" They got out of our way and it was like a dam burst, with all of us flying down the trail as fast as we could, with the guy behind me yelling "Go! Go!" The rest of us knew what we were doing and sorted it out as we went, and soon we were all in our proper order.

It wasn't long before we were off the single track, had exited the thick woods, and were running on a wide path, where we could hear the announcer at the finish line.

Running through the trees, soon I rounded the corner and there it was, with people lining the way cheering us in, and over the line I went!

Vas had finished a couple of places ahead of me and was waiting there, and we went and got some cookies (chocolate chip and oatmeal), banana pieces and bagels with peanut butter and Nutella. They also seemed to have free samples of wonderful Vega products on every table, and we ended up stocking up a little bit.

They had the awards, and Vas was 2nd of 22 in his age group and 12th of 158 overall, while Paul Butcher was 1st and 6th overall.

 I finished 1st of 11 in my age group, and 14th overall, with a time of 41:02. 2 friends who just started running again this year after a long hiatus, Randy Klassen and Ron Fraser, were 2nd & 3rd in our age group. It was a pleasure to share the podium with them! 

Willi Ribi turned 60 this year and so moved up an age group, where he did well placing 2nd. 

http://racedaytiming.ca/raceday-results?display=alicelakesport2013

To see many photos of the race, Robert Shaer has them up on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/5peaksadventures/sets/72157634040944910/

After the awards were over it was time to head back to Vancouver, as I had a race to run in White Rock the next morning.

On June 9th I ran the Sandcastle City Classic 10K. It was put on by my club, the Semiahmoo Sunrunners. It's a point to point race where they bus us from the finish by the beach to the start line near Crescent Park Elementary. I remember it was cool and rained off and on during the race. Afterward it began pouring, but eventually it let up and we got the awards going. I finished 46 of 262 overall, 5 of 15 in my age group, with a time of 43:29, so I missed the age group podium after finishing 3rd the last 2 years. This resulted in me taking pics, ending up as one of the race photographers, and posting my first collection on flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/97391931@N05/sets/72157634348169876/

Paul Kimugul won the race, and Jen Moroz was the top female.

http://startlinetiming.com/races/2013/sandcastle/oall10.txt

My last event of this extended weekend was the Remax Twilight Series Meet # 2, on Monday, June10, beginning at 5:30 PM. I ended up where I'd started, at the South Surrey Athletic Centre track. The Twilight Meets are put on by Ocean Athletics, who do a fantastic job!

I did the long jump for the first time ever in a competition, finishing 5 of 5 with a 3.49 best jump. Needs a lot of work, but it's a start.

I also ran the 3000 meters race later in the evening, finishing 12 of 12 (only old person), with a time of 12:30.79. I was tired after all my activity this weekend, so even though didn't run as fast as I'd hoped to, I was happy knowing I competed and did my best! http://www.oceanathletics.org/results-photos-home/

The meet was almost over after the 3000, so I thanked the organizers and headed home, with my next race coming up very quickly, the Longest Day 5K on Friday, June 14 at 6:45 PM at UBC.

Okanagan Weekend

On Saturday, June 1st I ran the Giant's Head 5.4K in Summerland. There was also a Man of Steel Triathlon http://www.summerland.ca/departments/parks/Man%20of%20Steel%20Triathlon%20Entry%20Form.pdf that went on all day long, plus a 10K that started the same time as my race at 6 PM.

When I arrived there for the race the first thing that I noticed was a huge amount of young people, little kids plus teenagers, warming up and getting ready to race.

As we waited at the starting line, which was on a street a couple of blocks over from the finish line beside the aquatic centre, a guy in his 20s standing behind me told me that he thought it was awesome that all those kids were running the 5.4K. He then told me that he was running the 10K, and said that maybe he shouldn't have just eaten a big plate of poutine right before the race. Probably not!

 

It was almost 6, so the race director gave us quick last minute instructions, a 10 second countdown, and we were off! After about 30 meters we turned left and the 10Kers went right. We ran along a main drag, and I got past the main block of youngsters, but some stayed with me and even surged ahead. Then we turned off again, running along some quiet residential streets, and soon hitting a fairly steep hill about 300 meters long. As I was running up it in the heat I was thinking I probably did well last year to finish in 23 minutes and change, and thought there was no way I was going to run that fast this time around.

 

As we crested another hill that was shorter but much steeper than the first one, there was a fellow in his late teens in front of me, plus a kid who looked about 9 or so. A volunteer a few years older than me was standing there, and he yelled at us that there were some little kids farther up ahead of us, implying we should try and catch up to them. I figured that the older young runner was thinking the same thing as myself, "Who cares?", as he was struggling even more than I was, and eventually I passed him.

 

With less than a kilometer to go the young kid was still in front of me, and as we hit the main drag again I sped up, but so did he. There were people along the street cheering us on, and we hit the turn down the street to the aquatic centre and the finish line.

 There were less than 200 meters to go, and we were running downhill. I slowly gained on him, but he heard me coming and looked back at me. We gave the crowd a good laugh, with me racing behind him as fast as I could, and him giving it everything he had to prevent an old man from beating him. I was going to let him win, but I didn't have to, he beat me fair and square. I told him he ran a great race, and he just nodded, holding his side with an expression of pain on his face. About 10 minutes later I saw him sitting by the aquatic centre still holding his side and asked if he was okay, and he said yes, and soon he was fully recovered.

 

There were bananas and oranges plus juice, water and slushies for us after we'd finished our races. I grabbed a little sustenance, and stayed awhile at the finish line, cheering in the finishing racers. After grabbing my jacket and camera out of my car, I went back and got a couple of pics.

 Next I headed a couple of blocks over to the park where there was a huge stage set up with masses of prizes on it. We also had a huge selection of food to buy from the many food carts set up around the perimeter. I had some great Thai food plus an ice cream cone topped with butterscotch sauce.

 

There was a massive crowd now gathered, and thanks to the generous sponsors, a couple of thousand dollars worth of prizes on the stage to give away. Like last year, I failed to have my name drawn for any of them, but that's okay. 

Interspersed with the prize draw was the awarding of medals for the various races. They had teams and individuals from the triathlon as well as from the 5 & 10 Ks, presented by Miss Summerland and her princesses. 

I'd won my age group again this year, so when it was my turn I asked a young fellow standing at the front of the stage to take my picture. It was only me alone as the other 2 guys grabbed their medals and immediately exited the back of the stage.

 Right after the last awards were given out it started to rain so our emcee wrapped things up quickly and we all happily headed our separate ways.

 

I finished 6th of 442 overall, and 1st of 35 in my age group, with a time of 23:22, the exact same time I ran last year!

http://www.summerland.ca/docs/ActionFest/2013/RaceResults/GHR_5.4_OVERALL.pdf

 

Since I'd traveled all that way already I thought I may as well run another race, so on Sunday morning I ran the Dirty Feet 5K at Myra Bellevue Provincial Park in Kelowna. The 21K race had just taken off at 9:30 as I arrived and managed to snag a scarce spot in the parking lot. I headed up into the woods to the start area and got my race bib, and then went for a warmup. At 10 myself and many others cheered the 10K runners as they started their race, and then at 10:15 it was our turn.

 

We ran out from the start and quickly turned right and ran through the woods along a mud trail. The race was aptly named, as it had rained recently, and there was no way you weren't going to get "dirty feet". After awhile the trail narrowed to a single track, and we ran out into the open and through some scrub bushes. There were patches of water to go through and the rest was wet mud, with the exception of some rocky parts where you really had to watch your footing.

 

I ran behind a young woman for quite awhile, watching as she had more and more mud caked to the back of her legs, and knowing the same was happening to me. Again there was a volunteer along the way at one point who told us that some youngsters were kicking our butts. It was cloudy but still pretty warm, and like yesterday we couldn't afford to care.

 

We came to a steep downhill with about a  kilometer to go, and the woman in front of me tore down it. I managed to keep her in sight for most of the rest of the race, but that was about it, as she slowly increased the gap between us. Finally I heard the race announcer and knew the end was near, and headed down the single track and to the turn to the finish where people were waiting and cheering us in. I crossed the line and Rebecca, who won the women's race, was waiting for me, and we congratulated each other on a good race.

 

They had water, eload and coffee to drink, and gummy bears, chips, popcorn, bananas, oranges, and cookies to eat, and I refueled a bit and then went to my car. I grabbed my camera and went back to the finish line to get some pictures and cheer the people coming in. 

After awhile I went and asked the race director when they would have the award ceremony for our race, but he said it wouldn't be for another hour. Since I had to work that night I decided it was best for me to take off, as I had a long ride home ahead of me.

 

I ended up 5th of 85 overall, 1st of 3 in my age group, with a time of 28:16. In both races a youngster named Jacob finished close in front of me, and another named Elijah not far behind me, but they were different kids in each one!

http://www.dirtyfeet.ca/results-2/2013-results/june-2nd-run/

Last Weekend In May

On Saturday, May 25, I headed over to Vancouver Island for the Q's Victoria Run Series Meet # 2. It was at the University of Victoria this time, and there were some young people who came over from the Lower Mainland to compete, but I think I was the only "seasoned" runner who did so.

The meet started at 6:30 PM, and this time they ran the races from longest to shortest, meaning the 3000 meters was the inaugural event. The women ran first, and the race director filmed it riding along the track on his bike.

 They've posted a film of it here:  http://victoriarunseries.com/womens-3000m-race-meet-2/ . 

Next I watched Gary Duncan, Frank Towler and the others run it, skipping the 3000 myself.

 I was running the Shaughnessy 8K at 8:30 the next morning, and I figured that it would probably have been one race too many. Next up was the 1500 open race, and I don't remember much about it and the subsequent 800 meters event, except that I PBed in the first distance, but didn't do as well in the shorter race. It's much better running the shorter distances first and progressing to the longer ones than the other way around, at least for me anyway.

There were a couple of races to go after my last one, the (fast) men's and women's 800, but I had to go catch the last ferry leaving at 9 PM, so I said goodbye to Frank and Gary and headed for the terminal.  

For a report of the meet highlighting the faster performers go to:

 http://bcathletics.wordpress.com/2013/05/28/the-qs-victoria-run-series-featured-the-uvic-vikes-and-a-nanaimo-fa%E2%80%8Bmily-affair/#like-7411

I was 9 of 14 overall and 2 of 2 in my age group in the 800, with a time of 2:57.7, and 7 of 15 OA, 2 of 2 AG, with a PB of 5:44.8 in the 1500.

http://victoriarunseries.com/full-results-meet-2-2013/

The next morning brought the Shaughnessy 8K race, and it was a little cool and cloudy as we started off at 8:30 AM on the road in front of the Kerrisdale Arena. After about 200 meters we turned right down a side street and began our ascent of THE HILL. 300 meters or so later we reached the crest, and after awhile my legs recovered and I began to pick up speed again.

Wending our way along the neighborhood streets, we soon reached another incline, a few hundred meters long but much less steep than the first one. The course was a partial double loop, skipping THE HILL on the second go-around, which nobody complained about.

With less than a kilometer to go we came to an intersection with a lot of marshals, and I kept going straight as nobody told me to do anything else. I noticed fairly quickly that I could only see very slow runners and walkers in front of me, and I looked back and all the runners had turned right and were heading down that road. I ran back but the fellow who had been only about 10 meters in front of me before was now at least 100 meters ahead.

A few hundred meters later we were heading down the road leading to the turn to the finish. I had passed Bill Chang a couple of kilometers into the race, but I could hear his distinctive breathing behind me as I now ran down THE HILL. We reached the bottom and rounded the corner for the last 200 meter dash to the finish, and I pretended that I was finishing my 800 meter race the night before, and ran as fast as I could until I was over the line.

Jimmy Hinze from my club greeted me, he was there as a BC Athletics rep helping out with the race, and he showed me a picture that he took as I went across the finish line, and said he'd send it to me. We talked a bit and greeted some more finishers and then I headed over to get some food.

They had various fresh bagels with cream cheese, peanut butter, and jam to spread on them, delicious soft chocolate chip cookies, 2-packs of hard boiled eggs, and bananas & oranges, plus chocolate milk, water, smoothie drinks, and coffee.

They had the usual large amount of draw prizes, but I failed to win anything this time around. The awards were presented, and Bill Chang had told me before the race that he'd seen Mark Bennett, Tim Smith, and Larry Nightingale there already, so we both knew we weren't going to be winning any medals today. I ended up 6th out of 19 in our age group and 57th overall out of 283, with a time of 35:10, while Bill was 7th in our AG, and Arnold ended up 12th. http://www.startlinetiming.com/races/2013/shaughnessy/oall8.txt

http://www.startlinetiming.com/races/2013/shaughnessy/age8.txt

With the festivities over it was time to say our goodbyes until the next race, so I bid Arnold, Vas and Bill adieu and headed home.

Here's a further report on the race:
http://www.lgrr.com/pdfs/SHAUGHNESSY%202013%20report.pdf

Many photos were also taken, three different sets in fact:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.465065823578774.1073741843.103882399697120&type=1

http://www.flickr.com/photos/96693317@N08/sets/72157633945714143/

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.464236163661740.1073741841.103882399697120&type=3

My next race was the Giant's Head Run 5.4K race in Summerland at 6 PM on June 1st.

Peach City 10K

On May 19th I ran the 10K race at the Peach City RunFest http://www.peachcityhalf.com/ in beautiful Penticton. We took off from beside the beach in Skaha Lake Park at 8 AM. The race director had announced that the winner of the race for the last 2 years, Doug Wickware, was running it again. He wasn't standing at his usual spot near the front at the start line, however, and looked sheepish as he waved to the crowd. Later on we found out that he'd dropped out of the race, so he was probably running injured.

 

We ran along Main Street before turning off and racing along a winding road. At about the 6K mark we hit a pretty good hill that slowed me down considerably, but I could see the guy in front of me was struggling too. We reached the top and went around a couple more corners, and finally there were the marshals guiding us around a turnaround, only 3 more Ks to go!

 

About halfway there I hit the last hill, which was quite steep and I was happy to finally crest it. It still took awhile to get back up to speed, but soon up ahead the turn into the park loomed, with cheering volunteers and spectators waiting there to spur us on. I ran the final 400 meters as quickly as I could, but my time this year was quite a bit slower than in the past. Even though I finished 7 of 66 overall, I ended up 3 of 6 in my age group, and it took me 44:18 to do it. http://www.peachcityrunners.com/marathon/pc10k2013.htm I still managed to medal anyway, so all was good. I'm no longer the course record holder for my age group though, but hopefully I can rectify that next year.

 

To eat they had cut up eclairs and chocolate chip cookies, plus bananas, watermelon, and oranges.

 The volunteers also cooked us a great pancake breakfast, and they had coffee and chocolate milk to rehydrate us and recharge our energy levels.

 I looked at the list of winners of the draw prizes, and my name was right at the top, so I went over to the prize table. They said that I'd won the big prize, which is a waterproof container made by an Edmonton company called UK, worth $70!

 

I got some pics of happy finishers, including the half marathon winner, a guy about my age named Michael Kascak. 

Steve King did his always stellar job as race announcer, which adds a touch of class to any event where we're lucky enough to have him. They did the 10K awards, and the presenter told us that they'd sent a fellow to get the third place medals that had been left behind, and he'd be there shortly. While I was waiting for him three woman were looking at the posted results, and I was standing there as one of them said she'd finished 7th in her age group. I realized she'd been reading them wrong, as she was actually second, and her friend was third. I explained this to them, and said "You medaled!", and they were really happy about this news. The guy showed up with our third place medals, and it was time to head back to Vancouver. This is a favourite race of mine, and I'm planning be back to have more fun and try to post a new record next year!

 

My next races were the 800 and 1500 meters at the Q's Victoria Run Series track meet on May 25th.