Hitting The Road,Traveling Cross Country, To Run Track

This weekend began the 4 week travelogue portion of my season,Upstate New York,Broadway,Maryland and back to New York b4 a 2 week respite and then logging more travel miles to Boston,New York and Maryland in March.
While this was an Upstate New York trip it wasn,t w/out a brief stop in my second home,Manhatten on route from W.Philly to Queens to catch my flight to Ithaca,4 hours of train and subway/bus riding for a 45 min flight.
How rock star/elite athlete of me to fly in for my race,get picked up by a courtsey car and driven to the hotel that was paid for by the events gracious host Tom Hartshorne,forget Miller,THIS is the high life!!!!
Killed a few hours in my room watching tv and composing the latest chapter of"The Top Cat Chronicals'' for"The Queen Of The Slipstream"I need a back up plan in case this running lark dosen,t pan out so my plan b is to be a writer!!!
As is tradition on the Friday nite b4 Hartshorne dinner at Antlers,a chance to unwind from the trek to Ithaca and relax w/ some good friends and some good food and get ready for race day.
Saturday morning,a lite breakfast w/ my good friend Neil Fitzgerald b4 again doing the whole rock star/elite athlete thing and getting a ride over to Barton Hall w/ Tom Hartshorne,Pete Taylor and Nolan Shaheed,the race director,race announcer and overall meet top athlete,if this were a movie this sceen would have the classic Clapton/BB King "Riding W/ The King"playing in the background!!!.
Barton Hall hadn,t changed since my last visit,I gleefully took a warm up mile upon arrival,iroincally my first mile this week due to the below freezing temps back home in Philly...according to the tv show"It,s Always Sunny In Philadelphia"but it,s feckin freezing right now!!!.
Thanks to my trusty ipod the hour and a half till I began to stretch and warm up 45 mins b4 my gun time flew by,never underestimate the power of music,by the time "In This River" by Black Label Society" was over I was ready to get it on!!! and in a field this deep I needed to be.
Jim Sorensen,John Hinton,Alain Boucher,Neil Fitzgerald,Dan Franek a who,s who of Masters middle distance running here for the 42nd Hartshorne Memorial Masters Mile.
My reaction to the gun wasn,t great,I got boxed in going into the first turn,the disadvantage of being seeded 4th and having runners 5th thro 10th coming in from my right,no worries,down the back straight I swung wide into lane 2 and moved up into 3rd,for a brief moment I considered getting tight on John Hinton,s shoulder but thought better of it,it,s still too soon in my season to be that gung ho,33,66 for my opening two splits,2.12 at 800m,pretty much where I thought I,d be,out front Jim Sorensen was blazing a trail that had even the brilliant John Hinton in his wake,something you don,t see everyday.
Down the back straight of lap 5 Dan Franek went by me,I know he has great middle distance credentials but I was taken aback by his mile prowess,at the bell I didn,t check my split,my only concern was overhauling Dan in the final 200m.
Rounding the final turn I moved out into lane 2 and gave everything I had,in 07 off the very same final turn I had to hold off Anselem Lebourne today I became the hunter,not the hunted,pulling alongside Dan w/ the finish line right in front of us I managed to out lean him,how close was it?4.30.14 to 4.30.22,the moral here..............race like a miler,lean like a sprinter!!!
The great Nolan Sheheed pulled me to me feet and offered his congratulations,at this stage I still didn,t know I,d gotten third,I congratulated John on his runners up spot b4 finding my good friend Alain Boucher who,d gotten his Canadien record.
As is now tradition a few words for Diane for the Ithaca Journal,post race and a chance to finally to meet the great Jim Sorensen,who joked I need to wear more green,hey if I could convince the powers that be at GPTC to switch to a green race uniform I,d be golden.............well greener!!!.
The thing about Hartshorne it,s not just about the race,it,s the whole weekend, and following a round of phonecalls including my mother{yes folks I,m 45 years old and I still phone my mum first thing after every race!}my club and my coach who was delighted w/ my performance considering my lack of milage over the last two weeks it was off to the nearby Country Club for the awards dinner.
I,m still a rookie at Nationals and Masters Invitationals but each one I go to I meet up w/ the friends I,ve made at the previous ones and make new friends,Dan Franek and I got to share a conversation as we watched a video of the race,the finish deserves to be on You Tube I,m telling you,maybe after the dvd,s get made and sent out it will be.
Prize money and a medal are great rewards for a top three finish but I enjoy the fact I get to give a speech,never shy of a word or two{according to my late father Kevin "I didn,t just kiss the Blarney Stone...........I enhaled it"I opened my speech w/ a line I borrowed from Kevin McMahon two years ago,"a lethel combination,an Irishman,a microphone and a roomful of people"
I questioned if Dan Franek had not read the script when he over took me on lap 5 but more importantly gave praises due to Tom and Rick for the exceptional job they do each year w/ this event,I hoped that I along w/ everbody else present would return next year.
Another tradition is that Tom invites everyone back to his house after the dinner,it,s a nice way to end the event,hanging out and chatting about running,all events should be this much fun,but that,s what make the whole Hartshorne Memorial Masters Mile experience so unique,it,s unlike any other event out there.
Did my final rock star/elite athlete thing Sunday and got a ride to Ithaca airport from Tom who was kind enough to drop both Nolan and I off,I,ve know Nolan since Charlotte 06 Nationals,the man is as kind and genuine as he is awesome, a few moments in his company and you can,t help but feel good about yourself,the world needs more Nolan Shaheeds and Tom Hartshornes trust me.
Home again to a sub zero W.Philly by 4.30pm,a banner weekend,next stop Manhatten,Madison Square Garden and the Millrose Games,like the songs says"It Keeps Getting Better".