It's amazing that I hadn't ran any cross country for well over two and a half years from Winter Nationals in Derwood MD in Feb 09 till the recent Jack St Clare race at Belmont Plateau and now I've ran two in two weeks.....much like waiting for a bus you wait for an age for yours to show up and then two arrive back to back!!
I don't have a lot of xc races to my credit,I shunned xc for a couple of years but after committing 100% to track in 07 I came to embrace xc as the bridge between the end of outdoor track season and the start of indoor track season and in 08 enjoyed my best set of times for xc over 5k,6k,8k,then came the achilles injury in 09 which put a major kybosh on running period but also meant it was prudent to avoid some of the rougher terrain that xc races can sometimes provide.
I will say the Rochester course felt like real xc,maybe it was the mud,perhaps it was the fact most of the 5k course was on grass but whatever it was there was a universal feeling amongst those gathered here for the Master National 5K XC C'ship that this was a real xc course.
Conditions were surprisingly mild for Rochester for mid to late October,in fact conditions were better than in Syracuse three weeks earlier although due to some bizarre announcement prior to the race temperatures went up several notches!!!!
I never understood why this meet was billed as a USA vs Canada meet,granted upstate New York means our cousins from the great white north are not too far away but if this was an international meet then fair enough but to announce less than half an hour b4 the 11.30am gun time that International rules dictate runners are only allowed 11 spikes in their running spikes just seemed out of left field.
If that was the case put it in the race literature,I'm sure runners would've taken the steps to comply,instead there seemed to be some anger and bewilderment amongst my GPTC team mates as spike wrenches were hastily dug out and the removal of a 12th spike began.
Personally I didn't have more than 11 spikes on both of my running spikes and since there was nobody checking the 151 starters spikes on the starting line I found the whole episode very Shakespearean......much ado about nothing but if it meant some of my team mates run w/ a little fire under them maybe it wasn't so bad after all!!??
One of the things I love about xc racing is the start,as a track runner unless you're running the 1,500m you're invariably going straight into a turn in xc more often than not you're looking at a large field straight ahead b4 making a first turn which allows you a chance to get into your stride.
I had no set position/time to chase this was purely a race to run and see where I stacked up,that said I did check my watch at the 1 mile marker and saw 6.00.for what it's worth at Belmont 2 weeks ago I went through the opening mile in 5.38.
Heading out of the woods and up and around a large field I was joined by Conor O Driscoll a good friend of mine from Westchester Track Club,Conor suggested we work together which seemed like a good idea as we not only put distance between the pack behind us but began to reel in and pick off a few runners ahead of us.
No marker or visible marker at 2 miles so no split,heading back into the woods and then back across the soccer fields back to the finish I began to feel the excesses of a long week and that coupled w/ the mud meant not finishing as strong as I would've liked but still quite content w/ 21st out of 151 runners,8th in the M45-49 age group in 18.29 which is my third fastest 5k xc time.
Post cool down we waited patiently for the results,the temperature began to turn and I for one was glad it had been a lot warmer at 11.30am than it was now.
After much deliberation it was announced we'd finished third in the M40 team race behind Genesee Valley Harriers and Westchester Track Club and just ahead of Central Park Track Club,the four way dog fight I had predicted on Thursday.
I have one more xc race on my schedule next month b4 calling it a season outdoor and one indoor race b4 the end of the year.
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