Glory be on a beautiful day. 

Our 60+ men finished 1st, with power to spare. 

Our 70+ men took 5th, in a pinch. 

It was nip and tuck with 70+. Captain Dave nursing a foot wound, Chip with an injury that cropped up, Bob could not run, leaving me and Alex with George as the wild card to get 3 pairs of legs over the finish line; George came through. [Unbeknownst to us, he only intended to run 2.5 miles; nothing like good weather to go the distance.] We had our 3 scorers! Though we finished last among the 5 scoring teams, we picked up 6 points in the standings, leaving us nicely in 3rd place for the year with 2 scoring races left (short of the unlikely scenario of a team having 3 marathon contenders).

Our 60+ and 70+ men are in a happy place with 3 official team point races to go.

As to our 60+, we were 8 minutes faster than 2nd place West Side Runners, who incidentally are in 6th place in the year tally. As a side note, this has proven to be an unusual year for mens 60+. As far back as I can recall, there has always been a dominant team sporting 3 reliably talented runners, with us usually in second place. This year, we occupy that top spot. For so many years I’ve been looking at our 50+ men and wondering when they would join us. It’s happening now.

 

David Blumel had a PB of 1:07:25 / 81.44%. It was good for 3rd in AG and 30th overall AG among 6368 men.

Noel Comess-Labat: 1:10:50 / 76.77%, 5th for the same AG.

Charles Parchment: 1:11:08 / 76.45%, 6th for the same AG. Last year 1:09:25 / 77.61%.

Art Palmer: 1:12:18 / 75.94%. 7th for the same AG. Last year 1:16:07 / 71.45%.

Alan Ruben: 1:15:30 / 72.72%. 13th for the same AG. Last year 1:14:22 / 73.13%. 

Thus, 3rd, 5th, 6th, 7th and 13th in the 60-64 age group. There were 202 men in this group. I will forward that our placement defines the concept of depth.

Eiji Ebihara: 1:17:03 / 69.92%. 1:14:13 / 71.91%.

Dennis O’Donnell: 1:20:08 / 68.52%. Last year 1:17:35 / 70.09%.

Gary Gosselin: 1:22:37 / 68.42%. Last year 1:19:30 / 70.4%.

Kevin McGuire: 1:22:59 / 69.49%. Last year 1:19:39 / 71.67%.

Yasuhiro Makoshi: 1:26:24 / 66.08%. Last year 1:11:15 / 79.34%.

 

Which brings us to these additions to our team’s Top 10 List for 10 mile races from David Greenberg, CPTC’s Masters record tally keeper:

3rd: M60+: David Blumel  1:07:25

7th: M60+: Noel Labatt-Comess 1:10:50

9th: M60+: Art Palmer 1:12:18 

 

After a number of ironic twists, David ran a personal best. This year had been marked with one setback upon another. He has average merely 25 miles per week. Last week he came down with something, but sprung right back, leading our collective charge to 1st place:

I finally made it to the starting line. ‘Nuff said. Art, thanks for pulling me through the first two miles.

Noel looked solid from the little I saw of him. He was in my corral and gone with the horn.

Charles, voted by the team as last year’s MVP, effortlessly passed me on the downhill on Mosholu. In my same B corral, certainly he could have run a faster, even pace:

as the security defender I am Glad the boss returns DAVID BLUMEL to keep us in contention for the 60+ club points championship we are sitting pretty in front mile 10.  I was feeling strong but the lights went out,  cool runnings staten island coming up.

Art is returning to race form. His time was a significant improvement over last year. His is the old struggle of injuries vs mileage.

Alan , who was 30 meters ahead of me till the Mosholu, where he motored ahead, out of sight:

My Bronx 10M reflected where I am these days, slowly getting used to my slowing times. Only a minute slower than last year and I finished well, but am feeling my calf now so hoping that won’t hinder my training for NYC too much.

A side note here. A couple years back running Tony’s Tuesday intervals on the 6th Street Track. Alan, in the lead of our D group, picked up the pace on the final interval. We each tried to hang on. As we broke into a jog, Alan said, “I just wanted to run that at the average pace of my fastest marathon.”

Eiji, whose 60th birthday was the day before this race:

I tried to run under 1:14 min but I had so much stress because of some train trouble that day and started 10 min late. I could not control my pace (so many people) after 5M it was ok but late. Recently I’ve been feeling good and enjoying for the running.

Welcome to the 60+ Eiji!

Dennis, 35 races since March. I believe the correct term is profligate:

One marathon, Copenhagen, Four Half Marathons, Boilermaker 15K, Three 10ks, One 8K (New Hyde Park), Two 5 milers, Three 4 milers, One 1 mile (Fifth Avenue), All the rests, 5Ks.

Gary’s focus is the marathon, this was one of three 10 mile training runs.

Kevin again ran the Maple Leaf Half up in Manchester, Vt,1:56:33, good for 3rd in AG, where Alan Heblack, Phil Vasquez and Dave Delano did the 5k option: 

Great fall day to run. Warm but not overbearing. Good amount of shade from the buildings.

Held pace most of the race although a bit slower pace than last year. 

NYRR does a good job on this race. The course is very favorable with a fast finish. 

Yasuhiro feels his diminished performance over last year was due to a paucity of training miles.

 

70+:

Hank Schiffman: 1:16:03 / 78.18%. Last year 1:14:20 / 79.17%.

Alex Wilkinson: 1:48:16 / 52.24%. Last year 1:36:35 / 62.27%.

George Hirsch: 1:50:12 / 73.53%. Last year 1:49:31 / 71.63%.

Hank and George took 2nd in their age groups.

Hank/me:

I inaugurated my ascension to 70-74 with this race, a supplicant with plantar fasciitis, well educated in that injuries become more frequent, go deeper and last longer with advancing age; Father Time is an insult comic.

Two double espressos race morning, two Aleves in the hope of scavenging prostaglandins generated by my PF burden an hour prior, and a caffeinated gel at the start, whatever did what, I had zero foot pain during the race. Having run a total of 93 miles since the first week in August, I did not know if I was a fool to run, or would be a fool for not trying. Sometimes the magic works; my ship came in. Now where is the free beer?

Alex:

Wonderful! Well, not so much how I felt during the run, but glad to have been able to fill the trio. Kudos to Tony for hanging out tenaciously at mile 8. Not sure who was more surprised when we high-fived, him or me!

 

Captain Hank