The Mini 10K was the fifth Club Points race of the year and the CPTC women came away with their third win. This being the Mini, a top international field was assembled, and staying with the world-class leaders was not the prudent thing to do. Nevertheless, Aileen Conlon started out very fast, within sight of the top runners, and led Caroline Bierbaum (second in the 2005 NCAA 10,000 meters) for much of the race and just missed outkicking her. Aileen, in less than ideal weather conditions (warm and very humid), came in 27th, setting yet another PR of 36:22, and even more impressively, was the third American overall. If you didn’t see the NY Times today there was an article on the NYAC women vs the CPTC women rivalry that has developed this year, and Aileen is quoted in the article. Check out this link.
We know we’re going to have a great team score when we’ve got back to back Laurens running in the race. For the first time, Lauren Esposito and Lauren Gustafson both ran in the same race, Lauren E, running in her second 10k after a nagging injury, ran a 37:30, finishing only four places behind Aileen. Lauren G was very close behind, running a 37:47, in 33rd place. Next runner was Allison Lind in 39th place with a 38:35, and Sarah Alaei rounded out the top five, finishing with a 39:01 in 44th place. Also finishing under 6:30 mile pace were Andrea Costella, Felice Kelly, Kathy King, and Yumi Ogita. Yumi, Sue Pearsall, and Margot Sheehan contributed to a 5th place finish in the 40+ division. Deborah Barchat, Jan Farnung-Krause and Mary Diver ran to a second place finish in the 50+ division.
A huge contingent of CPTC women (33) ran in this race, and it was great to see some people in this race that we haven’t seen for a while. Congratulations to everyone!
All club members shouldn’t be too upset if your time was not as fast as expected. The high humidly in this race did tend to cause slower times. It’s a common misconception that runners perspire more heavily in humid conditions. Actually, you will perspire much less in very humid conditions, but the perspiration on your body can’t evaporate as quickly when the concentration of water vapor in the air is high. That means that the evaporation can’t cool your body efficiently, which tends to raise your core body temperature, forcing you to slow down.