The Central Park Track Club men’s masters team turned marathoning into a team sport at the 42nd New York City Marathon. The orange packs took down both the men’s 40+ and men’s 50+, a coup des pieds not accomplished by any team in at least five years.
The victory of the 40+ was particularly sweet since the young ones had not won a club points race in 2011 and had finished third in the marathon in 2010. The average 40+ scorer in 2011 was almost 9 minutes faster than in 2010. Thom Little was the first across the line at 2:33/83.5%, after leading the open team through 30k. Josh Rayman was second (2:39/81.5%) and 54 year old Alan Ruben was third (2:49/85.4%).
Josh Rayman sped north from his green training grounds in Georgia to hit the asphalt and rebar of NYC. Beside the latitudinal diversity Josh brings to the result sheets, he also has a different view of tapering. Two weeks ago, while his CPTC teammates were dialing back like a candidate after an election, Josh was lining up for a race. A marathon actually. Josh and a team called ‘Unholy Trinity’ won the Great Floridian relay triathlon, with Josh splitting 2:56 with a two minute stop.
Josh credits some big miles in training for allowing him to run two solid marathons in two weeks. He had averaged over 110 miles per week for the previous eight weeks and felt ready. The early miles were plagued by calf soreness, but he made like Majdic and sped on. At mile 25 he was facing every marathoner’s dream/nightmare: knowing he had a PR and a time barrier in sight…but only if he could summon the fire for the final mile. Sue Pearsall’s camera caught well the determination of Josh’s last push. He joined up with another runner with the same opportunity, and put the hammer down to kill mile 26 in 6 flat and the last 400 in 69 seconds. 2:39:42 was a four second PR and maybe he had enough cushion to enjoy the last few steps.
The #3 scorer for the 40+ (and the #1 scorer for the 50+), Alan Ruben, has shown Coach Tony and the rest of us how to finish with dignity for many years. Much of what you need to know about Alan as a marathoner is that he covered the ground between 35k and 40k in 20:02 and the ground between 0k-5k in 19:58. His splits were 1:24:22/1:24:55, which is probably the closest any CPTCer came to negatively splitting the race.
“I honestly didn’t think I’d break 2:50 again, so I was delighted.” Alan said afterwards. “I’ve run enough marathons (53) that I run more by feel than by pace, knowing the effort level I need to put in as the race progresses. So even though I was ahead of my expected splits, I knew I was running at the right effort level so I wasn’t too concerned.”
Running rock-solid above-expectation splits by feel is a clear benefit of having run formany years. As is the self-knowledge required to get you to the line in high fitness. To get back under the 2:50 barrier, Alan added more progression runs than in the past. “Training-wise I tried consciously to get back to doing workouts more comfortably and picking up toward the end, which was how I used to do them when I was a lot faster. As I’ve slowed I’ve found I’ve been working a little too hard to try to prevent my splits from degenerating too quickly. Again, for me, it’s all about getting the effort level right, not the pace.”
The No I Will Not Quit award goes to Mike Rennock, #2 scorer in the 50+, for his climb back from injury over the summer. “Three months ago, I ran my first race (Club Championships) since coming up gimpy with two strained hamstrings and having foot surgery.” Mike writes. “I could not break 6:45 pace per mile in that five mile race. I determined to slog through the workouts and the training miles to get to the marathon.” He stayed with Alan for the first 14 miles and clocked the finish at 2:54:27, under his goal of 2:55.
So in three months, Mike went from 6:51 pace for a five miler to 6:40 pace for a 26 miler. He credits Coach Tony’s Tuesday track workouts for getting his legspeed and confidence up, and is looking forward to Boston 2012.
Also scoring for the victorious 50+ was Peter Allen (3:04/77.7%)
On the individual side, CPTC took down a podium in the women’s 65-69. Judith Tripp ran 4:05/81.4% to finish 3rd in her age group. Her time was the 2nd fastest of her seven NYC Marathons, behind a flying 3:46 in 2009. “I had high hopes (for a sub-4) as the time seemed to go by fast and a friend who clocked my splits said I was very steady.” But as the race went on her body started to give her trouble. “A few miles from the end, in the sun, I started to get kind of a numb left foot and then toe cramps! So I was sort of scuttling along like a crab when this happened, and I also got a bit of a calf cramp.”
It takes a big effort to get on the podium at the NYCM, and Judith pulled it off by being the only CPTCer to set a 52 week age graded PR in the race.
Even after decades of running, good training and great motivation can push us to new speeds. Andre’ Lejeune turned twenty years of capillary development into a lifetime best 3:05/72%. Unlike teammate Josh, Andre’ was able to savor CPS – this would be his best time by seven minutes.
Finally, making a marathon of marathons was Rick Shaver, who completed his 35th consecutive NYCM, in 3:55/64.5%. May we all enjoy running so much.
Team standings before the marathon:
First Place: M 50+
Second Place: M 40+, W 40+
Third Place : M 60+ (up from 5th place)
Fourth Place: W 50+
Fifth Place: W 60+
Thanks to Sue Pearsall for the photo of Kimihiko Oishi.