Welcome to my runner’s blog!

The world certainly doesn’t need another blog — running or otherwise — and I don’t need yet another distraction from getting my work done. Having said that, after having become a “runner” just a couple months ago at the age of 56 I’ve had some great experiences that I don’t want to just forget, and hopefully I can provide a little inspiration for some others who would like to be more active but think they’re too old to get started.

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Race #254 - Brooklyn Half Marathon - Brooklyn, NY - 05/17/14

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Wow... Just when I thought my best running days were over, this one has me thinking that maybe there are still a few all-time Personal Records waiting to be set with these old legs. Over the past month I've added about 10 extra miles per week to my training regimen and I think that made the difference. I had been running 10-12 miles for a long run each week, but I've bumped it up to 15, 16, and 17 miles over the past three weeks as I begin training for my first full marathon in four years, which will be coming up in September. I'm feeling great right now so I thought I'd do okay, but I was shocked when I found out my chip time was 1:32:13, only 16 seconds slower than my all-time PR that I ran three years ago, the fall of 2011, when I ran all of my all-time PR's. I didn't win my age group but I didn't expect to since New York City is one of the most competitive racing communities in the world. My goal was to finish in the top 10 in my age group and I fini...
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Race #232 - Grover Pumpkin Run 5k - Grover, NC - 10/26/13

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This was possibly the least organized race I've ever run. If all races were like this I'd probably revert back to being a mall walker. I arrived in Grover having read in the directions that the race was on "Main Street." Okay, that sounds simple enough since Grover is just a small town. Since the race was being held in conjunction with the Grover Pumpkin Festival I thought it would be easy to spot, and sure enough, there were hundreds of people gathered for the Pumpkin Festival, and it was nice. Lots of good-smelling food (although I was trying to watch my diet), great entertainment with a band on stage that sounded surprisingly good I thought, and lots of people, many dressed in Halloween costumes. I found the nearest parking space I could find, which was probably at least a quarter mile from the action, and walked up to find the race registration area. I walked completely to the other side of the festival without seeing anything, so I asked three guys who were...
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Race #158 - Mount Mourne Christmas Elf 5k - Mooresville, NC - 12/24/11

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I had heard a lot about this race from others who have run it in the past and the reviews were always good, so we headed over to the Mooresville area to experience it for ourselves. It actually exceeded our expectations, being just about a perfect race except for a glitch in putting down the cones or marking the course or something (I never figured out what exactly). The result was that the race was quite a bit longer than a 5k. According to several other people I talked to, they all had Garmin measurements of between 3.38 and 3.40 miles although personally my Garmin measured only 3.25. I don't check distances as I'm running, but I usually have a pretty good feel for how fast I'm running and I felt like I might have been somewhere between about 20:45 and 21:00, so as I approached the finish line and saw the clock at 22 minutes I was surprised. My final time of 22:39 still won my age group (55-59) and everybody else seemed to think they would have been about 2 minutes fast...
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Race #274 - Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon - Myrtle Beach, SC - 10/19/14

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For my running group, the Gaston County Runners (GCR), this has become our biggest event of the year. It was the fifth year of the Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon and I've run four of them. I'm not sure about the year I didn't run, but for all four years that I've been there the weather has been perfect. The last five miles or so is straight down Ocean Boulevard, with a turn onto the new boardwalk to the finish line at the site of the old Myrtle Beach Pavilion. It's one of the best finishes of any race I've been a part of and I look forward to it every year. This is a pretty big race with more than 3,000 finishers in the half marathon, and this year the GCR had seven runners who finished in the top 3 in their respective age groups. For the third straight year I managed to win the 60-64 age group, this year with a time of 1:35:44. I'm happy with that time although it was on a flat course and was about 30 seconds slower than last week's Hokie Half Marathon,...
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Race #214 - Mount Holly Springfest 5k - Mount Holly, NC - 05/04/13

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For the first time since last July I ran a 5k in under 21 minutes (20:58) so I was happy to know I still had a sub-21 in me at the age of 61. This race is just a few miles from my home and one of the few Gaston County races I had never run. It's a smallish race with 156 finishers this year, but there are a lot of good things about races this size: parking nearby, not losing your friends, a more casual starting line, etc. As I've been doing lately, I'll go light on the talking and let the photos tell the story since I wore my video glasses. Below is the video, followed by a few of the 100+ pictures I took. You can see all of the photos on my Facebook page. Click here for my Facebook gallery of this race. It was frigid for a race in May, when we expect springtime temperature. Bill refused to leave his car to warm up before the race. This was the first race I've been in with Dianne Allen in a while. She's coming back strong after an injury kep...
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