4.8 miles - Judd's Bridge Road October 22, 2005 8:30 am. Cold drizzle ended just before race |
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A third rainy Saturday in a row diminished the Roxbury stalwarts yet again,
causing one of the crazy people who showed up this week to call them a
"bunch of fair weather fanatics." It's hard to know what we miss
more, our many friends or the nice weather.
In any case, 37 people showed up to run the 4.8 mile out-and-back Judd's Bridge Road course. The temperature was in the low 40's, and the rain had stopped a little before the race began.
At the half way mark, both winners occupied second place. Pam Quist was two places and about ten seconds ahead of Roxbury Rookie Ellen McCurtin, and Jeff Sheldon was looking smooth and easy, about five seconds ahead of Dangerous Ken Merrick, who was running like a predator.
Tom McNulty showed a strong second half, but Chris Norris was even stronger. At the turnaround, the two were together, only about ten seconds ahead of Mo van Moffaert, who was running a steady race with the Fossil. By the end, Tom was almost four minutes ahead of Mo, and Chris was another 30 seconds ahead of that. And it wasn't because Mo slowed down; she ran a nearly perfectly steady race.
Next Week's Course
We will not be able to run the 3.95 mile Jeep Trail course next week, or any time soon, for that matter. The bridge on River Road got damaged in the floods last week and the week before, and it isn't there now. For a while, pedestrians could get through, and so we were able to use it for the race for the last two weeks, but now the big steel-reinforced concrete beams have been removed, and there is just a plywood cover over the culvert under the bridge, at least four feet below where the road bed would be. It is safe only for squirrels to cross, and it looks like it will take quite a bit of time to fix.
We'll pick a different course for next week and announce it later this week. Watch this space.
Safety
Now that autumn is coming, the sun is lower in the sky at 8:30 (unless it continues to rain every week) and the drivers might have trouble seeing us. Be extra careful.
Fossil has three rules of running:
Be safe
Have fun
It's more fun if you run well
Be nice to the drivers. For the most part, they like us, and they are proud to have us running in Roxbury. Smile, and, if you wave, be sure you use all five fingers.
This week's pictures
Up top is a shot from last March, part of a bitter cold winter that grew into one of the hottest summers ever. It wasn't that cold this week, but it was colder than we were used to, and a lot of people wore hats, gloves, long sleeves, and things like that.
Below that, we have a few of this week's
fast guys, winner Ken Merrick and second place Jeff Sheldon, taken a few weeks
ago when short sleeves were appropriate attire.
Along side the results we have Lynnie Zuback and Sinnead Blevio smiling, with Ron Karl behaving himself in the background. Then there's a shot of Christina Clark going fast, and then one of Fast Mario Hasz and his wife Diane, the Belle of the Finish Line.
Down at the bottom, we have three women smiling after the race, Fossil meeting a dragon in Germany, and a collection of three sets of feet.
We have more great pictures from this week's race, but Web Guy didn't find enough to write about, so there isn't room. Maybe we'll use some of them next week.
The Roxbury Races are now listed on the Internet both on RunningInTheUSA and on HiTekRacing.com
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Created October 22, 2005
