What's in a name?

Photos by Kristin Wainwright

On Saturday I raced the Big Lake Half Marathon up in Alton, Bay NH. If you recall a couple of weeks ago there was a big fire up in Alton. It wiped out a ton of small places right by the finish line. Any way it seemed to be a good day for racing. It was a little warm, around 60 with partly cloudy skies.

As I was thinking about writing this blog on my way home from Alton Bay on Saturday, I realized there were just to many Title's I could use so I decided to write this blog using the titles that I came up with.


1. "I beat JJ today" OK, I always show up early to races. How early well that all depends on the distance. At a 1/2 marathon, at least 2 hours early. Chris Dunn is of the same mind set and I hooked up with Chris and his wife Karen at registration. We then were hanging out by Chris's car when a bright yellow Xterra drove up with Jim and Kristin. So Chris and I beat JJ today!


2. "acidotic RACING is STYLE'N" That's right, Chris brought with him our new team shirts. They are really nice, read and black colors, so they must be fast! In addition I ordered a white and blue tanktop for summer racing and also got the team shirt for the Reach The Beach relay. Add to that the shirt from the race and I walked away with 4 shirts. My wife is going to kill me.


3. "That's going to leave a Mark" Mile one was fast, how fast you ask? Well for me it was the fastest mile I've run in the past couple of years. 5:57.03. Now I've heard that this is a short mile but I was feeling really loose and it didn't' really surprise me. How ever I knew that I was in trouble.


4. "Myles pass by" At mile 2 Myles Chase pulled up along side of me. Myles is my "EXPERT" bike mechanic and owner of MC Cycles of Laconia. Myles is very fit and is a strong biker. He was shooting to run sub 1:25. I thought I had an out sided chance of running with him but once he passed me it was for good.


5. "Cannon ball in my gut" At mile 3 my stomach was starting to bother me. It felt like I had a heavy weight in my stomach. I was starting to slow down.


6. "I'm Dunn" During mile 4 Chris Dunn ran past me like I was standing still. He then slowed down and said that he was going to pace with me. That only lasted about 50 yards and he started pulling away. At the half way point he had 50 seconds on me and was still running strong.


7. "Major Slow Down" Miles 5 and 6 are up a long steady hill. When you reach the top you are at the entrance of the Mt Major parking lot. I was slowing down and needed to get it going again.


8. "I'm getting double Chicked" The first woman passed me around 1.5 miles into the race. Now the 2nd woman passed me at 6.5. She was young and flying and there was no way I was going to be able to catch her.


9. "Chuck and Run" At around mile 8 I noticed a young kid around 19 years old had pulled over and had his hands on his knees. He was blowing chow, it looked like Gatoraide had taken it's toll on him. I figured this was my chance to pass him. But much to my surprise, this kid finished up with his technicolor yawning and jumped right back in running 6:30's. I knew that I was not going to be able to beat this kid. Anyone who can loose their lunch and then start running full speed seconds later is to tough for me.


10. "Game ON" At mile 11 there was a kid about 50 yards a head of me. I figured that if I pushed it I could catch him with in a mile and then would have to work hard during mile 13 to put some distance between us so he wouldn't be able to beat me with his kick. At least that was the plan. At the 12 mile mark I caught the kid. As I passed him he started to break and slow down. I shouted to him, "tuck in behind me and we'll work together, DON'T GIVE UP". For the next mile that's just what he did. With a tenth of a mile to go, he came around me and started his kick. I don't have a kick so I watched him pull away. Then I heard foot steps behind me. No way I was going to let another person pass me so close to the finish. I gave it everything I had and ended up beating the guy by about 2 seconds. Note to self: "If you want to beat someone towards the end of a race don't give him the plan on how to beat you".


11. "I got CHIPPED" At the finish I figured I ran well enough to place 2nd in my age category. I knew that there was one guy a head of me who looked my age so I was content to take 2nd. When the results came out it showed that another 50 year old guy beat me by 1 place and 6 seconds. Hold on the kid in front of me was only around 18 and the next guy in front of him was a couple hundred yards a head of him. Where did this 50 year old guy come from? At the awards I spoke with him and he said that he got a slow start across the chip timing mat. In fact he crossed the timing mat 15 seconds after the gun was fired. Off the gun he finished behind me but because they were using chip timing he finished a head of me. The awards for 2nd and 3rd were exactly the same so it really didn't matter. Maybe I'm old school but, this kind if ticked me off. Awards should be based on gun time, not on chip time. How do you race against someone if you don't know they are there? This guy should have seeded himself up towards the front with the rest of us. To top it all off I just checked the results this morning and now it shows his age as 49....AAAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!


12. "Last Myles to slow" I told you about Myles Chase trying to break 1:25. Well he came as close as you can get but failed. 1:25:01. Talk about close.


13. "Dunn Right" Chris Dunn ran a fantastic race placing 20th with a time of 1:27:01. He was 2nd in the 40 - 44 age category. It must me the Shirt!!!


13.1 Liz Hall ended up wining her age category with a time of 1:32:27 and Karen Dunn set a PR for herself. Way to go LADIES!!


Photos by Kristin Wainwright

Below are my splits


1 5:57
2 6:37
3 6:43
4 6:55
5 6:56
6 7:05
7 6:36
8 6:45
9 7:22
10 6:19
11 7:18
12 6:54
13 6:54
13.1 42


Total 1:29:08 Pace 6:48