Slow and Steady... James Joyce 10K

Monday, April 20: 0 Miles
Tuesday, April 21: 6:00 PM - Track WO @ Bentley w/ Ari, Tony, & JP
23 min w/u
4 x 800m w/ 2.5 minR - 2:21, 2:20, 2:19, 2:18
4 x 200m w/ 200m jR - 32.2, 31.2, 31.2, 30.6
26 min c/d
Wednesday, April 22: 9:30 AM - 6 Miles, 40 min
Thursday, April 23: 6:00 PM - Moderate Track WO @ Bentley
38 min w/u
20 min of Drills
8 x 200m w/ 1 min rest - 32-33 sec
15 min c/d on the grass
Friday, April 24: 6:00 PM - 10 Miles, 69 min
Saturday, April 25: 0 Miles
Sunday, April 26: 11:00 AM - James Joyce Ramble (Photos)
22 min w/u
10K Race - 32:31, 1st Place (4:54, 9:58, 15:14, 20:40, 26:05, 31:15, 32:31)
16 min c/d

Week Total = 48 Miles, 5 Sessions

Well, I wouldn't necessarily call it slow and steady, but it was certainly slow! Of course, I am referring to the James Joyce Ramble 10K that I raced on Sunday. I won in a time of 32:31, over 2 minutes slower than last years winning time. Over the last couple weeks, Kevin and I had been talking about possibly finding a local race to jump into. It had been over a month since my last race (Gate River 15K) and would be over a month until my first track race (NBB Twilight Series), so we both agreed that a race could be useful at this time. Also, since the last few weeks haven't been spectacular training-wise, I was afraid I wasn't making much progress in my fitness and was starting to feel a little stale. With everything going on in my life, I felt like I was just trying to stay afloat with training and survive the workouts each week. I definitely needed something to kick start my motivation.

Once I decided on James Joyce, I started getting anxious about it. Not so much excited, but more nervous about not racing well. The JJ Ramble is usually pretty competitive and I figured I would need to have a really great race to finish in the top 3. Once race day arrived, I had no idea what to expect. The temperature was in the upper 80's and after looking around the start line, there was no set favorite for winning the race. My thoughts were to just race on how I felt but also try to key off of people I picked as "favorites" including Ben Schmeckpeper, Dan Mazzocco, and Dan Smith. All of these guys have been racing well recently and would certainly be in contention for the win.

The gun went off and I was slow off the line, I looked up after about 400m and saw Schmeck was leading the charge. Considering the heat, I tried to be conservative and hung back in about 7-8th place. Coming up on the mile, I felt like I was running a pace I couldn't handle in those conditions but there were still 5 other guys up ahead of me, as I hit the first mile in 4:54. By two miles, I had moved up into third and came threw in 9:58. I was noticeably slowing down as the race went on, but was in good position to place in the money. By three miles, I was not feeling very good and it felt like the last 3 miles were going to be a death march. I was taking advantage of every hose and sprinkler out on the course to try and cool off. 15:14 for 3 miles... 5:16 on that one and we hadn't hit the hills yet. However, I had closed the gap on Schmeck, could still see Mazzocco, and couldn't here anyone behind us. It was at this point that I started to realize that if I could hold it together, I might have a chance to challenge for the win. We started hitting the hills in the 4th mile, Schmeck had fallen off and I was about 75 meters back from Mazzocco. I was struggling at this point and could not seem to make up any ground on him. I focused on each individual uphill and downhill, just trying not to fall apart and be patient. Towards the end of the hills, I noticed I was significantly closer to him and was closing the gap more on each down hill. I tried to keep that same tempo until I finally caught him a little ways into the 5th mile, passing mile 4 in 20:40 in route.

Now the race had completely changed for me. I knew I still had close to two miles to go, and I was not feeling great. I tried my best not to make this evident as I passed Mazzocco, so I focused on smooth rhythmic breathing, a good strong stride, and cruised by him without hesitation. I continued to push for the next half mile or so at an effort I knew I couldn't hold to the finish. The idea was that this would hopefully get me far enough away from everyone else so that when I did slow down, it would both be less noticeable and also give me some cushion at the finish. I ran the last mile as hard as I could, hoping that no one was catching me and didn't look back until about 300m to go. In a quick glance, I saw what looked to be a GBTC uniform and assumed that it was Dan Smith. He was probably closing on me, but the distance between us assured me that I could ease up a bit and still take the win. This was the first point in the race where I knew I was going to win and was so relieved to cross that finish line after what felt like the longest last 1.2 miles ever.


Again, the time wasn't very impressive and I'm sure next year will be stacked with guys trying to pick up some prize money when they check this years results next April and forget about the 88 degree day we had. Nonetheless, this was a big win for me and until this point, I had not had a god race at the age of 25. With 2 days left, I finally had a good one and picked up some cash in the process. It felt good to actually compete against people again and felt even better to break a finish line tape after a long drought in my career. I'm hoping I can build on this going into the spring season and as Kevin said, it may be good practice for some hot weather racing this summer.

Lastly, I wanted to note a couple things. As you may have noticed above, I linked the NB Boston Twilight Series as my next race focus. You may be wondering what this is. Well, if you click on the link you'll probably notice some similarities to the Boston High Performance Series website. See where I'm going with this? The elite track series formerly known as the Boston High Performance Series has taken on the new name of the NB Boston Twilight Series. Nothing else has changed and we still expect to see the same great competition and exciting races that we've seen in past years. If you are planning your track season and are unsure of the meets you'd like to run, I strongly recommend taking a look and consider paying us a visit on any of the three nights at Bentley University.

The other note is that our team now has a blog that you can check out and post comments to as well. Read more about this star studded team, see photos, attend events, and more. Our team continues to grow with each passing season and are always looking for hard working athletes that may be interested.

Stay tuned for more from NB Boston and The JC Experience.

Photos courtesy of GBTC and Ted Tyler from Jim Rhoades website