Wednesday workout, July 30

RACES

Congratulations to Kevin for winning the rarely awarded but highly coveted GRC Athlete of the Week. Kevin started his week with a 4:21.18 mile at the DCRRC Championships on Wednesday, which puts him 4th on the all-time GRC list, and he followed that with an excellent 14:55 at Crystal City Twilight on Saturday, which puts him 5th on the all-time list. That Kevin was not particularly pleased with either race shows that he has got a lot of room to improve this fall. Keep your eyes on that young fella as he continues his assault on the record books!

We had numerous strong performances from the very large crew that ran at Crystal City and while, in the interest of not boring all of you to tears I will not endeavor to list them all, a few are worthy of special attention. On the women’s side, I was extremely pleased with Kristin’s 18:01, which was a 23 second PR. Kristin’s training has been going incredibly well, and we are going to see many more PRs from her in the months ahead. Of the many highlights on the men’s side, I was very happy to see James make a successful return to racing after a lengthy absence due to injury. James has worked very hard to get back into shape, and now that’s he’s fully healthy he’s going to have a breakout year. We also had solid GRC debuts from Sean O’Leary and Kyle Cooke, both of whom were high school standouts who did not achieve their goals in college due to injury. They’ve both got unfinished business to attend to, and we’re going to see them make up for lost time in the months and years ahead.

WORKOUT

We should have beautiful weather on Wednesday night, which is both good and bad. It’s good because it will allow us to continue our transition to longer intervals. It’s bad, however, because the track will likely be even more crowded than it has been the last couple of weeks.

See you Wednesday at BCC.

Jerry

GRC Captures Second, Fourth in Crystal City

GRC teams finished second and fourth in the co-ed team competition in the Crystal City Twilight 5k last night. Compared to prior years, conditions were generally merciful. Pacers/New Balance team took top honors finishing in an aggregate time of 1:16:44, about two minutes faster than GRC's A squad. Cheers to Pacers Events for putting on a great race.

Women
3.  LDO 17:53
5.  Kristin Johnson 18:01
7.  Maura Carroll 18:42
9.  Tina Morrison 18:48
11.  Kerry Allen 18:53
12.  Teal Burrell 19:02

Men
5.  Kevin McNab 14:55
8.  Mike Franklin 15:15
9.  Sam Luff 15:16
11.  Sean Barrett 15:21
13.  Kieran O'Connor 15:25
21.  Paul Balmer 15:38
26. Sean O'Leary 15:54
28.  James Frick 15:56
29. Kyle Cooke 15:56
31.  Justin Snair 16:02
33.  Charlie Ban 16:04
36. Patrick Kuhlmann 16:11
51.  Tom Kelly 16:57
54.  David O'Hara 17:03
57.  Lavar Curley 17:16

Wednesday workout, July 16

RACES

Congratulations to GRC ex-pat David Roche for his 6th place finish at the USATF Mountain Running Championships, which earned him a spot on the US team at the World Mountain Running Championships, which will be contested on September 14 in Italy.  David's fiancé Megan also qualified for the worlds team, and as luck would have it they are getting married shortly before the race, so they will enjoy an all-expenses paid honeymoon to Tuscany. 

Speaking of superstar ex-pats, congratulations to Drea for winning the 10,000 meters at the USATF Clubs Track Championships in Tacoma, WA.  Drea's time of 37:07 was well off of her GRC club record of 35:46, but she reports that the conditions were not conducive to running fast, so she'll take the win, and turn her attention to preparing for a big marathon PR at Twin Cities. 

Closer to home, we welcomed the debut of new GRC superstar Phil Royer, who won the Montgomery County Midsummer Night's Mile in 4:20.  Phil is another in our long line of former Ivy League greats, and during his excellent career at Dartmouth he was a many-time Heps scorer, highlighted by his second place finish in the indoor 3000 his sophomore year.  After a couple of injury-plagued seasons, Phil is fully healthy, and we're going to see some great things from him in a GRC jersey in the months and years ahead.  The Midsummer Night's Mile also marked Sam's long-awaited return to competition, and he got his 2014 season off to a strong start with a 4:23.6.  Well done to all!
 
WORKOUT

We're set for our normal 7:15 start at BCC on Wednesday, so meet for the warmup at 6:30.


See you out there on Wednesday.

Jerry