Traditionally the biggest turkey day race in New England and one I wasn’t aware of until Pat Stumbras told me about it and a great tip about getting a preferred start. I was down in Somerset at my mother-in-law’s for Thanksgiving. The drive out was relatively painless and was more scenic then I expected; I left at 7:30 am and was in Manchester by 9am. The was an unexpected abundance of good parking on the side streets east of the start/finish area. I found an empty bathroom on course, dropped the kids off at the pool and then took in the start area scene. Lots of families, huge media set-up at the finish area, and great costumes, particularly the entire family dressed up as the Wizard of Oz (3 kids, dad was the yellow brick road). Once I got past the initial crowd, I took a real slow warm-up jog in reverse direction along the last ¾ miles of the course. Huge American flag draped over the finishing stretch.
I didn’t have huge expectations going into the race. My mileage has been meager since New York and the pace has been easy (nothing faster than 7:15 pace)… just enjoying fall weather and trying to heal up from various nagging injuries. I suspect I’m in decent shape, but definitely not in peak condition. The plan was to try to get close to, or break a 6 min/mile pace. I knew the course was challenging. The first mile is slightly downhill, but the next mile and quarter consists of one long hill locals dub Heartbreak Hill. The next mile is a steep downhill followed by a flat mile, and finally a half-mile gradual downhill to the finish line. The key to this course is not to redline on the first mile, go strong up the hill, try to make up some time on the ensuing downhill, and then try to hold pace to the finish line.
The ironic thing about this race was the effort required in getting to the race (3 hour drive round trip) and the sheer number of participants (20,000+) was more commensurate with a major marathon then a race that didn’t even crack 5 miles. The finish area had a huge media set-up and the energy level from the runners was really high. This was going to be an interesting race. When I finally felt sufficiently warm, I headed back to the car and got into my racing gear. One of the draws of Manchester is they offer a preferred start. Thanks to Pat, I submitted my qualifying time and was slotted into the corral right behind the elite runners. Interestingly, the qualifying times across the various race distances aren’t equivalent. A sub-30 5 mile is much easier than a sub-2:49 marathon. I’d be curious to find out who or how these times are selected.
I quickly spotted Pat in the corral area and chatted about the course. Both of us had not done this race before, and we were both curious to see just how bad the hill would be. We are consistently never more than 20 seconds apart in a race and the faster runner is usually the one who has been doing more miles. In all seriousness, I don’t ever consider beating a 50 year-old by a couple a seconds a victory, but its fun to compete nonetheless. The Flash showed up moments later, held up by long lines at the newly introduced shuttle system. In the time before the starting gun, we tried to pick out familiar faces in the elite crowd.
I didn’t feel particularly springy today so I was curious to see how I would respond. I settled into a solid, but not fast, pace on Main St., and found that I was feeling pretty good. After making the first left turn, I passed the 1st mile marker in a quicker than expected 5:35. Shortly after, I spotted a familiar figure ahead with a very distinctive stride. Could it be the famous Joanie Samuelson? I knew she was doing her first one and pulled up alongside just to confirm. She looked very comfortable and focused. Coincidentally, a brass band was playing the Olympic anthem as we ran by. I didn’t think I would be able to keep up with her and as we got into the meat of heartbreak, she started pulling away. Amazing runner! I started to struggle on the way up the hill and noticed runners were streaming by. Soon Pat pulled up and commented on how I had taken off like a rocket. It sure didn’t feel like it, but now I was really feeling it. The 2nd mile was excruciatingly slow (6:52). The hill was longer than I expected and it felt good to finally make the left turn to begin the descent. As I made the turn running the tangent, some guy actually came up from behind and shoved me in the waist. I felt a bit of runner’s rage and ran ahead to actually cut him off. Probably not worth it, but I thought the guy was really rude. I was going pretty smooth down the hill and trying to hold pace with Pat. I felt pretty recovered by the time the course leveled out and mile 3 was back on pace (5:53).
Shortly after mile 3, my race started to fall apart. My lack of fitness and the downhill running gave me a bad stitch that I contended with for the remainder of the race. I actually felt well enough to hit the rest of the course hard, but the stitch just wouldn’t let me pick up the pace. Mentally, I was fine with cruising the rest of the race, but a small part of me still wished that I could have really competed, especially since I didn’t have any plans to make the trek out for this race in the foreseeable future. I gamely soldiered on. Shortly before the last left turn onto the finishing stretching, I heard a spectator scream “Go Korea,” and my first instinct was to turn around and look for the Korean guy running by, until I realized he was referring to me… funny.
The finishing stretch was actually a lot of fun, a bit reminiscent of Boylston St. The stitch had finally started to subside and I tried to pick off a couple runners on the finishing stretch. My final time was nothing to write home about (28:52 – 6:04), but it was quite an experience being involved in one of the largest and oldest Turkey Day races in the country. Around the finishing area, I heard stories like, “I’ve been doing this race since my Dad took me in 6th grade” or “My dad hardly runs anymore… he’s had bypass surgery, but he still does this race every year.” While I had made the pilgrimage out of sheer serendipity and curiosity, most runners were doing this out of tradition and a desire to build new family memories. Or in the case of Joanie, “I’m looking forward to coming to Manchester because it is one of the few traditional New England road races that I have not attended. I’ve heard that it’s a true runner’s race.”
Splits
5:35.3 164/177
6:51.5 179/181
5:53.3 178/181
6:04.6 179/181
4:27.5 178/183
Results: 163rd overall and 29th in my division.
I also found some low resolution race day coverage of the race. You can see me about 12:30 into video 2. Enjoy!
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