Saturday, May 24, 2008
For the past two years I have made it to the Chestertown Tea Party Distance Classic; which includes a choice between two races; a 5-kilometer (about 3.1 miles long) race or a 10-mile race. Both courses are relatively flat with gently rolling hills. It is actually still one of the more hilly races I've encountered on the relatively flat Maryland Eastern Shore and I would say aside from the Governor's Bay Bridge Run that goes from the Maryland Eastern Shore across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge to the more central area of Maryland, that the Chestertown Tea Party Distance Classic is one of the most popular races on the Maryland Eastern Shore. One of the things that keeps me coing back is how well the event is put on (including the free Rita's snowballs after the race, YUM)!!! I also like how people from all over Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania (just to name a few states) come to the Maryland Eastern Shore for this race. After running a race in every county of Maryland last year, I really got to see a lot of familiar faces from all over Maryland at the race, which was really awesome. I stayed there long after I finished just hanging out with and talking to other runners I hadn't seen in a while. It definitely put the "party" in post-race party. I saw some people from the Howard County Striders, Annapolis/southern Maryland area, the Maryland Eastern Shore, and even from western Maryland. My friend, Phil (who was kind enough to send me the photos above) was one of the people who came from western Maryland to do the event. He was staying with his friend, Don (who is also pictured above). I met Phil last June, when I went to Garrett County to run in the First Annual Grantsville Days 5K in Grantsville, MD. When I saw Phil at that race, I saw him wearing a Stockley Stride 5K race t-shirt, and I thought "wait a minute, I think that's a race that the Sea Shore Striders put on in Sussex County, Delaware near the Rehoboth Beach area). I started talking to him about it and I found out he used to live on the Eastern Shore and had done his share of races on the Maryland and Delaware Eastern Shore. In fact, I had my 2006 Crab Derby Mike Sterling 10K t-shirt on and he mentioned that he had run that 10K a long time ago in Crisfield (Somerset County), MD. Needless to say, we had a fun time hitting it off at a western Maryland race talking about the Eastern Shore. It was pretty cool to see the effects that going all over Maryland for races was having on what I could bring to a conversation about races in different places of Maryland. So yea, Phil and I kept in touch via e-mail and he became a supporter of me in my Maryland-wide running endeavors and a friend too. That is one fine example of how I feel God has blessed my endeavors in running in running events in different counties of Maryland; I would probably never have met some of the people I have met nor experienced some of the things I have expereienced had I not attempted it!
Back to the Chestertown Tea Party Distance Classic... In 2006 I ran the 5K in 19:21; a time which at the time I knew I could definitely improve upon. In 2007, I ran the 10-miler and struggled through that because I lost feeling in my legs for a large portion of the race because I was not eating or resting as much as I should have (it was probably more or less due to not eating as much). I ran just under an hour and fifteen minutes by my watch (even though the clock read 1:15:01, but I think that discrepancy was because I started a little ways back from the starting line at the start of the race and I did not start my watch until I got to the starting line). This year I decided to go back to the 5K, 'cause at this point I was getting back into consistent running, and I thought a 5K would be more appropriate to my current fitness level.
I went through the first mile in about 5:46, and I was like "whoa that's the fastest mile I've run in a while!" The course had changed this year. Instead of starting on a downhill start on Washington College's campus, it started flat on the roads by the entrance to Wilmer Park in Chestertown. The end was still the same for both the ten-mile and 5K races: Wilmer Park. I don't think the change of the course affected the relatively easy first mile, the end of which, however, was on a slight uphill. From the second mile we went up a steady upgrade on a country road. Two people were ahead of me in the 5K, one person ahead of me running the 10-miler (in case I didn't mention it before, both races started simultaneously), and another person running the ten-miler was just behind me before we turned around near the half-way point. At that point the ten-milers went straight while us 5K'ers retraced our steps the way we came.
I passed through two-miles in about 12:05, not bad at all. I remembered that my best time at this 5K was 19:21 (even though the course was slightly different when I ran it back in May of 2006 with the starting line being more up in the college campus than in front of Wilmer Park), and I thought that if I kept up the pace I could definitely beat that time. The two-mile mark was at the beginning of a steady down hill where we then made a left and took a long flat road back the way we came towards Wilmer Park. even though it was flat, I found this stretch of road kind of tough because of some moderate wind resistance. I felt the wind slowing me a bit as well as fatigue from not having run this hard in a while. God helped me press on and soon I ran over a bridge that went over the Chester River (I think that was the body of water that the course crosses over), a landmark letting me know I was closing in on the finish line. I tried to maintain a solid and strong form and I came up on Wilmer Park, made a right turn into the park and ran down the slight downhill to cross the finish line in the parking lot below in... 19:12!!!! Wow! My first 5K in a while and already it was in the lower 19's. The clock had gotten me at 19:15, and my watch was at about 19:12, and that was because it took me about three seconds to get to the starting line after the race started, and I started my watch at the starting line. Since I hadn't run in a while and I had two other races I planned on running in in the next two days, I really wanted to go conservatively. Yes my pace definitely slowed, but I thought it was a nice first 5K since I started back with consistent running, and I thought that this 5K included more uphills than the 2006 version with a different starting area. Plus, there was the wind. I'm pretty happy with it; it was about nine seconds faster than the 19:21 I ran at that 5K in 2006 (even though the course was slightly different back then).
I had a lot of fun at the post-race party, because like I said before, I recognized and got to catch up with other people I had met at races and running events throughout Maryland. That was probably one of the most fun things about it.
Now one of the reason I did this race was because it was sorta on the way to Ocean City (Worcester County), MD where my friend Joe lives. Even though that's on the other side of the Maryland Eastern Shore from Chestertown (which is on the west end of the Maryland Eastern Shore in Kent County), I thought it still put me a little closer than going to it from my place in Baltimore County, Maryland. We were talking about doing the Masser Five-Miler the next day in Lewes (Sussex County), Delaware right by Rehoboth Beach. None of us had done that one before, and I wanted to do it to start my week-long endeavor of trying to run in a running event in all three counties of Delaware within a week. After that I would hopefully go on to do the 7th Annual Friends of Mary Husty 5K right by the University of Delaware campus in Newark (New Castle County), Delaware on Monday, May 26, 2008 (Memorial Day). Soon afterwards I would hopefully make it over to Kent County, Delaware for the 4th Annual Firefly 5K in Smyrna, DE, where I would finish out my week-long goal, God-willing!
Having gotten a really solid sub-20-minute 5K in after not much running really boosted my confidence and led me to look forward to the three (hopefully) upcoming races in and all over Delaware.
Also worth mentioning is the photos above taken after the run. The left photo (from left-to-right) is one with Dr. Lee Masser, and my friends Don and Phil, and then myself. Dr. Masser is a famous runner, having made many contributions to the running community and I hear he runs in at least like a hundred races-a-year. As a matter of fact, the Masser 5-Miler I had planned to run the next day is named after him and it is one of the more famous and popular races in Delaware. In fact, its promotion reaches all the way to Columbia (Howard County), MD where I grew up. Don is pretty cool; he's famous for doing ultra marathons and running from Easton (Talbot County), MD to Salisbury (Wicomico County), MD and then back. While these locations are both on the Maryland Eastern Shore, the run there and back is well over a hundred miles worth! Very inspiring stuff; several months back I read a newspaper article about his LONG distance running. Phil was the friend I made when I ran the Grantsville Days 5K back in the June of 2007 in Garrett County, MD and he is friends with Don. He came from western Maryland with his wife to spend the weekend with Don and run the race. It was great to see them both there.
In the photo on the right, it shows the awards that Don (right), Phil (middle), and myself earned in our age groups (that was a wonderful bonus to be blessed with age-group-based performance awards at such a prestigious event :)
Thank you for reading about my running and a bit about my social life that has come with it. I also really thank you all who have been praying for me on my week-long Delaware-wide running endeavor; God can definitely help with that. Your support and attention are awesome! I look forward to having details about how my attempt on running in running events in all three of Delaware's counties within a week went down.
Take it easy and enjoy :)
