Hanover Turkey Trot '13

If I had not signed up for this race ahead of time, I am not sure I would have done it. I really wanted to end the year with a PR and nip that 35:00 mark. I am fairly confident I can, and figured this would be a decent time to do it. A week out, the forecast looked bad: cold and windy. As race day approached, the forecast looked worse: colder and windier. On race day it was cold, and it was windy. It did not rise above 20 degrees all day (yes, that is Farenheit) and the wind was stand-up wind. At one point near mile 5 the wind was enough to almost make me stop forward motion. Compound the cold (near-zero with wind chill) and wind with a slick coating of the first years snow, and drifts from the fields, and it was definitely not a PR day.

First time all year I wore shoes for a race. Went with my Altras and was not disappointed; though, as it was the first snow of the year I was a bit uncomfortable running around corners at pace. This would not have been fixed with any other pair of shoes. I tried to push the pace here and there, but had a hard time of it. Sometime around mile 4 I started to feel my right calf and left quad a bit; first and second were 20/30 seconds ahead so I want to say I took it a little easier, but that might be a lie. I definitely do not think I pushed it as hard as I could have, but there was little need. No PR, no free turkey, might as well just put in a good effort and decent time.

Ended up running third with a 35:41. Not super fast; only a couple of seconds faster per mile than my CHaD Half time. But with a day like this, I am happy with a sub-36.

Here is the excerpt from the Valley News (you will need a subscription to check out the link - it is free):

Hanover — The Upper Valley Running Club’s Ben Schippers nipped Hanover’s Alex Hall at the wire to win the 21st Hanover Turkey Trot 10K road race on Nov. 24.

Schippers, 32, of Brooklyn, N.Y., gained the victory in a race that saw both finishers record times of 35 minutes, 7 seconds. Hall, 26, took second ahead of Windsor’s Ben Pangie (35:41). Lebanon’s Laura Hagley, 29, won the women’s division in a time of 38:52.

Despite a near-zero wind chill and a course with patches of ice, a field of 125 runners turned out for the 10K, about a fifth of them from the Lebanon-based UVRC.