Purple Stride 5K - Nov. 10, 2019

So, yes, after four relatively disappointing 5Ks, I immediately started training for a December 10K using Hal Higdon's Advanced 10K training program.

And, wow, it is a killer program.  With Tuesday tempo runs (up to 60 minutes), Wednesday 400-meter track sprints (up to 12), Saturday runs partially at race pace, and Sunday runs in which the last 25 percent of the miles are done near race pace, we are essentially talking about four days of speed training per week.  That leaves Monday and Thursday for easy runs and an optional (!) rest day on Friday.

As per usual with Higdon's programs, races are included midway through training.  This past Sunday, being halfway through the eight-week cycle, it was time for yet another 5K.  It just so happened that this fell on the day of the annual Purple Stride 5K in Parsippany, a benefit for the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network.  In support of our friend, whose mom died from the disease, Gloria and I and our friends jogged it in 2016 and walked it in 2017.  Last year, I raced it competitively while training for the Mississippi Gulf Coast Marathon, taking third place with a time of 18:11, my last sub-19 5K.

At the start line on Sunday, some guy said to his kid, referring to me, "Just stay behind this guy and draft him if you can.  He looks fast."

That made me feel good, but I wondered if I would live up to his expectations after my past four outings.  At the sound of the horn, I blasted off, legs in full extension, pumping as hard as I could to get off to a good start, and to warm the hell up on this 30-something degree day while wearing only shorts and a single long-sleeve polyester running shirt.  For the first mile in this flat course through what is essentially a giant park of office buildings, a young runner in a cape took the lead and I stayed elbow to elbow with Justin Tufano (literally - he actually kept bumping elbows with me - even as we approached the left-hand turnaround, he kept drifting and pushing me to the right).

I hit the first mile 5:52 and it felt great.  I did not even feel like I was pushing hard enough to get a split like that.  Both Mr. Tufano and I pushed ahead of the caped runner and pressed on into mile 2.  I pulled away from Tufano and briefly held the lead until I heard footsteps coming up behind.  I was surprised to see the person passing me was not Tufano but someone else - an 18-year-old kid named Sam Fowler - and he was doing it effortlessly.  There was no catching up to him, and I was already slowing down, but I was OK with my 6:09 second mile.

Turning around again (those turnarounds are such momentum killers!), I gave it everything I had, with Tufano right behind me.  I only managed to stay in front of him by three seconds, but it was enough as I threw my body forward into the third mile with a 6:04 and a finish time of 18:50.

Unbelievably, I had managed to get my first sub-19 in a year, at the same race as my last one.  It was a pleasant surprise, and just what I needed to fend off the sometimes depressing sight of my drastically lower 5Ks lately.  This was a nice boost.  I may not be close to what I was a year or two ago, but at this point, I will take any sub-19 I can get.

Last year's event was fraught with problems, notably the course being too short.  In addition, the timing company, Best Race, screwed me over with the results, putting me at fourth place, rather than at my rightful third (they never fixed it on their website).  This time, though the course was re-measured to accuracy, Best Race once again managed to screw me over by spelling my name wrong - check out the results and you see that Daniel Falioto took second place at the 2019 Purple Stride 5K in Parsippany. [eye roll] 

But hey, it was a good cause with good friends and my best 5K of the year.

The mettle to meddle for a medal (Part IV)

I understand that when a race-timing company is charged with giving accurate results to thousands of runners at hundreds of races, errors are bound to happen from time to time.  But, seriously, this shit seems to keep happening to me.  Three times in the past, I had been completely looked over. On all those occasions, I had come in second place (SOCH 10K, Cheshire Home 5K and Samra 5K), but forgotten when they distributed awards, as if I was never there.

At the Purple Stride 5K on Nov. 11, I was excited to accept my third place medal among my friends.  They called out the top three winners and I was not one of them.

Confused, I checked the posted results sheet.  I was listed as being in fifth place, but with the fourth place name crossed out.  At first, I wondered if people had cheated, slipping into the race chute without having run it.  Then, I started wondering if I had it wrong.  Maybe there was another guy in front of me and I was concentrating so hard that I did not see him.

It was my long run day and I needed to run more miles, so I ran home from the race site.  During the whole run, I was playing it over and over in my head, wondering what had happened.  At some point, I started getting mad, composing in my head the strongly-worded email I was about to write to the race organizers and the timing company.  I looked at my splits when I got home and noticed that as I got more angry, my miles got faster.  I guess running angry makes you run quickly.

At home, I asked my wife, Gloria, who had been standing at the finish line the whole time, what she saw.  She said she only saw the first place winner (Andrew Ferretti), the second place finisher (Charles Griffin) and then me.  No one else in between.

The next day, I wrote the email to the Purple Stride organizer, Alex Rappoport, and the Best Race timing company (Bill@BestRace.com).  I explained the situation and even showed a screen shot of the extremely messy results page that was posted (that showed me as the 254th finisher and people finishing the race in a few seconds - clearly, their chips were registering results when crossing the start line, rather than the finish).

The next day, the results were revised online, but were (and are, as of this writing) still incorrect, showing me in fourth, with someone named Brian Cannona in second.  I do not know who this person is, but I searched the internet for any other race results with his name, and there were none.  One would think that someone in his 20s that can do a 5K at a pace of around 5:30 would have done other races.  But there is no such record.

So, I emailed Alex and Bill again and told them all of this.  

Alex wrote back to me, saying that they had looked into the problem, admitting that there was an error and agreeing that I was, indeed, the third place finisher.  My third place medal was promptly mailed to me and I received it a couple of days later.  That is someone who, despite merely being in the business of putting together a fundraising event, understands fairness and the importance of what we do in this sport.

Interestingly, Bill from Best Race was silent.  He never admitted to his company's mistake.  He never corrected the results online.  He never apologized to me for the error.  He never said a word.  That is someone who, despite being in charge of a company whose specific job is understand fairness and the importance of what we do in this sport, does not.  

In the end, though Alex made me feel better about the idea of participating in another Purple Stride event; Bill will make me think twice about running a race timed by Best Race.

Purple Stride 5K

On Nov. 11, I took a slight detour from my marathon training to support the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network (or more specifically, my friend, Alana, who has a family member that suffered from the illness) at the Purple Stride 5K in my hometown of Parsippany, N.J.

The race was an out-and-back set in a corporate park area (Sylvan Way) on flat roadways with minimal turns. It was refreshing to run a race with no logistical worries.

It was also refreshing to run a 5K for the heck of it, instead of specifically training for it, gunning for a PR and putting pressure on myself to lay it all out there. Instead, I used it as my my speed training for the week - a hard effort, but not one that had any of the stress of hitting a specific goal.

It was a chilly morning in the 30s (F) and most of the guys at the front of the starting line (including me) were in shorts, so we were not too pleased that the race was a half-hour late in commencing. I understand that there are speeches to be made about the cause and all, but if they advertise a start time, they should adhere to it.

When it was finally underway, I quickly passed a bunch of guys whom I had assumed would easily stay ahead of me.  Within the first half-mile, I took my place in third.  The front runner, Andrew Ferretti, was extremely fast and far ahead, but Charles Griffin was close enough that passing him seemed possible.

I hit the first mile at 5:41, though I didn't know it at the time because I refused to look at my splits. I wanted to run as fast as I could without the possible disappointment of being slower than usual or the possible shock of running too fast.

By the time I got to the turnaround point at the halfway mark, I was losing some steam but still pushing hard and getting results, marking my second mile with a 5:51 (again, unbeknownst to me at the time). Now it was just a matter of getting through the last mile and finishing strong.

For a moment, I thought once again that I could close in on Charles, but that moment did not last long because I was fading.  Seeing my friends that were walking the course was a nice boost, but I was ready for this race to end soon.

It turned out that it would end too soon. With the finish line in sight, I finally looked at my GPS watch and saw that I had only gone 2.8 miles. The course was short.

Ah, well. I pushed hard into the finish in with a time on the clock of 16 and change, but more importantly, in this case, in third place.

My final pace was 5:51, which means my third mile would have been 6:01. Good thing this was not a longer race - losing 10 seconds per mile is rough.  Doing some math, I extrapolated that my finish time would have been around 18:11 - not bad for a race for which I did not formally train.