USATF New England Open Championship Meet

I ran a 1500M track race at Holy Cross in Worcester within the USATF New England Open Track and Field Championship meet on Saturday. Track racing is my least participated running discipline. However, the All Terrain Runner Series including a 1500M race. It could only be contested at the New England Masters or New England Open Meet. I was out of town for the masters meet so this was my only opportunity.

I entered this race with a 4:47 seed time, the mile equivalent conversion to 5:10. I have not run a 1500 since the early 2000’s (4:19 or so at New Englands in Dedham). My last mile race was indoors in 2017 running a 5:11 or so for then, again, an ATR series event. A recent 400m interval workout on Tuesday told me exactly where I was. I thought I would be able to hit 78’s at the end of the workout. Nope. Never broke 80. I ran eight 400’s with a lap of easy running for rest in between them. Most of them were around 82 seconds. The clock does not lie.

 

I got my bib # at the meet from pal Jeff Rockwood. I checked in for the event, ran a little over a mile for a warm up and put a pair of Inov-8 flats on. I jogged around and watched the women’s 1500M finding comfort cheering for Leslie O’Dell, Barbara McManus, Kim Gordon and Emer O'Donoghue.

 

The men’s race was called to the line. I had hip #5. I studied the pre-entry list a few days earlier and knew my place and the competition. I got out into the middle of the race after it started, staying in control and making sure I did not go out too fast. Four guys got away from us and they had their own race. I was behind Timothy Hoff (MVTC) and Mark Capparella (Tri-Valley). I got around them before one lap. They went by me before 700M. Into the final lap, I thought I may be able to push by with a calculated effort but we all seemed to “go” at the same time rounding the last turn. Timothy finished in 5^th with a 4:53.37, Mark 6^th – 4:55.31, and I 7^thwith a time of 4:55.76. It was a pretty good race and felt fortunate to run with them and have the company and competition. Meet results.

Photos above from Stephen Laska. Photos below from Mark.