Paul Schweitzer, PT on Injury Prevention,
Nov. 5th, ATI, Limestone Road, 7 PM
Our next seminar will be a session with Paul Schweitzer on Tuesday, Nov 5th. This will be held at the ATI location just off Limestone Road (100 Valley Center Drive, Wilmington, DE 19808). This is just south of the Pike Creek shopping center and New Linden Hill Road. Paul will speak about injury prevention, specifically for runners.
Paul Schweizer graduated with honors from University of Delaware’s physical therapy program. His early experience was at A.I. duPont Hospital for Children where he became the Director of Aquatics Therapy. After that, he started several physical therapy practices, the most recent of which is PRO Physical Therapy (which is now ATI). Paul’s expertise is in the areas of aquatics therapy, sport medicine and general orthopedics. He is an accomplished runner and has been fixing athletes for years. You can read about some of his activities here http://www.atipt.com/news-media/blog/physical-therapist-leads-cancer-survivors-advocates-finish-line
There will be a short “open” Board meeting for the first half-hour, for a “club discussion” about any items that board or the members feel is appropriate, followed by Paul’s talk. Come with your ideas, suggestions, comments and contributions!
RSVP’s are appreciated but not required to Paula Jermyn at
PCVRC Holiday Party, December 9
Mark your calendars now for our Holiday party – Monday, December 9th at 6:30 at Timothy’s (upstairs) in Newark! Details to follow.
Race Results, Reviews and accomplishments:
Kristen Stump’s been busy!
Joy-Hope 10K, Oct. 12, 41:32 (Overall Female Winner)
Run for Buds Half Marathon, Oct. 19, 1:35:30 (Overall Female Winner!)
Theresa Cannon, Steamtown Marathon, Scranton, PA, Oct. 13, 3:58:39 (BQ)
Special note – Theresa has now run a marathon in under 4 hours for 4 decades!
Mike Piorkowski, Whistlestop Trail Marathon, Ashland WI, Oct. 12, 3:29:13 (BQ)
PS, for a special treat, check out the race photos of Mike!
Monster Mash Marathon, Dover, Oct. 19
Dave McCorquodale, 4:06:03 (3rd in AG)
John Schultz, 6:47:57 (2nd in AG)
Monster Mash Half-Marathon
David Baca, 1:47:10 (3rd in AG)
USATF
MidAtlantic USATF Quarterly newsletter.
Check out the great article about our own Hugh Campbell on pg. 15.
http://www.mausatf.org/association/newsletters/Newsletter-2013-October.pdf
USATF Masters 5k Cross Country-Championships, PCVRC Earns 3rd Place in a National Event (Tom Steenkamer)
This past Sunday, October 20th, at the Cross-Country Championships at Deer Path Park in Flemington NJ, our team competed in the Men’s 50-59 age group team competition against 13 other clubs from NJ, NY, PA, and GA. Cross country scoring rules applied to this race. Therefore we raced head-to-head with the order of finish from each team determining the team scores. The top five positions from each team create the team total and positions six and seven displace other runners. The lowest score wins.
The course was two loops on an all-grass course, fairly flat with a few minor hills. The hills were followed by gradual descents. We believed it was a fair test that could produce fast times. Race time approached and we assembled for check in and team uniform inspection. Thanks to DE New Balance and Jamie Graham! PCVRC was assigned to starting box 15, which was a great spot in the middle of the starting line.
With a brief delay to reload ammunition the gun sounded and we were off. The pack of 106 headed across the field and up the first gradual hill. Spacing was tight, with three or four runners abreast, the pace felt slow. 2:35 at 800m must not be that slow, 5:40 at the mile. The pace felt under control and there were four PCVRC orange singlets within a few strides of each other. Pack running, that’s what is needed in XC to get a good team score.
Things were looking good as we headed back past the cheering crowd for lap #2. The field stretched out finally and we were only two abreast or single file heading up the first hill. Going down to the two mile mark, the PCVRC pack was still intact but stretched a bit. John maked a move up the last hill at the 2.5 mark, with Dave and Tom in pursuit. We ran down through the tree line and had only 800m across the field to the finish. Feeling pretty good, the stride lengthens and the arms drive, attempting to close the distance or at least keep from getting out-kicked. We avoided the dreaded last-second sprinters and hit the finish mats.
On a perfect fall day for XC racing the six-man PCVRC team did exceptionally well in a strong field. The winner of the 50-59 division was renowned Californian, Pete Magill, who put down an amazing 15:51 at age 51. The next three places were under 17 minutes and the rest of the top 20 were under 18 minutes. The combination of cool weather and a good course contributed to the great times.
We were excited about the potential to score as a team, and speculated during our post race cool down that we could be on the podium. Fueled by the energy of the race and some of the post-race tail gate material we anxiously awaited the race results posting.
The award ceremony began without the results from our race being posted. All of the other race results were available except for the Men’s 50-59. Unknown to us, there had were issues with the chip timing and subsequent scoring for the 50+ race. Finally the 50+ team awards are announced and posted. We are shut out! Atlanta Track Club is awarded third, Genesse Valley second and Greater Philadelphia took first.
Meanwhile Lynn Knothe and a few of the guys are busy analyzing the result pages. The numbers are not adding up! Lynn discovered that Greg was listed with PCVRC but his finish place was not included in our score. Dave and Tom headed to the timing company truck to explain the situation. The timer agreed and admitted that they committed a data entry error. Adding Greg changes the results and we needed to file a results protest with the USATF race officials. We located the official and he stated that we were within the official USATF one-hour protest window and he accepts the timer’s explanation. We are awarded third! Unfortunately, the third place plaque and medals had already departed with the Atlanta Track Club!
Post race was a great affair. Fellow competitors welcomed us to their tail gate parties. We owe a special thanks to Greg’s buddies in the Baltimore Washington Athletic Club who shared their keg of home brew. Greater Philly also shared their spread and opened their coolers of Guinness. Our dear MA-USATF friend, Robin Jeffries, satisfied our continued thirst with some Troegs Double Bock during the awards ceremony. The celebration continued when we returned home as Sheri and Dirk opened their home for an impromptu barbeque. Special thanks to Sheri and Lisa Jalot for pulling it all together.
PCVRC’s Jim Durkin also competed as an individual in the 75+ age group in the men’s 60+ race. Jim finished the 5k in 29:55 for 5th. Nice work Jim!
Congratulations to my teammates: Greg Cauller, Harvest Bob Klezsics, John Stoudt, Dirk Sweigart. I am both honored and thankful to have been able to participate.
Team Results:
8. John Stoudt, 17:29 *
12. David Wiechecki, 17:36 *
13. Thomas Steenkamer, 17:37 *
20. Gregory Cauller, 17:55 *
41. Dirk Sweigart, 19:39 *
48. Bob Kleszics, 20:03
I believe that this is the first time in club history that PCVRC has sent a team to a national championship. A belated awards ceremony for the PCVRC team is tentatively scheduled at the Delaware XC Open Championship on Saturday, November 30th.
It would be great to have PCVRC have greater involvement in these types of USATF events. Next year the USATF National club championships will be held at Lehigh University on December 13th. This is a bigger and even more prestigious race where PCVRC could potentially enter teams for both men and women.
PCVRC USATF Evansburg Challenge 10-mile Trail Race Recap (Ray Christensen):
The Evansburg Challenge 10-miler is part of the USATF Series, held on a pretty state park course near Collegeville, PA. With many of our fastest male trail-racers competing at the national master’s club cross country championship in NJ, Tom & Rich knew that they’d have to scramble to put together a team to at least put up a score to hold our place in the series. That turned out to be a huge challenge itself. Between injuries, and a multitude of other races, we didn’t have a full five-person lineup until the day before. Many emails and calls confirmed valid reasons even though over 50 club members are members of USATF. For example, John Schultz ran Monster Mash Marathon on Saturday and was actually willing to take on the long trail race Sunday except that he was already booked for another activity.
So I was the lucky guy who joined four of our dedicated ladies to round out the PCVRC team. Tom repeatedly told us “not to be heroes” and that everyone finishing was our only important goal. So our team battle cry was “Just finish!” Along with Carole Feole, Carol Giampietro, Sheri Herrmann-Sweigart and Lisa Jalot, we hit the trail on a gorgeous, crisp, sunny morning. Lisa was really heroic. She took one for the team, aggravating her existing leg injury and running through the pain to finish first in her age group, no less! Sheri took second in the same group while Carol G won her own age group.
The course is not as hilly as others in the series, but there was plenty of surface mud along with rocks and roots. There were also two water crossings. I didn’t realize that the first was nearly waist-deep until I was wading through it and actually put a hand down to avoid going for a swim. Even with the course being not very technical, 10 miles of trails makes your mind almost as tired as your body just from concentrating on staying upright. There are always some runners at the finish proudly displaying their battle scars from the race.
I was having a good run until I got through the second water crossing with just a half-mile to go. That’s when I guess I felt that 10 miles just wasn’t enough of a challenge, so I made a wrong turn and added an 11th mile to my race. At the start, Ron Horn had instructed us to watch for markings and signs and to follow course marshal directions. But by mile 9.5, my mind was too tired to remember the last critical direction. The trail goes either left or right and I went left since I thought I heard a volunteer say “go left”. I had lost contact with the runners ahead of me so it was only after I ran all the way to where we had first crossed the water that I knew for sure that I was in the wrong place. I hurriedly back-tracked while pondering how I’d screwed up.
I had thought the guy said “go left”, but maybe he had said “half mile left”. Maybe he said “don’t go left”. Maybe he saw my PCVRC singlet and intentionally sent me in the wrong direction. Whatever it was, I said a lot of naughty words when I finally got to the finish, over six minutes after I should have been there. I cheered up once I saw that all of our ladies had finished and cheered up a bit more when Sheri, Lisa and I grabbed some frosty beverages at the car.
After awards, a team picture and a photo with a bunch of Korean guys who requested a photo with my lovely teammates, it was time to head for Delaware while awaiting results from our guys competing across the river. I was still perturbed about messing up what would have been a good race. Lisa and Sheri were carpooling with me and we needed a restroom break en route. When we missed a turn to a gas station on 202, we saw a Dunkin Donuts ahead. I realized that there was a Hooters right next to it. My day suddenly improved when the ladies suggested we drop in to grab a beer. Who cares that I ran an extra mile when I’m sitting with two of our own lovely ladies surrounded by Hooters girls while drinking beer, eating french fries and watching football?
But the real point of this story is “join our club USATF team!”. You don’t have to be fast. We need a long bench to fill in for injuries, busy race weekends and last minute schedule changes. Team events make running and racing even more fun. Run safe!
USATF Grand Prix “Road” Series
The next race is the Bridge run 10k on Sunday November 3rd. Online registration has closed (October 18th.)