Author Archives: Kit Wells

The Philadelphia Five

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Nick Williams finds that redemption lives close to home, in his second attempt this fall with a new personal best. Meanwhile Shinobu Kusakabe positioned herself excellently for a potential breakthrough, cruising through halfway in 1:37:04 and finishing 6th in her division. Well done to all!

GORE-TEX® Philadelphia Marathon
November 17, 2013 - Philadelphia, PA
Results

Marathon
Bib	Name 			S/Age	Net	Pace	Plc	Sex	Div
1395	Nicholas Williams	M31	3:00:12	6:52	316	287	61
2676	Shinobu Kusakabe	F42	3:22:30	7:43	1059	159	6
1024	Daisuke Ogata		M38	3:27:42	7:55	1372	1126	189
3288	Scott Sanger		M48	4:04:23	9:19	4539	3012	345
10,889 Finishers

Half Marathon
Bib	Name 			Sex/Age Net	Pace 	Plc 	SexPlc 	Div
20733	Brian Savitch		M34	1:24:53	6:28	128	109	24
12,466 Finishers

Shinobu writes: Continue reading →

Sic Itur Ad Astra (Thus do we reach the stars)

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Paul Karlsen, bearing his club colors and displaying impeccable trail etiquette. At the Riffle Ford Rd. Aid Station along the Seneca Creek Greenway Trail, at mile 12.8 of the 2013 Stone Mill 50 Mile Run.

Paul Karlsen, bearing his club colors and displaying impeccable trail etiquette. At the Riffle Ford Rd. Aid Station along the Seneca Creek Greenway Trail, at mile 12.8 of the 2013 Stone Mill 50 Mile Run.

Paul Karlsen has achieved escape velocity from Planet Marathon’s gravitational pull, and is now in ultrarunner space. Many thanks go to race director, Doug Sullivan, and the MCRRC, who so capably hosted this logistically challenging event, thus culturing an engrossing experience for both athletes and their enablers alike.

Meanwhile, an undeterred Lauren Gabler stealthily struck a redemptive performance that somehow eluded her at this year’s Marine Corps Marathon. Word has it that her passport application for 2014 Boston is now being expedited.

Stone Mill Fifty Miler Race
Montgomery County, Maryland    11/16/2013   6:00 A.M.
Official Results

Place Sex/Tot  Num   Name                S Ag Gun Time Pace  
===== ======== ===== =================== = == ======== ===== 
   15  13/178    159 PAUL KARLSEN        M 35 08:07:00  9:45 
251 Finishers

2013 Anthem Richmond Marathon
November 16, 2013 - Richmond, VA
Results

PLACE	NAME		BIB	HALF	NETTIME	G/PLACE	D/PLACE	DIVISION
147	John Kendra	1096	1:30:37	3:07:22	130	 4	M50-54
577	Lauren Gabler	1125	1:44:22	3:34:03	119	32	W25-29
4798 Finishers

Friends of WRC, Harsha Thirumurthy (2:40:42) and Shawn Rumery (2:41:33), also ran quite respectably down in Richmond.

Good job to all! but what will Sunday’s Second Act bring? Stay tuned for late breaking results from Philadelphia and the 2013 USA Masters 12 km Championships!

Today’s Daily Double, and Next Week’s Superfecta

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Presumptive 2013 WRC Grand Prix series leader, Christine Hackman, assembled a great performance today all throughout the Tidal Basin. Meanwhile, recently joining member and rising star Megan Haberle conquered newer (to her) and longer (than last week‘s) distances further along the same brackish estuary. Megan can take some notes from Suzy Coffey, who is back on the racing scene!

Veterans Day 10K
November 10, 2013 - Washington, DC
Results

 179   1221 Christine Hackman 50F   45:16 7:17 2nd F50-54
1814 finishers

Woodrow Wilson Bridge Half Marathon 
November 10, 2013 - National Harbor, MD
Results

  40   1227 MEGAN HABERLE 33F   1:26:21 6:36 9th woman OA
 226    767 SUZY COFFEY	  57F   1:45:29 8:04 5th F50-59
1737 finishers

Says Megan about her stellar performance:

I had WRC on the brain while I enjoyed my post-race cappuccino over in National Harbor. No terribly deep insights, but obviously the weather was great and there were some inspiring visually-impaired racers who started us off. (For my part, I’m maybe happiest about my negative splits, something that’s been elusive in my workouts so far.)

El Presidente, Kirk Masterson, reminds us that only one more race remains on the 2013 WRC Grand Prix schedule: Jingle All the Way 8K. Look into it, plan to race with your clubmates, and of course let the GP coordinator, David Pittman, know about your results.

Next weekend promises something completely different, as we turn toward three four very different kinds of races strewn across the Mid-Atlantic:

Great job and good luck to everyone!

Pics, Plz

Aside

A small (but growing) number of albums have finally been indexed on our Pictures page. This is only an interim step, anticipating more native hosting of club media in the future. Enjoy!

‘That’s a Washingtonian, that’s a runner’

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WRC Vice President Carla Freyvogel, current club member Charlie Ban, and club alumnus Jim Hage are all quoted at length in Jessica Goldstein’s October 25th article in the Washington Post’s Style section (or, “the gateway to the Sports section”, as we like to call it).

The excellent lead photo by Katherine Frey is of the start of our Sunday Distance Run, with Liz Lambert, Gerry Ives, Christine Hackman, Megan Haberle, Mike Manning, Carla Freyvogel, Rachel Clattenburg, Emily Buzzell, Drew Killian, and Kit Wells all visible in the foreground.

Clattenburg and Killian will be competing with their teammates at the 38th Marine Corps Marathon on Sunday.

That it appears Gerry is being chased by a hoard of very fit and accomplished women is no accident.

Works Cited

Goldstein, Jessica. “City of the Long Run.” The Washington Post Oct 25 2013. ProQuest. Web. 25 Oct. 2013 . <Link>

Army, Open, Paul, Peru, Post

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Here are the rare G-rated four letter words which leap to mind, following this 16 day stretch of paralysis, fear, and loathing:

Army—The Army Ten-Miler is actually happening this Sunday, and el Prez Kirk is registered to race it. General registration sold out in just 9 hours; you may or may not consider this to be a good thing. Update: Julia Taylor is also entered!

Open—The National Parks are finally open. So while we do have some hardened backup routes, the oldies-but-goodies are so back in circulation. Maybe this week for the MCM marathoners: Brookmont – MacArthur Blvd Loop (9.3 miles), plus some extra 100m strides down by the Georgetown Waterfront Park. Non-marathoners might do the above, plus a Dumbarton Oaks – Georgetown Loop (3.9 miles), then the strides. As usual, we’ll figure things out on the fly.

Paul—Mr. Karlsen will be granting autographs and telling apocryphal stories from last weekend’s triumph in Chicago. We can also settle the matter of who came closest to predicting Paul’s finishing time; winner takes a coffee and a cronut (breakfast of champions).

Peru—We’re expecting a special guest from Lima, who will sneak away from some coursework to join us on Sunday morning. Welcome, Jenny!

Post—Wear your Sunday’s finest, because a certain daily newspaper is going to have a photographer come out and take some shots of us training. Once was not enough!

Karlsen, Kennedy Cleared for Chicago Competition

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WRCers Paul Karlsen and Rick Kennedy are ready to rumble tomorrow morning (Sunday) at the Bank of America Chicago Marathon, one of the World Marathon Majors (i.e. most prestigious marathon races on the planet). Paul will be hyper-visible throughout this Second City in his 2013 Series Singlet.

The Wave 1 Start is set for 7:30 a.m. CDT (UTC−05:00). We’ll be updating their splits and results below, immediately following the unstoppable Sunday Distance Run.

UPDATE: Paul finished 555th overall, shaving over 3 minutes off of his previous personal best!

Splits

Paul Karlsen, bib #1050, profile
Checkpoint Time Pace
10K 0:40:51 6:33/mi, 4:04/Km
Half (21.1K) 1:26:21 6:35/mi, 4:05/Km
30K 2:03:14 6:36/mi, 4:06/Km
Marathon (42.2K) 2:54:56 PR 6:40/mi, 4:08/Km

Full splits (unofficial), 555th place overall