Injury: News and update

The bad news: On Friday, July 30, I was involved in a bicycle/car crash in Manchester, N.H. Unfortunately, I was on the bicycle.

The good news: Though my bike was severely damaged, I was not. Through some miracle, I landed on the pavement by rolling on my back. I received a bruised left knee and some serious road rash on my left shoulder, but otherwise escaped injury.

More bad news: The driver who caused the accident by cutting me off (I was doing about 20 mph at the bottom of a hill and could not steer out of his way) did stop to check on me, but then took off before I could get his plate number or any other info.

More good news: Part of his car's passenger side mirror was torn off in the crash, which allowed me to find the vehicle the next morning. The car was registered to a woman, but the cops interviewed her and it seems the boyfriend was driving the car that night.

More bad news: They interviewed him and he's denying everything. So now I have to go pick him out of a photo line-up some time this coming week.

More good news: The injured knee has come back fairly quickly, to the point where today (Sunday, Aug. 8), nine days after the accident, I actually went running a bit with the dogs, and also took my non-ruined back-up bike into Manchester for the first time since the crash.

So that means it looks like I can get back into the road race scene after a month-plus filled with other commitments and then recovery. Thank God! I will miss the annual Cigna 5K in downtown Manchester due to a prior commitment that evening (on Thursday, Aug. 12), but I will try to get back on the board with races in Rumney, N.H. and Epsom, N.H. this coming weekend.

In the meantime, I've missed quite a few in the past month, among them Ossipee, Enfield, Madbury, Langdon, and Rindge. Rats! Well, just goes to show that after 110+ races, there are still quite a few towns I can bag.

Stay tuned!

Oops! Missed a few!

Okay, after a pretty good run (pun!) through mid-June, the last few weeks haven't worked out too well in claiming any further towns. On Saturday, June 26, I missed (for maybe the 10th time in a row) the Goffstown Gallop, this year in favor of an impromptu climb up to the summits of Mount Monroe and then Mount Washington in New Hampshire's White Mountains.

The expedition was something less than a success, as above treeline we were caught in a frigid wind-driven cloud bank that reduced visibility to almost nothing and then started spitting freezing rain at us as we neared the top. (The photo is of faithful companion Zahnna cowering on the viewless summit of Mount Monroe.) I admit I wasn't really prepared, bringing with me only light summerwear, so by the time we reached the Washington summit I was really feeling the cold and beginning to lose feeling in my hands, enough so that I could not dial a cell phone. Lesson learned! It really can be dangerous up there at any time of year. As conditions worsened, we decided to get a ride down the auto road, meaning the climb didn't count because we didn't return to a trailhead under our own power, or using our own feet.

I suppose it would have been smarter to run the Gallop in Goffstown, which remains the closest New Hampshire town to my home (it's Bedford's northern neighbor) that I have yet to run. (In the end, we returned to the White Mountains to do the same loop on Monday, July 5 on what turned out to be a very warm day with much better conditions, so mission accomplished.0

The day after the aborted climb, Sunday, June 27, I was sore and in no condition to try running anywhere. Even so, I totally forgot about the Enfield "Shaker 7," another long-time race that I also keep missing every year. Sheesh! So put that one in the "wait until next year" category as well. And at this point, it looks like I'll miss a race in Ossipee (a rare town; I don't recall seeing this one before) this weekend, too. Let's hope I can get back on track and rack up some towns before July turns into August.

Charlestown, N.H. on Saturday, June 12

Remember the lyric from that Talking Heads song that goes, "You may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile..." Well, I found myself in the middle of a Christian youth camp deep in the backwoods of Charlestown, N.H., getting ready to run what amounts to an unusual 5K.

The setting? Camp Good News, a 240-acre reserve run by the Child Evangelism Fellowship of New Hampshire, which describes itself as "a Bible-centered, worldwide organization composed of born-again believers whose purpose is to evangelize boys and girls with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, disciple them in the Word of God and establish them in a Bible believing church for Christian living."

Well, a race is a race, and I needed Charlestown, so off I went. This was actually the second time I tried running the Camp Good News 5K Gallop. Last year, I got to town the morning of the race without enough time to find it. I once coveredCharlestown when I was a reporter for the area's daily paper, The Eagle-Times, so I thought I knew where it was, but nope. This time, however, I did a bit more research (it really is in a remote part of town) and also left home a little early on the morning of the race, all of which added up to success this time around.

The grounds and buildings look pretty like any other summer camp, with a few Christian touches added: a long structure with a peaked roof had a small white steeple perched on it; the dining hall had a puppet theatre with backstage props that included signs reading "Obey" and a white cross with 'Jesus' written on it. (Sorry, no photos this time around as the camera is still missing in action.)

People on hand the morning of the race were all nice and polite, but it was a little too Protestant-God-oriented for someone like me, who might be described as a lapsed-Catholic-turned-inactive-Unitarian-skeptic. In the dining room, a few guys were setting up a sound system for a concert of Christian music and one wore a black T-shirt reading "GOD'S GYM" and emblazoned with a drawing of Jesus lifting the cross above him; a younger kid was wearing an oversized t-shirt with the slogan: UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT. OWNED AND OPERATED BY GOD. That sort of thing.

And though I didn't feel unwelcome, I think the people there sensed my "outsiderness" and so kept their distance.

The 5K course itself was unusual: one could choose between running a twisting path through the grounds a total of six times, or run the twisting path once and then scoot up and back down a dirt road that provides access to Camp Good News. The start found about 30 of us standing in the rain; once underway, it seems most everyone (runners and walkers) opted for hill option. It wasn't terrible, but parts of it were nearly as bad as last week's arduous ascent of Pack Monadnock Mountain.

My finishing time of 31:01 wasn't that great, but pretty good considering the hill, which slowed me down but I managed to keep running through the entire course. Coming down the hill back to the camp, my runner's bib (made of paper) came loose in one corner, creating a distraction as I ran one last time through the twisting course prior to the finish line. When crossing, I was surprised to notice the bib completely gone, but the nice ladies believed me when I said I was No. 123, and nodded approval at my offer to go back and find it.

I did find it, right next to my car, where it had finally come off in the midst of the pre-finish line excitement. And then, after picking up a couple of bananas from the dining hall, it was back to the car and to the open road, satisfied that I'd bagged Charlestown, Town #112.

Sunday, June 6: Pack Monadnock 10-miler

Well, I made good on my desire to run this race, but only because the weather cooperated this morning. It was overcast, rainy and in the 60s, which cut down on the views a bit, but made it possible for a non-elite runner such as me to actually finish, which I did!

The 10-mile course, which winds along some very pretty back roads, actually touches on three towns: Wilton, Temple, and Peterborough. I bagged the latter two some years ago, so the reason to run this was Wilton, as well as to experience the dramatic last two miles straight up hill, seemingly, partly on the state's busiest east-west highway (Route 101) and partly on an access road to the summit of Pack Monadnock that's as steep as the road up Mount Washington.

It's a point-to-point race, meaning some logistics are necessary to join in the fun, especially because no vehicles are allowed up the road to the summit, where the finish line is. So I drove up to the former Temple Mountain Ski Area parking lot (about a mile below the Pack summit) and was early enough to get a good parking spot. Then I'd have to find a ride to the start, about 9 miles away at Wilton/Lyndeborough Co-op High School. I wasn't sure how this would go, but no sooner did I cut my car engine than a guy in a van pulled up and offered a ride to the start. I piled in with a nice group of runners and in no time we were at the high school. So that worked well!

Registration ($32) was a snap, but then came the next logistics step: race organizers allowed you to put a bag on a U-Haul that would be driven to the summit, so after you finished you could change out of wet clothes or whatever prior to beginning the long slog back down to the Temple Mountain Ski Area parking lot. So I found a tag, wrote my number on it, tied it to the bag, and went outside and heaved it into the U-Haul no problem. Another one down!

And then I had about an hour prior to the race start, which is a rarity for me. I used the time to catch up with a few acquaintances and explore the high school, which I'd never visited. One benefit of this was that I discovered another set of bathrooms down a dimly lit corridor, allowing me to escape the bathrooms near the registration tables, which were plagued with what looked to be one of the longest lines I'd ever seen. (And that was for the men's room!)

I then settled down to stretch in a cul-de-sac with a door leading out to a courtyard, and that's when I noticed: it was pouring! And it wasn't one of those quickly passing kinds of rains, but a steady downpour that looked like it could go on for quite some time. I went outside for a warm-up run around the school and came back soaked just from that. It wasn't cold (about 65 degrees) but it was wet. And all I was wearing was my lucky moisture-wicking "Big Lake Half Marathon" shirt and a new pair of shorts I bought yesterday at Runner's Alley. I didn't even think to bring a hat with a visor to keep the water out of my eyes.

I also had on brand new shoes and socks--not the brightest thing to do for a tough 10-mile race, but my current shoes had been pretty much shot by a combination of dog-chewing and running an incredibly muddy race in Wolfeboro last month, so I picked the same brand of shoes up yesterday (also at Runner's Alley) and figured it was wiser than using the old ones.

As race time approached, the downpour continued. We all hiked down the school's driveway and made a right to the official start. Many entrants wore plastic ponchos, which I would consider extremely uncomfortable for running, but then again, the rain was getting worse as we stood there. Then, next thing you knew, we all started running, so that was that.

Most of the course was on roads sheltered by a leafy canopy of hardwood trees, so the rain actually wasn't that bad, and eventually stopped, though it remained overcast and damp. You really couldn't ask for better conditions in June to run a race like this, so I'm glad I showed up. Speaking of up, that's how the first mile went, but then the course leveled out to gentle ups and downs on some beautiful roads. Some were freshly repaved, and all seemed immaculately maintained, whether dirt or tar.

If all you know of Wilton is the town center and Route 101, then you'd be surprised to see some of the wonderful historic properties along the back roads: large-scale colonials with outbuildings, rambling New Englanders with barns attached, horse farm properties with grand signs welcoming you to immaculate grounds.

Refreshingly, not all the homes were fixed up showplaces; some were clearly old-time town families who were somehow just getting by, including one very old couple in a majestic but shabby white house, the man in his open garage and the woman on the granite front stoop, both looking on at us without comment as we passed by, him with a faint air of disapproval and her with wide-eyed wonder. It's great people such as this still call southern New Hampshire home.

In races longer than 6 or 7 miles, my problem usually is my feet. They just begin to hurt from all the pounding, making anything more a real effort. So that's what I monitored, and reaching the half-way point at Mile 5, things were still pretty solid. In fact, at that point I seemed to have tapped into an energy source; there's a fairly steep hill prior to Mile 6, and I scooted right up, passing several people who had resorted to walking. I resolved then to keep running as far as I possibly could before giving into walking at all, and so onward I trudged.

Starting at Mile 7, things began to climb in earnest. At this point, you're on a dirt road called "Old Revolutionary Road" that parallels busy Route 101 down below; you can hear the traffic whizzing by. And though it's still up-and-down, the ups are much uppier, as if preparing you for the big grind ahead. Climbing some steep short inclines, you pass a few more picturesque farms, then there's a one final long downgrade where Old Revolutionary Road bottoms out and you spill out onto Route 101 just before Mile 8.

And that's that: from now on it's completely uphill. Overall, the course climbs a total of about 1,700 feet, or about 1.5 times the height of the Empire State Building. But most of that is in the final two miles, the first of which is a long steady pull on the shoulder of Route 101 as it snakes toward the saddle between Temple Mountain and Pack Monadnock. This, the only part of the race where you can see some distance ahead, wasn't actually too bad. Traffic wasn't heavy, and people were spread out enough for passing to not be a problem. I just kept going, and, about halfway through Mile 8, I began to think I might be able to keep a running pace all the way to the finish.

Well, forget it. After chuffing through the entrance to Miller State Park (where the summit road begins), I hit the first real incline, and my running slowed to a walking pace or less. I kept at it until the Mile 9 marker, but then the road steepened and I just couldn't do it. So I settled for walking up through the hairpin curves as we rose into the overcast, which reduced visibility down to where you could see probably 100 yards at best. The wind picked up, too, and I actually began to feel cold, but still climbed, or walked, passing by hordes of runners on the way down after finishing, many of them wildly encouraging. A couple of times I tried running again on the occasional flat patches, but gravity and my body won out over what was left of my mind.

Finally, I approached the finish chute, but only after the steepest grade of all; the final 200 yards or so are seemingly straight up. I had thought finishing in less than two hours would be a minor miracle. As it was, I clocked in at 2:07:18, for a rather slow pace of 12:42, placing 336 out of 361 finishers. The U-Haul with the bags had been prevented from making the summit run due to "slippery" road conditions, I was told; instead, it was down below, so I commenced the long and somewhat painful stroll back down the road, taking parts of it backwards (facing up) to reduce the stress on already overstressed joints. Nice feed at the base, and nice timing with the weather. Just as things were breaking up and I was getting ready to pull out, a downpour started, sending everyone scurrying for cover.

Postscript: That first night I developed pain in my left achilles tendon, which caused me to limp for most of the next day. It threw me enough so that I actually left the house Monday morning without a belt, and so for the entire day I was walking with a severe limp and also trying to keep my pants from falling down. The pain subsided by the end of the day, however, and after an icepack on Monday night, as of Tuesday I'm nearly back to normal. This afternoon I even rode the bike into the newspaper office, where I'm dashing this off now.

Saturday, May 29: Bartlett

The first-ever "Race for Reading," held on Saturday, May 29 at the "100 Acre Wood" complex in Bartlett, N.H., was also the first race I've run that included warnings to the runners to look out for bear. But I almost didn't make it after cutting things way too close on the two-hour ride from my home, and then taking a wrong turn at the last minute.

The race was promoted as being in "Intervale," but that's one of those New Hampshire communities that doesn't really exist. It's actually an area within the sprawling township of Bartlett, which includes a large area south of Mount Washington and into the mouth of Crawford Notch, one of the most spectacular parts of New Hampshire's White Mountains. I knew about Intervale, however, because my Aunt Bunny and Uncle Bunk lived there in the 1950s when he was stationed up here as a state trooper. Anyway, whether Intervale or Bartlett, it's Town #111 for me.

For the ride up, the only way to get to this part of the Mount Washington Valley is over state highways that thread through many towns of the Lakes Region, and so continuously go from 50 mph to 30 mph. It's a nice drive but if you get behind a slow-poke, things can get bottled up fast. So even if it's a two-hour drive from my home in Bedford, N.H. (and I left at 6:30 a.m.), you may get slowed down, as I was, and not get to North Conway (the area below Intervale) until something like 8:45 a.m., which is when seconds count, especially if you don't know exactly where the race is, which I didn't.

The description online included something called "100 Acres" and "opposite Town Hall Road," which was the only named road I could actually find on my map. So the plan was to get as far as Town Hall Road, anyway, and then go from there. Heading up Route 16, I find it no problem, swing a left, and begin to look. And look. One mile. Past Town Hall, okay. Two miles. No sign of anything. Road narrowing. Three miles. I was thinking 8:50 a.m. as my turn-around time to rush back in a last-ditch effort to to not waste a whole weekend morning driving up here for nothing; before that, the road becomes a dirt washout heading up a steep hill with a sign that saying, cryptically, "ROAD WIDTH VARIES," so I swing around and bomb back at a high rate of speed.

I'm thinking of those words "opposite Town Hall Road," and it comes to me: though there seemed to be nothing on the other side of Route 16 where Town Hall Road started, that might be where I want to be. All the way back, there's nothing about any road race, and I get to Route 16 at 8:54 a.m. No traffic, so I roll across the highway and there it is: A dirt road and a sign saying "100 Acres." So I head in and finally see the first evidence that I'm in the right place: a "ROAD RACE IN PROGRESS" sign. Well, not just yet, I hope.

I follow the road, which becomes paved for a bit and seems to lead through a construction site, then goes back to dirt and up a hill. Finally, a parking lot filled with vehicles, but not a person to be seen. I park, get out, and notice a small sign saying "Road Race" and with an arrow pointing down a path. It's 8:58 a.m., so I grab $30 in cash and my keys (but forget to lock the car, as it turns out) and jog down the path, which leads to an overlook; below me are two enormous, dazzlingly white geodesic dome-like tents in the middle of the wilderness, and still no one in sight. I felt like Woody Allen in "Sleeper," in that part when he runs across the farm in the middle of the forest. But there's yet another sign for the road race, leading around these, and I begin to think it's some kind of trap. But just as I begin to have second thoughts, I round the corner, and sure enough, there's everything: a registration table, cars, music (which somehow couldn't be heard on the other side of the tents), a timing crew, and a group of people cutting a ribbon with a giant pair of cardboard scissors.

I came up to a woman who looked like she was an organizer, apologized for being so late, and asked if I could still register. No problem, she said: they were still doing a ceremony to mark this first-ever running of the "Race for Reading" 5K trail race. I filled out the paperwork and glanced at the route map, which snaked all around the property in confusing series of loops that reminded me of the picture of the human intestine in my doctor's office, but the lady assured me the trails were well marked and I'd have no problem. Which was good, because the moment I stepped away from the table, someone announced that bears had been sighted on the trail that morning, so watch out. And then the race started, and off I went, without so much as a chance to stretch. One of the all-time close calls, considering the distance I had to travel, but at least I made it.

And yes, the course was a series of constantly twisting trails, some of which looked freshly bulldozed. The property was mostly level, though, and not too tough if you paid attention to your footing, which I HAVE to do on trail races after too many twisted ankles. A highlight was the crossing not once but twice of the old Maine Central's "Mountain Division" railroad line, which traverses Crawford Notch as part of the link between Montreal and Portland, Maine. The line, which runs through the "100 Acre" property, is now used only by the North Conway Scenic Railroad for occasional tourist trains, but organizers still had someone stationed at the tracks to make sure runners got over safely.

Nice shady course, though the last half-kilometer was uphill in an open area, with the sun just hot enough to make it a tough slog after all the cool time under the trees. Finished in 32:01, pretty slow but not bad for a trail race, I guess, and for a guy who did a two-hour hilly bike ride the night before. I was officially 21st out of 33 entrants, including, amazingly, a guy pushing a stroller who finished in like 40 minutes. (Must have been a bumpy ride!) Afterwards, I met a woman with four collies, all part of the same family, including one on three legs, the victim of a car accident seven years ago. He seemed to be coping fine.

This was the last race before one of this season's major challenges: the 10-mile all-uphill "Pack Monadnock" race on Sunday, June 6. I have one more longish run scheduled before trying to tackle that, weather permitting. If it's hot and humid that morning, forget it. Right now, the weather calls for a high of 76 and "scattered thunderstorms," which could mean anything. So we'll see.

Saturday, May 15: Hanover

This event had the nicest bathrooms I've seen in more than 100 races: luxurious marble and paneled wood commodes in the admissions office of the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College, which sponsored the race. Usually you get junior high boys rooms or port-a-potties at these affairs, so it was nice to go Ivy League for once. Too bad I left the camera at home this time!

Nice and cool, breezy and intermittently sunny weather for this 10K, the first one of this length (6.2 miles) I've run in quite some time. Hanover is Town #110 for me, and the race came with an unusual start: the woman announcing it and the speakers carrying her words were set up behind the runners, and so when she told us to go, no one up front heard her at first, so no one went. I thought a redo was in the cards until people just started finally moving and we were off.

Strange course in that there was a 5K with a turnaround only a very short distance from the start. So it weird to see the 5K people coming back the other way less than 5 minutes after we began. (Organizers said there was a turn-around at the 'half-way' point, but it was more at the one-tenth point!) Things spread out quite a bit once the 10K folks got past this and were on our own, making a wide loop north of town through over residential roads up on a ridge and then descending and swinging back to Hanover along a golf course. Thank God it wasn't hot and humid as this long stretch was completely without shade!

Interesting that the mile markers were a bit erratic: written in chalk and half-washed away by showers. So I was a bit hazy as to where we were during the race, which I actually like in contests that are longer than 5K, as it allows you to settle in to a pace and forget that part of you which quantifies everything.

And finally, one very unusual thing for me was that after the pack really spread out, at about the 2-mile mark I found myself fairly close behind a guy who was keeping about the same pace as me. I stayed behind him, having to push myself a bit to not drop too far back, but eventually he pulled quite far ahead of me as we ran along the golf course back into town.

"Oh well, guess I can't catch up to him after all," I said to myself, as we coasted down and then up a hill into Hanover, where I thought we were nearing the finish line. But then, looking ahead, he was noticeably slower on the hill, and I was surprised to find myself quickly closing the distance after all. It got so I came up right behind him as we crested the hill near the Dartmouth Medical School complex (if nothing else, conveniently located), and I felt strong, so I decided to work to stay behind him until the finish line was in sight and then see what I had left.

But as we neared what I thought was the final turn, the safety-vested volunteer posted there pointed at us to turn in the opposite direction of the finish line, off the campus and down a residential road back in the direction of the golf course. What?! Is this some kind of sick joke? Turns out we were only at about the 5-mile mark and there was still quite a bit to go. This took the wind out of me, so I immediately pulled back to conserve some energy and the guy in front of me was quickly quite far ahead.

And so I focused on just running with a smart stride (so as not to cause any damage, and I was already feeling it a bit), and that was that, I figured. But as we neared the turn-around out by the golf course again, I looked ahead and was surprised to see he'd stopped and was trying to figure out where the actual route was supposed to be. He found it and got back to his stride, but by then I'd pulled closer and I started to feel the urge again.

All the way back to town, I tried keeping with him. As we neared Hanover and the final turns, I had to push hard to keep him from pulling away again. Egged on by, among others, rowdy attendees of a front-lawn fraternity party, I kept it up. Finally, as we rounded the next-to-last corner, I widened my stride and increased my pace just enough to begin closing in.

And so I pulled up right behind him as we made the final turn in front of the iconic Sherman Library, and headed toward the finish line, now ahead of us but still in the distance, at the bottom of Tuck Mall. As I rounded the corner, a woman pushing a stroller in the road leaned in and said conspiratorily, "You can catch him," and that was all I needed. I felt strong, but knew it would take strategy to pull this off. The trick was to come up behind him close enough to be able to make my move when I felt the time was right. Too soon and I'd run out of gas and look like a dope at the finish. (Nothing new there!) Too late, and I wouldn't be able to make it in time.

So I stayed with him as the finish drew closer. Finally, we got to where I'd parked my car, and for some reason that felt right, and so I immediately widened my stride as much as possible and pushed the pace to the maximum I could manage. I breezed right by him and didn't look back, pouring it on all the way to the finish, which was now close enough for the cheers and the music and the adrenaline to carry me through.

I crossed in 1 hour, 2 minutes, and 24 seconds, according to the time clock sitting on the ground. (Official race results haven't been posted as of this writing.) And it was only after going through the chute that I turned around to see where my friend was: and it turned out he was still way out there, slowing nearing the finish line and keeping the same pace, which he hadn't altered despite my antics.

Not that it's that big a deal, but for me it's somewhat rewarding to be able to have so much left after a 10K race. Nice! And that's it for Town #110. Next up is Intervale/Bartlett, up in Crawford Notch, on Saturday, May 29. And hoping to work up to the big 10-miler up Pack Monadnock in June. Still possible if I keep at it!

Saturday, May 8: Holderness

A rainy day for a modest 4-miler this morning up in Holderness, a town on Squam Lake, where 'On Golden Pond' was filmed. Only about two dozen folks turned up for this race, a Project Graduation effort, augmented by a plant sale inside the school entranceway. These are the ones I like to get, as often they're one-time-only races that aren't repeated, so it's important to be up for them when they happen.

This one was a friendly local affair. (With colorful T-shirts, see photo!) I looked at the registration roster when signing in (last-minute as usual) and I think I was the only flatlander in the pack. Though the weather wasn't awful, it was raining enough to wash away the chalk starting line, which caused a bit of confusion, but no problem: off we went on a nice loop in the countryside out in back of Holderness Central School. After some ups and downs, the road turns to dirt, but it was a graded and well-packed surface, so mud and puddles weren't a problem. (Unlike the Wolfeboro run from last month.)

Hills were just enough to keep it interesting. Things leveled out about half-way through, and then an easy push to end in the school parking lot. One unique touch was the "human finish line," a picture of which I've included. In keeping with the "no frills" spirit, the race had no clock; rather, my time of 40 minutes and 32 seconds was called out in unison by two nice gals as I crossed the finish line. A couple folks coming in after me apparently took a wrong turn at one point. I heard one say "I knew things weren't right when I saw the sign for the town border."

Well, that's town #109. Only...er, 125 to go!

Update: I've just found the results posted online; the race had just 20 entrants, and I came in 11th with an official time of 40:24. Not sure where those missing eight seconds went to.

Wolfeboro 4-mile mudfest Sunday, April 18

Primed by two days of rain prior to the start, today's 'Muddy Moose' trail race in Wolfeboro certainly lived up to its name. This was easily the muddiest, messiest race I have run so far in New Hampshire: mud bath after mud bath along a network of poorly drained logging roads and trails behind Kingswood Regional High School.

The full course was an unthinkable (for me) 14 miles; I went with the 4-mile version and finished in a slow 52:15, which actually isn't bad considering what we had to slog through. Mud everywhere! It's the only race I've been to where runners are given plastic bags specifically to isolate their mud-chocked footwear after finishing. (Stupidly, I only brought one pair of shoes, which I kept on for the drive home. See cell phone photo below.)

Before anything else, I need to say that I just checked the results online and was surprised to see the last place finisher in today's 14-mile race was Rielle Hunter, 42, of Cary, N.C., otherwise known as the woman who had an affair and a child with one-time presidential hopeful John Edwards. Wow, you never know who's going to turn up at these things, but up until now the biggest name I ever shared a race with was former U.S. Congressman Jeb Bradley. Update: On Monday, April 19, I heard from race director Fergus Cullen that the alleged participation of John Edwards' mistress was what we in the news business refer to as a "hoe-ax." Seems it's tradition for bogus names to appear on the rosters of some races, sometimes as a cover for an elite runner who's slacked off a bit. (In that case, it's often the name of a Yankees player, Fergus said.)

The race itself was a masterpiece of masochism, with mud and boggy terrain almost constant once we got into the woods. My biggest fear was turning an ankle, which I am prone to do on trails, and so had sworn off such races until this one, as I wanted to do Wolfeboro as Town 108. It took a lot of concentration, jumping into and out of mud pits, but I managed to finish without major damage. Not everyone was as fortunate: at least a few folks were hobbling pretty badly in the parking lot afterwards.

The big news was, yes, the mud. At the first few mudbath encounters, the group I was in would slow down and everyone would gingerly pick his or her way along either side of the muck, trying to keep the splattering to a minimum. But the terrain was hard to read (leaves covering deep wells of cold liquid goo), and so before long you couldn't help but have one shoe sink completely into the ooze, and then the other, and before you knew it everyone was pretty much covered with mud from the knee down. Once we stopped worrying so much, it was more fun, but still quite a slog.

This is the only race I can remember when I came close to killing several people. Really. On a long uphill leading to the half-way point, in order to get around a particularly nasty bog, I gripped a stout tree trunk and did that little "swing out and over and get around it" move. But the tree was dead and so rotten that it immediately gave way and began falling across the trail. I glanced up and to my alarm saw that the tree was tall and coming down very fast. Two people right behind me saw it, and stopped for a moment, letting it fall in front of them; they also had the presence of mind to shout "HEADS UP!" to a woman in front of us. Fortunately, the tree fell just behind her. One step off, and it would have clobbered her.

On the way back to the finish, I finally figured out how to run in mud. Rather than slow down and triangulate and look for little "islands" to step on (such as rocks, or branches or dry patches) as you go, you instead look for the smoothest, least wet patch of mud and just run straight through, giving it a little extra push just before you hit it. And what happens, usually, is that your foot goes right into the mud, yes, but because you're moving forward, there's only time enough for the mud to push away from your shoe. By the time the water and muck moves back into the hole you've made, your foot is gone, which allows you to get through it without (literally) bogging down.

A light step and slightly faster pace seems to be the trick. Of course, the downside is that you really are running right through the mud, and if you hit something wrong, you go sliding off balance and can wind up with a mud facial. I didn't see that today, but I did see a few folks who bore evidence of close encounters with the mud on most other parts of their bodies.

Here's the map...

...with all the New Hampshire communities in which I've run a road race highlighted with orange marker. Right now I'm up to 107 out of a total of 234 in the Granite State.



I've posted an alphabetical list of all the places I've run, so you can check that out if you want. As time permits, I'll populate it with race info, including date, finishing time, notes about the weather, and personal observations, all of which I wrote on the running bib immediately after finishing each race. (Except for one race where runners were identified by holding numbered Popsicle sticks!) It'll take awhile, as some of this stuff goes back to 2001.

Next up is Wolfeboro, N.H., where there's a trail race on Sunday, April 18. It's 14 miles through the mud, but thankfully there's a four-mile option which is a little more my style right now. Overall goals this season are to complete the legendarily murderous 10-mile slog from Wilton to the top of Pack Monadnock in early June, run the Dixville Notch/Colebrook half-marathon in September, and add maybe a dozen towns to this list. Maybe more!

See you on the road!

5-miler in Bethlehem on Saturday, April 10

Up to Bethlehem today, above the White Mountains (and about a 90-minute drive from my home) for an up-and-down five-mile race in Town No. 107. Weather deteriorated as I went north; by the time I hit Franconia Notch, snow was flying from a low overcast and temps had sunk to the mid-30s. Snow had changed to sleet or small hail by the 11 a.m. start. Overcast the whole time, some wind, but no really tough hills. Just a long steady slog.

Something about the five-mile length seems very satisfying to me. Longer than the 5K but not a full 10K (some of which can drag on forever), the five-miler always seems to go by quickly and painlessly. My theory is that with a five-mile race, there's enough time (nearly an hour at my pace) to really settle in, and so you just run and not focused on the splits or other milestones as the race progresses. You just keep going, and the miles really do fall away, which is what happened today.

Surprised by a 51:32 finish, or about a 10:19 minute mile. (67 out of 99 men in the race.) Guess all the time on the elliptical trainer this winter (as opposed to actually road time, which has been practically non-existent) has helped get me to a level I didn't expect to be.

The race also touched on Sugar Hill, a neighboring town, but I can't in good conscience include it as a second town because we just crossed the border and maybe 100 feet later came back. So no double this time.

But in terms of the map, Bethlehem is quite a catch. It's a large town that stretches across the northern limit of the White Mountains, and so was very satisfying to color in with the orange marker. Here's the map before Bethlehem, with orange indicating town's I've run races in:

And here it is after:

5K in Dover on Saturday, April 3

First race of the 2010 season was a surprisingly good one: finished in 30:07, a lot faster than I expected. I've hit the gym pretty consistently all winter (spending a lot of time on an elliptical trainer), but haven't had a lot of road time recently, so thought I'd be somewhere in the 35-minute range for the "Helping Children Hear 5K Run/Walk" in Dover, N.H.

So, with that in mind, I started at the back. But the weather was cool and the course was kind, and I felt good enough to push myself a little. What happened was after the first mile, I found myself sandwiched between an energetic power-walker and a much older gentleman, and I thought as bad as I am, I should be able to push ahead of both of these worthy competitors. We were on a slight downhill, and so I let the brakes off and pulled away, and it stuck. I kept up the pace, passing a few others, and felt strong all the way to the finish.

I have to check to see what "number" this race is: probably about 109. But even so, it held a few firsts for me:

• It was the first time I'd ever heard a pre-race talk that included warning runners about the speed bumps. It sounded funny at first, but this was serious: big humps on the access road to Portsmouth Christian Academy (where the race started and ended) could trip up people in the opening pack and also sprinting to the finish.

• It was the first time I saw a mid-race baby change, which happened shortly after the start. The kid was being pushed in a stroller by mom, and when the squalling started, both parents pulled over to the side of the road and commenced a well-organized maneuver worthy of any pit crew, drawing applause from many passing runners.

• And for the first time ever, I saw a guy lose his breakfast in mid-race. Usually if this happens, the person runs into the woods for cover or something, but this poor guy right in front of me just bent over and there it went. A friend was there with him and everything seemed under control, so I didn't stop, which would have only increased his embarrassment, I think.

• Mid-race entertainment: Guy playing bagpipes in driveway. My witty passing comment to his wife: "Hey, I thought you got bagpipes when you die."

And yes, to my surprise, when the timer at the finish line came into view, it had yet to reach 30:00! So I poured it on, and though wasn't able to beat the half-hour mark, it was a surprisingly fast time and a good start for what I hope will be a fun season of collecting more towns on the way to running in all 234 in New Hampshire.