HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Wishing all of you and your families a happy and healthy New Year!!! Certainly looking forward to it from a running perspective!

Washington Running Report - Fall Rankings

The January-February edition of the Washington Running Report has just been released.  In addition to featuring the Fall 2011 Rankings, it includes a page-long race report from the Metric Marathon (pg 45).  Click here to view the full report: WRR Digital.

Congratulations to the following Striders, who made the fall rankings:


Becky Gessler (8th, F19 & Under)
Kara Waters (4th, F35-39)
Robyn Humphrey (5th, F45-49)
Donna Wecker (7th, F45-49)
Marsha Demaree (49th, F45-49)
Pat Wilkerson (2nd, F50-54)


Jason Tripp (13th, M35-39)
Mike Colaiacovo (7th, M40-44)
Peter Keating (6th, M45-49)
Dave Berardi (4th, M50-54)
Jim Carbary (20th, M60-64)
Mike Fleming (10th, M65-69)

Rankings Link: http://www.runwashington.com/runner-rankings/2011-3.htm

SFO Men's Health Urbanathalon Video

Woohoo!! Special thanks to Jason for recording the Universal Sports showing of the Men's Health Urbanathalon in San Francisco, a 10.2mile race with lots of obstacles on 13 November 2011.

We've posted the video on YouTube as unlisted (meaning that you need the link to see it):
Part 1: http://youtu.be/zX-5krh8FxA
Part 2: http://youtu.be/sB5qbK7n9iA

Email howardcountystriders at gmail if you'd like the higher resolution version.

Our very own Carlos Renjifo (Captain of the Howard County Striders Racing Team) won the overall shindig. And his triumph over the obstacles is actually shown throughout this video, which also includes a finishing stretch-down with his brother Jorge. :oD

Previous blog entry with details: http://stridersracingteam.blogspot.com/2011/11/news-flash-renjifo-brothers-take-over.html

Kent's idea: Who's planning the Howard County Striders' subUrbanAthalon?

Great job, Carlos and Jorge! Thanks again, Jason!
Happy Holidays, everyone -- see you next year! ^_^

Men's Health UrbanAthlon on TV this Week

In case any of you are curious about the race I ran back in November (Men's Health UrbanAthlon), Universal Sports will be airing a 1-hour special about this year's races.  I did get interviewed after the race, so there is a chance that I might make a short on-screen cameo.  Here are the show times:

Tuesday, December 20 at 8pm
Wednesday, December 21 at 8pm
Thursday, December 22 at 8pm

Celtic Solstice 5M Results

The racing team finished a great year of running with some awesome performances at the Celtic Solstice 5M.  The race, organized by Jim Adams of Falls Road Running, continues to grow each year, which means that the competition grows, too.  This year, over 3000 runners participated, making the field quite competitive.

On the men's side, Carlos Renjifo took an early gamble and jumped into the lead a little over a mile into the race.  For a few miles, it seemed that he might have enough fuel in the tank to fend off perennial champion Dave Berdan; however, at mile three, Berdan asserted himself, took the lead, and never looked back, going for a record fifth win at the race and setting a record on the newly redesigned 5.1 mile course (25:47). Carlos continued to push for the next two miles, and had a close call, tripping near the slippery lake and almost falling. In the last 250 meters of the race, he was caught by Falls Road's Tristram Thomas, and had to settle for third.  The margin for the top three was the closest in race history, with the group separated by a mere 16 seconds.

Next up -- and arguably the most impressive performer of the day -- was Kent Werner, who ran on his own for most of the race and still blazed to 26:35, good for 6th place.  Kent's performance follows on the heels of his outstanding time of 2:45 at the Richmond Marathon one month ago. Despite numerous interruptions to his training due to medical residency interviews, his gutsy race performances have earned him a spot back on the racing team after a three-year hiatus.

Mike Colaiacovo, in great form as usual, easily took first in the master's category (27:04) and finished 10th overall.  He was followed by the most recent addition to the racing team, Keith Levasseur, who scored a 14th place finish with a time of 27:26.  Rounding out the men's competition for the Striders, Brian Fleming finished in 28:43 (21st), Jason Tripp ran a solid 28:42 (22nd) and John Chall finished 31:06 (40th).

With distinctive pink flair, Caroline Bauer represented the Striders women with an excellent time of 32:16, good for 4th place overall.  Janeth Scott also had a very solid performance, finishing 16th with a time of 34:36 (1st in the 45-49 category).

Many thanks to Issel Anne Lim for taking some great photos, posted here: Link.  Full results are available here: Link.

Happy holidays, and see you all on the roads in 2012!

Mini Race Recap (In Pictures)

The bagpipes sounded, the swords descended ...

...And they're off!

Near the lake, Carlos tries to keep things close as Berdan jumps to the lead.

Kent ran mostly solo, but that didn't appear to slow him down.

The spread between 1st and 3rd was pretty small.

Kent hammers home with a 26:35!

Mike Colaiacovo easily takes 1st Master, with a huge grin on his face.

Keith Levasseur runs a great time (27:26).

Jason Tripp finishes strong, with Brian Fleming close behind. Jason claims that he's looking forward to beating up on the masters runners next year.

Post-race photos!  Smiles for everyone!

...More smiles (and pink socks)!

Shamrock 5k Registration OPEN - Price increases later today!

If you want to run this race, I strongly recommend signing up very soon as it is guaranteed to sell out...

CLICK HERE

Cherry Blossom 10 Miler Lottery Open

The lottery for the Cherry Blossom 10 miler is now open (http://cherryblossom.org/).  If you have not received some guaranteed form of entry (volunteer, charity, seeded runner, etc), please make sure to sign up by December 9th.  Once the lottery selection process is complete, I will send out a call for people interested in being part of a Howard County Strider team.

More details are available at: http://cherryblossom.org/generalinfo/entryinfo.php

CARLOS AND ISSEL ARE ENGAGED!!!

So it's not running related, but in case you didn't hear...

Carlos and Issel are officially now engaged!!!

Join me in congratulating these two awesome friends!!!

Labels:

More Weekend Results: Buschman/Wecker Lead the Way at Metric Marathon, Colaicovo Runs fast 8k at Richmond

Some additional performances from this weekend:

Mark Buschman blazed to a dominant first place finish at the Metric Marathon.  His time of 1:35:05 was more than two minutes ahead of fellow racing team member, Peter Keating (1st Master, 1:37:23).  Jason Tripp finished in fourth place overall (1:39:41, 2nd 35-39), and Mark Miller was 8th (2nd Master, 1:44:10).

On the women's side, Donna Wecker finished well ahead of all her competitors, with a time of 1:57:31 -- 4 and a half minutes ahead of 2nd place!

In the metric 5k, John Chall finished 5th overall (1st 50-54, 18:47) with Bobby Gessler not far behind in 7th (2nd 50-54, 18:56).  Pat Wilkerson and Robyn Humphrey finished 1-2 in the female masters category, posting times of 20:05 and 20:11, respectively.  Janeth Scott ran 20:53 for 6th place overall and second in the 40-49 age group.

Down south in Richmond, Mike Colaiacovo had a great 8k race, running 27:08 and finishing as the top master runner.

Pictures, articles, and full results of the metric marathon are available here: http://striders.net/races/metric/2011/

FLASH: Kent and Adam rock Richmond Marathon!!!

Kent Werner and Adam Wytko toed the start line of the Suntrust Richmond Marathon this morning in what I had to imagine as nearly perfect marathoning weather. Kent had fallen off the map over the past year but began showing up at bagel runs over the summer. Adam is coming off of a sub-2:50 marathon in Akron only 6 weeks ago. They both rocked it!

Bib 1308: Adam Wytko - 2:56:13
Bib 1310: Kent Werner - 2:45:47

Way to go boyz!!!

Rock 'N' Roll Series Discounts on 11/11

In case you are thinking about running a Rock N Roll race next year, a good day to sign up might be this coming Friday, November 11th between 11AM and 11PM PST (2PM and 2AM EST).  You will save $20 on your race entry to most Rock N Roll events (restrictions noted below).

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In celebration of 11.11.11 this Friday, the Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Series will be offering a special incentive to join Rock Nation. For one day only, SAVE $20* when you register between      11am – 11pm PST! Stop, Rock and Run! -  Join runners across the country in sharing your passion for running. On Friday, drop what you are doing and get outside at 11am to walk, jog or run for 11 minutes. RSVP on Facebook for the event today! Bonus Offer: •    Free shipping on all merchandise purchased on the web store on 11.11.11 *Discount is only valid on November 11, 2011 from 11am – 11pm PST. Some exceptions apply. Events not included are San Antonio, Las Vegas, New York 10k, Edinburgh, Madrid, Dublin, Montreal and Lisbon. No other discount codes or promotions can be used in combination with the 11-11-11 promotion.

Striders Take a "Run Through the Grapevine"

06 November 2011 - by Jim Carbary

For 17 years, the Run Through the Grapevine 8k course at Linganore Winery was actually a little short, so this year an extra hill was added around another grapevine to satisfy a more exact measurement. The unofficial story for the route change, though, was that Mark Buschman vowed to beat the best time of Pekka Stenholm, a former racing team member who had moved back to his native Finland. Mark and Pekka had met at the Berlin Marathon earlier in the year and must have had a discussion about the Grapevine. Race director Jason Tripp decided the course should be as accurate as possible, so a course extension occurred, and Mark failed by 20 seconds to beat the time (about 30:30). Everyone else reported slower times at the Grapevine “8k” this year, too.

The extra 0.2-mile didn’t bother Carlos Renjifo, who won the race by over 1:30, the largest margin by which anyone had ever won the race (29:07). Carlos led the field for essentially the entire race, although he inexplicably went off course twice. Once, he took second place Andrew Revelle off course with him, and third-place Mike Colaiacovo shouted to them to turn left rather than right. They quickly corrected themselves and resumed the competition. “I thought I could run in 27 or 28 [minutes] but I couldn’t,” Carlos said, not realizing the extra mileage had its effect. Still, he was the only runner in the field to break half an hour on the treacherously hilly course.

The women’s race was a much closer affair than the men’s. Initially, Howard Countian Rian Landers-Ramos assumed the lead, but then Jill Krebs took the lead after emerging from the second set of grapevines. Jill and her teammate Sherry Stick battled “back and forth through the woods.” Jill then took “a weird step” at four miles and Sherry was on her. “I could see she had her game face on,” Jill said. “I knew it was all over.” A perennial winner, Sherry hung on to win by 12 seconds (35:03).
 
Elkridge’s Donna Wecker outsprinted Jane Wickman of Germantown to claim the award as top master-woman (41:25). Although Donna regularly runs trails, she had never run Grapevine before and was not prepared for the steep hills and ankle-twisting grass. “The hills were brutal,” she said, “and there were soooo many of them.” Donna turns 50 in a few weeks and will then begin to terrorize the grand-master women.

The top master man was Mike Colaiacovo, who finished third overall (30:53) and earned and overall award. The next fastest master was grandmaster Keith McIntyre (34:03). Keith’s stunning performance was blunted only by his son Conner’s beating him.

The Run Through the Grapevine featured a plethora of team competitions. The Howard County Strider Men’s team, with Renjifo, Revelle, Buschman, and Colaiacovo crushed the opposition to win the overall men’s team competition with a perfect score of 10 points. The Baltimore-Washington Athletic Club consisted of Stick and Krebs with their old pal Diana Pool and new-comer Joan Namasinga had a nearly perfect score of 13 in winning the women’s team competition. Put together by Steve Anderson, the OMG men’s masters team won a prize for the seventh year in a row (although it was only men’s masters team). There was no prize for the best team name, but some of the outstanding samples were “Mac Attack” (the McIntyre family) and “Merlot is how we roll” (Ken Miller, Jeanine Rogers, and Laura and Ryan Guenin).
The 18th Annual and Newly-Recalibrated Run Through the Grapevine took place at the Linganore Winery in Carroll County on November 11. The race is staged each year by the Howard County Striders, who wish to thank the winery owner Anthony Aellen for the use of his grapevines and hills. Jason Tripp directed. Award winners received gift certificates for bottles of wine, which they could redeem immediately after the race. The weather was so nice this year that many stayed after the race to enjoy wine and lunch under pleasant autumn skies.

The race sold out two weeks before with a total of 650 registrants. Of these, 573 actually showed up and ran the race. “Not a record, but close,” said official scorer Jim DiSciullo.

Results and pictures are available at:  http://striders.net/races/grapevine/2011/

The winning men's team (Randy, Carlos, Adam, Mark, Andrew)

Washington Running Report Summer Rankings

The latest edition of the Washington Running Report is out and it includes the summer rankings.  Congratulations to the following Striders:

Julie Gessler (4th, 19 & Under)
Tiffany Lang (7th, 19 & Under)
Becky Gessler (13th, 19 & Under)
Donna Wecker (2nd, 45-49)
Pat Wilkerson (3rd, 50-54)
Dorothy Beckett (7th, 50-54)

Doug Mock (3rd, 40-44)
Mike Colaicovo (4th, 40-44)
Peter Keating (3rd, 45-49)

The full report can be found HERE.

Baltimore Running Festival Results

Windy conditions at today's Baltimore Running Festival did not keep the Striders from posting some solid times.  In the 5k, Pat Wilkerson ran 20:27, good for first place in her age group. Jason Tripp, John Chall, Kara Waters, and Caroline Bauer all ran solid times in the half marathon.  Jason ran 1:19:40 (1st 35-39), Kara ran 1:21:40 (2nd Overall), John finished in 1:28:16 (1st 50-54), and Caroline crossed the line in 1:30:13 (3rd, 25-29 & 5th overall).  In the marathon, Mark Miller ran a superb 2:58:10 (5th, 45-49), well under the 3 hour time he was shooting for.  Finally, in the team relay, the Bullseye Running squad (consisting of Tom Williams, Phil Lang, Mark Buschman, Carlos Renjifo) took first overall, with a time of 2:28:59.  The Howard County Striders/Baltimore-Washington Athletic Team (Mark Gilmore, Dave Berardi, Steve Kartalia, and a last-minute substitute for Chris Chattin) were close behind, finishing in 2:34:19 (1st Masters).  The Run4Chocolate ladies fielded two teams this year, finishing 2nd and 3rd in the women's division with times of 3:08:29 and 3:09:29, respectively.

Some pictures from the race are posted HERE. A video of the Bullseye Running team finish is posted HERE.  Relay team splits are posted below.  The rest of the results are available HERE.

Great job everyone!

BULLSEYE RUNNING #8950

Age: 99

Distance	MAR
Clock Time	2:29:01
Chip Time	2:28:59
Overall Place	2
Division Place	2 / 126
Team	BULLSEYE RUNNING
Leg1	0:32:56
Leg2	0:42:28
Leg3	0:34:34
Leg4	0:39:02
Pace	5:41

HOWARD CO. STRIDERS BW ATHLETIC CLUB #9147

Age: 99

Distance	MAR
Clock Time	2:34:23
Chip Time	2:34:19
Overall Place	4
Division Place	4 / 126
Team	HOWARD CO. STRIDERS BW ATHLETIC CLUB
Leg1	0:35:19
Leg2	0:42:22
Leg3	0:36:45
Leg4	0:39:55
Pace	5:54

RUN4CHOCOLATE2 #9408

Age: 99

Distance	MAR
Clock Time	3:08:39
Chip Time	3:08:29
Overall Place	19
Division Place	2 / 288
Team	RUN4CHOCOLATE2
Leg1	0:42:36
Leg2	0:50:21
Leg3	0:43:32
Leg4	0:52:01
Pace	7:12

RUN4CHOCOLATE1 #9407

Age: 99

Distance	MAR
Clock Time	3:09:40
Chip Time	3:09:29
Overall Place	21
Division Place	3 / 288
Team	RUN4CHOCOLATE1
Leg1	0:41:59
Leg2	0:47:40
Leg3	0:45:49
Leg4	0:54:02
Pace	7:14

Pics from Berlin

Some pictures from Europe...

Mark, Seth, and Pekka in front of Brandenburg Gate


East meets West

At expo with Katherine Switzer

With a piece of the Berlin Wall outside a restaurant

 Success!

Marathon Results (Berlin and Akron)

Results are in for the weekend marathons.

In Berlin, Mark Buschman, Seth Geoghegan, Pekka Stenholm, and Mick Slonaker ran in favorable conditions and posted some solid times (Mark - 2:36:33, Seth - 2:50:51, Pekka - 3:02:52, Mick - 3:07:20). No news yet about the actual race, but hopefully we will get some of those details up soon. I do believe Seth's time may be a PR of about 3:30!

In Akron, Adam Wytko toed the line with the goal of running a sub-2:50 marathon. Mission accomplished! His final time was 2:49:20.

Splits are posted below. For the guys in Germany -- Enjoy Oktoberfest!

Mark Buschman

Seth Geoghegan


Pekka Stenholm


Mick Slonaker

As a final note, Berlin saw a new World Record set in the marathon, as Patrick Makau broke Haile Gebrselassie's previous mark of 2:03:59 by 21 seconds!

Striders Prepare to take on Berlin ...

In less than three days, a group of Striders will make their way to Germany to participate in the 38th annual Berlin Marathon. Weather conditions look favorable so far. Combined with a fast course, we could see some monster PRs. Gun goes off at 9AM, Central European Time.

Good luck to: Mark, Seth, Pekka, and Mick!

FLASH: CARLOS RUNS 1:09:54 AT RnR PHILLY!

Just in...

Carlos rock n' rolled his way to a sub 1:10 half marathon earlier this morning along the streets of the city of Brotherly Love!

Official splits:

Carlos Renjifo
Bib: #1055, Race: Half Marathon
Point Time Time of Day Pace
START 00:00:00 8:00:27 am --
5K 00:16:17 8:16:43 am 05:15
10K 00:32:45 8:33:11 am 05:18
10M 00:53:08 8:53:35 am 05:24
FINISH 01:09:54 9:10:20 am 05:24
Avg. Pace 05:20

I believe he beat his half-marathon PR by two minutes AND set a 10 mile PR along the way! AWESOME JOB, CARLOS!!!!!

Tuesday Workout

We will be doing our weekly track workout on Tuesday this week. Due to high school sports games, we will be moving to HCC this week. Warmup starts at 5:30pm. Workout to be determined once we get there...

No Trails Tomorrow

With all the rain we have had in the past few days, it is very likely that the trails are in bad shape. Since I'm sure nobody wants to risk getting hurt less than 3 weeks out from their fall marathons/half marathons, we will not be meeting at the trails this week. Track workout, however, is still on for Thursday.

Track Workout/Trail Swap

We have made the decision to swap the track and trail workouts at the last minute. We will be meeting at the Oakland Mills HS at 5:30PM for a track workout today (Wednesday) and at the Patapsco trails tomorrow (Thursday) at 6PM.

Washington Running Report - Spring 2011 Rankings

This is a retroactive post, mostly because I just found this article in the Washington Running Report: Spring rankings for 2011, compiling results from Cherry Blossom, the National Half Marathon, etc.

Features photos of Carlos Renjifo (ranked in Open Men as #28, when he was 28 years old!) and Peter Keating (#1 for 45-49 y/o men), and a few other Striders, including Mike Fleming (#11 in 65-69 y/o men).

For more details on these rankings, see CAR's previous post, with the digital link to the article. Great job, guys!!! :)

Two-Person 5M Relay

Time to break out the old high school/college track spikes in preparation for this year's Two-Person 5 Mile relay on Wednesday, August 3rd, at 6:30PM (Oakland Mills HS).

Never taken part in the event before? It's pretty simple: Two participants run alternating 1/4 mile legs on the track. Each participant runs 2.5 miles total. If you've been looking for a challenging workout to help you work on your turnover, this is the perfect workout for you!

It'd be awesome if we could get a bunch of the folks on the racing team to show up. We can mix and match to make things fun. If you have a relay baton lying around at home, bring that too! If you're hurt, please consider coming also. I am the race lead and am still looking for some volunteers to help out.

Hope to see you there.

Running Times + Carlos

The Finnish division of the Howard County Striders has shared a few cool articles with us:

The official finishing video from the race can be found on the Running Maryland website! You can see Carlos Renjifo around 1:45, and hear his girlfriend cheering in the background. :oD


Carlos also appeared in an article from Running Times. We couldn't find the online link, but our fantastic Finnish friends sent us a foto of the page:

[Thanks, Pekka! :oD]

HC Striders are hotter than sparkling vampires -- Recounting the Rockville Twilighter

Folks running the Rockville Twilighter sped by yesterday, under clear skies and cooling breezes.

The Howard County Striders men raced splendidly, with Weems McFadden running 30:58 and John Chall running 31:45. Weems sported the HCS singlet, John had a nifty headband, and they were the 5th and 6th Masters, respectively.

Special congratulations to Carlos Renjifo, who achieved 14th place out of over 1100 runners, and fifth in his age group. He also ran a PR of 25:50 (Great job!). The results can be found here: http://mcrrc.org/racing/2011/Twilighter-Men-8K.html

Videos can be found, as always, on the Howard County Striders' YouTube Channel.

** update on 2011-07-21 **
The official finishing video from the race can be found on the Running Maryland website! You can see Carlos around 1:45, and hear his girlfriend cheering in the background. :oD (Thanks to Pekka for the link! ^_^)

On a bonus note, here's a conversation that we overheard between a little girl and her dad:

Girl: Daddy, Daddy, guess what?
Dad: What?
Girl: (pointing to Carlos): Daddy, did you know that that guy has abs?
Dad: Dear, you would have to be blind to not see the six-pack on that guy.

We did not see any vampires at the TWILIGHT-er, but we do encourage everyone to see the new Harry Potter movie. :oD

hehe ^_~ This post was brought to you by one of the unofficial reporters for the Howard County Striders Racing Team. Have a great week, everyone! ^_^

RACING TEAM WOMEN DOMINATE AT HCS WDF 5K

On another hot and humid morning, the women of the Racing Team took several top honors at the HCS Women's Distance Festival 5k. Stefanie Commins showed she is beginning to return to old form as she took off at the gun and never looked back to beat local stars Sherry Stick and Denise Knickman in 18:28.

Donna Wecker and Kelly Westlake battled one another with Donna creeping away at the end to claim 1st Master. Pat Wilkerson continued to be 'Mrs. Consistent' posting a time of 20:20 for 9th overall and 1st Grandmaster. Dorothy Beckett was tops in the 50-54 age group with her 21:45, only hours after returning from a late night flight from CA.

Official results:

1 Commins, Stefanie 18:28

4 Wecker, Donna 19:26

5 Westlake, Kelly 19:34

9 Wilkerson, Pat 20:20

16 Beckett, Dorothy 21:45

AWESOME JOB LADIES!!!

Washington Running Report Rankings

The newest edition of the Washington Running Report is online. Click here to view (Link). Striders among the rankings this go-round are:

Michael Wegner (1st, 19 & Under)
Mike Colaiacovo (3rd, 40-44)
Pete Keating (1st, 45-49) + Picture
Bob Burns (13th, 55-59)
Kara Waters (3rd, 35-39, 10th Open Women)
Robyn Humphrey (4th, 45-49)
Donna Wecker (6th, 45-49)
Pat Wikerson (3rd, 50-54)
Dorothy Beckett (12th, 50-54)

There is also a picture of Carlos Renjifo, which is a bit strange, since he is not ranked...

Congratulations to all of you!

Edit by Issel (2012-01-27):
Actually, rankings can be found here: http://www.runwashington.com/news/3440/475/Spring-Men-2011.htm
Blog post: http://stridersracingteam.blogspot.com/2011/08/washington-running-report-spring-2011.html
And Carlos was ranked #28 in the Open Men division. :)