Thursday, August 28

We’ll post CPTC results of the meet shortly – in the meantime here is the link to all of the results.

There were so many amazing things that happened in Kansas (both on and off the track), but here is one of many examples of the tenacity of our team members. Club president John Roberts ran the 5000 meters in 15:45.28 to finish second, (for eight points) in that event. Five minutes later, (literally), John was on the starting line in the 10,000 meters. He ran and finished that event in eighth place to score another point. Again, more to come very soon. ]]> http://www.centralparktc.org/2008/08/journal/usatf-club-track-and-field-championships/feed/ 0 http://www.centralparktc.org/2008/01/old-posts/club-records-and-club-best-times/ http://www.centralparktc.org/2008/01/old-posts/club-records-and-club-best-times/#comments Mon, 28 Jan 2008 23:03:28 +0000 Frank Morton http://test.centralparktc.org/?p=247 Some of the newer club members may not be aware of the club top ten lists which you can link to in the racing section under Best Times. Here you can see the all time Central Park Track Club top ten performers at all of the standard track and road distances. These times were achieved by members while they were competing for the club, (and are not necessarily the individual’s lifetime PR). At the present time these lists combine outdoor and indoor performances. They also combine road and track times for the distances where they overlap (mile, 2 mile, 5K, and 10K).

There have been a huge number of changes in the past year on the women’s, including Aileen Conlon, (9:38.67 – Club Record), Kate Irvin (9:43.45), and Katrina Bruckschwaiger (9:54.7) in the 3000 meters, just in the past week. Changes to the men’s lists are less frequent, but there were two new additions in the men’s 3000 meters from last Thursday’s NYRR meet: Geoff Decker (8:49.0) and Carl Dambkowski (8:51.9).

The Results section of the website now has the latest Club Records posted, both for road and track. Here you see all of the standard track and road distances. While the track distances combine indoor and outdoor performances, there are separate road and track records for the mile, 2 mile, 5000 and 10,000 meters. Natalie Gingerich recently broke Kate Irvin’s mile track record of 4:51.41, with an outstanding 4:50.5 performance at the first NYRR Thursday Night at the Races meet.

Open men win their second points race of the year with a score of 87 points over GNY’s 120. John Roberts led the open men with an 8th place time of 32:31. The rest of the men’s scorers: Birger Ohlsson (33:05), Sean Fortune (33:08), Eric Boucher (33:19) and Jason Ostenson (33:29).

Masters (40+) men were second with Mike Trunkes (34:45), Peter Allen (35:15), and Alan Ruben (35:21). Alan (who also was first in his age group) led the men’s 50+ team for the win, with Tom Phillips (37:23), and the legendary John Kenney (38:16) completing that team.

As we’ve said many times, everyone who runs affects the scoring. Not only do open men and women outside our top five push our competitors further down in the scoring, but the mere presence of so many orange singlets can have an intimidating effect on the competition. There were 9 CPTC men under 5:30 pace and an astounding 23 men under 6:00 pace, with many running PRs.

The CPTC women needed to win this final points race of the year in order to win the overall yearly points race series. But seven athletes traveled to Ohio to participate (and place seventh) in the USA National Club Cross Country meet. Could the CPTC women win anyway? And would some of the cross country runners compete in the Ohio race and (covered in mud) immediately head for the airport back to New York to get ready for the 10K the next day? By now you know the answer to that. Thirty-four CPTC women towed the line on Sunday morning, including six very tired, jet-lagged cross country runners. It was a dominating performance by the open women as they scored 32 points to win over NYAC’s 62. When our team comes in 4, 5, 6, 8, 9 that pretty much tells the whole story. New member Sara Vergote was first for the club with a 35:53. Right behind Sara were Aileen Conlon (35:54), Kate Irvin (35:59), Katrina Bruckschwaiger (36:10), and Lauren Esposito (36:18). Sara moves to sixth on the club all time 10k list. Aileen runs a course PR. Kate runs a PR and moves into seventh on the all time list. Katrina runs a PR and moves into ninth. And Lauren runs a PR and improves from her debut CPTC race from three years ago at this same event and remains on the list in tenth. In all, 9 CPTC women ran sub 6:00 pace, and 20 women ran sub 7:00 pace, including many others with PRs!

Masters (40+) women were fourth led by Stacy Creamer (40:56), Susan Strazza, (41:01), and Jeannine Bardo (45:29). The winning 50+ team was led by Deborah Barchat (45:52), Silvie Kimche (winner of the 60-64 age group in 47:22), and Mary Diver (47:49).

The open women crushed the field even more so that the NYRR website indicates, since a couple of runners were not included in the results (this should be corrected shortly on the NYRR website). Race results have been posted on the CPTC website and we’ve added the runners that either weren’t counted at all, or who didn’t get counted as CPTC runners.

Much more about the race will be posted shortly.

Aileen, Natalie, Kate, Lauren, Lauren, Sarah, and Andrea ran their hearts out in the mud of Voice of America Park in West Chester, Ohio, (just outside of Cincinnati). Results are now posted in the results section of this website. Full results of the event are here. It’s rare you’ll see all of these women run in the same race – some are 1500 meter specialists, and some are marathoners – (Lauren Gustafson just ran a 2:55 in the NYC marathon only a few weeks ago). But when we can get everyone together in the same race, the result is sometimes amazing. If you look at the results in the “race results” section you can see that the CPTC women had the second lowest spread (time between the 1st and 5th runners on the team) of all of the top ten teams. This highlights our fantastic depth, which is what you want on a cross country team.

You can see a video of the women’s open race finish line with this link, where you can clearly pick out all of our runners as they approach and cross the finish line.

In addition to the open women, Sue and Armando ran in the masters races, with Sue finishing 10th in her age group, and Armando finishing the men’s masters 10K in 38th place with a 37:34.3. Here is the video of that race.

(We have learned of two more victories by CPTC members:

Melissa Sherman won the Andrea Holden 5K (18:03)in Massechusetts, and Micah Adriani won the Tallahassee Turkey Trot 5K (18:39) in Florida.)

Central Park Track Club members can’t help themselves when it comes to racing. Instead of relaxing on Thanksgiving weekend, we’ve heard of members running in races all over the country, from upstate New York, Brooklyn, Bronx, Missouri, New Jersey, Florida, California and several others.

There were many great performances and several race winners:

Aileen Conlon won the Bethesda-Chevy Chase Turkey Chase 10K for the second year in a row (37:29). Before Aileen was a runner, she used to run this for fun every year, but now, of course, is always one of the favorites in any race she enters.

Kate Irvin won the Rockland County Turkey Trot 5 mile for the third year in a row in a relaxed 30:08.

John Roberts (25:40) and Sarah Alaei (29:13) won the men’s and women’s division of the Prospect Park Turkey Trot 5 mile.

Lauren Gustafson won the Turkey Beach (moved to Golden Gate Park) 5K in San Francisco (18:08).

Finally, Kristina Maletz won the Pete McArdle 15K cross country race on Sunday in Van Cortlandt Park with an official, but incorrect, time of 61:03, – the actual time was an outstanding 64:03.

First off, even though many of our men and women ran in the big Philadelphia Half Marathon that day, the CPTC open men won for the first time this year! They were led by new member Birger Ohlsson, who came in fifth overall in 16:19, (2nd in his age group). He was followed by Jason Ostenson in seventh (16:27), John Roberts in eight (16:28), Brian Mongeon in tenth (16:40), and Nick Thompson in sixteenth (16:53).

The 40+ masters men also won, led by Mike Trunkes in 19th with a 16:58. (Mike also won his age group). The next two placers for the masters team were two 50 year olds: Alan Ruben (17:55), and Tom Phillips (18:25), who also, of course double scored for the 50+ team. That team came in second, with Harry Litchtenstein running 21:32 to round out the scorers.

The CPTC open women’s team also had a few people running the Philly Half, but they fought hard and came in a strong second. For the second straight week Aileen Conlon and Kate Irvin led the women’s team scorers, with Aileen running second with a 17:46, and Kate running seventh with an 18:57. Rounding out the scorers were Felice Kelly in ninth (19:18), Sarah Alaei in tenth (19:26), and Kristal Adler in twelfth (19:35).

The women’s 40+ masters team also came in second, led by Sue Pearsall, who won her age group and ran 22:02. Jeannine Bardo was next with a 22:35, followed by the amazing Deborah Barchat, who also won her age group with a 23:57.