The Hills Were Alive, the Runners, Not So Much

So this morning was the Boston Prep 16 mile road race in Derry, N.H., and a bunch of us headed north to give it a try. For years, we've been hearing about how tough the course is, how many hills are in it, how bad the hills are around miles 9-13.

Turns out nobody was lying to us.

Don't they hold races on flat courses anymore?

Bad enough the weathermen were all wrong. It WASN'T warm, though we were able to get away with shorts. But apparently when you run on isolated back roads of New Hampshire, surrounded by snow-covered trees, fields, and meadows, the temperature tends to reflect the landscape. Brrr!

In the end, Tommy didn't need to protest Barry's designation as a Clydesdale runner, because apparently there are some Clydesdales who are pretty damn fast and took all of us out of the running for any hardware (which in this case was maple syrup).

Fun race, well organized, nice post-race event, great tee-shirt. But I'm still not convinced we'll be making a return trip in 2011.

First Run, First Scandal

Continuing a New Year's Day tradition that dates back decades, the E Streeters took to the streets on Friday for a New Year's Day jaunt, this time around the streets of Pawtucketville with 800 of our friends for the First Annual First Run 5K and 10K road races.

A good time had by all, especially the group that ran together and freaked out many of our fellow runners. Whether panicking them with threats of projectile vomiting, regaling them with screeching choruses of AC/DC songs, or egging on a Presidential candidate to take on a new running mate, there were lots of laughs to be had.

Here's a look at the wild, the not-so-innocent and the E Street shufflers, with photos courtesy of race photog extraordinaire Jim Rhoades. (Check out his website at http://www.jimrhoades.com/)

Here's Andrew, taking 24th place out of 400, third in his age group in the 5K, with a time of 21:14

Scott kicked ass for the 10K stretch, coming in 15th out of 404, at 39:46, second in his age group:

Then there's the group of five (Carlos, Barry, Pat, Tommy and John) that ran the 10K together - well at least four of them did. Here they come on the first pass around:

By the second loop, though, one of them had inexplicably disappeared. Here's four of them coming in to the finish. (You figure out which one was missing.)

So where did that fifth runner disappear to? Here's a clue: take a look at this runner, Tom Hildreth. Note his number, 376, as supported by the race results:

84 TOM HILDRETH 60 M 376 25:35.31 25:44.69 8:19

So then how did John manage to get captured on film a short time later sporting the same number?!?

Put this one down as the first running scandal of the New Year. And John, thanks for the fodder. We'll get a ton of mileage out of this one...........