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Downtown Temple,NH

Sunday, June 12, 2011

2011 Bow Lake Dam 15k

For the 3rd year in a row I decided to run the Bow Lake Dam 15k (results) in Stafford,NH. I think the course is turning into one of my favorite road courses - scenic and challenging. As a bonus this year the weather was just about perfect for running: 60, with a light rain throughout the race. It never rained hard enough to get your singlet or shoes wet, at least during the race. Of course it poured right after finishing, making the post race food and awards less than pleasant. Other than that, a great day.

A handful of familiar faces at the start, including a 1/2 dozen folks from the Somerville Road Runners.  Their yellow singlets would come in handy during the race. My splits have been a little schizophrenic over the first 5 miles in the past so I was hoping to run a bit more steady this year early on. At the gun a very large group decided to go out pretty fast. I did not get sucked in ran my own race and patiently waited to reel them back in. At the 2 mile mark I was probably 10th o/a and by mile 4 I had probably slipped as low as 14th o/a. No worries....yet. I could see quite a few runners in front of me and most were either holding steady or slowly coming back to me. Around mile 5 I finally began passing runners for the first time all day. The stretch from mile 5 to 7 includes a brutally steep climb for nearly a mile followed by a gradual climb for another 1/2 mile. I ran this section HARD, passing another 4-5 runners on the climb. By mile 7 I was in 6th o/a, trailing a couple of SSR runners. I caught the first one around 7.5 and about a mile later caught the 2nd SSR runner. I continued to pick up the pace all the way to the finish (I did not want to get passed in the last 1/2 mile!!). After dodging a few 5k runners from an earlier race, I crossed the line 4th o/a in 59:10, a 35 second PR.
Next year I might even put this race on my calendar!

Splits from the last 3 years:

Mile 2009 2010 2011
1 6:24 6:19 6:23
2 6:17 6:11 6:22
3 6:29 6:27 6:21
4 6:41 6:36 6:23
5 6:33 6:24 6:20
6 7:58 7:31 7:17
7 6:50 6:36 6:35
8 6:29 6:07 5:52
9 6:07 5:49 5:46
0.3 1:53 1:45 1:51
Finish 1:01:41 59:45 59:10