Level Legion: Boston Marathon Edition
February Race Recaps: The Level Legion has been hard at work training through one of the toughest and coldest winters of late. Fitting then that the Legion be equally tough and ice cold on the start line of their February Boston tune-up races. Whether one is trekking through the New Hampshire snow, winning a debut 20-miler, representing the hometeam at a local race, pushing along a 5 month old companion or simply putting in the steady work, this past month has brought along some great races. You have already heard from Scott, who decided that if you can’t beat this winter, might has well don the snowshoes and have at it. Now we bring you some more perspective on just how racing has been fitting in to the training plan as Boston inches ever closer.
Brian Harvey
40th Annual Jones Group Realtors 10 Miler (2/23/14) – 4th place, 51:41.8
A couple weeks ago I ran the 40th Annual Jones Group 10 Miler out in Amherst, the first stop on the USATF-NE Grand Prix. From past training cycles, I have learned that I should not race too much as I end up becoming tired or flat by the time of the goal race. Therefore, I decided to use this race as a hard workout and a good way to get an extended effort at goal marathon pace. The plan was to do an extended warmup (8 miles) and go right into the race with minimal rest.
For the race, the plan was to do 8 miles at 5:15 effort and then hammer the last 2 miles if I felt good. The Amherst course is hilly so it was difficult to find a rhythm but the average pace came out pretty close to goal for the first 8 miles (5:09, 5:08, 5:46, 5:22, 5:21, 4:56, 5:07, 4:44 — 5:12 avg). I was in a good pack for much of these first 8 miles including Eric Blake, Neel Tarneja, and Brian McNamara. At the 8 miles mark, I could see Dan Vassallo less than 100m or so up ahead. I closed the gap on him some over those last 2 miles (5:18, 4:49) but ended up finishing about 12s back. After the race, I went directly into a 4+ mile cooldown to get to 22 mile total for the day.
