Millennium Running’s Ribfest 5 Miler playing host to this year’s USATF-NE 5 Mile Championship. Despite the hot, muggy conditions, the race went off without and hitch, providing all participants with great camaraderie and delicious post-race ribs.
The men’s race turned into a four athlete duel between Amos Sang (Western Mass Distance Project), Whirlaway’s Ruben Sanca, the BAA’s Brian Harvey, and 2016 LVL 10k winner Neal Darmody. The pack of four rolled through the 5k mark in 15’10 and hammered on all the way to the finish. Amos Sang made the late break with about 600m to go and ran away with the W in 24 minutes, 32 seconds. This is Amos’ third Club New England Road Title since last August and he also lead his WMDP Wolfpack teammates to the USATF-NE 5 Mile Team Title. Brian Harvey would have the next strongest finish with Sanca and Darmody right on his heels for the 3rd and 4th spots.
The women’s race on the other hand, was much more spread out. Holly Rees put on a clinic out there, dominating the race in a course record time of 27’48 and leading her Battle Road Track Club team to the USATF-NE Title. Runner-up Apryl Sabadosa 28’52. Rees is in the best shape of her life thus far and seeks out a strong performance at the British National Outdoor Championships in a couple weeks (she plans to race the 5k). Reigning New Bedford Half Marathon Champ Katie Moraczewski raced to the bronze medal in 29’08 with the reigning Amherst 10 Mile champ Danielle Bessette crossing the line in 4th (29’19).
One other unique twist to this year’s USATF-NE 5 Mile Championship is that it fell the day after the Mount Washington Auto Road Race, one of the largest team events in the region. Many New Englanders accepted the challenge of doubling up and racing both events. We briefly analyzed the results of both races and have to give some shoutouts to those who crushed it at both races.
Adding up the times from both events, Nacho Hernando narrowly edged out his college coach and Millennium Running teammate Nick Aguila for the fastest Rockpile/Ribfest doubler while Apryl Sabadosa (Western MA Distance Project) was dominant in the same category for the women. Nacho notched top 10 finishes in both events, finisher 9th up Mt Washington (69’38) and 8th at Ribfest the following morning (25’31). Apryl handled the double in superb fashion, placing 4th for the women up the rockpile in 79’25, 2nd at Ribfest in 28’52. Other impressive doublers included:
- Central Mass Strider Ed Sheldon (5th senior at Mt. Washington then doubled back to take the USATF-NE 5 Mile Senior’s title with a 28’10 at Ribfest)
- GLRR’s Mark Reeder (top 55+ athlete in both races)
- CMS’s Leslie O’Dell (6th Master at Mt. Wash, 3rd Master at Ribfest)
There were a handful of folks out there providing coverage of the race.
Mike Giberti biked alongside the runners as the race went on and captured some exciting footage with the GoPro mounted to his handlebars:
Full results courtesy of Millennium Running
