Shad Bloom 2021

New Shoreham (Block Island), RI

Saturday, May 8, 2021

This was my 5th time registered for Shad Bloom, although only my 3rd time running it:

• 2013:  Debut run.  41:50 in pouring rain, and with jetlag after arriving the night before from India.
• 2017:  Shaved a lot of time off, in better conditions.  39:30.
• 2018:  DNS.  Car issues.
• 2019:  DNS.  Moron issues.  Missed the ferry.
• 2021:  And this is where we'll pick up this blog post ...

There were a scad of WTAC runners coming over to the island this year.  In fact, more than 15!  This was really encouraging, and when added to Matthew letting me know he'd be making a trip south to run his inaugural Shad Bloom, I was pretty excited about this.  

The race start is an odd time from both a transportation and eating perspective.  Taking them in order, you had ferry choices of either 9am or 11am, against a 1pm race start.  Add an hour in ferry transit, plus time to walk from the ferry to the race start (no buses this year due to COVID) and check-in, you either had 2.5 hours or 30 minutes available before the starting gun.  There was no Goldilocks option.  With fueling, you're obviously not going to eat lunch an hour before the start.  I had a turkey pesto sandwich at 11am, so I ended up cutting both the arrival time and eating time a tad too close for comfort.

Warm-up:  Went out a 2-mile OAB on dirt road start, with Matthew and Dave Goodrich.  Had wanted to run some of the trail, but missed the trail cutoff completely.  We got back with 10 minutes to the start, and unfortunately I had unnecessarily and inadvertently added angst to Matthew's start by placing his race shoes in the "WTAC support vehicle", which had since departed.  Fortunately, with a cell phone call, we were able to get the vehicle and his shoes back to the starting line just in the nick of time.

The start:  This year the starting line was moved from one side of the Block Island School, to around the corner, ostensibly due to COVID.  I don't really know what that means; maybe COVID is more prevalent on the east side of buildings on Block Island (original start) than south side (where we actually started)?  Anyhow, my own minor moments of angst were 1) when told one minute before the start that we needed to have on masks to start the race; that's not happening as my mask is packed away in my bag in a car, and 2) at the start, they told us runners would go every 5 seconds, but they said "Go" "Go" in rapid succession (2 seconds apart?) for the first four runners, and then stopped saying anything.  I was fifth in line; do I wait for a command?  I just went, and fortunately nobody said anything to me about my lack of mask wearing nor just taking off without any command.

Milling about before the start.

Most of today's WTAC field

The dirt road:  This was uncomfortably fast from the get go.  I didn't so much set the pace as I followed Dave out and stayed just behind him for the approximately two miles of dirt road.  I could hear Nick just behind me, and we stayed in this formation for 2 miles.  I could see Matthew take the lead early on from eventual 2nd place Adrian Massie and 3rd place Steve Brightman.  I never saw Matthew again for the duration of the race, whereas I could occasionally see the latter two on longer straight sections of road.

Mile 1 was my fastest in 3 efforts, and looking back now,
I went out too fast.

Rodman Hollow trails:  The next two miles was trails on undulating hills, utilizing a mix of grass and gravel  I was glad to be done with the roads, and confidently expecting this is where I would start to make moves and have an advantage.  My confidence was misplaced, as this was not be.  After a 1/2 mile or so, I wouldn't see Dave again until the finish, and Nick caught right up to me and we ran side-by-side for a while, before he passed me about Mile 3.  One measure I like to take during a race where someone is staying with me is which one is breather harder, me or my competitor?  Advantage: Nick.

Just before the descent into Rodman Hollow, I repassed Nick, but we were really never more than feet apart from each other.  As I was running up "The Wall" out of the hollow, I thought I stopped hearing Nick's footsteps as prominently, as wasn't sure if he had dropped back a bit, or was power-hiking, or both.  This should have been my opportunity to open up and put some distance on Nick, but that wasn't to be either.  I was just gassed with little strength left.

Slightly faster uphill climb on "The Wall" than 2013,
but this section overall was tied for my slowest ever.

Fresh Swamp and finish:  Final mile.  One mile to go.  My legs were feeling wobbly, and as I tried to climb that awkward stepladder thing going up and over a stone wall, I crashed into the stepladder instead.  Whatever small advantage I had had coming out of Rodman Hollow was gone.  Nick had once again caught right up to me.  To add insult to injury, there was one final climb that I had totally forgotten about, and it just did me in.  My focus now was just on getting to the finish line.  I was done.  I continued to slow, and when I exited onto the road, I had nothing in me for a chase and wished Nick a strong finish as he passed me for the final time.

My final mile was the slowest of all three of my races,
and it felt it as I just tried to hold on.

Trailing by Nick at the finish,
by 6 seconds net time

Glad to be done

Final results:  40:49 (chip time), 7th out of 158 overall, 1st out of 12 in age group.  Full results here.

Westerly Sun article here.

In Tommy 5K fashion, what went well:

• Well, I actually showed up.  Yeah, that's a pretty low bar, but I was only 50/50 going into the four previous times I had signed up for this race.
• This was possibly my first time ever racing with a hat, and I was afraid it would be a distraction as I don't like to change anything up on race day, but once I got going, I completely forgot it was even there.  (Since every run will have to be with a hat for a long time, I'll need to buy some more of these lightweight tech caps.)
• I had great competition (Dave and Nick) to push me along; otherwise I'm certain my finishing time would have been slower.
• I held in there and gritted it out when so many times I just wanted to slow down (even more).
• A shoutout to all the WTAC runners that came out and ran, and an extra kudo to those who went home with an age group win (Dave, Nick, me, Paul Collette, and Erin 2nd female overall).
• Pretty cool to see Matthew take the overall win, plus possibly the course record.
• Fun time getting together with some of the WTAC clan for a late post-race lunch on Block Island, before taking the ferry back.

What could be improved:

• I went out too fast, plain and simple.  Yeah, I was kind of being pulled along trying to keep up with Dave on the roads, but it contributed to my fatigue later on.
• I felt out of shape and had a tough time running the trails, which I shouldn't have to that extent.  Sure, I can blame some of that on ten consecutive days off recently for surgery/recovery, but I own that one to get back in better endurance form.