Trust Me, You'll Love It 10K

Charlestown, RI
Saturday, June 4, 2022

Race background:  This was at least the 4th incarnation of the “Trust Me, You’ll Love It” 10K trail race.  The race is hosted by the Charlestown Land Trust and directed by John Varadian.  John is a long time runner and ultra-runner, and I met him a few years ago when he kindly reached out and offered to help with course marking at our club’s annual Li’l Rhody trail race.

While I try to support local races, especially the few trail races we have in the area, every year that this race has transpired I have had some sort of conflict.  (I sort of did this year as well, as I had a flight out of Green at 1pm, but with the flyer promoting “runners start promptly at 10am”, I figured if I left immediately at the finish and showered at my Mom’s house nearby to the race instead of home, I could make it.)  The price of $35 for a lowkey 10K trail race is on the high side, but I also figured it was for a great cause of land conservation, one of my advocations.

Pre-race:  Having never been to the Amos Greene Farm, a Charlestown Land Trust conserved property with the original structures from the 1700s, I was glad the long dirt driveway off Route 112 was clearly marked with flags and “Parking” signs.  The property is privately owned and operated as a working farm, but with a conservation easement.  

After checking in and going on a short warm-up led by Jonny Hammett, we were ready to start the race, or so I thought.  John had a song he wanted us to sing along with as he played his guitar.  I don't remember the name of the song, but to me it was something like the familiar "There was an old lady who swallowed a fly.  I don't know why she swallowed the fly; I guess she'll die..." in that each verse kept building upon what we already had.  I was fine with the first verse, even the second, but after that not being inclined to sing I was losing interest.  Also I was on a tight timeframe to race, leave, shower, and get to the airport.

Race - 1st half:  Finally we were off.  We did not start promptly at 10am, but rather 10:14am.  OK, this is going to be even tighter now to get to the airport.  After a mowed grass 1/3 mile loop that brought us back past the start, Nick was in the lead.  We ran down a different dirt road, which was only 1/4 mile long and brought out us to Route 112, where two volunteers with flags ensured a safe crossing for us before entering Carter Preserve.  Nick's pace was a little spicy for me, but I tried to stay just behind him.  Enough distance that I had good vision of upcoming roots and rocks, but not so far behind that I would get dropped and be on my own.  That worked well for about two miles, until he was starting to get just out of sight.  In my mind, I was already accepting a 2nd place finish.  I need to build more confidence in situations like this.  

Race - 2nd half:  At almost exactly three miles, I popped out of the woods and onto the "Grassland Mile", an open grass field with a double-track flat manicured one mile perimeter.  In this race, we would run about 3/4 of that mile perimeter around the grass field.  Given the open field, I could now see Nick not too far ahead of me.  That gave me incentive to pick up the chase.  This was by far my fastest section of the race, as I was running close to six-flat pace.  Gradually I closed the gap Nick had on me until 1/2 mile into the grassland section, I caught up to him.  I went past him before we went back into the woods, but I knew I needed to keep pushing as this was a 75' uphill section now and that is not my forte.  Went past a water station, but I cannot waste any seconds and kept going.  I could hear Nick's footsteps for a while, and then quiet.  A good sign, but no resting here.  Pushed the remaining two miles as hard as I could, sometimes slowed by blowdowns that I needed to jump over, but reminding myself that those would slow Nick as well.

As I came back out onto Route 112, the two volunteer course marshals were not in position and themselves had to run to get where they needed to be.  I couldn't wait for them so I looked out for traffic myself on Route 112, and saw where I could easily cross before the next car so I did.  I asked one of the volunteers how far back the next runner was, but when I didn't get or didn't hear an answer, I just pushed it hard down the short dirt road to the finish.

Final results:  1st place (out of about 40-ish), 41:24.  (I could not find any online results.)

Courtesy of RD

While I wish there was just a little more online info (web page, course map, results, etc.), this was a fun local old-school trail race which was very well marked and on a great course.  

It looked like there was pizza and other food coming, but I grabbed my prize and headed out, as I was now running a little behind schedule.  No time for talking to Mom, quickly showered, changed, and high-tailed it to the airport for my flight to Florida.  I made it.  Would I run this race again?  Absolutely!  Just maybe not again if I were flying out within a few hours of the race.

My prize:  a fresh blueberry peach pie!
This had to wait until my return several days later,
but Mom kept it in her refrigerator for me,
and all was good.