He’s a freak…he’s the fastest kid alive…

40. Run 3 10K races

From the time I was a little kid, I always disliked running.  At summer camp, I always tried to play positions in sports that minimized the amount of running I would have to do: catcher, goalie, defense, and the like.  I was not very good at it, I was always slower than everyone else, and I always felt goofy.  Fortunately for me, as much as I was unlike a gazelle on land, I was a fish in the water, so my lack of running skills was made up for in spades by the fact that I could swim circles around them.  In college, we were always encouraged to run in the off-season and we used to run at the beginning of the season to get ourselves back in shape before really dialing up the yardage in the pool.  We used to run 3 miles at a clip, and I used to hate it.  Didn’t help that I was a good swimmer, since I was running with a bunch of swimmers.

Since I finished up graduate school, I’ve been working really hard at getting back  in shape.  My friend and coworker Joe started running, and I took it as a challenge – if Joe could do it, then why not me?  I started off slow, running on the treadmill, a mile at a time.  I started talking about running with my blog buddy Rob, who ran the NYC marathon last year.  It turned out that my other coworker Brian was an accomplished runner in his own right, and he gave me tons of advice and guidance.

I’d also just like to point out how amazing Caitlyn, Rupert, Laura, Jenny and Brian, MD and Donna are for coming out to support us.  Just check out these awesome signs and awesome people.

I don’t remember who suggested it, but we drafted two more science teachers and formed a team to compete in the Jersey Shore Relay Marathon.  Joe and I wanted to take on the challenge of running two of the 10K legs, and we’d been building up to it for a few months.  Here’s the batting order:

• Leg 1 – Post: Seaside to Brick Beach
• Leg 2 – Fritsche: Brick Beach to Point Pleasant
• Leg 3 – Schwartzman: Point Pleasant to Manasquan
• Leg 4 – Rosenwald (that’s me!): Manasquan to Belmar
• Leg 5 – Pevovar: Belmar to Asbury Park

Alright, this wasn’t technically an official ’10K’ race, but my portion of the relay was 6.28 miles, which is slightly above a 10K, which makes it a 10K race in my book.  I got to the transition area in plenty of time to scarf down some Cheerios, do some stretching, finally meet Steph’s cool friend Jon Vena (who was cheering on his wife, also tastefully named Alex), all before I took the handoff from Dave right in front of Gigi’s on the Manasquan boardwalk.

I started off feeling good running through Manasquan, but then hated the gravel path through the National Guard camp.  The Sea Girt boards were pleasantly short, followed up by a quick run over the pond before getting to Spring Lake.  The rest of the race was a straight shot down the boardwalk from Spring Lake to the end of Belmar, which was right in my comfort zone as I’d been up and down that stretch of boardwalk more times in my life than I can count.  Around the B&T, two things happened: my iPod finally crapped out, and Post joined me and ran with me for a little bit, giving me encouragement and a pick-me-up.  I was met by the amazing Jenny just past the North End Pavilion, who ran with me up through the ‘arches’ that mark the crossover from Spring Lake into Belmar.  At that point, my parents and Steph were there at the end of the boardwalk cheering me on.  Seeing them was excellent – knowing they were there supporting me and cheering me on gave me my 2nd wind and gave me the pick-up I needed to finish strong.  Couldn’t have done it without them.

After I had passed them, I knew I was in the home stretch, so I picked up my pace as best as I could.  The nice thing about running down the Belmar boards is that there are tons of landmarks, so I could gauge my remaining distance and how much I had left in the tank.  I really hit the gas once I passed 5th Avenue, and started bellowing at people as I ran into the transition area – people were walking in my way, and I told them in no uncertain terms I would run them over if they didn’t move.  I literally almost barreled right into the back of this woman.  Alas, the pass to Pevovar was blocked by her bad-mannered face.

So how did I do?  According to my Ironman watch, I ran 6.28 miles in 54:06, which works out to about 8:37/mile.  For the first time running a 10K, I was pretty pleased.  Our team finished in under 4 hours, with a clock time of 3:52:43, which apparently got adjusted somehow (according to the race results page) to 3:37:42.  We came in 145th overall out of 452 teams, which put us in the top 1/3 of finishers!  Go Running Rebels!

Check out the rest of the photos that Stephanie took here.