The Old Fartleks is a loosely organized, over-40 group that assembles a team for a few races each year. The team captain recaps their entry at the Lactic Acid 5k on the PSU campus on November 7, 1999.
Nearly 60 runners turned out on a sunny, cold, and VERY breezy Sunday morning for the Triathlon Club's Lactic Acid 5K. The Tri-Club always puts on a good show, with good T-shirts, food and refreshments, nice winner's medals and prizes, and drawings for more prizes. Another nice attraction of the Lactic Acid race is the team category.
The Lactic Acid race is a moderately
challenging course on the Penn State roads behind the Ag Arena. The race
was made tougher this year by a very stiff wind. That wind was blowing
directly at the runners coming up the final hill with less than half a
mile to go. The hill, on the extension of Orchard Road near the sheep barn,
is normally a short little suck-it-in-and-get-it-over-with speed bump,
but on Sunday it became the
last straw to some runners as
they struggled against it.
The competition was not quite as stiff as the breeze, and not as fast as last year's showing. Last year's male overall winner, Simon Tavener, was at an out-of-town race, and last year's female winner, Therese Brown, is "in the family way". None of this year's times came close to theirs of 1998. This was probably partly due to an adjustment to the course that made this year's about 15 seconds longer. The wind no doubt played a part. Even so, only 4 runners this year broke 19 minutes, while 18 of a similar-sized field did last year. Analysis aside, the runners were there to have FUN this year, not break any records fighting that awful wind. And fun they had!
The overall winner was Ed Rabold, in 16:51. Second went to Julien Bernardin 17:22. The first two female places went to Mary Beth Acker (3rd overall) and Donna Fidler (7th overall) of the PSU Cross Country team, in 18:30 and 19:08, respectively. Our own Morgan Wasikonis finished third in 21:31.
For the second straight year,
the team winner was the Old Fartleks, this year rebounding from a devastating
6th place finish at the PSU IM races. Despite running without Fartlek superstars
Simon, Therese, and DennySimonetti (who watched the race but was saving
himself for an upcoming marathon), the five man OF team of Jim Kisenwether,
Jim Moore, Ron Cunfer, Gerry Glyde and Marty Mazur placed 8th, 10th, 14th,
16th, and 21st overall, respectively. Jim Moore took first place in the
30-39 age group, and Jim Kisenwether and Gerry Glyde each took 2nd in the
40-49 and 50-59 brackets, respectively. Every one of the Old Fartleks except
Marty beat all finishers from the two other teams, and Marty was only lagging
behind two other non-Fartlek team finishers. The OF's only disappointment
was the no-show of
the Navy ROTC team, on whom
the OFs wanted to avenge themselves after the IM defeat. Only one Navy
ROTC guy ran, and he did it in combat boots! The full results are posted
on the Tri-Club site at
http://www.clubs.psu.edu/triclub/
Thanks again to Ravi Raman of the Tri-Club for organizing the race. And thanks, Ravi, for being good hosts and NOT fielding a Tri-Club team to go against the Fartleks. You guys probably would've killed us!