Cranford Firecracker 4-Miler - 2014

The Fourth of July may be my favorite Holiday - and one of my traditions on that day is the Cranford Firecracker 4-Miler. It attracts a field of about 1000, with a lot of excellent runners, primarily from the Union County area. I've probably run it close to a dozen times, and I'm accepting that it's at a slower pace as I creep through my 50's. Four-miles is an unusual race distance, and I couldn't find a goal pace on my RunBayou "V-Dot" chart. But since I ran a 26:30 three years ago, I figured anything between that mark and 27:00 would be okay. As a gym owner and Fitness Trainer, I'm exercising several hours every day. However, the day before this race was exceptional: ten training sessions, including severl with high school and college athletes that involved numerous step-ups, jumps, and medicine ball throws - for client and trainer! In other words, I had my excuse in place! Sure enough, warming up, my quads felt tight and heavy, but I got there early enough to get in a solid 30-minutes of stretching before the 9 a.m. start, and I felt fine by the start. Like many big races, the first half-mile is a bit of a mess, with lots of young kids crowded up front. I weaved through the morass of arms and legs as best I could, and settled into a comfortably hard pace. Actually, it must have been more "comfortable" than "hard," as I reached the mile mark in a disppointing 6:55. At this rate, I thought, sub-28 is more realistic than sub-27! I put the "no one passes you" rule into my head, and slowly tried to pick-off runners one-by-one to keep engaged and get my time somewhere closer to what I expected. Good news: mile two on the flat course down Springfield Ave registered at 13:25; a 6:30 second-mile pace. I kept my focus through the third mile as well, and was pleased to see "20:03" as I passed that clock. One mile left - over footpaths through Nomaheagan Park. I was back-and-forth with a few other runners at this point, but the interplay kept me mentally involved and (probably due to the slow start, more than anything else), I held pace in the final mile. As usual, the finish line banner seemed a little further away than I imagined, but I crossed in 26:37, not disappointing at all, especilly considering that first mile. I waited around for the award ceremony, and got third in the 55-59 age group, about 30 seconds behind the second-place finisher. No complaints, and a good start to my favorite Holiday!