Mark Williams runs away from Hartshorne M40 elite mile field
Lapping a runner on the last of eight circuits, Mark Williams conquered a storm-weakened field Saturday to win the M40 elite race of the 49th Hartshorne Masters Mile at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Clocking 4:33.04, Mark, 43, stretched out his lead every lap as Peter Taylor narrated the race. See results for all races and lap splits courtesy Leone Timing. James Derick won M50 in 4:46.73. But the top age-graded male time was superblogger Kevin Forde’s 4:47.27 at age 52 (90 percent age-graded). Kevin described in gruesome detail his ordeal getting from Philadelphia to Upstate New York. He was a lucky one. Some entrants didn’t make it to the starting line. “We lost about six-eight competitors due to the big snow storm that came through the states just to the south of us,” said meet director Tom Hartshorne. Winners of the W40 and W50 elite races were Sascha Scott (4:54.55) and evergreen Alisa Harvey (5:14.25) — not far off the AR of 5:08.5. (WR is 5:07.32.) But Coreen Steinbach, 64, won the age-graded title with her 6:20.08 — a 95.7 percent age-graded score. Mazel tov to all. Hope y’all made it home OK.
9 Responses
Mark Williams, Alisa Harvey, Sascha Scott, and Jim Derick were all wonderful, and both competitors and observers are invited to e-mail me with any comments or observations about the races. Yes, I am writing the article for National Masters News; my e-mail is petertaylor2@verizon.net.
1. Watch Mark narrowly avoid a collision about halfway through the race as some nonparticipant simply strolls onto the track right in front of him.
2. The American indoor mark for W50 is 5:08.65, slightly different from that reported here.
3. I am not sure whether the splits were at 220, 440, 660, 880, 1100, 1320, and 1540 yards, which would make sense for a mile race, or 200, 400, 600, 800, 1000, 1200, and 1400 meters, as suggested above by “lap splits,” which would produce seven laps of 200 meters each and then a final lap of 209.34 meters. I will have to find out the answer for my article.
Tom Hartshorne, who did a wonderful job on this event (as did co-director Charlie Fay), informed me that the splits were taken every 220 yards (201.168 meters). In other words, they were taken the right way.
Ken, I apologize for the harsh tone of my third remark (above). Driving back on I-270 in Maryland was kind of rough, and I’m still thinking about that experience.
Congrats to both Mark and Kevin.
Hi Pete, The camera is setup at the finish line so the first split is 209.34m and all other splits are 200m. Congrats Mark!
Bill, I will have to consult again with Tom Hartshorne, as he indicated to me that the split timer walked to the various marks (220, 440, etc.) to get his splits. In other words, he slowly advanced from the starting line to the finish line over the course of the race.
Perhaps we are talking about two different things. Tom may be talking about the splits that were “called out,” while you are talking about the recorded electronic splits. I will e-mail Tom again.
Congratulations to all the runners and Peter Taylor for getting to Ithaca and giving their best! I think Mark needs special recognition for avoiding someone walking in front of him on the track while he was racing. From the video, I find it very disappointing (I’m trying to be polite and not use disrespectful, or worse), that many those who were present for the college meet, appeared to pay no attention at all to the fact that a competitive race was taking place. Hope everyone got home safely.
In all the years that I have been running Hartshorne I have never seen the collegiate athletes so oblivious to what was happening on the track. Many of them behaved as if the people participating in the Masters miles did not exist – walking across the track from the infield without looking, warming up in lane two practically brushing elbows with those trying to race in lane one; inexcusable pandemonium. This must be addressed in the future before someone is hurt. Kudos to Mark for keeping his cool when that happened. Congrats to him, as well, for a stellar race and to all of the other runners who raced Saturday. Peter, SO grateful your scary driving experience wasn’t worse.
Thanks for that, Coreen. I believe the theory is that we can’t say anything about the wandering collegians because the main event of the day is the Upstate Challenge, an event that drew 8 colleges/universities this year. We are guests of Cornell, the college athletes dominate us in terms of numbers, etc.
Still, Coreen, warming up in lane 2 while a race is in progress is beyond the pale. I remember 2 years ago someone practicing his sprint starts in lane 3 (with his back to the runners) while a race that included Nick Berra, Mark Williams, and others was in progress. What if one of our runners had gone wide and hit this guy?
Speaking of Mark, the video does indicate to me that Mr. Oblivious (a college athlete) and Mark did make contact in lane 1, for crying out loud. Lane 1! Talk about rudeness.
By the way, because he is in such a strong age group, Mark Williams has not gotten all the publicity he deserves. The man can motor.
As far as my driving incident, going south on I-270 in Maryland on Sunday afternoon I hit either some ice or packed snow and skidded/slid about three lanes to the left, ending up in the fastest lane. Fortunately, there was little traffic, and I hit no one, was hit by no one, and did not hit the guard rail.
Steve Gallow has posted a gazillion photos of all the Hartshorne races: https://stevegallow.smugmug.com/Sports/Hartshorne-Memorial-Masters-Mi/2016-Hartshorne-Memorial-Masters
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