Week of November 22, 2020

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Hi, everyone,

I hope you all are doing well as we head into the first week of this magical holiday time of year. 

I’m thrilled to announce to you, my wonderful athletes, what I hope you will find to be, two exciting race concepts that we have planned for 2021: 

1. RaceFest Series 2021! This will be a series of chip timed races of varied distances on different surfaces over the first six months of the year. There will be points awarded for participation, for overall place and for your individual age group place. Points will be tallied after each race to be compiled as an ongoing point competition. The goal is get us through the latter stages of the pandemic (hopefully) with a fun, competitive and organized series of races. Stay tuned for the details on specific dates, distances and locations of the individual races that will make up the RaceFest series. Note: The Ten Miler, in some form to be announced in the coming weeks, will also be a part of the series!  
2. And to kick off this special series, our first race will be the NYD5K, which will be held over a new 5K course at Foxfield on January 1st, with 15 minute reserved time slots. This popular holiday race will be chip timed and will have the same safe pandemic protocols we had in place at the Men’s and Women’s races. Registration opened this morning and heads up: the race is limited to 250 total and will fill up very quickly, so I’d suggest entering ASAP! https://www.runsignup.com/NYD5K
3. Interested in a marathon this spring instead? We will be hosting the Rivanna Greenbelt Marathon again in mid-March (specific date to be announced in the coming weeks but most likely March 14). We just successfully had the marathon last weekend with 29 finishers, 5 of which ran a BQ time!). I will be writing you specific workouts, to get you prepped for this new marathon, through the Boston Bound weekly emails. Not a member of BB? Then, please text me at 434-962-1694. Like the Speedsters, being a member of BB is free!

I’m also working on hosting, along with Dr. Wilder, a monthly zoom series called “Lessons Learned”, featuring informative and exciting guest speakers from near and afar. Topics will vary each month, from Marathoning to High School running and each expert will take a few minutes to recount a personal learning experience in their running journey. Our first one hour free seminar will be in January. I can’t wait! Stay tuned for details 
         
Hats off to two of our fellow Speedsters, who successfully completed creative pandemic running challenges in the past week:

*First off, kudos to Emily Voss, who last week finished her mighty task to run every single foot of every single mile of every single street within the City of Charlottesville. Simply amazing! This must be a first. 

*And a big congrats to Ali Kelly who set the new RTF loop standard, as she blazed over the grueling 20+ mile loop in 2:51 (8:26/mile average)! Wow! And thanks to Jason B., Carter and Ben, who paced her along the way. 

Big Happy Birthdays during this holiday week to Karen D.J. (60 on Wednesday!), David F. (Friday) and Heidi (Saturday)!  

Here’s wishing each of you a restful holiday this week. I always find myself feeling extra grateful at Thanksgiving, but this unique year I feel even more thankful than ever for the wonderful gift of your friendship as my athletes. The joys I witness of your athletic accomplishments andt, even more importantly, the friendships you share, personally means the world to me! Thanks!

I hope to see each of you soon.  

Hugs and high fives, 
Coach Mark 
434-962-1694 (text)

WEEK of NOVEMBER 23
****Base Building phase for both groups for the next few weeks. So, all at AHR unless I indicate otherwise.    

*RaceFest folks = 20-25 miles or more total with a long AHR run of 7-9 miles on Saturday.

*March Marathoners = 30-35+ miles total with a long AHR run of 10-12 miles or more on Saturday.  

***Those racing a virtual Turkey Trot this Thursday, should run 3-5 miles with 5 x 12 second flat surface surges on Monday and then 2-3 AHR miles with 2 x 12 second flat surface surges on Wednesday morning.