PJango Unchained

The P is silent.

As the very, very lengthy email pointed out, this weekend was chock full o' incredible performances. I actually wonder how many times I used the term "incredible" - someone want to check on that for me?

Rather than go through each and every one, I'm going to just do some highlights:

Frederick Half Marathon

Dave Berdan gets the W in a new PR of 1:05:40. Absolutely unreal when you consider his previous best performance came a couple of years ago at PDR (1:05:50) when he later went onto crush the Baltimore Marathon. If you haven't read his race recap, do it. It's really good. Especially the part about fighting the negative thoughts late in the race. Dave had a bogey on his heels the whole day, and then toasted him in the last mile. Great job Dave! Dan Miranda and Ed Jablonski ran the 1:40 and 1:45 pace groups, and Carly Page ran the relay with her friend. Looked like a fun day out in Frederick!

Broad Street 10 Miler

Steve Febish ran 51:50 for 19th place. That is some next level ish. Just two weeks ago Steve dusted off the cobwebs at Pike's Peek, breaking 32 minutes. He had been running for maybe 6 weeks or so following a pretty long period of injury time. The way he whipped himself into shape is nothing short of amazing, and this race is easily a contender for Performance of the Year. I also noticed Rodney Taylor ran, I didn't see his name on the awful results page earlier.

Flying Pig Marathon

PJ Anderer went big, and it paid off. 1:33 through the first half led him to nearly evenly split the race. He finished with a 13 minute PR of 3:07:59 and qualified for his first trip to Boston! PJ is the epitome of what our group is about. He shows up to virtually every run and comes ready to put in work. Everyone sees him working and he encourages and spurs on those around him. It's been a pleasure to watch him improve over the past couple of seasons.

Fiesta 5k

I didn't even realize this was on Saturday, but when I checked the results I saw we took the top spots for men and women, with Dan Miranda getting the overall win (16:39) and Sara Breedlove winning for the ladies in 18:33. It's the fastest she's run since 2002. Sara is another one who hits the track every week and just works hard. Matt Franco was 2nd in 17:01 and Nick Klastava was 8th in 17:51. All 4 are TNT regulars, so it comes as no surprise that TNT works! Sara earned this week's Purple Drink Athlete of the Week.

Port to Fort 6k

Not a whole lot to say about this race, but worth pointing out that Denise Knickman was 3rd after a late night of wine drinking. Jen Sheely continued her reign of 4th place finishes.

Elsewhere, Collin Anderson ran 1:15:33 at the Provo Half Marathon. A truly exceptional performance, he still did get beat (see: crushed) by a 20 year old Mormon girl. In Collin's defense, the race was at 5500' altitude with a net elevation loss of 900', so the course was still slower than it would have been at sea level, even if it was flat.

Ben Ingram rolled the Lincoln Half Marathon, starting at 6:10s and working down to 5:45s to finish in 1:17:31. Kevin and Meghan McGrath represented for TWSS at the Long Branch Half Marathon relay. Dave Ploskonka ran another marathon (at New Jersey) and so did Britt Kern (Pittsburgh).

I missed them in the email, but Patty Stott, at 27 weeks pregnant, ran 27:29 for 5k in DC, and Patrick O'Rourke got the win at the Dulaney Lionheart 5k.

And of course Friday night was the Maryland Alumni Mile, where Greg Jubb took home his first title as an eligible participant, using his massive kick to take down two-time defending champ Conrad Laskowski. Denise also ran here.