The Newstead 5K: One Runner's Odyssey

During racing season, a local runner discovers the satisfactions of the 5K.

‘Tis the season to be racing. Both the New York Marathon (Nov. 1) and the Boston Half-Marathon (Oct. 11) loom near, as does the “Vermont 50 MT Bike or Ultra-Run” (Sept. 27), whose Web site describes it as “50 miles of beautiful, but challenging Vermont back roads and trails.” One would like to know more about the challenges, but it's at least more inviting than the promo for the already finished Pikes Peak Marathon (Aug. 16), which depicts its runners as “zombies” and their uphill climb as a “death march right out of a scene from ‘Dawn of the Dead.’” Think I’ll stay home and rent the DVD! For the rest of us, however, there was the Newstead 5k (Sept. 26), a race that offers a gently undulating course, crisp fall weather, and a worthy cause …

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Newstead 5K Could Draw 400-500 Runners

SOMEF made $9,000 last year from the benefit.

Sunny weather is in the forecast for Saturday morning's annual running of the Newstead 5K, now in its seventh year. According to the race's founder Helen DuBowy, just under 300 runners have pre-registered. She anticipates that as many as 400 to 500 could actually show up. "Each year, it's just grown," observed DuBowy, a self-described "late-in-life runner" who recalls that the race drew 50 runners in its first year, when she literally measured out 3.1 miles in her car and enlisted a few local businesspeople to be sponsors. In subsequent years, she began working with Carla Edelstein in the capacity of race director, and the Newstead 5K is now certified by CompuScore. The race has always benefited a local charity, but this is the second year…

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Survival of the Fittest: Last Runner Standing

Middle-aged runner has plans to win local 5ks by waiting out the competition.

I have a plan to win the Newstead and the Maplewood-in-Motion 5ks in my age category, and it does not involve any extra training. My plan is to wait it out. At 46, I do not exactly lead my peers across the finish lines of local 5ks, but every day brings me closer to setting records in an age category that, if I make the cut, is likely to hold only myself and at most one or two other runners. World’s fastest 89-year-old man! While I’m at it, I may even take up the discus or javelin. World’s fastest 89-year-old man sends missile crashing through downtown store window! The people at the “Guinness Book” are going to have to work hard to keep up with me. This leveling of the playing field, or race course, is one of the consolations of aging. (…

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Everywhere Man: Running Through S.O. and Maplewood

The author speculates that he has a double or a triple, since people constantly report seeing him running across town.

All over South Orange and Maplewood people see me running, sometimes even in places where, to the best of my recollection, I have never set foot with any haste. “I drove past you running on Scotland Road today,” said a fellow bather at the South Orange pool who climbed down the ladder to talk to me. I suggested that it might have been somebody else, since Scotland is not part of my route. “No, it was you,” he insisted before pushing off toward the deep end. Others who drive past me on my actual route are no less certain that they see me running there “all the time.” Statistically, this doesn't seem possible for someone who devotes an average of 40 minutes a day to the sport, often before seven in the morning. To be seen so often by so many…

Come Walk With Gwen

An emotional appeal for a charitable walk/race.

Editor's note: Maplewood-based not-for-profit cancer patient advocacy organization the Valerie Fund is holding a fundraising walkathon/5k run on June 13 in Verona (see here for more information). We received this emotionally-charged release written by Jeanne Lukasavage, and wanted to share it. Early last June, our daughter Gwen had not really been feeling well for a few days. Our pediatrician, Jennifer Shaw, sent her for blood work, noting her extreme paleness and lethargy. Dr. Shaw called later that afternoon to let us know that Gwen was severely anemic and needed to go to the hospital for a blood transfusion. She did not know what was causing the anemia and was awaiting the rest of the test results. A short while later she called back. …

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