17 Flyers were among the 4,107 finishers of this morning's NYRR Frosty 5K race. This was the first race for the new NYRR CEO Rob Simmelkjaer, as was announced at the start. The run was held entirely in beautiful Prospect Park, not a typical venue for NYRR races. Prospect Park is known to be hilly, but so is Central Park, where many of us train routinely. The truth is no hill can hold back a bunch of tough Flyers!
For the sake of accuracy, not all Flyers train in Central Park, and the Fyers also have a regular Sunday Morning Group Run in Prospect Park. In fact, at least one of today's finishers can pride himself on calling Prospect Park his backyard: Chris Brennan, former president of the Flyers. Chris is a true Brooklynite, and running in Brooklyn has recently become the pattern for him. I spoke to him after the race, where he finished second for the team. "Outside the NYC Marathon," Chris told me," I think I’ve only participated in races within Brooklyn since the pandemic started. What can I say except “fuhgedaboutit!, it’s Brooklyn!" In addition to Chris, his nephew and niece ran the kids race that followed the 5K. "It was a real family affair!" he said.
On a more somber note, Chris reminded me that Flyer Gary Heard left us much too soon on the very course of today's run, earlier this year. "Our hearts were heavy thinking about our dear friend", Chris said. Thank you, Chris. Gary's sudden loss left indeed a huge hole in our hearts, and he is in our thoughts.
The Flyers' team was led by Michael Alexander, who beat the hills (and the frost) with an impressive 20:22 (pace 6:34), came 5th in his AG and hit an AGP of 69.72%. He was followed by Chris, who finished second for the team (as mentioned above) in 21:36 (pace 6:57), and Peter Lewy, who came fourth for the Flyers and third among the Flyer men with a time of 25:50 (pace 8:19, 6th AG).
The women's team was led by Jilian Hobson, who also came third for the Flyers' team, in 24:43 (pace 7:58). Deb Saat finished second among the Flyer women with a result of 26:58 (pace 8:41) and won third place in her age group. She also hit an AGP of 72.31%. Congratulations to Deb on her podium! Aoife-Roisin Bourke placed third in the women's team with 26:59 (pace 8:41).
Kudos also to another runner who both finished in the top 10 of her age group AND scored an AGP above 70%: Elaine Rosen (27:25, pace 8:50, 4th AG, AGP 71.1%).
The team’s full results can be found here: https://results.nyrr.org/event/22FROSTY/teams/NYF.
Congrats to all the runners!
-Francesco P, NY Flyers Blog Race Reporter, #NYRRstaff