Boston Marathon buildup: Women's team
I promised a few months ago that I would post the articles I wrote for the Boston Marathon program. I still haven’t seen the finished product, though it’s undoubtedly out there somewhere now, but since there are four articles and four days to the marathon, I’ll post one a day from today through Sunday. Monday, there will be plenty to read.
These are, of course, the rough versions; they’re a bit long, I think, for the space, and my writing tends to improve from being shortened. Also, what’s appearing in print has probably had the benefit of a professional copy-editor. And there will probably be photos.
This was one of the toughest to research, because the women involved are busy, and often not in ways that let them check and respond to email so we can arrange interview times. The team-scoring aspect of Boston is under-reported in the media, probably because the athletes involved aren’t professionals, nor are they (usually) world-class. However, it does mean a lot to the athletes participating. The three women here will likely be the slower part of the B.A.A.’s team; two other women on the team will be in tomorrow’s post about the top American women.
I’m looking forward to picking up my credentials etc. tomorrow, so I can lay hands on hard-copy of all this stuff.
Anyway, in the extended entry: Mimi Fallon, Laura Smith, and Carrie Zografos.
Carrie Zografos, Laura Smith, and Mimi Fallon
Known for:
B.A.A. runners Zografos, Smith, and Fallon will join Emily LeVan and Carly Graytock as contenders for the women’s team title. Fallon, new to the Masters division, has already run three Olympic Trials marathons (in 1996, 2000, and 2004) and is hoping to qualify for a fourth. Zografos, formerly a cross-country standout for the University of Oregon, has won local tune-up races and was part of the B.A.A. squad that captured the New England cross-country championships in the fall of 2005. Teammate Smith was part of a Boston College cross-country team which placed as high as fourth in the NCAA.
What we didn’t know:
Despite having been a runner for over fifteen years and a lifelong resident of Eastern Massachusetts, Fallon will be running her first B.A.A. Boston Marathon this year. Blame the Olympic Trials. “I was always going for Trials qualifying times, and this course has a reputation for being tough,” says Fallon. She’s hoping to run 2:47:00 or faster to punch her ticket for her fourth Olympic Trials, which would put her in a very exclusive club of four-time qualifiers.
Also, says Fallon, “I’d like to be competitive in the Masters division.” Her Trials-qualifying goal time should also make her a top-three contender among the over-40 women.
Zografos and Smith hadn’t even considered marathons when the last Trials was contested. Smith’s first marathon was the 2005 Boston, which she ran with former B.C. cross-country teammates Maggie Guiney and Erin Maloney, finishing in 3:15:42. She followed up with a 3:16 at last fall’s Philadelphia Marathon, but this spring she’s hoping to finish right around three hours. “Last year, I was still finishing up graduate school, and I didn’t do enough workouts and long runs. This year, I’m already ahead of where I was last year. Training with the B.A.A., I have a program and scheduled long runs. I’ve been able to go with the flow and learn from the veterans.”
How Smith has more time than last year is a mystery, though, since she has traded grad school for three different jobs. She’s a Nurse Practitioner specializing in women’s health, and practices at the state correctional facility in Framingham and Health Services at Worcester Polytechnic Institute while she builds a practice with a family medical group in Newton. “I enjoy all my jobs, but hopefully by next year I’ll be settled in to just one.”
Zografos, a newcomer to the marathon distance, is a student in the same B.C. graduate nursing program Smith just finished. Like Smith, she comes to the marathon from a top NCAA team; she competed at the national level for the illustrious University of Oregon Ducks under coach Tom Heinonen.
“After watching last year’s marathon,” says Zografos, “I knew it was something I want to be a part of.” Zografos graduates in the spring and plans to head back west, so she decided to take the opportunity while still living practically on the marathon course. As with many first-time marathoners, she’s cautious about her goals, quoting Coach Jeff Staab: “The first goal is to get to the starting line. The second goal is to get to the line healthy.” But with a training group of Smith, Fallon, Suzy Walsh and Hillary Burns-Dudley, though, a good race for Zografos could be very good indeed.
![[Swinging off a dragger, Cundy's Harbor, Maine, July 4th, 2003]](/images/cundys_harbor.jpg)