Father's Day: More than the Branford Road Race

I'm not sure how many times I've run Branford. Several, that's for sure. Sometimes I've run it after running for an hour (or two), sometimes I've run it after time on the bike, sometimes it's been the focal point of the entire day.

What was certainly under the radar for most of my years here in Branford was the idea of it being a Father's Day race. Father's Day was pretty far under my radar for a long time, from say 1973 until at least 2005. Yes, there were cards from the cats, but coming within a few days of my birthday it was never something I really considered. When you go thirty plus years with no dad, grandfather, or expectation you are about to suddenly turn into a dad yourself, the signal on the holiday is pretty weak, and I certainly never considered Branford a holiday weekend race or holiday race (not that Father's day is a holiday weekend).

Of course, Ian is still a little too young to run Branford himself, so we needed to find a babysitter for him for the race tomorrow, so that is certainly a reminder of fatherhood. Last year was cool, he was out on the lawn cheering for us as we went by in mile 4. This year he'll be on the green, I think, hopefully enjoying himself- his babysitter is a teenage girl and that is something that usually makes him seem (pretend ?) to forget us in a heartbeat.

Branford is one of those June/July races I used to do pretty well at when I was a runner, but 27-29 minutes is behind me now and I don't really miss it as I train for LP next month. I was runner #2 in 2006 (?) and didn't even break 30 minutes- talk about not earning your number...

Anyway, the race is still a USATF-CT championship and after our master's team finished second by one second a few weeks again, it's not like I can mail this one in. But it's certainly not a focus race, even though I train on the course several times a week (I can't run out the driveway without being on the course, after all). Well, we all have to live somewhere- or rather we all should have somewhere to live...

Maybe that's something to think about tomorrow. The seemingly homeless man that walks by my house every day- I wonder if he has a place to live. Or if he is someone's dad...