Miscellaneous notes and opinions from the world of masters track and field and road running for July 2016:

- The Oregon Track Club Masters tied for 46th at the USATF Masters Outdoor Championships July 14-17. We were represented by the one man team of Ken Ogden, competing in the 80-84 age group.  He won the 1500m in 8:52.83, won the 2,000m steeplechase in 13:37.05, and placed second in the 5000m in 34:13.84.  Ken racked up 22 points, with no other OTCM member competing.  Our rival to the north, the Bowerman Track Club, had three athletes compete, and scored 12 points for 71st overall.

- Winning the team championship at nationals was the TNT International Racing Club out of Pennsylvania.  They edged perennial powerhouse So Cal Track Club 595 points to 562.  With the top six in each event scoring at 8, 6, 4, 3, 2, 1 clearly both of those clubs fielded huge teams.  TNT International had 201 event entries (fewer athletes than that since some athletes entered multiple events).  Team members must reside in the geographic USATF association area (the state of Oregon in our case), but practically speaking it is hard to recruit for a club outside of the city the club is based in.  Not surprisingly many of the top teams are based in large metropolitan areas (LA, Atlanta, etc.).  But two of the top 4 teams are from Pennsylvania, with TNT International run out of Lincoln University, about 30 miles outside of Philadelphia, home of 4th place team the Philadelphia Masters.  That is a lot of fast masters in a small area.

- The OTC Masters won both the masters coed and seniors coed divisions of the Butte to Butte 10K.  We were the only group to field teams in those older age groups, in spite of sending out a challenge to other masters clubs.  But our teams posted impressive times that would have been hard to beat.

- We will race again as a team at the Scandia 10K in Junction City on August 13th.  There is not a separate masters division, so we will go head-to-head against the younger teams.  That race will apparently also serve as part of the USATF Oregon Road Race Series, and there “may be some cash prizes” according to the USATF national calendar.  But the USATF Oregon website hasn’t been updated this year, and mentions nothing about the race series.  In addition, the Scandia run currently isn’t a USATF sanctioned event as of July 22nd.  Hopefully all that will get squared away before race day.  Regardless, Scandia is always a great race, with a flat, fast course that often draws a competitive field.