It wouldn’t be the Fourth of July in Harvard without the Great Road Race, and roughly 300 people turned out to run the 5-miler and 1-mile fun run on Friday, July 4. The Bromfield School and the Francis W. Parker Charter Essential School, located in Devens, boasted winners in the male and female 5-mile race, and a Bromfield middle school student took second place in the fun run.
Harvard runners are off to a strong start, including Shea van Cleef (1919), Kyran O’Leary (1877), Roy van Cleef (1911), Eric Suchecki (1846), and Paddy O’Leary (1879). (Photos by Jen Manell).
The 5-miler began at 8:15 a.m., under a clear sky and with temperatures comfortable for most runners, hovering in the upper 60s and low 70s. The humidity was low, making the conditions even more pleasant along the course that started and ended at Bromfield and took a scenic route down Warren Avenue, up West Bare Hill Road, and back down Bolton Road.
Imogen Kauppila reaches the finish line of the 5 miler. She was inadvertently assigned the same number as her patriotic socks.
Journalist Julie Gowel does double duty on the 4th, both running the 5-miler and writing about if for the Press.
Coming in first place overall, with a completion time of 26 minutes, 34 seconds, was Adam Pacheck, a Somerville resident in his 30s, who decided just that morning to jump into the race. “I bike through here a lot,” said Pacheck in a postrace interview with the Press. “I thought I would give the race a try. That hill, around the halfway mark, was pretty crazy. Otherwise, it was an amazing course.”
Pacheck was referring to the section of West Bare Hill Road that has a nearly 400-foot elevation gain. That section of hill might have slowed racers down, but not enough to keep Bromfield rising senior Rosie Bradley from taking first place for females. Bradley, a member of the Trojans cross-country and track teams, finished the course in 31:34. “The hill on West Bare was intense,” she said. “I run these hills all the time though, so I was prepared.”
Jett Johnson a rising freshman at the Parker Charter School races to a second-place finish.
Rising eighth grader at Parker Charter School, Evelyn McKenna crosses the finish line at 38:27.
Taking second place overall was Jett Johnson, from Bolton, who is about to enter his freshman year at Parker and also runs for the cross-country and track teams there. “The hills were absolutely brutal,” said Johnson. “I thought I would just take it easy, but then I got excited. I went out with the lead (Pacheck), but I ended up getting dropped at the 1-mile mark. I ended up going very slow up the big hill.” Johnson’s idea of “slow” was modest; he finished the race in 28:57.
Patriotic tutus in red, white, and blue; T-shirts from Great Harvard Road Races of the past; and even a pair of socks with “1776” printed in large numbers adorned runners. Coincidentally, the wearer of the socks was Harvard resident Imogen Kauppila, who was randomly assigned bib number 1776, making it a very fitting pairing for the celebration of the nation’s birth.
Left: Nora O’Leary (1942) comes in as first female for Harvard in the 1-Mile Fun Run, just behind Mara Maney of Pepperell in a dash to the finsish.
Right: Isaac Weibe races in as Harvard’s first finisher in the 1-Mile Fun Run, placing second overall. .
When the 5-miler was complete, registrants for the day’s 1-mile fun run lined up at the end of the Bromfield driveway to begin their journey to the pond and back. Bromfield’s Isaac Wiebe, a rising eighth-grader, took off running and completed the course in just 6:58. The winner, another youth, Dennis Maney of Pepperell, came in eight seconds faster than Wiebe.
When asked about postrace plans, both Bradley and Johnson said they would be barbecuing at home with family. Many other runners were spotted at the parade in Harvard, noticeable by their race T-shirts, enjoying field games and well-earned indulgences from the Lions Club food tent.
