Athlete: Tom Hartshorne
Age: 61
Residence: Ithaca, NY
Affiliation: CA Notice at Collection
Family: Running Shoes - Gear
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400 meters: 53.30
800 meters: 2:01.42
1500 meters: 4:12.30
Mile: 4:32.22
Road Mile: 4:23.10
Key Workout
- 6 x 400m on a slight hill, as fast as 82 seconds per run, with 2-minute jog downhill recovery between runs
- 2-Periodized Training Can Help You Hit Your Goals
Tom Hartshorne, 61, who has trained and raced barefoot for much of his career, competed last month for the seventh time at the world masters track & field championships, held August 4 to 16 in Lyons, France. Leading up to the worlds, Hartshorne won the U.S. masters 60–64 1500 meters by 13 seconds in 5:05.91 in Jacksonville, Florida, in late July.
Hartshorne, whose unique training approach includes ice hockey and backwards running on a treadmill, also placed third in the national masters 800 meters in 2:28.13. Hartshorne felt in peak shape for Lyons, but a left knee injury resulting from hard labor around his house in Ithaca impeded his performances. An architect and developer, with a masters’ degree from MIT, Hartshorne had felt ready to run around 4:50 and possibly make the 60–64 1500 final in Lyons. But with his knee problem, Hartshorne could manage only a 5:09.53. The last worlds 60–64 qualifier ran 4:52.52.
World Meets: In addition to Lyons, Hartshorne has competed in world masters outdoor championships, starting in 1995, in Buffalo, Gateshead (England), San Sebastian (Spain), Riccione (Italy), Lahti (Finland) and Sacramento. He has made a number of finals, placing as high as eighth at Lahti in 2009, when he ran the 800 in 2:12.39 at 55.
Training Regimen: For the past decade or so, Hartshorne has used what he considers an ideal program for a runner in his 50s and 60s: 4 runs a week totaling 20–25 miles, plus two days bicycling and two days playing ice hockey. Hartshorne grew up playing hockey and now plays on a team with former Cornell University players (some in their 20s) called the Toothless Bears. His running includes weekly long intervals or short intervals depending on the time of year. A favorite short interval workout features 2 x 400 in 72 to 75 seconds, then 6 x 200 from 35 seconds down to 30.
Frequent Flyer: Hartshorne’s participation in world events has given him the opportunity to travel far and wide and satisfy his architectural desire to see great sites and historic ruins. After the Riccione worlds in 2007, Hartshorne drove through Italian hill towns steeped in antiquity. While attending Princeton University in the 1970s, Hartshorne took six years to graduate because he took two years off to travel abroad. He went to Europe, Africa, South America, Central America and Mexico.
High School: At Ithaca High in the early ’70s, Hartshorne was a member of two New York State championship cross-country teams. He ran the mile in 4:19 and two-mile in 9:28 and once found himself dueling future Olympian Matt Centrowitz (father of the current world-class miler Matthew) on the home straight of a cross-country race. Centrowitz outleaned him.
Barefoot Beginning: Hartshorne’s barefoot fixation began at Princeton when he developed knee problems. He felt that the torque of his feet while wearing shoes caused him trouble. As a result, Hartshorne discovered a future training component by playing on the P.U. ice hockey squad as a freshman. He said skating didn’t bother his knees.
Hartshorne had done some barefoot running in high school on a golf course, and after much frustration with injuries at Princeton, he talked the head coach, Larry Ellis, into allowing him to train barefoot. An injured cross-country teammate, Larry Trachtenberg, joined him, and in the fall of 1975 the two of them did 30 miles a week on the P.U. golf course and wooded trails in bare feet. The plan worked so well that in that season’s Harvard-Yale-Princeton meet—the HYP—Hartshorne and Trachtenberg raced barefoot to victory in a planned tie on the Yale golf course.
Bronx Boldness: A golf course is one thing—but the rock-strewn wilds of Van Cortlandt Park? Hartshorne told Ellis he wanted to run the Heptagonal Championships barefoot. Ellis said no. Hartshorne said he would not compete in shoes. At the last minute, Ellis relented. Hartshorne ran Van Cortlandt barefoot and was the Tigers’ fifth scorer in 25:30 for 5 miles as Princeton won its first Heps title. Hartshorne finished that season running barefoot in the NCAA championships on a snowy course at Penn State.
Brooklyn Bound: After working for architectural firms while living in Brooklyn in the then rundown neighborhood of Williamsburg, Hartshorne decided to go into business for himself purchasing and renovating nearby buildings. “Tearing down buildings and fixing them up” 70 hours a week would eventually leave Hartshorne little time for running. Learning Polish from the masons he hired, Hartshorne decided to play soccer as the only American on the Polonia Polish club of New York’s Cosmopolitan Soccer League. Wearing soccer cleats, Hartshorne played three games a week. But after dislocating a hip in a rough game, he thought, “Maybe I’ll try running again.”
Masters Winner: At 40, without any training other than his recent soccer background, Hartshorne won the New York Metropolitan Masters indoor 1500 in 4:12 and 800 in 2:04 at the New York Armory. He competed in racing flats on the Armory’s old wooden surface. Enlisted to join the Central Park Track Club, Hartshorne experienced some of his greatest thrills on CPTC masters 4 x 400 relay teams at the Millrose Games and Penn Relays. He cites as his greatest masters victory the 1997 national indoor 40–44 800 title, in 2:03.41, at the Reggie Lewis track in Boston.
Current Program: Hartshorne now wears shoes after running barefoot on and off into his 50s and then using the Vibram “five-finger” models for a period of time. In addition to bicycling and ice hockey, Hartshorne, while giving up soccer, does soccer-style exercises like backwards running and side-striding on a treadmill. Living in Ithaca (his son and daughter run for the high school team), Hartshorne still runs in Brooklyn as he spends one week a month in Williamsburg looking after properties he owns.
Hartshorne Mile: Hartshorne started running because his father, James, was a top runner and masters pioneer who started the CA Notice at Collection and a number of events including an indoor masters mile at Cornell in 1968. Now called the Hartshorne Memorial Masters Mile, it will be held for the 49th time in January. The event draws top runners nationwide and has seen a number of national and world masters records. Tom is the current meet director.
Feeling Awesome: When at 53, Hartshorne made the world masters outdoor 800 final in Riccone, taking ninth in 2:09.72, he felt on the track that night the essence of his mid-life quest. “My theory about masters running,” he said, “is that we try to recreate the feeling we had in our 20s when you ask your body to do something, and it actually does it. When that happens, as it did then, it’s awesome.”
Marc Bloom’s high school cross-country rankings have played an influential role in the sport for more than 20 years and led to the creation of many major events, including Nike Cross Nationals and the Great American Cross Country Festival. He published his cross-country journal, Harrier, for more than two decades.
