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Burgasser Wins Race Against Time

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By JOE HENDERSON | The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 28, 2009

Updated: 02/28/2009 11:33 pm

TAMPA - A typical day for Joseph Burgasser includes a run of at least 10 miles, unless it's Sunday. On the day of rest, he likes to push it with a 20-mile run. He'll also find time for a daily swim of about 1,000 yards, maybe a bike ride, plus five trips a week to the gym to lift weights.

Feel tired yet? Understandable.

Think how tired you're going to feel when you learn this about him.

He is 70 years old.

He is also one competitive son of a gun, as he proved Saturday morning when he ran the 15-kilometer course at the Gasparilla Distance Classic in 1:01:46, beating the American record for his age group in that event by a solid four seconds. That record had stood for 22 years.

Give him credit for something else, too - there wasn't a lot of false modesty about the accomplishment afterward.

"I didn't want to break it by too much," he said. "That would make it harder to break the next time."

He wanted the record. And he knew exactly what he needed to do to get it.

"I knew it every step of the way," he said. "I've known it for six months."

Just as he knows he wants the 12k record two weeks from now at the Bay to Bay run, and he wants to win his age group at April's Boston Marathon. That will be, oh ... let him think for a second ... his 27th run at Boston.

"If I get the miles in, don't bet against me," he said.

Get Out The Door

Clearly, Burgasser is not your ordinary Joe recreational runner. He leads the Forerunners Florida Track Club in St. Pete, although he doesn't like the label of "running coach."

"I'd rather say I design fitness programs," he said.

Right about now you're recalling his training program - an average of 83 miles a week, plus all the swimming, riding, and gym trips - and thinking that a fitness program like that would kill you. He agrees, which is why he said anyone starting out should just start slow.

You hear stories all the time about how serious runners started racing when they basically learned to stand, but not this guy. He didn't start running until he was 29 - OK, that was 41 years ago. But he started and stuck with it.

It's a perfect story for a day like this, the largest local one-day concentration of serious runners, walkers, and all those in between. Just finishing a Gasparilla race is the goal for many of the 20,000 participants at this event, whether it was Saturday's 5k or 15k, or today's marathon or half-marathon. Like Burgasser, they all started somewhere.

"Put on your stuff, get out the door, and go out there and walk," he said. "Do that for a couple of weeks to start. When you're in good enough shape to run a little bit, do that. Then try to run a little farther and keep at it until you don't have to walk any more, but there's no reason to push it.

"I see this as a long-term project for people. The people who impress me are the ones who do it year after year. It needs to be like brushing your teeth, something you do every day. You're not trying to set records. You're trying to be fitter."

Forever Young

Who said this is a young person's game? Age is a state of mind, admittedly sometimes with achy knees.

Birthdays only stop you if you let them, though. Burgasser was one of an amazing 2,957 runners 50 and older who took part in Saturday's races. Like him, many of them weren't just out for a stroll along Bayshore.

There was 65-year-old Richard Wiles of Lutz, who finished the 5k in 21:57, which would beat a lot of high school cross country runners.

And there was Max Borland of Tampa in the over-80 category, who ran 23:57 in the 5k. Or 78-year-old Lois Ann Gilmore of Janesville, Wisc., who ran the same distance in 28:28.

You saw so many faces out there, and they all have stories to tell. Some run to keep a promise they made to a loved one. Some kept a promise to themselves. They did it for health, to lose weight, to socialize, or to simply see if they could. Some ran, some walked, some did both.

"When I started, I was like a lot of people. I wanted to be more fit," Burgasser said. "I wanted to be healthier. Now it's my life. It's just something you have to do. I don't get a chance to watch much TV."

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