NEW BRITAIN – Mario Vazquez only ran one race a year, the Race in the Park in New Britain. Vazquez had run in high school and he would train for about a week, then run the 5K and not run that much for the rest of the year.
He watched as Chris Chisholm of Farmington won the race year after year, in his 40s and 50s, and marveled at how someone could beat all the younger runners at that age.
When he turned 33, Vazquez had an epiphany – maybe he could do that, too. He started training more and running more races.
Now, Vazquez – at age 45 – is the guy the younger runners are admiring. He won the USATF national 12K masters championship last month. He won the 10K national masters championship last year and finished second this year – despite running 48 seconds faster – to Joe Gray, who has won the Mount Washington Road Race multiple times and who just turned 40.
Saturday, Vazquez will race in the half marathon at the Eversource Hartford Marathon. His personal best came in June at the Fairfield Half Marathon when he ran a 1:07:53 in the heat. The masters record is 1:11:52, set by Dan Smith of Shelburne Falls, Mass. in 2018.
For comparison, last year, Ethan Hermann of Philadelphia won the half marathon in 1:04:51. Hermann was 23. The first masters runner finished in 1:17:23.
“He’s a really efficient runner and he’s super motivated,” said Everett Hackett, the 2022 Hartford Marathon winner who is a teammate of Vazquez with Hartford-based Hartbeat Track Club. “You put all that together – and he’s been training like an absolute beast.
“He’s known as Super Mario in many circles.”
For his part, Vazquez, who lives in Farmington but trains a lot at Walnut Hill Park in New Britain, has a sense of enthusiasm about running in general and also that he is still able to not only run but excel.
“Chris Chisholm is my idol,” he said. “I always saw him running here and he was older. It made me believe you’re never too old to do it.
“The way I feel now, how amazing I feel – people are like, ‘How are you 45 doing this? It don’t make no sense to me – but I’m not going to take it for granted.”
Vazquez, who grew up in New Britain, ran cross country in middle school and loved it. But when he arrived at New Britain High, he said he didn’t take school seriously and was ineligible to run due to his grades. He got his grades up by his junior year and was able to run track then cross country in the fall.
That year, he won the CCC South championship. He still remembers that feeling, 27 years later.
“My coach before the race, he said, ‘Mario, you’re a senior, today’s your day,’” Vazquez said. “He did not expect me to win the whole race.”
Vazquez outkicked two others at the end to win.
“They gave me the card after the race and it said, ‘No. 1’ and I couldn’t believe it,” he said. “My coach came running down with the biggest smile and gave me the biggest hug. We didn’t win the meet, but every time one of my teammates finished, the coach told them, ‘Mario won the race’ and they were so happy, they came and hugged me and cheered, it was like our team won the whole thing.”
After graduation, there was no time for running. Vazquez had to get a job and his mother was sick. She died the year after he graduated. He would come to Walnut Hill Park and run the breast cancer race every year but had no other aspirations.
“When I was 33, I don’t know why it was that specific year, it was like, ‘I’m going to try to get back into this,’” he said. “I started falling in love with it all over again. I kept meeting other people who encouraged me.”
He joined the masters running team at Hartbeat in 2020 then the pandemic hit and all the races went away. The gym was closed and Vazquez couldn’t run on the treadmill anymore. So he went outside. He’s never gone back in. He trains with Hartbeat and on his own, running 100 miles a week during his peak training periods.
This year, he won all six masters races he entered in the New England USATF series, from the mile to the 10K. He has won three half marathons in Connecticut this year. Last year, he finished seventh overall at the Hartford Marathon, his sixth marathon, in 2:27.
“It’s crazy to see what he’s doing, it’s giving a lot of us hope who are in our early 30s, mid-30s – he’s in his mid-40s and he’s crushing it,” said Hackett, who is the cross country and track coach at the University of Hartford. “It’s cool.”
And Vazquez still thinks there’s room to improve.
“Can I go faster? I think so,” he said.
He never envisioned that this was how his life would turn out. He still can’t believe it sometimes.
“Running has brought me here,” he said. “It’s added more time to my life, I’ve gotten healthier – it’s amazing. It’s like you’re living a dream you never thought you’d have. But you’re living it. It’s so amazing.”
