Tread Brightly Trail ½ marathon Race Recap
I pushed my Hoka blue feet back in to my Hoka Evos, and I
headed toward the starting line to shake out my legs before race start.
Dark clouds and steady drizzle had settled over the area. On
the other hand, the weather was much cooler than last night.
Looking around at the starting line, I only saw 3 blue bibs
and lots of red bibs. Meaning, there were only 3 of us doing the double. The rest
showed just to do the race this morning. I knew I was in trouble.
All of those fresh legs took off right from the start, and
they gapped us by several hundred yards by the mile point.
Paul, Cody, and I settled in to a nice little group and were
chatting back and forth to make the miles go by faster.
Cody picked up the pace heading in to thread, and soon just
Paul and I were running together. By the time we reached the power line section the
drizzle had turned to a steady down pour of rain. My legs felt heavy and slow
despite the cooler weather.
Paul pulled away from me on the backside of the thread
trail because I was having a bad spot during that section of the course. I grabbed some water at an aid which helped. With Paul out of sight, I was solo to the finish. . On top of the ridge of the North
Main trail, I saw a couple of guys coming up behind me but neither caught me by
the finish.
I finished 11th overall in 2:07:16. I am still
puzzled how I ran nearly 5 minutes faster in this race when I actually felt
worse. I really felt like I was running so much slower.
My 11th place finish put me first in my age but
more importantly, I finished 2nd in the Treadmeister category. This
is weighted category for runners competing on both days. Paul took home the
first place in this division.
I really like these cool little challenges. They offer some different to the normal race routine.
Lastly, kudos the WWC Race
series crew. They dealt with some rainy and muddy conditions. Yet, they were
out there with smiling faces to help each of us runners have a successful race.
My hat is off to all of them.
Tail Dust Tails
The Cool Down Runner
Comments