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| Veteran's Acres at Sunrise |
My First Trail Race a DNF!
I should be upset about this but I’m not. I had
a great time and hope to be back to complete the 15 miles or maybe even tackle
the 50K. I learned a lot on this first
venture into trail racing. It’s all
good.
First, let me say that this was a well-organized event and I’m
always grateful when things are just done well.
It was easy to sign up for, communication prior to the event was good,
it was easy to find and everything was set to go right on time this
morning. After picking up my packet and
shirt, I wandered over to a table with free stuff. Who doesn’t like free stuff? There were copies of Trail Runner magazine,
stickers for the new Hennepin Hundred event this fall, and samples of 2Toms
sportshield anti-chafing products. Michelle
Hartwig, the race director, was manning the table and recognized me from this
blog when I said I was running the 50 mile distance as part of the Hennepin Hundred. If you’re reading this Michelle, I was very
impressed this morning! Nice job!
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| Free Stuff at Packet Pickup |
The race shirt is a very nice powder blue with an Earth Day
trail run themed design in green and brown.
It’s a nice weight shirt, not paper thin. I chose a women’s large. I’ve lost some weight since I registered and
the shirt is kind of large, but not unwearably so.
Because the race starts from the pavilion at Veteran’s
Acres, there are REAL restrooms, NOT port-o-lets. There were only 3 or 4 stalls but people got
there early enough that this wasn’t a problem.
In fact, I peed twice before the start and didn’t need to wait at
all. Such a small thing but such a nice
change from cruddy port-o-lets at big races.
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| New Friends |
In the parking lot, I found a new Facebook running friend
from Wisconsin and her friend, from all places Lisle, the next town over from
mine. Her friend even knew one of the
women in my running club. I love how the
running community, although large, feels small.
They were planning on running five minutes and walking five
minutes. I planned to do shorter
intervals so figured I would not be running with them.
The weather this morning was beautiful. The sky was clear, there was a light wind and
it was warm. I had on a short sleeved
shirt and a pair of capris and was actually a little too warm, even at the
start. Note to self, if the temperature
is over 55, shorts and a tank are probably more than enough.
I had heard that most trail runs had much more informal
starts and that certainly was true. As
race time approached, someone announced over a megaphone and everyone moved
down the hill to the start. After a few
directions and thank you’s, someone set “ready, set, go” and we were off. After
a few hundred feet of running in the grass, we immediately hit climbing single
track. There was a bit of a bottleneck
as the mass of runners narrowed down to single file. Lots of chatting at this point and getting
use to moving our muscles.
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| Just Before the Start |
Before we took off, I thought I would probably run 2 minutes
and then walk 2 minutes. That works
pretty well for me on paved hills so figured it would be a good strategy. Wrong!
In fact, it now seems funny that I would even have considered that. The uphill sections were way too steep in
spots for me to run and the downhill sections were either way too steep and/or
full of rocks and roots. I’m just not
experienced nor balanced enough to run down those sections. In the beginning, I tried to run up as many
uphills as possible and quickly realized I was tiring out too soon. After about the first mile, I fell in behind
a couple people that were walking all of the sections that I felt too
uncomfortable to run and running a good pace for me when we could. This lasted for mile 2 and mile 3 but then
the man I was following pulled up with a cramp.
After checking that he was fine, I continued on behind a woman doing the
same thing. Then she stopped too. I was essentially alone for miles 4 and
5. I saw almost no one. I knew there were people behind me, but I
didn’t see them at all. It was a little
lonely out there.
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| My new friends and me |
On an uphill climb at about mile 4.5, I was lapped by one of
the fast runners. That means he had made
it around two times while I was still working on my first. The good news is that only one runner lapped
me during my run. The bad news is I
totally blew trail etiquette and it is actually one of the reasons I stopped
after the first loop. As he ran by, he
appropriately called “on your left” and what did I do? I move right into his path. I know what to do, I hate it when people do
what I did but I was just so tired and hot at that point that I blew it. Although I apologized, I would like to
apologize again here. That was an amateur
move on my part and I’m sorry!!!!!!
As I crossed the timing mat, I had to decide whether to
continue on or not. Ultimately, I
decided to stop. I was not making good
foot placement decisions and I was not all that excited about doing the same
loop again. One thing I realized in
trail running is there is pretty much no sight seeing. Today, I’m glad I stopped, I must have strained my left quad. Nothing serious that won’t be better in a
couple days but it hurts today and walking is difficult. If I had done more loops, I suspect I might
be telling a different story.
Looking back on this run, I realize my attitude was not good,
my training was not
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| My less than stellar results |
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