So the day before was the Trenton Half Marathon and I did well. Missed a PR by 1:20ish but it was my 3rd ever under 1:50. I just ran well. Sometimes you have it and sometimes you don't. After I got home, Adele texted me asking about the 10K. I was kinda on the fence about it for her. Usually, I'm the enabler but this is a trail run and I thought the 10K would also be the same. Apparently the inaugural 10K would be on flat railroad bed so the hope was that she wasn't going to fall. She tried trail running once before and fell so I was worried. Still, a flat railroad bed might actually be nice for her and her getting better legs so why not...
She was going to drive with me and Jeff in tow. Cool. This race unlike yesterdays race was a "late" start, starting at 9. Even tho I prefer early starts, the propect of waking up a hour later really sounded good to me.
Morning came and so did Adele and Jeff. Jeff told me he was thinking about doing the 10K and I laughingly I asked if he already decided the night before which he did. That's cool. I got no problem with that...
Oh...1 thing to mention. I saw a notification on Facebook that they decided to start the 10K ten minutes later. Unfortunatly they didn't update the web page so it was a little confusing but we were going to get there early no matter what so it didn't really matter.
Anyway, we got there early and it was beautiful. It was chilly and I was cold but it was beutiful and I was excited as I haven't done a trail race (or run trails actually) in a while. My legs weren't dead but I was a little tired and I just knew that the trail run would help out. I guess I better explain. Trail running, especially if it's super technical, can be very hard. You traditionally, unless the race is climbing a mountain, don't have long climbs. Usually, it's more like short bursts of hard efforts. Still, the surface of the run/race is usually softer and therefore less harsh on your legs. The other bonus is that there is no clock on the course. The only pressure is the watch on your wrist and you don't really have to look at it. Also, lots of times there are no mile markers so the time doesn't really make sense.
Anyway, we went to check in and it was kinda funny that Adele who was registering day of finished before me who was pre-registered. Oh well. In any case, got a bag with a long sleeve tech shirt and a medal. Cool - already won the race. Well, it was a cheapy medal but that's ok too.
Put stuff in car and to the port-a-potties. It hit me that in the last 7-8 weeks, I have seen the insides of port-a-potties much more than other people have. Not sure if that's good or bad but it's the truth.
Jeff tried to tell the timer that he is switching distances but the guy told him to come back later which jeff didn't. More on that later.
While waiting around, I saw Robert Pasquel which I expected and CJR. Nice! Apparently Helen stayed home with the baby and Rob got in touch with the only one he knew who would drop everything to go to a race with no warning. Nice. Socialized a bit and got ready.
I also saw a woman wearing a "Pasaic Orthdox Women Runners" club shirt and I say hello and ask if she knows Martin Bodek. Of course, she does. Cool. Anyway, imagine seeing an orthdox woman running this race in a long skirt. Plenty of woman wearing short skirts, skorts and pants but long skirt for trails?!? Wow...
Ok - we line up. The 10Kers are actually 10 minutes after us. I'm not sure of the course or really anything here so I try to listen. The RD/timer was cool. The course was made of 2 parts. The first part was an 8 mile loop which ended right here at the finish. We then cross the road and do another 5 miler which includes the "terror of doom". Hm. I have no idea what that means but he had a wicked smile on his face. I wasn't sure if he was just joking around or if I should be worried but I decided on ignorance is bliss. One piece of good news was that the day before, the volunteers came and blew all the leaves of the trail. Wow! That's big news but I didn't realize it at the point how big it was. Certainly that's an amazing undertaking.
He then, and I do love wiseass RD's, peels a banana, eats it and puts the peel right in front of us and says don't fall. We laugh and he picks it up.
Ok - time to start. We start and almost immediatly we go into single track. The pace is a little slow and I don't mind trails so I go on the side and pass some people. Some of these people later pass me back while others never do. That's cool.
Remember I mentioned that they blew all the leaves away? Thank God they did. This is a technical race. Lots of roots and rocks and uneven ground and holes and what not. If all the leaves were still there, I could see their medical plan being truly tested.
Here and there, I also roll or twist my ankle but as usual my balance is good and I'm ok. No falling for me thank you very much.
Having fun.
Started talking to this dude named Aaron Kuderka. Nice guy and we run together. At times behind each other and at times side to side. This is his first half-marathon. Cool.
It looks like they put a mile marker every 2 miles or so, so I get a sense of our pace. We are doing approx 10 minute pace per mile and that is perfectly fine with me. Trails are usually slower pace and I ran hard the day before.
Around mile 3 was a water stop. Grabbed a little freezing water. We then hug the lake which is on our right side when we suddenly see one of the lead runners make his way back to us. The entire left side of his face is all bloodied, he is hugging his ribs and limping. Oh boy...We do hit a very interesting part where if you don't "hang" on to the trail, you fall into the lake but Aaron and I and the sub group with us all manage it without a problem. There is also a cement wall about 4 feet high or so that we need to climb onto. Cool.
Right around mile 4 was the only spot I thought that wasn't marked well. We came out of the trails to a road and you had choices. We knew it was a right turn but not sure what happened after that. Luckily, I saw some people and asked and they told us that runners went "that" way. Turns out the race markings wanted us to stay on the grass up high. We went to the road below. Not sure how many other people were caught by that.
We continue on. I truly have no idea where we are. I am following the "follow the idiot in front of you" approach and truth be told the course was well marked except for that little hickup. Still, we made so many turns, I don't know where we are in the big picture kinda thing.
I did power walk some of the big hills tho. Aaron felt good and dropped mem, which is pretty cool, since I never want to feel like I am holding someone back but within 5-10 seconds I was right back with him.
Not sure when this happened but at 1 point, I had a woman drafting me big time and I told her to let me know when she wants to pass. She said she was just fine right where she was. I then saw a spot and moved over and gestured for her to pass. She yelled "thanks and sorry for being right on your ass". I, in turn, immediatly yelled "no problem you weren't and that my wife always tells me that it's one of my best features so I get it". She suddenly understood what I said, started laughing and almost fell down on the trails. Oops... Still, I like it.
Met 2 brothers on the way as well. I thought they were 15 years old but turns out they were in their 20s. I think their names were Michael and Joe Drylewicz based on the results. One of them had major knee/leg issue and hasn't run more than 7 miles as his longest distance. The brother wasn't going to leave them tho. Cool. They stayed with us for a while but eventually disappeared from view.
We eventually made our way back to the finish to finish up the 8 mile loop. So far so good. We crossed the road and got put on a flat soft road. Cool. We thought it was a straight shot but every so often, we made a right turn into the trails to pick up some distance and than right back to the path. There was someone there spectating and she and I got friendly and every time we saw each other we greeted each other like long time friends.
At this point, it was a straight shot. We all figured it was out and back. It was an uphill, but not terrible. We did encounter runners coming back and I asked what's up ahead and they told us about another 1/2 mile to go to the 10 mile turnaround at the water stop. Cool. At this point, I think, I left Aaron and continued trucking. Got to the water station and I'm running with this girl and all is good. All the runners up to here told us that this is it and there is no big hill or tower of terror and it was probably just the RD messing around. I pick up the pace. Mile 10-11 was 8:46 and I was feeling good. I knew I could continue at least at that pace or even better. Maybe a sub 2 hour finish like always?
One strange thing happened tho. I could swear that we ran uphill to the water stop at mile 10. Now it seemed like we were running up hill again even tho it was exactly what we just ran but going the other way. Whatever. I was feeling good. Distance was getting smaller constantly.
I was joking around with that girl and all was good until... Oh well...We saw a runner then another and another on our right side in the trails going the opposite way we were going or in other terms "away from the finish". Back to the trails and back to trail running speed. It's still not tower of terror or some nonsense bad... And then it was. We looked ahead and there were tons of switchbacks but in general we were climbing up and up. Some parts were real steep too. I wish there was a mile marker here but there wasn't. There was a guy climbing slowly with a garmin tho. Now that I think of it, how the hell was he so in front of me?!?
Mile 12 and we weren't all the way up. Someone finally showed me the tower. What's the tower of terror? It's an antenna tower on top of the mountain and we had to climb up to it. Awesome. We did. And we did some more...
Finally at about mile 12.5, we got to the top. It was a group of us. There was me, maybe 1 other male and about 3 females. One of the females was a downhill specialist. She was awesome. She had a blond ponytail and I think she wore a yellow top and she flew down hill. All I could think about was how many black toes I was going to get to go with the one I already had. I tried to stick to her but was afraid to. I let her go. Still, every flat and up I would bridge back to her. There was a tattooed girl who actually placed in her age group and she was with us as well. She suffered on the ups like all of us. Anyway, it was a mad dash going downhill at a speed of "go as fast as you can forgetting about your toes and forgetting that you can crash easily". That was fast. Suddenly it was done. We were at a flat area and I was still weary about really letting go. I asked around and someone responded that that was it. We have somewhere between 1/4 and a 1/2 mile to go tho probably closer to the 1/4. Also, they pointed out a road to me and told me that's the road we need to cross to the finish line. I asked if they are sure and when they said yes, I said my goodbyes. I remember someone tried to stick to me but I was going full blast. I dropped them all and bore down on another female. Passed her, made the loop around the finish and then set my sights at a guy heading to the finish line. Passed him at the last minute and that was that.
Met up with Adele and Jeff and got food. The food needs mentioning. The aid stations on the course were really sparse. They were about every 2 miles and just had freezing water. No gatorade or anything else. The finish line made up for it. Fruits, bars, BBQ hotdogs, chicken soup, (AMAZING!!!) vegetable soup and great bread. The veggie soup really was amazing. We stuck around waiting for the raffle and I kept repeating a cycle. I would get really cold, have some soup and warm up. I drank about 5 or 6 cups of that awesome nector.
There were some nice raffle prizes (blankets) and some cheepy stuff like ice scrapers. Jeff won a ziplock bag with Nuun in it and hand warmers. Gave me the handwarmers. Nice... You know I already used them.
Jeff didn't go back to the timer and therefore came in 2nd for his age group in the half-marathon even tho he did the 10K. I told the timer and made 3rd and 4th for age very happy as they got bumped up.
Adele/Jeff: Besides going to the port-a-pottie pre and post, Jeff had to go during as well. He was running with Adele when the need to fertilize the woods took over. She said she was actually worried about him. This seems the new thing with him during races...;)
Both CJR and Rob had a great race with Rob doing really awesome. He came in 3rd overall or 2nd male or 1st for 55-59 age group depending on how you want to look at it.
We drove back and something very shameful happened to me. Jeff was sleeping in the back and I was in the front. My job was to make sure the driver was ok when I fell asleep. I just couldn't keep my eyes open. At one point, I did open them, mutter "oh man" and went back to sleep. I don't think I was out for too long but it wasn't right. Sucks.
Anyway, went to Krav Maga that night but thankfully the (new) teacher didn't show up. Allegdly his car was in a traffic accident. Kinda sucks we were there and ready and no class but I wasn't too upset not to do burpee's and pushups that night.
The kids wanted and expected me to have pizza as I did run 13.1 + 13.1 or 26.2 miles and as you know in math the "sum of the parts are equal to the sum of the whole". Unfortunatly that does NOT apply in terms of running and pizza.
In general tho, my legs weren't completly trashed. I think if I would not have run hard on Saturday and certain parts on Sunday, I would have had fresher legs on Monday but really not a huge deal. I have done a B2B with marathons but this is my first time with halfs. On the other hand, I finally "mooned up" with the Half Fanatics. I am now 4 moons just like 4 stars with Marathon Maniacs. Cool.