50K, 7:14, 8500' climb.
[Elevation Profile, some hills]Pix Gallery
Perfect running weather, clear skies, a little breezy but not often in the face, cool temps. This was a run from Fremont to Livermore, through the Ohlone Wilderness. This is a big goal run for me. I back packed 2/3rds of it 15 years ago or so solo (nice disaster rainstrom in the middle collapsed my tent and made me force march two days of hiking in one day - adventure!) So, I dreamed of getting back out there for a while, little did I know then I be running it all in ~7 hours and adding on another 10 miles!
The terrain was a lot of big ups and big downs. I went out easy for the first 1/3 as per Nancy's advice and ran what was runnable and walked the bigs ups as per David's advice. Ate well along the way way, Gu's with caffeine (did I drink equivalent of 10 espresso shots that day???) and tried the taters - who knew that cold potatoes dipped in salt could be so good! I passed on the Oreo cookies though :)
Mix of fire road and single track, including a little section of just beaten down grass, sometime it pays off to not be in the lead pack, the trail was well cleared by the time I was running through.
Worried about a nagging ankle injury, ball of foot injury and tight back for the first 15, I could feel them all, then somehow got into the zone and by mile 20 I was pleasantly surprised that I had totally forgotten about them and nothing hurt at all!
Big wide open views of the California rolling hills really helped pass the time, aid stations were awesome, they were like a pit crew at Nascar ready to take your bottles and fill with water and gu brew, food, fuel, sun block, whatever!
[Cranking up the hills in Sunol]I _had_ to beat 8:00 (8:09 was my last 50k), wanted to beat 7:30, eyeballing sub 7:15 and was curious what sub 7:00 would do to my body :) So, I was getting tired and random - sometimes I was thinking sub 8:00 would be hard, sometimes even sub 7:00 seemed achievable. Last two miles was super steep downhill and I tried to fly it when my left knee start locking up and hurting, ITB! Ouch ouch, pushed through, but going slower. Had a shot at sub 7:15, so opened up again, watched the knee and ran into the open arms of Celine and the boys at the end, ~7:14. Great race, we really lucked out on the weather, hope that we can do it together some year!
Talked to the girl and guy I was pacing with at the end - "dude - where did you go???"
[Family at the finish!]
