The morning of the race was different weather than we've had all weak - it was cold, foggy, and rain/snow was in the forecast. And as I drove the hour drive, I was amazed at just how thick the fog was! And it stayed foggy for the entire race - which meant that the temperature stayed a brisk 40 degrees without the warm CO sunshine. True to nature, I was late to pick up Carolyn! (hee, hee) Luckily it was a small race so there were still packets and parking spots available. Instead of a t-shirt, we actually got a hooded sweatshirt!!! Pretty sweet, huh?!? The race started and we were happyily cruising along (I forgot my garmin, so I probably headed out a little too fast for my 1st mile) and it turned out to be fortunate that the race was as small as it was (only 90 people finished the 10 miler) because the trail was actually very narrow. Passing people was a little precarious. It was a beautiful course, though, with the scrub oak just changing colors; and if it weren't for a road that we followed for a short time and a few power lines, it would seem that we were in the middle of nowhere (the fog helped that as well. ha!)
The run was fun as Carolyn and I chatted. She's so sweet and I love the blog even more for meeting a great new friend! The race was a little scary, though, when at about mile 1.5, the fast runners who were running the 5 miler were coming back along the trail - which I already explained was a single file trail. It was actually a very confusing course with 2 loops and 1 turn around. I had thought it was only 1 large loop, so I was very disoriented each time we came to a fork in the road or had people coming back after the turn-around. I was doing fine until mile 5 or 6 when I finally had to put my knee brace on (luckily it was small enough to fit in my pocket). Mile 7 was hardest as far as umph goes. I was feeling so exhausted from the uphills that somehow seemed more plentiful that the downhills (is that possible?!?! it felt like it). The last mile was mostly downhill, so we really tried to push to the finish line. I could hear a runner behind and kept reminding myself that I was NOT going to be roadhill on the last half mile. I think we ran much of that mile at a sub-9:30 pace, which was much faster than our average of 10:33. Overall - fun race, great new friend, nice sweatshirt, and a decent finishing time. I knew I wasn't going to be impressive in my finishing time since my running has not been very consistent lately. My knee is still a little sore after the race, but that could've been because the rest of the day was very busy and I didn't get much time to just take it easy. ;o)
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