XTERRA Trail Running National Championships

A full day yesterday. Guy and I went to Bend to run in the XTERRA Trail Running National Championships. This is a half marathon on trail along the Deschuttes river. We left Corvallis at about 4:30am. Got to the race start, in the Old Mill District, at about 7:30 or so, plenty of time for the 9:00 start. Dave Bateham was there ... nice to see him again. Lots of high-end runners here for this one, including some I recognized from the Mountain Nationals on Mount Hood last week ... always nice to watch the big guns do their stuff. The start and finish of the course were on paved and gravel road and wide trail. A lot of single track, sandy trail too. Nothing too technical. Not a lot of elevation ... I think about 1,000' in total. I wasn't too fond of the course. Bend offers up much nicer trails, but as one gal put it, they were looking for production values. I went out pretty hard. It wasn't long before I felt fatigue in my quads ... not enough rest since Mount Hood. But I managed pretty well. After the half way point I managed to hold position pretty well ... I was passed by a few, but managed to reel in a few. I had to really focus for the last few clicks, keeping my mind on my breathing, rather than on my tired, aching legs. I finished in 1:29:43, 43rd overall, 5th in age ... not bad, given the level of competition. Guy and Dave both finished strong too. Afterward, we went to Smith rock (cool place) to drop off Dave for some climbing. Guy and I headed to Sisters for lunch at Bronco Billy's. That night, Todd hosted a nice get together for the ultra runners ... M & I didn't stay long. I was toast. Slept well that night. No more racing for a couple of weeks, at least.

Northwest Mountain Running Championship

Ran in the Northwest Mountain Running Championship on Mount Hood yesterday. Went there with Guy. Will and Mike were there too. Jason was too, but he wasn't racing. The race started at Timberline Lodge (6,000'). It was a cold, cloudy, misty morning. The race trail took us down the mountain to about 5,500' in elevation, before climbing up to about 7,000'. The climb was brutal ... I walked most of it, sucking wind the whole way. There was snow at the top. The run down was very technical ... couldn't really open up. I passed Will going up, but he zoomed past me on the downhill. Took about 53 minutes or so. Not sure yet how I placed ... in the top 30 maybe. Quads are feeling it today.

Ole's Astoria Assault

Did Ole's Assault in Astoria yesterday. This is one crazy race. It's about 10K I think, but it took me 1:43 or so. Except for the starting and finishing miles, it was mostly bushwhacking ... following flagging tape. No trail, really. There were some man-made obstacles ... barbed wire to crawl under, log walls to climb over, tunnels, etc... But the toughest part was just running through the bush. Over logs, under logs, down and up gullies, through thorny shrubs. Tripped a lot. Fell down a couple of times. Went over on each ankle once. Got scraped up pretty good. Several times had to take long pauses looking for the next piece of flagging tape. No drinking water on the course, so I was pretty parched by the end. Lost my sunglasses ... again! It makes the Mount Hood Scramble seem like a gentle trail run. A lot fun. Wouldn't want to do it more than once a year though :)

Back at 'er, pitter patter

Good run today with Guy, up Horse Trail, down Dan's Trail. 12K and 1,000' in 1:08. Felt good the whole way. Did some speed work this week too. No long runs though. Almost back to a normal routine at the gym too, but will need another week or two there. Less and less likely I'll do another ultra this year. But really looking forward to the short races of September and October.

Running Again

It's taken longer to recover from Waldo than I figured. It's been two weeks. Did an easy 20K yesterday ... up the ridge and hill twice. Managed a few 12K runs earlier in the week too. Not feeling too badly, but far from normal. Kind of glad I didn't sign up for MacKenzie ... it would have been optimistic ... and courting injury. Still considering that 50 miler in October, but we'll have to see. Looking forward to Ole's assault. Tomorrow the gym re-opens. Cannot wait to get back at it ... feeling like a slug.