Winter Running Achievements

A season shouldn’t be defined by the final race. A few jaunts in the winter woods have both humbled me and provided confidence for the upcoming year. The final race of the Pikes Peak Road Runners Fall Series was in Palmer Park just after a major snow. What was normally a 7+ mile loop was reduced to about 5 miles due to icy conditions on the rocks. My race started a tad aggressively since I expected to enter trails immediately. Instead, ¾ of a mile later, we were still going uphill on the long park road. By the summit I was gassed, and continued to go backward from there. Rather than pass people, I was the victim as many runners cruised by. I struggled to the finish line barely able to hold on to a top 30 placing. My buddy Steve was under a minute behind me, indicating a very excellent race on his part, and a not-so-good race by me.

A few weeks later we ran the Turkey Trot Predict the Saturday before Thanksgiving. This race had runners predict their time, and leave the starting line when their time posted, thereby having everyone (theoretically) hit the finish at the same time. I put 19:36, having not raced a 5K in years. When my time came, my name was announced and off I went. It was like the Tour de France with people cheering as you rolled out on the course. Almost instantly I caught the people who had left ahead of me and all idea of pace was out the window. I rolled up on Steve who had more than 1:30 in hand, and by. The end was chaos as hundreds of runners approached the finish. I crossed in 19:06, surprised I was able to run the pace with no speed work. I was way off the time! Sarah rolled in just under 3 seconds off for 8th place. Our friend, Susan, took home 2nd and a turkey!

Deciding to test my ultra skills, I went to the infamous Incline in Manitou Springs. Just enter "Manitou Incline" into Yahoo! Images search and see what the hype is about.  This one-mile long trail of railroad ties rockets 2000’ into the clouds at an average gradient of 41%. I started strong and soon started a suffer slog of lactic-acid in my teeth and death in my legs. The maximum incline is 68% requiring the use of all four appendages. It was a nightmare! But I crossed in 25:40, an excellent time and a desire to try it again in better shape and without snow on it! But the real kicker is the 4-mile bomb down Barr Trail. After falling once on the ice and nearly dying, I was glad to be done.

I joined Matt Carpenter’s Incline Club for some trail training. Rather than embarrass myself the first week, Steve took me up the route the week before. The run up Ute Pass trail was gnarly and required a lot of walking. But ultimately you gain the trail to Waldo Canyon and are rewarded with amazing views before looping back. I ran out of fuel and struggled all the way in. This was a really hard run taking 2:44 for 15 miles!

The following weekend I invited Michael Trahan down for the Incline Club. We started with 135 other trail runners up the road and out the trail. Our goal was to pace well and we slowly gained on those ahead of us. We made a game out of catching those ahead of us and staying ahead. The Waldo loop was very icy and it was cloudy. We ran very solid and finished back at the car in 2:16, nearly half an hour faster than the previous week! Only Matt and one other guy finished the route faster than us.

The next weekend I entered the Rock Canyon Half Marathon in Pueblo. It was amazingly cold leading up to the race (below O), but I still stripped down to shorts for the gun. The pace went out pretty fast, dropping from 6:30, to 6:20 over the first three miles. I thought this was too fast given my sub-1:30 goal for the day, but I just tucked in the pack. It blew up at three miles so I took over chipping at the field ahead of me. I was in about 23rd place and kept running in the 6:30s. People just kept coming back. I ran with experience and was never passed in the whole race. At mile 10 I came up on a guy with his arms flailing and legs twisted. As soon as I went by, he surged to stay with me. “Fine,” I thought to myself. “Burn yourself out.” But 30 seconds later he was still there. I figured if I wasn’t going to shake him, I might as well help him. So I told him to stand up more, relax the shoulders, and stop surging. He did and stayed with me. When he faltered, I would correct him. After all, he was only 18. He had been on the state championship XC team and was off to Arizona State in the fall. We rolled past people left and right in the final miles, going 6:22 and 6:16 uphill into the wind. He urged me to go with him as we passed a runner, but I just laughed knowing that I only had one gear. Soon I caught him anyway and had to push him on. At the end of the monstrously hilly 13th mile (which we ran in 6:31), I told him not to let two old men out kick him and he was gone. I maintained and crossed in 11th place with a time of 1:24:59, winning my age group. I was ecstatic with the pace (6:29 per mile) since I had only run 6:09’s for my 5K. Due to the stomach, I hadn't run more than 3-4 days a week for about three months. Now I am up to 6 days a week, yet only about 35-43 miles a week. With no speed work this early in the season, good things will come.

I have a fast half marathon under my belt, a good time on the Incline, and some excellent trail experience. 2010 should provide some excellent races.