Thats right, my race has finally come and gone and I have learned quite some lessons! First of all, I will never run a "trail" run again. I will also seek out the course myself before comitting to it and not just go by what the internet says about how fun the trail is! I should have known, "trail" = through the woods and not pavement nor flat terrain. If you haven't noticed what I'm getting at is that this was brutally hard! Not kidding! Being sick and not training two weeks up until my race had a for real effect on how I did, but at the same time I was not expecting to be running up Mt. Everest either.
The morning started out awesome (and then it was all down hill from there, not literally though, the trail was 100% up hill)... Poppa Todd suprised us with a carb loaded breakfast when Jordan and I walked into the kitchen at 6:30am! Home made Belgian waffles with Aunt Jamima syrup....love that girl. When we got there, people were doing warm up runs around the parking lot, we saw some new running gear we hadn't ever seen before, and we chatted it up with a woman who was in line to get her T-shirt right in front of us. All I can recall from the convo was that she said, "Oh yeah... it's hilly..."
The announcer started counting down at the 10 second mark to let us begin, thats when I welcomed Akon and MJ into my life. The song was "hold my hand..." I had my head nod going great to the beat and well, thats about all I had going for me. The trail was INTENSE. At the mile one mark I began to wonder why I had running shoes on and not my dang hiking shoes, and fanny pack because thats the terrain I was trying to RUN to! I definitely had to walk, and while I should have power walked at some points to make better time I decided to enjoy the scenary and bring it down a notch (aka get recooperated).
Have you ever heard the song "Just roll with it" by Eastin Corbin? Good ol' country song...anyways it came on my ipod at a perfect time. Right when I was coming around the bend I saw a bunch of canoes that overlooked a huge lake, and for about 12 seconds I literally thought about "just rollin with it" and grabbing a canoe, departing the race, callin' it a day, puttin' a fork in it, and DONE! Ohhh, but just as I ended that terrible thought a nice woman at a stand offered me water and said, "Your halfway, you look awesome!" Oh really, I thought... is that what you say to everyone whose struggling and has "where is the pavement" written on their foreheads? Nice woman though, thanks again for the H2O.
And the 20 bucks all became worth it as I'm making my way out of the woods, I see the light (literally) and all of the hardcore trail runners cheering me on as I make it down the finish line. I turned on Akon and MJ once more and ran, ran, ran... like I was famous and on T.V. or something. I loved the home stretch, and loved how my dad was clicking away on the camera like I was on the red carpet or something, ha, made me feel famous once again! Time? I came in at one hour and 2 seconds flat!
I'd like to end by saying *DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME LADIES AND GENTLEMEN*
It was tough, very tough...but I am glad little Jordy was there to run with me, even though she beat me...it was a good, lesson learned, eventful morning. I even got a cool running shirt, toothpaste, new toothbrush, relax drinks, chapstick, and entered to win a free teeth whitening!
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| Before: Dear Cameron, you have no clue what you are about to get yourself into, love Trail. |
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| Turning off Akon and MJ in action |
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| Gatorade + Done = Hallelluja |
