What a change in weather over the course of a single week in Alabama! Last weekend it was icy and cold before my parents arrived in town. Then it warmed up to the 80's most of the week.
This was the first inagural event directed by my friend Tom Possert. It was a small field of only 52 people. Tom did his best to seed the entrants and I was numbered as 5th I went out on the first mile strong, going under 7:00 on the roads before hitting the trails. Then Mile 2 was easy on white trail. After that we went down Goat Trail and back up warpath on mile 3. I walked up most of War Path Ridge to conserve energy for late in the race.
After some quick aid, we ran down rest shelter into McKay Hollow. From there until mile 5 going up Natural Well was good running. Got into 4th overall by passing Brian Robinson who was feeling ill, and would end up dropping out later in the race.
I power walked up Natural Well again to save energy until later in the race when I would need it. At the turn at mile 7.3 I was only 1/3 mile behind Dink. I struggled going back out on Natural Well before Arrowhead. I saw Joey Butler and felt pretty energized.
Then my inability to run downhill caught up to me when Chad Davis passed me. This was also about the time that my ankle started bothering me. I walked a little more and more to mile 11.9 at the base the Death Trail. I walked the entire hill. At the top I saw Laura and my Mom and then muttered enough strength to run to the finish, albeit in pain.
Overall it was a decent race, but have to improve on trails and get ankle better before Mountain Mist training later this year. I finished 5th overall in 2:05:36. I was hoping to go under 2 hours, but I dad no idea how hard the trails would be to race on.
My splits where: 652, 701, 845, 801, 755, 1158, 728, 822, 750, 901, 759, 1703, 1341 (1004+337). I did loose signal on my GPS so my splits weren't all correct.
My Dad was at the turn and the finish, which was pretty cool to have him see me run this race.