Trail Mix 25k Race

Trail mix is a TOUGH race, but if you could select the perfect weather, it wouldn’t be much different from today. The often-muddy trails were dry, temperature 61 and mostly cloudy, with a dry breeze that actually felt pretty good most of the time in these woods. I wore a technical T-shirt and shorts, but could easily have worn a singlet or gone without any shirt, as many did.

Lots of birds, all kinds of birds: owls, ducks, geese, cardinals, hawks, and many that I don’t know, many that I only heard. Hyland is a beautiful park, and we ran a beautiful trail through it, mostly grass and wood chips, very hilly. I walked up a LOT of hills, sometimes looking over my shoulder for Ed and Harvey, my age group mates. I didn’t see them after the start, but they did finish right behind me.

Pace was 9:13. Ouch, that’s slow! But the pace just indicates how hard this course is; I ran hard enough to make 8:00 or 8:15 miles on flat pavement, I think. Breathing was three footfalls per full breath most of the way; that signals a very hard race pace. After a race I ask myself if I did the best that I could, and today I can say Yes. Some pain in the right knee afterward, hopefully temporary. Glucosamine will help. First loop was 1:08:29, second loop 1:14:25.

My sweeties took pictures, and we three waited after the race for the four SCV runners who ran the 50k team event, where my sweeties took more pictures. Here is a slide show of a few of those photos.