Sunday, July 17, 2005
2005 Indian Ladder trail race results
2005 Indian Ladder race & Peebles hike photo slideshow
Indian Ladder is an old friend by now (albeit an old friend that kicks my butt every year.) The weather started out good – cool and cloudy – but VERY humid, and that made itself clear once we started running. Ann was a sport and came along again, despite the fact that waiting at a trail race is even less interesting than watching paint dry. (She muttered something about “beats sitting inside waiting for you to get back.”)
I started out strong – 9 minute miles for the first two – but then the hills kicked in and my legs started running out of “fast juice.” Managed a thumbs-up for Ann taking pictures at about mile 6, but suspect I looked like heck. The last three miles seemed to take forever… more and more I think the loop is mis-measured and is actually 4 or 5 miles long.
During this last loop it actually turned into a race between me and two other gentlemen. Passed one early on and he never quite caught back up with me. Passed the other about a mile and a half from the finish, and he never quite caught me either. Both finished within a minute of me, so they were right on my heels at the end. One shook my hand afterwards and thanked me for giving him such a good run. (Doubt I’ll ever hear THAT again!) Now for the truly funny part, lest it sound like I’m getting a swelled head from beating these two to the finish… the first one is 72 and the 2nd one is 69. I laughed for a while when I saw that in the results on-line. Yes, indeed, I can beat people well over retirement age (and only some… the other runners in their age divisions beat me, in some cases by as much as 15 minutes.)
So I finished at 1:47, which translates into 11 ½ minute miles. I find that disappointing – I was really hoping for something in the 10’s – but I ran as hard as I could. Probably too hard, given the aftereffects.
Woke up Monday morning and my left calf, which has been giving me minor grief after my runs, was screaming at me. Apparently I badly strained, pulled, or tore something that had been aggravated for a month or so. So the bad news is… no running for me for a while, which is driving me crazy. I cancelled going to the Presque Isle duathlon July 31, as well as a 7 mile race on August 3. I’m also writing off the Adirondack marathon… I doubt there’s any way I can safely get up to marathon distances by the end of September. I’m still shooting for some half marathon distances in September and October… that might be doable.
Depending on how my calf heals up, my next race may be a 7 miler on August 7, down in Connecticut. But August depends a lot on how things go over the next week.
In between being aggravated and bummed about not being able to run, I’m still working on my riding and aiming for the Lowlander 100 mile ride on September 10. Maybe another long ride or two as well… have to see how things go. Hopefully riding can keep increasing my aerobic conditioning so that getting back into running longer distances won’t be a major challenge.
JMH
