A Year of Long Distance - Race#6
Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
2006 Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race results
Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race info
Lake Minnewaska Photo Slideshow
2006 Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race Photo Slideshow
What a fun evening!
Backing up a bit, at first glance it might seem like running the Summer Solstice Run three days after struggling through the Greylock Death March doesn't qualify as the brightest of plans. Perhaps if I'd actually been able to run most of Greylock that would have been the case... but Tuesday night on my short bike ride my legs were definitely tired but not shot. And Minnewaska is a Really Cool Place - one of the most beautiful places I know and one of my favorite places to visit. Plus the trails are relatively easy to run - more like somewhat rough dirt roads than trails, with the most challenging part being that the first 3.5 to 4 miles of the course is almost constant uphill. Plus I figured I could take it easy (hah!) and have a nice run at Minnewaska. Add in great weather and that's how I ended up on my way to Lake Minnewaska State Park Preserve late Wednesday afternoon.
The drive down is great - the Thruway goes through some very scenic terrain. Got to the park around 5:20, checked in, and spent the next half an hour walking some of the trails around Lake Minnewaska and taking photos. Then it was time to change into my running gear, after which I sat near the start and waited for the fun to begin...
A few minutes before the start everyone crowded into the starting area. As usual, the folks in the back were chattering away so no one could hear the RD. Fortunately, the course is simple enough it wasn't really necessary. And then - off we went!
As usual, I was near the back, but one of the nice things about this race is that there are usually enough slower folks running it that I wasn't the only one back there. There were a number of people this year who were using the race as a training run, at least two for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team in Training program. The first 3.5 to 4 miles is pretty much constant uphill - nothing too awfully steep, but it does seem to go on forever. The periodic views off the ridge help make up for it, and the panoramic view when you reach the top is absolutely awesome. I didn't push too terribly hard but was still huffing and puffing all the way to the top.
Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
2006 Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race results
Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race info
Lake Minnewaska Photo Slideshow
2006 Summer Solstice 14K Trail Race Photo Slideshow
What a fun evening!
Backing up a bit, at first glance it might seem like running the Summer Solstice Run three days after struggling through the Greylock Death March doesn't qualify as the brightest of plans. Perhaps if I'd actually been able to run most of Greylock that would have been the case... but Tuesday night on my short bike ride my legs were definitely tired but not shot. And Minnewaska is a Really Cool Place - one of the most beautiful places I know and one of my favorite places to visit. Plus the trails are relatively easy to run - more like somewhat rough dirt roads than trails, with the most challenging part being that the first 3.5 to 4 miles of the course is almost constant uphill. Plus I figured I could take it easy (hah!) and have a nice run at Minnewaska. Add in great weather and that's how I ended up on my way to Lake Minnewaska State Park Preserve late Wednesday afternoon.
The drive down is great - the Thruway goes through some very scenic terrain. Got to the park around 5:20, checked in, and spent the next half an hour walking some of the trails around Lake Minnewaska and taking photos. Then it was time to change into my running gear, after which I sat near the start and waited for the fun to begin...
A few minutes before the start everyone crowded into the starting area. As usual, the folks in the back were chattering away so no one could hear the RD. Fortunately, the course is simple enough it wasn't really necessary. And then - off we went!
As usual, I was near the back, but one of the nice things about this race is that there are usually enough slower folks running it that I wasn't the only one back there. There were a number of people this year who were using the race as a training run, at least two for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team in Training program. The first 3.5 to 4 miles is pretty much constant uphill - nothing too awfully steep, but it does seem to go on forever. The periodic views off the ridge help make up for it, and the panoramic view when you reach the top is absolutely awesome. I didn't push too terribly hard but was still huffing and puffing all the way to the top.
Once there I discovered I'd been running somewhere between 11 and 12 minute miles - faster than I expected - and my legs felt OK, so I picked up the pace (the next stretch is mostly downhill) and hit the last aid station (about 3 miles from the end) at about 55 minutes. After that it gets a bit tougher - lots of very gradual uphill, broken up by some gradual downhill stretches - but I was still doing OK, so I kept pounding out the pace, and over the course of that last 3 miles found myself passing half a dozen folks. The last bit is a killer - just before the finish is a steep hill, and this year it was covered with a layer of fresh (ie. loose) stone. Had to walk part of that so I wouldn't blow up... but ran gasping across the finish line at 91 min 29 sec, almost 2 minutes faster than my time last year.
So I averaged 10.5 minute miles for a run where I planned to take it easy, and actually made it to the finish before a number of runners who went out faster than I did. I'll be sore for a couple of days, but it feels good to know that I haven't just been getting slower and slower as I've trained for longer distances.
After that I got to see glimpses of a very pretty sunset as I drove away from the ridge and headed back to Albany. What a gorgeous area... I will definitely have to try to go down there sometime this summer and ride the trails, sometime during the week when the crowds shouldn't be as bad as on the weekends.
-JMH
2006 event totals
snowshoe - 3 miles, 59.5 min
running - 74.5 miles, 19 hr 51 min
riding - 32.4 miles, 2 hr 32 min
