Sunday, October 30, 2016

Slow & Steady 2016 - Race #45
Hairy Gorilla Half Marathon Trail Race
Sunday, October 30, 2016

I checked and apparently I've run this race 7 times in the 12 years it's been happening. One year it was cancelled because we got something like a foot of snow the day before, a couple of times I bailed at the last minute because they'd changed something that aggravated me (bringing in a time cutoff at the 5.8 mile point, changing the course to it's current version) and most recently (two years ago) I dropped down to the six mile race because the weather was awful (freezing rain) and the thought of spending another 90+ minutes out there was very unappealing.

This year the big question was whether or not I'd beat that time cutoff. I've been using a strategy of start slow and gradually increase pace, especially for longer events. It's worked very well for me... I tend to run negative splits and find myself passing other runners as the end draws closer. Unfortunately, that slow starting pace is somewhere in the mid-14's or low 15's, and making the time cutoff meant I'd need to average at least 13:30 per mile for pretty much the 1st six miles. I'd find that challenging on paved roads, much less on Thacher's trails.

It wasn't fun or pretty, but I did manage it, squeaked through with about a minute to spare. (Next time I'm going to petition for an early start option.) Unfortunately, that left my legs in the same shape they'd be in after I ran all out for a 10k or so... except I had 7+ miles still to go. Needless to say, my pace dropped substantially for the 2nd half, and overall - this race hurt.

I liked the course about as much as I expected to... in other words, I didn't particularly like it. Don't get me wrong, running at Thacher is a wonderful thing to do, especially in the fall when the weather is cool and the leaves are changing. But when the HGH course was changed to match the August Trail Running Festival course, it lost one of the features I enjoyed the most about it, namely the fact that much of the course was different from the Indian Ladder 15k route, and even the trails that the two shared tended to be run in the opposite direction. Now there's substantial overlap, and of course the current course is virtually identical to the Trail Running Festival. I'm sure there are all sorts of good reasons for doing it this way... but I really liked the old courses, and I don't know that I'll ever feel all that fond of the new one.

On the plus side - that gives me more options for the last weekend in October, since I won't mind missing the Gorilla to run a race somewhere else. And if I'm going to be in Albany that weekend, I can probably count on getting in a nice run at the Gorilla... especially if I can get that early start option so I don't have to darn near kill myself to beat a time cutoff.

One other plus to today's race - I guess the running I've been doing has done some good. All of my other half marathons this fall were quite a bit easier than this in terms of terrain and running surface, and they all took me right around three hours. So running this tougher race in 3:07 is a welcome indication that I've made some progress... even if I'm still slow as a turtle racing in a vat of molasses.

JMH

2016 Event Totals
Run 316.8 mi, 76 hr 55 min
Bike 119.2 mi, 9 hr 1 min
Snowshoe 6.2 mi, 1 hr 39 min
Kayak 1.5 mi, 20 min

states visited: CT, MA, ME, NH, NY, PA, RI, VT
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