| Today I ran my first 25K trail-running event. A number of factors brought me here, not the least of which was the happy coincidence of my finally getting healed up from some sports-related injuries and meeting a special someone who already had a love for the longer-distance events. Allow me to digress very briefly and say that I have been competing in trail-related sports (XC mountain bike racing, 24-hr mountain bike racing, and adventure racing of various lengths) for a number of years, but that since the birth of my youngest child, my energy necessarily has been focused on working and being a mom. When my son entered school, I found some time to start training again, doing the occasional race. But then I began to be plagued by back issues, and then calf issues. My time spent running was suddenly minimized, and my focus was necessarily on mountain biking. Fast forward a year, and an acquaintance of mine tells me about Dr. Chris Sellers, aka The Miracle Worker. And within a couple of months, I’m running again! Hallelujah! On my very first “long” run, I bump into Oz, and within a couple of months, we start dating. It doesn’t take long before I realize that, between Oz’s love for longer trail-running events and my newfound ability to do longer runs, my athletic endeavors have just taken a new path.
I used the Rogue summer series to help me do some longer runs, pacing Oz on his 2nd and 3rd laps of the 30K distance. I continued working on longer runs in my training. And I examined the race calendar to see what events I might do next. Oz loves the Bandera run, and with it coming up fairly soon, I decide to try an “easier” 25K prior to that. So I pick Warda. I’ve been racing mountain bikes at Warda for over 12 years. I know the terrain and character of the trail very well. And I figure it will be an “easy” introduction to the 25K distance. Ha! Best laid plans, and all that. We’ve been watching the weather leading up to today’s event. We know about the rain on Thursday night and Friday, forecast to end in the wee hours of Saturday morning. Knowing the sandy soil of Warda, I proclaim that the course will still be in very nice shape for the race. Not to worry. It turns out that the rain has other ideas, hanging about until mid-morning on Saturday and turning the trail into a slog-fest, especially in the second half of the course. But our spirits stay high as we weather (pardon the pun) the conditions together. And of course we meet several great folks along the way: the lady in pink who stayed with us most of the first lap (sorry, I didn’t get your name), Gordon and his belt buckle at the first aid station, Henry and his jams at the second aid station, Joe’s son Ryan (and his baby, Hannah), Joyce, and several more people whose names I didn’t get. And Joe himself, who seemed a little too delighted at the challenge presented us by the mud. All in all, it was not the race experience I had in mind, but it was very satisfying to meet the challenge of dealing with the conditions. And of course I got to spend time enjoying this activity with my sweetie. I ended up with the fastest female time, and got the coolest trophy—a large metal ant of rock and stone. Life is good! (So, Bandera is not slippery when wet, is it??!!) |