Before I start my race report let me acknowledge that
a) it is ridiculously long,
b) it is overly self-indulgent, and
c) it was a pretty middling performance.
...but I had fun writing it.
Let me also correct another egregious error from my initial post--it was my very last mile that was ~6:26 (actually, after a better analysis, it was closer to 6:23)....however, the overall average for the third leg was ~6:34/mi. I had to do some estimation, because I'd forgotten to start my Garmin until I was 0.2 miles into the leg....and the first 0.2 was pretty fast (a bit downhill) at about 6-flat pace (by extrapolation). Also, in the end, my overall average pace was ~6:32/mi, which is pretty slow compared to where I think I could be (if fit and trim), but also probably about as good as should be expected given where I am at these days. OK, with all these caveats in place, here is the protracted report.
Race Report River-to-River 2015
The guys I ran this with are all from Wisconsin (Madison area) and are organized around my old HS track coach, Tom Kaufman, who is a pillar of the running community in the Madison area. There aren't enough positive superlatives that I can state about him and his dedication to the sport, as a runner, mentor, coach, and friend. Five of the guys are pretty much the staple core of this River-to-River team and have been running it for the past couple decades. The other three (myself included) are fill-ins to round out the crew of 8. Tom entered us in the handicap division, which gives time handi-caps based upon the age and gender of the 8 runners; as a 55-yo male, for example, I had an 10:00 handicap. Our teams total handicap was 1:06:45 (which was actually on the low side for this division.) Some of the teams in our division had up to a 3-hour handicap! It's a bit of a crap-shoot to decide which division to enter: Masters or handi-cap. In recent years, the winning masters times have been completely out of reach for this predominantly 50+ crew; which is why, six or so years ago, Tom switched over to the age/gender-graded handicap division, in which they've had moderate success (we won it last time I ran with them in 2011.)
We met up Friday evening in Marion IL, the location of race central and the only nearby town with enough accommodations for this many runners (250 teams). The race goes off in four waves starting at 6:15 and leaving each half-hour. To get to the start, we had to drive about 45 miles, first by interstate, then by state and county highway, and finally up a gravel road into the "Trail of Tears" State Forest above Wolf Lake. The climb took us from 300 feet elevation to about 750 feet for the start, and was pretty serpentine near the top. Race crew were stationed at the bluffs to insure no cars would take a "wrong turn"! All the A cars (since we were a seeded team, we were allowed to have two vehicles, an A car with runners 1(me),3,5, and 7, and a B car with the others, rather than a single Van) would then line up on the same dirt road that we would be running down. The cars would then take off with about 10-minutes prior to the start, leaving us 1st-leg runners at the peak awaiting final instructions. I could never quite figure out the logic used to decide who's in which wave, but all the seeded-handicap teams were in this first wave, whereas all the fast young studs were in the last wave leaving 1-1/2 hours after us. The other categories and the unseeded teams then filled in the gaps in seemingly random order.
On to the race! It was cool, overcast and slightly misting for most the morning; thankfully, the severe weather they'd been predicting all week was now predicted to hit much later in the day. Promptly at 6:15, the gun went off and down the dirt road we went. The first half mile actually has a couple of 30-50 foot climbs, before it plunged (the second 1/2 mile dropped about 150 feet). A few of us immediately separated from the rest, with one guy quickly getting away from me, and I hung with the second guy through about 2 miles before he inched away. Neither of these two guys, were in our division, and it turns out these were also their teams fast guys. According to my Garmin, at the very steepest section, I was down to about 5:00/mi. As the road slowly leveled out, I also slowed, considerably. I tried best I could to both negotiate the tangents and avoid the pits in the road. I think I was fairly successful at both. By the time we came out of the forest (back at 350 feet elevation) to the county road after 3.5 miles, I was about 30-seconds behind the second guy who was well behind the first, the remainder were a minute or more back from me. The exchange came up very quickly and I gave it off to runner two. My total time for this leg was 21:48 for 3.6 miles (Garmin paces 5:46,6:06,6:19,6:37). I should note that I was playing it a little safe, in that I didn't want to blow up my quads on this first leg....but I was still pretty well spent by the exchange, with my left leg significantly more fatiqued than my right (something I'll need to work on). The remainder of the legs would be on county roads.
Even though I came out third from the first leg, we fully expected that within the next couple of legs our team would be well out in front of the other 6:15-start teams and so it was. I'd provided a link to the course layout in a previous post, so you can see what the legs looked like. They ranged between 2.5 and 4 miles with a wide range of difficulties; no one got off easy. By the time baton came back around to me (leg 9 of the race), we were essentially running time-trials as the first runners on the course. My second leg pretty much kicked my butt. It had four climbs of 100 feet or so (and a fifth 50 foot climb) on a poorly paved road (by far the worst paving on the course.) I had to choose my path judiciously so as not to get pinched into inescapable loose gravel patches. Again, I was mostly successful at this, but I did have to run through a few sections of poor footing. By 2.7 miles in, though, I was running out of leg-strength (the penultimate climb was run at about a 7:30 pace), and I couldn't remember whether it was a 3.35- or 3.6-mile leg. Around 2.9 miles I was starting to hit the last climb and my pace had slowed to 7:30/mi. I put my head down and started driving up the last hill praying that it was only 3.35 miles and this was it; I got my pace back to 6:40 or better by the crest. Good thing I was right, because I couldn't have made it another 1/4 mile....my legs were shot. My goal was to keep this leg under 7:00/mi and I did....barely (6:58/mi as per my Garmin).
In the mean time, back on the course, the fastest, young teams were rapidly gaining on us. during the second round of legs, the A car for the lead open-division team started to arrive while we were still at the stop, and finally somewhere in the 15th leg they passed us. There was clearly no staying with them, but the question was how many fast teams would catch us before the final chute? I received the baton for my 3rd leg about 5-minutes after noon, so we were on pace to break 9 hours (our goal). Also, by now the Sun was starting to peek out so the temperature was climbing and it was still humid. The third leg should have been my easiest. It was 3.3 miles, had only one significant climb, and a lot of modest downhill before and after the climb. I started out fast on the first downhill but slowed to about 6:30 pace on the flat preceding the climb. The front part of the climb was steep and for a moment, I almost hit 8:00/mi, showing that I'd never really recovered any power from the beating I took on my second leg. As the hill leveled a bit, I was thankfully able to recover some pace. Without any power left in my legs, during the last two miles you could easily see my pace fluctuate wildly on every change in elevation: 6:20 on the downs, 7:20 on the ups. Finally, there was one last little downhill where I could see the finish, and I started to push (hoping I'd not misjudged the distance.) I got back into 5:50 pace briefly and finished the last little rise into the exchange just over 6-minute pace. As stated above, my average pace on the leg ended up at 6:34/mile. My day was done, my legs were absolutely spent, I felt physically miserable, but mentally I was at ease. There was absloutely no way that I could have run a respectable fourth leg.
I was lucky in that I finished before the wind picked up. There was a lot of headwind running for the rest of the guys, although the humidity did start to drop. A couple of our runners had to will their spent bodies through their final leg, while others had remarkable strength and endurance through to the end. But everyone pretty much doubled over and was wobbly when they finished their last leg. We figured our last runner (the youngster of the group at 45 and an ex-800m D1 college runner back in the day) would have to run around a 6:20 pace into Golconda for us to have a chance to break 9 hours, and he did easily pulling us in at 8-hours, 58-minutes and change (I forgot how many seconds.) Only one more team passed us during these final legs, so we entered the chute as the third team in. After the usual immediate post-race stuff, we hit the showers and came back into town to see how we faired against the other handicap teams and to see if any other teams had come in with an overall faster time. Unfortunately, it was already clear that we would do no better than fourth in this division as the perrenial elder statesmen (Los Tortugas from New Mexico) were joined by a group of ladies from Chicago (Chicago Gazelles) who already owned the women's record and the women's masters record with their team of former olympic marathoners and other fast ladies. Additionally, another team from Madison was a formidable challenge and nipped us by a few handicapped minutes at the end. Interestingly enough, only three teams came in ahead of us this year on raw time (all open division), so we were fourth fastest overall and would have been first had we entered the straight up masters division! Go figure! We headed over to a local watering hole to enjoy a round of beers (or two) before the awards ceremony.
Before the awards could be handed out, though, the storms that had been predicted finally descended on us with gusto! It was our cue to stay in the tavern for a another round (other than the designated drivers, of course) to wait out the storm. In the mean time, the officials finally decided to cancel the awards ceremony on account of the repeated storms and delays. Other teams were still out on the course; some probably getting pelted by hail....but they raced on (although, at some point, the course was officially closed)! As such, there were some very drenched teams bringing home the baton (it happened here too, SCGal!) Once the weather settled down, we headed back to Marion to recount the day and take in some pizza. Despite being a less-than-my-best performance, it was a great experience, especially to be able to share it with such fine gentlemen as this crew from Madison. I'll likely join them again for another go, hopefully more aerobically-fit and a little lighter.