Lots of fresh powder for this morning’s run! I think there was about 4 inches of fresh snow, but I still wanted to hit the hills of the trails. There was enough snow that I ran with a skier and his dog for a short bit! Look for him in the one picture!
The workout was a 6×300. Given the snow it was more about effort level than a specific pace for me. It was fun to play in the snow a little bit too! The total run was 3.94 miles in 43:33.
1:58
1:54
1:59
1:40
1:25
1:43
Evening runs are definitely not my forte. But it was nice to run in the warmth of the sun! And in shorts!
I ran on a mixture of snow pack, ice, mud and dry pavement. In one case dry pavement disappeared into a muddy mess and a few steps later snow pack! That mixture made it a little more enjoyable. The 4×800 not so much!
I setup the workout in my Garmin, but then forgot to switch to it. Ugh. So the intervals and rest weren’t exact. I did get to mix in more hills with this run.
5 miles in 48:34
4×800
.64 – 5:27
.55 – 4:26
.47 – 4:36
.5 – 4:00
You can’t complain about a free race! That being said, I was quite surprised when my Garmin said 4 miles at the end of the race, it was after all the MDRA Mudball Classic 4 miler. In the 3 years we’ve lived here, this is the first of the free races that I’ve run. I look forward to doing more of them.
Obviously, low-key this trail race at the Quaking Bog was a perfectly fun way to get back into the race scene. It was 36f with wind chill of 22 at the start, fortunately it was quite sunny. I was perfectly dressed: shorts, long sleeve, and singlet with gloves and ear warmers. Took off the ear warmers mid-second lap. Before the race started I wasn’t sure if I’d dressed properly or not, so I was quite glad as we started that it felt good.
The race was 3 1.34 mile loops starting just up the trail from the Quaking Bog parking lot. Within the first 30 feet you were heading up a hill. There are a million different options for running through the Quaking Bog area and I think there were 3 or 4 “major hills” and then a few smaller ones. I positioned myself towards the middle of the pack and went out really slow. I had no idea what to expect since I’ve only done slow base mileage. My goal was to have fun and finish strong. I ended up deciding to push up the hills and recover on the downhill and flats. This worked out pretty well and I dropped 3 or 4 people doing that. They would catch up on the flat and then fall back on the hills.
One of the tougher uphills had a tree fallen over the trail, but it was easy to jump/steeple over. The race photographer was there on one of the laps and I’m sure he got some great pictures. If I find the pics, I’ll post a link or post them. This added a fun challenge!! There actually wasn’t a lot of mud, except for at the finish area. This was a fairly large muddy area that got worse each time we ran through!! It made me smile each time. There was a table with water on it around the start area and I paused each time by to grab a drink. I actually stopped and drank, because there was no sense in trying to drink while going up the hill!
The course was marked with flour or chalk (white arrows) which were pretty easy to see, except for in some of the grassier areas. A young boy almost missed a turn on the first loop and in the last lap I almost turned too early (both would have been major short cuts)!
When we came through the second lap someone was yelling out times and I was at 23 something. I felt like that was a pretty good pace and guessed that I was under 10 minute pace and would finish well under 40 minutes. I remember previous run in this area last year when I was in shape that were hard to be under 10 minute pace so I was happy with that. I made sure no one passed me in the last lap and really only had one person try but he ended up 10-15 seconds behind me.
Overall only one person passed me and stayed in front, sadly it was a woman, but she was 3rd overall female I think. I finished in the top 20 (17) and 3rd in my age group. Official Results! Great pictures by Wayne Kryduba. I ran the 4 miles in 34:54. Quite pleased!!
Great morning, great race!!
Almost another perfect day for a spring race made for a pretty good race for me. According to my race plan I was hoping to finish in 1:08 which would have been quite excellent. I actually passed the halfway mark in 34 minutes (and change) but knew I was struggling so it was going to be tough.
I arrived pretty early and got my bib number and start time. The first runners left the starting line at 8:30 and then every one else’s time was handicapped off of it in 1 minute intervals. Based on their projections I started at 9:30 with the last runner starting before 9:40. This gave me WAY too much time to sit around before the race started. It is a low-key race but I still got pre-race nerves. Not an ideal race if you have alot of anxiety. I “gave” my wife the morning off so I didn’t really have anyone to talk with or to take wonderful pictures of me!
As I mentioned due to a bridge being redone on the Luce Line trail the traditional out and back course was modified. They made up all of the missing miles at the beginning which was appreciated. Though they added 3 180 degree turns which wasn’t cool. They are planning on this only being a 1 year diversion so let’s hope that the construction stays on pace!
The Luce Line is a great place for a race because it is a limestone covered dirt trail (according to the DNR). There is some shade off and on along the course and it is more scenic than many road races. The course included 2 water stations which made for a total of 4 potential water stops (although the 4th was about 1/2 mile from the finish). I took water 2x’s. I maybe should have taken some more since it was sunny and a little warmer than we were used to mid-40’s. The weather actually made for some difficult clothing decisions. I didn’t pack 9 different choices like Joe but I had 3 shirt options to wear – long sleeve, short sleeve, or singlet. I had trouble deciding and ended up wearing the short sleeve over the singlet. This was a decent choice given some slight winds.
I was a little surprised by the elevation chart that my Garmin produced. It resulted in a net elevation loss and most of the “hills” seemed like long slow grades not the sharper grades on the chart. But it is close enough! You can tell there are some inaccuracies because the elevation chart should be like a mirror. This year’s turnaround point was at mile 6 so it should be a mirror on either side and it obviously isn’t. Hmmm.
In some sense the slow grades are harder than short quick hills. They wear more on the quads. I was impressed by the overall accuracy of the course measurement – especially given the changes this year. My Garmin produced a 10.03 mile race which may be one of the closest measurements I’ve seen.
A few things of note during the race. Three of us started at my time and we went out a little quick but I stayed with them for the first 2 miles and never saw either of them again. I “caught” the first runner between 4 and 5 miles and got passed for the first time at 6 miles. I cramped up a little bit around mile 5 and it eventually went away. I don’t really remember where the water stops were mileage wise but it seemed pretty reasonable. By miles 7 and 8 I was starting to pass more participants which was a pretty nice feeling. I tried to keep pushing the pace in the late miles – but wasn’t overly successful with that endeavor.
Here are my splits according to the marked miles:
6:48
6:42
6:44
6:59
7:10
7:07
7:20
7:07
7:22
7:06
Based on the results posted at Raceberry Jam I was 15th overall, 12th male, 2nd in my age division and an official finish time of 1:10:31.
For $5 you couldn’t have asked for a much better race. I would be willing to pay a few bucks extra to use a timing chip and potentially save the race director some post-race headaches, including faster post-race awards.
[tags] Fred Kurz, 10 mile, Race Review, Wayzata [/tags]
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This race served as the USATF-MN Cross Country Championships. As with collegiate championships this year it was a 10k. Fitting for the mid-November race, it was cold and snowy when I awoke. By the time we got to the race course, another golf course, the snow had stopped falling but the ground was very wet and soggy.
The course was 4 laps meandering around the golf course hitting a few good sized hills each time and rarely more than a couple hundred yards of flat terrain. Knowing the course would be hilly and wet I secured a new pair of cross country spikes. They did a good job for me. I didn’t slip and fall and I don’t really remember sliding at all while climbing the hills. The Nike Zoom Waffle XC 7 did an excellent job. With the waffle it is only a 4 spike bed. My toes hurt a little bit from jamming but I think that is due to the hills and I should have cut my toe nails!
Each lap was 2,500 meters long and the only distance marker on the course was the 1 mile mark. So if you wanted to do that math that’d be 1600 meters which means that each lap after passing it you had about 900 meters to get to the finish line. This was helpful on the last lap. I felt really good at the start and went out with a few guys from my team. We sorted around a little and ended up with a pack of 3 until about midway into the 3rd lap. At that point I started dropping back a bit. I tried not to let them gap me too much and we all finished within 20 seconds of each other. It was a little disheartening to see Chris pull off the course in front of me during the 3rd lap as I was starting to get tired, but I struggled on and it looks like he’ll be ok.
I didn’t have much of any kick at the end but the finish was also kind of uphill. The cold made it a miserable day. On the way home a bank thermometer said “32” so it was right around the freezing mark for the run. Most of us ran in long sleeves and shorts. Once you got moving your legs weren’t too cold, until you stepped in a puddle or something! There was no precipitation for our race, it was snowing/sleeting for the women’s 5k.
The course had 2 bad spots. One was over a 90 degree turn around a tree that was on the edge of the rough. The other was a hairpin turn around 500 meters to the finish. Both of these caused me to slow down a little, even though I tried running them a little wide.
I finished the race in 43:09 which is 6:57 pace. (That is faster than last week’s 6:59 pace for a shorter run!) I was 6th on our 3rd place team and 32nd out of 39 overall. The winning time was 33:23 by Christopher Erichsen of Collegeville TC. As I was coming around the hairpin turn on my 3rd lap I saw the gator in front of the leaders and vowed not to let myself get lapped. (I didn’t!) Our women’s team placed 4th in their 5k (which was 2 laps of the same course, run after our race).
[tags] USATF-MN, Cross Country, XC [/tags]