Even by Kansas standards race day was unseasonably cold and windy with near gale force winds out of the north east and a high that barely reached 40 degrees. Thus wind chills were deep into the 30s all day long and remained about the same overnight as the wind eased somewhat but the temperatures plummeted to freezing. The race course is a 50 mile out and back and so most of the out bound leg was either directly or indirectly into the wind! Fighting the wind was extremely demoralizing and I could not wait to hit the turnaround. The return leg was much easier having mostly a strong tail wind to guide me home. I ran the first 25 miles , to the Teterville Road aid station, with my wife Kathy, who would end up going on to win the women’s race in the 50 mile event, in around 4 ½ hours. After Kathy turned around to finish up her race, I continued on and ran right around 4h 55m to get to half way (9h 25m for 50 miles). I had a slower go over the next 25 miles as night had fallen over one of the more difficult sections of the race course. It took me nearly 5h 35m to cover those 25 miles. However I began to “feel my oats” so to speak and sped up over the remaining 25 miles covering this ground in around 5h 22m to finish 11th of 61 starters and 41 finishers in 20 hours 21 minutes and 33 seconds.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
2009 Heartland 100 Mile Run
Even by Kansas standards race day was unseasonably cold and windy with near gale force winds out of the north east and a high that barely reached 40 degrees. Thus wind chills were deep into the 30s all day long and remained about the same overnight as the wind eased somewhat but the temperatures plummeted to freezing. The race course is a 50 mile out and back and so most of the out bound leg was either directly or indirectly into the wind! Fighting the wind was extremely demoralizing and I could not wait to hit the turnaround. The return leg was much easier having mostly a strong tail wind to guide me home. I ran the first 25 miles , to the Teterville Road aid station, with my wife Kathy, who would end up going on to win the women’s race in the 50 mile event, in around 4 ½ hours. After Kathy turned around to finish up her race, I continued on and ran right around 4h 55m to get to half way (9h 25m for 50 miles). I had a slower go over the next 25 miles as night had fallen over one of the more difficult sections of the race course. It took me nearly 5h 35m to cover those 25 miles. However I began to “feel my oats” so to speak and sped up over the remaining 25 miles covering this ground in around 5h 22m to finish 11th of 61 starters and 41 finishers in 20 hours 21 minutes and 33 seconds.
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