About a month or so ago, I thought it would be a good idea to incorporate some hill workouts in my marathon training. After all, the hills at Big Sur are what I hear people complaining about the most. What a better way to do this than join a Brazen trail race! I looked at Brazen's race calendar, and saw that the Badger Cove half marathon would fall on March 16th, a week where my long run was scheduled to be 12 miles. Perfect timing... or at least I though it was.
Well, fast forward to this past weekend and it was time for my first trail half marathon. I was already kind of worried about this race, since I've never run a half in this type of terrain. Brazen labels this as part of their "Ultra Half" series, which makes it sound even more dubious. To make things worse, the week leading up to this race was not a good one. Work was super crazy and on top of that, I caught a cold. Basically, a whole week of training leading up to the race was wiped out. On race day, I still wasn't feeling well and had a nagging cough that kept me up part of the night. I finally resorted to taking some of the "good" cough medicine, but that left me feeling kind of hung over that morning. I contemplated about pulling out of the race, but I decided to go through with it and I promised my wife I would try to take it easy if I wasn't feeling up to it.
The race was held at Lake Del Valle in Livermore, CA. This was my first chance to go there and it was beautiful! It was just south of the vineyards and wineries of the Livermore Valley and had gorgeous views everywhere.
The start of the race was a brisk 48 degrees. The Mountain House Running Club was in full force and well represented in all the distances (5k, 10k, half).
The race started and all seemed well. I moved up to one of the groups up front and tried maintaining a pace of 7:30 min/mile while I was on the flat terrain. Once we started running uphill, that's when some issues arose. I don't know if it was my cold, the cough medicine, or all the above, but after the 2nd or 3rd mile, my mind was starting to wander (more than usual) and thoughts about quitting crept into my mind. Questions raced through my mind like, "Why are you running this? Why aren't you in bed resting?" Valid questions, but strange nonetheless. I actually considered dropping out at that point. I tried to ignore these thoughts and pressed on ahead, but it seemed like I couldn't shake them, especially during those uphill climbs. What to do...
Eventually, I think the physical issues overwhelmed the mental ones as I was having a hard time with both the uphills and the downhill segments. I was finding myself walking the majority of the uphills and struggling down some of the steep downhills. There was one particular downhill segment that I had to run through twice where I almost lost my footing on both occasions because it was so steep. I was noticing that my knees were taking a beating because of the downhills. At one point I came close to injuring my left knee because of a particularly bad jolt I had experienced on a descent, but thankfully, it wasn't anything serious.
I don't know how I got through the two loop course, but I finally made it to mile 12 and the home stretch. Home free, right? Uh uh. My left calf muscle started cramping up. I tried numerous times to stretch it out, but every minute it would cramp back up again. At one point, I let out a high pitch shriek and a woman behind said, "I know that cry! You cramping up?" Yes ma'am, I was. Thanks for asking. With the end in sight, I tried to jog as painless as possible to the finish line. With my arms barely held up in some silly attempt at a victory salute, I crossed the finish line almost doubling over immediately. It was finally over!
Post-race, I gladly indulged in the free sports massage to get my calf worked on. I also realized that I didn't really cough during the race. That didn't stop my cough from returning afterwards, but it was a small blessing I guess. Actually, it was a small miracle that I made it through the race and managed a decent time. I have no idea how that happened. This was the toughest race physically and mentally that I've run to date. Hopefully, this will make Big Sur a little more manageable.
Race stats: Distance: 13.1 miles, Finished in 1:54:09, 8:43 min/mile, 23rd/240 overall, 5th/24 in Men's 35-39, Total Elevation Gain/Loss: Approx. 2,250’
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