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IMRA season 2011
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race report from training log.
Wicklow Trail Race 121:09 / 18th
I arrived at Johnnie Fox's just after 10:30, pretty much straight away I bumped into SJ and his two young helpers (who seemed to be doing most of the work). There was a reasonable mist down over the hills, but i expected that to get burned off by the sun as I had left kilkenny at 9 in the morning under pure blue skies and sunshine.
It had been just over a year since my last outing on the hills in annacurra, and the memories of that run had faded sufficiently for me to reminisce with a rather (misguided) warm and rosy hue about hill running in general. A 25k trail race, sure what could be easier than that?
In the few weeks before this i have been starting to come back into some sort of fitness after my post marathon break. I figured the couple of xc races that I had run recently would stand to me, and checking back on the 2010 results I was able to get a handle on where I should stand against the overall results. Benchmarking against a couple of lads i knew, and all other things being equal, maybe a top 10 - 12 finish is where i figured i could get to. That said, my basic plan was to follow the lead ladies for the course - they were probably about 4 min ahead of me in terms of target time but I hoped their pacing would help me to get the best out of myself.
I hadn't had the chance to do a recce before hand; and was pretty worried about the navigation aspect, but i had downloaded KC's gamin connect link from last year so i had some rough info.
As with most community based events; this one had a really good buzz in the build up. I quickly fell into conversation with a really sound guy beside me who was very experienced and a font of knowledge about the route and what to expect in the way of terrain. According to him, the route is basically 3 big hills; and once you came to the last water stop its only one more hill and you are done.
We got the bus out to the start and basically had a few minutes warm-up before the off, I just had enough time to do some stretches and hide Mithril's lucozade bottle*.
At the off, the legs engaged and my brain turned off I quickly abandoned my plan to track behind the ladies and found myself settling into about 9th place. We ran a couple of k's on forest road before taking a sharp right hand turn and up on to Hill No. 1 (djuice / djoust ). I'm very used to road races where the first few miles are run for fun and you feel numb to the effort required, in contrast here we hadn't even started the real climb and my heart was really racing and my breathing very heavy.
We ran on up to the boardwalk into a stiff cross wind and heavy mist - i had no concept of where i was or what direction i was running. My breathing was still heavy, but i was getting a draft off a guy ahead of me and i didn't want to drop off the pace and lose him. But we came upon an ultra runner, and my draftee skipped by and left me in his wake. I took the opportunity to slow up a little but with the wind it all felt a bit of a battle, I took a quick check of the watch…"ok only about about 90 minutes of this left" oh fcuk.
After the boardwalk, there is a nice trail section around the hill, but I was struggling to get my feet down quickly enough, and occasionally careering off the track altogether, a couple of time I pulled over to let faster runners through. After this there is a really good downhill section on grass which leaves you crossing a bridge at the foot of a really steep hill that i walked up. It's a mad feeling walking up a hill, cursing yourself for having to walk yet not really getting any recovery from the walk - I just remember sweat falling off me.
I reached the top of the hill, and I remember a section that was quite Mordor like; once i reached the start of the downhill I let another guy through. This section in isolation is probably a fantastic run - but my legs were shot and i found the turnover quite hard on the downhills. A young guy from Raheny went by me at this stage and rather than let him go, I went with him - he seemed to have the legs on me going downhill but i could catch him on the flatter sections. We dropped down a long way before coming to the first drinks stop, he grabbed a water and kept going whereas I stopped and drank. The guys at the water stop estimated we were top 15 at that stage.
I continued on and could still see raheny guy ahead of me. He had stretched the lead to a couple of hundred metres by the time we reached the bridge over the river. This whole section was the lowest point for me i think. I felt wrecked and knew I had lots of running still to do, totally aware of the fact I had started to hard and was going backwards in terms of position. Not my usual game plan.
Mid way up my run / walk up the next hill, i was passed by Donna Mahon, spurned on by this I closed the gap on Raheny guy again and by the time I reached the second station i was ahead of him again - having passed him on the road…the lovely flat and friendly road section.
I took a gel and some water at that stop and the second lady passed me like i was standing still, which i was. The battle between me and raheny guy had turned into a rather sad war of the attrition…where he would jog very slowly all the time and i would walk a good bit and then catch him with my "just a tiny bit faster then him" jog, i then wouldn't have the energy or heart to go by him…so i'd just start walking again…repeat as you like.
Two more guys caught us on this hill, they went through us pretty close to the top when we had to go over these massive stones - I went passed Raheny guy at this point and I think he pretty much walked in from there.
Just at the top of this final big hill - i caught up with KC, Fair play to him, even though he had just run a marathon over twice the mountains I had; he gave me some water and a quiet pep talk that got me going again.
It felt great to run the last 4k or so at speed on proper track and road; i chased down one of the guys who had passed me earlier, and crossed the line just over 121' minutes about 15 seconds behind the other guy who passed us on the final hill. I think when the final results are posted I'll have finished in 18th position. In the end i wasn't too far off my target time. But the second lady, Karen Alexander passed me with 8k to go put 3.5' on me in that 8k. Says a lot really.
I have never been as beat up after a race; not even the marathons compare to it. Its now tuesday and i haven't run since - hamstrings, quads and calves all took a fair hammering. I will go back next year, i might just alter my expectations and my race plans before hand. In the meantime, I'm off to spend a summer running road races
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*joke.0 -
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Slogger Jogger wrote: »The lead runners should carry cameras and take a few pics
I have debated running a few descents with a head cam to try prefect my descending....
It could turn out ****, so I didn't bother... ie... why would I want to watch myself running down a mountain, when I could actually be running down a mountain0 -
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Slogger Jogger wrote: »map up for Tonelegee & the Lake.
Is it free route choice? The descent looks kinda curved... Surely its possible to go straighter?
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