On the first weekend in May, I headed down to
the Hudson Valley for a 50K trail race as a warmup for the Cayuga Trails
50 Miler. I've previously run the half marathon and full marathon at
the
North Face Endurance Challenge: New York, and thought the 50K would
be a solid training effort for Cayuga. (I crashed at my friend Adam's house the night before the race, which helped immensely on the logistics. Thanks Adam!). Based on my memory of the marathon
from 2013, I figured I could break six hours in the 50K
without putting in an all-out effort. The 50K race started at 7:00 AM. After
some brief pre-race announcements from Ultramarthon Man and North Face
athlete Dean Karnazes, we were off, and by 7:05 I had already realized
how wrong I'd been.
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| Pre-race sunrise. Looks to be a beautiful day! |
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| Cruising in the early miles. Photo: Ultra Race Photos |
In the two years since I'd run the
trails at Bear Mountain and Harriman State Parks, I'd forgotten how the
tough, gnarly terrain took a pretty good toll on my body. Despite being
in better shape with more trail running experience this time around, I
was still running that same marathon course plus an extra
