The Twisted Ankle marathon isn't your typical marathon. For one, it's on the trails. Two, there are going to be wicked elevation climbs. I'm a little unnerved that they had to change the course at the last minute and the RD has yet to give any indication of what the new elevation chart will look like. All I know is there's going to be a ridiculous climb (a 20% grade for about .6 miles) at mile 9 and 22 (of course it would be in the last 6 miles- of COURSE!). Everything in between is a mystery, but perhaps that is a good thing since ignorance is bliss.
Interesting to note- last year's first place finisher had a time of almost 4 hours. There were 5 women in my age group, with the fastest time being 4:44 and the slowest being 6:50.
Those numbers sure give me an idea of how difficult this course is going to be. Hopefully I'll fit somewhere in between.
It seems like every time I make a goal for myself and openly and publicly declare it- it always comes back to bite me in the derrière. But I just.can't.help it!
So my goal for this race....
Based on my last 50k time and my last mountain training run, my goal is to get as close to 5:59:59 as possible. That's about a 13:40/mile pace, and I'd be lying if I thought that was going to be easy (for comparison's sake, I ran the Savannah RnR marathon with a 10:45/mile pace).
I plan to: run the down hills, "shuffle" the levels, and crawl, I mean walk the uphills. Just like the Fools run, I plan to eat something every other mile and take an e-cap every 5 miles. Hopefully, this will keep the tummy gremlins at bay.
And to end on a positive note, I'll leave you with this quote from an ultrarunning guru I know, "at least it's called the 'Twisted Ankle' and not the 'Broken Ankle' run. You can at least run on a twisted ankle."
Done anything stupid lately?
love that last dog pic :)
ReplyDeletelol that name scares the crap out of me, i'm not going to lie. I think regardless of your time it's a HUGE win because the course sounds so daunting. GOOD LUCk though, if anyone can rock it, it's you!
ReplyDeleteYep, I let my friend talk me into doing it too! :-) There are definitely plenty of places on the trail where it's not bad at all. There's even some asphalt at the beginning and end, some grass around a lake after that, and some really pretty, fairly flat and smooth places throughout. For every uphill, I started running, and *very* quickly went to a walk. We don't need to feel bad about that at all. "Walking good!!" Becky's Bluff was very tough and made my calves burn, but it actually didn't seem that long. There's a part referred to as a "fire break" which means it's an ungraded part of the trail with all sorts of impediments to progress. That will definitely be a slow, tedious part. A friend who runs many trail races just told me this advice: Keep your eyes focused 3 steps in front of you and look for the "sweet spot" for landing. Then, try to make your steps in between as even as possible and try to keep in a rhythm. Sounds pretty good, so I'm going to try it. Truly, this is no venture to worry at all about time. We will try to stay safe, have fun, and push with everything we've got to endure the pain toward the end. Then, we'll rest and feel like rock stars!!!
ReplyDeleteWow! That sounds super intense! Best of luck to you! And remember to have fun (well, as much as possible!) during it!
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