Chattooga 50K Race 2013

If you would like to spend a day running across rocks, roots, lush river scenes and substantial mountains then the Chattooga 50K is just for you.

Terri Hayes (Race Director) put on a two day option of running it on either Saturday, Sunday (or both) and runners enjoyed a spectacular day of clear blue skies with high temps in the upper 70's.  This was a nice change to her older schedule when the race was held later in June.  The cooler temps were appreciated by everyone.  So were her great volunteers and homemade banana bread!

This was my 4th time running Chattooga and I've been up and down the course on several training runs so there was no worries of getting off course.  As I've been improving my fitness over the past month I was a little concerned about some of the tough climbs and terrain.

My GPS ended up showing about 5,300 FT of climb over about 31 miles.  At least 10 of these miles were along very technical trails littered by rocks and spidery systems of tree roots. 

This is by no means an easy race, but if you're looking for a relatively safe and user friendly run to test yourself with, it's hard to beat this one.

The views along the river more than made up for it though.

This ended up to be a typical "steady" training run for me with nothing too out of the ordinary to speak of.  I hit what is becoming my new normal low point around mile 15 in the race and thought that I would probably have to drop at the next aid station.  I'm not sure what this has been happening over the last month, but it seems to be consistent so I'm just going to plan around it for the next race.

Scott H. was nice enough to hang around with me for most of the run and we enjoyed some scenic miles together along the river.

We were surprised to see Epic Joe and Leslie join in to run with us as they were volunteering at the mile 16/20 aid station.  I was beat down when they met up with us and it was great to have them run into the aid station with us, and then go out for some more mileage.

On the return trip to the finish around mile 27 we decided that it was just warm enough to jump in.  The water was a bit breath taking at first, but was just perfect after about 15 minutes.  We both noticed that our feet hurt for about a mile afterwards due to them going numb in the cold water.

I started feeling much stronger around mile 28 and felt like I could have easily kept running into the evening and night.  This was very encouraging after battling through some tough runs over the past months.

I ended up with a 8:49 finishing time which was about 1:15 off my best time, but I messed around a lot on the trail enjoying myself.  No regrets as I'm keeping my eye on the prize for my two 100's in the fall.

Here is the run data if you're interested:

Thanks to Tiana for the pictures & support.

Race For This City Jackson GA 32 Mile Race

I signed up for this one on a whim to use as a training run for some fall hundos I have on the calendar.  Ok, so in reality it was a good excuse to play in the woods and hang out with some great friends too.  Annie mentioned this one to me as we were running Leatherwood and a few weeks later I found myself heading down to Jackson, GA with C$ and Weezy.  Just like old times...

We all knew that this was a inaugural race and that normally means that things will go wrong.  To make a long story short the trail was not marked adequately and runners were literally all over the place.  Weezy and I were just out for a good hard training run together and Annie stuck with us for most of the day too.  Christian took off like a banshee from the start and ended up placing 2nd overall.  Annie, Wayne and Myself managed top 10 finishes in a field of......uh ummmm.........14 runners, but hey you take what glory you can find in the ultra world of racing.

After seeing all of the trail confusion early Wayne & I agreed to run about 6 to 6:30 hours and call it a day no matter where we were on the course.  We felt that we could cover 32 miles for sure in that time on this course.  We did end up finishing around 6:05 so it worked out well.

The RD was very apologetic about the course and vowed to make things right next time by giving us a free entry.  This was a VERY runnable trail system (Dauset Trails) with small rolling hills and beautiful stretches along lush creek beds.  Even with the mix up in logistics I really enjoyed this race.  There were about 14 aid stations along the 32 mile course with cold drinks and great food choices.  The volunteers were as helpful as possible too.

Any day that you can go out and run 32 trail miles, meet new friends, and hang out with your old ones is a GREAT day in my book.

I'm now focused on running the Chattooga 50K on the Foothills Trail in two weeks as I whip myself back into shape for The Georgia Jewel 100 Miler and Pinhoti 100 in September and November.

I'm excited to be heading into the hot part of the year which is my favorite time to train!