Story
I needed to put down an 11 miler this week, so I figured I’d head back to Hammond Hill and score a pair of Loomis runs. My goal time was 2 hours, which broke down to 10 minute miles plus 5 minutes at the ol’ Yaris aid station.
I did my first lap counter-clockwise again, and promptly went down on a root pretty hard at about 1.1 miles, just past Carson, but I wasn’t going to let that set the tone for the rest of the morning. Saw Jilene blow by me in the opposite direction at about 2.8 miles, en route to a 47 minute finish, and one pair of elderly hikers, but other than that the trails were all mine.
I came in to the aid station pretty hot, given the 2 miles of downhill I was just coming off of, and I wanted to keep that momentum, so I dumped some water on my head, chugged as much Gatorade as I could, grabbed a banana for the road, and back out for round two. 72 seconds, which I soon regretted once I started heading back uphill again – should have given myself another minute or two to chill and rehydrate more. I also hate ripe bananas, but mid-run, can’t waste energy on chewing!
Second lap was fairly uneventful, until I hit the wall a little past 10 miles. Within a few minutes though, my pace had picked up again for the last mile, as the adrenaline from the very fresh bear evidence (definitely not there on the first lap) helped me get back to the car ASAP.
Upon changing back at the car, I noticed a pair of hitchhikers on my shoulder.
All in all, another nice morning on the trails. I ended up 1:55:20, which was 9:55 pace including the aid station, which is right where I want my 50K to be – I just need to do what I did this morning 2 more times back to back…not daunting in the least!