Thursday, August 13, 2009

DINO 2009 Race #3 - Versailles State Park

Wow. Where to start? So, the race was finally able to go on after being postponed for two weeks due to excessive amounts of rain. It probably wouldn't have been a huge problem since the sun came out each weekend but since one of the trails was only built a couple of weeks prior, the rain turned it into a soupy, slippery, dangerous mess. Suffice it to say that it was a good idea to postpone the event.

An interesting day for us as well. After what was a good morning we ended up leaving quite a bit later than I wanted. This resulted in my starting with the 40+ group which was 2 minutes back from my class. Not really a problem since I'm not yet ready to stand on the podium.

The trails at the park are pretty amazing. HMBA is, again, to be commended on their trail building, especially when you consider that all or most of it is volunteer work. The trails also integrate some of the unique features of the park, including what's called the Waterfall:

As you can see, this is just exposed rock and the trail follows along a natural ledge. Pretty amazing but can be quite slippery.

Since I'm not much for planning, I didn't give much thought to making sure I was fueled up for the race. This was evident about halfway through when I felt like I was going to bonk. Luckily, I seem to have a good size reserve since I made it through to the end. I even passed somebody right before the finish line! I finished 10th out of 12 in my age group (wow, top ten!) and 21st out of 31 for Cat3 (results). Even with my 2-minute deficit, it doesn't change my results at all.

Overall, I thought it was a good race that could have been better had I done a better job of planning and preparing. This weekend is race #6 at France Park. I have to redeem myself since I DNFd last year. And I'll have a bigger cheering section, my mom and sister will be there!

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