Last years race was a horrible race for me. It was my first off road event of anywhere near that distance. I had a horrible start.. at mile 40 I did start feeling better [which seemed like a good sign].
This year my fitness is down. It is not for a lack of trying but I had a horrible winter, with set back after set back. It was off enough I was unsure which race to enter. Some.. I was not sure I could complete the longer, I also have a 24 hour race coming up [in 3.5 weeks now] and I was worried about recovery.
I have a friend... close to my age who has a lot of endurance race experience...that has been following my training and he convinced me I was ready... and it would be enough time to recover for my next race.
Wow! What a tough race. It was fairly warm and humid.. much of the course was quite technical.. and of course it was hilly.
It still wasn't a great race for me, but I did improve over last years. Due to some injury my upper body is weaker than last year.. and that cost me. Many people had cramping issues. Some that never have that problem. My legs were cramping the night before sitting around the fire..
I knew that wasn't good.. I tried drinking a lot, but that only left me getting up to pee every hour.. and didn't seem to help rehydrate me. My hands had started cramping just a few miles into the race. I never got into a full lock out.. can't move cramp... but I had both legs.. quads, calfs and hamstrings affected [as well as hands] I did have some sections I had to walk.. trying to loosen them up... and some technical sections I had to walk because the body english to get me through them.. would trigger more cramping.
I did have a mechanical which cost me maybe 10 min.
As bad as I was at times.. I was my strongest at the end again.. The last 15 or some miles I felt pretty good. While most people were fading.. I was getting stronger.. and I caught quite a few people and moved into 3rd in my class. [Without the mechanical.. I would have had second] [although I had no idea on any of this until after the finish.] I felt so good at the end.. I actually sprinted and did a nice full bunny hop crossing the finish line. [Of course it would have been better if I had expended more of this energy earlier in the race.]
