I won't give in till I reach the end... and then I'll start again (comments welcome)

[GollyGadget]

Congratulations! Enjoy your nap. And lots of snacks!!

 

[WillRunForPizza]

Congratulations! That is a wild elevation chart lol. Awesome job with those freaking mountains!

 

[striker1064]

Congrats! That is so cool.

 

[NYC_MW]

Amazing!

 

[flav]

Wow, amazing You trained for and conquered!

 

[DopeyBadger]

Woot woot!

 

[azrivest]

Jay Peak 11M Trail Race Race Report​

This run was part of the Jay Peak Trail Running Festival that is held at Jay Peak resort every labor day weekend. It was an opportunity to do my first trail race in a family setting, since we were going to spend the weekend at the resort with my brother's blended family and my parents. This was my brother's 4th time doing the race and he had semi-prepped me beforehand, telling me "Anyone can finish this!", but downplaying it too much since for him, this was not a hard race. Since some runners were doing 3 loops of the 11M, I had until 5pm to finish, with a race start at 8:30.

I had not adapted my training that much, except trying to do my weekend long runs in the mountains, trying out different conditions. An 11-miler race is easily in my reach, but not 3500ft of elevation. I ended up trying all the conditions I would get over the race in different training runs. And isn't race day about putting everything together? We got ski slopes with mowed grass, technical trails in the woods with lots of rocks and branches, and some mountain dirt tracks that were disgustingly muddy.

On Saturday night, we had an info meeting with the race director, who went over the course and the current conditions. He mentioned that this was one of, if not the, most difficult trail races in the North East. And this is my first one? Yay!

The course had 5 aid stations split over the 11 miles:

• ULLR's Dream: Mile 2.2
• Tram (top of the mountain): Mile 3.1
• 242: Mile 5.5
• Stateside: Mile 7.5
• ULLR's Dream: Mile 9.5 (same one as before)
• Finish line

I still decided to be autonomous, since I didn't want to risk any aid stations running out or eating something that did not sit well with my GI tract on the day of. Nothing new on race day right? I'm glad I did, since my good nutrition plan helped me finish strong. I had my pack with a 1L of water mixed with one scoop of Skratch that was meant for drinking on the course, 4 GU gels and 2 Pickle Juice Shots

I split the course up into three sections in my head.

Section #1 - Climbing Jay Peak mountain - 1732 ft climb - 3.ish mi
There were three parts to the climb. The first part was the kind of trail I'm used to. Steady climbing in the forest, with woodsy trails that cross brooks and such. It finished at the first aid station. I took my first GU with two cups of water. I was feeling good. Then right after the aid station was the worst climb. The next 750m was up the ski slope. Noone was running this, it was like climbing stairs. The only thoughts going through my head were "Keep going, don't stop". Doubting my life choices and all that. Then the course went back into the woods. I thought it was going to be more of the steady climb. But not. Again, doubting my life choices. It was another 700m of stair climbing, in rocks and roots. When I exited the forest, I fortuitously crossed my brother who was just coming down from the mountain. He snapped a pic of me trying to look happy:

Then we had another 500m of climbing in the ski slopes, but the incline was manageable. I could do a mix of slow jogging. And before I knew it, I had reached the top in 1:11!

Section #2 - Climbing down to route 242 and back - 500 ft climb - 2.9 mi
I enjoyed the downhill running on the ski slopes, being still careful since it was a rocky terrain where I could easily slip on a rolling rock. We had a little over 1 mile run (1.87k) before we entered the forest again, going on what they call the "Long trail", which was a 1.07mi out and back down to route 242. This was the cruelest part of the course for me, since we had already climbed 1700ft at that point. Knowing I was going down just to go back up again had me inside. Especially since I was starting to be passed by runners doing the 2-loop or 3-loop version of the course. I was in awe that ppl would voluntarily do this 3 times in a row. I again crossed my brother who took another pic:


I look much happier than I feel. I reached the aid station at the bottom in 1:48. Took my 2nd gel, a few Swedish fish and turned around. Trail race is very much a mental game. I really dug deep into myself to again "Keep going, don't stop" up that 2nd climb. Fortunately, it wasn't as steep. If I could finish that 2nd climb, I could finish the race. I rolled my right ankle about halfway through the climb. I continued advancing, telling myself I would stop if it started to hurt. (Spoiler alert: it didn't and it still feels okay this morning) My only thought was to reach the top. I did this in 2:14. We were at roughly the 10k mark at that point. Only 7.7k to go.

Section #3 - Digging deep to finish - ?? ft climb - 6.4 mi
Next part was running down, down, down, to one of the resort baselodges, Stateside. It was a little more than 2k to reach the aid station. My whole family was waiting for me to cheer me on, which I was not looking forward to honestly. I didn't think I'd have the mental fortitude to keep going if I saw my kids. Here's J running with me to the aid station.
But I did because... Bacon Station!! The aid station at Stateside is known to have BACON. grilled fresh right there. Not kidding. Trail does have better snacks than Road. I didn't take any gel and just enjoyed the greasy, salty goodness of grilled bacon for my 4th aid station.

The last part of the race was not "difficult" physically, but oh so difficult mentally. It was all ups and downs in the ski slopes and the dirt tracks. Around KM 14 we hit a 500m patch of muddy grass, like the kind of mud that swallows up shoes. I only had 4k to go at that point so I kept on keeping on. If I had hit some of those conditions early on, I don't know if I would have finished honestly. Then I hit the last aid station, took my last gel, and realized not only could I finish in less than 4 hours, but I was probably going to finish in around 3h30, which was way better than I had ever dreamed of. I cruised down the mountain, again with no ambition of going down too fast. There's one last "little" 150 ft climb half a mile from the finish line. And then, I was one of only 87 finishers in a time of 3:32:39.87:


Final thoughts
Strength training is worth it. I've been doing 4-5h/month and even though it's boring and dumb and I hate it, it really paid off for my trail race. My quads didn't feel too tired in the climbs and my strongish arms helped to control and balance when I was going downhill. And today, I'm not overly sore. DH says I look better than I did after my marathon.

Will I do this race again? Eh. It was a good experience, but also really challenging. I'll give myself some time to recuperate before I consider signing up again. I thought I wasn't going to be ready, but in the end it was the mental aspect that was a lot harder than the physical. Knowing you have another climb to do when you already have 2000ft, 3000ft, done, is not easy, and not all that fun.

Dopey, here I come.

 

[Naomeri]

Holy cow, that elevation map! Great job!!

 

[nancipants]

Amazing job! Congrats!

 

[jmasgat]

I'm not sure if I'm more impressed at you finishing the race or the exceptional leap at the finish line!

 

[striker1064]

Congrats! Awesome job!

 

[azrivest]

Is anybody willing to help me out? I got a POT during one of my races in May. When I look up the results on the Sportstats website, I keep getting No records found. I see my race time:


But when I click on the result, I don't see anything:


I tried reaching out to the company and they said they fixed it, but I still don't see it. Is it my cookes or my browser or something?

I'm really worried if I use this in my Challenge registration, the ppl at Trackshack will just reject my result.

I can DM you the link for someone else to test maybe?

 

[flav]

Is anybody willing to help me out? I got a POT during one of my races in May. When I look up the results on the Sportstats website, I keep getting No records found. I see my race time:
View attachment 792180

But when I click on the result, I don't see anything:
View attachment 792181

I tried reaching out to the company and they said they fixed it, but I still don't see it. Is it my cookes or my browser or something?

I'm really worried if I use this in my Challenge registration, the ppl at Trackshack will just reject my result.

I can DM you the link for someone else to test maybe?

I went and found the race on Sportstats. Nobody has results! Neither on the 5k, nor on the 10k. I also confirmed with your Bib number that you did not have results.

 

[flav]

I went and found the race on Sportstats. Nobody has results! Neither on the 5k, nor on the 10k. I also confirmed with you Bib number that you did not have results.

And I see that all your other races have time associated with them.

I hope that Sportstats will be able to fix this ASAP.

ETA: If Sportstarts does not succeed, could they at least provide you with an email stating your time so you would have something to present at the runDisney expo to be changed corral if they rejected your POT based on a faulty site?

 

[azrivest]

And I see that all your other races have time associated with them.

I hope that Sportstats will be able to fix this ASAP.

ETA: If Sportstarts does not succeed, could they at least provide you with an email stating your time so you would have something to present at the runDisney expo to be changed corral if they rejected your POT based on a faulty site?

I'll try! I'll ask them again to fix it and maybe send me some email proof, good idea. It doesn't hurt to try

 

[azrivest]

Hum, I think I PR'd today, with absolutely no intention of doing it and doing no specific 5k training in months.

I decided to sign up for some catered training runs this fall while I still can. There was a 5k (/10k/15k/30k) being held in my MIL's neighborhood today, so I decided to sign up on a whim yesterday. I figured I could use this as a time trial to have an idea at what pace I should run my easy runs for Dopey training. I have done absolutely no speed work sessions this summer and I've been really tired, so I figured I must have lost at least some fitness since my race in May.

I went out with the 30 min pacer planning on not taking it too hard. I started to distance her and decided to go with it. By km 3.5 I was huffing pretty hard but I just decided to continue running, no matter what the pace.

I finished in 28:41, which was 13th in my AG! This is my fastest "official" 5k

So my 40s are starting out not too bad at all. A 10k PR, a 10M trail race and now a 5k PR

 

[WillRunForPizza]

Congratulations on the PR!!

 

[GollyGadget]

Woo! Way to go!

I'd love some of that PR energy if you have any to spare. I'm racing a 5k in 3 weeks and have done 0 speed work in at least 3 months.

 

[flav]

That reminded me that all my best 5k came while training for much longer races. The « run slow to race fast » seem to apply here too. And of course the volume of training helps a lot.

Congratulations @azrivest
Good luck @GollyGadget

 

[azrivest]

Woo! Way to go!

I'd love some of that PR energy if you have any to spare. I'm racing a 5k in 3 weeks and have done 0 speed work in at least 3 months.

I dunno if I have the energy. My run on Saturday the day before my race was super slow and laborious I think with the experience of doing more Halfs and Fulls, I'm just getting smarter at racing and not going out full blast in the first few minutes.