Point Mugu Trail Run

October 26, 2024

Malibu, CA- 8AM

Unlike many of my recent trail races, which I had decided to do at some point in the summer, this one had been on my radar for quite a while. I was familiar with the SoCal trail race organization, but this one particularly had my eye due to proximity to my home in Thousand Oaks, being very familiar with the route, and knowing Chris Garvin had raced it before. There's something nice about racing on trails that you run on a regular basis. The event was scheduled for April, and had a few late changes. The first was that the old distance of 17K (?) was changed to a half marathon, incorporating some flatter dirt road running. The second change was a bit more drastic as a few weeks before the event, the date was moved to October! Zero email was sent out notifying me about this change, which was a little frustrating. Fortunately, the October date worked for racing it and I'd likely be in much better shape than I would have for April. Small downside was I'd be living in Los Angeles then so the drive was an hour instead of 20 minutes.

I knew this wouldn't be a super deep field, but wasn't sure if there would be a few really strong runners, as can be the case in these events. I found one strong-looking runner on the ultrasignup list who ended up being a no-show (understandable with the date change). My goal for this one was to win. I had a few frustrating 2nd place finishes this year and only one win at Surf City. It'd be nice to get another and I felt this was my best opportunity of my remaining races. I also hoped to be in the range of Chris' effort on some of the segments as I felt his race effort was pretty strong here. 

Pre-race was smooth, although I felt quite sluggish and out of it. I was going to do 2.5 miles out and back for the warm-up but I had to use the bathroom towards the turnaround and knew it would be closer to get to one if I kept going. So warm-up ended up being a little longer than usual at 3.6 miles. The bathroom lines were too long to go again at the start unfortunately and then I had to line up. So few races order enough port-a-potties. Spotted one pretty fast looking guy on the line and no one else looked super serious or wanted to line up in front. There's only 200 meters of road before hitting narrow singletrack, which I had been worried about. Go out too hard for position and risking burning out, or go out too slow and risk losing the race being stuck behind people. My plan was to stick in 2nd or 3rd on the first climb and decide where to make a move depending on pace. 

This was a hilly race with 2,100' of elevation gain but not-technical whatsoever. I had run about 85% of the course before, which was absolutely an advantage. Basically two 1,000' climbs and descents. Race started and I went out very easy to allow others to take position/assert themselves. But everyone else essentially jogged and I found myself at the lead at 6:30 pace. Approached the trail in first, so I just took the lead and went for it as clearly no one was going for a really big day. If I'm going to lead, I'm not giving anyone a free ride, they're going to work to stay with me. I immediately got quite a bit of separation. I ended up hitting the first half mile pretty hard and went through the mile in 7:35 (450' of elevation gain) which was a 5:20 GAP. While my legs felt good, the sluggish feeling of the warm-up remained as I felt quite low on energy. I felt like I was struggling significantly for the remainder of the climb and feeling pretty bad. I was disappointed to see my splits climb into the 8s but turns out these were still fairly solid splits. 

Ray Miller a quarter mile in

Ray Miller just after 2 miles

The race turned onto dirt road, which would be uphill for a little longer but less steep and pretty fast. This gave opportunities to look back on certain sections. There was one long section where if I couldn't see the next guy, I knew I had a pretty big lead. I ended up seeing him right before the turn, but I knew I had at least a minute on him. The next mile was only gradually uphill and my fastest yet at 6:24. The next 2.5 miles would be downhill and pretty fast, dropping back down. 

Finished out the dirt road section, and then had a 1.7 mile descent on the Wood Canyon Vista Trail, dropping about 800'. I had run this several times, and usually came out to around 7:00 pace. One time I pushed it a little harder and ran around 6:30. So I figured race pace here would be close to 6 flat or just under. Not even close- I ran this trail at a 5:24 average pace, much faster than anticipated. I actually felt pretty good too. It helped that the overgrowth from the previous times were cleared, but you can run so much faster on singletrack with the mindset that you're going to hammer compared to running casually. Other than the last few tight switchbacks, I felt I never lost much momentum and moved quickly and consistently. 

Next was 2.1 miles on the sycamore canyon fire road at a very slight downhill grade (about -50'/mile). This would be a great section to hammer and maybe run 5:30s but I was feeling pretty sluggish again. I had been taking gels every 35 minutes in these trail races, but had to wait until hitting the dirt road at 42 minutes to take it here as it'd be too difficult to consume running hard downhill on singletrack. I ran at a more comfortable effort and ran just under 6 minute pace. 

Next would the last climb, up the Fireline trail- 700' in 1.3 miles. Unlike the rest of the course, I had not run on the fireline trail before, but it was steeper than any of the trails I had run. I was expecting a brutal climb and surprised that the first half of it on switchbacks felt pretty manageable as I ran 8:30 pace. I got a good view of the fire road I had come from and was also surprised 2nd place was not in sight (meaning he was at least 2-3 minutes back). It seemed like the win was mine and I could let up if needed, although you never know. Although I think I knew if I ran the wood canyon vista descent well I probably had an unsurmountable gap. After thinking I totally overestimated this climb and it was not bad at all, I hit the last bit- 250' in 0.3 miles (about 16% grade, compared to the 7% on Ray Miller) and this felt absolutely brutal. Took a lot of willpower to just continue running instead of walking. Although at this grade, just running was still a good effort. Hit the top and the rest would be on the overlook dirt road back to ray miller to complete the loop.

End of Fireline trail climb

There was still 200' of climbing left, although spread out over a mile- so pretty runnable. However, my drive was completely gone after the steep climb and I could only manage 10 minute pace initially, actually quite a bit slower than what I've done on easy runs for this sections. It felt so rough and we also hit the 10K runners here. I was barely going faster than them, and these were the mid-packers. I slowly shook out that inability to push and was able to gradually ramp it up until I was back at a race-appropriate pace. Now for the final Ray Miller descent- although I now faced two challenges I had not up until this point in the race. 1) I was overheating a bit. It wasn't that hot- mid 50s but I think the hard effort over hills and more humid than I'm used to got to me. and 2) A problem I've faced in a lot of these races- the people in the other distance were on narrow trail ahead of me, meaning having to slow for them if they can't move over immediately and constantly announce my presence while tired. In this race specifically, there were people going both ways which hadn't happened yet.

I got through most of the traffic in the first half mile but occasionally would have to pass someone else. Interesting I slowly picked off the top runners for the 10K, and I think I caught all but the top 2 or 3. Some of them were hesitant to move over, and it seemed like they thought I was in the 10K and passing them. They probably thought I was rude asking them to move over as if I was in the 10K I was probably only going marginally faster and putting them at a disadvantage to repass. Either they figured it out when I dropped them quickly, or thought I paced it really poorly. 

I felt really tired and drained on this final descent and really just wanted to get it done, plus the overheating was only getting worse. I definitely felt like there was room for improvement on the descent as whole, both having to pass people and I kept the effort at solid, but not not quite 100% as I knew I'd win. Basically went for a "good enough" effort where I had a low risk of blowup and didn't have to suffer. With a quarter mile to go, the race photographer ran behind me to take video. I had no idea he was going to run behind me, and it totally spooked me to hear someone matching my footsteps. I instantly panicked and turned around, shocked that the second placer caught me before realizing what happened. Nearly screwed up the following turn up by turning around. I took it pretty wide and nearly fell off the trail. Finished it up a little faster but didn't really try kicking. It'd be so difficult to actually race someone on this narrow trail to the finish. If you move over, you essentially concede defeat as there won't be an opportunity to repass. If you stay ahead, it might be seen as a dirty move as it'd be nearly impossible to pass. Fortunately, this was not an issue for me as I crossed the line first in 1:28:15. Results here. 7 minute victory, so there was really never any reason for concern but you never know in a trail race as it's often hard to see more than 30 seconds behind you. I can't recall ever having a bigger margin of victory than this.

I felt pretty rough post race for a bit. Like three sisters and kodiak, there was breakfast included which was essentially the same for all three- eggs, beans, tortillas. Unlike those races, this was one was well cooked, seasoned and actually tasted pretty good (the other two races were bland and/or undercooked). I had trouble eating for while as it's tough after a hard effort like that. I talked a while with the 2nd and 3rd place finishers. I feel like that's much more of a trail racing thing, to talk a while with others. Whereas road races usually I just handshake/fist bump the guys right around me and we go our separate ways. 2nd place guy was a triathlete who was just getting into running races for the first time, so that was an interesting perspective to hear. I think the sport of triathlon is really cool and in some ways, more complex and interesting than running. He lived in San Diego and was saying how it was a great place to train. I can't think of anywhere in the US where it would be better to train for triathlon. Anywhere else you can swim year around in the ocean would be really hot.

Overall, I felt this race was well organized and I liked the course. But I really can't justify the insane $147 entry fee. Most of the trail races I did this season cost around that, and it's just crazy to me that most New England trail races are in the $20-50 range and most ones out here are in the $100-150 range. I don't get it. Two additional complaints are 1) changing the race date to 6 months later, not offering any refunds at all, or even notifying the participants. Who does that? And 2) On the website/race email, it shows the winner will receive free entry into the Crystal Cove trail run in December. I couldn't do the race anyway as I'll be driving back to RI, but this was never offered to me in person or emailed to me. A plus was the free (and high quality) photos! It's tough writing 90% of these race recaps with zero photos because almost every race hires photography companies that watermarks and charge over $50 to download the photos which is absolutely not worth it. 

As for my performance, I was pretty happy with this one. It's always reassuring when you can run well when not feeling your best. I felt sluggish and weak for much of this, but my splits were still consistent and strong. I think the most room for improvement would be the dirt road section on Sycamore Canyon as you could run some really fast splits there. These were also my only miles with a GAP over 6 minutes. Being pushed always helps as well. I was also happy to get the win. I had not won any race since Surf City 5K in February and I knew this would be one of my best opportunities to win. The field ended up not being very strong, but I ran a strong, consistent effort throughout in time-trial fashion. Only disappointment with that is I haven't won a close race and I'd really like to do so as it feels that isn't in my skillset as I typically get dropped late or outkicked in races like that. This effort felt close to my best, whereas some other races like Three Sisters or Kodiak I feel like parts of my race were really not close to half marathon race effort (I was running much slower than my best). 

Point Mugu- Weekly Log: October 21 to 27

 Back to racing. Had my eyes on this for a while back when I was in Thousand Oaks.

Monday: 0 Miles

Tuesday: 9 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Griffith. Was going to workout but the combination of flat legs and having a short time window before an appointment made me bail. Explored a new trail.

Wednesday: 11 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Car was being worked on, which is tough as running from my apartment is pretty terrible (sidewalks, busy area, ghetto) but sitting on public transport drenched in sweat post-run isn't ideal either. Split the difference and took public transport out and ran back. First 8 miles were fine as I stayed on my typical Elysian Park loop, last three were terrible going through downtown on sidewalks with frequent traffic stops. Super hot day, got up to the mid 80s and I stupidly didn't bring water so it got rough. I felt fine running but felt like I had to vomit when I stopped. 

Such a dirty city

Huge homeless encampment on Sunset

Thursday: 10 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Griffith post-car pickup which meant an evening run. The nice thing about the evening is the sun has gone down, but it's never a great time for me as fueling is difficult and I was full on this run.

Friday: 10 Miles- South Pasadena, CA

Arroyo Seco loop minus the top part. Still ended up 9.5 miles with strides, which is a bit long for pre-race.

Saturday: 17 Miles- Malibu, CA

Point Mugu trail run. Race went well.

Sunday: 10 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Griffith loop. Sore from yesterday. Generally didn't feel great on this one and had to poop mid-way. Walked around for 15 minutes before finding a bathroom.

Weekly Total: 67 Miles

Weekly Highlight: Good race

Weekly Lowlight: The other runs didn't feel great

Yosemite- Weekly Log: October 14 to 20

 No race this week, used the opportunity to get a long run in at the famous Yosemite National Park.

Monday: 9 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Elysian Park loop. I had been parking at the Los Angeles State Historical Park which costs $5 to park there. So changed it this week to park in the actual Elysian Park for free. But not the best timing to switch lots as there was a Dodgers playoff game (Dodger Stadium is in Elysian Park), which made parts of the run a bit different. Fortunately able to find parking just fine, although the first few miles had so many cars parked on the road compared to usually just a few. 

Tuesday: 11 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

I run in Griffith Park 2-4 times a week now so there's not much to remember these individual runs by. The first few times I ran here with Matt we went through the popular areas: Observatory, Mount Hollywood, Hollywood sign. But those areas are not only more crowded, but require an OAB at some point. So running from the railroad or Greek theater (Eastern side of park) is usually better to make a good loop. This one was from the railroad, with the last 5 miles on the flat main trail.

Wednesday: 10 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Griffith Park workout. Ran hard up to the observatory and mount hollywood, and then finished out the 3 miles with a little bit to vista del valle. Overall 880' of climbing and 360' of downhill. I paced this effort much better than last time I attempted a very similar workout and overall was pretty strong. This was a good effort.

Thursday: 10 Miles- South Pasadena, CA

Arroyo Seco lollipop. This route is pretty mediocre, but the few miles of trails just north of the Rose Bowl are nice. 

Friday: 23 Miles- Yosemite National Park, CA

Long run checking out Yosemite. One great thing about trail race training versus road race training is you can just have fun and explore. Road race training is generally a long time suffering on a boring, familiar loop. Trail race long runs you can go to some really nice park or trails and enjoy being out in nature while also building your endurance and getting time on feet. So this and Sequoia run served a dual purpose of getting to check out cool California national parks and train for the 50K. 

Unlike Sequoia, or most runs I had done in 2024, there were some long steep climbs and actually a few sections that would get up to sustained 20% grade climbing. The drive was just under 6 hours, so I drove up to the Fresno area the night before. Driving on I-5 in california is so boring.

Found this guy in my hotel room

About 2 hours in the morning. 38 at the start, which felt quite cold to me and I wanted to get going quickly. About 2 miles at a gradual climb (8%) grade on road and then a washed out dirt/paved road before hitting the trail. The singletrack was quite a bit steeper with about 1,600' of climbing over miles 3 and 4. And my legs pretty flat, so I had a few stretching breaks. But tried to run most of it. Really beautiful forest here. 

Much of the difficulty of the run was in the first half so it was nice to get climbing out of the way. Unlike Sequoia, I felt pretty good and got the miles done quickly. The vast majority of the route was in a thick, beautiful pine forest with the occasional scenic viewpoint of the famous yosemite valley and cliffs. Great views on a clear day. After 12 miles, it got quite crowded. Final point on the ridge at 14 before the big descent. My knees started bothering me here. There weren't as many streams as Sequoia and at one point I ran out of water, but I managed. I can't imagine going for long runs in the desert as I have no idea how you'd get water.

The descent wasn't that fun due to really sharp switchbacks, crowds and some of it being paved. My knees were also starting to bother me, likely from all the elevation. Last three miles on a rolling, non-technical and I forced myself to gut it out but I was definitely bonking a few times.

Good run- 23 miles with 5,700' of gain in a really cool environment. It was so nice to be in a forest again as the SoCal shrubland landscape gets old quick. And the fall weather felt amazing as there are no seasons in Los Angeles.

Saturday: 10 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Griffith easy loop. Hot.

Sunday: 10 Miles- Los Angeles, CA

Griffith harder loop. Hot. 

Weekly Total: 84 Miles

Weekly Highlight: Great week, highest mileage week of the fall and PR for most elevation gain in a week at 12,372 feet. Best run was Yosemite of course.

Weekly Lowlight: It's so depressing to come back to Los Angeles after a cool run like that and experience the heat and lack of shade.

Kodiak 23K

October 12, 2024- 9AM

Big Bear Lake, CA

After a few travel races in the Bay Area and Oregon, this one would be closer to "home" with only a two hour drive from Los Angeles. However, it wasn't the usual Southern California terrain I was used to as Big Bear Lake sits above 6,000' feet and has quite a bit of pine forest (compared to the dry shrubland at sea level). 

This race had been on my radar for a while because it was a UTMB world series event. These serve not only as races to obtain points (running stones) for non-elite athletes to qualify for the big one, UTMB but generally are high quality and competitive trail races. One thing that sets UTMB world series events apart from other series is that they often have very long distances of 100K and 100M. This isn't applicable to me now, but I don't think any other series or organization can match their options for those distances. Being mid-season and still inexperienced at ultra trail, I opted for the 21K. This one didn't conflict with other events, was local, courses looked nice, and would start my journey of obtaining UTMB running stones. It was a no brainer to do it.

One key wildcard for this race was it starts at 6,700' and climbs up to 7,800'- this would be my first race at altitude. Many high profile trail races are indeed at high altitude, but being a lifelong sea level resident this would definitely pose a challenge for me. I definitely considered the possibility at one point of either running it for fun, or going out extremely conservative. However, by race day I had done several training runs above 6,000' and some hikes that went above 8,000 including Mount Langley which went above 14,000'. I hadn't struggled with any of those and I think gained enough confidence that I forgot about it. More about that later.

The race was supposed to be 21K and have a cool loop course south of the lake, but due to wildfires in the area, it became a lollipop course north of the lake that didn't look nearly as neat and had quite a bit of dirt road. The course's "stick" (OAB portion) would climb or descend 800' in 2.7 miles and continue to 3.5 miles on singletrack. 4.5 miles of downhill or flat dirt road, before a 600' climb and another 2.5 miles on singletrack before returning. So about 6 miles of the 14 on dirt road, nearly half. Being a UTMB event, I knew the competition was decent and was expecting to be in the top 5 to 10 range. I was ranked 10th by my UTMB index going in. 

Race Day:

I drove the two hours over to Big Bear, with the second half on winding mountain roads. Short shuttle from parking to race site. Felt a bit chilly, and did a 2.5 warmup on the bike path. I went a little too late and had to cut a half mile off. Before the race, a volunteer came up to me and asked if I knew where I was going. I asked him if about half was on dirt road, when he replied "There's no dirt road.". Which is kind of weird because I knew for a fact there was quite a bit of dirt road. He also told me the first climb was extremely steep and technical (it wasn't) and that there were mountain lions on the ridge (I suppose technically that's true). This race required you to carry your phone, which I stupidly didn't test out where to put in my pack prior to 10 minutes before. I tried just below my flasks and it was jabbing into my rib. I tried putting in my back pocket but it was bouncing around. Less than 10 minutes to go, so it would have to do. Fortunately didn't bother me much during the race. I lined up in the second or third row. I got something sticky on my hand and pushed a little water out of my flask to clean it and accidentally violently sprayed the guy ahead of me. I looked down and pretended it wasn't me. 

The whole reason not to line in the front row is to go out easier, but race instinct kicked in and I weaved around a bunch of people right away until I was in third. One guy blasted out way ahead and I settled in behind a fast looking runner with a singlet. I kept a solid pace through half a mile and while the effort felt appropriate, it felt extremely draining and it was super hard to breathe. The second guy began to pull away towards the end of the mile and I could not match him, while I had opened a gap on fourth. Solid first mile in 7:29 with 272' of gain. Except I was going backwards fast. I had either forgotten about potential altitude effects or had been overconfident as it was hitting me hard. I slowed dramatically to what felt like easy run pace but there were zero drive to pick it up as I simply struggled. I guess it was hitting other people too as 4th place wasn't gaining on me quickly. After 2 miles of climbing that felt like absolute hell, we finally crested the top and began the downhill. I ran the next two miles close to or over 9 minutes despite having similar elevation gain to the first. The 4th guy slowly gained on me during the climb and then was right behind me on some downhill singletrack, so I pulled over to let him pass. Went past the aid station and started the dirt road section.

This was downhill on a smooth dirt road and surely a place to rip some sub-6s, but I hadn't recovered that strength and had to settle for 6:30s. The good news was the 3rd placer wasn't really gapping me by too much, but I got caught by the first female and moved back to 5th. I wasn't feeling amazing about my race at this point, getting 3rd sounded really cool and at this point I was absolutely in damage control/survival as to whether more people would catch me. I didn't feel great about getting "chicked" right away but then I remembered we were at a UTMB race so it was quite possible that she was an elite runner. We started to hit the back of the pack 50K runners and there was were some vehicles on the road. The girl passed into 3rd and surprisingly the guy came back to me as well as I moved into 4th. 

Got to the second climb and I still hadn't really recovered from struggling in the beginning, so it just felt brutal plus this was 400'/mile instead of the 300' from before. Don't think I did anything special on this as it was probably easy run pace but I worked at it and caught and gapped the girl to move back into 3rd. There were quite a few people I passed, which wasn't a problem here on the wide dirt road, but I got to the second aid station, which was a complete zoo. I didn't need aid but had to stop and walk here because it was just clogged with the 50K runners. 

The next 2.5 miles was singletrack on the Pacific Crest Trail and it probably would have been quite nice, if not for constantly passing people on narrow singletrack. While I hadn't been hitting "racing" splits due to the altitude struggle so far, this wasn't really "racing" either as I couldn't go 20 to 30 seconds with coming up on someone as having to slow way to carefully pass them with little room. Most people were fine, but you'd have the occasional person who wouldn't hear me, wouldn't move or would go the wrong way while I was passing them and I'd either bump into them or have to put my hands on them. Kind of awkward, but I'm racing here. After passing probably 100 people, finally got back to the cut off and the final 3.5 miles of descent. 

I finally felt decent again and like I was able to push. I had no idea where the people behind me were and tried to keep the hammer down to not get caught. I felt I ran decent on the last downhill. 7:30s on the initial section that was moderately technical and I wasn't used to that then the last mile was really fast and I was able to run close to 6 flat. I figured 1 and 2 were long gone and was shocked to hit the last quarter mile on the road and 2nd was right there. Absolutely hammered the final 400m, but the gap was too much. Was a little frustrating as I absolutely felt I could have caught him had I known he was there, but that's trail racing. Someone actually said 2nd place wasn't far from me with 2 miles to go but I didn't believe them. I found the 2nd placers strava and I ran the last mile a minute faster than him! Note this was the guy who went out really hard in 1st, the second placer I stuck for a half mile dominated the race and won by 10 minutes. 3rd place in 1:48:28, 3 second back from second. There was actually little risk of being caught as 4th was 2 minutes back. The top woman and other guy I had been racing with on the dirt road actually fell back to 6th and 7th. 

Talked a bit with the 1st place (from Canada), 2nd, and 10th place finishers. Awards were not for quite for a quite a while so I opted to leave. Had stomach issues immediately after. They had breakfast but it wasn't great (bland). 

Overall, I felt the course and event was pretty good. I feel like trail courses that are varied surface and have multiple ups and downs like this are always fun. Trail races with little variation or climbing are not so great. Of course, running into the 50k runners was a big issue but I couldn't complain too much as that was probably due to the last minute course change.

This was a mixed bag of a performance. I was really happy to rebound after struggling and fading to 5th to get 3rd comfortably and actually nearly get 2nd. This wasn't super competitive for a UTMB event (the 50K was absolutely loaded and the top 3 actually ran a faster pace than I did) but 3rd at a UTMB event still felt pretty good. Quite happy place-wise, my pace/time/effort certainly had a ton of room for improvement. I struggled quite a bit with much of the course and felt the final descent was the only thing I ran strongly. Not a super strong effort, but a course like this is going to be very different coming from altitude. Overall an okay/acceptable effort. Week off, then final trio of sub-ultra trail event before the goal race.

Notes on UTMB Index:

The UTMB index is an interesting way to analyze race performance. I'm not sure how they score it. I originally thought I did really well at Quebec Mega Trail 50K but I got much better scores for Headlands and Kodiak. I guess that makes sense given I was more looking to finish the 50K versus being competitive at the other shorter ones. I also felt my performance at Headlands was stronger than the one here, so the scores check to me out.

Portland Half Marathon

Sunday, October 6th

Portland, OR

Breaking up these trail races with the Portland Half Marathon. I didn't actually have much interest in a road half, especially not having done much tempo work, but I used this as an excuse to visit Portland for the first time which I had always wanted to do. If anything, the event didn't seem all that great, but it's always nice to explore and race in different areas. 

I flew up early Saturday morning. Very impressed with the Portland Airport, which had trees in the airport and the light rail system, which had a $5 all day pass and conveniently went from airport to downtown right near the places I needed to go. First I went to the expo and picked up my bib, before heading downtown to the hotel. I got really lucky they let me check in 3 hours early or I would have had to just wait around. I had a sandwich in the Union Station area where there were many homeless people, weirdos, and encampments, yet much nicer in the downtown area where I stayed. 

Nice airport

Tomorrow's start

Nice hotel room at the Duniway

Pre-race did 5 miles on the Williamette river bike paths. Didn't have to stop at all, but there was a lot of cement. Nice views of downtown. I can't remember how I felt, probably a little weak from running in the afternoon.

The race was supposed to start at 7:15, so a 4:15 wakeup. These used to be rough on race day, but I'm used to it now. Cut my warm-up into two parts as I often do (to avoid warming up in super shoes) and did 2 miles at 6AM, then changing into race gear plus a few sweats and jogged over to the start. My plan was to use the bathroom, drop off my bag, and then have about 20 minutes to do strides, stretch and line up. That didn't work out so well because the bathroom lines were ridiculously line. I wasted 10 minutes waiting in line before realizing that there was at least another 10 minute wait, and I had no idea if the bag check had a line. I went to the bag check first, shorter line, and not a long line for the bathroom in that area but had already killed a lot of time at that point. It'd be a little tight, but I had about 10 minutes to get in some strides, stretch and get on the line which would be just enough. I headed out for my first strides about 8 minutes before and did one back. I was going to get 2 more in plus some stretching when I heard "The half marathon will start in 30 seconds". This was at 7:07. I figured the announcer made a mistake but I jogged over to the start corral anyway. When I got there, they did indeed start the race 7 minutes early. Wow! WTF! I had never missed a race start before and was still about 10-15 rows back at the entrance. I didn't make much of an effort to get up to the start quickly as I was still processing what was going on, and observing others sprinting and weaving their way up and other fast looking runners tying their shoes. I shuffled/jogged up to the start and was wondering if I just do this as a workout. When I hit the line, I started to go into race mode and accelerated. I threw my water bottle to the side as I forgot I was carrying it. I followed some fast looking girl out, passed her and the crowds of half marathoners if front of us. With the marathon starting only minutes prior, we immediately ran into the back of the pack and I had to run on the sidewalk to get around them, plus lots of weaving that first mile. I also never loaded satellites as I didn't have much watch ready. Went through Mile 1 in 5:32, a bit faster than I wanted and finally out from the mess. The eventual winner went past me there, who had also wasn't ready to start 7 minutes early. 

I think my goal was run 5:35s or so with a target in the 1:12-1:14 range. But it was hard to pace with the crowds from Mile 1 and my watch not loading properly. The adrenaline wore off quickly after mile 1 and my legs felt quite heavy. I moved up, but felt pretty bad and was losing some confidence. I struggled up a hill towards the end of the mile and ran Mile 2 in 5:34. I definitely thought I was going to go backwards and this would be a rough one. However, I latched onto two guys there and felt much easier running behind them. I ended up pulling ahead and still feeling pretty good. I got into a nice groove and passed 1 or 2 people per mile, feeling good through 10K hitting 4 consecutive 5:42s.

The first 10K was on some nice highways and major roads and then a bridge, and now we went into some quieter neighborhoods. I got into no man's land after a while. The next 5K was pretty smooth, although there were a few times where people would retract their arms at the water stops or not let go of the cups, so I missed a few drinks. The weather was ideal but the cups were tiny so I was trying to get as much as possible. I guess at some point I realized I could push a bit more as I went 5:33-5:34-5:38 for miles 7 through 9. 

Carrying two cups. Also look at the cup size: way too small.

My legs got really heavy around that point and while aerobically things felt good, I was looking forward to the finish as it wasn't comfortable anymore. I spotted one guy a decent amount ahead and tried to close the gap on him. I also got a personal bike pacer around here for some reason as a lady was ahead of me and would point the directions out. Which is nice, because there were a lot of turns in the final 5K, and some sections that were poorly marked/organized. There was a stupidly steep climb at 9 that was the only tough part of the race, then unfortunately a half mile on one of the cement paths I ran yesterday. Especially confusing through that section and annoying to have to deal with pedestrians on the path, but the pace didn't take a hit. 5:38-5:36-5:32 for Mile 10-12. We crossed over the river again and had a mile to go. I was slowly closing the gap and now tried to really press for a last effort to catch this guy. Unfortunately, we hit the marathoners/10Kers for the last mile due to route overlap, which meant more weaving. I still ran pretty well, and hammered the last half mile. Another annoying thing was the half marathon went in the left lanes and marathon in the right, but there were a bunch of marathoners went in the left anyway. I was disappointed to fall slightly short of catching the guy and miss out on sub-1:13 which I had in the back of my mind for the last few miles. But it didn't matter, I beat the guy on chip time and broke 1:13 by a second. Last mile 5:09.

I ended up finishing 21st in 1:12:59. Results. I'm a little surprised it was that competitive, especially with the start debacle. I got the usual pre-packaged snacks and they lied about having donuts, but at least had chocolate milk. 

I got out of there very quickly as I wanted to catch the bus to Multnomah Falls, and the next one after wouldn't be for hours. Which I meant I was quite hungry, so I decided to have the brunch buffet at the falls hotel/restaurant, which was overpriced and pretty bad. What wasn't pretty bad was the falls itself. I did a 5 mile hike with a variety of trees, rivers and waterfalls that was quite nice. Lush, wet environment, especially compared to dry central/southern Oregon from several weeks ago. I ended up ubering back to Portland as it would save me several hours of waiting and I wanted to see the Japanese garden before I left. The uber driver left out a loud "F**K!" after hitting traffic and then proceeded to lecture me on his frustration with his cars braking system? How local drivers don't use directionals? Take your pick as he barely spoke english and was unintelligible. Another light rail ride (I definitely screwed up doing the falls before the garden), and used the lime electric scooters to do the mile between the station and garden. I got honked at 5-6 times and I'm really not sure why. Checked out the Japanese Garden, pretty nice although a bit crowded and then walked back and waited a long time for the light rail this time with the MLS match roaring next to me. Felt more like Europe in that moment with good public transportation, clean streets and a big soccer game.  

I see Washington

Good thing I had extra time on my hands as one of the light rail cars ran out of power and there was a huge delay getting to the airport. But I made it. Nice to explore Portland and a good weekend overall. I had wanted to visit this city for a long time, and it absolutely impressed. Only downside was the homeless issues. 

Race notes: Went pretty well, especially considering start issues. I imagine my legs feeling heavy after mile 8 was not helped by starting suddenly, running on the sidewalk and not having time for full strides or stretching. I was happy to run sub-1:13 given my training. Good close and pacing. Pretty good run for the fitness I was in.

Event notes: Yeah, first time missing the start of a race. I've been complaining about races starting a few minutes early, but 7 minutes is truly terrible. The winner of the race ended up getting 3rd due to the issue as he missed the start. Besides that, the course was poorly marked in the later miles and made a lot of weird turns. Running on the cement path was not fun (SF flashbacks). The cups at the water stations needed to be bigger. I ran into crowds at the end due to poor management/enforcement. I complain a lot about Honolulu and Rock 'n' Roll Las Vegas organization, but missing the start/starting 7 minutes early is on another level, where it pretty much ruins the event. It's not okay and I encourage anyone looking at the Portland Marathon to look elsewhere. That said, two good things here- every mile split was available (never had that before), and free photos which is rare.

That's a wrap on my Portland half weekend. Bad event, good performance, good city, fun weekend overall.