Prickly Pear 50k

Running the Prickly Pear yesterday was sooooo much fun! The race started at 7:00 am, in the dark. I lined up just behind a group of guys, one of whom was wearing the yellow lead jersey. The weather was perfect- crisp and cool. I ran a bit behind the lead guys for a couple miles before they picked it up even more and were out of site. To my surprise, I rounded a tight corner less then 30 minutes later to see a guy peeing on the trail. He ran off just in front of me. A couple of minutes after that I came up to the whole group of guys. They had slowed quite a bit, and I hopped passed them on a down hill stretch. But all 3 of them stayed right on me. Around mile 8 I told them they were welcome to pass any time. One of the guys said, "Thats alright. I figure the footing is better a few feet behind you." Then he repeated this comment to his buddies....(hu???)...who laughed....(okay..).

The four of us finished loop one together, with me in the lead. As we were leaving the aid station, one of the guys said he was finished. The other 2 guys asked me if I wanted to lead. I told them to go on ahead. Boy did they! I didn't see them again until I came in to finish loop 2. My splits for the first 2 loops were the same, and I got out of that station about 2 or 3 minutes after the lead guy. The other guy had only planed on running 2 loops of the 50k, so there was only one runner ahead of me.

By this time it was HOT out. My legs were cramping, and Amanda (my coach) gave me extra electrolytes and pinned some Shot Blocks on my shorts. I had hoped to run the first 2 laps in about 1:20 and the last one faster. So far I was on pace. But I wasn't sure about running faster for lap 3 with the cramping and heat.

Just before mile 4 of lap 3 (mile 25ish), I passed the lead guy. He was walking in a hot, unshaded section and said, "Go get it" with a smile. So I kept going. I was running quite a bit slower now- almost one minute a mile slower then I wanted. But I did what I could, and fought the urge to slow my pace further. I finished in 4:08:14- first female and first finisher . :)