I didn't plan to do this race until 7:00 am this morning when I discovered that rain and fog would make pretty difficult to go out and run. This race was on a trail 20 minutes drive from my house, so I called my running buddy, we changed our plan and we headed to the top of the highest mountain around to the start of the race. Half of the course is part of the trail marathon I did in april and it has this name because the main sponsor is Estee Lauder offering good prizes (parfumes and make up) to all women. Once up there we where shivering in shorts and shirt, we payed 5 euros, got our goodies bag and bib number and we went back to our car until 15 minutes before the race. Because it is a tough race, fall weather and temperature and on a trail there were only approx. 100 men and 20 women. My plan was to try to finish around 1:10, I started conservatively the first 2km are crazy technical downhill, but on the way up I was the only one around running (for the first 400 meters), and immediately I gained several positions, even when I started walking I was still passing people and until the end nobody passed me. After km 4 when I was passed by a 70 y old german guy (and then I passed him again) I was on my own not knowing that I was in 9th position, I was just trying to maintain an honest effort and when I saw I was finishing in 1:10 I relaxed a little bit on the final downhill. I was happy about how I felt throughout the race, I didn't expect to be in the top 10 (and winning two bottles of wine), but honestly it was the result of lack of competition and my final time shows. It was a good training run overall.
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