Clyde's Comeback!

One mile on the treadmill then hit the DC loop after Mik'L got home from her run. Felt really good for a Monday. In fact it's the best I've felt in around a month. Maybe that little push in the 10k on Saturday helped snap me out or this funk I'm in. Hoping so with 26.2 miles to run on Saturday in Alaska. 

Ran this afternoon. The high today was 105 F and that's in the shade. Out on the blacktop it felt like my bones were boiling. I wore a wet shirt and hat and had to stop on the golf course to resoak them. Without the soakings I'd have been toast. 

Up at 4:30 a.m to get a run in before we head to Vegas to fly to Alaska. It was super hot and muggy. Temps said it was 80 F. It rained a little over the night and basically it just sizzled off the ground. Felt like I was running in Florida and not STG. I'm pumped to run in Alaska for the rest of the week. Hopefully I freeze my can off. 

We spent last night in Anchorage then got up this morning and went to the temple there. After that we drove from Anchorage south down the coast to a place where we went through a 2 mile tunnel. And after the tunnel the you came to a town called Witter and the road ends. We borded a ferry that carries about 40 cars, trucks or whatever and had a 3 hour ride to our final destination of Cordova.

While in Witter I had about 1.5 hours to kill befor the boat left so I decided to run. It was just amazing! A little village tucked in a canyon where the ocean  comes in. I ran up and down the road along the coast. The mountains around were covered in snow and spewing off water all over from the melting. There was mist in the air everywhere. Temps were around 60 with partly cloudy skies. Big fluffy white clouds with an amazing blue ski. This was a great run and I felt pretty supnky too so pace was uptempo. Alaska is SOOOO VAST!  

Ran here in Cordova from my wifes aunts house through town and down the Orca road. While running down the Orca road I saw a ORCA! Watched it's back and big fin surface and then go back under. This place is beautiful. Green, lush. Amazing veiws of snow covered mountains in every direction. All with either ocean or lakes at the base. It gets dark around 11 p.m and light around 4 a.m so sleeping isn't easy. One becaue it's light and two because you want to be out doing stuff. Mik'L and I went for a 4-wheeler ride at 9 p.m last night an it felt like 6 p.m at home. We road up the banks of a big lake filled with big Red Salmon. At every tributary coming into the lake there were fish everywhere. The watere was just as blue as the sky.

Anyways the run was out and back and kind of uptempo too. 6:40 pace. Felt pretty good.

Drove the marathon course today... not thrilled about it. There are stunning views in every direction but found out that the dirt road will be 14.7 miles of the course and it's really loose marble size gravle. I'm guessing it's just going to be brutal to try and keep any kind of pace and my feet are going to hurt because the there are soo many loose rock I'll feel them through the shoes. Hoping to not roll an ankle.

EZ run from the house down into town and back. Temps and conditions have been perfect. For running and fishing. We caught so many fish in the river last night and this morning that I lost track. Arms were sore for sure.

Not really that pumped for the race tomorrow. I'd rather be fishing and doing Alaska stuff. I'm just going to go out and have fun. Not planning on pushing it or stressing at all. So I may not even break 3 hours with that and the nasty gravel road. Anywho I'm so tired and I think we are going fishing tonight again until like midnight. Love it when the sun never goes down.

Pre race junk: I signed up for this race a few months ago and thought it would be fun to do while we were up here in Cordova Alaska. But after getting up here I got way too into the fishing, sight seeing, 4-wheeling ect and the thought of having to take time away from all of that to run a race sounded tragic. I've turned into an even bigger adult kid up here. There are way too many cool things to do outside and I can't control myself. Plus it gets light at around 4 a.m and doesn't get dark until after 11 p.m. So I haven't slept much all week. No time to sleep when  you fish until dark then spend 2 hours after taking care of all the fish we caught. And last but not least my diet up here has been off the hook. Mik'L's aunt is an amazing cook and I love to eat. Haven't stopped plus I've been drinking Mt. Dew to help take the edge off:) So anyways not the best prep the week of a marathon. But I didn't come up here to run the marathon. I came to do everything Alaska and as much of it as I could in the time we have here. I told Mik'L on the ride out to the starting line that I'd be lucky to break 3 hours with the way I felt... running faster just sounded out of the question.  

The weather was forcast to be rainy the entire time we were here but it's been amazing. The day of the race was the best day of them all. As we drove out to the starting line of the race we saw a moose walk out in the road in front of us.

The Course: It starts 26.2 miels (distance was right on after driving it twice). We started out in the flats or the Cooper river delta. Basically a massive drainage at the base of a massive mountain range. But it's flat from there all the way into town. Well maybe a 1% grade incline for the first 14 miles then a 1% decline for about 7 miles and the rest flat. The first 15 miles of the race start on a dirt (very loose gravel road) and it turnes to good pavement after that. You cross countless bridges and rivers as you make your way back into town. All of them bigger than any river in Utah (other than the Colorado). I've never seen so much water. It's all running off the mountains and the 4-5 big glaciers that are above the Cooper River delta. Then as you get 4 miles from town you start to come into a little valley that flows around a big freshwater lake and then the town is on the far side of the lake creating a little barrier between the lake and the ocean. This place is really amazing! Words do no justice...

The Race: I got to ride out there with my wife and her aunt who also got to drive right behind me for the first 22 miles of the race. This was for caution of any bears. And they were able to bring me GU and drink anytime I wanted. That was nice. We started and two guys went out ahead of me and that kind of flipped a trigger in my brain. I quickly matched their pace and basically from there to the finish was locked into a 5:50ish pace. It felt smooth and comfortable. I didn't feel like I was killing it, rather just enjoying the day. Had to stop at mile 11 for a big boy potty break that took 40 seconds of real time and maybe cost me a little more just becaue I had to stop and start. But still hit the half in 1:18:00. By the half I was getting really sick of the gravel and the long, long incline. It wasn't steep but there was no change in grade from mile 7 to 14 or so and it just got pesky. I'd dropped the other two guys after mile 1 and had no sight or sound of them by mlie 5. 2nd pace was 3:02 and would have been a new course record from the old 3:20.

Once on the pavement I wanted to try and get a little faster turnover with the slight decline for about 6 miles but my splits just stayed basically the same. Once you get to the lake there are some rollers into town and I slowed from 6 min pace to around 6:10 pace. Hit the second half in 1:18:40. So a pretty even split race for me.  

I felt good the entire way. Mile markers were right on through mile 19 or 20 and then my garmin went crazy when I dumped water all over myself so I didn't get anymore splits. Had a blast and am so glad I signed up and then decided to run the race. So pretty, so fun and I never felt trashed. Finished the race then went back to the house got ready to go fishing and we fished from noon to basically midnight. Never felt any hang over from the race. Really no soreness or the normal fatigue.

Sorry this is long for those who made it this far.