Rim to Rim - 46:11 - 3rd place
Hard for me to believe, but this was my first race in almost 2 years. A lot has happened in my life since then. The Rim to Rim is really a good race, though, and it's hard to pass up an old school tradition in my hometown (33rd year of the race - our high school xc team used to volunteer at it.) The race correlated with a trip home to Twin Falls to see family and friends, so that's always great.
I had several factors working against me: big time fatigue from a couple of nights of really poor sleep; very few miles under 6:00/mile pace; lack of motivation race morning. All 3 ended up working against me, and I had one of the worst races I think I've ever had. The biggest factor was probably the lack of motivation and willigness to inflict some pain on myself.
The course climbs from river level out of the canyon, across the Perrine Bridge, down the other side of the canyon, and across the Snake River to the start/finish area. I ran the entire race in 3rd place. I could have run out of my gourd or slowed down another minute-plus and I would have still been 3rd. In this stage in my running career, that makes it tough for me to really push hard. I talked myself out of pushing hard numerous times during the race.
No garmin, so these splits were from the markers on the road. 14:01 at 2 miles (mile 1 was in the midst of the climb out of the canyon and I didn't hit my split button), 6:04 (flat), 5:49 (flat), 5:45 (flat, then downhill), 5:27 (downhill), 6:43(flat, across a foot bridge and then a steep hill) and 2:19. I'm pretty sure the mile 7 marker was a bit long, although that last hill killed me.
Post race food was excellent as always and I enjoyed the hot weather and socializing with lots of folks.
Three years ago I ran about 2 minutes faster and won the race. The course this year was about 1:00 - 1:30 longer than then, so I guess it wasn't too bad comparatively.
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