|
|
||||
| Blog | Photos | Movies | Stuff | Mail Us |
Home
|
I ran the Western Washington Fat Ass 25k again this year. Results were sort of mixed. On the one hand, I was 12 minutes slower than last year. On the other hand, I didn't feel nearly as lousy as I felt after finishing last year, so I clearly did a much better job of pacing. Whereas it was very cold (mid 20s) last year, it was in the mid 50's this year. The rain held off while we were running, but the trail was plenty wet - ankle-deep in places. I spent much of the run by myself, as I'd have expected with my slower pace. Although I've run this coruse twice, I don't have a good handle on it. The first little while is easy, as we wind around the back of the mountain, and go past the high school. The big climb visible in the plot below goes up the Poo Poo Point and One View trails. It about 4 miles of continuous, sometimes steep climbing. Because the ground was so wet, the footing was occasionally 'interesting'. After the big climb, we're on the Tiger Mountain Trail, with some steady ascent/descent. The trick here was again watching my footing. The trail angles down to the right, so I'd occasionally find myself careening down the side a bit. It's tough on the ankles, and also on the hips (as they try to keep you level, which is fairly impossible). After a while on the Tiger Mountain Trail, we began climbing again. After about 30 minutes of this, we came to the West Tiger #1 summit. Then we descended very quickly on Tiger Mountain Road before another short climb to West Tiger #2. By now, my quads were pretty fatigued and I was ready to finish. There's a short (just a few minutes) camel-hump to West Tiger #3, and then it's all downhill. I was able to run a bit on the short ascents. By then though it was apparent that I wasn't going to equal my previous time, so I relaxed a bit. That said, I didn't take a lot of time to enjoy the views at each of the summits, as the wind made it feel pretty chilly (despite the balmy temps). I was there long enough to recognize that Rainier was behind the clouds, but the view to Seattle was clear enough. Some days you can't see anything from the top of Tiger - so this was a pretty nice view. Last year, by the time I got to the final descent from West Tiger #3, I was toast. There were two younger women running just ahead of me. Foolish pride made me try to keep up with them as they chatted away, and laughed each time they hit some ice and almost lost it. This year, owing to my slow pace, I was not under such pressure. I stepped carefully when the mud offered poor footing, and made it down the final 3 miles in about 30 minutes. My time was just under 3:08, about 12 or 13 minutes slower than last year. Still, I'd call it a good day. I felt okay afterwards. I have pain in my foot, and quads. There's a bit of tightness in my low back. Despite all of that I'm ready to do it again next year - perhaps with better preparation. I wore my new Polar 625x heart rate monitor for the occasion, and actually used it to determine when I might think about walking. Fairly early on I noticed that my heart rate would shoot up above 170 as I climbed, no matter how slowly I tried to run - so I walked instead. For a while, I would ease up until my heart rate dipped below 160, then I'd try running again. Predictably, it shot up pretty quickly. I ended up walking for much of the ascent on this course. That's probably being too conservative, but I've got a busy month planned for running and I didn't want to overdo it. The heart-rate/elevation plot is below :
So - this stuff is pretty interesting to me.
|
