The Pikes Peak 20 miler

So the Ascent was today.... sorta. I met up with my friends from Jack Quinn Running Club that were in the second wave with me. We all took off together at the start, being silly and having fun. There were so many people that it was impossible to run fast. That was fine with me. It was one of the only times my friends were forced to run slow enough for me to get to run with them. I wasn't going for any records today, I just wanted to finish in under 6.5hrs.

When I reached the bottom of the big hill on Ruxton in 15min, I was surprised. I seemed to be doing fairly well. I guess all that early-spring training actually made a difference. My times...

Top of the Ws 53:03
No Name Creek 1:20:17
Barr Camp 2:20:45
A-Frame 3:32:52

Notice that there's no finish time...? That's because of the lightning and sleet (that turned to ice when it hit the ground). Only ~700 out of over 2000 people finished. The majority of the first wave made it, but vast majority of the second wave and some from the first were turned back at the A-Frame. Talk about your major disappointments. I was doing surprisingly well; my A-Frame time was almost an hour faster than I hoped it would be. Having been exposed on the Peak during storms, I completely respect the race directors decision to turn us back. But I have to admit that I'm horribly disappointed. I was expecting to barely be able to make the cut-off and instead was looking at about a 5 hour finish!

There's worse yet to come. No shirts. No medals. At least so far. I talked to Matt Carpenter and asked what was happening about that and he said they hadn't decided what to do yet. On one hand it makes sense. Only finishers should have finisher shirts. But this is such an extreme case. Less than half the racers actually finished! More than anything, though, I'm disappointed about my Triple Crown medal. I worked so hard, for months. I was 3 f'ing miles from the top and kicking ass. I feel a bit cheated. I know its not their fault, but that doesn't make it suck any less. Plus, I had a victory beer waiting for me on the top that went un-drunk. It's a crime.

On the up-side, I got great training in today for Imogene. I have been working my up-hills so much more than my downs. I need to be able to go 10 miles up and then 7 miles down. Today was a 10.2 miles up and about 9 miles back down. So, errr, good training!