What another great event! It started friday morning with a shopping trip to Costco to pick up supplies for the pre-race continetal breakfast, then pick up Kris for a ride up. We drove in the rain until Mt.Vernon when the clouds parted and cleared by the time we got to the ferry. On the ferry we ran into Clem and Ken Ward from Corvalis. It was great catching up with Clem and Ken showed me how to work my new camera. Glen was there also, hadn't seen him since Cascade Crest. It was still daylight when we reached Moran State Park. Several runners had already signed up and when I brought in the race shirts, pandimonium! James scrounged up recycled shirts, zip tops, sweatshirts, and hoodies and printed them up. They were fantastic and it was first come, first serve to choose the one you wanted. It was just like a 50% off sale at Walmart. Everyone just dove in and shirts went flying. I of course got the best one. We spent a relaxing evening waiting for the late ferry with the rest of the oly folks, on it. By the time they showed up, it was about 10:00 and time to go to bed.
In the morning, Kris and I chopped bagels, muffins, bananas, and melons for the breakfast. It all went well,there was plenty of food and enough time to get ready for the start. For some reason, Dave decided to run the 50K instead of the 25K, so after the start, he ran with me for a couple of miles to keep from going out too fast, then as we approached the first climb, he took off. I felt good on the first climb, and after reaching the summit, I blasted the downhill passing alot of runners. Just before reaching the 10 mile aid station, I caught up with Wendy. I knew I was going too fast, I shouldn't be anywhere near her. Just before the aid station, Dave passed me on the out'n back. I think we were both surprised to see each other. Wendy and Dave would end up beating me by more than 45 minutes. I had a hard time getting back up to speed before hitting the infamous powerline trail. As usual on a hard climb, I got passed by all the runners I blitzed on the downhill on the first loop. I ended up running with Randy, an Orcas local, and Glen till we got to the aid station at the top of Mt Constitution at mile 22. It was great to see John, Clem, and James up there. I grabbed a cup of coke, and left just as Kris reached the summit. I started down the steep switch backs with Glen and Randy, but
started to fade and lost touch with them as I slowed to eat a gel. I wish I would have eaten that peanut butter sandwich at the top. I started to feel better as the trail flattened out and was about 2 miles out with less than 20min to go. For a moment, I thought I could finish under 7 hours, but decided to walk the little ups and cruise into the Lodge.
James pulled off a great post race party with tons of black bean chili, 2 kegs of beer and great live music. We all had a great time and after cleaning up in the morning, even caught our ferry on time. It was another great event, but I sure felt it with sore quads for 3 days after.