Adventure pure at Orcas Island 50k

This past Saturday I ran the Orcas Island 50k Fat @$$ run which as you can imagine from the name is on Orcas Island! Originally I wanted to run, then not because Franklin and Ats were coming to town, then yes again since Franklin absolutely wanted to do the run and heck that was even better. Not having been able to run much since the H.U.R.T 100, I expected little of the race and started off easy, which is how I usually do best. There were superb runners there, Bryan Morrison, Kyle Skaggs, Ralph Pooler, Brock Gavery, Glen Rogers, Van Phan, Scott McCoubrey, to just name a few, so I knew I needed to run my own race or else I would just blow myself out. The race was tailored to my strenghts, with 8000 feet of elevation gain there were not a lot of flat parts in the race. Four big hills were going to be climbed, including the top of Mt. Constitution. After 9 miles, where we returned once to the start/finish, I was in roughly 25th position, just warming up for hill #2. After that I powered up the powerline trail which was not so much a trail but a general rut in the ground that could be followed, and some sections were a plain scramble. There I passed Van, Scott, Brandon, and Murray among 4 more racers in just 10 minutes, feeling good about having taken it easy in the beginning, knowing there was still plenty of race left for me to finish well. Both highest peaks of the race were snow covered, and both times were the actually only time it rained, or with my luck snowed up above the snowline, so I experienced virtually try weather all day. Hill #3 was Mt. Constitution, and then after the 2nd aid station there was a whole lot of descending to do. I felt great at all times, powered only by clif shots, shot blocks, and hammer perpetuem, plus a few ecaps and nuun. I finished in 6h05 in 10th place, and felt really good about my race. Just 5 minutes behind Glen, bugger! Especially since Murray and I got lost for about 3-4 minues at mile 9 where we took a wrong turn and ended up down at the water.

Happy, tired, a wee bit wet....