Everyone get out your 2009 Calendar.... (yes, you too.... "Mr. Idon'tliketorace"). Mark the second Saturday in November with the words - "Haney 2 Harrison". Put together a team - friends, co-workers, couples, families... whatever. Trust me, you will have a blast...
This event has so many things going for it....
1. Teams - Simply put, it is more fun to compete as part of a team. There were super serious teams and teams that ran with wigs and prosthetic asses attached to their shorts.
Click photos to enlarge.
2. Epicality - I made that word up. I bet while this race was being dreamt up someone said "Why don't we make it shorter, it will appeal to more people." or "It would be easier to put teams of 4 together so let's shorten it." BAH! 100k - 7:31 (our time).... That is the kind of challenge that bonds a team and makes everyone want to go out and party afterward..... make it 50k and everyone goes home to weed the garden.
3. Saturday - To accommodate the partying mentioned above the race takes place on a Saturday.... Makes me question why a race would ever be held on a Sunday. The after party was awesome - the Agassiz Agricultural Hall doesn't sound so cool, but throw together hundreds of people who just competed in teams of 8 all day, add some loud music and alcohol and the race becomes known for its after-party. Team IF threw down just as hard post-race as it did during the race.
Click photos to enlarge.
4. Country Bumpkin Locale - If the race was called Port Moody 2 Vancouver everyone would disperse and either go home or go to some irritating bar downtown and dress up and try to act cool. End it in Harrison and people find a room or rent a house and make a night out of it without any attitude.
5. History and Planning - This race has been a staple on the running calendar for years (not sure how many, but lots.) So they have it all figured out - every team provides one volunteer = never short of volunteers. Every team has one (or two) support vehicles = no need for aid stations. Put the effort into making the event fun, organizing it well and people will return year after year. Like we will..... and you should too (re-read first sentence of this post.)
Team Result
We won our division (Corporate Mixed) - which was the goal after the other two IF locations failed to field teams. Our time was 7:31:10 which was good for 22nd overall (out of 214 Teams.) Check out the results HERE.
Our victory was the result of consistent performances from everybody despite often terrible weather. We never placed worse than 5/16 on any leg and we won the 4th and 6th legs.
My own result:
On Stage 8, the "glory leg", is HERE.
I placed 2/16 in our division and 37/214 overall... numbers I would normally be pretty happy with, but the time was unusually slow: 36:28 (or 4:38/km pace).
This pace is slower than recent 5 and 10km races I have done... and slower than I had hoped for based on my current fitness so it is worthy of a little analysis. To keep it brief I think I screwed myself by cutting my warm-up short.... I was way too paranoid about missing the hand-off from Justine. The warm-up is key - particularly in a short race - it will allow you to lock down a faster pace early on and avoid a yo-yoing heart rate. And I knew that.... but I still didn't really do a good job of it.
Thus it was irritatingly predictable that I sucked wind trying to find my groove for the first 10-15 minutes.... once I settled in I was able to pick it up and felt great but there were only a few kms to go - in a longer race there would have been plenty of time to make up for a slow start.
Normally I start out feeling great and get progressively worse - like most people... this time was the exact opposite.
Anyway, it was a great day, and a great night. Awesome job everyone! See you next year!
Team Credits
Stage 1: Chelsea Raymond
Stage 2: Rob Elliott
Stage 3: Shauna Connaughton
Stage 4: Ashley Perry
Stage 5: Kate Perry
Stage 6: Josip Maras
Stage 7: Justine Boulin
Stage 8: Meyrick Jones
I.F. Volunteer: Steve Bell-Irving
AND special huge mention - NICOLA GILDERSLEEVE (An IF trainer - and sponsored athlete) ran the WHOLE 100km herself. She did it in 9:31:31 and took first place for women and 6th overall in the Ultra.
Click photos to enlarge.
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2 comments:
Sweet job! Lovin the pics. You guys look like you had much fun ;-)
You are right about the need for a good warmup for a shorter race - especially in cold, wet conditions like that. Still, it sounds like you had a great time.
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