Saturday July 19 - The "Sprint" To The Summit

I may have stopped working at Voile a couple of months ago, but I really like the people I worked with so I wanted to keep in touch. This weekend was a perfect opportunity to do so as it was the weekend of the now annual "Sprint to the Summit" Trail run 10K put on by Mark and his wife, G. When I signed up, Stacy was a bit leary about her knee issues so she volunteered to help G with the signing in process as well as the finish line duties. We met Mark and G at the old firehouse in Summit Park around 8 so Stacy could magnify her calling. I knew a few people there and there were others I just knew of. I prepped for the race as usual. The race began at about 9 o'clock. This is not your average 10K (in fact, it ended up being about 7 miles, so a little further than a 10K). No, this race was basically straight up to the summit, then straight down back to town. I looked around as the race began and tried to figure out who I was going to pace myself with. As we got a bit further I found that Andrew McLean and myself were going similar speeds... so I tried to keep up with him. For the first half of the race, he and I basically traded off pacing one another. I figured if I could keep up with the world premier ski mountaineer then I did alright for myself. When we finally reached the top we were greeted by another local skiing celebrity, Bob Athey, in Bob's usual way. We all chatted for a second and then I took a second to have a Gu. Before I knew it, Andrew was headed down the trail for the finish line. I tried to catch up, but was never able to do so as I just don't quite know how to run down hill. I was more worried about not breaking my ankle than I was about being speedy. I ran the last quarter of the race with a dude from my ward, Adam Hunt (sorry, but I don't think he has a website). I finished in 1hr and 26min. I felt pretty good about this. The winners only came in 26 minutes earlier. I took second in my age division (men 20-29), but this was easy since there were only two of us that did the race. There was a potluck lunch afterwards and Stacy and I hung out and chatted with the many people we had met over the course of the morning. I won some sweet cycling socks and a water bottle in the raffle then we thanked Mark and G and made our way home. It was a fun race. It was a good day of training. I was able to meet and chat with people I have wanted to for a long time. I had a good time. On Run.