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Imogene Pass Run 2010
It was a glorious day, what we call a "bluebird" day here in Colorado, for the 37th annual (and my third) Imogene Pass Run, a 17.1-mile trail race mostly on jeep roads. The morning dawned cold and clear, and the race director took obvious glee in telling the runners, as we assembled at the start line shortly before 7:30am, that the temperature was currently 24° at the summit, some 10 miles distant and 5000' above us. I lined up with my friends from the RWOL forums, Jen, Annette (whose first time it was), and Karah, and when the gun went off, so did we.
With 1200 runners, I lost sight of my friends almost immediately, although Jen passed me about a mile in. Just before the first aid station, right around mile 2.5, I also spotted a local friend I consider my trail nemesis - she has beaten me in every trail race we've both done (4 of them) while I always beat her on the road. Unfortunately, at that point I decided that I had to give in to the rumbling in my gut that had been bothering me since the start, and dashed off into the trees behind the aid station (they didn't have a portapotty there, which is what I was hoping for) and, er, made like a bear in the woods. (Fortunately I was carrying toilet paper against just this eventuality.)
I felt much better after that, but the stop threw off my pace plan. I had guessed I might be able to run the first mile in around 12 minutes and the next two in about 10 each, putting me about 2 minutes ahead of my time at that point last year, but as it happened I ran the first in just under 13 (a little ahead of last year), the second in just over 11 (a little behind), and then lost 1:30 to the stop. Then the next four miles were a bit steeper, and although I felt like I was doing well, by the mile 7 mark I was behind by another 1:30, for a total of about 3 minutes behind my last year's time. It was pretty aggravating, actually, because at this point it was quite steep - an average of 450-700 ft/mile gain - and I had to alternate running the less-steep sections and walking the steeper ones. When I was running, I would pass both walkers and runners, but as soon as I started walking everyone would pass me. I guess I have short legs, because even when I matched cadence with the people striding by me they would easily pull away. Phooey. (On the other hand, I caught up with my local nemesis again, said hello, and passed her, haha!)
Around mile 7 we got into the sun, which felt good. I had put my jacket into my pack before the start, but my hat and gloves were alternately on and off depending on how hard I was working and whether the wind was blowing. Unfortunately it is at mile 7 that the course takes an abrupt turn for the seriously vertical. At this point I was no longer running, but walking. On the other hand, so was everyone else, and because of the altitude and the extreme steepness, I wasn't that much slower any more, and even passed a few people.
I actually made up almost 2 minutes on my last year's time during this stretch, and I also spent much less time at the summit - last year I had been quite cold and it took me a long time to fumble my warm clothes on, plus I had taken a potty stop. I knew I couldn't reach my goal of 3:49 at this point, so I took the time to get some photos - or rather, I asked one of the aid station volunteers to take a few pictures of me. I also absolutely had to get a cup of hot chicken broth, and a handful of gummi candies to nibble on the way down. (My stomach was dodgy most of the day, and I probably took in only 200 calories total during the race - maybe 6 candies eaten slowly throughout the race. I could feel on the edge of bonkiness the whole time, but I was afraid I'd get sick if I ate anything. This is why the back of my shirt - the one we had made for our race last year - says, "The most fun I've ever had while wanting to throw up!" I got a lot of compliments on it. :-)
I did know, though, that I was close to my time from last year, and could possibly PR, if I did well on the descent. I pretty much matched my descent time from last year, a little slower - I just felt worn out, particularly near the bottom. In fact, when the trail leveled out and went uphill briefly, in a few places, I actually had to walk. But most splits were within 15 seconds of my last year's time, and in the end, I came in at 3:54:26 - a tiny 40-second PR. I celebrated with an overpriced beer at a Telluride restaurant, and a soak in the icy San Miguel river.
Jen, who edged me by a fraction of a second last year, beat me by 5 minutes; I beat my local nemesis by 5 minutes. I came in 13th out of 76 finishers in my age group, 117th out of 499 female finishers and #428 out of 1148 finishers. (There were a number of DNFs; there are cut-off times that runners must make or get turned back.)
Mile Split Elev.chg Avg. HR Max. HR
1 12:56 451 148 (70%) 160 (81%)
2 11:10 260 157 (78%) 160 (81%)
3 11:19 225 150 (72%) 160 (81%)
4 13:31 446 157 (78%) 162 (82%)
5 15:59 557 159 (79%) 167 (87%)
6 13:53 441 155 (77%) 160 (81%)
7 20:45 698 156 (77%) 161 (81%)
8 18:13 626 152 (74%) 157 (78%)
9 23:37 825 148 (71%) 154 (76%)
10 25:50 763 145 (68%) 149 (71%)
11 11:42 -886 142 (65%) 149 (71%)
12 9:56 -744 149 (71%) 152 (74%)
13 9:17 -548 147 (70%) 152 (74%)
14 8:37 -284 149 (72%) 153 (75%)
15 9:17 -602 144 (68%) 148 (70%)
16 9:37 -669 141 (65%) 143 (67%)
17 8:38 -560 143 (67%) 154 (76%)
I think it's interesting to contrast my near identical performance compared to last year, with my 5K last month which was much faster than the same race the previous year (and the 10K which is almost exactly an equivalent performance to the 5K as per the pace calculators). What this says to me is that my speed has improved over last year (although it's decreased since my peak in early March) but my endurance is about the same (ditto ditto). Since the longer races are more about endurance than speed, it seems to me it's reasonable to plug my half marathon time from last October (just under 1:42) into the calculators to come up with a marathon pace goal for St. George in 3 weeks. Which in this case is 3:32-3:35, and so I'm going to be a little conservative (although not much, since it's mostly downhill) and aim for 3:35-3:37.
Just the photos
2009 IPR
2008 IPR
With 1200 runners, I lost sight of my friends almost immediately, although Jen passed me about a mile in. Just before the first aid station, right around mile 2.5, I also spotted a local friend I consider my trail nemesis - she has beaten me in every trail race we've both done (4 of them) while I always beat her on the road. Unfortunately, at that point I decided that I had to give in to the rumbling in my gut that had been bothering me since the start, and dashed off into the trees behind the aid station (they didn't have a portapotty there, which is what I was hoping for) and, er, made like a bear in the woods. (Fortunately I was carrying toilet paper against just this eventuality.)
I felt much better after that, but the stop threw off my pace plan. I had guessed I might be able to run the first mile in around 12 minutes and the next two in about 10 each, putting me about 2 minutes ahead of my time at that point last year, but as it happened I ran the first in just under 13 (a little ahead of last year), the second in just over 11 (a little behind), and then lost 1:30 to the stop. Then the next four miles were a bit steeper, and although I felt like I was doing well, by the mile 7 mark I was behind by another 1:30, for a total of about 3 minutes behind my last year's time. It was pretty aggravating, actually, because at this point it was quite steep - an average of 450-700 ft/mile gain - and I had to alternate running the less-steep sections and walking the steeper ones. When I was running, I would pass both walkers and runners, but as soon as I started walking everyone would pass me. I guess I have short legs, because even when I matched cadence with the people striding by me they would easily pull away. Phooey. (On the other hand, I caught up with my local nemesis again, said hello, and passed her, haha!)
Around mile 7 we got into the sun, which felt good. I had put my jacket into my pack before the start, but my hat and gloves were alternately on and off depending on how hard I was working and whether the wind was blowing. Unfortunately it is at mile 7 that the course takes an abrupt turn for the seriously vertical. At this point I was no longer running, but walking. On the other hand, so was everyone else, and because of the altitude and the extreme steepness, I wasn't that much slower any more, and even passed a few people.
I actually made up almost 2 minutes on my last year's time during this stretch, and I also spent much less time at the summit - last year I had been quite cold and it took me a long time to fumble my warm clothes on, plus I had taken a potty stop. I knew I couldn't reach my goal of 3:49 at this point, so I took the time to get some photos - or rather, I asked one of the aid station volunteers to take a few pictures of me. I also absolutely had to get a cup of hot chicken broth, and a handful of gummi candies to nibble on the way down. (My stomach was dodgy most of the day, and I probably took in only 200 calories total during the race - maybe 6 candies eaten slowly throughout the race. I could feel on the edge of bonkiness the whole time, but I was afraid I'd get sick if I ate anything. This is why the back of my shirt - the one we had made for our race last year - says, "The most fun I've ever had while wanting to throw up!" I got a lot of compliments on it. :-)
I did know, though, that I was close to my time from last year, and could possibly PR, if I did well on the descent. I pretty much matched my descent time from last year, a little slower - I just felt worn out, particularly near the bottom. In fact, when the trail leveled out and went uphill briefly, in a few places, I actually had to walk. But most splits were within 15 seconds of my last year's time, and in the end, I came in at 3:54:26 - a tiny 40-second PR. I celebrated with an overpriced beer at a Telluride restaurant, and a soak in the icy San Miguel river.
Jen, who edged me by a fraction of a second last year, beat me by 5 minutes; I beat my local nemesis by 5 minutes. I came in 13th out of 76 finishers in my age group, 117th out of 499 female finishers and #428 out of 1148 finishers. (There were a number of DNFs; there are cut-off times that runners must make or get turned back.)
Mile Split Elev.chg Avg. HR Max. HR
1 12:56 451 148 (70%) 160 (81%)
2 11:10 260 157 (78%) 160 (81%)
3 11:19 225 150 (72%) 160 (81%)
4 13:31 446 157 (78%) 162 (82%)
5 15:59 557 159 (79%) 167 (87%)
6 13:53 441 155 (77%) 160 (81%)
7 20:45 698 156 (77%) 161 (81%)
8 18:13 626 152 (74%) 157 (78%)
9 23:37 825 148 (71%) 154 (76%)
10 25:50 763 145 (68%) 149 (71%)
11 11:42 -886 142 (65%) 149 (71%)
12 9:56 -744 149 (71%) 152 (74%)
13 9:17 -548 147 (70%) 152 (74%)
14 8:37 -284 149 (72%) 153 (75%)
15 9:17 -602 144 (68%) 148 (70%)
16 9:37 -669 141 (65%) 143 (67%)
17 8:38 -560 143 (67%) 154 (76%)
I think it's interesting to contrast my near identical performance compared to last year, with my 5K last month which was much faster than the same race the previous year (and the 10K which is almost exactly an equivalent performance to the 5K as per the pace calculators). What this says to me is that my speed has improved over last year (although it's decreased since my peak in early March) but my endurance is about the same (ditto ditto). Since the longer races are more about endurance than speed, it seems to me it's reasonable to plug my half marathon time from last October (just under 1:42) into the calculators to come up with a marathon pace goal for St. George in 3 weeks. Which in this case is 3:32-3:35, and so I'm going to be a little conservative (although not much, since it's mostly downhill) and aim for 3:35-3:37.
Just the photos
2009 IPR
2008 IPR
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The most fun I've ever had while wanting to throw up!
HA! That pretty much sums up my whole endurance sport experience right there.
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Yeah, speed and endurance are an interesting equation. Most people, you plug in their 5K time to one of the calculators, and it predicts their 10K time pretty well, but it's overly optimistic on, say, 10 mile and half marathon times, and ludicrously optimistic on marathon times, because most people have more speed than endurance. I'm kind of the opposite, because I can't imagine running a 5K at the speed my half marathon time predicts (or vice versa, my 5K PR predicted a half marathon time that turned out to be far slower than my actual time). But I haven't yet really extended that to the marathon.
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One of these year, I will just have to come out for that one!
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Hey, that's awesome :o) ! And congrats on PR.
You look really good in the pics.
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