Memorial Day Race Weekend Part I

Memorial Day marked the unofficial start of summer as well as my race season. It is becoming a tradition to run at the trail racing festival held every Memorial Day weekend at Pineland Farms in New Gloucester, ME (They keep changing the name. This year it was called the Salomon Trail Running Festival at Pineland Farms). My girlfriend and I also go camping at Bradbury Mountain State Park in Maine for this event too. Something about trail running and camping that seems as natural and perfect as peanut butter and jelly and it made for a totally awesome/exhausting weekend.

The weekend started with taking off from work early on Friday, we loaded the car with the supplies, running gear, dragged the dog (her name is Lady) into the car and headed north to Freeport. As it happens, check in was held at the L.L. Bean flagship store, which is weakness of mine. It always reminds me of my family trips to Maine which included a midnight run to the store (it never closes). We got our bibs and shirts and strolled around the store for a bit and then headed off to the camp site. Bradbury Mountain State Park is one of the most well maintained state parks I've been to. Maine loves its wilderness and it definitely shows in their parks. Our site was nestled in the trees and was on a nice flat area covered with gravel for drainage, which is great because camping with my girlfriend inevitably involves rain.

As we checked in, it started to slowly drizzle (seriously Crystie always brings rain on camping trips). We got our camp site up in a hurry. You never know true motivation until you are trying to set up a camp site in rain. Once the tent and EZ up was set up, we cooked dinner and played some cribbage before heading to bed.

The lead pack early in the race.

Before I knew it the sun was up and I was awake. We had a quick breakfast of bagels and coffee, took Lady for a walk and headed off to Pineland Farms. This race always draws a crowd so it was busy when we got there. I headed out for a 2 mile warm up before my race to check out the trails. The trails are basically fire roads and XC ski trails that aren't technical but they are constantly rolling. Seriously, there is not a flat section the whole race. Last year, they were so muddy, I basically skied down the hills. I was happy to see that unlike last year, the trails were dry, which means I could just freewheel down them and not be terrified of wiping out. As I headed back to the start line, I came across a fox on the trail. We stared at each other for a second before he scampered off back into the woods. It's things like this that always reinforce my love of trail events.

 I made my way back to the start line and waited. I remember last year I was able to get out front so I made sure to line up in that first row so I wouldn't have to fight through a crowd. The race started and the front pack was out like a shot. I was able to lead the pack through the first 1k before I started to settle in and dropped back.

I was able to hang with the lead pack for about 4k before the hills and fatigue started getting to me. I took it out too fast in hopes of getting under 40 minutes but I checked my pace and was under 20 minutes through the first 5k so I still had a shot. I buckled down for the second half of the rest which involved a net gain in elevation.

Happy to finally be done.

I was fading fast and I totally lost site of the lead group on the switchbacks. I shortened my stride and quickened my turnover to conserve as much energy as possible and hopefully not have to sprint against anyone at the finish. Eventually, I came up to the 5k canicross race, which started after the 10k and knew I was getting close to the end. Buoyed by this and the fact that I didn't see anyone from the 10k behind I kept plugging away. However, the last 2km seemed to take forever and as I passed crowds of exhausted runners and puppies I tried to get a finishing kick going. Finally, I came to the finishing chute and crossed the line in 41:27, good for 2nd in my age group and 7th overall.

Overall, I was pretty happy with my race. I was over a minute faster than my time from last year. I did not execute the best race but given how intense I had been training up to that point, I was happy to see improvement. Crystie and Lady also had fun doing the canicross race. Shipyard Brewing was a race sponsor and provided each runner (21+) with two beers so Crystie and I relaxed for a bit before heading back to camp. We spent the rest of the day hiking Bradbury Mountain and then relaxing by the camp fire. This would have been a busy weekend by any measure but we weren't done just yet...

To be continued...