Yesterday I ran the 5k portion of the winter off-road race series. It was at Stanky Creek (aka Nesbit Park), which is one of my favorite local trail-running locations.
As expected, the pace for this race was a bit slower than the 3k, and I had a good time running this one. Apparently, I'm going to keep writing about this WORS experience, so here's some thoughts about race number two:
- *wow*. There were a lot of people. I'm still surprised by how many people ran this thing.
- *wow* there were a lot of kids! Towards the end of the race, I was really pushing myself to keep up with a rather swift young man (who appeared to be around 12 or 13 years old). I'm pretty sure I some someone at the beginning of the race who couldn't have been older than 7. It's awesome to see kids running these.
- This race really was *crowded*. There's really only enough room on the trail to run single-file. I've been told on multiple occasions to start at the front of the race or risk getting bottle-necked as soon as we hit trails, and this is *very* true. Even though the race directors asked the faster people to start at the front and the slower to start at the back, it might be time to set more formal pace groups–especially at a place like Stanky Creek, which is fairly treacherous during a solo run.
- Yesterday was perfect weather for running. It was clear, about 60ºF, and not at all like *winter*.
- My new shoes, the Salomon Speedcross 3, are pretty awesome on soft ground. They still feel like *new shoes*, so I'm ready to break them in, but once they're a bit better worn, I think I'll really like them for trail running.
So that's race two. Next up is the 8K (also at Stanky) and then the 10K (at Shelby Farms).