I flew in the day before and made it to packet pickup so I would know where to go the next day. The town was very pretty, a quintessential small New England town. There was a farmer's market going on and it seemed everyone in town was out and about. Pickup was a breeze and I made my way back to Burlington to rest. The race started early on Sunday, 7:00, so I had to leave around 5:30 to get there around 6:00. I was concerned about the parking in such a small space but the race organizers did a great job. Even the start area was pretty!
Miles 1-5: We took off at 7:00 on the dot. I'm not going to worry about splits for this race. The hills made it impossible to go out at a consistent pace. Some miles clocked in at 9:20 and others clocked in at 7:30. It was up and down the whole way. You can find the nasty elevation chart for the full marathon here. The first few miles weren't bad as we made our way out of town. Our first climb came up about 2 1/2 miles in and was it ever a climb. It was roughly a 500 foot climb over a mile or so. Straight up. We then encountered the downhill which was almost worse. I tried to hold back some on the downhills, knowing more climbs awaited us later on, but it was destroying my quads. We leveled out for another mile or so and made our way back for the very same climb! Our two biggest climbs came up in the first half of the race.
Miles 6-10: We hit the halfway mark at the end of the climb and I was around one hour here. My goal was to simply break 2:00 or even a 1:55. At this point, I thought breaking 2:00 was going to be a stretch. We kept on hitting smaller uphills that felt worse than they were and that kept slowing me down. Things leveled out a bit over miles 9 and 10. I finished mile 10 around 1:28 and was finally feeling comfortable about breaking 2:00. We had been running around a hill over the town, so I knew we had a long downhill coming soon that would take us back to the finish.
Miles 10-13.1: We finally started hitting the downhill and winded our way back to Waitsfield. This was a long downhill and I gained a lot of time during this stretch. It was finally comfortable enough to hold some conversation with other runners. Everyone was extremely friendly. I also finally got a chance to enjoy the views. The race was gorgeous throughout, but the final 5k was the prettiest section of the course with some views of the town and the mountains. We made our way back towards the start for a nice, level finish in Waitsfield. I didn't really pick up the pace as I knew I had a much better time than expected. The finish line finally came into view and I came in with a very good time of 1:51:48. This was good enough for 56/366 overall and sixth in my age group. I was actually less than two minutes away from placing in my age group. I was beat!
As much fun as this one was, it will be a one-time thing for me. It was tough and my legs were feeling it for a few days. I've actually taken most of the week off and will start hitting it again soon.
Next race: Cooper Tire Centennial 5 Miler- Findlay, OH
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