11.3km | 64.11 What a great weekend ! We flew down on Saturday morning and were met by CR Ripley at Albury airport. Lunch at All Saints Winery followed in what was not the greatest race preparation, but certainly fine food and wine. Now to the race. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that this would have to be up there with the toughest circa 10km races in the country. The race starts at the other end of town at Lavington and runs along fire trails up Nail Can Hill and along the undulating ridge and then down to the banks of the beautiful Murray River. The course map is below: I ran with Ripley for the first two k's but slowly pulled away. After the 2km mark the trail started to climb steeply and rose hard for the next km. As I ran up the steep incline as many as 80% of the runners were forced to walk. I ran all the way up to the first water stop at 3km. I took 2 cups of water and walked while I drank. The trail continued to rise from 3km through 4km. At this point I was dreading that I decided to race in a longsleeve dri-fit instead of a singlet. It was only 5 degrees at the start and with a misty rain falling I thought that it was the right move. I was overheating bigtime and was contemplating running shirtless. From 4km to 8km the trail undulated up and down. I found that my Adrenalines were not giving me the grip on the rocky clay/sand trail that I needed and many times going either up or down a hill I found my footing slipping. As I figure that much of my running will be on grass/dirt in the future (to avoid injury) I may include a pair of trail shoes in my rotation. At about 8km we came to the end of the ridge and a quite dramatic drop back into the valley. Many were running down the trail at pace but I didn't feel comfortable so I kept the brakes on and ran with small steps for the decent which lasted about 1km. This did not do great things for my shin splints ! Maybe if I had more trust in my shoes I would run it with a different attitude next time. The course then dropped down to the river for an easy 1.5km sprint to the finish, which I ran hard. I ran through the finish shute with a great cheer from 1,000's of locals and met up with my wife and friends. My splits were:- 1km 7:08 2km 6:25 3km 8:51 4km 5:46 5km 5:32 6km 4:52 7km 5:10 8km 5:42 9km 5:35 10km 4:56 11.3km 4:09 I'm stiff and sore, but remain pumped for the half in 3 weeks. Ripley is coming up for the half as well and he finished strong in 69:xx. I think he surprised himself today and he'll do good to put that in the bank for the half. Good to finally meet CR Blogger Flashduck today as well ! Mood: :D

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