Well it's official, despite repeatedly cursing myself for signing up for Sinister 7 during the race and swearing I'd never do this again, I'm already looking forward to my next 100 miler! As tough as it is to condense 22.5 hours of running into something that is actually readable, here is my race report from Sinister 7
Standing on the start line of your first 100 miler is quite a feeling. A mixture of excitement and panic tumbled around in my head as I stood there like a deer in the headlights. My mind was full of doubts, how can you do this when your ankle is only 85 percent? Think about how much you hurt after Blackfoot, can you really run 60km farther than that? Can someone actually run for over 20 hours? I worked hard to push those thoughts away and focus on running one leg at a time. I knew going into the race that it would go out fast, and wanting to avoid a blowup like Blackfoot, I had decided to take a very conservative start. I also find that I don't do well in the heat, and with forecasts predicting temperatures between 25 and 30, I knew if I survived the heat and my ankle was feeling alright, I could pick up the pace and make up some ground after it got dark.
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| Organized chaos at the start line -Raven Eye Photography |
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| Looking like I might throw up -Photo: Joan Brown |
At the start line, I made a conscious effort to start a few rows back from the line so I wouldn't get caught up in the excitement and go out too fast. Shortly after the gun, everything bottlenecked and we ran in a long line for a few km. When it opened up again, I looked up and found myself running with Mike Kirby and Ben Rempel, both of whom I finished close to at Blackfoot, so I knew I was in a good spot. I made a point of chatting with people for the first big climb to make sure I wasn't pushing too hard. After blowing through TA1 with just a quick stop to fill a bottle, Mike and I headed out on the big climb to start leg 2. We matched each others pace quite well with a mixture of power hiking and running and topped out together. Mike sped ahead on the downhill quickly disappearing out of sight, and I realized that with my limited time in the mountains over the past 4 weeks while rehabbing my ankle that I wasn't as sharp as I had hoped to be.
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| Tiptoeing through the tulips on Leg 1 -Raven Eye Photography |
