Dirty Half Marathon

The past two years I've had my Junes filled with Western States and the Dirty Half Marathon in Bend two weeks before. Usually I also had Comrades two weeks before that but this year in an effort to be slightly more sensible (unlike Ellie Greenwood who foolishly put in lots of effort for her close second place at Comrades just three weeks before WS - tut, tut [head shake]), I skipped Comrades and the days of flying it involves.

Last year I opted to run the Dirty Half in 10 layers of clothing for heat training and most people kept asking if I was ok or if I wanted to leave some layars at an aid station. I didn't. This time I tried going for a hard run, especially since it's a competitive race with the leaders gunning for the national USATF half marathon trail title. It's really a race for second since Max King rolls out of bed each time after a hard shorter distance race the day before (this time it was an Olympic Trials qualifying time of 8:36 in the 3,000m steeplechase in Portland). He won in 1:15, as expected. 

The course is pure Central Oregon with beautiful, twisty single-track trails through the pine forests with plenty of sandy-colored background inbetween thanks to this being the beautiful Central Oregon High Desert. Not too much ascent, just rolling and sharp mini climbs. Basically really fun and fast for most of it. I managed a 1:20 so was happy with 8th and some faster running on trails thaan I usually would do.

Everyone had a great time, but later that day we found out there was a real tragedy that one man had collapsed on the course and died. The organizers weren't at fault at all and put on a fantastic event again, but there's always that chance that something can go wrong with any extreme exercise, as accidents can happen anywhere, any time.

The women's race was tight with local Marci Klimek edging out Colorado's Megan Kimmel in a sprint to the line in 1:24. My North Face team-mate (and Bend resident), Steph Howe rounded out the podium in 1:26 after winning her third Pole, Peddle, Paddle race the month before. Full results here. Come and do this sell-out trail race next year.

Dirty Half Marathon Back in Bend

First mile was on the road allowing everyone to spread out.

Just back from a great trip to Bend where Amy and I used to live. Oregon is such a perfect place for trail running and the Dirty Half is now in its tenth year and is a top-class race which I did last year too. Great long weekend seeing friends and favorite restaurants (so many of both).

It was a new course and was also the USATF National Trail Half Marathon Championship for the second time, meaning lots of fast runners. At some point I'll race this one but it was more sensible to use it as a WS training run and sit back and enjoy the ride. I layered up with as many jackets and warm tops as possible to get a reasonable fat suit look and hoped it'd be a hot day on top of that.

It was sunny and warm, providing near perfect running conditions but maybe a little hot towards the end for fast running. So I started at the back of the first wave and was comfortable for the first five miles but then started to feel the heat. The course had some steep sections and I doubted whether the winners would break 1:15 by much. Only one person did, local Max King, who had won the race multiple times before. A great recap of the whole race is on Scott Dunlap's blog here. All results here.

I was nowhere near the sharp end of the race but kept up an even pace to finish in 1:44. The heat got to me and plenty of volunteers and supporters seemed concerned that I was wearing too much, but everything that makes the heat feel easier in less than two weeks is worth it. Combining this with torturous sauna sessions is hard but worthwhile and the big showdown at Squaw Valley looks like being pretty special.

Dirty Half makes for a great US trail championship

Today was the USATF trail half marathon championship in Bend, OR at the Dirty Half. Since I'm in Bend for a couple of weeks it would have been a shame to miss this so I signed up early for the highest profile and well-regarded local race. It was a bonus that it was also a championship race since it's well worth travelling to, even without that honour.

Summer started in Bend on the Saturday after a long period of generally crappy weather but the conditions on race day were perfect with the recent rain making the course less dusty. It starts off with a few miles of uphill, levels off around five miles, then undulates before descending again and throwing in some more hills near the end with a total elevation change of +/-1,000ft.

The guys at the front went off fairly fast and I didn't see them again after about a mile. For me, the aim was to run hard and get in a great training session on relatively easy trails. The legs are still feeling Comrades and I could tell within the first minute that they had no pace in them, especially for the uphills.

I wanted to have an enjoyable day and most of it was...except the actual running bit. The tired legs meant I was breathing hard and going slow enough uphill to have people overtake me easily. But with it having plenty of downhill in the second half, I aimed to push and get the heart rate up higher than in all the marathons and ultras. This almost ended with me having to walk or at least slow down to a gentle jog because I started sprinting downhill before seven miles and the legs felt extremely wobbly with a lot of miles left. But I spent the time from five miles in going past people and got up to eighth by nine miles then couldn't see anyone again til the last half mile. Seventh was too far ahead but it gave me an extra incentive to push and meant I got in a great training session.

Max King won by over a minute in just under 1h11m and was almost a minute per mile ahead of me, in 1h21m. It's a great race, although trying to race it on tired legs wasn't as much fun. Excellent organisation, as ever, by Footzone and it reminds me of why Bend's such a great place to live, especially for runners.

No more races until Western States in 13 days. Am guessing I'll need another session of Active Release Technique work for the knee, but that should be long enough to recover and be in reasonable shape. As long as I can get a place, 2011 will probably be the year I can race it really hard and this year will need to be a learning experience (not that I won't try to be near the front).

Now I need a lie down. These half marathons are knackering.