On Sunday August 27th, I did one 14.7 km lap on the second day of the Conquer the Canuck race at Crabbe Mountain one day after my triathlon in Sackville. The morning on the hill was quite cool and foggy. I wore a second shirt, but I don�t think I really had too, because I warmed up quickly.
I did what was the first lap of a marathon for some runners on the day after they did a 50 km run. These folks were doing the Ultimate race of 92 km in two days. I ran with the front runner (Shawn) for the one lap and we had an interesting conversation about everything from triathlons and running on PEI (were he is from) to wood working and wildlife. I was only able to stay up with Shawn, because the distance was only 15 km and the terrain was very technical and hard to run fast on. He also had lots more running to do and he had done lots of running the day before. He seemed to be getting stronger as we kept running and I started to struggle more. I didn�t do too badly for the day after the Sackville triathlon.
As I said the course was very technical. By this I mean there was a good deal of none-flat terrain running along forest paths, dirt roads, up hill and down hill (steep hills). The terrain was typical New Brunswick back country forest. I ran fairly comfortably for the first half or 2/3 of the run before I started to struggle. We ran through lots of mucky terrain and I will have to throw my socks away that I wore during this race. I fell down once, but the ground was very soft and I got up quickly.
I�m glad that I was running with an experienced trail runner, because there is a good chance that I would have gotten lost during the race a time or two. As it was we got turned around at one point. Roy showed up after we wandered around a couple of minutes wondering where we were and helped straighten us out.
I enjoyed myself a get deal on this run, because I like trail running and this day reminded me of tromping around in the woods with my father when I was young. One day I would like to participate in this entire two day event. It would, however, take lots of careful training and preparation, because this run is really tough.
August 27, 2006