Happy 4th of July!!

How’d Nate and I celebrate? A race, of course :).

We did the Afton trail run for the first time the morning of the 4th. We went out to the park once before to preview the course so at least I knew I was going to have my butt kicked :). The race itself was a lot of fun. The trail is gorgeous, challenging, and the people running and volunteering are super friendly. I’d definitely do the race again next year.

There are a couple things I’d do differently next year:
1. Practice on trails more often. Every time I’d get to a relatively flat or even uphill with secure footing I could open up my stride and fly. Everytime I’d be in an area where I wasn’t quite sure where I was stepping (the entire last 3 miles of single track course) or was trying to navigate the downhills I’d have to pull up BIG time on my speed. With practice I think I could get much better at these.
2. Wear a Fuel Belt or other hydration system!!!! Nate ran with one and I was SOO jealous! 🙂
3. I was very gratful for my Vasque shoes! Anyone still running in their road shoes should really think about upgrading 🙂

I finished 2nd for women overall (official results still pending), so not a bad debut for the trails :).

Now… on to the rest of this week, which marks the start of ramping up the mileage for TCM!