Equinox Marathon

 I drove up to Fairbanks last night and ran the Equinox Marathon for my 4th time today. The fall colors are out and it was almost perfect weather. It was cold enough that I needed to keep my windbreaker on the whole way, but even with some pretty strong wind, I never needed my hat or gloves. It seemed like quite a struggle most of the way. I think I may have been tired from the 6 hour drive. The first long hill is always kind of a challenge. After I reached the top of that, I was able to run at my usual pretty slow speed. Things were going pretty well until mile 11. At that point I started feeling unusually exhausted. Not quite dizzy, but even wondering if I was going to need to stop. But I ate one of my fuel gels and suddenly felt back to normal. I suppose my blood sugar was just a little low since I hadn't eaten much for dinner last night and only a muffin for breakfast. This race is a trail race with long narrow steep trails most of the way. There is an area called the Tunnel that is basically just a tunnel of high trees that creates a canopy over the trail. Halfway through the tunnel, there is a gorgeous view over the countryside. Last year I took an amazing picture at that spot. Today the fall colors weren't quite as spectacular, but the picture I took with my phone today looked almost the same. Brilliant fall colors. My friend Alice and her brother were planning to just walk the course so I knew they would be somewhere behind me. From the top of Ester Dome, the course goes down the hill to a turnaround spot around mile 15. Just as I reached the beginning of that descent, on my return to the top, Alice and her brother passed me heading down. I'm not sure if that indicates how slowly I was running or how incredibly fast they were walking, but they were just a few miles behind me. Once back on top the course heads down the other side of the mountain. The steepest spot is a very steep straight down area nicknamed the Chute. It follows the powerline straight down the fall line until it takes a turn to the left. Fortunately, I'm fairly good at running down steep hills. I basically hop from rock to rock and make very good time on all of the downhill areas. The rest of the course is basically downhill, but there are still about 8 more miles to the finish line. But after so many miles, even flat stretches had become quite challenging. But I kept a fairly steady pace and happily finally reached the finish line. My time was very slow, but 2 minutes faster than last year. 8:45:42. That's a long time to be on my feet. I was very tired. I waited for my friends who arrived about 45 minutes later. We went to the awards banquet after the race and I finally had some real food. Pizza which was delightful! I did get an award for first in my age category. Female 75-79. I had zero competition and would have won if I had crawled across the finish line at 10 hours. But I always say, I beat the folks who stayed home! It was fun in a very exhausting way. Driving back to Palmer in the morning.

View in the Tunnel

Age Group Medal

Me sporting my medal