Fresh out the gate again Time to raise the stakes again

On Saturday I ran my second Run for the Toad 25km trail race in Pinehurst Park (between Cambridge and Paris).  Once again George and Peggy put on a great event that saw about 1300 people out on the course.  Some were doing the 50km including Taylor Murphy who crushed the course record and ran 3:23.  I won again and ran about 1 minute and 30 seconds faster than last year.  My legs were more tired this year which was probably due to running more mileage and doing workouts.  I don’t think I had to dig as deep this year as last year.  In ’08 I ran the last 5km fairly hard in my attempt to break 1 hour 30, in which I hit dead on.  This year I was 44:30 at halfway and decided to push a little more to run sub 1:29, I ended up being 30 seconds faster on the second half.  Taylor Milne finished second in the 25km as he used the first 6km to warm-up and then did an hour of tempo and then cooled-down for the remainder of the race. RESULTS

Great trails for running, most of the race was in the forest and fairly hilly and turny.

Finish line, 1:28:31.  The 25km race is 2 times a 12.5km loop.

This afternoon I have a VO2MAX workout in Guelph that should prove to be pretty tough for me as anything remotely fast has been quite challenging.  I need these type of workouts to get back my 5km-10km speed for next spring and luckily I have a fit group to kick my ass into gear.  Last week I put in over 180km and other than a slight foot soreness (soft tissue stuff, bone is strong) I feel pretty good.