Creede Mountain Run/Imogene Pass Race Reports

I ran back-to-back races the last two weekends. First I ran the Creede Mountain Run 12 Mile on Labor Day weekend and then the Imogene Pass Run last weekend.

A bit of lead up to both races: I had ratcheted up my training from maybe 25-30 miles a week in 2016 to 50-60 miles a week in 2017, so I was excited to get out and see if I could prove my fitness. I had only run two races in the past five years, so two races in back-to-back weekends was a lot for me.

I had originally planned to run the Aspen Backcountry Marathon in August, but some Achilles tendinitis made me think the better of it. I laid back on the training for a couple of weeks, then put in a solid three-week block of 70 mile weeks with lots of elevation gain. The Achilles never fully healed, but I was able to run through it in training, so I was hopeful I could do the same in races.

The Creede Mountain Run was a super chill race, even by the standards of my most recent races. The race had a 2 mile, a 12 mile, and a 22 mile variant, I was doing the middle version. The race was so low key, if you weren’t careful, you might not find it. To give you an idea, the race website says that “the race starts in town,” with no further information. So I showed up in Creede about 45 minutes before the start, and asked the owner of the local coffee shop if she knew where the race started. She didn’t, but another patron in line pointed me to the starting line a couple of blocks from the coffee joint.

I did a little jog warm up, bumped into a guy I knew from Salida, and then waited for the start. I lined up in the front. I immediately got the sense that this wouldn’t be a particularly competitive race, because I was literally one of two people who started at the actual starting line. No one wanted to be near the front. Everybody sat back 20-30 feet back from the line waiting for the gun to go off. 

When it did, I found myself jogging with a couple of local runners and a 10-year-old kid who started off hot in the accompanying 2-mile fun run.

At about the half-mile mark, I looked at my watch, and we were going about 6:45 pace up what was probably a 5% incline. It seemed easy enough, and so I picked up the pace.

For the first time since I was in high school, I was leading a race.

The incline increased and I did my best to keep up the pace. But I was definitely working hard, harder than I had in any race in years. I had a heart-rate monitor on and my heart rate was right around 170 for most of the first five miles. In training, I never let my heart rate go much higher than 165, so this was uncharted territory for me.

From what I knew of the course, it went up about 2000 ft. for five miles, leveled off for two, and then descended 2000 ft. on a dirt road for the final five miles. So I figured I’d gun it for the first five and then try to hold on for dear life from there.

It was working. At three miles, I had about a 200-meter lead. By the five-mile aid station, I couldn’t see anybody behind me. I had run five miles in just under 45 minutes, with just shy of 2000 feet of elevation gain. I felt like I was having the best race I had in years. When I got to the aid station, there was one kid who handed me a glass of water and one lady who asked me for my race number.

I blasted through the aid station, and to my chagrin, the road kept climbing. I was under the impression that the race topped out at about 10,700 ft., but my watch (and my legs) kept telling me I was going higher and higher. By the time I got to mile 6.5, and I was over 11,000 ft., I was pretty sure something was very rotten in Denmark. I looked around me on a long stretch of road where I could see nearly a half a mile behind me, and there was absolutely no one.

And then a little later I saw something that made my stomach sink. I saw some course flagging. But whereas earlier in the race, there had been orange and blue colored flags (go Broncos!), now there was only blue. I stopped dead in my tracks, because I was pretty sure I had gone off course. But I was in the middle of nowhere and running by myself. So I had no idea what was the right course, either. So I slowed my pace to a jog and then talked to the nearest driver on the road. He didn’t know the race course, but he said there was an aid station a quarter mile up the road. So I jogged up the road, where the aid station volunteers were buoyant and jolly, cheering me on eagerly as the first runner, when I asked, “Am I still on the 12-mile course?”

The lady cringed and said, “Sorry, no.” I asked her where the turnaround was, and she said that it was right at the 5-mile aid station. I looked at my watch and it said 7.46 miles. I had gone nearly 5 miles off course in a 12-mile race. I did some swearing, saw that there were children present, and then apologized.

At that point, I had another decision. Should I just continue and do the 22 instead? I was so far ahead of second place in the 22 mile I couldn’t even see the next runner, even though I had stopped for a minute or so. But my wife was going to be waiting for me at the finish. And it was pretty hot, and I didn’t have any water or nutrition. I thought about borrowing the lady’s cell phone and calling my wife and telling her I’d be a couple of hours later than planned, but she had no service.

So I decided to turn around and head back. I ended up running just shy of 17 miles with about 3k of elevation gain in just over 2:10. But my 5-mile detour took me from first to last place. When I got back to the actual turnaround, the only marking was a 2-foot-by-2-foot cardboard sign drawn by a child that someone had nailed to a tree. Nothing on the road. No one directing traffic (or at least they weren't when I was there).

Needless to say, I was not the only person who had gotten lost. At the finish, I (and a few others) spoke with the race director about the lack of markings. She was a nice enough lady, but totally out of her depth when it comes to organizing a race.

Sigh. It's a small mountain race. What can you do?

Imogene Pass was much less eventful. 

My Achilles tendinitis got flared up pretty badly from my hard effort in Creede, so all I could muster the week in between the two races was three miles of super easy jogging on a treadmill.

Come race day, I felt flat, and my Achilles was still not fully healed. 

I gave it a decent effort, but wasn’t expecting much. I got to the top of the pass in just over two hours, which had me in 22^nd place (out of 1600 runners, I believe), and then ran one of the slowest downhill sections of the top 50 runners, where I got passed by quite a few on the way down. The road was much more technical than I had anticipated, and bombing down techie descents is not my cup of tea.

All whining aside, I did about as well I had in me to do that day.

2:55, good for 31^st overall, and 12^th in my age group. If I had been two months older, I would have been 2^nd! Looking forward to the start of my Masters’ career.

All in all, neither race was quite what I had hoped for. But I’m happy with how my fitness is progressing overall.

Next up is to let myself heal completely. Then I’m going to work on speed. Maybe even make it to the track for a few workouts or races.

If nothing else, it should make it easier to stay on the right course.