Steeplechase 2009

I was going to write a ling and lengthy epistle of this year's Steeplechase, but I'm tired. Here's the condensed version.

I originally didn't plan on running it, but my brother was signed up and decided to go to California instead (what's he thinking, sun and surf instead of 3+ hours of agony?), so why let a perfectly good registration go to waste.

My legs were definitely not recovered from Squaw Peak the week before, and were tired from the day before's Grandeur loop with Greg and Christian. I was thinking 3 hours would be a reasonable time to finish. As I thought, the legs were tired on the climb up to the crags, I took my time scrambling across the crags, and got to Smuggler's Notch in 1 hour 33 minutes, about 15 minutes slower than usual. The descent to City Creek was as overgrown as ever, with added mud from all the recent rain. Luckily I managed to stay on trail and not have to climb my way back up through the jungle. I got to City Creek leading a group of 5 or 6 that had caught up to me, including Dave Larsen, Chuck Konopa, Mic Jurynek, Mark Christopherson and a couple others. They all took off once we hit the road and I thought I'd take it easy the last 7 miles. After a few minutes and a gel, I noticed my legs feeling a little better, picked up the pace and I started passing people. I eventually got within about 50 yards of Dave, he saw me, sped up and I never saw him again. I finished in 2 hours 38 minutes, only 6 1/2 minutes off my PR, and the run down City Creek was my fastest ever. Maybe those mile repeats are paying off after all. What a great day for a run! Thanks Greg for the pictures!

The only downside to the day was that Shilling decided to sleep in and didn't show up after promising he would be there. Hmmmmm.