Tecumseh Trail Marathon (Bloomington, IN)56th Marathon
12/6/2008
55th Place
4:10:51
The Tecumseh Trail Marathon is run in Yellowwood State Forest, between Bloomington and Nashville, IN. The course is about 90% single track, with a lot of rolling hills (much more than I expected). It is put on by D.IN.O (Do Indiana Off-Road) who put on a lot of trail and off-road triathlon races throughout Indiana. They did a very good job of putting this race on. It was well marked with pink flagging every 100-200 meters. There were aid stations every 3M or so, so you didn't need to carry water if you didn't want to (although I did). At the finish, they had hot soup, cookies, hot chocolate, sandwiches as well as a heated shelter for all the runners to warm up in.
Logistically, this is a point to point race, meaning you have to ride a bus to the start. It is an hour ride, which is probably why the race starts at 10:00 AM. However, the race actually started at 10:20 because we needed to wait on all the buses to get there.
I personally did not have as good a race as I had hoped for. Well, maybe I did. I just went out too hard, not expecting the hills to really take their toll on me. I was on pace for a 3:40 at the half way point (which would have put me in the top 20), but the hills drained me over the last 10M, causing me to slow a lot.
The weather for the race was just plain awful. It was 22 degrees at the start, with a wind chill below 10. It also started to snow about 8:00 AM, causing the trail to have about 1/2 inch of snow on it. Normally, this would be OK, but the snow didn't let up the whole time I was running (again, normally this would be fine). What made it tough was the packing down effect of the runners ahead of me, causing the trail to be slick in a lot of sports. I fell twice (my dad fell 12 times) and twisted my ankle at least three times. But, that is part of running a trail race.
Overall, the race is awesome. The course is challenging and beautiful. The race organization is great. I just wish it was in Sept or Oct, when the weather is a bit more predictable.
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3 comments:
Congrats on a great finish time, especially given the tough conditions. I've been the trail sweep for all 6 years of the Tecumseh and this year was definitely the most difficult.
I'm also glad you found the hills challenging, as I just moved to Colorado this year and have been trying to convince people that we had vertical relief back in the Hoosier state.
October would be a beautiful month for the Tecumseh, but unfortunately the Hoosier Hikers Council (who built the trail and supplies all the aid station volunteers) has another race (1/2 marathon, 10mi, 10k, 5k options) in Oct and it would be really hard to get volunteers out for both events in one month - plus their regular trail building activities.
I also agree that 10am is a rather late start (especially for those pushing the 8hr time limit), but besides the required busing there was also the hope that on most years it would warm up enough by 10am that ice forming overnight would be melted off by the start.
Good luck on completing all 50 states!
Congratulations on a great run! It sure was tough. Are you the one in the yellow shirt? I think I remember seeing you midway through the race.
what a fun-sounding race! well, maybe minus the packed snow and related spills. i've always thought about getting into trail running but just haven't yet. your report is enticing! congrats on a great run!
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