Hobble Creek Half 2010

Adam ran the race last Saturday. He came in at 1:34 at Hobble Creek in 2009 and wanted to get the same or better this year and he came in at 1:34 again. Average minute per mile: 7:13!!! He got a medal for being in the top 100 men. He placed 22nd in his age group. Runners must be getting faster though. Last year with that same time, he placed 12th.
Mind you that he did this all without hardly training at all the last couple months. He is in awesome condition and I am proud of him.

Adam:

Since Julie left out the gory details I felt like I needed to add my 2 bits worth. (at least 2 bits, I personally feel like it is worth much more than that).

The day started out about 4 am with me getting up cuz I didn't feel like sleeping much. I drank me a big glass of chocolate milk and got out the Rokit Fuel. Rokit Fuel wasn't too bad but it should not be eaten before distance running, call me if you want the results of the research I have done. So, I drove myself over to the start of the race in my trusty old pickup. (It has a couple of awesome new "character points" : trailer came unhooked and buggered the tailgate and then some guy edging his lawn hit a rock about the size of a golf ball with the edger and threw it into the driver's door. He was about 150 ft away, so, if you use one of those machines, look out. Once again, my ADD raises its handsome head, back to the race)

Got on the bus and rode up next to a girl from Boise who came down to sell baby stuff at the county fair. Once we got to the top I got off the bus and started to mozy up the road to the start line. There were tons of people who were in a hurry to get to the start but I wasn't one of them. I then saw my friend from growing up: Riley Brinkerhoff. I have known Riley since we were in Elementry School, he was in 3rd grade and I was in 5th. (Another ADD moment: when we were in high school we were on the wrestling team. Riley's mom was from a small town outside of Vernal. Her maiden name was McKee. One of Riley's McKee cousins on the team was teasing Riley about only being a half breed McKee since only his mom was a McKee, AS IF THAT IS A BAD THING!!!) We talked and chatted until the race started. We got to visit for almost 2 hours since the race was about an hour late getting started. We saw each other at the race last year. It was so fun to talk with him.

In the Hobble Creek race only the first 100 men and 100 women to cross the finish line get medals. Riley and I were quite a ways back from the start line when the gun finally went off. I wasn't too worried about it because the chip on my shoe would keep track of what my time was for the race. We crossed the start mat, Riley told me good by and I was off like an orange balloon that had just got a hole popped in it. I was bouncing all over the place and not getting anywhere. I was pinched in by the crowd of people. They were everywhere and moving much slower than I thought they should have been. I was trying to slip my way around and through the crowd for about half a mile when it hit me that some fella whose time would be a few minutes slower than mine might cross the finish line before me and get my medal. I determined at that point there had to be a better way to get past this huge mass that was doing its best to keep me from my medal. I looked over and noticed "hey, that hillside has absolutely nobody running on it. There really aren't that many bushes or big rocks or trees on it." I worked my way over to the side of the road and then off the road and up the hillside. One guy yelled at me that I would turn an ankle but if it was risk a turned ankle or not get my medal I figured I would heal. Sure enough, I was able to start passing and making good time. I am assuming trail running is easier on a trail but I wasn't in it for easy. I would have trained for the dang race if I wanted it to be easy.

After about the first mile things had opened up enough I was able to get back on the road, exactly 6 minutes and 58 seconds after crossing the starting line. I worked my way down the road for the next mile in 6 min and 50 seconds. I was determined to catch every guy I could see in front of me so he wasn't the one that ended up with my medal. I didn't notice how fast miles 3 or 4 went but at mile 4 I had been running for 26 minutes, my average was about 6:30 for the 4 miles.

I would hit the downhill sections and have flash backs to my Boy Scout days when we would find a big ole hill and down it screaming "bonzaiiiii." I didn't scream, but I used the same form: arms flailing and barely keeping myself from falling on my face. It is amazing how much faster it is to get to the bottom of a hill that way. All these poor people I was passing were trying to maintain good form or keep themselves under control. They are lucky they were pretty spread out because I wouldn't have been able to navigate around them with my super cool downhill technique.

So, we finally got to the end of the downhill and started up the only major hill of the race. It is about a mile long. I wasn't able to pass as many people on this section but there was one lady who I passed about halfway up. I turned to her and said "this hill's a killer" she said "thanks, you are too." ????

After that, the runners had really thinned out and I was on a roll. Last year about mile 10 my foot was in terrible shape because around mile 4 my shoe came untied. I didn't bother to tie it, that 12 seconds to tie my shoe would have taken too much time. About mile 10 this year I was still feeling good and looking for guys to catch and pass so they wouldn't get my medal. I was passing all of them I could see then one guy slipped past me and I just didn't have the gas to catch him. There was a girl who had been passing me and then I would pass her the whole race. We got inside of mile 12 and I was done with that balony (Julie thinks there is an "e" in balony and I know there is a "g" that should be there too, but ya'll know what I am getting at) I passed her and kept running hard to catch one more guy I could see in front of me. I caught him with about half a mile left. He was out of gas and I was sure I could coast the rest of the way into the finish line.

Then out of nowhere, like a grey and red bullet, some old guy, probably close to 70 blew by me like I had just stepped out of the porta potty. All I could see was his red clothes and grey hair in a blur. He was amazing, it was so neat to see. He was like a machine, he passed me and I couldn't even come close to keeping up with him. I wanna be him (or Mick) when I grow up. Passing him was out of the question. I said to myself "if he gets my medal then I really won't feel too bad about it" It was awesome to see him run. He finished and had enough time to walk several hundred feet back up the course before I ran past him.

I crossed the finish line and the girl with the medals for the first 100 men was standing there. She had one in each hand. She gave me one and I asked her how many she had left. She held up the one in her other hand and said it was the last one. I was so glad to get my medal.

Then the pain started to kick in. It is now almost 5 days later and I am still hurting. I haven't hurt this bad for a long time. But I have my dang medal by george.

And that is the rest of the story.

PS After watching me limp and gimp around the house for a couple of days Mick said "I know why they call it the HOBBLEcreek race"

ADD PS - On our way to Torrey, Mick was reading a book about sea creatures from the deep ocean. Julie looked at some pictures of the strange things then said "Everything God messed up on he threw in the ocean." Mick then asked her "Why isn't Wyoming in the ocean"