Another successful completion of the Road To The Pogue.  The rain held off, the weather was great.  Cool, cloudy.  I did my best time yet on this course, which was good.  I keep forgetting how challenging it is and so after 4 years, starting to really get to know the course and where I can speed up and where I need to reserve my strength.  I realized this year that the final hill up to Mt. Tom isn’t as steep or long as the other hills.  Basically the course goes up and down for 3 miles, then more up than down, then downhill for the final 1.8 miles.  There is a elevation map on their website.  The downhill isn’t as easy as it sounds because you still need to keep balance and the pounding on legs is hard.  There apparently is a women-only marathon in somewhere like South Dakota that is mostly downhill.  I think that would be so painful on your quads.   A good combo of hills, downhills, and flats works all the muscles. 

Onto Covered Bridges in a little over 2 weeks.  New start time of 8:15am will be interesting.  Getting up at 5am and trying to eat breakfast and get out the door will be a challenge.  Thanks Ben for being my crew!  Hopefully you won’t have to stand in the rain this year!