Bandera 25k - Tejas Trail Run

The Hill Country State Natural Area just outside of Bandera, Texas is as beautiful as it is rugged. If it can cut you, scrape you, trip you or otherwise make you bleed, the HCSNA has it. Every January, Tejas Trail productions puts on an Ultra Trail Run at the park. You have your choice of doing the 100k, 50k or 25k trail run.

As most of you know, I’m not a ‘runner’ although I have improved my running quite a bit in the last year or so. In January 2010, Bernice, Patricia and I did this same race. The 2010 race went down on record as the coldest weather they had ever had for this particular race. When we rolled up at 6 a.m., it was 10 degrees outside. By the time we started the race at 7:30, it had warmed up to a scorching 14 degrees.

We had elected to do the race ‘adventuring racing’ style so we had our camelbaks, food, etc with us. Right off the bat, our water froze solid. Long story short, it was a long, long day on the trail. All 4:45:40 of it.

This year I signed up for the race early, knowing that I could knock it out in a much better time. I had been riding my bike a lot recently so I knew I had to switch over to focus on running. Unfortunately, as I started putting more miles on my feet, my left knee started to bug the crap out of me.

I wish this were something that I could write off to the typical aches and pains of training but that’s not the case. Last year at the Miles of Discomfort Bike Race, I banged my left knee on the stem of my bike. I didn’t think anything of it at the time other than it hurt like hell. Since then I’ve had this random knee pain that just comes and goes. Sometime my knee feels like it’s going to lock up. Sometimes it just hurts. And sometimes it feels perfectly ok.

Anyway, the knee had been bugging the crap out of me and even though I had paid for the race, it didn’t look like I would be able to run it. Enter Bernice and Patricia to put the peer pressure on me. Needless to say, I was ‘encouraged’ to do the race by my friends.

This year’s weather turned out to be spectacular. Start time temp in the low 50s which is perfect running weather in my opinion. Bernice ended up being late for the race so Patricia and I took off on our own at the 7:30 start. Clearly this was going to be a much better day. The first couple of miles included a couple of hills that I remembered from last year. Patricia and hills don’t get along all that well so I did my best to get her up these things without her dying on me. After that, the first 10k flew by pretty quickly. We grabbed water at the aid stations and settled in to a nice jogging pace.

Patricia and Me on the Trail

Around mile 11 there was a big aid station with food and drop bags for the folks doing the 50k and 100k. We rolled in to the tent and have never been so happy to see M&Ms, Trail Mix, and real Coke. Something about working out and putting your body under stress makes race food taste SO GOOD! As we finished off our snack, we took off but immediately started to hit a little bit of a performance wall. Mile 12 was tough and it seemed like my feet were just begging me to stop. Patricia was holding her own but her feet were starting to bother her as well. At mile 14 or so, there is this nasty hill that you have to climb. I say climb because you really can’t run the thing. At this point in the race your legs are already a little tight and having to move up and down this thing isn’t easy. Somehow we managed to make it up and back down again.

As we got back on the Jeep road that led to the finish line, I think we both got that extra shot of adrenaline knowing that the finish line was close. We ran a pretty good pace to the finish even though both of us were hurting pretty badly. Finish time for me… 3:48:54. Almost a full hour better than last year. That works out to be 4.096 miles per hour. On a good day with no hills, rocks or cactus to navigate I can run 6 miles per hour. All in all, it wasn’t a bad day for me. Just for fun I calculated the pace of the guy that won the 25k. 9.468 miles per hour. In a time of 1:39:01. Who the hell can run that fast…on trails? Not me.

Heading to the finish line

So now I have goals for next year. Try to get my time down under the 3:15 range. If I can do better than a 5 mile an hour pace, I might be able to get my time under 3hrs which would put me in the top 100 or so for the race. It’s good to have goals.

My thanks to Patricia for helping to pace me on the run this year. She has that runner’s block thing where she can just zone out and go for a while without thinking about this distance, the time or the pain. I hope to have that some day. If I can just get my knee to cooperate with me.