Trail race set for this Saturday

ORN:  Rest day

You know you are a runner who lives in Indiana when you can utilize a race to make sense of a negative basketball event.  

When the NCAA Brackets came out a couple of weeks ago, a wonderful possibility quickly appeared to me.  If the seeds held, my own Purdue Boilermakers would play my family favorite Notre Dame Fighting Irish in the Sweet Sixteen.  Very cool!!  I promptly plunked the necessary choices to make this happen by my prognostication.

But, last weekend, I began to investigate and faced a conundrum.  The Sweet Sixteen games are played on both Thursday night and on Friday night and the potential Purdue-ND game would be played late Friday evening.  And I was already signed up for an early start in  the Kal-Haven 33.5 Mile Trail Race on Saturday morning.  

Do you see the dilemma??  I had to stay up and watch such a crucial game.  Yet I also had to get up at oh-dark-thirty the next morning to run 7+ hours in the woods the next day.  Oh no!!!

All of this was predicated, of course, on Purdue winning two games last weekend.  No problem with St. Peters, but VCU proved to be too much for our local lads.  And, as the Boilermaker defense became more and more porous in the 2nd half, I half-smiled, consoling myself that I was increasing my chances of getting a good nights sleep before the ultra.  I then went to bed, waking up in the morning to learn the Irish had lost later the same evening, removing any need to watch hoops till midnight this Friday. 

I'll drive to Michigan Friday afternoon, get up early, stash bananas at the mid point of the course, take an early start at 7am Saturday morning and see how it goes on the rail trail, point to point race.  It's gonna be cold, likely just 20F at the start.  I had hoped for more warmth by late March, but I guess not.  If this all works, it will be my longest single run ever.  

I'll post updates on Friday on FB, with photos and a blog post later.  I'll persevere. 

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