Violet painted skies
Hang beyond the golden hills
This bright spring morning.
Monday, June 18, 2018
Typically, going into any race over a 10k, I’d like to scout out the race website for as much information as I can glean from it. But when pulling up the Billy Goat half marathon this Saturday there just isn’t much there, and that’s kind of a challenge in itself.
Bare bones pretty much sums it up; it’s a half marathon that starts at 8a.m., goes up a hill for 5 miles, rolls for about a mile and half, then turns around and heads back to the start. What’s at the aid stations? Are there aid stations? That’s not info found on the website.
I suppose I could search for blog reports, but I’m kind of enchanted by the challenge of the minimum information given by this race director.
I did, however, cheat a little to help me plan. I went to ultrasignup.com to look over past results and noticed that the winners are going slightly under two hours and the best person in my age came in third last year with a time slightly over two hours. Extrapolating from that information, I’m going to presume there is at least one aid station at the turn around point slightly after the top of the climb. That station, I presume, will at least have water.
That means starting with a 20 oz. bottle with Skratch Labs electrolytes, two Hammer gels, and a pack of Run gum. I’m hoping that’ll get me through and it’s probably what I would’ve carried even if I knew they had plenty of stations. But it’ll give me a little extra joy if I finish well with planning this as a minimum information race puzzle.
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