I'm such a planner, and that makes me a very atypical trailrunner. But Gorge Waterfalls 50K on March 25 deserved and benefitted from my obsessive analyzing nature. The race has a 9 hour time limit that I have beat my head against a wall about because, on a good race day, it's gonna be close given the distance (probably 32-33 miles, 50K on a trail is just a "minimum" when you see it on a race distance) and elevation gain (6500 feet).
Well I went out on the race website yesterday to look something up, and there was a big note on the main page.
"NOTICE: Due to a construction project on the Gorge Trail in an area with no alternate routes the course is now going to be an out and back from the west end of the route with a slight change to the route between Wahkenna Falls and Multnomah Falls. More details coming soon. The race will still go past almost all of the waterfalls."
Wait, what?!? After I've researched pictures of every step of this course (well, the best I could). And analyzed and planned my running for every up and downhill. Again, not a big deal if you are fast, but don't you DARE judge me when I'm skirting the line of a time limit on what for me is a tough course for my pace.
I know I'll be okay. So I'm kinda scary calm. Yeah, that scares me more. Like maybe I'm in denial and it hasn't set in.
My big wonder and concern is that the 1500 ft mountain we climb up miles 1-2 and back down miles 3-4 will turn into climbing it twice on this modified out-and-back, but the second time, it's miles 28-31. Yowza. And now the elevation gain would also be substantially more.
But who knows? The race director loves hilly, difficult courses, so I should be mentally prepared. He's hoping to post details by March 10 when the course is approved. So I'm eyeing their Facebook page multiple times a day until then.
It's not that I can't handle whatever he comes up with. I just want to plan to handle whatever he comes up with.
No worries. You can do this. You do like a challenge after all...
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