It was a rocky start, finish, and all that’s in between!
I ran this rocky trail half marathon last weekend on Saturday, November 5th. “Remember, remember the 5th of November” for it was a rocky one. Ok, ok, I made my point it was rocky, but it also kind “rocked” in my opinion.
The Half Marathon started in Lyle, Wa at The the Klickitat trailhead. I got a little mixed up and showed up where the shuttle buses dropped off instead of arriving at the finish line to take the shuttle bus to the trailhead/ start of the half marathon course. No worries I was still good to go.
We started near 10:30am and took off at a gradual double wide trail that use to be an old railroad trail. It started out flat, ended flat, and all that’s in between (oops, I kinda repeated myself). While I expected flatness, what I was not expecting was the varied terrain.
The race website desribed it as a medium technical course and I suppose you could say that it was, but it was not all that comfortable running on loose rocks. As an avid trail runner, I am more use to rocks on the trail you must climb over as opposed to continually running on. However, the fact that it was flat made it so I really couldn’t complain too much. Even though I didn’t get a PR, I am still pretty happy with my finish time (even with having to stop to use the bathroom at the 5k start).
I loved how there were aid stations every 3 miles, something I am not always used to. As an aspiring ultra runner, running distances where the aid stations are 5 or 6 miles apart, this made it so I didn’t have to wear my hydration pack or carry a handheld bottle.
I not only enjoyed the company of some leap frogging runners, but the entire course was very pretty and extremely scenic (as you can see from my pictures). I loved every minute of the backdrop and I believe it was definately one of the more pretty half marathons I’ve ever participated in. It also had some relaxing audio as well, as it hugged along the Klickitat River pretty much the entire way so you could always hear it flowing.
Overall, I very much enjoyed myself and honestly would recommend this race to anyone. In fact, one of the runners whom I met was running her first half marathon – and she was in her 60’s! Mozel Tov to her and everyone who ran and volunteered during the race!
