Terrapin Mountain 50k Race Recap

Race: Terrapin Mountain 50k
Location: Sedalia, Virginia
Date: March 22, 2014
Gain/Loss: 7000 ft
Time: 6:00:22

Standard pre-race briefing from Clark Zealand (Race Director)

The Terrapin Mountain 50k, the 2nd race in the Beast series.  It wasn't too complicated: get started on a flat road, after about 2 miles, start going up, and up, and up!  Refuel, and go down, down down... A lot of this was on gravel or jeep roads so it wasn't technically challenging and you could actually run downhill, but the uphill parts required walking for the most part.

The climax occurred about 20 miles in, when we summited the rocky Terrapin Mountain lookout, then quickly made our way down to squeeze through "Fat Man's Misery".  Here runners need to drop down between 2 giant boulders with only about 2 feet of space between them.  FUN!

Runners punch their bibs at the Terrapin Mountain overlook.

Just check out the below topo-map for the course, that provides most the details!

The real tale of the tape here is the elevation changes, with lots of sustained climbs, relatively short flat spots, and long downhills.  The toughest part was actually the extreme downhill between miles 22 and 25 where we descend Terrapin Mountain.  After this though things got more manageable. We hit the last aid station, turned around and headed back to the finish.  This was at least on terrain runable in some sections, and as the trail leveled out I did less and less walking.  Some creek crossings provided a refreshing change of pace!

The, approaching the final creek crossing I fell!  You never expect it, but somehow you stop paying attention just enough to catch an edge - as I felt myself begin to tumble I consciously rolled onto my right side before falling, managing to do an almost graceful barrel roll.  Horton was on the other side of the creek and saw the whole thing play out - he seemed to congratulate me on it.  "This is how we roll!"

Once I finally broke out of the forest onto the last section of gravel road I was able to pick up the pace to around 7 minute miles, and pound out the last mile on pavement in close to 6 minute pace.  I passed 2 more people in the final mile and my real goal was to break 6 hours.  It didn't happen, as I came in at 22 seconds beyond the 6 hour mark, still very happy with my time though! ON-ward and UP-ward with the BEAST!

After conquering the mountains off in the distance!