Relay around Seneca Lake

On Sunday I ran as part of a relay to finish the 77.7 miles around Seneca Lake. This was a seven person relay around the lake, and the first relay I have done since the Ragnar ADK race nine years ago.

We finished the trip around the lake in 11:13:23, which was good enough for us to just slip into the top 100 teams.

I was the fifth runner on the team which meant that I had the longest to run, with of all of my legs totaling 13.5 miles throughout the day.

The first leg was 4.8 miles and almost all of it was straight up. While it was a beautiful day to run, and ultimately not all that far, I felt like I was going to be in trouble if the full day had as much elevation as the first leg did.

My second leg was a 10k and the longest of all 21 legs in the race. Knowing that it was going to be long, I made the decision to carry water and more or less run it at my marathon pace. This was a good idea, as I came out of this section feeling strong, even if I didn’t necessarily feel fast. However after looking at my time, my pace was almost exactly what I am looking to hold in next month’s marathon so it was a very successful run.

The final leg was 2.6 miles, however I had the misfortune of thinking that it was 2.0 miles and therefore went out a bit too fast. At the point I was mostly just looking to wrap up my run having already completed the vast majority of my miles.

Given that this was a relay race my goal was actually less on the finishing time, and more on getting to spend some time with the other runners on my team (and the other FBR team). It was a great community event, and one that I am hoping becomes an annual tradition.

My next race is the Run Our Trails three mile race at Mendon Ponds on Tuesday night, which will be my first trail race of the year.