2016 7 Sisters Trail Race

Total muddy splatterfest!  On this course!  Awesome!!!

4,000'+ of elevation gain, them's some hills!

Results here: 2016 7 Sisters Results

Photos here: 2016 7 Sisters Photos

Placed 168th out of 388 finishers at 3:15, not sure how many DNF/DNS's there were, but there were 500 originally registered.

I went into this brutal 12-mile trail race (Garmin fenix3 had 10.3, but who cares!) thinking I was sure to go sub-3:00, as I train on very similar terrain (part of the same trail system), have a ton more hill training under my belt this year, and my time last year of 3:10 was an easy target to crush.  Apparently Mother Nature had other ideas.

Last year I got a hotel room in Amherst, drove up the day before, and had a nice leisurely packet pickup, dinner with friends, and an easy 5-minute drive to the race.  This year, as the race was happening on Mother's Day, I opted to drive up in the morning and keep the peace with a very understanding wife, who had the chance to shut me down on this one but graciously let me off the hook.  There may or may not have been a small amount of bribery involved.

Skies were partly cloudy and the air was cool on the way up, but as I approached the Holyoke Range I could see that fog had settled in, and everything had clouded up.  The forecast was for rain to start around race time at 8:30.  Sure enough, at about 8:25 or so the raindrops were coming down.  I figured it was gonna get slick and chilly on the trail, so I smartly opted for the CamelBak to keep both hands free, extra layer of shirt, and light gloves.

I started to get chilly waiting for the elite wave and wave 1 to go out, and really wanted to get going.  Chatted with my wave 2 people before the race, and after a short set of instructions from RD Amy Rusiecki, we were off!  And immediately walking.  There's an instant bottleneck at the race because of the start on singletrack, but it's OK because the first climb is a beast, and there's very little running anyway.

The rain gradually picked up over the next hour along with the wind, and as chilly as I was, I felt pretty good!  I also realized the slippery conditions weren't really conducive to a PR, and resolved to do my best and see what happened.  I reached the summit cabin, walked across the porch as required, and began the long descent to the turnaround.  The mud was really treacherous on the way down, and even my kickass trail shoes were not much help in some places, turning a sketchy trail (on a good day) into a really slippery, sloppy mess!  I arrived at the turn in 1:28, quickly turned around and began the long climb back up.  The rain had subsided by this time, but the trails were a shitshow, and what a great time passing by everyone on the out/back, all shouting encouragement to each other!

Today's fabulous view from the summit cabin's porch...just a touch of fog!

I gradually slowed on the return, and although I was obviously fatigued I still felt okay.  Hiked the uphills, jogged the downhills, and crossed the line in 3:15.  A respectable result on a challenging course/day.  That trail is humbling - I really can't do it proper justice with words.  It's beautiful, but just relentlessly hilly and technical, and even when there's a short runnable section, you're smacked back to reality with a serious climb or descent.  For anyone who likes to run trails and likes a challenge, this is another bucket-list race.  Two years in a row now!  It'll be on my schedule every year.

And that's race #2 in the "Spring Trifecta" that I'm attempting.  Race #3?  Coming up faster than I'd care to acknowledge...