Here is the report for race #4 of my running season. The run was in a small town named Grand Valley a little west of Orangeville. It was put on by our local running club, Run Dufferin, with a lot of support from Running Free Orangeville (runners, volunteers etc.) As was previously stated in a report this race has a little history as to why it is named “Chase the Tornado”. I have attached a link to a good write up of the history of where the name originated from.http://dufferincountyrealestateguide.wordpress.com/tag/chase-the-tornado-2nd-annual-10k-run/
This is a small event but is very well run with accurate timing, KM markers, 3 add stations, essentially everything you want in a race. The field isn’t large but the competition is fairly strong. This year there were only 73 runners but 10% under 40 minutes with the winner and second place being 7 seconds apart at 35:50 & 35:57.A little bit about the actual course. If you are looking for a nice easy run to set a new PB I would probably look at another event, but if you are looking for a competitive race with some hills thrown in then please come on out. I would say that there are 4 climbs in this race, with the second incline not being too much trouble. I have attached the course elevation that my Garmin spit out from the race.
The majority of the course is on country roads with a mix between asphalt and packed gravel. A small section (a little over a KM) is on a flat trail running between concessions. You pass over the Grand River a few times on your run and finish off at a community centre, right beside where you park.
How did I do? I had a couple of blow ups in my last two races so I was a little hesitant on going out too fast with the fear of dying once again. I lined up in the middle of the pack and started off at a good pace since the first little bit is a downhill. I started a little farther back than I should have but was again trying to be a little cautious and I started to pick runners off quickly for the first few KMs. I was running with my running partner Andrew (also from team running free Orangeville) and we were attacking the hills and trying to recover on the declines. On the second small hill I noticed that Andrew was a little stronger on the way up than I was and I told him at the next climb he should just go hard and not worry about sticking with me. I ran this race last year a little under the weather and the hill at 6KM forced me to walk ½ of it, but this year I was feeling a lot better and pushed hard to the top. I had been not recovering well during my runs in the weeks leading up to this race and the same occurred at the top of the hill at 6K. I could see Andrew about 20 metres ahead of me, but I was exhausted and didn’t even have enough to increase my pace to catch him (I wasn’t recovering from the hill well at all). At 8K I was running behind about 3 runners that I could see and made it my goal to pass them all by the finish. It took a while but overtook the last of the 3 on the incline into the finish, the problem being that some of them didn’t want me passing them so they sped up. Now I was completely exhausted as one of them ran passed me 100m from the finish and I just wanted to cruise in to the line, but pride took over and I mustered everything I had to sprint (it felt like a sprint) into the finish leaving all close runners in my wake.
I was happy with my determination as the run was anything but easy and not upset with my time of 45:02 which was good enough for 5th in the M30-39 division. Luckily 2 of the top three overall were in that group so I snuck in a 3rd Place in the category. I wasn’t passed by a single runner which is a bonus even in a smaller race.
Running free Orangeville really showed up for this event and hopefully it only grows as the years go on (2nd year for the race). Nice to have a run in the north west area.
