Friday night was party night. At about 1:00AM I ran into some friends of some friends: Annie Henderson and Amy Goh. In conversation, they mentioned that they were running a 10 mile trail race on Sunday, which was also Annie's birthday, hence Henderson Challenge. My thought process: run the 5k on campus you signed up for that's going to be lots of Penn people, or run a 10mile trail race with a bunch of crazy old folks. The decision was simple.
Saturday night I went to a party where I saw my friend Jess in a cowboy hat. Realizing I was running in a 10 miler the next day and was out drinking the night before, I decided that was far more cowboy than her simple partying and passing out, so I stole the hat to wear the next day.
8:20AM on Sunday found me walking to Hamilton to catch a ride with Annie and Amy in Annie's highly styling pink Storm. As I walked past the Panhel women setting up the Reno Rowan Ribbon Run, I grabbed my T-shirt from them and continued on my way. Annie, Amy and I met up and were off.
The race was in Collegeville PA on some great Trails that Annie has run for the past couple of years. Race day was blisteringly cold and windy. I was wholly unprepared for the weather. Amy and Annie laughed at me freezing from inside of their sweats over 3 layers of shirts. It was sad.
After getting confused on the start time and essentially having no time to warm up, we were off. The directions were simple: follow the guy in front of you or stay on the path with the blue blazes every 100 feet. 3 aid stations, 2 "river crossings" and lots of mud, enjoy. Amy took off like a bullet, though she was aiming to do well. Annie and I took off like...well...not like bullets, but we were in the race to finish and have fun. We spent the first four miles chatting and moving up from the back of the pack where we started to a point where people were going our pace. At mile 4 or so we started to follow Pat, our 50 or so year old new friend. We chatted along the way about the dangers of roots being hidden by the leaves, what we were doing with our lives for the next year or so, how much we hate people who left trash on the trail, and being cowboy (I still had the hat on).
This race turned out to be kind of difficult in some areas because you could get caught on some single-track trail at a slow pace behind a group of 3 people. The only way to pass was to run off trail quickly at a point where the brush was small. Additionally, the river crossings were about 20 feet and 50 feet and ranged from 1 inch deep to thigh deep (and I'm 6'2"). Along the way we also had to pass through many muddy pits. All in all, it was great fun, in spite of and because the terrain made it more challenging.
At mile 8.5 I was feeling pretty good and wanted to see how fast I could run the race if I pushed myself, so I split from Annie and Pat. On the way home I passed the only guy who had passed me in the race. When I told him that he had been my motivation to run hard he wheezed back, "ok, well now it's your turn, take me home." I also passed the puking guy and they guy who started walking with 100 yards left.
In the end, Annie left Pat and finished just minutes behind me at about 1:36. Pat finished a few more minutes later. Amy, wonder of wonders, finished in 1:24 (I think) and took second place for her age group. The fastest time was an hour and a minute. That's fast.
After eating all the bagels and cream cheese, Annie got her laundry and we drove home: Annie and I chatting while Amy zonked out. All in all the day was great. I've made some new friends here at Penn, Annie ran her first 10 miler, (her pervious longest distance was 6 miles) and Amy won second place and was close to first.
That night, we celebrated Annie's birthday at New Deck where only over-age people engaged in a rational amount of consumption of tasty beverages. When told to have some more of her drink, Annie told Ramzi, "Just because it's pink, doesn't mean it's pussy." Indeed!
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