I was runner 10. I ran 20.7 miles for the Chase. This is, by far, the longest I have run in a day. I was worried about holding up, particularly since the hardest leg was the last one. I really wanted to hold my own in this crowd.

Leg 10 - Springfield, KY: 7.28 miles, 7:28/mile pace (7:03 grade corrected pace). 530 feet of climbing with a slight overall uphill. HR=172. I started at 10:30 or so for my first night run. This was actually the hilliest of the runs, but they tended to be what I was used to - a bit shorter and punchier than what I ran later. And I was fresh. Handed off to me and I tore off into the distance. I saw very few people on this run with the exception of one person that was a quarter mile ahead and I never could catch and one girl that I reeled in and caught very close to the finish. One big, steep hill that hurt pretty good; the excellent corollary to this was that the finish was the long 3% downgrade for almost a mile. I flew. The interesting part of this run was there was a distinct thermocline going - I'd be running in 55 degree weather and when I hit the bottom of a downhill the temperature would drop at least 15 degrees and I was blowing steam everywhere. Awesome. Handed off to 2Y and headed into the van. 1 net kill.

Overall a good effort and pretty close to the right effort I wanted. 7 minute mile effort was perfect.

Leg 22 - Salvisa, KY: 5.05 miles, 7:15/mile pace (7:02 grade corrected pace). 200ft of climbing with a slight overall downhill. HR=169. Again my adrenaline spiked at the start and I took off. I was really looking forward to this leg. Slight downhill, shortest distance, at dawn with beautiful scenery, nice and cool. I made the last second decision to go shirtless - good choice as I was pretty comfortable the whole run. The hills here went on forever - up and down. I did, however, actually get a .25 mile straightaway here. That was the only one I got the whole Chase. I wore brand new shoes (now line from Brooks that just came out) and they were awesome. I felt like I really put out a good effort here. I paced well and had an effort equal to the first leg. Considering I was running on 1 hour of sleep and a hard race pace earlier this was a good result. 0 net kills - passed a run/walker and got torched by a guy doing something well under 6:30 miles.

Leg 34 - Midway, KY: 8.2 miles, 8:07/mile pace (7:41 grade corrected pace). 500 ft of climbing with a decent overall uphill. HR=pegged/beyond pegged. This was one of the hardest things I've ever done. I knew it was going to be tough - the temperature when I ran (3:30 or so) was well over 80 on the roads and this was the longest run I had. Legs were toast before I started. A cocktail of gatorade and acetaminophen was the order of the day. I even went antisocial for a bit to listen to some pump up music. Adrenaline at the start - I torched the first mile in 7:16 (yeah, yeah, you knew this was coming). Because this was such a long, hot leg the guys pulled off at about 3.5 miles and handed off a cold water. Mana from heaven - I don't know if I would have made it without that. I was slowing a bit but still doing well through mile 4 when the road turned up.

Mile 4 started to get tough, but at mile 5 the torture started. The road turned way up and never let up from there. After the hill the last 3 miles were ~8 small rollers going up and down 40 feet or so each. I can't describe how demoralizing these were - my HR was beyond pegged, my legs were numb, and it was just one ####### hill after the other. The only thing that really kept me going were the other runners that were quitting and walking the hills. No ####### way I was walking a step of this race. I chewed people up and ended up with 8 net kills on the leg. Despite all that I was conflicted when I knew it was about to end - the Chase was almost over for me. Over the last quarter mile I turned it up as high as my body would allow and chugged in at 7:28 pace and handed off. I was so tired at that point I couldn't even straighten out the baton for him - it ended up in a small ball. I just didn't have anything left. After the run I came perilously close to keeling over and staggered around for a bit until I could climb into the van (and even then I had a hard time getting up the step). My Chase running was over. I left it all out there, though, and that is what I had set out to do.