Mineral Point Historical Run

I meant to write this post about the Mineral Point Historical Run that happened on the Fourth of July earlier, but I got started and then I sort of just forgot. So I'll do my best to recap.

I wasn't feeling the run at all on the morning of the Fourth. I slept late the previous night and got woken up much too early by chirping birds. Only about 3.5 hours of sleep before Barry picked me up at 6:30am. In my hazy not quite awake state, I managed to put on the proper clothes, but forgot to apply sun block or bring a hat. This was a mistake for July. At first I wasn't too worried since it's only a 5 mile run. I figured 50 minutes in the morning sun shouldn't be too bad. Nope, felt that sun beating down on me about 25 minutes into the run, and I started worry about sun burn.

I had been warned that it'd be a hilly course, but I thought it'd be good training. Unfortunately, only about a mile into the race, I started getting cramps. I began walking knowing that that was the only way I could expect to continue, but then I was kind of just done with the race. I just didn't want to run anymore. Eventually, I manage to convince myself to start running again, and I aimed to just pace with the people around me. By this point, there were very very few people around me.

In most races, I'm usually middle of the pack. I've never been far back enough or in races small enough where I needed to actually pay attention to the route markers. The Mineral Point Historical Run had two events, a 2 mile and a 5 mile. The 2 miler had about 150 participants, but the 5 miler only had about 80. I was occasionally in view of a couple of people, but when corners were quickly turned in succession, I had to follow the route markers or I'd be completely off course.

I came in 52:57, which is still under an 11 minute pace, but puts me in 77 out of 80 people. Poor showing, but I can't complain when I walked nearly half of the course. After the race, I went to bbqs and enjoyed good food with little guilt.

The Mineral Point Historical Run is a very small town race. We didn't even have bibs, just our name written on a slip of paper tucked into a ziplock bag, pinned to our shirts. Registration was expensive for what it was with the lack of food at the end, but it benefits the local Chamber of Commerce.