Estes Park Marathon, that is elevation

Today’s post is about what I did on Father’s Day, which was run the Estes Park Marathon. Living in Boulder at about 5400 feet I do not go up in elevation for too many races, but this sure was the exception since Estes Park is at 7500 feet. Here is the elevation map of the race, which tops out at about 8150 feet. The map is deceptive as this was very rolling the entire race and one of the most hilly courses I have run, especially the first 8 miles.

This was a fun race given how it is so small (160 starters in the marathon). It also was the first time I have had pre-race instructions that covered the issue that we would pass two Elk calfing areas and that if there was an “active” birth happening someone would be there to provide detour instructions. While we did see Elk we did not see any new births.

I really enjoyed the first half of the race, but the second half was quite a chore since it really warmed up about two hours into the race. 75 degrees and 7500+ feet was a real challenge and I managed to finish in my slowest time ever, but this is not a race anyone does for a good time. In fact, only the winner broke 3 hours. He (the winner) passed by me as the course had an out and back portion and he looked great at mile 21 while I was somewhere around 15 miles. My next races are all in the 5K, 10K length for the next couple months and all back at around 5400 feet. I am going to have to find some sea level races to run as it has been two years since I did a race down at the flat land and that sounds very attractive.