"PRIOR PREPARATION PREVENTS PISS POOR PERFORMANCE"

Last ML run before the Dam Marathon on Saturday the 29th.

nothing but rest today....back after it tomorrow am.

I went for a 3 mile easy run this morning. One more run then it's carb load and rest till the Dam Marathon......

3 miles this moning. Last shakedown run till Saturday.......Yea!!!!!

It full blown rest and carb load time for the Dam Marathon.

No running. Travel day to Nevada, The Hoover Dam Marathon.

Wow, this Hoover Dam Marathon was really a different experience for me. On Friday the 28th I left home in Sandy rather early and headed out to Boulder City Nevada to run the Hoover Dam Marathon. This marathon is my 43rd overall and my 9th marathon in the last 9 months with 2 more to go. (From  Feb. 27, 2011 - To  Feb. 5, 2012) 

I got into Boulder City around 11:am Friday morning and went to check in to the marathons host hotel, but to my surprise they werent ready for me. They told me to come back around 1:pm and my room would be ready.

This gave me some time to drive out to the Lake Mead Boulder Beach Special Events Beach area and check out part of the race course.

Just as advertised the race starts out on a steady gradual incline for the first 1/4 mile and then runs along a paved path till about the third mile where you meet up with a hard dirt packed and gravel railroad tunnel trail and all of this is with in view of the beautiful blue waters of Lake Mead.

The next morning I got up at 5:am got myself ready and returned to the Lake Mead Special Event Beach where the other runners had started to gather. It was pitch black out there. You couldn't see you hand in front of your face. There were about 500 people there to do the three designated races, The Full Marathon, the 1/2 Marathon and the 10K.

As we met by the BBQ area there were lanterns set up in the area so you could find the PoP's, all four of them, and continue to prepare yourself for the race at hand.

It was hard to believe but this was the first marathon that I had attended that I didn't know somebody, either someone running it or even a spectator or family member. Oh well, I just went out and made some new friends and cured that situation.

So just as the sun was coming up and the area became lighted up the race director started hurding us all towards the starting mats in the roadway adjacint to the BBQ area. She had a bull horn and explained that the 10K'ers would start about 2 minutes before the marathoners, on a different course of travel, and the 1/2 marathoners would start at 8:am on the same trail but for only one loop of the course, where as the marathoners would make two loops of the course. The temprature was in the mid 50's at the start and near 80 at the finish.

The 10K race started promptly at 7:am and then just two short minutes later the Race Director started the marathon. I quickly learned that the first 1/4 of a mile was indeed a gentle incline that seemed to be more like 2.5 miles of gentle incline and I knew that this was not going to be an easy day of running. At least it was on a paved pathway that resembled the Porter Rockwell Trail in Draper. It was wide and very smooth with a lot of turns in it until about three miles out where the black top paved trail turned into a hard packed dirt and gravel rail trail (similar to the rail trails at the Park City Marathon) that was used in the 1930's to supply the construction workers of the  Boulder Dam. This portion of the trail then travels thru massive tunnels that are carved thru the mountains which take you through six switchbacks as you decend down to the upper level of the parking structure where you have a killer sweet view of the Hoover Dam and the Bypass Bridge.

Now that I had made my way through 1/4 of the purposed course I knew that todays run was going to be a tough one. Running on the packed dirt and gravel trails was rough and you had to run 14 miles of it in the Marathon, the rest of the way on the paved asphalt trail. This is no piece of cake easy marathon. Matter of fact, I think it is one of the hardest marathon courses I've ever had the pleasure to engage.

At this point in the race you turn around and head back to the starting area only to retrace your steps back along the same trail as the marathoners make this journey in two loops to finish back at Boulder Beach.

It was an amazing thing to see the leaders of the marathon pass by you as they doubled back to re run the course in the two loop configuration. It was also just as fun to see the runners who were behind you as it was to see the front runners. And some where during the first return to the finish area you run past the 1/2 marthoners as they make their first leg of the first and only loop.   

The Hoover Dam Marathon is really a beautiful  high desert trail marathon with some of the most picturesque vistas  and it's brutal and tough on the under prepared and faint of heart. The aid and hydration stations were well stocked and right where they said they would be.

I finished the race in 4:14:34. That was good enough to be 30th place overall in the Marathon and 2nd place in my Age Division. There were 97 total runners in the marathon and 7 runners in my Age Division.

An amazing marathon!!!!