Rocky 50 Miler
I think it was about a month before this race, I had come to Huntsville to pace a friend in the Rocky Raccoon 100 miler (which I had DNF’ed years earlier….my first ever DNF). As I was running with him, he mentioned that his friend was going to be doing this 50 miler later and that started me thinking. So….a few days later I also entered this race. I got to the race start and found parking (one has to pay to park – but you can pay in advance on-line which is what I did). I found parking and checked into my race. All runners lined up for the start. It was dark so, of course, I had a flashlight. I often run with a headlamp but decided to just use the flashlight here – and that worked (it got light enough in the first loop that I didn’t need the flashlight anymore). I had a light day-hike backpack on (I had worn it in Leadville, Mont Blanc, and a few other races – a nice REI one). The course is loops and almost all trails. The trails have many roots in them so footing can be challeng...