Mountain Madness

I'm sitting here in my office, obsessively checking accuweather.com for the latest updates on tomorrow's weather in Ringwood, NJ. Hoping against all hope that it will miraculously clear up, and be anything other than cold and wet.

Cold, I can do.

Wet, I can handle.

Cold and wet - ick.

Earlier this fall, I registered for the Mountain Madness 50k. Yes, I know - a 50k 6 days after a marathon? I never claimed to be sane, people! But how could I pass it up? It's less than half an hour from home, has a humane start time (9 am) and if I'm going to tackle a 50M race this winter I need to shore up on my trail running. Plus, how bad could the weather possibly be in mid-October, right?

Urgh.

Currently, tomorrow's forecast calls for low 40s with a real feel of about 30. Did I mention it's supposed to rain ALL DAY LONG?

OK, I can handle it. Not ideal, but doable.

The 50k also has an 8.5 time limit -not generally an issue (well, unless you count Bear Mountain, but that was a monster of a course). However, having just run the marathon on Sunday I'm most likely going to be slower than usual. There is a soft cut off at the 14.75 mile mark (runners will have until 12:30 or 3.5 hours) and a formal pulling from the race at the 17.5 mile marker (after 1:30 pm or 4.5 hours).

The smart thing for me to do would be to switch to the 7.77 mile fun run. My right quad is being funky (that's what I get for bounding up the stairs last night), and my left hip is tweaky (yay for sitting at a desk from 9 am - 9pm the past few days). By doing the fun run I'd still get out on the trails to stretch my legs, while minimizing the possibility of turning tweaks to injuries.

So now, all that remains is to decide if I'm going to be smart, or if I'm going to be Staci.