Castle Rock Trail Run 10.5 miler

This race run by Redwood Trails starts at Saratoga Gap close to my house in the Santa Cruz mountains. So I left a bit late thinking it was just minutes up Summit to Skyline and 9. I got there just as the bulk of the racers were leaving. Another woman was also late and we both started the race with the 5Kers who started 10 minutes later. It was a beautiful hot and sunny day for a run. We ran out on the northside of Skyline for about a mile and a half. Then we crossed the road and ran down the hill. It was total singletrack with lots of rocks and branches ont he descrent. I had been planning to do the 10K, but it was too nice. At the turnaround, I decided it was too nice to just do the 10K and kept going to do the 10.5 miler. The trail started climbing again up the mountain and then descended again to the turnaround for the 10.5 miler which looped back on a slightly different path. At this point I was really glad I did the longer route. The trail started offering up incredible vistas of the Santa Cruz mountains down to the ocean in the distance. It was quite rocky and a bit treacherous, but that just made it more fun. I had been feeling great up until about mile eight. The last mile on the south side of the road was quite hard for me, and I even found myself walking for a few seconds on the uphill. I finally made it up and crossed over the road to do the mostly downhill back to the finish for the last mile and a half. I finished in 1:54:06, fifth among the 40-44 year olds.

This is a beautiful race and well worth going out of your way for.