Ohyama Tozan Climb

I completed the Ohyama Tozan 9-kilometer run/climb on Sunday. 

I am racing so much lately, and I was a bit concerned to find myself limping when I tried to do some strides during the warmup.  Actually my struggles during the warmup may not have been the mileage and racing as much lately, as the tough yoga session the day before.  I really have no idea.  

So I started at a relatively slower pace - 3:56 on the flat first kilometer.  This may not seem that slow, but amazingly there must have been close to one hundred other 40-50-year old men and female runners ahead of me at this point.  By maintaining about a 4-minute per kilometer pace through 6k (23:55), even as the course got gradually steeper and steeper, I passed dozens and dozens of runners - and was feeling reasonably good given the increasing grade of the hill. 

But then we hit the stairs at 7k.  I just can't get over how the guys around me simply exploded past me at this point. This happens to me at every hill climb race. Today I was telling myself to be mentally tough on the first set of stairs and not let up.  But I still dropped from 12th to 17th place over the 8th kilometer.  Do these guys really train that much all winter on stairs (or am I just that weak on stairs and slowed down that much?)

I hung on fairly well over the final kilometer up the rocky steps to finish in 48:44.  This was good for 18th place.  Not 18th overall -  18th place in my age division.  Yet I felt like I ran nearly as well as at Arizona/Tokyo races where if finished 3rd/4th respectively -- overall. 

Ohyama Tozan is always an interesting challenge for me - even if I am not competitive on stairs.