Hagg Lake Trail Race-25k and 50K
Written by Shawn Bostad
TRAIL FACTOR Participants Included:
Shawn, Jessi, Mallory, Ruben, Rick, Steve, Mo, Andrea, Reed, Rusty, Aubree and Heather
Race Recap: Trail Factor and all of those participating in the 2009 Hagg Lake Trail run were treated to an amazing day of running and racing. With the conditions a little too nice for Hagg Lake standards, the racing was fast and the post run hanging out weather was great.
Over 200 people toed the line in the 25K and over 100 braved the 50K. Trail Factor had at least 12 people running the course and we were all looking forward to presenting the trails with our fitness and new homemade team shirts that said, “TRAIL FACTORED”. To get “TRAIL FACTORED” is to bonk, trip, fall, get passed, or pass someone else. It’s a term that we have all come to know well in one way or another and I think this spreads beyond just the Trail Factor crew. The 50K race started promptly at 8:00am; with an optional 7:00am early start time and the 25k started at 9:00am. For those of you who have not run Hagg Lake, it’s a great early season race. It’s mostly single track, but does incorporate some road sections to connect trails. The footing is typically very good, although there are some sections that can get really rutted out and sloppy with mud. This makes for some much more technical running terrain, but on this day it was relatively dry and forward progression was steady. The 50K course includes a 1.5 mile out and back section and 2 loops of the Hagg Lake trail, which is 14 miles around. The 25k is simply a shortened version of the 50k. We had 2 individuals participating in the 50k (Heather and Rusty) and 10 individuals in the 25K (Jessi, Mallory, Steve, Rick, Ruben, Mo, Aubree, Shawn, Reed, and Andrea). We had aspirations of doing really well and Trail Factor certainly did come home with some bootie. Since Heather and Rusty were running the 50K, they were already started before most of us made it to the race. We were thinking wonderful thoughts about their performance and hopefully they would warm the course up nicely for those of us running the 25K.
The 25k started as most trail races do. No official start line and a simple countdown to the start. The starting gun is one of the race directors yelling, “GO”. This is true trail style racing. The 25K race was off to a great start. Ruben and Shawn were just behind the two leaders and pacing off of their rate. The race starts with a slight uphill, just to get you warmed up for the rest of the course. Most of the Trail Factor runners took it out pretty conservatively and weren’t trying to break any records in the first 1.5 miles, which has you cross back over the start line. By the time we all crossed the start line we headed onto the first single track section of the course.
There were a couple runners who took it out fast, but Ruben and Shawn just hung tight. Finally the course gave way to Ruben and he caught the leaders and on one of the early hills he took the lead. Basically it was an early victory for Ruben. Once he took the lead, he extended it to over a ½ mile pretty quickly and held it the whole way. A little further back the race was still undecided. Shawn was hanging tight in 3rd for most of the race, but was then passed by Kevin Cave to put him in 4th. This held for most of the race with a Red Lizard runner named Dean Giblin maintaining his 3rd place spot. With about 2 miles to the finish, Shawn finally caught the Red Lizard runner and passed him to go ahead and finish the race in 3rd.
On the women’s side of the house, the battle between Mallory Gordon (Trail Factor Runner) and Emily Kelenius was really heated. They were both gunning for the win, sticking together for most of the race. Mallory took the Lead at about mile 10 when Emily stopped at the Aid station for some fuel. Mallory was hoping that this lead snag would hold, but during the last 2 miles Mallory was passed by Emily, who went on the snatch the win by finishing the race very strong.
In the end, the 25K top three places shaped up as such on both the women’s and men’s side.
Men’s 25K
1. Ruben Galbraith(TRAIL FACTOR)-1:44:35
2. Kevin Cave-1:48:15
3. Shawn Bostad(TRAIL FACTOR)-1:52:26
Women’s 25K
1. Emily Kelenius-2:01:09
2. Mallory Gordon(TRAIL FACTOR)-2:04:59
3. Mandy Giblin-2:07:32
25K TRAIL FACTOR Finishers with Finishing Times
Rick Kneedler 10th overall and 1st in Age Group-2:00:32
Aubree Swart 6th woman and 3rd in Age Group-2:12:09
Jessi Moroney 12th woman and 3rd in Age Group-2:20:12
Mo Chambers 17th woman and 1st in Age Group-2:25:22
Steve Gabel 65th male and 10th in Age Group-2:43:23
While I have a very clear perspective of what was unfolding in the 25K, my perspective on the 50K race is much cloudier. One thing I do know for sure is that there was a pretty heated race between Rod Bien and Lanny Gower, who is a relative new-comer to the ultra marathon scene. In the end Rod Bien raced a PR on the course, but Lanny Gower held him off for the win. On the women’s side, Joelle Vaught ran away with the race by leading the whole way into the finish and setting a new women’s course record.
Men’s 50K
1. Lanny Gower-3:48:56
2. Rod Bien-3:50:24
3. Brendan Trimboli-3:59:05 He’s only 21 and it was his second 50K ever.
Women’s 50K
1. Joelle Vaught-4:10:54 and the women’s new course record by over 21minutes. Outstanding!
2. Krissy Moehl-4:16:21 Under the women’s course record by a ton.
3. Devon Crosby-Helms-4:24:12 Also under the women’s course record
50K TRAIL FACTOR Finishers and Places
Heather Daniel 4th woman and 2nd in Age Group-4:32:50-Her first 50K. YA YA!! In the end, the race was a complete success for not only TRAIL FACTOR, but also the race Directors Stacey and Ronda. There were some great performances and fast times. We all look forward to next year.
Complete results can be found at: http://www.haggmud.com/
If you are interested in seeing some post race TRAIL FACTOR video, visit: www.trailfactor.com
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