Evergreen - Colorado State 10k Championships

The Colorado State 10k Championship is history for 2011. This magnificent race course brought out all of the top runners in Colorado to compete for prize money as well as the title of Colorado State 10k road champion. Patrick Rizzo of Boulder won the men’s race with a time of 29:59 good enough to beat Tyler Mccandless, also of Boulder by 18 seconds. Cassie Slade won the women’s championship with a finishing time of 34.40. Wendy Thomas was second in35:07. 

                                        Tyler Mccandless above, powers his way to a second place finish.

 The Evergreen course is downhill, so runners focused on leg turnover as they wound their way down Upper Bear Creek Road. The road is closed for the racing, making for an interesting scene of colors as racers stretched across both lanes of pavement. I entered the 10k after having completed two editions of the 5k race. Breaking from previous tradition, I started a little faster than normal running the first mile in around 6:20. Normally I would be better off to run a 6:40 first mile in this race but the excitement of racing against so many top level racers got the better of me and my race strategy disappeared shortly after the gun sounded. (I recovered though for a great Pearl Street Mile with a much slower start-more later)

I did however battle through my fast start and came in with a personal best of 41:23 which left me very happy if not a little overheated at the finish.

There are so many positives to talk about with this race. There is ample parking for either race (5 or 10K). The buses were right on time, transporting hundreds of runners to both start lines. There is a sag truck to dump gear in for those who prefer to warm up at the start and then change into racing gear or to store fresh gear at the finish. This is a huge benefit that I really like about the race. In addition there are plenty of bathrooms at both the start and finish lines PLUS plenty of water. 

All of this reflects tremendous race organization, so major kudos to John Wells and the race group for an A+ job. If the 10k race could somehow start about an hour earlier I would give this race top honors next to the Bolder Boulder as one of the top 2-3 races in Colorado. In fact, I am going to give it those honors anyway because it is a great race despite the hotter temps that come with an 8:45 morning start. Uggg—I really suffered the last 15 minutes of running in the heat but that is just because I tend to run so early in the morning.