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Joshua Fine
2017 REVEL Rockies Marathon
Published: June 12, 2017, 4:03 p.m. 
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Overall Rating
4/5 Stars
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Describe your race day.
The course was gorgeous! Watching the sunrise at the top was breathtaking and running down by creeks and cliffs (even an elk who looked not so interested in all these runners) was fun. Weather was perfect - unexpected cloud cover made it much more manageable (would have been tough with full sun which was forecast). I had stomach issues which ruined my chance for a BQ, but the course was well supported with portapotties at each water station!
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Did you PR?
Yes! But only by 35 seconds. This was disappointing as I was hoping to BQ and fell way short of that goal. I had to stop at a portapotty as I had an upset stomach for much of the course, so considering I stopped for a couple minutes I can't complain about still getting a PR. Still, this course is NOT EASY. There is no such thing as an easy 26.2 miles.
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How would you describe the course?
The first half is much steeper without long downhill grades. Most of the elevation is lost before mile 13. The second half has some flats, a few short uphills (including a nasty one right around the halfway point when you run up Evergreen Parkway). Most runners seemed to bomb down the first half and then many were totally cooked by the time the course flattened out. I was in 92nd place overall for the first two quarters. My pace slowed considerably in the second half (by 75 seconds/mile) but I passed nearly 20 runners and finished 73rd. Amazing that even with a dramatically slower pace, I started passing more people in the second half - it shows how difficult it was to continue those last 10 miles or so after the screaming downhill in the first half.
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Tell us about your training.
I ran the course with a friend in advance. One Sunday we did the upper half and then the next Sunday we did the lower half. We took two cars and left one at the top and one at the bottom. This really helped a lot and is highly recommended if you live locally. The elevation profile on the website is misleading. There are some uphills that it is good to know about in advance.
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What advice would you give future runners?
The 4:15am shuttle meant I had to wake up at 2:45am and leave my house by 3:15. I think waking up in the middle of the night and then trying to eat some breakfast messed with my stomach and was one of the reasons I didn't feel well while running. Not sure how else to schedule it. You really do need to start at 6am as it would be unbearably hot otherwise, and to start by 6 the shuttles need to leave by 4:15. There wasn't that much time to wait around at the top. I would advise future runners not to follow their normal race day diets - consider that you are waking up well before dawn and don't eat so early if that will mess with your system.
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What fun things did you do in the area before or after the race?
I came from Denver and just went home afterwards and SLEPT.
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