Brazos Bend Trail Races 50 miler, 50k, 25k, and 10k - 2014

Ran the Brazos Bend 25k and afterwards I headed back on the trails on my mountain bike to help support my bro and capture some of his race on my GoPro. Here's the edited footage! Hope y'all enjoy.

25k Brazos Bend RACE REPORT:

Ran this race with my 2 brothers William and John. We were suppose to wake up at 4:30 am in the morning but all of us slept through our alarms and didn't end up waking up until 5:40 am! Because of this we were in a total rush to get in the car and go.  Willie was doing the 50 miler and was suppose to be at the race by 5:30 to start at 6 am and John and I were doing the 50k and 25k respectively and were suppose to start at 7am. The drive to the Brazos Bend park was about 40 minutes from my brothers house so we were incredibly late. 

We got to the park and had to first wait in the long line of cars to get into the park and then when we finally parked we had to walk what seemed to be a mile to the packet pickup. So not the best way to get a race going. When I got back to the car I realized I didn't have my planned shoes that I was wanting to run in. The only shoes I had were my 4 year old Asic Kayanos that I had planned to put on after to mountain bike with. I switched to minimalist running about 4 years ago so running in Kayanos and its 11.5mm heel to toe drop for 15.5 miles was not going to be fun. That's all I had so thats what I strapped on. I headed to the start line alone at 7:20ish since the 25k/50k start was at 7 am and was off. 

Miles 1 -5

My watch again never got satellite reception so I had to do this race all by feel. The Brazos Bend State park was really nice and the trails were packed dirt with areas of gravel. The first few miles I was alone and I was not enjoying running in the Asic Kayano shoes. I kept debating on whether or not I should take off my shoes and go barefoot. Once the gravel trails were gone I did just that for about 2 miles. It wasn't too bad but my feet did feel like they were getting raw and once the gravel trails returned I decided to keep the shoes on for good. 

Miles 6 - 10

More of me running trying my best to not heel strike and now I'm getting blisters around my heels and toes. UGH! At least there was no real shin splint pain like I had years ago while running in these shoes. The swamps at the park were really nice with all the wild life and yes there were plenty of alligators to be seen during the run. I'm finally catching up to some of the other runners so it's less of the running all by myself feeling.

Miles 11 - 14

My brother William catches up to because the 25kers didn't have to do an extra little loop along the course like the 50 milers had to do. We run together for much of the remainder of my race. I am struggling a bit because of the shoe situation but just push forward the best that I can.

Miles 15 - 15.5

I'm just about done and the finish line is within reach. I end up crossing at about 11:30 am and with my 7:20ish start thats a finishing time of 3:10ish. They didn't have chip timing so I'm not really sure of my actual time. Good race though. With the added run back and forth to the car beforehand I probably did about 17.5 miles.

It's always a good time racing with my brothers and it was a beautiful day at the park. Who knew a place like that existed no to far away from where my brother lives. The course was really flat and might just be a contender for a possible ultra for me one day. :)

After the race I headed back onto the trails to capture some video of my brother Willie's 50 miler race as seen above.

my bro and his medal

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