Mine and My wife’s favorite race every year. The Cowtown Ultra Marathon. A nice 50K thru and around Fort Worth. Lots of Texas hospitality and great Texas food. Another reason I enjoy my Fort Worth race is it always around my Birthday. This year I raced in a new age group. 55-60 years olds. Where has the time gone? No way I can be 55 years old.

Perfect weather for this year’s race. After a whole week of rain. A two day Ice storm at home. Race morning was a perfect 47 degrees. Sunny, light wind. Warmed up to around 65. I have never walked a 50K in over 6 hours. I have never missed as much training as I have so far this year. As I have gotten older I have developed an aversion to cold. As a result I tend to skip very cold training days. So I arrived in Fort Worth undertrained. My only goal this year is New Zealand in October. A 31 mile walk in Fort Worth would be a perfect kickoff to my New Zealand 100 mile training. No matter the time. I needed the miles.

I lined up behind the 6 hour pace group at Cowtown. The plan was to hang with them as long as I could. I have never used a pace group that raced like I want to race. Of course they never will, because they run, I walk. This group was the best I have used. I would struggle to keep up. A sub 11 minute pace. When we got to a water stop the pace group would stop. I didn’t. Drink on the fly. They would catch back up and pass me before the next stop. This worked very well for me. I walked very well till mile 28. My group left me behind. I was powerless to do anything about it. Just walk the best I could. It was just for training after all. Turns out I missed my six hour goal by just over one minute.

Very pleased with my result at Cowtown. Legs and my butt a little sore this morning. Now I have kicked off my Centurion training. First stop the FANS 24 hour in Minneapolis this June. Two little Oklahoma marathons coming up. One each in March and April. Same plan with my Marathon as Cowtown. Training walks.