I ran in the Mt. Charleston Notch run this year, i haven't done this race since 2001. This race is only 4 miles, but starts at about 7800 ft above sea level and then climbs about 1000 feet to end close to 9000 feet. Tough race. When i was 10 years younger and much better shape, I ran my best time of 29.53, about 7.30 pace, so this is a tough race. Another comparison, the all time record for this race was done by the legendary Hobie Call, when he ran a phenomenal time of 24.08, so for 4 miles, he didn't quite break 6 min pace, just to give you an idea of the difficulty. We started the race, and the usual 10-15 high school runners jump out in the lead, but most of them have never done this race, and are they in for a surprise. My first mile was 7.12, and I was probably in about 8th place, the 2nd mile is tough, and I ran 8.09, and was now in 6 place, Devin Mancuso was in the lead, and then Stephen Morgan and James Edwards were 2nd/3rd, then two high school runners, and myself. I finally passed the two high school runners in the 3rd mile, when I ran a 8.02, and now it was time for the toughest mile, the 4th mile, it just goes straight up. I ran that race in 8.30, and finished at 31.53. I might not have broke 32 mins but Erica and Julian Julani were screaming at me to finish hard and break 32, so I hustled it in. Good Race. Nice temps, about 75 degrees. The achilles was pretty sore, probably pretty stupid to run this race with a sore achilles. Cheers Mike | 