Since 1996, the Fredericksburg Area Running Club has hosted a 10-mile race in late August. The club’s objective was to provide a long race event for those runners training for a fall marathon or other long event. They were first held in Hartwood, now in Culpeper, since 2017.
The last 3 miles of the race are on Route 666 and, without cloud cover, would be hot in full sunlight. Thus, the Devil’s Den 10 Mile was born. BTW, today there was no cloud cover.
After last week’s 3H half-marathon, I hoped to run a reasonable ten-mile race. I planned to walk for 1 minute at each of the four water stops. A finish between 90 and 100 minutes would be excellent.
Saturday night, I won an online $500 freeroll no-limit tournament. So, I only got 6 hours of sleep but still had a 93% readiness score. I got out by 5:25 am and arrived at the Culpeper Sports Complex at 6:20 am.
The weather was 74 degrees with a 70-degree dew point, not a cloud in the sky. Today was not going to be a good running day. With the 7:15 am start, finishing by 9 am would be good, with temps rising only to 80 degrees by then.
Around 6:40 am, I ran a 16-minute warmup, stopped in the men’s room, changed into a singlet, and made it to the FARC group picture.
I wore shorts over compression shorts, my white FARC singlet, a ball cap to keep the sun out of my eyes, and my new Saucony Triumph 20 shoes.
For the first three water stops, I stuck with my plan walking for a minute at each.
Miles 1.5 to 3.5 were directly into the sun. I had to pull my cap bill down to block the light. Should I have worn sunglasses? Many trees shaded the road in this section of the course. The low point on the route is at mile 3. The long uphill to the Brandy Station spur was more challenging than I remember. My first four miles were 9:18, 9:09, 9:48, and 9:42.
As was Stephenson Road, the spur road to Brandy Station was nicely shaded. Though on Stephenson, there were more rough pavement and uphills than I remembered. Those 3 miles were 9:09, 10:22, and 10:13. We need to verify the location of Mile 5. We’ve had some issues in the past with this mark. My 9:09 does not make sense as I walked for a minute in this mile. I don’t remember running that fast or slowing in mile 6.
The 7-mile mark is at the beginning of Route 666. There is no cloud in the sky, and the sun is full against my back. Fortunately, the road is flat and newly paved.
Even with the amount of water I had been drinking, I was concerned about heat stroke and the heart issues I had been having. Around mile 7.75, discretion took over, and I stopped pushing and started walking. Knowing the final mile was mainly in the shade; I started running again. My last three miles were 10:50, 14:26 and 10:04.
My finish time of 1:43:06 was 3 minutes slower than 2022, good for 71st overall, 46th male, and 7th of 14 in the Male 60 to 69 age group. All three placements were better than in 2022, with more finishers this year. I guess the weather took its toll on everyone. I survived to run another day.
They gave an excellent finisher’s award, a smaller glass, and the race shirt was a full print sublimated. I won’t be able to tuck in the flames at the bottom.
This race was the sixth in the 2023 Coldwell Banker Elite Grand Prix. Having run them all, I received the second piece of the GP medal, one part for each three race finishes.