My 2nd race of the year was also my 2nd race in 2 weeks so my plan was to treat it as part of a LSD run and not to race it.

This was the first time I did the Spring Run-Off in High Park. It’s apparently the oldest race in Toronto and kicks off the race season for the city. The route is quite hilly and there’s a hill in the last ~400m which is timed separately called the Kill the Hill Challenge.

Packet pick-up

Packet pick up was located at the Runners Shop which is easily accessible by subway. Thanks Lisa for picking up my packet! The swag included a soft cotton tshirt, cetaphil wipe (I love these), and some other samples. Not bad. Bag check was free.

Pre-run

Because we were supposed to do a 28k long run this week as part of our marathon training plan, it was perfect to run to High Park for our pre-run. Simply running a 8k race on its own would have been too short anyway.

Originally, Lisa agreed to run with me and then she was gonna volunteer at the race. The day before the race, she won 2 free entries to the race so she signed up and offered the other entry to Tracey. It was meant to be! 😄

I followed Google maps to get down to High Park and along the way, we saw a lot of murals and took a lot of selfies. People were so confused because we were wearing 100% matching outfits. #twinning

We still got to High Park with 20 minutes to spare and even had time to go to Tims for a proper bathroom break before the race started.

At the corral

Denuja recognized us from IG. It’s always nice to meet IG people IRL. We took a Team Tap photo together.

Then Tracey arrived after parking far far away.

The race started promptly at 10am and we were off!

The race

The race was well run. The corrals and route were well marked. There were 3-4 aid stations on the course even though it was only an 8k race. They provided both water and Nuun which was perfect because I had run out of nuun by the time the race started. The course was crowded at times but because we weren’t racing it, we just ran at the pace of the pack. It would have been hard to weave through people if we were racing it. There were plenty of photographers on the course and lots of cheersquads including Tribe and Rouge Runners. They have these funny posters that they bring to races. We need to up our RunNinjas cheer squad game! We also saw Gail from Run Little Monkey who was there to take a photo of her monkey twinsies. 😂

I felt good throughout the race and Lisa kept on reminding me that we weren’t supposed to be racing it. 😅 At the last 2km, I started to feel it but knew that there was still the Kill the Hill challenge ahead. By then, it was all a mental game so I just pushed through it knowing the end is right around the corner. We ended up finishing in 0:44:17. My (secret) target time was 0:45 so I was happy. 😊

They gave out Nuun samples and water at the finish line. The medal is quite nice although I liked last year’s medal better.

Tracey finished shortly after us.

We waited for my coworker to finish. She’s part of my 47RunRun club at work and this was her first race. She was so happy to have finished strong and didn’t walk at all, even at the last hill. I’m so proud of her and hope that she has caught the racing bug. 😁

We also bumped into another pair of #solesisters from IG. They also have matching tops. 😍

The food at the end was plentiful: banana, yogurt, an individually wrapped bread, and cookie. I also bought the pancake breakfast for $5. Kind of expensive for 2 pancakes and given all the free food, it wasn’t necessary. We all shared the pancakes.

We stayed at the post-race area for a bit and then Tracey offered us a ride home which was super convenient vs taking the subway. Thanks Tracey!

Summary

Everything worked out perfectly for this race. It was basically a 28k LSD run where the last 8k had aid stations and we got a medal and pancakes at the end for our efforts. It was a great way to spend our Saturday morning!!!

Here’s my overall time. I just realized we pretty much did an even split! Great work despite the hill at the end!

Here’s my time for the Kill the Hill Challenge.