The Yakima River Canyon Scenic Byway is well known in my part of the country for its spectacular beauty.

A little history: I have always wanted to drive the canyon road, but I have never had the chance to do it. So, when I found out that there was a Canyon marathon I immediately put this on my “wish list”. It took me seven years to finally have the chance to run it and I must admit that I was not disappointed. The view indeed is stunning and breathtaking the whole entire way.

Training background: When I decided to run this marathon I was just coming back from a month of being overseas with little or no running at all. I had only 10 weeks of training for this marathon, of which I was sick with the flu for two weeks. So, knowing that I was still in the base building stage for my July marathon I decided to use this marathon as a long training run.

My goals:

Treat the first half as a half marathon race to find out my fitness level.

Run a steady pace until mile 20 without any walk breaks.

Run/walk the last 6 miles to the finish.

Finish time goal: 5 hours; half marathon goal: sub 2 hours. HM found me at 2:05.

Short version:

Official finish time: 4:39:39.

Age group: 7 / 25

OA 190 / 390

OA female: 52 / 156

The Long version:

After work on Friday I drove the 3 hours to the marathon starting city. This is a point to point marathon. There was threat of rain for race day, but Troy promised me that we will have perfect weather condition. I woke up on race day and the first thing I did was look out the window to check on the weather, which was cloudy and no rain drop insight!

After a nice breakfast I drove to the starting line. I must say here that Bart Yasso was the speaker at the pasta dinner the night before, but I did not make it to the race headquarters on time to listen to him. Not knowing what he looks like I was not able to locate him at the race either.

The race starts in Ellensburg, WA. A nice college and agricultural community. The race course takes you around town for a few miles before it dumps you into the Yakima Canyon Scenic Byway.

Being able to visit the Canyon for the first time by foot, presented me with the opportunity to really take pleasure in its beauty and the chance to admire its rich natural resources one step at the time.

The miles went by very quickly since every corner we were greeted with new volcanic basalt cliff formations; with a cluster of wild flowers in their various stages of bloom; with wild animals such as coyotes, deer, and big horn sheep (I saw two of them up on a cliff between miles 14 and 15).

The weather was kind funny. As runners follow the meandering Yakima river we encountered strong gusts of wind, sunshine, clouds and eventually rain (it started raining about 3 minutes after I finished but by then I was already in a minivan to go back to the starting line to get in my car and drive back home). I believe the strongest gust of wind was as I was descending Tetsujin’s favorite Rosa Hill. This hill comes at about mile 21 and it just kept on going up for over a mile. After Rosa Hill the course presented us with a few bumps, but mostly downhill to the end.

Runners going up Tetsujin's Rosa Hill

A few fond memories and some lessons learned:

-The volunteers were remarkably friendly. Most of them were families who are out there with their kids to have fun. I think the youngest volunteer was about 5 years old. Ohh she was so cute with the volunteer t-shirt down to her knee filled with chocolate stained and red chicks offering runners her support.  She made me smile when I heard her saying: good job, water or Gatorade?

- Running a few steps with Bob Dolphin, the founder of this marathon who at age 84 was running his 521 (I believe that is what he told me) made my day.

- Not worrying about time allowed me to enjoy the scenery. Thanks to this I was able to spot the big horn sheep and the coyotes.

-Being able to finally meet Tetsujin’s favorite “Rosa Hill” at mile 21. Through the years I have heard him talk with so much fondness about this hill.  This is one of two big hills on the race course. Rosa Hill sure is mean since it is a long hill and it comes right after a downhill where the quads are already screaming and stamina was already gone. In honor of Tetsujin I ran the darn hill every step of the way

- The spectacular view of the town of Silah as one approached the finish line. The apricot and peach trees were in full bloom in the many orchards found in that town.

Lessons learned:

One: You get from a marathon what you put into your training (having done only one 20 and one 18 miler in preparation for this race, I really did not have the endurance needed to run even a slow marathon, after mile 19 I really had to dig deep).

Two: having three different goals for this marathon helped me to stay focused.

Three: always have a second plan for hydration and nutrition. I had only 3 shot blocks with me since I forgot to replenish my race bag before I left home. There was no gu given during the race, so I really was running on empty tank. Since my stomach cannot handle Gatorade during long distance runs I relayed on my meager supply of Nuun to support me to the end. This was one day I was glad I did not throw away my water bottle by mile 10 as I had planned to do.

Four: don’t take every race too seriously or you just may miss the big horn sheep cheering you on from up above a steep volcanic basalt cliff.

Five: I also learned that a Bluetooth can be a driver's best friend! It was fun being able to keep twocat company as he was cooking one of his amazing dinner. Thanks for your gift of time my dear friend. I hope your dish turn out good.

 Ohhh, I also learned  that the Golden arches' Swiss cheese and mushroom burger is not bad after all (another story for another day)

As I said, after the race I drove my achy body, but happy heart home.

I took every chance I found to stop to get out of the car and snap pictures of the lovely scenery I often take for granted.

Dry falls

All in all, it was a perfect way to spend a lovely Saturday, won't you say?

Here is more on the Canyon, a little lengthy video, but hey, we all have time as we await the Boston Race and race reports.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAcGby6koqM

A disclaimer, some of these pictures were borrowed from Google pictures and some were taken by me.

Yakima River Canyon Marathon 2014 anyone?

This looks like a really beautiful course. I've never been to Ellensburg. Isn't this the race that is frequently the Marathon Maniac Reunion race? Seems like it was a couple of times recently. You did this one right, Mariposai, and nice that you could fit it into your schedule this year AND see the sheep! Thanks for the pictures, wherever they came from!

Spectacular photos!  I want to run there!!

And that's a pretty terrific run for a "training" run on little base.  Bravo!

--Robin

Nice job, Posie!  Great pictures and a great report.  Thanks for sharing it with us.

Wonderful. Simply wonderful.

Posie, that looks like a beautiful place to run!  Glad you finally got there to do the race.   Congrats on another marathon - what number is this?

Wow!!! great photos... this just ended up on my list for next year.  Looks simply spectacular

don’t take every race too seriously or you just may miss the big horn sheep cheering you on from up above a steep volcanic basalt cliff

This really ought to be on a T-shirt.

Gorgeous-looking race course and you had the right attitude to enjoy it to its fullest.  Congrats!