Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Pikes Peak Marathon

The Pikes Peak Ascent and Marathon were held this weekend. On Saturday, the race starts in Manitou Springs, elevation 6,300' (1,920m) and finishes at the Pikes Peak summit, 14,115' (4,302m). That's a 13.1 mile climb of 7,815' (2,382 meters) with an average grade of 11%. On Sunday, the Marathon is held. It's pretty much the same route, except that, at the summit, the racers turn around and run back down.

If you think the marathon is hard, consider that a number of people complete both the marathon and the ascent in the same weekend.

The photo above shows both the starting line and the summit house on top of the peak.

Kelly ran the marathon this year and finished in 7:09:41. That's about 1 hour improvement over last year. Awesome!

Sunrise on the peak before the Marathon start

That's part of my world. Be sure to visit My World Tuesday!

4 comments:

Gaelyn said...

Love the sunrise shot.

It would take me days instead of hours.

Martha Z said...

Makes me tired just thinking about it. That is a grueling hike even without running.

ninja said...

Simply amazing mountain sunset!

JPT said...

Fair play to all those runners!
I do some running (started 4 months ago) and have completed a six mile road race, am now training for a half marathon and would if possible love to do the New York marathon next year - but I'm way off that mark yet!