The sun was not shining, but it was a beautiful day for running a 5K! For my second race of the season I picked another VA Momentum sponsored event, this one at a functioning quarry.

Granted, the race was on a Saturday and no work was going on, but it was a big deal to host a race at an active quarry. We had a safety briefing first thing, which included an explanation that runners were to stay on the trail demarcated by caution tape at all times. The course had changed even in the days leading up to the race due to continuous rain from Mother Nature and the tendency of piles of rock to shift. COOL.

Oh, one more detail: The course ran us along side “The Pit” for a portion of the race. Go past the tape, you get to close to the edge and you’re the first one to the bottom. NOT the first place for which anyone was aiming.

It rained ALL week leading up to the race, and Saturday morning greeted us with cool, drizzly weather.

Ahh, running in the rain.

In a rock quarry.

What perfectly sane person drags their a$$ out of bed to run in the rain? At a rock quarry?

Well, I don’t know the answer to that one, mostly because I’ve never considered myself perfectly sane.

This slightly-less-than-sane Mom Who Runs inherited a “Oh, construction, cool!” and “Big equipment, check it out!” fascination, so was not going to miss a race at an active quarry. The course ended up a little short. In a spring where the abundant rain showers happened in April, the Crusher Run 5K included a short loop down in The Pit.

 

As you can see in the above picture, The Pit was completely under water on race day. The valley got so much rain that week that The Pit had been filled like that for several days.

The course did run us down the steep grade into the pit, but instead of a loop at the bottom, we simply made a U-turn and headed right back up that hill. Let me say that running (and walking) Pound the Peak the week before was an outstanding preparation for this part of the course!

Once you reached the top of The Pit, you were in the home stretch. A windy, but relatively flat, puddle-ridden, gravel-mound-circumnavigating portion of the course.

All in all, it was AWESOME. I was a glorious mess and my ten day-old shoes were now thoroughly broken in. What else can I say? I’m looking forward to doing it again next year!