Talking turkey 6 mile off road race

The talking turkey is a great race, 6 miles, mostly flat, on the packed gravel access roads around the Ashley reservoir in Holyoke. The weather today was awesome with the temperatures in the low 50s. This race is so hit or miss weather wise, last year it was in the 20s with a solid sheet of ice on the course.

Personal best time this year with the following mile splits:

Mile 1: 7:09 Ave HR 176
Mile 2: 7:29 Ave HR 189
Mile 3: 7:39 Ave HR 190
Mile 4: 7:53 Ave HR 189
Mile 5: 7:58 Ave HR 189
Mile 6: 7:48 Ave HR 192

For a ET of 45:59 @ a 7:40 average pace with an average heart rate of 188. My watch actually read 45:57 but what's a couple of seconds between friends!?!

The first mile felt really good as did the second about mile 2.5 I started to suffer real bad. I was thinking that I went out too hot, despite how good I felt. Once I got into mile 3 I found a good place that I could sustain and rode it into mile 5. Once I got to mile 5.6 or so (passing by the reservoir and heading up the access road to the Elks) club I dumped out the last of my can of whup ass and was able to negative split the last mile. I'm pretty happy with the result!!