I got to the buses at about 6:40 AM and then got up to the top of Emigration Canyon just after 7:00 AM. The race didn't start until 8:45 AM so I had a ton of time to kill. It was in the low 40s and pretty chilly. To keep warm for the next 2 hours I headed up a trail near the starting line. After about 10 minutes of hiking I came up on two of the laziest hunters sitting near the trail. Any deer nearby would surely have been scared off by the blaring music and hundreds of people down on the road. Not sure why they didn't go farther on the trail. I passed them and kept going for a while as the sun rose and saw seven deer cross the ridge I was on. I didn't tell the hunters. There was a headless horseman at the starting line and a yoga class. I didn't really hang around though and headed off for a 2-mile warm up down towards Mountain Dell Reservoir. Although this was not a very small race, right up next to the starting line was not crowded at all. No pushing necessary to get near the front. The gun went off and the headless horseman threw his pumpkin head and it exploded on someone's car hood. The don't think that part was scripted. The first few miles of the course are very steep (7%-4%) and it was difficult not to got too fast. My goal was not to go faster than 6:00 min/mi. I averaged 6:09 for the first two miles. But slowed down after that. I think I kept my pace reasonable for the rest of the miles. I struggled at the end in the neighborhoods because there were a couple of small hills. And at Sugarhouse Park there was a tough Hill directly before the finish. | 