Turkey and TATURS--the REAL story.

It was the 6th running of the Turkey and TATURs trail race, a tough, gnarly jaunt in Tulsa's urban wilderness. 189 runners chose between distances of 10K, 25K, or 50K. With perfect weather on tap, most finished their endeavors, and a couple of course records fell.
I had worked all week marking the course, an hour or two or three in the evenings after work, and all day Saturday. About 25 hours, hundreds of pink ribbons, and hundreds of yards of caution tape, I felt on Saturday evening the course was sufficiently marked.Still, I left out early Sunday morning--4:30 am to be exact--to check to make sure a turn had not been blown through by a biker. And as is always the case, we did find a few places where caution tape was broken. Us?? Oh yeah. I had the company of my running buddy Edward.Not a single pic of Edward showed up--much like another Edward of vampire movie fame. So, I ganked one from his Facebook page.

The going was slow in the dark. I love night running, but running on such technical trailz, and also keeping a close eye out for missing ribbons brought our pace to a walk for the most part.

After a couple of hours, daybreak illuminated the fall foliage. Much of the trailz on Turkey Mountain are rocky and rooty, and this time of year, it was blanketed with freshly fallen leaves.

Still, Turkey has miles and miles of runnable single track.

Did I mention rocks?

After 10 miles, Edward picked up the pace and I ran much of the remainder of my time alone. I was passed by the front-runners in the 50K, and then a few 25Kers blew by me as well.

The leaves were superb in color. Another week, and they'll all be on the ground.

So, while my pace increased a bit with the daylight, it slowed again while I took pictures.

I was slowing down at this point, feeling the lack of rest. I guess there is something to that "taper" thing.

Playing on one of Turkey's wooden bridges.

The Elbert/Eraker aid station--mile 7. I spent a while here--chatting it up and completely ignoring my usual "quick in/quick out" rule. At this point, I was giving thought to whether or not I wanted to run all day.

I decided to just slow it down (as if I weren't going s l o w anyway.) A picture here, a picture there. I was enjoying the run, soaking it in, and taking a lot of time doing it.

Such great color!!

Next was Bobby and Susan's aid station. Despite much lallygagging and a second visit to use the civilized bathrooms, I forgot to take their pic, so this one is from a couple of years back.

Then it was UP Lipbuster and over to the last aid stop on the course. Rachel pours a soda but I got away without drinking it--what was I thinking?

More picture taking. (This one is out of order. I actually took quite a few after I got to the finish and went back out on the course.

So, when I got back to the start/finish, I had over 5 hours on my Garmin. Slow, but I did burn some time checking the course in the dark. The food sounded good, and I was just beat. My string of 5 finishes at the T&T 50K had come to an end.I took a few shots of finishers when they came in. Most were taken with the foliage setting on my Canon and were very blurry. Here, John Hargrove finishes the 25K.

John's friend Nels, who is also the major sponsor for the race, donates some blood to the course.

Trail Goat and Thing 2 scorched the 25K course, blowing by me like I was standing still. (wait, I WAS standing still.)

Having dropped at 25K, having eaten 2 hot dogs and some Gatorade, I decided to go back out on the course to take some more pics. I took several of runners coming down the home stretch.

About $3.00 worth of caution tape.

One of the many wonders of Turkey Mountain--scenic Lake Logan.

Another face in the rocks keeps eyes open for runners.

Cole Starkey led and increased his lead all day (or at least 4 hours and 41 minutes of the day) and won the 50K in 4:41:35. Saraj Henning took the women's crown winning in a time of 7:01:35. WHitney Kerth crossed the finish as first woman in the 25K in a speedy 2:43:05, while Christopher Greenlee was number one for themen running a 2:12:46. For the 10K, some of those runners from that other state just east of here (Arkansas, for the geographically challenged) took home both the male and femal trophies. Christian Moore scorched the trailz in a winning in a mere 42:32. Enough time to even break a sweat? Not far behind him, Jenny Scott clocked a 56:03. We need to add more hills--just for these Arkansas speedsters--no wait--they LOVE hills!!!
Complete results can be found here.
I don't have pix of the winners as I was still plunking along on the course, but I DO have this one. Here, 50K winner Cole Starkey takes a breather, partially and modestly obscured by a convenient trash can.
Bigtime thanks to race-director Kathy for all her hard work, and Brian who worked his butt off with course marking in some of the most crical locations on the course he and did a flawless job in timing the race.