Running the Mountain!

Enjoy the story:drinker:

The 2nd Annual D-day 10k at Camp Toccoa today. First, a little background on the place, then my overall race review.



Mount Currahee is a 1759ft peak located in Northwest Georgia and was the site of parachute infantry training during WWII. It was made famous in more recent years by Tom Hanks and the hit HBO series Band of Brothers as the training site for the regiments featured.

The line, "3 miles up, 3 miles down.", was the famous line and the motto for all the soldiers trained at this base.

Race day:

The start of the race is on the site of the original camp, with 0.1 miles to the dirt road that leads to the summit. Just below the summit, about a hundred yards down is this view:



Water station at the halfway up/down points and at the summit were manned by local Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts. Awesome job guys!

Running the race today were many military groups, some active duty like the army folks from Columbia, SC, who boarded a bus @ 3:45am to come honor the regiments that originally trained here. A small group of USMC recruits was present(they had not yet left for boot camp on the delayed entry program) led by the SSgt that recruited them. Some Air Force retirees and those like me who had served and moved on to other parts of our lives. All branches were represented today USN,USAF, USMC, USA, and USCG. And true to all our ethos, no one was left behind.

Finishing the race was an accomplishment and this is definitely one I will do again next year! Time for this 10k was 1hr 11min 1sec(about 5.2mph avg speed).

*All information on Camp Toccoa and the first pic shown are from www.wikipedia.com. The second picture was taken by me on the way down with my Android smartphone.