The second Tryon Farm Run took place on May 18th, and attracted about 260 runners, including yours truly, who cooked pork, tended trail and ran 5K.  There was a bit of chaos at the start, or rather before the start, so my brother suggested I start out on the trail to see if I could follow it.  I made it about 2K of 10K before the first 50K runners blazed past led by my brother, and I can report that all was not entirely clear, but I soldiered on marking things and then perched at a particularly confusing spot to guide people.  Not being experienced in these matters, I did not realize that getting off the trail is part of the deal.  I soon learned that the standard answer to most lost runners is some variant of "You weren't going to win anyway"  or "Your time can be adjusted" or "Speak to my brother".  Some part of the confusion is the trail, and some part is human lemming behavior as they all follow someone who decides to ignore a directional arrow.

After deciding that the first 50K runners now had been through the course once, or were hopelessly lost, I headed up to the barn in time for the 5/10K start, which had its own issues as part of the crowd is cutting off half the loop to get the lesser distance, and a significant subset of both groups of runners has headphones or ear buds in so they hear nothing.  As the crowd thins out and we enter the woods where the trail narrows, we run like Indians, through mud, over logs, ducking limbs.  The finish is through the prairie back to the farm, where beer, water, and pork sandwiches provide fuel, and a horse trough provides cooling.

Respect and admiration to the 50K people, a sturdy and good-humored lot of all ages and sizes,  rather than  the Nike-clad gazelle-robots I expected.  Kudos to my brother for making the race happen.  (Noonans at the farm for the race: ten, including me and all my siblings, a fivesome that is not complete so often.)