The North Face Endurance Challenge

I'll be racing the North Face Endurance Challenge 50-mile race in San Francisco on Saturday morning. The course runs through the Marin headlands, just across the Golden Gate bridge. It's very much a championships race, with a who's who of trail ultra-running racing, or at least those still standing and willing to the toe the line after a long season of running and racing. A few notable names will be missed as they follow along online, drinking beer and/or head out for a day of skiing. As always, Bryon Powell has a good overview of the field at iRunFar.com.
I came here to test myself against a great field, but after a quick run on the trails today I'm also feeling really inspired by the surroundings. It's much more stunning and open than I expected and the area has a long history of ultra-running, with some iconic races run on the trails. Although it isn't technically a mountain race, there really isn't much flat on the course.
I'm well prepared and excited to race, which is a great starting point, but as with any ultra, there's a lot of footsteps between the start and finish. The course and the stacked field will throw a lot at us out there, which should provide some entertaining drama.

I believe that you can follow my race via my Facebook page, as Sportstats will be linking to the site. Other than that, you can follow the race on Twitter, I believe updates will be posted here(not sure what their hashtag will be):
http://twitter.com/#!/iRunFar
http://twitter.com/#!/thenorthfaceECS
http://twitter.com/#!/salomon_running

For the curious, here's a course profile from the race package: