Joja Jogger

Cumberland Trail 50K Race Report

2011-12-17T11:10:00.004-05:00

This is way late, sorry!

Two years ago, I ran the Cumberland Trail 50K as my first trail ultra, at the time it was the most difficult and rewarding race I had ever run. Guess what? Nothing has changed in two years!

I drove up to Cove Lake State Park north of Knoxville the day before to pick up my packet and say hi to RD Susan and the rest of the gang. Then I checked into the Hampton Inn which was less than five miles from the start and grabbed some dinner.

Race morning arrived with perfect conditions. Cool temperatures, clear skies, and lots of masochists ready for some trail fun. It was still dark when we started, so after a quick briefing, we were sent on our way down the bike/running path. I quickly established my normal place at the back of the pack and after a couple of minutes, Leonard Martin joined me, having gotten a bit of a late start. We talked about not missing the initial turn onto the single track and easily saw the well marked turn. I'm very cautious when it comes to running trails in the dark, so Leonard soon pulled ahead and I was on my own.

About five minutes later I hear footsteps coming up behind me. These aren't fellow back-of-the-packer footsteps, these are fast runner footsteps. I step aside to let him pass, thinking it was another runner who had gotten a late start. Then I heard more footsteps and soon dozens of runners were passing me. What was going on? Apparently, the lead runner ran right by the initial turnoff, and since it was dark everyone just followed the headlamp ahead of them. Leonard and I were far enough off the back of the pack that we weren't following anyone and were actually in first and second place for about a mile. This was the first and probably last time I held the lead in an ultra.

Sunrise and the first aid station arrived quickly, but this meant that the climb up Cross Mountain was next. There is no false advertising about this course. From the website, part of the description reads: "The race takes you on a challenging, out-and-back route on the rugged New River section of the Cumberland Trail. This section crosses the high point of the trail, Cross Mountain, at over 3000’. Be prepared - this course could take up to twice your PR for a 50k. The climb up Cross Mountain is steep and will be slow." According to my Garmin data, my pace on this climb was 26 minutes/mile and my heartrate the highest of the entire day. The best way I can describe the climb to non-trail runners is to get on the stair-master, climb two steps at a time, and continue that pace for an hour. Oh yeah, and throw in slippery wet leaf-covered rocks and stream crossings while you're at it. I had to laugh at one point, I had passed a gal on this climb and looked back after a particularly brutal section. She was just standing there, looking at the section with an incredulous look.

At the end of the climb we were rewarded with another great aid station and a short, more runnable section. Then came the longest section between aid stations. It is over 6 miles and has a nasty climb on a very rugged, rutted, slippery "jeep trail". I use quotation marks, because I sure wouldn't want to drive a vehicle up that road. By this time the gal I had passed on Cross Mountain and passed me again and I was back in my familiar spot. After a final steep climb in which a rope would have been helpful, there was once again a welcome well-stocked aid station.

Next was the easy peasy section. Susan gave us a two mile gravel road and meadow trail section to recover a bit from the brutal climbs. Two years ago a big mama elk had camped out in the meadow and quietly observed all the crazy runners traipsing across her home. Unfortunately this year she didn't show. I soon reached the turn around spot, picked up my card to prove I had gotten there, and started back. I was about 15 minutes ahead of my pace from two years ago. On the way back, I saw Rob the sweeper and said hi and that I hoped I wouldn't see him too close behind me.

The downhills on the way back were almost as slow for me as the climbs were. The footing was treacherous in spots with the wet leaves and rocks and the descent down Cross Mountain was only a minute/mile faster than the climb had been. As I arrived at each aid station on the way back, I announced to the crew that the pre-sweep sweep had arrived and that Rob would be by shortly. I finally crossed the finish line in 9:50:26, DFL once again, but 26 minutes faster than two years ago.

If you are looking for a trail race that is both challenging and rewarding, consider putting this race on your calendar. It is very difficult, but the generous cutoff time makes it doable. In fact, there have been only three DNFs in the three year history of the race.

Thanks Susan for the incredible experience.

Nooooooo!!!!!!

2011-11-23T11:50:00.002-05:00

Ok, first of all, I owe you guys two race reports.

Second, I went to the grocery store today. The only thing worse than going to a grocery store the day before Thanksgiving is going to Walmart the day after Thanksgiving.

To add insult to injury the twelve year old checkout gal asked if I qualified for the senior discount!

To tide you over until I finish the race reports, I finished the Cumberland Trail 50K DFL, but my time was almost 30 minutes faster than it was two years ago. I DNFed the Javelina Jundred, but I did get a buckle for completing 100K.

Hope you all have a happy Thanksgiving!

Pre Cumberland Trail Thoughts

2011-10-09T09:03:00.003-04:00

First an update on the final Hinson Lake 24 Hour Run results. I covered an official 86.49 miles, a PR by over a mile and good for 6th place female and 20th overall out of 254 runners. The amazing Mike Morton ran an incredible 163.9 miles without a crew or pacer, less than two miles short of Scott Jurek's American record.

The Cumberland Trail 50K

Two years ago I ran this as my first trail ultra. I had run a couple of road 50Ks and had run a trail half marathon and thought it was time to step up. I had met RD Susan at the Hot To Trot 8 Hour Run earlier that year and as I was drinking wine and browsing the internet I saw that she was going to direct her first race. With a couple of glasses of wine clouding my brain, I thought, cool, I'll run this as my first trail ultra.

The next morning I went back to the website and read the route description. Oh. My. God.

There is over 8000 feet of climbing with the climb up Cross Mountain being 2000 feet in just 2.5 miles. That is a relentless 800 feet/mile for 2.5 miles.

I finished that race two years ago in a time of 10:16 and DFL.

Fast forward to this year.

I had an opening in my schedule this month and thought to myself, self, let's run the Cumberland Trail 50K again. I didn't even have the excuse of having drunk too much wine this time.

After my "hilly" trail 20 miler yesterday I thought I would revisit my Garmin data from two years ago. Oh. My. God. My average pace up Cross Mountain was a whopping 28 minutes/mile! My average heart rate during that climb was 161. For me, that is like 5K heart rate. Oh yea, I'm going to have fun next Saturday.

My goal is to beat my time from two years ago, we shall see.

Hinson Lake 24 Hour Report

2011-09-29T13:00:00.000-04:00

I have been putting off this report waiting for the official results, but I have some free time now so here it goes. I'll provide an update once the results are official.

This is the first year I ran at Hinson Lake and it quickly became one of my favorite events. (I am getting way too many favorite events on my list.) First of all, the entry fee is only TWENTY-FOUR dollars. For that $24 you get better swag than you get at a big city marathon.

Plus you get all the food you can eat, all the water and Gatorade you can drink, and all the ultra comraderie you could want for 24 hours. That's $1 an hour, I'd like to see a Competitor Group marathon with an entry fee of 3-5 dollars.

The course consisted of 1.52 mile loops around Hinson Lake. The path is sandy gravel with several wooden footbridges. There was one "hill" which was a couple of hundred yards long and maybe 15' gain in elevation. It was raining a bit at the start and as I was waiting in my car, I saw southeastern ultra good guy Bill Keane walking by. I lowered my window to say "hi" and he offered me one of his Pat Pending Green Powered Digital Lap Counters.

There is one drawback to the design, the operator needs to remember to move the ring from one finger to the next after each lap, which does become difficult around 2-4 AM.

The race started promptly at 8AM and although it was a bit crowded at the beginning, everyone quickly settled into place and we were on our way. There were a lot of GUTS and Darkside running cult members, so there were a lot of people lapping me that I knew.

The volunteers were all fantastic and the aid station was stocked with just about anything you might need. It seemed more like a picnic with some running.

That is not to say there weren't some incredible performances out there. Mike Morton put on a phenomenal display of athleticism. With the heat index approaching 90 degrees, Mike kept on pounding out the laps. Even with his superior effort, he took the time to encourage us plodders every time he passed us. One of the main reasons I wanted to wait for the official results is that I'm pretty sure he got within a couple of miles of Scott Jureck's American 24 Hour record. It was amazing to watch him run and I swear he picked up speed after 4 AM.

As I stated in my last post, I was going to attempt a PR. It was very humid so I started slower than normal, but I was able to maintain my pace for much longer. In my previous 24 Hour runs, I ended up walking most of the night, but this night I was able to run about 2 - 2.5 minutes out of every 5 minutes. I think this also helped reduce the severity of blisters. It took me 15 hours, but I did eventually make the leader board (I also had to stop and get my camera to take this picture).

At about 4 AM I asked the scoring table how many laps I needed to do to cover 85.5 miles (previous PR was 85.25 miles). I looked at the time remaining, my current pace, and how many laps I needed to do. Doing the math in my head, it was apparent that I would not make my PR. I decided to mosey along the next lap, change my socks one last time, then keep moving and get a nice 82-83 mile training run for the Javelina Jundred in November.

When will I ever learn...DO NOT DO MATH IN YOUR HEAD AT 4AM AFTER RUNNING 70ISH MILES!

As I passed the timing table again, I saw that I still had 4 hours to go. I had misread the time by an hour on the last lap. Well crap, (I mean yea!) I can still make that PR, but I have to pick up my pace back to where it was. So I put my big girl panties back on, maintained the pace I needed, and ended up with an unofficial 86.4ish miles, a new PR!

I'll update this with my final mileage and the amazing Mike Morton's mileage when the official results are published.

I had an awesome time, and I hope to return again and again.

An Update

2011-09-15T15:10:00.003-04:00

At the risk of jinxing myself, I have to say that my running has been really coming together the last couple of weeks. Ever since I DNF'ed Rocky Raccoon back in February, my running and races have not been where they were last year. I had a couple of nagging injuries that didn't keep me from running, but that did keep me from performing to my (albeit mediocre) potential. The injuries also kept me from putting in the miles I was putting in last year.

Well for some reason or other, all that changed about three weeks ago. The last two weeks I racked up my highest two training weeks (without a "training" ultra) ever, 71 and 84.5 miles. I also picked up my speed. Yesterday I ran a tempo run that seemed way too easy, my heartrate was the same as my easy run heartrate was just a month ago. Today I ran a trail run 6 minutes faster than I did last week, even with the temperature the same and the dew point higher.

I was just about ready to attribute my slowing down earlier in the year to getting older (which I still am), but this is giving me hope that there may still be a PR or two in my future.

The Hinson Lake 24 Hour Run is in just nine short days and yes, I'm going to be shooting for a PR!

I'm In!

2011-09-07T19:05:00.001-04:00

Remember last year when the Boston Qualifier whiners were complaining because it sold out in eight hours or so? Well I squeaked into Umstead this afternoon. It sold out in THREE MINUTES!

Darkside Labor Day 26.2 Mile Fun Run

2011-09-05T17:34:00.004-04:00

The cult I belong to (Darkside Running Club) puts on three free marathons for members every year. They are held on New Year's Day, Memorial Day, and Labor Day. The club supplies the water and Gatorade and the runners bring a box of cookies or bag of chips for the community aid station. Just as at previous events, I saw a lot of folks I knew and met a few folks I hadn't met yet.

The race started at 7 AM ish and fortunately the temperatures had cooled down quite a bit from earlier in the week. There was a bit of rain though, mostly in the form of drizzle, but the rain did get a little heavier for my last of five loops. There was a race for last place as a lot of runners were either doing this as #2 of a double marathon weekend or as part 2 of back to back long runs. One group of gals was doing a 30 second run, 30 second walk Galloway variation. That's a little too short for both the run and the walk for me. By the time you get to running speed its time to walk and vice versa. I used the Galloway method myself, but with 3.5 minutes running and 1.5 minutes walking. I managed to finish in a time with a 5 in front, 5:56. I took it slow and easy on purpose with the Hinson Lake 24 Hour Run coming up in three short weeks and was happy with how my legs treated me.

Final note to self: Never ever EVER run a marathon or greater without prepping with Desitin, especially if its raining.

That is all.

What I Did On My Summer Vacation

2011-08-27T17:46:00.011-04:00

This week I had some vacation time and no race on the schedule so I went to one of my favorite places, Lake Tahoe. When I lived in Salt Lake City I went out there several times during the year, but I haven't been out there since I moved to Georgia about five years ago. Also, the last time I was there, I wasn't a trail or ultra runner and since I'm thinking about maybe throwing my hat in the Western States lottery ring, I thought I should try some higher altitude running and see how my lungs handle the lack of oxygen.

I got to Lake Tahoe late on the first day and it was getting dark, so my first run was on the hotel treadmill. Not too bad, I took it easy and ran three miles about 30-60 seconds slower than my normal pace.

The next day I headed out to the Spooner Summit trailhead of the Tahoe Rim Trail. It was only a 12 mile drive from the hotel. When I got there a cross-country team was just finishing up their training run and they all had smiles on their faces. I decided to take the trail north and immediately the trail started climbing.

The trail is very runnable and could be run in road shoes. There were a couple of places where I could see glimpses of Lake Tahoe. The altitude didn't bother me too much, but I was slower than I am at sea level. I was only out there for about two hours because all I had with me was a 20-oz handheld. Next time I do this, I'm packing my hydration vest because I would have loved to have been out there a lot longer.

After I finished I joked with my online running buddy that I hadn't been eaten by any bears or mountain lions. Little did I know how that would affect me the next day.

The next morning while getting ready for my run I read this race report. Then on the way to the trailhead, I saw this sign that I hadn't noticed the day before.

This day I ran the Tahoe Rim Trail from the same trailhead, but this time I headed south.

The initial climb was much steeper for the first mile, but then it undulated with rolling ups and downs. The views on this portion of trail were much more spectacular. Unfortunately I opted to bring a 12-oz plastic water bottle instead of my camera so I didn't get any photos, but I was able to stay out there longer. About two miles into the run I saw some tracks. My wildlife track identification skills aren't very good, so it was either a very large dog or a mountain lion. Needless to say, I kept my eyes on the surrounding terrain for any signs of carnivorous wildlife. Even with that, I still had a huge grin on my face the entire time. I swear that alpine pines give off some kind of mood-altering chemicals. Most of the time I like running, but during these two runs I LOVED running.

Hot 2 Trot Race Report

2011-08-08T11:56:00.002-04:00

You know you are in for a hot day when you are sweating and the race hasn't even started yet.

The Hot 2 Trot is held at one of my favorite places to run, Sweetwater Creek State Park. The course consisted of 1.18 mile loops which included single track, jeep trail, a little bit of paved road, a lot of flat, some downhill, and a walking hill that the front runners ran. There were a few roots, but it was very runnable and trail shoes weren't a requirement. There was one aid station at the start/finish area that had everything you might need, including lots of ice.

The heat wasn't too bad at the beginning, there was some cloud cover and even a misting of light rain, but that just meant that the humidity was at 100%. It is definitely humid when your glasses fog up and the temperature is 80 degrees. I was making good time the first 3-4 hours and was realistically expecting to cover at least a 50K. There was one unexpected surprise at about the one hour mark. Jason was ahead of me on the hill when suddenly he stopped and yelled in pain. There was a yellow jacket nest near the trail and apparently they weren't happy with all the runners running through their neighborhood. I made it through this lap unscathed, but the next time up the hill I got zapped. I'd never been stung by a yellow jacket before. OMG they hurt! By the next lap RD Sarah and her sidekick were out there with some kind of bug bomb. Sarah made me RUN up the walking hill, though, so they could get some space between runners while they sprayed. I was afraid that the killer yellow jackets would just get pissed off, but I was unmolested for the next seven hours.

I stopped once to use the restroom (they had a port-pottie, but if you walked 5 yards off the course there was a restroom with flush toilets!) and once to change socks and shoes. At about the four hour mark the heat started getting to me and I slowed way down. At this point I knew I wouldn't be getting a 50K, but I kept on moving and wound up with 24 laps which is just over 28 miles.

After the race we had burgers and veggie-burgers and the awards were handed out. It was fun catching up with and congratulating everyone on their great efforts. There were some speedy folks out there. I really enjoy myself at GUTS events because I knew just about everyone who lapped me as well as all the volunteers.

Thanks Sarah and your crew, I had a fantastic time!

Getting My Act Together - Week 1

2011-08-01T06:14:00.002-04:00

Just a quick note on my progress. Getting my act together has three parts:

1. Lose 10 pounds. This first week I lost 2.4 pounds, 7.6 to go.

2. Run 50 miles a week. I ran 54.6 miles.

3. Speed work once a week. I ran 12 x 1/4 mile intervals on the treadmill.

So far, so good :)

I may have a bit of a set back this week when I go to Vegas. We'll see.

2011 - The Year of DNF?

2011-07-26T18:54:00.005-04:00

If you look on the right side of my blog you can see the races I've done. So far this year I've attempted 9 races of marathon or longer distance. THREE of those resulted in the dreaded DNF. I had never had a DNF until Rocky Raccoon this year and that seemed to start a mini-avalanche. How am I going to stop this from accelerating?

I will be the first to admit that my training hasn't been as intense this year as it was last year. Last year at this time I was running 50-70 miles a week. Right now a good week has me topping out at just under 50 miles. Last year I weighed about 5 pounds less than I do right now. Finally, I've tried some races that were more of a challenge.

The good news is, two of my next four races are impossible to DNF. They are time events, so as long as I complete one lap of the course, I'll be credited with a finish. Of course, I'd like to get at least an ultra distance while I'm out there. The other two races will both be challenges. The first is the Cumberland Trail 50k. It is a tough course that starts out with a 2000' climb, but it has fairly generous cutoffs. The other challenge will be the Javelina Jundred in November. I have finished this one, but no 100 mile race is a given.

Now, my plan. It's simple. Lose the weight I've gained plus a couple of extra pounds. Run more miles and get my average over 50 miles per week again. Try to do one "speed" workout every week which can be in the form of intervals, a tempo run, or hills.

The plan is simple, now I just have to get my act together.

Afton Trail Run Report

2011-07-04T09:45:00.010-04:00

First of all, I want to thank the Race Director, John Storkamp, for the excellent planning and execution of this event. For the last 18 years this event has been held in Afton State Park. However, because of the political shenanigans happening in Minnesota, he didn't know if the park would be shut down until the day before the race. So John had to plan not one, but two 50K events simultaneously. Unfortunately, the state parks were shut down, and the race was moved to an alternate location, the Afton Alps ski area located right next to the state park. And no, the Afton Alps ski area is not a cross country ski venue. It is a bona fide downhill ski area with chair lifts and everything. Unfortunately for us runners, the lifts weren't operating and we had to walk or crawl up those hills.

The course John came up with was four loops for the 50K runners. There was very little flat running, most of it was up or down hill, a lot on mountain bike trails, some traversing across the ski slopes, and some climbing up and down the ski slopes. Without factoring in the weather, this was one of the most challenging courses I've run. With the warm temperatures and high humidity, the conditions were brutal. For comparison; last year's winning time was 3:48, this year, the winner took 4:30 to complete the course. The woman's winner last year was the same as this year's winner and her times were 4:24 and 5:13.

John gave us plenty of warning before the start and sent us on our way at 6:30 AM. I started in my usual spot of dead last. The first half of the first loop wasn't too bad, and at about the 2 mile point there was a water and ice aid station. Boy that ice felt good on the second and third loops. A little past the 4 mile point was a full service aid station with plenty of food selections, salt tabs, ice, water, HEED, Coke, and cheerful, encouraging (and lying) volunteers. As the day progressed, I found myself spending longer periods at this aid station. There were less than three miles from there to the start/finish aid station, but this section was the most brutal. About a mile from the end was a long steep climb, and after the downhill you could see the aid station. But no! The sadistic race director made us turn right and climb the steepest climb of the entire course. During my second loop I actually saw two guys on their third time up that hill physically sit down on the trail and take a breather.

I rank the difficulty of a course by how many times I call the race director a bastard. Many courses don't even merit a one bastard rating. This course merits a full five bastard ranking. John, that is meant as a compliment!

The cutoff time on the normal course is nine hours. I was well behind that pace, but I had heard at the aid stations that because of the difficulty of this alternate course the cutoff would be extended. When I was about two miles from the end of my third loop, I heard from one of the course officials that John would be sending the sweeps out at 2 PM, 7.5 hours after the start. I looked at my Garmin and saw that I probably wouldn't make it. I passed the start/finish area about 5 minutes after cutoff. Out loud I said, "darn, I can't continue", but inside I was shouting "thank God I don't have to do another loop!"

Overall I had a great time on a challenging course on a difficult day. Mr Garmin measured over 5000' of elevation gain during my 22+ miles. I'll be back again to try the "easy" course.

Finally, a couple of pictures.

The start/finish aid station area with a view towards the top of one of the ski slopes

Some, but not enough of the trail was easy peasy single-track.

Runners walking up the start of the last climb, you can't see the really steep part because it's to the right of those trees.

The view from the top of the last climb. What's that, you can't see the trail? That's because there is a steep drop off that I couldn't get a picture of because there was no way I was going to back track to get it in the picture.

Changes

2011-06-23T15:16:00.005-04:00

As I was driving to Sweetwater Creek State Park this morning, it occurred to me that a lot has changed in my running. Not that long ago, I went out of my way to avoid running hills and this morning I was driving specifically to go up and down hills.

My goal this morning was to do an Afton Trail Run simulation so I climbed and ran down Jack's Hill a total of seven times.

Here is the profile of one half of the Afton Trail Run:

Here is the profile of the run I did:

I had a great time. It wasn't too hot, but it was very humid and rained for about half the time I was out there. It rained just enough to keep the trail soft, but not enough to make it sloppy.

I was happy with my effort, just nine more days until the Afton Trail Run 50K!

FANS 24 Hour Race Report

2011-06-07T10:54:00.014-04:00

What a great weekend. As the race director wrote in an email, they don't know if they are planning a running event or a family reunion. This was my second year doing this, and I feel like I'm part of the family and will be back for many more. The ages of the participants ranged from pre-teen kids to 70+ year old veterans. There were world class runners and some who had never run farther than a 5K or 10K. There were even families out there participating together including a woman walking with her daughter and granddaughter. There were many stories out there and 24 hours in which to share them. Here is my story. One word of caution, though, the blister picture is at the very end, so don't scroll all the way down if you are squeamish, I will provide another warning.

The race is run around Lake Nokomis just outside the MSP airport in Minnesota. The course is just over 2.4 miles long and starts with an out-and-back section so that the 50 mile and 100K splits are at the timing tent. After the timing tent, medical tent, aid station tent, and big tent for tentless runners is "Tent City". Many runners have crew that set up tents. My sister-in-law was my crew and had this tent set up for me.

My great-nephew was also there to help out for much of the afternoon.

Here are some pictures of the course. It is a public park area and the weather was great, so lots of people were out enjoying the day, swimming, catching rays on the beach, and cooking out.

There was one section that crossed a bridge next to a busy road. This got very hot during the day and everyone except the front-runners called this the walking bridge.

Two airplanes taking off from the MSP airport.

On the backside of the lake was this weird looking monstery sculpture thing. I just hoped it wouldn't start moving and talking to me at 2 AM.

Finally there was Mt Nokomis. Not so daunting in the beginning, but it grew as the day progressed.

I started out great and my knee lasted for about 15 miles. With aid station stops, I was averaging about 12-13 minute miles. Then the knee decided it had had enough and I was reduced to walking. Walking was great even with the temperature rising to about 85 degrees and I was averaging 16-17 minute miles. However, I think my foot moves differently in my shoe while walking vs running and I started developing blisters on the balls of my feet at about the 40 mile point. I wasn't about to quit however because they ring a cowbell for you when you hit 50 miles and I wanted to hear that cowbell. So, I kept moving, but at a much slower pace. We're talking 20-25 minute miles. I finally heard the cowbell around midnight and there were still 8 hours to go. I couldn't quit now. Besides, they also ring the cowbell at 100K, that was "only" five more times around the lake. So, I kept going, feeling the blisters getting larger and finally popping, and then growing some more, eventually starting to move up the side of my foot. Around 4 AM I hit 62 miles and called it a day. I napped in the tent for a couple of hours until my nephew and his girlfriend arrived to pack things up. We then went up to the Community Center for an awesome breakfast of eggs, sausage, hash browns, pineapple, strawberries, etc. There were lots of awards handed out and the overall winners of both the 12 hour and the 24 hour runs were women! Connie Gardner from Ohio won the 24 hour with 127.95 miles and Carolyn Smith won the 12 hour with 83.19 miles!

FINAL WARNING, here is the promised blister picture. Thankfully it is a little bit blurry, but do not scroll down if you are squeamish.

Yes, it is covering about 1/3 of my foot, but it feels fine now, just a little tender. I'm planning on a short 3 mile recovery run later today.

Preliminary FANS 24 Hour Report

2011-06-05T12:41:00.002-04:00

I finished with 62 miles. Had to stop at 20 hours for blisters. Full report to follow with blister pics. (As a teaser, it took me 6 hours to work up the courage to take off my shoes and socks.)

Las Vegas Rock N Roll Marathon Rant

2011-06-01T09:02:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I got an invitation to pay $140 to run the Las Vegas Rock N Roll Marathon in December. If you look at the times though, you see that they shortened the cutoff time from the 5:30 they had last year. This year the cutoff time is 4 hours and 30 minutes. My fastest marathon time is 4:58. In just eight short years, 4:30 will be my Boston Marathon Qualifying time. If they had used this cutoff time last year, 47% of last year's finishers would not have finished. Never mind that half of the course is run through the industrial park section of town with lots of boring out and back sections. Oh, and I almost forgot, this quote is from the website: "The marathon and half marathon courses are as flat and festive as they come – perfect for runners and walkers of all ability levels."

I think I'll decline this invitation.

Darkside Memorial Day 26.2 Mile Fun Run

2011-05-30T16:25:00.004-04:00

The running cult I belong to puts on three free marathons every year. I used this one as a training run for my 24 hour run coming up on Saturday. It was 70 degrees with a dew point of 70 at the start, so I knew it was going to be a hot one. There were about a dozen Darksiders that showed up and stunt-double Race Director Victor sent us on our way at 7 AM. The race consists of five 5+ mile loops on the Peachtree City golf cart paths. My first two loops were fine, but I was taking it nice and slow. On the third loop my right knee decided to start squawking and that combined with the rising temperature made me walk quite a bit of the third loop.

My knee was yelling at me by the time I finished the third loop, so I decided to call it quits. I dropped my bottles off in my car and got out my lawn chair to watch the other runners come through the aid station. By the time I finished my Diet Dr Pepper (about 15-20 minutes) I decided that I would go back out and walk a loop. After all, I would be walking quite a bit at the FANS 24 hour run. I was able to maintain about 16 minute miles while walking and about halfway through the fourth loop my knee felt just fine. Oh great, now I'll have to do the fifth loop and complete the marathon. When I got back to the aid station, I put all my stuff in my car so that Victor would be able to pack things up and I headed back out. I walked the entire fifth loop also and ended up walking it about two minutes faster than the previous loop. I checked the weather when I finished and the temperature was 86 degrees, the dew point was 72, and the heat index was 92. Victor had everything packed away when I finished so I headed to my car, drove home and emailed him my finish time.

I love Darkside marathons, they are so low key, they are negative key and its always nice to see the other cult members.

Everyone heading out on the first loop

Stunt-double Race Director Victor busily manning the aid station

Running With John

2011-05-15T17:05:00.006-04:00

I've known John for years and years. We met in a financial chatroom and 2-3 years ago we both started getting serious about running. While most of the room occupants talked stocks, we'd exchange instant messages about our growing obsessions with running. Well this weekend, work was taking me to Omaha and finally had a chance to run with my longtime virtual running buddy. He picked me up at the hotel and drove me to one of his favorite running spots, Lake Zorinsky. Once there I took a quick picture of us (why oh why do I always looks so dorky in self portraits?)

and we were on our way. John agreed to run at my slow ultra pace and we planned to be out there for about three hours. He is not at all intrigued by marathons or ultras, preferring to run 10Ks and half marathons, so this was going to be his longest, slowest run ever.

Here are some pictures along the running route around the lake. The lake was drained several months ago for a zebra mussel infestation.

After almost 8 miles we returned to the parking lot to refill water bottles and met with an unpleasant surprise.

I had a change of clothes inside a hotel laundry bag. Unfortunately inside the pockets of my jeans were my IPhone and a wallet with my driver's license, credit card, debit card, etc. They also took John's phone and his gym bag.

So, our run was cut short and I spent the next hour or so on his computer and home phone getting everything canceled. I'm guessing these crooks were just stupid kids and not professionals since they didn't even attempt to use the credit card but did try to use the debit card at an ATM without the PIN. Several hours later I remembered I might have had my Health Savings Account card in there, so I checked online and sure enough they had used that. Once again they showed their lack of imagination and it looks like instead of electronics, they bought beer, beef jerky, and cigarettes.

Overall a positive run with my virtual running buddy, plus I got to meet his wife again, along with their dogs Fergie and Lucy and new grandbaby Emerson. (I just realized I listed his dogs ahead of his grandbaby, does that make me a bad person?)

Miwok 100K - Biting Off More Than I Can Chew

2011-05-08T14:51:00.005-04:00

Miwok is far and above my new favorite race. Although I missed cutoff at the turn-around by a whole bunch of minutes, I had the best time I’ve ever had at a race. And hey, what other race has a micro brewery whip up a batch of special IPA for it’s runners?

I knew I was going to have a difficult time making the first cutoff. You have to maintain a 14:36 pace to the 33.9 mile point, but then a 17:15 pace from there to the finish. I managed the first major climb and descent at the required pace, but I continued to lose pace as the number of climbs climbed. But, I’m getting ahead of myself, here is what transpired and why I love this race so much.

A race this fantastic is obviously very popular, so popular in fact, that there is a lottery for entries. (I almost hesitated writing this report in glowing terms because one or two of my dozen or so readers might think to enter next year, lowering my chances of gaining entry again.) Fortune smiled on me and my name was selected and I was on my way.

I flew into SFO on Friday, and then drove up to the host hotel to pick up my bib. They don’t hand out the goodie bags ahead of time, so if you know your way around, there is no need to do this, you can just pick up your bib the morning of the race. The main reason I drove up was to reconnoiter the drive to the start. It’s a good thing I did, because even with having been there, I still made one wrong turn on race morning.

On race morning, I checked in, used the toilet facilities (flush toilets no less), said “hi” to Krissy Moehl who was right behind me in line and who had won the Red Mountain 50K I ran two weeks ago, and also met up with Susan and Rob, running friends from Tennessee. It was chilly at the start, but not cold, so I started out in shorts and short sleeved shirt. About 5:25 AM we walked down to the beach for some last minute instructions from the race director and then promptly at 5:40 AM we were off. The start is just 30 minutes prior to sunrise so there was no need for headlamps. The leaders and mid-packers sprinted off to get a prime place in line up the first single track climb while the rest of us trudged through the several hundred yards of sand. Even with walking, we still had to wait about 5 minutes to start up the first hill. Not long after that we were all sorted out and on our way. After the first relatively short single track section, we started the first major climb. One thing about climbs in California as compared to climbs in Georgia; in Georgia, there are lots of trees and you can’s see how far you are going to have to climb, in California, you can look all the way to the top and see the long line of tiny specks making their way up. During this stretch, we were on one of the few sections of road and the view was spectacular. We could see the Bay, the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, and a cruise ship making its way into the Bay. Soon, I was finished with my first climb and descent and looking at my Garmin, I was at a 14:30 pace, even with the 5 minute wait at the trail start. Next was some single track, and then I was spilled back onto the beach for about a ¼ mile run (walk) in the sand and back to the start area and the first aid station (water and GuBrew only) at the 7.1 mile point.

I really can’t remember a whole lot about this next 4.0 mile section, but I’m sure it was scenic and had some climbing.

The third section was both my favorite and most hated section. It was the longest at 8.9 miles (my Garmin actually said 9.5 miles) and had two killer climbs. On the first of these climbs, I found myself sharing the trail with 70 year-young Hwa Ja Andrade. She has been doing ultras for years and looks and runs like a much younger runner (her calves look like they are carved out of granite). I want to be like her if I grow up. I was able to keep up with her on the climbs, but she would leave me in the dust on the descents. (I really do need to work on my downhill running) Somewhere around the 15 mile point was my favorite part of the course. It was a couple of miles of gentle downhill single track, going through meadows filled with wildflowers, funky looking woods (to me they looking like “Wizard of Oz” woods and I found myself chanting lions and tigers and bears, oh my!) and finally a section of redwood forest complete with giant trees and ferns. Of course, all good things must come to an end and soon I was on another monster climb to the Pan Toll aid station at mile 20.

By this time I realized that I was not going to make the cutoff at the 33.9 mile point. So even without intending to, I found that my pace slowed during the next 6.7 mile section. I was still moving well, but not as fast. There was a lot of running along the sides of grassy hills and about this time the leaders were on the way back and I was further slowed by stepping up off the trail to let them pass. Not too far back from the leaders was Ian Sharman running in an Elvis costume (he was the dude that ran an incredible 12:44 at Rocky Raccoon in February). We were high up and I could look down and see hawks circling looking for prey. One thing a little annoying about this section was the number of flies in this grassy area, they didn’t bite, but they did their best to try to fly in my eyes.

I got to the next aid station and announced my intention to continue the 7.2 miles to the turn-around aid station even though there was no way I was going to make cutoff. After grabbing a handful of food, I was on my way on my last miles on the incredibly beautiful course. I ran though some more redwood forest and this section was net downhill. The outside of my right knee started hurting a bit running downhill (I think I tweaked it a bit from the angle I was stepping off the trail for the front runners on the previous section). It was fun seeing all the runners who had made the cutoff on their return. About one mile from the aid station, I met the sweep coming my way. He told me the aid station was closed and packing up and that I had better hustle if I wanted a ride. I did pick up my pace as much as my knee allowed and soon saw the U-Haul truck. I yelled down “don’t leave without me!” and they waved back. Even though they were just about all packed up, they got me a Pepsi and water and we waited a couple of more minutes for a hurting runner I had passed about two miles earlier.

There were three of us late droppers and we all managed to squeeze into the cab of the U-Haul with the driver, “the Rocket”, who has been running ultras for 30 years. It was a tight fit, but Mr Rocket kept us entertained with ultra talk for the 20 minute ride to the Pan Toll aid station. As he drove the winding, switch-back road, we were all amazed that we had climbed that height via a different route. At the aid station, Mr Rocket found me a ride to the start/finish area with some friends of his. As I was waiting with them waiting for their runner, I started to get chilled. Using ultra runner ingenuity, I asked a volunteer for a garbage bag and made myself a makeshift poncho. While waiting, I got to see Susan and Rob again and wished them luck.

When I eventually got back to my car, I got my jacket, then caught the shuttle to the Finish area. There I saw my hill climbing friend, Hwa Ja Andrade. She had missed cutoff by less than 10 minutes, so we had a quick commiserating hug and then headed to get our goodie bags and some food. This race knows how to do swag. There was hardly any filler (as opposed to Rock-N-Roll marathon bags which are ALL filler) Included were a shirt, a fleece vest, a 6-pack of GU, a chocolate bar, a beanie, a ceramic dish, and a bottle of Miwok 100K Trail Ale.

The finish line food was also very good, I had a jalepeno Brat, macaroni salad and home-made cole slaw. While I was in the food line, Krissy Moehl came over and asked how my race went. In what other sport will the third place finisher make time to talk with a back of the packer?

Next year, if I’m selected in the lottery, I’m going to make this my “A” race. Then I’m going to work on both my uphill walking and my downhill running. That means I’ll be going out to Sweetwater Creek State Park at least once a week and go up and down Jack’s hill for 4-6 hours.

Until next year!

New Camera Trail Trial

2011-05-05T07:59:00.008-04:00

I like reading other blogs that have pictures, so for my birthday I bought myself a rugged light-weight camera to take with me to races. Earlier in the week I took it on a trial run on the trails of Sweetwater Creek State Park. Here is what I took pictures of:

Most of the trail is easy peasy trail like this

But, there are some rocky, rooty sections

And one monster rock to climb over

And one long uphill

View of abandoned factory ruins

I ran here for several months before I noticed this sign

I ran one loop with my camera and one loop without and discovered that taking pictures adds about 30 seconds/mile to my pace. Since I will be running close to cutoffs at Miwok, I won't be taking any pictures during the race, but I'll try to take some before and after.

Total Image 10K Report

2011-04-30T13:23:00.003-04:00

Earlier this week when I saw that I was going to be in Manchester, NH for work, I looked to Mr Google for places to run. What do you know? There was going to be a 5K/10K race with the start/finish line no more than three blocks from my hotel. Since that was about as far as I was planning to run, I quickly signed up.

I walked to the start to pick up my bib, then ducked into Jillian's Billiards (the host pub) to stay warm and use the facilities. There were about 300 runners, 200 doing the 5K and 100 doing the 10K. We all started together with the 5K runners splitting off at about the 1 mile point. I stayed at the back of the pack, using the first three miles as a warm-up. The course was wonderful, just about a mile on roads, the rest of the race was on paved bicycle/running paths with some of it next to a river. Near the half-way point was a short steep hill that I walked up, the rest of the route was mostly flat and fast.

After about three miles (and coming down the backside of that hill) I picked up my speed and started picking off runners one by one. I ended up passing eleven runners and ran a significant negative split. The time for my first three miles was 34:17 and I ran the last 3.2 miles in 32:08.

After the race, Jillian's had a pretty good spread. Besides the standard water and bananas, there were veggies and dip, crackers and cheese, shrimp, and meatballs. So I stuck around for the awards and ate lunch. I knew there might be a chance of getting an age group award in a race this small. Lo and behold I won first prize in my age group! Ok, I was the only one in my age group, but hey, it still counts.

Final time 1:06:25

Red Mountain 50K Race Report

2011-04-25T18:55:00.004-04:00

I signed up for this race because I was looking for a 50K to run as a training run before the Miwok 100K in two weeks. It's much easier to do a 6-8 hour training run when there are aid stations, volunteers, and other runners sharing the road with you. This weekend was also close to my birthday so when I found the Red Mountain 50K near St George which is less than a two hour drive from Vegas, I knew my birthday weekend plans were set.

Packet pickup was Friday night and the guest speaker was world class ultra-runner Krissy Moehl. She and Devon Crosby-Helms had just set the women's record for the Rim-2-Rim-2-Rim crossing of the Grand Canyon earlier that week!

Race start was at 6:05 AM, but before that we had to meet at the finish at 5 AM to board buses for the long drive to the start line. It was a little chilly at the finish, but the start line was 2000' higher elevation and it was almost cold. I'd guestimate the temperature was about 35. I immediately got into the porta-potti line. I looked behind me, and the gal behind me sure looked like Krissy, but I thought to myself, nah, she just set a record a couple of days ago, there's no way she'd be running in this little 50K. Now, days later, I realize that it was Krissy and I'm kicking myself for not say hi and congratulations and all the other stuff you mumble to rock stars.

We lined up at the start line and the race director attempted to play the Start Spangled Banner but encountered some technical difficulties, so instead, we all recited the Pledge of Allegiance. I don't think I've done that since grade school and it was kind of cool. Right after that we were on our way. The sun wasn't up yet, so I used my light-weight headlamp for the first 30 minutes. I was also wearing a throw away sweat shirt I had bought at K-Mart the night before. My fingers were getting numb in the cold, so I just curled them up inside the sleeves.

This race is advertised as 12 miles of trail and 19 miles of road. The trail part is more gravel road than trail, but the scenery was spectacular. The course starts at about 5000' elevation and ends at about 3000'. Even though it is net downhill, there were still a couple of 200-300' climbs that got your heart pumping, especially when you come from near sea level.

Everything was going fairly smoothly until the 9 mile point. Apparently some vandals thought it would be fun to mess with the course markings. Not only did they remove the correct course markings, they placed new markings directing runners in the wrong direction. I ran about a quarter mile in the wrong direction when I came to a group of 12-15 runners near a knee deep stream crossing. Some of them had run over 2 miles and came to a T intersection with no markings telling them which way to go, so they had retraced their steps. A race official came by and helped us sort things out and we were soon all headed in the right direction. Sometimes it does pay to be slow, I only added an extra half mile to my race while the front runners added up to four.

Soon after, we were on the road section. Runners were given the opportunity to have their road shoes delivered to this aid station. I just ran the whole thing in my road shoes, since there wasn't really any "trail" trail that necessitated the use of trail shoes. I think I passed at least 5 people at this point who took time to change their shoes.

The road part was much like any road marathon, except that the aid stations were much better with lots of food and beverage choices and encouragement from the volunteers. Somewhere along here I found myself yo-yo-ing with another gal. We'd exchange a word, then go on our way, then see each other again. Eventually our paces matched up and we got to chat for a mile or two. Janice has been running ultras for over 20 years and she has run all the big mountainy 100 milers like Leadville, Western States, and Wasatch. It was fun sharing the road with her for a few miles. Eventually she did drop me as I took a little longer at an aid station.

Some time in here I passed a young dude who was having some difficulty. I offered a word of encouragement and then continued on my way. As I was googling for race results, I came across this blog. I have mixed feelings. I feel good about being called fit by a young man that I am old enough to be a momma to. But did he have to call me an old lady? No hard feelings Cory, but if I see you at another race and you are hurting, don't hold it against me if I pass you again, OK?

The day started heating up, so I was glad to see the finish line. In a pre-race email we were promised root beer floats, so for the last couple of miles that was all I could think about. Finally I saw the park, and just before the final turn I saw Jerry. Jerry is an online friend that I've met a couple of times in person and it was nice of him to show up for the finish.

All-in-all this is a fun race. If you are a road marathoner looking for a first ultra to make the transition, I'd highly recommend this race. The pluses are many: easy course, awesome scenery, great volunteers, well stocked aid stations, laid back atmosphere. The negatives: too much road for someone used to trails. (I can't believe this used-to-be-almost-exclusive-treadmill-runner just said that!)

Oh, the official results are on the website now, I finished in 6:51:26, 55th out of 65 finishers.

I'm Baaaack! A Way Too Cool Race Report

2011-03-18T08:10:00.001-04:00

Ok, I can admit it now. I was worried about being able to finish this race. Just five weeks prior I experienced my first DNF. I injured myself and wasn't able to run for 11 days after that. I was only able to log one 20 mile trail run about 10 days prior to the race. The cutoff time was 8:30 and my previous best for a trail 50K was 8:40 (that race did have a mile or so of bonus mileage).

I'll save you all the suspense and let you know I finished in 7:49:32. Here's a picture of me right before devouring my finishers award of the much sought after frog cupcake.

The weather Saturday was perfect. Temperature was in the 40's at the start, about 60 at the finish, with partly cloudy skies. The pre-race atmosphere was almost like a party and at 8 AM we were on our way. The first 1.5 miles are on road so there was plenty of room for everyone to space themselves out before hitting the trails. Just before we turned off the road, a dude in a gorilla suit was "terrorizing" the runners. Supposedly there was a guy in a banana suit somewhere on the course, but I never did see him.

Less than a mile into the trail running was the first stream crossing. Most of the runners slowed down to cross on the rocks to keep their feet dry, but some just splashed across the calf high stream. I attempted to do what most were doing and tried to cross on the rocks, but one wobbled as I stepped on it. Rather than trying to catch myself, I just accepted the inevitable and gracelessly sat down. So, less than two miles into the race I was soaked from my waist down. It was then I decided that I would just splash through any remaining stream crossings.

The single track trail was beautiful and mostly dry, but there were numerous muddy sections. These were only from 10 to 50 yards long, but they ranged from shoe-sucking-off mud to slick-as-snot mud. There were also lots of stream crossings, so after muddying up your shoes you could clean them off splashing through the stream.

This course is a figure-eight course, the first loop was an eight mile loop with no aid stations until you got back to the start/finish. The second loop was 23 miles, but with several aid stations. The longest distance between aid on this section was six miles, but to me, that section seemed the longest. It was from mile 15 to 21 and seemed to take forever. The next section included the climb up Goat Hill. I had heard horror stories about Goat Hill and thought I was prepared. If you look at the course profile view in my last post you can see a "little hill" right at the 26 mile point. Doesn't look like much, but notice that the line is nearly vertical? Well, even though it wasn't very long, it was about the steepest climb I've ever done without having handrails. I am proud of myself in that I managed to pass four people on the climb. (Of course my downhill running still sucks and they all managed to pass me on the following miles.) There was a most welcome aid station at the top of the hill and then there were only five miles to go.

I have to give a shout out to DryMax socks. There were several dozen stream crossings on this course with at least half a dozen being ankle to knee deep. I didn't get a single blister wearing these magical, moisture-sucking socks. (Maybe DryMax will send me some free socks now?)

At the finish line there was a crowd of people hanging around after their race, eating pizza, soup, and cupcakes and cheering on those finishing after them. The post-race food was wonderful, all supplied by local eating establishments. I didn't try the soup, but the pizza was fresh-out-of-the-oven good, even as late as I finished. And a frog cupcake as a finishers award is way better than any medal!

I'm On My Way Too Cool!

2011-03-02T19:38:00.004-05:00

I did my 20 miler today and am happy with the results so I've reserved the motel and rental car. My pace was actually a bit faster than it was on my 10 miler last week and about 30 seconds/mile faster than the pace I'll need to maintain at the WTC 50k. I'm not kidding myself, this will be a difficult race because although my leg is back to about 98.5%, my conditioning is at about 85-90%. The first half of the course is easier than the trail I ran today, but the second half is much more difficult.

So my plan will be to bank some time during the first half and then try to hang on to meet the cutoffs. Final cutoff is 8.5 hours which is a 16:27 pace. I ran a 16:00 pace today for 20 miles so a finish here will definitely be a challenge, but I really really really want that frog cupcake that finishers get!

Recovery House

2011-02-25T10:01:00.004-05:00

Just saw this on the interwebs. A perfect house for folks recovering from hard race efforts...

Recovery

2011-02-23T18:07:00.003-05:00

Sorry folks on the waitlist for Way Too Cool, the odds of me making it to the start just increased to about 75%.

After Rocky Raccoon, I took a week off. I didn't run, I didn't bike, I didn't elliptical. I walked very slowly. Then I started doing some easy biking and ellipticaling (I just made up that word). Finally, 12 days after Rocky, I ran a whopping 10 minutes. I gradually increased that and the last couple of days I was able to run for an hour on the hotel treadmill. Obviously I didn't have a stress fracture, more than likely it was a deep muscle and/or bone bruise.

Then today I went on a wonderful ten mile trail run at Sweetwater State Park. I felt kind of stiff the first two to three miles, but gradually the stiffness went away and I was able to run normally. In fact, the second five miles was faster than the first five miles by about four minutes. I have lost some fitness during my time off though as my heart rate got higher than I'd like the last three miles.

I was very happy with what I was able to do today. If I can manage a 20 miler next week with no pain and at the same pace, I'll be on my Way Too Cool!

Stress Fracture?

2011-02-11T10:35:00.002-05:00

About two weeks before Rocky Raccoon, my left leg was feeling some pain in the quadriceps area. I told myself it was a muscle problem, but the back of my mind was thinking about the possibility of a stress fracture. However, it was taper time and with the reduced mileage, the discomfort wasn't getting any worse. Then I ran 89 miles on it and fell on it twice. I know that impact will not cause a stress fracture, but maybe it exacerbates it? Anyways, I had an officially diagnosed femoral neck stress fracture about nine years ago that had me on crutches for eight weeks. That time I just kept on running until the pain got so bad that I couldn't run and could barely walk. This time I'm going to treat it like a stress fracture early, while I can still do alternative cardio. I'm hoping this is a misdiagnosis and that it is only a deep muscle/bone bruise and that I can resume running after a week or two. Right now it looks like Way Too Cool is a 50/50 shot.

Rocky Raccoon: A Tale of Two Races

2011-02-08T11:26:00.000-05:00

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

I was ready, my long runs the four weeks prior to Rocky were the Atlanta FatAss 50K, a marathon, 19.5 miles on a hotel treadmill, and then one week prior an easy 15.4 miles on the trails at Sweetwater State Park. My left quad felt a little wonky after the treadmill session (hotel treadmills aren't always in the best condition), but other than being a little twingy in the morning, it did what I asked it to after about a two mile warm-up.

The Best of Times

This part is going to sound like it was written by a star-struck name-dropper, because that's what I was. I've mentioned before that Anton, Zach, Scott, Hal, and Karl were all expected to run. Oh, and a guy I had never heard of named Ian was also assigned a single digit bib.

Initially it looked like the most difficult part of the race was making it to the start line. A winter storm was hitting Texas shutting down roads and airports. Waiting for my flight at the Atlanta airport, I saw several other area runners, so we spent some of the delay time talking about past and future races. We had also heard and read some e-mails that several roads in the Houston area were ice covered and closed, but on final approach I could see that the traffic on I-45 was moving normally. So I picked up my rental car and headed north to Huntsville expecting that it might take awhile if conditions worsened as I drove. Fortunately the drive was uneventful and I made it in time pick up my packet, drop off my drop-bag, and eat the standard pre-race dinner of spaghetti. I also got a chance to say a quick "hi" to fellow bloggers Misty and Brian.

Race morning arrived after about 4 hours of good sleep and 4 hours of tossing and turning. I lubed up and dressed in layers since the temperature was about 20 degrees at the start. I got there about an hour before the start to get a good parking spot, check in, and drop off my main drop bag for the start/finish area. Then I got back in the car to stay warm. At 5:45, I used the restroom, started my Garmin, and headed to the start.

At 6 AM we were on our way. I started out walking because there were a lot of runners and I knew it would take awhile to sort everyone out. Besides, it was dark and I didn't want to trip over any of the infamous roots in the first mile. Running the first section, I found myself in the vicinity of Wendy from Mexico City. She had run this race several times and had beaten the winter storm by arriving in Houston on Tuesday. However, her husband with all the race gear was supposed to arrive on Friday. He didn't make it, so she was running in borrowed shoes and with borrowed gear. The first aid station arrived quickly at three miles and I didn't even need to refill bottles, just grabbed a couple of M&Ms and I was on my way. The second section was also a three mile section and like the one before it, had several sections of wooden boardwalk. These sections were covered with frost and were extremely slippery. We saw one gal who had taken a nasty spill and was out of the race with a badly sprained ankle. From then on I was walking those sections. As I got closer the the Dam Road aid station, I had my first look at the front runners. I was approaching my 6 mile point and they were near their 12 mile point. Zach Gingerich was leading by several hundred yards and there was a pack of about 4-6 runners behind, including Anton Krupicka, Scott Jurek, and Hal Koerner. I yelled out "go, Zach, go" as he went past and he either said, "thanks ma'am", or "thanks Jan". I was wearing my fleece Pine Mountain hat so my hearing was a bit muffled, so I'm telling myself he somehow knew my name. The next section was the longest one between aid stations, 6 miles and mostly one way traffic. On all loops this section seemed to take forever, especially since the 50 mile runners get to take a short-cut here. Finally, I returned back to Dam Road, and was on my way to the start/finish area. The next aid stations are after 3.5 miles and the start/finish area is 4.5 miles after that. On this next stretch there is a boring section of jeep road that has a couple of "hills". The hills aren't all that steep and I found myself trying to keep up with a very tall dude named Emmett. He had to be at least 6'6" tall. He was from California and had run both the Way Too Cool 50K and the Miwok 100K, two races that are on my schedule this year. So I spent a bit a time getting information about those courses. The next aid station was my favorite. They always seemed to have exactly what I wanted when I wanted it. Pancakes, quesadillas, pizza, grilled cheese sandwiches, peanut butter sandwiches were all on the list at various times during the day and night. Finally, I was on the final section. On the way in to the start/finish area is a 3 mile stretch of two-way traffic. As I was nearing the finish of my first loop, I saw the leaders on the start of their 3rd loop. Zach was still in the lead and Anton was still wearing his shirt. My pace was just about perfect for watching the men's race unfold. In fact, during the course of the day, I saw Anton and Hal a total of five times and even when the day had warmed up enough for me to run in shorts and short-sleeved shirt, Anton's shirt never did come off. Ok, back to my race. The aid station at the start/stop area was incredible. As I crossed the timing mat, a volunteer noted my number and asked if I needed my drop bag. I entered the tent and someone else grabbed my bottles to refill them. I sat down and by the time I had untied my shoes, the volunteer was sitting in front of me with my drop bag opened and helping with anything I needed help with including changing my race number from my cold weather running clothes and putting it on my shorts. I was in and out of there in eight minutes including a shoe and sock change, refilled bottles, and grabbing something to eat. I felt like a total rock star. As a point of comparison, at Javelina it took me 12 to 15 minutes to accomplish the same things without a "personal valet".

The next two loops were very much the same. It had warmed up nicely and I was able to run the second loop in shorts and a short sleeved shirt. The next time through the start/finish area I once again had the services of a "personal valet", changed shoes and socks again, picked up my headlamp and added a couple of layers since the sun would be setting soon. As I was doing this I heard a huge cheer. I didn't get a chance to see who it was, but my valet said it was a guy named Ian and he was in and out and starting on his fifth and final loop. About halfway out on my third loop I saw a runner on the way in with short curly dark hair wearing bib #6. He looked like he was running easily, smiling and chatting with his pacer. They looked to be two runners out for an easy 10 miles in the woods. They weren't anywhere close to where I was expecting to see Anton and Hal, so I shouted out a "good job" and thinking that this guy was way off the lead. Turns out this was Ian Sharman who was so far ahead that it looked like he was behind! He ended up smashing the course record by 30 minutes, finishing in an incredible 12:44 which for awhile was thought to be a trail 100 world record. Turns out it isn't but still an amazing run by someone I had never heard of before but who will be well known now.

The Worst of Times

Anytime there is an aircraft accident the NTSB investigates and most of the time they find that it wasn't just one thing that caused the crash, it was a chain of events and errors that caused it. Any break in the chain and the accident may have been prevented. Such was the case in my crash.

This was the first time I was running 100 miles without a pacer during the night. Since this is known as an "easy" course and there were lots of people running, I thought I would be all right. I thought I was moving well and I was well ahead of cutoff, but I had slowed quite a bit. Just like in my two previous races, I was mostly walking but without someone to talk to and push me, I was doing about 1-2 minutes per mile slower. Then, on the lonely Dam Road section, as I was putting my Clifshot Blok wrapper in my pocket, I caught a root and went down for the first time this race. I had my spare headlamp batteries in my left front pants pocket and they connected with my quad. (Remember the whiney quad from the treadmill run two weeks ago?) I slowly got up and tested my leg. It was difficult to walk, so I took two Ibuprophen and continued on. If the aid station had been a half mile away or less, I probably would have dropped from the race at that point. However, the aid station was 3 miles away and by the time I got there my quad had loosened up and I was walking normally with no pain (ok, no more pain than can be expected after 70 miles on your feet). It was later during this loop that I found myself on the jeep trail next to the gal running in borrowed shoes again. We were both without pacers and without even verbally agreeing on it, we paced each other for about three miles. We didn't talk much, but when one of us started lagging, the other kept moving making whoever had slowed pick the pace back up. Thank you, Wendy, for helping me out in that section. I finished the fourth loop over 30 minutes ahead of cutoff, but I would have to do the final loop faster than I had just done this last loop. I knew it was possible, because the sun would be coming up in less than two hours and from previous experience I knew things would get better. About 3/4 of a mile past the start/stop aid station, I was looking at my Garmin and trying to do math in my head to see what kind of pace I needed to maintain. When I looked up I saw a "Wrong Way" sign. I was only a couple of yards off course so I turned around, saw course markings, and was on my way again. About 10 minutes later I saw the lights of an aid station. Wait a minute, I should have at least another mile to go. As I got closer, I saw the big red numbers of the clock at the start/stop aid station. #&#*&*!!!!! When I had gone off the trail a couple of yards and turned around, I had started heading the wrong way and added a mile. I had been 30 minutes ahead of cutoff, now I was only 10 minutes ahead of cutoff. I took off running. In fact I was running at about the pace I ran my second loop and this was still in the dark. I told myself I could still do this but I couldn't afford to waste any time at the aid stations and I had to pick up my pace. I was in and out of the 3 mile aid station and about this time it was getting light. I took off my heavyduty headlamp and put it in my left front pocket. I was moving well, doing more running than walking (evidence that I had taken it way too easy during the night). About a mile from the Dam Road aid station I started planning what I needed to do in order to minimize my time there. Just then,

BAM!!!

I went down and I went down hard. I was so tired at that point that I didn't even have time to raise my arms, and I broke the fall with my nose. I felt a sickening crunch and immediately thought "I'm done". I laid there flat for a minute or two, not moving. When I finally raised my head, blood was dripping from my nose. I used my gloves to apply pressure and stop the bleeding and then tried to get up. This is where the end of my race became absolute. I was able to roll myself over and sit up. Standing up was impossible. Remember my headlamp in my left front pocket? Remember me falling and hitting my quad with the spare batteries earlier that night? Well, the second point of contact after my nose was my quad and the headlamp with the ground. My quad flat-out quit at that point. I sat there in the middle of the trail for another several minutes until another runner and his pacer came by. They stopped and helped. By this time my nose had stopped bleeding and it hadn't swollen or anything, I think the sandy/loamy soil cushioned the impact a bit and the crunching I felt was just some cartilage moving around. It took both of them lifting me to get me on my feet because my quad had quit working. I could put very little weight on it. At this point I had another decision to make. I had already come to terms with the fact that my race was over, now I just had to get off the course. The next aid station was about a mile away, but it was a remote aid station and a "no drop" aid station. The aid station behind me was about two miles away, but by this time it was past that station's cutoff and they would probably already be packed up and gone. The third option was to take a "shortcut" to the next to last aid station about three miles away and drop there. Off I went on my own two legs with a quad that had quit working. It took almost two hours to get there and when I did and announced that I was dropping, they said "you've only got four miles to go!" They didn't know that I had skipped about 7 miles of the course. With my slow motion walk I had gotten quite chilled so I wrapped myself in blankets and waited for a ride to the finish line. When I got there I turned in my timing chip and bib, picked up my drop bag and drove back to the motel. When I stripped off my clothes to take a shower I saw a perfect imprint of my headlamp on my left thigh. You could see every detail, even the on/off switch.

This was taken several hours later and has already started to diffuse but you can see the battery pack, the cord and the headlamp itself.

Aftermath

I reached the psychological stopping point when I felt my nose crunch, but on the hike to the aid station I realized that I would have been able to continue with just that. The physical stopping point was when my quad quit working. Back at the motel I elevated it and made frequent, slow trips to the ice machine. Initially, I couldn't even bend the leg 90 degrees, which made draining blisters very difficult. Speaking of blisters, in previous races I would get monster blisters on the balls of my feet at the 70 mile point. This time the only blisters I had were under a couple of toenails, which are annoying but don't really slow me down like blisters on the bottom of my feet. I watched the "other" Super Bowl (the best Super Bowl had occurred on the trails Saturday) with my legs elevated and the left one iced. The next morning my leg was feeling better and I could bend it almost 120 degrees. This was good, because when I got back to Georgia I had to drive my car which has a manual transmission. Two days later I'd say my leg is at 50%. I can walk up stairs almost normally, but going down has to be done one step at a time. I'm going to take another two days off, then get back to running because the Way Too Cool 50K is in less than five weeks!

Ready for Rocky

2011-02-03T08:10:00.002-05:00

In less than 48 hours I will be starting my third 100 miler. On Saturday morning I will be toeing the line (more like lollygagging at the back) for the start of Rocky Raccoon. After I finished my first marathon two years ago and was wondering what was next, I came across this race report. Strangely, I was intrigued more than scared by the thought of continuing past the marathon distance. So, after several ultras, I am going to the scene of the crime, running the same ultra that Misty ran in that race report. The author will also be there, along with her husband and a lot of other ultra running celebrities. (Do names like Krupicka, Gingerich, Jurek, Koerner, Meltzer, Howard, Gardner, Perry ring any bells?) It should be a Super Bowl of 100 milers out there and with a loop course with several sections of two-way traffic, I'll have tickets on the 50-yard line.

PF Chang's Rock N Roll Arizona Marathon

2011-01-28T18:33:00.008-05:00

Two years ago I ran this as my very first marathon. This year I came back to run it for a third time. My parents live in Minnesota, but spend their winters in Arizona, and the marathon is usually within a couple of days of my Mom's birthday. So it is an excellent opportunity to see family, celebrate my Mom's birthday, and run a marathon, all in the same weekend.

I met my brother and sister-in-law, John and Mary, at the airport because our flights got in at the same time. John's running buddy, Ryan, also came down this year to run the marathon and escape the winter cold. The days before the marathon were spent visiting, playing cards, watching Dad play shuffleboard (we even did the "wave" and earned steely eyed looks from the other competitors), carbo-loading, visiting my aunt in Tuscon, and climbing Camelback Mountain. I didn't make it to the top because I was slower and didn't want to get caught climbing down in the dark, but the views I did see were wonderful.

Dad contemplating his next shot

View from Camelback Mountain

At the expo I got to see one of my Javelina Jundred pacers and found out that I was a bad enough influence that she is going to run it herself this year! They had some good speakers at the expo this year, I got to hear Josh Cox, Frank Shorter, and Meb Keflezighi who were all very inspirational. I also stopped by the Brooks area and won a pair of earbuds that are the best earbuds ever.

My awesome Javelina Jundred pacer

I ran the marathon as a training run for Rocky Raccoon, taking walk breaks and enjoying the bands, cheering sections, and talking briefly with other runners. I knew Mom and Dad would be at their usual spot near the 22 mile marker, so as I got closer I recruited the half dozen or so runners near me to sing "Happy Birthday" to my Mom. She got a kick out of that and then ran a half block with me. The runners who sang with me also got a kick out of the Police guy who started yelling at my mom to get off the course. In fact they gave him a little grief which was appreciated. Mom turned 85 that day, what was he going to do, take away her birthday? (I totally stole that from this blog) Thank you anonymous runners for making my mom's day even better!

The finishers showing off our medals and free beers

Once again a great weekend, I'll be back for #4 next year.

Atlanta FatAss 50K Report

2011-01-10T09:46:00.008-05:00

I have found another favorite place to run thanks to GUTS. Yesterday they had their annual FatAss 50K at Sweetwater State Park just west of Atlanta. I had always been wary of running there because I had seen pictures of the SweetH2O that GUTS puts on with its famous creek crossing and had the mistaken impression that you couldn't run in the park without crossing the creek. So, it was with great trepidation I signed up for this event, and boy am I glad I did.

The day started out very cold (temperature was below 20 at the start) and didn't warm up much past freezing. I layered three layers planning to undress as the day warmed up, but ended up running the entire 50K with all three layers. The only thing I ended up removing was my gloves. After meeting several running friends, Kena kicked us out of the warm building and sent us on our way.

The course consisted of six 5.4 mile loops (yes, if you multiply 6 x 5.4 you get more than 31 miles). Most was on runnable single track and there were some rooty sections that were good training for Rocky Raccoon next month. There were no water crossings, a little bit of boulder climbing, some stairs that we went down, and one long 300' climb. It was fun seeing and talking to the other hardy runners out there. GUTS also provided a fully stocked aid station and there was chili, macaroni and cheese, cornbread, and cake. Probably the best run FatAss race out there and free to GUTS members for a measly $15 annual membership fee.

I ran this as a training run for Rocky Raccoon in four weeks so my goals were to get some time on feet, not get injured, and have fun. I accomplished all of my goals and ended up finishing DFL, but in my defense there were a lot of Half Ass runners out there. As I came into the aid station after my fifth lap, the RD informed me that she was sending the sweeps out after I left for my final lap. I introduced myself to the sweeps and I was out of there. I think my last lap was the second fastest of the day and I got a taste of how front runners must feel. Although I never saw or heard them, I was always looking back, making sure I was maintaining my lead. I finished in a respectable for me 8:40. As I crossed the finish line, Sarah was there to take my picture, unfortunately she missed it and made me run back 20 yards and finish again!

All in all a fun day in the park, I'll be back again next year.

The creek crossing we did NOT do

Trail along Sweetwater Creek

Some of the Rocky Raccoon practice roots

Sarah's third try of taking my finish line photo

Catching Up

2011-01-07T19:02:00.004-05:00

Wow, I've been away from my blog for a long time. No worries, I'm still running, just not writing about my running. Here's what you've missed.

Javelina Jundred

This was a lot of fun. Susan and Rob (both accomplished and prolific ultrarunners) from Tennessee were there. Rather than write a belated race report, I'm taking the easy way out and providing you a link to Susan's race report. There are even a few pictures of me. Towards the end you can see a picture of me with the "leans". I couldn't tell that I was leaning until someone told me. I've added some intermittent core exercises to maybe prevent this from happening in the future. I also enjoyed meeting my pacers, Lauren and Jessica, who both did a fantastic job of keeping me awake and moving through the night. Tammie was fun to run with the last couple of miles, she kept trying to get me to run and I tried telling her that her Jedi mind tricks wouldn't work on me, then I ended up running anyways.

Pacing At Pinhoti

Just two weeks after Javelina I found myself in the Alabama woods waiting for my runner. I paced co-worker Ronnie the final 30 miles to his first hundred mile finish. The terrain at this race was much more difficult than my hundred milers and the temperatures dipped into the mid 20's during the night. I think I was more nervous about my first pacing job than I was about running my first hundred. Ronnie did great, finishing in 28:25.

Las Vegas Rock N Roll Marathon

I was planning on going to Vegas around this time anyways, so I though what the heck, I'll run a marathon while I'm there. This is a fantastic half marathon. As a marathon, not so much. The first half is run up and down the Strip and there are enthusiastic crowds and great energy. The second half is run through an industrial area with no scenery, endless turns, abandoned bandstands and nearly abandoned aid stations. There was a 5 1/2 hour cutoff and even with that, the headliner concert was finished by the time I crossed the finish line in 5:05. The biggest disappointment was that the beer garden was already shut down even with about 1000 marathoners finishing after me. If you want to run a marathon in Nevada, pick another one.

What's Next

This Sunday I'm running the GUTS FatAss 50K at Sweetwater State Park. The forecast is for sleet and snow, so it should be a fun time.

If I still have any readers, sorry for the long hiatus, and thanks for sticking around.

Buckle #2

2010-10-25T15:11:00.002-04:00

Yes it is possible to have a 100 mile long 30 hour Halloween Party. Full report is in progress, but you can see that I was successful in obtaining my second buckle and it was a PR in a time of 29:11:43.

Javelina Jundred Jopes

2010-10-19T16:11:00.002-04:00

It has finally hit me. This morning I got a Final Update email from the race director. I am really going to get on a plane on Friday, fly to Arizona, and attempt my second hundred miler (101.4, actually). I am really looking forward to this one because I know several runners who will be running, plus I hope to meet a few I have been stalking online for quite some time now. The best thing I'm looking forward to is meeting my pacers. You may remember that for my last hundred miler I had several of you as virtual pacers. Well this time, two cyber friends that I have never met in person will be pacing me! The first is Jess. She used to blog and that is how I "met" her, she offered to pace me way back when I was first thinking of running one hundred miles. She will pace me from mile 60-75. The second is Laur, you may know her as RunningLaur and she will be pacing me from miles 75-90. A lot of runners drop out after 62 miles at this race because a "wimp-out" option is offered. In other words if you complete 100K miles, instead of a DNF, you get credit for completing a 100K. The good thing about me having pacers starting at the 60 mile point is that I won't be tempted to quit after four laps, I wouldn't want to disappoint my pacers and have them drive all the way out to the course only to see me quit.

What are my goals this time? Of course the primary goal is to finish under the time limit of 30 hours. My secondary goal is to set a PR, in this case I hope to finish under 29 hours. The weather looks like it will cooperate with highs only in the mid 80's. I just hope my feet hold up past 70 miles this time.

Just in case anyone out there wants to stalk me, my number is 181 and I think that they will have live tracking at the website. (At least they did last year.)

FATS 50K Race Report

2010-10-04T10:27:00.005-04:00

South Carolina has a five race ultra series organized and put on by Terri Hayes. Terri is an experienced ultra runner with a couple of hundred ultras under her belt and she knows what ultra runners need in a race. We don't want frills, we want incredible runnable single track, great volunteers, and a chance to test ourselves with other kindred spirits. Terri delivers all this and more in races with no cutoff times. Oh, did I mention that there is no entry fee? No wonder every one of her five races "sells out".

Race morning arrived with perfect fall weather. Temperature was about 50 with clear skies. After checking in and writing the order of the loops on my hand with magic marker, (we were told in an earlier email to memorize the order of the loops, yea we know how well brains work after 5 hours of ultra running) Terri gave us final directions and we were off.

The course is on the Forks Area Trail System (FATS) just across the border from Augusta, Georgia. These trails are used a lot by mountain bikers and are very well maintained and runnable. The course immediately started with single track and we sorted ourselves out pretty quickly. I started at the very back right in front of Terri. Oh yea, Terri also runs her own races as the sweeper. All intersections were well marked, but having the loop order written on my hand helped out a bit, too.

It was a great day for a run in the woods. Since this was a "training" run for me, I started at an easy pace and enjoyed the day. The aid stations were well stocked with water, HEED, powerade, pretzels, cookies, chips, boiled potatoes and salt, bananas, pb&j sandwiches, and a special treat of home made banana bread. Along the way I slowly picked off other runners, by my count I ended up passing a total of eleven runners. One of these was Leopold who was running his very first ultra. Did I mention that Leopold was 10 years old? He was running with his mom and ended up dropping but not until after he completed well over 20 miles. Way to go Leopold!

After finishing there was plenty of pizza and chocolate brownies. Thanks Terri for a great experience, I'll be back to run some of your other races next year.

Looks kind of like a plate of worms, doesn't it?

A Day At Kennesaw Mountain

2010-09-21T11:17:00.003-04:00

I would have preferred to do this training run at a 50K event, but since my weekends are during the week this month, I had to do this 30 mile training run by myself. I packed my car with cold drinks and snacks and drove up to Kennesaw Mountain yesterday for a long training run. My plan was to run 30 miles or 8 hours whichever came first. I parked at the Visitor's Center and got started around 8:30 AM. It was going to be a hot one with temperatures peaking in the mid 90's but the dew point was in the 60s. So it was humid, but not as bad as it has been this summer. The plan was to run outbound for an hour and then run back to my car/aid station to restock and use the Visitor Center restroom.

On my return on the first out-and-back, I saw a high school cross-country team out for a six mile trail run. They were zipping by me, but about two miles from the Visitor Center I caught up with a kid who had obviously gone out too fast. I power-walked past him on an uphill and didn't see him again. Didn't see him again until about a quarter mile from the Visitor Center. I could see and hear his teammates at the end of their run. About this time I heard footsteps behind me. I could also hear cheering for Brandon. I looked over my shoulder, and there was the kid I had passed. Did I maintain my pace and let him pass me for his cheering teammates? Heck no! I picked up my pace and maintained about a 10 yard lead.

An hour or so later in my run I got to thinking maybe I should have let him pass me. Then an hour or so after that I came to my senses. If Brandon doesn't want to be beat by a 51 year old lady he needs to do more training.

Even though it got hot (like it will at the Javelina Jundred), I was able to maintain a pretty good pace, finishing the 30 miles in 7:37. I did get one blister on the ball of my right foot. I really need to solve this blister problem. My next long long run is in two weeks, but this time it'll be at the FATS 50k in South Carolina so I'll have some company.

Labor Day 26.2 Fun Run

2010-09-06T14:59:00.005-04:00

The running cult I belong to has three free marathons each year, New Year's Day, Memorial Day, and Labor day. Today I showed up for the ultra runners' version of a fun run. The race started at 7 AM and the sun hadn't quite come up yet, but there were some folks that had started an hour or two or even three hours earlier because they had things to do later in the day. This race was run on the honor system, you had to do five marked loops and then write down your time on the clipboard when you finished. Since most of us were ultra runners, there was an ultra type aid station with water, Gatorade, cookies, granola bars, potato chips, etc for us at the end of each lap. It was kind of fun showing up as a 100 mile finisher because I now felt like I had all kinds of street cred! The loops were uneventful until the third loop when I took a detour to K-Mart to use their restroom. I did my business, then was on my way. About 1.5 miles later I realized that my fuel belt (with my phone inside) was still hanging on a hook in one of the stalls. I turned around and fortunately it was still right where I had left it. Now I had the problem of my laps being messed up, so I just made the decision that on my last lap I would turn around when my Garmin said that running back would give me a 26.2 mile run. After I finished I wrote my time of 5:15:35 on the clipboard, got my medal out of the tupperware box, and sat around with some of the other finishers to swap stories and wait for the remaining runners to finish. All in all, a pleasant way to spend a holiday morning.

Aid station before the start

Relaxing after finishing

Finisher's Medal

Recovery

2010-08-31T16:01:00.004-04:00

Recovery has been going very well. To tell you the truth, I have felt worse after some 50Ks than I did after Burning River. My weekly mileages post 100 miler were: 30.6, 13.6 (going to Vegas for three days probably had something to do with the low mileage that week), 41.1, and 50.3 miles last week. On Labor Day I'm going to do a marathon "fun run" with the running cult I belong to. This event is so low key that it is negative key, just a bunch of crazy ultra runners getting together to run 26.2 miles just because. I'm planning on getting my mileage back to 60-70 miles per week in September in preparation for the Javelina Jundred in October.

I am also trying to acquire a taste for HEED. I have found that a lot of ultra events serve this beverage instead of Gatorade so I figure I should get used to it. It is definitely an acquired taste. During my run today I finally came up with a description of the lemon-lime flavor. Find an extremely dusty shelf, spray it with lemon Pledge, dust with a rag, put the rag in a bottle of water, shake, then drink.

I think something that tastes that bad should improve my times by at least a minute per mile.

Burning River 100 Race Report - A Study In Stubbornness

2010-08-20T10:32:00.002-04:00

You would think that after making you guys wait three weeks for this race report, I would have a well polished piece of prose. Alas, that is not the case. The reason for its lateness is that I finally got around to writing it. My thoughts and feelings about this epic feat are still in a jumble and as a result this race report is also a jumble and a long one at that. Thank you for reading it and sharing in my accomplishment.

Race Overview

This was one of the best organized, well-run races I’ve ever participated in. It began with the event website that not only had course maps and descriptions, it even had videos of each section, so you knew exactly what to expect. It continued with great communication. Joe was quick to answer all questions and there was an online community both on Facebook and Yahoo that were wonderful sources of information. There were also maps for crew and pacers, so everyone involved knew exactly what to expect. The course itself was a good mixture of roads, bike paths, towpath, horse trails, and of course single track trails. Whoever marked the course deserves a gold medal because it was the best marked course I have ever run. I saw one guy take a wrong turn, but that was only because he had zoned out and didn’t see the arrow right in front of him. The aid stations were also wonderful. Even though I finished second to last, I was treated like a rock star every time, with workers filling my bottles, asking if I had a drop bag, and answering questions. Also, the stations were well stocked even for us back of the packers, I never felt like I was picking through leftovers, everything was still out and in adequate supply. Finally, I was surprised at the number of ordinary people out on the paths and trails getting in their Saturday or Sunday exercise that seemed to know what the heck us crazy people were doing. I had lots of words of encouragement from random folks along the course.

My Care and Feeding

I carried one handheld water bottle filled with water and wore a fuel belt with two 10 oz bottles that I kept filled with Gatorade. I had my Garmin set to buzz me every 10 minutes and I alternated taking a sip of Gatorade with taking a sip of water. If I was thirstier, I would take a drink or a gulp depending on thirst. I was able to tolerate the Gatorade for about 14 hours, and then switched to just water, and drank a cup or two of Coke at the aid stations to keep taking in calories. I was able to eat something at all of the aid stations, taking in a variety of cookies, chips, grapes, watermelon, turkey sandwiches, peanut butter sandwiches, whatever looked appetizing at the time. During previous ultras, pizza had hit the spot, but for some reason, pizza did not look good to me at this race. The one food I did bring as backup in case nothing at the aid station looked good was Clif Shot Blocks. I ate about three packages of those.

At FANS, I developed blisters at about the 65-70 mile point that really slowed me down. In an attempt to prevent that from happening again, I changed socks every 15-20 miles and shoes every 30-40 miles. I also did a complete clothes change as night fell because I was pretty much sweat-soaked and didn’t want to take the chance of getting chilled during the night when I would be walking. In hindsight, I could have done away with that and saved about 15 minutes.

People I Met Along the Way

One of the best things I like about ultras is the people I meet on the trail. I was able to meet a bunch of fun and interesting people during the 30 hours, unfortunately I am terrible with names ordinarily, and with ultra brain, forget about it!

The first dude I ran with a bit had done an Ironman the weekend before with his girlfriend. She was a much faster runner than either of us and he mentioned that she was on the Clif Pace Team. I later found out that she was the pacer I ran with a bit during my meltdown at Grandma’s marathon last year.

I also ran a bit with a couple of gals from Canada, there were about 6 Canadians running this race.

The most memorable guy I ran with was Fred. We matched paces at about the 40 mile point for a bit, and he passed me, I passed him, and we ran together several times in the next 60 miles. Fred was 62 years old and 12 years ago he had run his 50th 50-mile race in 50 states finishing up on his 50th birthday in the 50th state (Hawaii, where he was born) wearing bib #50. I think there was another 50 in there somewhere, but I can’t remember for sure.

Another memorable runner was a gal who had quit mentally. She was still moving well, but her mind quit when she realized it had taken an hour to go a little over two miles. (Which was the pace I was moving at.) She reached the next aid station only two minutes after me with plenty of time ahead of cutoff, but she had already quit mentally. That drove home the point to me that 100 miles is much more than a physical effort.

My Race

I had a plan all worked out and written down ahead of time. I made cards for each section with planned pace and time and my virtual pacer's name. I had written down my planned sock and shoe changes as well as where to put on my headlamp, change Garmin, etc for my brother. I knew that things would probably change after the first hour and throw everything off, but my OCDness needed a plan. I wanted to be about 2 hours ahead of cutoff at the 50 mile point because I knew I would be walking most of the night.

Amazingly enough, things went according to plan throughout the day. The first 10 miles or so were on the road and it was cool, so I was able to bank some time. Then the course started on trails and I was still able to run according to plan. The scenery was great, and at one point a group of six deer bounded across the trail. I and the guy behind me actually stopped for a few seconds in envy of their effortless movement through the woods.

One amenity at this race that you don’t find in too many other trail races was the availability of bathrooms. There were facilities at all but about two of the aid stations. Also, most of the stops had crew access, so my brother could meet me and have my water and Gatorade bottles filled and ready to go.

At about the 40 mile point, I reached the two sections I had run several weeks ago. It was nice to be on familiar trail and it wasn’t as muddy as it had been earlier in the year so I made better time. The “piano” stairs (named that because there are 88 of them) looked steeper than they had before, though. After the piano stairs it was about a mile to the Boston Store aid station and where my brother would start pacing me.

After Boston Store, the course had a 5.4 mile loop back to Boston Store where we could pick up our pacer. My brother had done a lot of research and saw that he could drive to Covered Bridge which was 30 miles worth of the course, but was only 5.5 miles away by road. So, while I was running the 5.4 mile loop, he drove to Covered Bridge, then ran back to Boston Store in time to pace me! We didn’t need headlamps yet, and the trail wasn’t too technical, so I was still able to do some “running”. The reason I have quotation marks around running is that at this point, my brother’s fast walking pace was the same as my “running” pace.

When it got dark, we also came to some more difficult single-track trail sections, so I walked 99% of the time through the night. There were a couple of times where I could see that the trail was smooth for a dozen yards or so, so I shouted, “I’m running on trails in the dark!” Then silly ultra brain kicked in and it became, “I’m running with scissors!” whenever I broke out into a trot. Ok, it doesn't seem funny now, but it was hilarious at 3 AM.

I wish I could have run some of these sections during the day because you could catch glimpses of incredible rock formations and coming into one aid station, there was a massive field of wildflowers. I’ve read others describe it as the “Sound of Music” hill, but it reminded both of us of the poppy field in the “Wizard of Oz” where Dorothy, Toto, and the rest of the gang lay down to sleep (it was about 2:00 AM after all).

I was losing time to cutoff, which I had planned for, but there was a difficult section after the first time through Covered Bridge and despite my best efforts at blister prevention, I was developing blisters on the balls of my feet. A podiatry college supplied students for foot care at the Pine Hollow aid station, so I stopped to let them treat my blisters. This ate another 15-20 minutes of my cushion and both my brother and I started to worry about cutoff times. Coming into Covered Bridge I was about 40 minutes ahead of cutoff and we were informed that I had two hours to complete the 4.8 mile loop back to Covered Bridge. However, I didn’t want to be right at cutoff. We figured I would need at least 20 minutes ahead of cutoff because there were still 16 miles left to the finish line after reaching Covered Bridge.

We started out optimistically. My brother determined that I would need a 20:30 pace on this next section. This section was used by horses and had a lot of deep mud, steep climbs and descents, and also technical sections with roots and rocks. My brother led the way and told me the best path to avoid the deepest mud and kept a few paces ahead in order to light the way and encourage me to keep a good pace. Unfortunately my blisters were really started to bother me, especially on the steep downhill sections. Instead of the required 20:30 pace, I was doing 21, 22, even 23 minute miles. I was never thinking of quitting, but we were realistic and discussed options of where to pick me up if I made the cutoff at Covered Bridge (which is where the car was) but didn’t make the next cutoff time at Oneill Woods which didn’t have crew access. We eventually came up with the plan of my brother asking if he could drive to Oneill Woods since we were near last place and there wouldn’t be a lot of runners and pacers there. If that didn’t work, he would drive to the aid station after that and run back.

Here is where the stubbornness gave me the added boost. It was the wee hours of the morning, and everything I had read about this time of the race was correct. My body wanted to slow down, my brain was slowing down, my blisters were hurting, I was losing time to cutoff, I didn’t know how long this rough (but beautiful) terrain would continue, and it would have been very easy to just give up. Then I remembered that I had trained for this event for almost a year. Every race I had done prior to this was either a test or a training run for this main event. More than training, more than ability, more than determination, by brother accurately figured out that it was plain old stubbornness that kept me on my feet during this difficult section.

Finally, we returned to Covered Bridge, and my cushion had dwindled to about 20 minutes. Oh boy, this next section will make or break my race with less than 13 miles left to go. My brother wished me luck and drove to the next aid station and I was on my own. Not knowing if there was more trail, I started on my way. There was road! Gloriously smooth, relatively level road! The sun was also rising as I broke into a slow run, once again optimistic that I could do this thing. Before I knew it, I saw my brother running back from the next aid station and I was able to report to him that I had busted out some 15 minute miles and was actually gaining a bit on the cutoff time.

For the next few sections, my brother continued to leap-frog pace me, driving to the next aid station, then running back and pacing me to the car. I think he ended up with close to 70 miles. I could not have done this race without him, especially during the night. He kept my mind occupied and my body moving, kept track of where I was vs. the cutoff, and made sure I was eating and drinking. I know with 98 and ¾ percent certainty that my completion of this race was due in a large part to his pacing.

Finally, we were on the last section. I knew there was a bit of trail left and also stairs. After 98 miles Joe the evil RD decides that the runners need stairs. And oh there were stairs. First a long group of stairs, then some more stairs, and then yet some more stairs. Did I mention there were stairs on the last section? We eventually made the last turn for the last mile to the finish line. Two bicycle riders came out to escort us in, just like I was leading the pack. I felt like a rock star. Since there was an award ceremony following the race, there were a lot of people at the finish line cheering me in. I didn’t cry, but I did remark to my brother that I was definitely feeling verklempt. As I crossed the finish line with my brother, Joe announced my name and my finishing time, then presented me with my buckle. I am a 100 mile finisher.

I Have Buckle!

2010-08-02T10:01:00.004-04:00

Now I have to buy a belt so I can wear it. Yes, I did finish the Burning River 100 Mile Endurance Run (actually its 101.1 miles). I finished in 29:39:16, good enough for 2nd to last place, but hey, I also beat the 90 or so runners that didn't finish. The course, volunteers, weather, race director, all you virtual pacers, and most importantly my brother who was my awesome real life pacer, were all incredible. I promise a full race report, but it will be several days because once again, work is interfering with life and there is ice cream I must eat.

Shoes Full Of Feet

2010-07-26T12:41:00.004-04:00

I am tapering and making final preparations for my first hundred miler and about a week or so ago I ran across the Dr Seuss story "Oh! The Places You'll Go". As I was reading it I couldn't help but think that just maybe he was writing about someone running one hundred miles. He talks about the endorphin rush, bonking and recovering, getting lost on the trail and finding your way back, resting too long at an aid station, being on sections of trail all by your lonesome, faceplants, and finally succeeding (ninety eight and three quarters percent guaranteed). Some people may disagree with the head full of brains part signing up for and running an ultra, but I do have my shoes full of feet!

Just in case anyone wants to stalk me this weekend, my number is 119 and you should be able to track me here.

I leave you with the Dr Seuss story that has been my inspiration the last week:

Oh! The Places You’ll Go!
by the incomparable Dr. Seuss

Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You’re off to Great Places!
You’re off and away!

You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go.

You’ll look up and down streets. Look’em over with care. About some you will say, “I don’t choose to go there.” With your head full of brains and your shoes full of feet, you’re too smart to go down a not-so-good street.

And you may not find any you’ll want to go down. In that case, of course, you’ll head straight out of town. It’s opener there in the wide open air.

Out there things can happen and frequently do to people as brainy and footsy as you.

And when things start to happen, don’t worry. Don’t stew. Just go right along. You’ll start happening too.

Oh! The Places You’ll Go!

You’ll be on your way up!
You’ll be seeing great sights!
You’ll join the high fliers who soar to high heights.

You won’t lag behind, because you’ll have the speed. You’ll pass the whole gang and you’ll soon take the lead. Wherever you fly, you’ll be best of the best. Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.

Except when you don’t.
Because, sometimes, you won’t.

I’m sorry to say so but, sadly, it’s true that Bang-ups and Hang-ups can happen to you.

You can get all hung up in a prickle-ly perch. And your gang will fly on. You’ll be left in a Lurch.

You’ll come down from the Lurch with an unpleasant bump. And the chances are, then, that you’ll be in a Slump.

And when you’re in a Slump, you’re not in for much fun. Un-slumping yourself is not easily done.

You will come to a place where the streets are not marked. Some windows are lighted. But mostly they’re darked. A place you could sprain both your elbow and chin! Do you dare to stay out? Do you dare to go in? How much can you lose? How much can you win?

And if you go in, should you turn left or right…or right-and-three-quarters? Or, maybe, not quite? Or go around back and sneak in from behind? Simple it’s not, I’m afraid you will find, for a mind-maker-upper to make up his mind.

You can get so confused that you’ll start in to race down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space, headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.

The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.

Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or waiting around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just waiting.

Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite or waiting around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting.

No! That’s not for you!
Somehow you’ll escape all that waiting and staying. You’ll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing. With banner flip-flapping, once more you’ll ride high! Ready for anything under the sky. Ready because you’re that kind of a guy!

Oh, the places you’ll go! There is fun to be done! There are points to be scored. There are games to be won. And the magical things you can do with that ball will make you the winning-est winner of all. Fame! You’ll be famous as famous can be, with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.

Except when they don’t. Because, sometimes, they won’t.

I’m afraid that some times you’ll play lonely games too. Games you can’t win ‘cause you’ll play against you.

All Alone!
Whether you like it or not, Alone will be something you’ll be quite a lot.

And when you’re alone, there’s a very good chance you’ll meet things that scare you right out of your pants. There are some, down the road between hither and yon, that can scare you so much you won’t want to go on.

But on you will go though the weather be foul. On you will go though your enemies prowl. On you will go though the Hakken-Kraks howl. Onward up many a frightening creek, though your arms may get sore and your sneakers may leak. On and on you will hike. And I know you’ll hike far and face up to your problems whatever they are.

You’ll get mixed up, of course, as you already know. You’ll get mixed up with many strange birds as you go. So be sure when you step. Step with care and great tact and remember that Life’s a Great Balancing Act. Just never forget to be dexterous and deft. And never mix up your right foot with your left.

And will you succeed?
Yes! You will, indeed!
(98 and ¾ percent guaranteed.)

Kid, you’ll move mountains!
So…be your name Buxbaum or Bixby or Bray or Mordecai Ale Van Allen O’Shea, you’re off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting.
So…get on your way!

Desperately Seeking Pacers

2010-07-18T12:05:00.003-04:00

Less than two weeks until my 100 mile attempt at Burning River. What I am asking you followers, readers and lurkers to do is run with me. I plan on writing your names on the back of my pacing cards for each leg (yes I am getting way OCD with charts and spreadsheets and I know everything will change after the first hour or so) so that you can "run" with me. My brother is going to be doing actual pacing for about 20 miles so that means I have another 80 miles to have you guys run with me. If you are planning on running or walking anywhere from 1 to 30 miles on July 31st or August 1st, please leave a comment with how much you are going to do that weekend and I'll be sure to take you with me. Just so you know, my 80 something parents are each going to do 2 miles.

I haven't been posting my training updates, but I did 75 miles two weeks ago, 68 miles last week, and 55 miles this week. This training included 92 miles on trails. Most of the time I feel like I've got this, but once in awhile I ask myself "what are you thinking?" The next two weeks will be tough because I am a lousy taperer, but I am going to force myself.

Thanks ahead of time for virtually running with me in two weeks!

Big Foot Had A Prior Commitment

2010-07-15T14:05:00.003-04:00

Saturday I ran the Rattlesnake 50K near Charleston, WV as a training run for my 100 miler that is now less than three weeks away (gulp!). I learned first-hand that they don't call people from West Virginia mountaineers for nothing. The only level terrain in this state is man-made, everything else is either up or down. The race website promised 5000' of climbs, but the race director said during the pre-race briefing that is was closer to 10,000' and my Garmin agreed.

I got there the night before and drove out to Kanawha State Forest to get my race number and shirt, eat some pizza, and talk to ultra runners I've run into at other races and introduce myself to runners I'd just met. This is a very low-key race run by friendly and experienced people who want everyone who shows up to have a great time. I've read elsewhere that there was a 10 hour cutoff, but I was assured by other race veterans that Dennis would not pull anyone who was still having fun after the cutoff, that the aid stations might be unmanned, but you could continue running.

I showed up around 6:00 AM Saturday morning, checked in, filled my water bottles, and used the flush toilet facilities. Much better than a mega marathon where you have to spend 20 minutes waiting in line to use a stinky porta-potti. Right at 6:30, Dennis sent us on our way. We started with maybe a quarter mile on the park road, then we were on our way up the first of ten climbs. This was single track uphill and soon everyone was hiking their way up. Since I'm a back of the packer, I stayed in the back and it was kind of fun looking at the long line ahead of me. About half way up the hill, Dan from Kentucky settled into the same pace and we chatted a bit. Then, on the downhill, Rob from Tennessee caught up to us and we ran together until the second aid station. Rob is a very accomplished ultra runner with well over 500 (yes you read that right five HUNDRED) ultra finishes. I got a chance to get some great advice for Burning River since he and Susan ran it a couple of years ago. These guys even made me take the lead up the second climb. I was reluctant, thinking I would slow them down, but I didn't. At the seven mile point the course passed near the start/finish area, so I stopped and used the flush toilets and my companions kept on going.

I completed the last 24 miles on my own. I didn't get passed by anyone and the only person I passed was a gal who was taking a break at the second to last aid station. I thoroughly enjoyed being out in the woods with spectacular scenery. I did see a deer on one of the climbs. She was on the trail ahead of me, ran ahead a bit, looked back as if to say "what's taking you so long" and then scampered up and out of sight. There were also a lot of black and blue butterflies that were pretty and too many pesky flies. Fortunately all the aid stations had bug spray. I never did see Big Foot or any rattlesnakes, but I did see some bear poop.

This course is very difficult. There were ten climbs and I found myself counting down the climbs. Every time I came to an aid station, it meant that a climb was next. Also, for some reason, trail builders here don't seem to believe in switchbacks. Although there were a few, most climbs were straight up and then straight down. Some of the downhill sections were so treacherous, I found myself grabbing and hanging on to trees on the descents. Oh, and there were quite a few downed trees across the trail that we had to climb over. One tree was so large that as I was straddling it, each of my feet was at least a foot off the trail. The absolute "best" part of the trail though, was a section that required rock climbing skills. I saw where the next course marker was and actually said out loud "you have GOT to be s#$*ing me!" All in all, this race is laid back, challenging and lots of fun.

I managed to finish under the official unofficial cutoff time of 10 hours and finished in 9:42:48. I met my goals of having fun, getting in a long "training" run, finishing under 10 hours, and not finishing DFL.

June Totals

2010-06-30T15:49:00.002-04:00

After I finished my run today, my monthly total for June was 301.6 miles. That is by far the most I've run in a month. It does help when you run 85 miles in one chunk!

In other news, I signed up for a 50K "training run" on the 10th of June. It is the Rattlesnake 50K near Charleston, WV. According to the website, the race includes "10 climbs totaling 5,000', 9 heavily stocked aid stations, gravel, dirt (mud if wet), sticks, bugs, snakes, deer, bear and Big Foot (if available)."

Yes, I have gone off the deep end, there is no saving me now.

Trail Training

2010-06-29T11:53:00.006-04:00

Yesterday (Monday) was a "Saturday" for me and on the schedule was an extra long run for my 100 miler coming up in less than five weeks. I decided I needed to do 7.5 hours and I chose to do it on the trails up and around Kennesaw Mountain. It's about a one hour drive up there, so I didn't actually hit the trail until 7:30 AM. The temperature was already 80 degrees with humidity to match, so I knew right away it would be a long day. I was wearing my Nathan hydration vest filled with water and carried a handheld bottle filled with Gatorade. The plan was to do 2-3 hour loops or out-and-backs with "aid station" stops back at the Visitor Center and my car for restroom breaks, refilling my water and Gatorade, and grabbing something to eat. The first loop took me up and over the summit of Kennesaw Mountain. I was able to maintain a good pace on this loop, 13-14 minute miles on the trails around the mountain and 21 minute miles on the actual rocky climb to the summit. The rest of the time I stayed on the trails around the mountain. These trails are a good approximation of the terrain on the most difficult sections of the Burning River course. Some climbs and descents, a little bit of technical terrain, but no mud. I was able to manufacture my own mud though. I was sweating so much that the sweat in my shoes combined with the dust of the trails to make a nice muddy paste.

This also turned out to be a heat acclimation run. By the end of the 7.5 hours the temperature was up to 92 degrees and the heat index was a sweltering 102. I did slow down a lot but still managed to keep my pace below the average that I'll need to maintain to complete the 100 miles in 30 hours. (Actually the course is 101.1 miles so the pace required is 17:48 minute miles)

As far as other training this week, here is what I did:

Sunday - 4.99 miles in one hour - 12:02 pace

Monday - 4.98 miles in one hour - 12:03 pace

Tuesday - 10.16 miles in two hours - 11:49 pace

Wednesday - 4.9 miles in one hour - 12:15 pace

Thursday - 15 miles in 3:22 - 13:28 pace. 10 miles running, followed by 5 miles of power walking. I realized that my blisters formed after I started walking a lot during my 24 hour event. So, I'm going to add a 5 mile power walk to the end of a medium run at least once a week to get my feet used to walking long distances.

Friday - 3 miles in 36:15 - 12:05 pace.

Saturday - 8.32 miles in two hours - 14:26 pace. "Hill" workout on hotel treadmill. Alternated half mile runs with half mile walks up an incline.

Sunday - 5.57 miles in one hour - 10:47 pace. Tempo run.

Monday - 27.14 miles in 7:30 - 16:35 pace.

I plan to do one more very long training run at Kennesaw Mountain in two weeks. I was looking for a trail 50K to do as a training run and I found The Skyline Challenge in Virginia. I'm still looking at the logistics and it doesn't look feasible right now, but there's still a chance I might do it. (I can't believe I'm considering a 50K as a training run, this ultra running thing does strange but fun things to you!)

Burning River Practice

2010-06-21T16:52:00.008-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, I noticed that my work schedule had me in the Akron area all day on a Saturday. I thought to myself, hey, that's real close to the Burning River 100 course. So, I left a message on the race message board asking where I should run to get a feel for the course. I found out that ultra runners are awesome. Kurt responded with some recommendations, then said he would set up a group run with water drops for when I would be in town! There wasn't a big turnout since the Mohican 100 was that same weekend, but John (who will also be running BR as his first 100 miler) joined us for a 20 mile run on the Burning River course.

Kurt has run this race all three years, so he was a great tour guide. As I requested, we ran two of the most difficult sections of the course. The course is slightly technical, but not too bad, and there were some good climbs and descents, but nothing too rigorous. The worst part of the sections we ran was the mud. It was shoe sucking off mud. There were detours around the worst sections, and both Kurt and John assured me that the course should be drier by race day. Also of note were the stairs, there were at least three long stair climbs, the worst was called the piano stairs, because there were 88 of them.

This run also turned out to be a heat acclimation run. Temperature was about 85 and it was humid. I actually sucked my Nathan hydration vest dry in a 10 mile section. One thing I was happy about is that I am getting less tentative on the downhills. I know this because I did three full-on face plants. Fortunately the ground was fairly soft and not rocky so there was no blood, just a couple of bruises and lots of mud and dirt. Hey, you can't call yourself a trail runner if you look like you ran on a treadmill when you are finished.

Just in case anyone is interested, here is what I have done in the two weeks since my 24 hour race.

Monday after the race - 3 miles in 56:37 - 18:53 pace. This was mostly walking with short one minute shuffles mixed in.

Tuesday - 3.21 miles in 40 minutes - 12:28 pace

Wednesday - 3.87 miles in 45 minutes - 11:39 pace

Thursday - 7.37 miles in 1:30 - 12:13 pace

Friday - 3.79 miles in 50 minutes - 13:12 pace. Heat index was 105!

Saturday - 8.13 miles in 1:40 - 12:19 pace

Sunday - 3.15 miles in 50 minutes - hill workout

Monday - 15 miles in 3:10:16 - 12:42 pace

Tuesday - 4.48 miles in 55 minutes - 12:17 pace

Wednesday - 9.08 miles in 1:50 - 12:07 pace

Thursday - 4.58 miles in 55 minutes - 12:01 pace

Friday - 3.8 miles in 55 minutes - hill workout

Saturday - 18.53 miles in 5:23:26 on the Burning River course - 17:28 pace

Finally here are a couple of pictures from my weekend.

Kurt and John, my Burning River tour guides

Just one of the sets of stairs

FANS 24 Hour Race Report

2010-06-15T18:32:00.011-04:00

Sorry this is so late, but sometimes work and other stuff gets in the way.

I flew up to Minnesota on Wednesday the 2nd to spend some time with my folks and celebrate my brother's 49th birthday. I also managed some carbo loading and ran around the lake every day I was there. My folks, both in their 80s, are still very active and walk a couple of miles almost every day on the path that goes around the lake.

On race morning, my alarm went off at 3 AM, I got myself ready and drove to my brother's place and he drove the 2 hour drive to Minneapolis. I relaxed in the back seat, sort of dozing, but mostly just keeping my legs up. We got to Lake Nokomis a little after 6 AM, time enough to get a good spot to set up the tent, get our supplies out, and get signed in and weighed in. I had a chance to see Andy from the Darkside Running Club and we had our picture taken. My sister-in-law, Mary, was going to crew both my brother and me. I've never had a crew before, and let me tell you, it is great! Kind of like the difference between staying at a Motel 6 and staying at a 5 star resort.

We started out with a 1.6 mile out and back and then started the 2.4 mile loops. The temperature wasn't too hot, but it was a little humid, and I was already sweating after the first couple of miles. I kept an eye on my heart rate, and it got up to about 145 the first hour or so, but then settled down to an average of about 140. It didn't take long for the drizzle and rain to start and that was pretty steady until the end of the 12 hour race. The rain didn't really bother me too much, in fact it seemed to keep things cool and also kept the bugs away.

I really enjoyed this race especially during the day. As I've said before, my brother was running the 12 hour race and doing very well. He lapped my about every 1.5 to 2 laps and we exchanged a couple of words of encouragement and a high five each time. It was also great having Mary, my nephew Travis, and my brother's friend Ryan crew for me. I didn't have to stop to refill water and Gatorade bottles, they had full ones waiting for me after each lap. They were also ready with special requests such as food choices, dry socks, etc. My 50 mile split was 12 minutes faster than my 50 mile finish at Umstead in March, and that time difference is 100% attributable to having a crew.

I also enjoyed chatting off and on with people and offering words of encouragement to the front runners as they lapped me. I was impressed with a couple from Belgium and a guy from The Netherlands who had entered the 24 hour walk. I would pass them when I was running, but when I slowed to take a walk break, they walked by me like I was standing still. All three of them ended up with over 100 miles! Another guy I exchanged words with now and then was Tom. Apparently he has done this event several times, but had recently injured himself. Not to be deterred, he was completing the event on crutches! His initial goal was to complete a marathon, but when he reached that, he changed his goal to a 50K. He ended up with 32.59 miles.

Just prior to 12 hours the rain stopped, so I took that opportunity to go up to the community center to dry off and do a complete change of clothes. I got back down to the course just as the 12 hour runners were finishing up. My brother did an outstanding job and finished in second place with an amazing 83.69 miles. When I had originally set my goal of beating my brother, I was thinking he would beat his previous best of 71 miles, perhaps even do 78 miles. But the overachiever had to set the bar high, I had my work cut out for me.

A couple of hours later my stomach started acting wonky. I could still eat and drink but just didn't feel 100%. About this time the sun was setting, so I made the decision to walk through the night. I had already sort of planned on doing that, but now it was certain. I walked off and on with several people and that passed the time and made the laps go by faster. It was taking me about 50 minutes to do 2.4 miles and that included aid station and porta-potti stops.

My brother came back out to the course later that evening to relieve Mary and to finish out the night crewing for me. He did set the bar high, but now he was going to help me beat him. Things were continuing to go well, but at around 2 AM and 70 miles or so, I had to make a stop at the Med Tent. I had a blister forming on the ball of my left foot. When I first noticed it, I tried to drain it myself and change socks, but it seemed to get worse on the next lap. The doctors took care of me and sent me on my way. One of the doctors, Dr Dave, had run 66.62 miles during the 12 hour run, and then stayed up all night keeping his fellow runners on their feet.

There was another volunteer at the aid station that I have to mention. Mike Henze worked the entire 24 hours. In case you don't know, he was on the United States 24 Hour Team that competed at the World Championship last month and took third place. At around 3 AM I had the #12 dude in THE WORLD make me a custom peanut butter sandwich. I don't think there is another sport out there where back of the packers like me can mingle and share experiences with world class athletes in their sport.

Around sunrise, I caught up to Kelly, another Darkside runner. We ended up walking the last two laps together, and on the last lap we were joined by my brother and her husband. During the last couple of laps, blisters had been forming on the ball of my right foot. So I stopped at the Med Tent again to have Dr Dave work on my feet.

By this time we were in the last hour and they opened up the 220 yard out and back section. Now we could see everyone who was competing. I exchanged fist bumps with Zach Gingerich (he ran an unbelievable 13:23 100 miler at Umstead in March) who was hobbling almost as badly as I was. He had the race won with a 10+ mile lead over his nearest competitor, yet he was out there with everyone else sharing smiles and grimaces.

After the end of the race, there was a breakfast up at the community center. When I say up, I mean it was on a small rise, maybe 30 feet high. I actually had my sister-in-law drive me up there because my legs were toasted. (don't know how I'm going to handle the stairs the Burning River course has in the final miles!) My brother collected his second place award, and after sitting awhile I had to put my legs up. They weren't exactly cramping up, but they felt weird and sitting wasn't doing them any good. After the awards were given out, my brother drove me to the hotel where I took a shower, then laid in bed most of the day with my feet and legs propped on about six pillows. I did manage to hobble to the phone and order a pizza, but that was about all I could handle.

I flew back the next day and was moving slowly, but when I got home I did manage a 3 mile walk with little one minute "shuffles" mixed in.

Now, after a week, I am fully recovered and back to my normal running schedule, in fact, yesterday I ran 15 miles with a heat index of 105 by the end of my run.

Finally I'd like to finish with a couple of lessons I learned. Remove your fuel belt before spraying bug spray all over yourself. Ginger chews are lifesavers for your stomach. Do not do math in your head after being on your feet for 22 hours.

Well, looks like all systems go for the Burning River 100. I'm excited because this week I get to do a 22 mile training run on the actual course.

Now last of all some pictures from the race.

Awesome Crew Chief Mary, Super Speedy John, and Me

A picture of me with Andy, this dude had done Badwater, Comrades, and numerous other bad-ass ultras.

Kelly and me at the summit of Mt Nokomis.

All smiles at the start!

Hobbling at the finish. I've just been passed by Tom the Crutches Dude.

Trying to ease the pain in my legs.

The smile of the victorious sister :)

I Passed

2010-06-06T16:00:00.002-04:00

Official results aren't in yet, but I think I ran about 85 miles. If its 85.1 or higher I'll give myself an A-. Full race report to follow.

FANS Grading

2010-06-01T16:09:00.002-04:00

I'm running the FANS 24 Hour run this weekend as a final test to see if I can possibly try a 100 mile race at the end of July. In order to pass this test, I want to be able to keep running and walking for the entire 24 hours with only short pit stops. I also want to see if I can conserve energy to last that long and keep myself fueled and hydrated for an extended period of time.

Ok, that's the passing grade standard.

In order to get a C, I need to run more miles than my brother does. He is a speedy guy, and even though he is only doing the 12 Hour run, this will definitely be a challenge.

To earn a B, I need to cover at least 80 miles.

To earn the gold standard A, I need to do 90 miles.

And, to get the A+++++ (that's FIVE pluses) I will cover 100 miles which will only happen in my wildest dreams and conditions are absolutely perfect.

Looking forward to Saturday, its almost here!

All American 5K

2010-05-30T10:12:00.006-04:00

Yesterday, Lt Dan Berschinski returned to Peachtree City after spending almost a year recovering from losing both of his legs serving our country in Afghanistan. As part of his welcome home, the Peachtree City Running Club put on a 5K race to help raise funds to defray some of the expenses he and his family have incurred as a result of his injuries. I haven't run a 5K in over a year, but I had to run this one.

The morning was warm and humid, both the temperature and dewpoint were about 70 degrees. Since I suspected that there would be a big turnout and parking would be a mess, I parked about a mile away and ran to the start as a warm-up. There was a big turnout, normally for these 5Ks there are several dozen runners. I'd estimate the crowd this morning to be several hundred, probably even close to 500 runners and walkers, all out to support Lt Dan. (of course, while running, I couldn't help but think of the movie Forrest Gump and the Lt Dan in that movie who also lost both legs.) Lt Dan was there to start the race and also at the finish to present the awards.

It was a little crowded at the start and it took awhile to settle into my pace, but I was able to run a good race, just a little bit outside of my comfort zone. Since the course is on the same route I run frequently, I was able to run most of the tangents and my Garmin read 3.12 miles at the finish line. My splits were:

Mile 1 - 10:12
Mile 2 - 9:37
Mile 3.1 - 10:39
Total time - 30:27, a 38 second PR!

The timing and results were no-frills. You noted your time crossing the finish line, then wrote your name, age, and time on a piece of paper and put in in the appropriate sex/age basket. There were already at least a dozen slips of paper in the 50-59 basket, but only one in the 60-69 basket. Looks like I have to either get faster or older to get any age group awards.

I think that I have a sub 30 minute 5K in me. I need to have better weather conditions, also, running 9 miles the day before probably didn't help my time ;)

Here is what I did the rest of the week:

Tuesday - 4.78 miles in 50 minutes, 11:31 pace

Wednesday - 9.42 miles in 1:50, 11:41 pace

Thursday - 4.6 miles in 50 minutes, 11:58 pace

Friday - 9.19 miles in 1:50, 11:59 pace

Saturday - 5K

Today - Planning to run about 15 miles in 3 hours

2 AM At The Gym

2010-05-25T03:23:00.002-04:00

Quick post because it is 3:15 AM. Ran 4.78 miles in 55 minutes for a 11:31 pace. Felt better than I thought I would. There were 6 folks at the gym at 2 AM and only 3 of us at 3 AM.

This Week's Training

2010-05-24T20:17:00.002-04:00

Less than two weeks until the FANS 24 Hour Run, my first attempt at staying awake and moving for 24 hours. Why did I think this was a good idea? My bedtime is usually 10 PM!

Here's how my training went this week:

Tuesday - Rest day.

Wednesday - 10.94 miles in 2:10:00 for an average pace of 11:54.

Thursday - 5.59 miles in 1:05:00 for an average pace of 11:39.

Friday - 5.41 miles in 1:05:00 for an average pace of 12:02

Saturday - Tempo run on the hotel treadmill, I did 1 mile at 5.1 mph as a warmup, then did a mile at 5.5 mph, and increased the speed each mile by .1 mph. I made it all the way to a mile at 6.1 mph before having to back down. Total mileage 12.13 miles in 2:10:00 for an average pace of 10:44.

Sunday - 5.6 miles in 1:05:00 for an average pace of 11:37.

Today - 23.7 miles in 5 hours for an average pace of 12:40. It was a heat acclimation run for me, temperature was about 80 degrees with a dewpoint near 70.

My plan is to try to stay up late tonight, then run for an hour at around 2 AM. I want to see if I can function on tired legs combined with sleep deprivation. If successful, I'll be back around 3 AM and let you guys know how it went.

Darkside 8 Hour Run

2010-05-17T20:01:00.004-04:00

On Saturday I lined up with about 40 other people of questionable intelligence and started running for eight hours. It was the Darkside 8 Hour Run. This run is held at a school 400 meter track. The entry fee is only $10 and food to share with the other runners. Everyone was in excellent spirits despite the hot and humid conditions (temperature got into the upper 80s and the track is black, so I'm sure the temperature on the surface was over 90). I got to talk a bit with two runners who will also be running the FANS 24 hour run in Minnesota in three weeks. I also convinced super fast Susan (she's run a couple of sub 20 hour 100s, and is running Western States for the second time this summer) to slow down and run a few laps with me. She ran Burning River last year so I was able to get some course information and tips from her.

I planned this as a training run and was successful in staying on my feet for the full eight hours with few ill effects. I had no blisters or chafing, and my legs felt fine the whole time. I did slow down as the temperature went up, but still managed to cover 34.25 miles for an average pace of 14 minutes per mile. There was one thing that came up that has never happened before, though. After about 5 hours of running, I noticed a couple of drops of blood in my urine. I kept going of course, and noticed the same thing at about 7 hours. However, my urine was clear by the time I got home. Of course I googled this, and found there were several possible causes, most of them with an underlying cause of dehydration. I thought I had been hydrating adequately, but it looks like I will have to step it up on really hot days.

As for the rest of my training this week, this is what I did:

Monday - 5.3 miles in one hour - 11:20 pace

Tuesday - 10.43 miles in two hours - 11:31 pace

Wednesday - 5.16 miles in one hour - 11:38 pace

Thursday - 5 miles in 55:05 - 11:01 pace - this was an interval workout, 400, 800, 1600, 800, 400, all at 9:40 pace

Friday - 5.03 miles in one hour - 11:56 pace

Saturday - 34.25 miles in eight hours

Sunday - 5.42 miles in 1:05 - 12:00 pace

Total for the week 70.6 miles! This is my second highest weekly total, highest was the week of the Umstead 50 mile race.

I'm Back

2010-05-11T14:53:00.002-04:00

Recovering from a five day break is worse than recovering from a marathon. After my birthday trail run, I flew to Vegas to continue my celebration. That, a crazy work schedule, and the soreness from my run up, down, and around Kennesaw Mountain all contributed to five days without running. I found that my legs didn't mind the break so much, but I lost a bit of cardio fitness during that time. Well, running in 85 degrees with 80 percent humidity didn't help much, either. In spite of having to recover from the break, I managed to run over 50 miles last week. Here's what I did:

Tuesday - 4.84 miles in 55 minutes - 11:22 pace

Wednesday - 9.11 miles in 1:50 - 12:05 pace (hot and humid)

Thursday - 4.49 miles in 55 minutes - 12:16 pace

Friday - 8.9 miles in 1:50 - 12:22 pace

Saturday - 4.69 miles in 55 minutes - 11:44 pace

Sunday - 19.02 miles in 3:53:45 - 12:18 pace

Next Saturday I am running around a 1/4 mile track for 8 hours with about 40 other crazy people. This will be a training run for my 24 hour run in Minnesota in less than a month. (and that run will be a training run for my first 100 mile attempt at the end of July) Forecast is for close to 90 degrees with a chance of thunderstorms. Could be interesting.

On an editorial note, did anyone watch House last night? I was excited when in the first couple of minutes Dr House announced that the patient was an extreme distance runner. I thought to myself, cool, I'll have some exotic ultra running disease to obsess about on my next long run. When they inevitably went to the patient's house, I was hoping to see some 100 mile belt buckles, or at the very least a couple of marathon medals. So what was on display? There were several.....wait for it.....10K finishers certificates! Apparently in Hollywood, 6.2 miles is an extreme distance. I just had to laugh. Oh, I did learn one interesting thing I might just have to try out. If you train for and run 10k's, your metabolism is revved up so high that you can eat two dozen donuts a day!

My Birthday Run

2010-04-26T21:10:00.007-04:00

Yes, I turned 51 today. Instead of saying I'm 50, I now have to say I'm "in my fifties". That sounds a little worse for some reason. Anyways, to celebrate, I decided I would do a 5.1 hour trail run up, down, and around Kennesaw Mountain. There are some easy peasy trails, but also some hard core, up and down, technical trails. I was able to do sub-15 minute miles on the easy stuff, but the serious up and down rocky stuff was at 20+ minute miles. Overall I did 17.83 miles in 5:06 for an average pace of 17:10. A little better than my outing at Pine Mountain, but I still need to improve. Right now I'm eating pizza, drinking wine, and catching up on my DVR watching (Glee anyone?)

Here are a couple of pictures of my outing.

Easy Peasy Trail

Roots and Rocks

That's a Trail?

A Little Civil War History Along the Way

The Rewarding View At the Top

Trail Running

2010-04-21T15:34:00.003-04:00

I really need some trail running. The Burning River 100 has about 25 miles on the road and 75 miles on trails. That's more trail running than I have in total. In an attempt to remedy that situation, I drove down to FD Roosevelt State Park to get in a little time on the trails. The trails there are well maintained and have some respectable but not too challenging ups and downs, along with good rocky technical sections. I only went for two hours and logged 6.72 miles according to Mr Garmin. That's 18 minute miles. I will need to pick that up quite a bit in the next couple of months. I'm thinking I'll need to be able to do 15 minute trail miles while I'm feeling fresh for my 100 miler. My biggest problem is that I am very tentative on technical sections. The good news is that I got my very first blood drawing trail crash out of the way. There was a very steep downhill section with large rocks leading down to a road crossing. I missed a step and went crashing down. Somehow, I ended up flat on my back, facing the way I had come down. A car went by just as I was crashing. Did he stop to see if I was all right? Of course not! Good thing I was all right, just shaken up, a couple of bruises, and a little blood. Overall a great outing.

Sean's Run Like Hellathon 2 Report

2010-04-18T18:08:00.003-04:00

Ok, this is a week late, but I have the IRS and work to blame. I joined a cult called GUTS (Georgia Ultrarunning and Trailrunning Society) and one of the members put on a run for the second year. Instead of doing a long boring training run on his own, he mapped out a 1.13 mile loop around his neighborhood, rented a Porta-Potti, offered his parent's front porch as an aid station, and invited everyone to come over and run as much or as little as they wanted in 12 hours. The course opened up at 7 AM. I slept in and showed up around 11 AM. My plan was to run a minimum of 4 hours if I was feeling bad and a maximum of 6 hours if I was feeling great. (Remember I had run 50 miles just two weeks before.) We were all asked to bring shareable food and drinks, so I dropped off my can of Pringles, bag of animal crackers, and bottle of Gatorade. Three runners came by about this time and I asked if they were slow enough that I could follow them for a lap so I would know where the course turns were. They assured me they would be slow since they had already been running for several hours. Kena was one of the runners, she had just run the tough SweetH2O 50k the weekend before and was taking it easy so I could keep up with her. She prefers the 24 hour and 100 mile runs. After the first lap, I was mostly on my own, but I did get to run with Matt Jenkins for a bit. He was running with a 30 pound pack and was barefoot, training for a 760 mile run across North Carolina to raise money for the Western Youth Network. Another Bad-A$$ dude was Jason. He showed up planning to run 6 laps for a 10k since he had also run the SweetH2O the weekend before. However, when new people showed up, he went out and did another couple of laps. Before he knew it, he was 4 laps short of a marathon, so he succumbed to peer pressure and did that. Then, of course a 50k was within reach, and once again the peer pressure kicked in and he ended up doing 28 laps for a total of 31.64 miles. Way to go Jason!

I stuck with my plan and at 5:59:29 I had completed 26 laps for a total of 29.38 miles. Although I only had 2 more laps to do a 50k, I did not succumb to peer pressure and had a beer instead.

In other training, I ran a total of 61.4 miles last week and 52.9 miles this week since I did a "short" long run of only 15 miles today.

What Happened To Spring?

2010-04-04T16:12:00.002-04:00

We had a week or so of perfect spring running weather, then this week summer and its higher temperatures arrived. Well, I knew I needed to start heat acclimation training, but I was hoping to start it in May.

My recovery week went very well. I took Sunday and Wednesday off, and here's what I did the rest of the week.

Monday - 3 mile shuffle on the treadmill in 35:47 for an average pace of 11:56.

Tuesday - 5.2 miles in one hour for an average pace of 11:33.

Thursday - 3.71 miles in 40 minutes for an average pace of 10:48. Temperature was in the 80s but for some reason, my legs wanted to move fast so this turned into an accidental tempo run.

Friday - 7.19 miles in 1:30 for an average pace of 12:32. I paid for my exuberance the day before during this run. Had to do a lot of walking the final 30 minutes.

Saturday - 4.43 miles in 50 minutes for an average pace of 11:18.

Sunday - 14.3 miles in 3 hours for an average pace of 12:36. Purposely ran with the temperature in the 80s. Heart rate started creeping up the last hour so I added more walking breaks.

Total mileage this week was 37.8 miles. I plan to continue running during the afternoon with the warmer temperatures to continue the heat acclimation. I'm also going to try to run on trails or run up and down Stone Mountain once a week. On Tuesday my running cult is doing a trail run with pizza after. Since I'm not working that day I'm going to try to make it. I've been assured there will be some people there as slow as me, we shall see.

Umstead "Only 50" Race Report

2010-03-29T10:11:00.010-04:00

I'm going to do this report a little differently. Rather than the blow by blow I normally do, I've divided it into sections so if you are more interested in numbers, you can skip to that part, if you're interested in what I ate, you can skip to that part, etc.

Pre-Race Preparation

I did the typical pre-race tossing and turning the night before, but the alarm clock did wake me up at 4 AM. (I remember seeing 3:30 seemingly just minutes before) I had pretty much packed everything I needed in my drop bag the night before, so I just needed to lube myself up, get dressed, grab a bagel, and head out the door. As I was in the bathroom getting lubed up, I was channeling my inner Clark Griswold saying, "Thisiscrazythisiscrazythisiscrazy", but then I looked at myself in the mirror, saw a huge grin, and knew I was going to have fun. I dressed in two layers and it was a good thing too, because I had to scrape the frost off my windshield before I drove to the start.

The Course and Conversations

The race started promptly at 6 AM. Since it was literally freezing, I was wearing two layers, with my fleece hat and gloves. I also wore a headlamp since the sun wouldn't rise for about another hour. I started at the very back and walked about a quarter to half a mile since it was congested and dark, but soon everyone spread out and I could start to run. There is an out-and-back section at the beginning and it was fun to see all the headlamps of the leaders coming back at you. At this point there was a gal running next to me at my pace and we started talking. Her name was Judy and I found out that she was getting in a morning 12.5 miles before coming back that night to be a pacer. So, I was lucky and had an unofficial official pacer for about 4 miles. Judy lives a couple of miles from the Park and runs there frequently so she was able to tell me where all the hills were (and that the nice long hill we were running down was called Cemetery Hill and that I would be going up that hill at mile 11 on each loop). The first half of the course is deceptively easy with lots of level running and a couple of descents and only one real climb. After Aid Station #2 there are more hills, including two fairly steep ones that even the front runners walked up as they lapped me. The good news is that none of the climbs are very long, I think the most elevation gain on any one hill is maybe 200 feet. There is no technical running on this course except for about a quarter mile near the Headquarters Aid Station that if you use your imagination you can call slightly technical. The only real hazards are the horse "apples". It was still dark when my headlamp illuminated a pile and I asked Judy if that was horse poop, and she assured me it was.
An interesting guy I leapfrogged with for about 10 miles was Bill. He was going for his 1000 mile buckle. In other words this was his 10th time running this 100 mile race. Since he was obviously an experienced ultra runner, when I saw him slow to a walk on a hill, I did the same thing. He was running with another experienced ultra runner and I overheard him talking about his "epic" nap. Apparently one year he took a three hour nap at Aid Station 2 and then continued on to finish.
The way the course is set up, you can see runners that are two miles ahead of you and two mile behind you (as well the the ones who have lapped you). So it was fun to see the front runners as well as the middle and back of the packers. I have been following Tammy's blog for awhile since she has run lots of ultras including this one and always has a great race report. I saw her several times on the out and back sections, and around the third or fourth lap I got a chance to talk briefly with her. She had been lowering her time by one hour each year and hoped to get under 27 hours (26:40 to be specific) this year in order to continue the trend.
Tom from Georgia was running the 100 miles and was hoping to run the first 50 around 12 hours to keep from going out too fast and ending up hurting later. We ran together briefly on my last lap, and he had to mention that even though I had signed up for the 50 mile option, no one would stop me if I kept on going. But, I stuck to my plan and only did the four loops (the blister at mile 47 certainly made that decision easier, because I was tempted.

Hydration, Nutrition, Aid Station Stops

First of all, let me say that the aid stations at this event are outstanding. They have everything you can imagine and the workers are both cheerful and helpful. I had to fill my own water bottle once, and that was only because there were three other runners at the station ahead of me. According to my Garmin, I spent 27:55 stopped. That works out to an average of 4 minutes at each aid station. I used the facilities at Aid Station #2 each time through whether I thought I needed to or not. That kept my bladder empty so I had one less thing to think about. At the Headquarters Aid Station, I went into the Lodge where I had my drop bag twice in order to shed layers, exchange my glasses for sunglasses after the first lap, and pick up my Iphone and earbuds for the last two laps. I ate something each time I came to an aid station, and ate what appealed to me. Surprisingly, protein looked good to me. I had a hot dog (minus the bun) twice, and also a turkey sandwich. That was besides the normal ultra chips and cookies. As far as hydration went, I carried a water bottle and wore a fuel belt with two small bottles I kept filled with Gatorade. I had my watch buzz me at 10 minute intervals and took alternating sips of either water or Gatorade. During the last lap, the sips became swallows and gulps. I also took S-caps to keep my electrolytes balanced. For the first three hours is was one an hour, then as the day warmed up, I took one every 40 minutes. I was pleased that I had no stomach issues, I seemed to stay hydrated the whole time, and had enough energy to keep me going.

The Numbers

My plan was to do the first loop in 2:40, second in 2:50, third in 3:00, and fourth in 3:10. Lets see how I did. These times include aid station stops, I hit the lap button as I left each aid station, the official timers recorded times as I entered the aid station.
First loop: 2:40 - right on schedule
12:42 pace to AS#2/12:55 pace to HQ
Second loop: 2:46
12:40 pace to AS#2/14:03 pace to HQ
Third loop: 2:55
13:44 pace to AS#2/14:16 pace to HQ
Fourth loop: 2:57
14:08 pace to AS#2/14:32 pace to Finish
Mr Garmin says I walked 11.65 miles at an average pace of 18:54, jogged 37.54 miles at an average pace of 11:51, and ran 1.24 miles at an average pace of 9:14.
Average heart rate was 136 and never got above 160.
I did slow down as the mileage increased, but not as much as I expected. I'm pleased that I never really hit a wall or low point where I had to talk myself into continuing. A large part of that I think was the encouragement I got from other runners I encountered along the way.

The Finish

The finish was kind of anti-climactic. Since this is a 100 mile race, there are no medals or belt buckles for 50 mile finishers, just a handshake and pat on the back and a "well done" from the race director. I grabbed a cupful of ice cream, some mountain dew, and went into the lodge to pack my stuff in my drop bag. I texted my brother my finish time, and as I was eating, I saw 100 milers gearing up for the night, since it would be getting dark during their next loop. I actually envied them and it gave me the inspiration to continue to train and try for 100 later this year.

I drove back to the hotel, grabbed a quick shower, asked at the front desk for a restaurant recommendation (the Babymoon Cafe) and headed out for a steak dinner and some wine. Of course I wore my race shirt and mentioned to both the hostess and my waiter that I had just finished running FIFTY MILES. As I was looking at the menu, I checked the website for results and saw that Zack Gingerich had already finished the 100 miles in an amazing 13:23, smashing the course record by more than an hour. To celebrate my finish, I had a wonderful steak, some delicious wine, and of course dessert. Back at the hotel I settled in, read my book, and tried to get to sleep. Although I slept better than I had the night before, I found myself waking up every couple of hours to check the race results and see how the people I met during the day had fared during the night. Bill earned his 1000 mile buckle, Tom hadn't burned himself out during the first 50 miles and finished strong, and Tammy not only ran sub 27 hours, she was under 25 hours!

The Aftermath

I'm writing this two days after the event. Sure I have some muscle soreness, but nowhere near the stiffness I've had after some marathons and shorter ultras. In fact, I'm walking down stairs normally, not even holding on to the railing. The only issue I had was blisters. I had blisters under two of my toenails on my left foot. (Note: do NOT click on that link if you are squeamish, mine weren't that bad, but were still kind of gross) I had noticed discomfort about halfway through the third loop, but nothing bad enough where I thought I wouldn't be able to continue. After about 47 miles I did develop a quarter-sized blister on the ball of my right foot. Walking and running on it was very uncomfortable, and I would have had to take care of that before continuing if my run had been longer than 50 miles. On a side-note, I took a break from writing this report and managed to shuffle three miles. I went to the gym and did it on the treadmill for two reasons. First, I didn't want to take the chance of running a half mile from home and not being able to get back. Second, I had to show off my race shirt and make sure people knew I had run FIFTY MILES two days before!

Finally Some Pictures

The race shirt, my Iphone thinks that red is orange.

Mr Garmin says I ran 50.43 miles, also I didn't stop my watch until after I got my ice cream, a girl has priorities.

The view heading up to the start/finish area and Headquarters Aid Station, yes it is uphill, I walked up that hill every loop except for the last one, I did run up for the finish!

The view coming into Aid Station #2

In the background you can see the start of one of the steeper hills.

If you click on this link you can see photos from one of the official race photographers. This link will take you to a picture of me (I think I'm being careful not to step on any horse apples)

Woo Hoo!

2010-03-27T21:11:00.002-04:00

Full race report to follow, but I beat my pie in the sky goal and completed FIFTY MILES in an unofficial 11:17. Weather and course conditions were perfect, in fact three guys ran faster than the previous course record!

You Know You Are An Ultra Runner When....

2010-03-26T12:05:00.002-04:00

This little exchange made my day. I was at the airport chatting with a co-worker about my big plans for the weekend. Another dude came by in the middle of the conversation and had heard "fifty miles". He then asked me, "What kind of bike do you ride?" The expression on his face was priceless when I told him I wasn't riding, but rather running that far!

I'm all checked in at the motel. I ran into two other runners (Sue Ellen and Jack) at the front desk and they just happen to be working the mile 25 aid station at Burning River this year, where I'll be attempting 100 miles for the first time. I plan to chat them up some more at the pasta dinner tonight.

So for now I'm going to just chill in my room, maybe take a nap, then head over to Umstead State Park for registration, pasta, and conversation.

Wish me luck tomorrow!

Its the Final Countdown

2010-03-23T19:48:00.002-04:00

Just four days until I attempt to cover FIFTY MILES on foot. I've been doing pretty well with not getting nervous, mostly because I've been treating the distance as something abstract. After all this is supposed to be an initial test to see whether or not I'm ready to attempt a hundred miler later this year. However, now the reality is starting to sink in. I see something that is fifty miles away, and I think, that's a looooong way, and I'm going to try to run that far! I know I have the training, but this will still be the unknown. As the distance increases past the marathon, the potential for problems doesn't just increase mathematically, but it increases exponentially. A blister at mile 24 of a marathon is no big deal, but a blister at that point in a fifty miler means running a whole marathon with a blister. Also, hydration, nutrition, electrolytes become more and more important as the length of the race increases. I think I have a good plan, and the weather forecast promises perfect conditions, but I'm also ready to be flexible as things can and will change.

Speaking of my plan, here it is. I would like to complete the 50 miles in under 12 hours. I'm going to start with walking 1.5 minutes out of every 10 minutes. I'll be keeping an eye on my heart rate, and when it starts getting higher (for me about 160 bpm) I'll increase the amount of walking. The course consists of four 12.5 mile loops so I hope to do the first loop in 2:40, the second loop in 2:50, third in 3:00, and the fourth in 3:10. That adds up to 11:40 which gives me 20 minutes for bathroom stops, changing shoes, aid station stops, and the unexpected.

My pie in the sky goal is 11:30. If everything goes right, the weather stays perfect, I don't have to slow down too much, and I don't dawdle at the aid stations, that just might be possible.

I'm starting to make a mental packing list which I'll turn into a written one tomorrow. In the meantime, I'm still not tapering too much, in fact I ran an 8 mile interval session today. Oops!

I'm a Terrible Taperer

2010-03-18T18:03:00.003-04:00

Less than two weeks until I attempt to run FIFTY MILES for the first time. I know I should be tapering, but I'm feeling great and my legs want to keep running. Here's what I've been doing so far this week after my six hour treadmill session on Friday:

Saturday - 5 miles in 58:19 running around my neighborhood.

Sunday - 4.27 miles in an hour. This was a hill workout on the hotel treadmill, I alternated 1/2 mile walking with the incline at 8, and 1/2 slow running level and 5.3 mph.

Monday - 10 mile tempo run on the hotel treadmill, 1 mile warm-up at 5.1 mph, 5 miles at 5.5 mph, 1 mile at 5.6 mph, 1 mile at 5.7 mph, 1 mile at 5.8 mph, 1 mile cool-down at 5.1 mph.

Tuesday - 5 miles in 56:47 running around the neighborhood.

Wednesday - 5 miles in 57:43 on the treadmill.

Today - 10 miles in 1:55:00 on the Peachtree City golf cart paths. I saw this guy on my last mile. He is some kind of heron or egret (my bird identification isn't very good).

Six Hours

2010-03-12T21:14:00.003-05:00

Today I scheduled myself for a six hour time on feet long run. Since it was raining and the forecast called for thunderstorms, this was my home for six hours today.

As you can see, I basically moved in at my gym. I had two bottles of Gatorade, two bottles of water (I did refill one of them), Pringles, cookies, and S-caps. I can tell you that I did get some strange looks when I took my "aid station" breaks for either Pringles or cookies.

I had hoped to log 27-30 miles, but I pooped out after about 2 hours and had to increase my walking time. I ended up with only 26.35 miles for a pace of about 13:40. The previous two weeks have been fantastic with my long runs, tempo runs, intervals, etc. so I figure I was due for a not so great run. Besides, my last two long runs were in great weather outside, so that helped the pace, I'm sure.

Now I am officially in taper mode. In two weeks I'll be attempting 50 miles for the first time. I'm hoping to finish in under 12 hours. I think I'll need to be able to do that in order to have a realistic shot of making a 30 hour cutoff for my 100 mile attempt.

The Streak Is Over

2010-03-03T17:40:00.002-05:00

I didn't run yesterday. Not because I was injured, or overtrained, or didn't have time. I just felt, eh, lets take a day off, and I did. So, my longest running streak ended at 65 days. My current run streak is now 1 day. I had a nice little tempo run on the treadmill. After a 1 mile warm-up, I did 4 miles @ 5.5 mph, 1 mile @ 5.6 mph, and 1 mile @ 5.7 mph, followed by a 2 mile cool-down. Total distance was 9 miles in a time of 1:40:06.

Monster Week

2010-02-28T21:04:00.002-05:00

I ran 69.3 miles this week! I think that has to be my all-time high weekly mileage. My monthly total was 223 miles which is also an all-time high and that was in only 28 days. So far I've been able to up my mileage while continuing to be injury-free.

Here's how the week added up:

Monday - 10 miles in 1:59:24, this was an interval session and I tried something different. I ran 16 200s at an 8:00 pace. The rest of the 10 miles was a warm-up, recovery between the intervals (walk at a brisk pace for 1:30) and finished up with slow running.

Tuesday - 5 miles in 58:40

Wednesday - 10 miles in 1:57:31

Thursday - 5 miles in 59:21

Friday - 4 miles on a sucky hotel treadmill, alternated power walking up an incline with slow running with no incline.

Saturday - 10.13 miles in 2:01:07

Sunday - 25.17 miles in 5:00:00

This week I plan to pull back about 15% before one last monster week and then taper time for my 50 miler!

Hello Spring

2010-02-20T17:14:00.003-05:00

I just got back from a great 15 mile run. The temperature was around 60, and the sun was shining so I could soak up lots of Vitamin D. I ran at a comfortable pace and finished in 2:53:18 for a pace of 11:34. This brings my running streak to 56 days. (They actually put a new belt on the world's suckiest treadmill so I was able to keep the streak alive!)

A quick review of my training this week:
Sunday - 3.93 miles on the treadmill, alternating half miles; an incline of 8.o and speed of 3.5 mph with slow running at 5.3 mph and zero incline
Monday - 9.23 miles in 1:50:00
Tuesday - 4.74 miles in 55:00
Wednesday - 9.7 miles in 1:50:00, this was a tempo run with 6 miles at a 10:54 pace
Thursday - 4.64 miles in 55:00
Friday - 4.88 miles in 55:00

Total mileage for the week was 52.12 miles. Next week's long run will be a 5 hour Time On Feet exercise at my ultra pace, I also plan on doing intervals one day next week. Five weeks until the 50 miles at Umstead.

Streaking

2010-02-13T14:11:00.002-05:00

Today marked my 49th day in a row of running at least 3 miles a day. I have been lucky enough to stay healthy so far and my training is going very well. Tomorrow may be a day off, I'm staying at a hotel with the world's suckiest treadmill and the forecast is for a high of 27 and a 40% chance of snow. Right now the plan is to do a "hill" workout on the sucky treadmill. It is terrible to run on, but tolerable for walking, so I'm planning on cranking the incline up to 10-12 and then power walking for 45 minutes. Or, I may be surprised and they bought a new treadmill since the last time I was there. (yea right, in this economy they are going to spend a couple of thousand dollars on a new treadmill)

This weeks mileage was a grand total of 55 miles thanks to two long runs this week. Because of my schedule I had to do last week's long run this Monday and this week's long run on Friday. I had planned on doing mile repeats on Wednesday, but failed miserably. I had scheduled myself for 4 one-mile repeats at a 10:00 pace with recovery miles at a 12:00 pace. I managed to get two before dying and finishing the run at a slow pace. However, I was able to recover nicely for my 4 hour run yesterday. I ran at my ultra pace, which is 8.5 minutes running and 1.5 minutes walking, and managed to log 18.5 miles in the 4 hours.

Six weeks until my big first test of 50 miles at Umstead, I'm starting to get excited!

Not One, But Two!

2010-02-06T16:27:00.003-05:00

If you look to the right at my race schedule you will see that I have chosen which 100 mile race will be my first attempt...the Burning River 100. But wait, it also says Javelina Jundred. Have I lost my marbles? Probably, but indulge me while I discuss my rationalization.

After doing a lot of research, I decided to run Burning River for several reasons. It is easy for me to get there, there isn't a lot of high terrain, and previous runners have assured me it is well supported and a good fit for first-timers. My hand was actually shaking as I clicked the "submit" button for my entry, but I did it, I entered my first 100 mile race.

Then Jessica had to comment on my blog and offer to pace me. (Even though I've never met you, I think blog comments count as a written contract, so I'm counting on you for at least 30 miles) I looked at the dates and realized there were three months between the races. I should be recovered in three months, right? RIGHT?? Before I knew it, I was filling out another race entry form and clicking the "submit" button again.

Both of these races have the potential of filling up which is why I am entering so early. They also have an option of getting a partial refund if you back out by a certain deadline, so its not like I'm taking a spot from someone else.

Having these two runs on my calendar gives me several options. The best option of course is to run and complete both of them. If, however, something goes wrong on my first race, I can learn from my mistakes, have three months to recover, and still have an entry spot to the Javelina Jundred. If Burning River takes too much out of me, I can still run the JJ100 and take the "wimp out" option and run 100k.

So, how is that for rationalization? Here I am, longest run to date is only 37 miles, and I have not one, but two 100 milers on my calendar. Please tell me I'm not insane!

Recovery Week

2010-01-25T19:36:00.002-05:00

I'm feeling great after my marathon last week. I did mostly slow miles this week and ran a total of 38 miles averaging about 12 minute miles. The distances varied from a low of 3 miles to my long run of 15 miles, which felt amazingly good. This week I'm going to start ramping up for my 50 miler in two months. My plan is to run between 40-60 miles a week with long runs of 15 miles alternating with time on feet "long runs" of between four and six hours. The time on feet runs will be done running with walk breaks of one to two minutes every 10 minutes of running. Also, I plan to do one interval, tempo, or hill workout each week. I'd also like to do some strength training at the gym, I'm very bad about lifting weights, but I feel I will need it.

In other news, I'm getting closer to a final decision as to what race I will attempt as my inaugural 100 miler. Right now, the Burning River 100 in Ohio is running first, with the Lean Horse in South Dakota and the Javelina Jundred in Arizona tied for second.

Negative Split

2010-01-20T09:29:00.008-05:00

When I ran the Grandma's Marathon last June and experienced the smack-down she gave me and resultant Personal Worst time, I had pretty much decided that I didn't really like marathons that much and would stick mostly to ultras. Then I ran the PF Chang's Rock N Roll Arizona Marathon for the second time on Sunday. Now I may like marathons again.

I arrived in Phoenix on Thursday, within 15 minutes of my brother and sister-in-law and at the next gate. They rented a car and we were on our way to Casa Mom and Dad for a nice visit. We spent the days leading up to the marathon visiting, celebrating our Mom's 84th birthday, carbo-loading, playing cards (for nickels), driving to Tucson to visit my favorite aunty and celebrating her birthday, and relaxing. We also took in the race expo and heard Dean Karnazes speak.

The Race

Race morning arrived with perfect weather, the temperature at the start was right around 50 degrees. The three of us (brother, sister-in-law, and me) got ourselves ready. I needed to make one last porta-pottie stop. The lines near the start corral were very long, so I backtracked to some where the lines weren't nearly as long. As a result, I didn't get to my corral until shortly before the start. I had hoped to run into Sole Mama (she ran 14 miles from her house to the start, THEN ran the marathon for a total of 40 miles, take THAT Dean Karnazes!) at the start, but my late arrival in the corral didn't give me enough time to look for her.

My training the last couple of months had me thinking of this as more of a training run, my long runs had been terrible with lots of walking breaks, my tempo runs were anemic, and when I looked back at my training for last year's race, I saw that my long runs were at a pace 20-30 seconds per mile slower than last year. If there had been a 5:30 pacer, I would have run with that group, but the choices were only 5:00 and 6:00, so I decided to run at my own pace.

Running at the slower pace and without my tunes (my armband thingy broke the day before) I was able to chat with folks here and there, do a little eavesdropping on others, and spot the many Vikings fans lining the course. I talked a bit with two Team In Training gals from Minnesota about the hot Grandma's marathon last year, met one guy running his 50th + marathon with a titanium hip, offered words of encouragement to several Marathon Maniacs on the course, and followed a guy in an outrageous orange outfit and hat that stopped to dance with every band on the course. I had followed him for several miles last year, so I pulled up next to him and we talked for a while. One couple had me laughing to myself, seeing the 11 mile sign, they told each other that they were halfway there. I didn't have the heart to tell them otherwise! At the six mile point on the course, a gal that I've known for over 10 years, but never met in person had a cheering section set up just for me. She had a huge sign with my name on it, and had several of her friends there to cheer me on. Apparently she had set up smaller signs along the way several blocks before in a kind of Burma Shave style, but I missed seeing those. It was great to finally meet her in person, even though it was only for about 10 seconds. At the 22 mile point I had another cheering section, my mom and dad were out there and this year my mind was clear and I could appreciate them being there. I even "made" my 84 year old mom run with me. I was expecting her to do maybe a brisk walk with me, but she broke out into an actual jog! We need to find her a 5K to enter that has age group medals, she would smoke the competition!

Now for the numbers, I'm going to list this years times compared to last years. You'll see that I started out much slower, and that worked out very well for me.

First 5 miles: Last year 55:40 This year 58:05

Miles 5 - 10: Last year 55:16 This year 58:11

Miles 10 - 15: Last year 55:09 This year 58:20

Miles 15 -20: Last year 58:23 This year 58:18

Miles 20 - 25: Last year 59:11 This year 55:05!

Last 1.2: Last year 14:44 This year 11:25!

As you can see, I started much slower than I did last year, and instead of fading after mile 15, I kept a constant pace all the way to mile 22 where I then put the hammer down (and boy was that fun, not only did I start running faster, I started high-fiving the cheerleaders and volunteers). My pace for for the first 22 miles was consistently between 11:30 and 11:45. I was thinking I would finish right around 5:05. Then I picked up the pace. The 23rd mile was 10:58 and I was feeling good, so I kept it there. The 24th mile was 10:50. I'm still feeling amazingly good, so I picked it up again. Mile 25 was 10:25! Halfway into mile 25, my brother met up with me. I told him I was feeling unbelievably great. He then told me that the 5:00 pacer was just ahead of me and asked if I was going to catch him. I looked at my watch and realized that I was too close to five hours not to go for it. Crap! Just past the 25 mile mark, I kicked it up another notch. My brother cautioned me not to start my final kick too early, I still had a long mile to go. We passed the final water station and I decided to try drinking from a cup while running. (I always slow to a walk at the water stations) I was half successful. I managed half a swallow of water, didn't snort any up my nose, and only got half a cupful in my shoe. I'm still feeling great, but about a half mile from the finish, I'm thinking that maybe my brother was right with his cautionary words. Thank goodness for sibling rivalry. There was no way I was going to slow down now. I ran the last 1.2 miles at a 9:15 pace! You have to understand, the fastest mile I've ever run when just running one measly mile was 8:48 and here I am running the last mile of a marathon almost that fast. I did approach the puke threshold and reached a new max heart rate, but I crossed the finish line hand-in-hand with my brother, a smile on my face, and hands raised in victory rather than surrender.

Final time 4:59:24. A negative split by about 4 minutes.

I still like ultras better, but I no longer dread the marathon.

Oh, before I forget, some charts for the math and chart geeks out there. These charts show pace versus average pace. The first one is from the Grandma's Marathon Massacre, and the second one is from the victory in Arizona.

Weight Loss Thoughts

2010-01-11T08:27:00.002-05:00

Last year I set a goal of losing 10 pounds. I didn't do that, but I didn't gain any weight either. I arrived at that goal weight from this website that calculates your "happy weight". This year I'm once again going to try to reach my happy weight. As an added incentive, I've calculated that when I do my 100 mile run later this year, if I am carrying an extra 10 pounds of weight, that's the equivalent of carrying an extra ONE THOUSAND pounds for a mile. That sounds like a lot, and it is. Maybe reducing my load by that much will be the incentive I need. I've already lost one pound, so nine more to go.

Training continues to go well. Tuesday I ran 7.79 miles in 90 minutes. Wednesday I ran 3.81 miles in 45 minutes. Thursday was interval day, after a one mile warm up, I did 2 x 400 @ 6.4 mph, 4 x 800 @ 6.2 mph, and 2 x 400 @ 6.4 mph. I then did a cool down for a total of 7.72 miles in 90 minutes. Friday was 3.81 miles in 45 minutes and Saturday was 3.35 miles in 40 minutes. Yesterday was a 15 mile long run in 3:10:16 for an average pace of 12:42, a lot slower than I would have liked to run.

The PF Chang Rock and Roll Marathon is less than a week away. My brother will be leading the 3:40 pace group again and my sister-in-law will be attempting to BQ. It is also my mom's birthday, so no matter how fast I run, it will be an enjoyable visit with family.

Change in Plans

2010-01-04T11:00:00.002-05:00

Last summer I announced that I would run a 4:45 marathon this January at the PF Chang's Rock N Roll Arizona Marathon (PFCRNRAZ). For the most part, my training went well. However, the last couple of months, the wheels seem to have fallen off. My long runs are hit and miss. For example, two weeks ago I did an OK 20 mile run, last week was a very good 15 mile run, but yesterday was a terrible 20 mile run. Also, my speedwork has been off and on. I had the great Yasso 800 workout a couple of weeks ago, but last week I could only manage 3.5 miles at marathon pace for my tempo run.

So, where does this leave me? I could try for the 4:45 and fail miserably. I could try for a PR (4:58:22 or faster). Or, in light of my big, huge, monster goal for 2010, I could treat this as a training run. I have my first 50 mile race on the schedule for March 27th, and I don't want to burn myself out for that. Soooooo, what my plan is as of this minute is to hang out with the 5:30 pace group, treat this as a training run, not do a taper, and most importantly, spend some quality family time.

As far as keeping you guys posted with my training...like I said, my 20 mile run was terrible. The first 5 miles were fine, but then I had to slow down. I managed the slower pace for about 10 miles, but for the last 5 miles, I had to mix in a lot of walking. The 20 miles took me 4:26 for a 13:18 pace. Today I did an easy 45 minute run on the hotel treadmill. I covered 3.83 miles for an 11:45 pace.

2010 Goal

2010-01-02T15:28:00.003-05:00

Yes, goal as in singular. Unlike last year, where I had a list of goals, this year I only have one.

RUN ONE HUNDRED MILES

Of course there are lots of sub goals, but they all are in support of reaching the big one hundred. Things like eating healthier, losing the ten pounds I didn't lose last year, running more, running several ultras leading up to my big goal, etc, etc. I am also going to try to track my training on this blog. Unlike the marathon where there are dozens of training programs to choose from, for a hundred mile race, not so much. So, just in case someone else out there thinks they might want to tackle something like one hundred miles, I'm going to be nice and boring and list all my runs, so you can follow along. You can see what works and doesn't work and maybe learn from my mistakes and successes. I am just an ordinary runner, I don't have extraordinary speed or endurance, just a lot of stubbornness and OCDness. So follow along on my journey and see where it takes me this year.

On that note, my running streak this year is two days. Yesterday I ran 4.23 miles on the treadmill in 50 minutes. Today I ventured outside in the cold (my brother is laughing at me because it was MINUS 30 degrees where he lives this morning, and I'm calling 35 degrees cold) and ran 4.4 miles in 50 minutes. Tomorrow is a 20 mile long run.

How Did I Do?

2009-12-31T17:11:00.002-05:00

Time for the obligatory look back at 2009 and see how well I did in achieving the goals I set for myself a year ago. Surprisingly I accomplished very few of them. That's not to say my year hasn't been a success, though. It just means that it took a turn that I did not expect!

Here are the goals from a year ago and how I did.

Run the marathon that I trained for and finish it strong enough that I want to run another one.
-Yes!

Train for and run a second marathon.
-Did that too, although this one was almost 40 minutes slower than my first one.

Log at least 2000 miles.
-Checked that one off, too. I ran a grand total of 2146 miles.

Run a sub 30 minute 5K.
-I came close, ran a 31:05 AND placed first in my AG (only one in my age group)

Run a sub 60 minute 10K.
-Didn't even run a 10K this year, probably because I ran 5 ultras instead.

Stay injury free.
-Check.

Lose 10 pounds.
-Nope, but I didn't gain any weight, either.

As you can see, I did pretty well meeting my goals, but my running took a turn towards the darkside of running ultras, something I did not anticipate at all, but a turn I'm glad I took.

A Treat For My Readers

2009-12-23T14:01:00.004-05:00

Since I am in the home state of Gayla Peevey, I am sharing my favoritest Christmas song. Enjoy!

Also, I finally got a hippopotamus for Christmas this year. My mom sent me a blue webkinz one :)

Maybe I Don't Suck

2009-12-16T18:17:00.002-05:00

The last couple of weeks have not been good training weeks. Especially my long runs. Every time I run longer than 2.5 to 3 hours, I end up having to take walk breaks. This was not looking good for attempting a 4:45 marathon in Arizona in January. Then today I decided to do Yasso 880s. Basically Yasso 880s are half mile intervals at your goal marathon time. In other words, since my goal is a 4:45 marathon, I should run my half mile intervals in 4 minutes 45 seconds, or a 9:30 pace. I planned on doing 10 of them, but I had a back-up failure plan of backing off the pace if I needed to. I warmed up for a mile, then started. Since it was about 20 degrees outside, I did these on the treadmill. The first couple almost seemed easy, and even after 6 or so, I was still going strong. I finished the last of them at the same 6.3 mph on the treadmill and then finished at an easy run pace for a total of ten miles. A very successful workout that tells me one of two things. Either I don't suck as much as I thought I did, or the treadmill wasn't calibrated correctly. Either way, I still need to get in a couple of good, solid long runs in the next couple of weeks in order to meet my goal.

What Was That?

2009-12-12T17:00:00.003-05:00

Either I ate something bad, or I had a some sort of stomach flu bug. Last night I woke up at 2:30 AM feeling terrible. I was drenched in a cold sweat, my stomach hurt, I was nauseous, and my bed was spinning like I had a three martini midnight snack. I managed to stagger to the bathroom where I spent about 30 minutes, and made it back to bed. This morning I was feeling better, but it was obvious my planned long run was not going to happen today. But then I got to thinking. I've read a lot of 100 mile race reports and talked to a couple of 100 mile veterans. There will be a 99.9% chance that at some time during my 100 mile run attempt next year, something will go wrong. It may be blisters, it may be muscle cramps, it may be fatigue, it may be nausea, but at some point, I'll have to make myself continue when either my mind or body is telling me to quit. So, I decided today would be a perfect time to make myself run while not feeling 100%. The run totally sucked, but I did it. My pace was slower than my slow run pace while my heartrate was faster than my tempo heartrate. However, I managed to slog 4.11 miles in 50 minutes. I'd like to report that the run made me feel better, it didn't, but at least it didn't make me feel any worse. Tomorrow, the long run is back on the schedule.

TWO THOUSAND MILES

2009-12-09T09:18:00.003-05:00

I did it, met another one of my goals. With my run this morning, I now have a grand total of 2005 miles for the year, and there are still three weeks of running left. The bad news is, this was the view for my 2000th mile.

I'm in Wichita, KS and the windchill is a bone-numbing MINUS 2 degrees. I have to pack four days worth of stuff in one rollie bag for my trips and that doesn't leave much room for cold weather running gear. Not that I would have run in this cold even if I had a parka, snow boots, and full face mask with me!

Pine Mountain 40 Volunteer Report

2009-12-07T11:17:00.004-05:00

Yesterday I got to spend some time freezing my buns off and cheering about 100 runners making their way through the trails at the FDR State Park near Pine Mountain, Georgia. I do have to say, volunteering at an ultra run is as much fun as running one (minus the endorphin rush of course). I got a really cool fleece cap, got to eat good quality junk food and awesome chili, got to cheer on some amazing runners, and soaked up as much ultra running information as I could from very experienced people.

There were four of us working the Rocky Point aid station which was the 17.5 and 24.5 mile point for the runners. Our supplies had been delivered earlier, so we just spread out the bounty and then waited for the runners to arrive. My job was to write down the times that runners arrived and to take pictures with my IPhone. While waiting, I got to talk to Mike who has run several 100 mile races. I soaked up as much information as I could and added another "easy" race to my list of possibles for my 100 mile attempt next year. So far the list includes Lean Horse, Heartland, Javelina Jundred, and now Burning River.

Soon the runners started arriving. Since the leaves had fallen already (and were covering the numerous rocks and roots) we could see them approaching from 100 yards away. We gave them welcoming whoops, then saw to their needs and sent them on their way. Most looked great, but there were a lot of bloody knees and more than one twisted ankle, but all them continued through our station. Apparently there were some stream crossings on the loop that went out to the TV tower and returned seven miles later. The first couple runners complained about the 4 stream crossings, but that increased every time someone came through, I think we reached a high of 20 stream crossing by the time the last runner returned. Kind of amazing what ultra running does to math skills.

Another thing I noticed was that no matter how bad someone looks, there is no telling when they will get a second wind. We had one dude come through that looked like death warmed over, just a few minutes ahead of cutoff. But, his spirits were good and he was quickly on his way. Later after we shut down the aid station and headed for the finish line, we got to see him finish well ahead of the cutoff and with a smile on his face. Another gal came into the station talking like she wanted to drop. She looked great and we were able to talk her out of it and she also finished under 10 hours.

I got to see some familiar faces, DavidRay, Susan, and Rob, and also got to meet some new people. This race looked like so much fun, I may have to run it next year. That is getting to be a problem, so many fun races, so little time, a wonderful problem to have.

The Sioux Falls Falls

2009-11-14T14:33:00.004-05:00

Or are they called the Falls of Sioux? At any rate, its another day and another chance to run in a runner friendly place. I started out heading north to see the falls that Sioux Falls, SD is named for, took a picture, and then ran south along the river. This day was planned to be a short easy run, but I came very close to changing plans and making it my long run, since I was told the path goes all around the city for 19 miles. I did stick with the plan though, and did 3.64 miles in 40 minutes. With all this fabulous fall weather I'm having a difficult time running slow, my easy days should be at a pace of 11:30 to 12:00 miles, but I'm finding myself running 11:00 miles. Here are the pictures I took on my run today.

Who Knew?

2009-11-13T13:04:00.004-05:00

I'm in Tulsa, OK today and went for a little run. The gal at the front desk said there was a running path along the river that was a couple of blocks away. Who knew that Tulsa was such an exercise friendly city? There were actually TWO paved paths along the river, one for runners and walkers and one for bicyclists. No worries about getting run over. Also, on part of the trail, there was a lane of fine gravel to run on if you didn't want to run on asphalt, and lots of grass on either side if you wanted an even softer surface. I ended up doing a little over 7 miles and was pleased with my splits when I downloaded them, each mile was faster than the one before!
Mile 1 11:37
Mile 2 11:15
Mile 3 11:12
Mile 4 11:03
Mile 5 10:48
Mile 6 10:46
Mile 7 10:35
I think it helped just a little bit that I had a 15 mph tailwind on the way back.

Here's a picture of where I ran, the path on the right is for bicyclists, the one to the left for runners. You can see the gravel lane to the left of the running path. Also, you can see a statue of a running dude in the middle.

Peachtree City 50K Race Report

2009-11-11T07:18:00.004-05:00

When I ran the Darkside 8 hour run in May, my prize for placing 2nd female was $20 off the entry for this race, so obviously I HAD to run it. That and the fact that it is just 10 miles from where I live and the site of most of my long runs, there was no way I wouldn't run this race.

The course is run on paved golf cart paths in Peachtree City. There are no hills, no roots, no rocks, just a pretty run through the woods. A perfect venue to attempt a PR.

Race morning was perfect. Temperatures were in the upper 30's and forecast to get into the low 70's with not a cloud in the sky and low humidity. I was surprised to see a pretty large crowd. There were about 40 runners doing the 50K and about 40 runners doing the 25K and about 10 who were already out on the golf cart paths having taken advantage of the early start option. Race Director Scott Ludwig gave us our instructions (follow the yellow chalk arrows) and at 7:30 AM we were off.

Since it was a little chilly, I started out with a long sleeved shirt over my short sleeved one and a pair of gloves. I quickly settled into my slow pace (walking 1 minute out of every 10). There was one race walker dude that zipped by me like I was standing still (he also looked to be in his 60s). I know the term for when I zip by a guy is that I chicked him, and when I zip by a younger guy I cougared him; but what is it called when an older gentleman zips by me walking? I'm going with polar beared until someone comes up with something better.

There were two aid stations on the 5.18 mile loop stocked with water, gatorade, animal crackers, pringles, pretzels, etc. I was using a handheld water bottle, so I filled up every other aid station and grabbed a handful of whatever looked appetizing at the time.

After the first lap, the temperatures warmed up, so I dropped off my gloves and long sleeved shirt at the start/finish/aid station and was on my way for the second lap. On this lap I caught up with race walking dude and I told him it wasn't fair that his walk was faster than my run. He was doing the 25K option and was hoping some day to work his way up to race walking a 50K.

My laps were very consistent, after the first two laps, I extended my walking breaks to 1.5 minutes out of every 10, and I was still completing a lap in about 1:01 to 1:02. The two leading guys each lapped me twice. On the fourth lap, Team Beth zipped by me. Finally, I was on the last lap and still holding my pace. I crossed the finish line in 6:13:14, a PR by over 24 minutes and my 5th ultra finish this year. Also good for 37th place out of 41 finishers. I really like the 50K distance, but I want to try for more next year.

If you are looking for a fast, no-frills 50K, this is the race for you. Lots of friendly people out having a good time Sunday morning/afternoon.

Fabulous Fall Weather = Fantastic Fast Times

2009-11-03T20:12:00.002-05:00

The plan was for a nice easy 90 minute run along the same golf cart paths that I will be running on Sunday during the Peachtree City 50K. After the first mile, the 65 degree temperature, the low humidity, the clear blue sky, the leaves committing suicide, and the smell of pine needles all combined to make my pace faster than planned. Rather than slowing down, I decided to go with it. I pushed a bit on the uphill inclines and let myself fly on the slight downhill sections. What had been planned as an easy run turned into a nice little 8 mile tempo run at an 11:00 pace. Boy, I love fall running!

Thinking Out Loud

2009-11-02T07:38:00.002-05:00

I took a glance at my goals for this year a couple of days ago and was surprised to see that I've accomplished very few of them. My running has taken on a whole new direction and one that I'm very happy about. Instead of setting PR's in the 5K and 10K (I haven't run any 10Ks and only one 5K) I've joined the darkside. There is no way I imagined I would be running 5 ultras in one year.

So, this got me thinking about next year. I'm going to type this out loud. I'm thinking of running 100 miles. ONE HUNDRED MILES. Not in a month, not even in a week, but in a little more than a day.

I've come up with a very preliminary route to get there. I'll be running the 50 mile option at Umstead in March. Then maybe the 24 hour FANS run in Minnesota in June. If I'm able to get in 70-80 miles without killing myself, I'll look for an "easy" 100 mile race for my debut. I definitely want to pick one out while I'm NOT drinking wine. So, I'm looking at races between August and October. Lean Horse is one of the options, as is the Javelina Jundred (although I noticed a 50% DNF rate at that one).

If anyone has any other ideas, please leave them in the comments.

An Easy 20

2009-10-26T09:22:00.005-04:00

Ok, it was an easy 15 followed by a not too difficult 5, but one year ago I would never have imagined using the qualifier "easy" in front of a 20 mile run. I am slowly becoming what back then I thought of as one of "those" runners. Of course if you believed the runners quoted in last weeks NY Times, I am one of the people ruining the marathon. Hey, I train just as hard for my marathons as any middle of the pack runners. I do long runs, tempo runs, intervals on the track, and hill repeats. But since I have not been blessed with fast genes (my brother managed to get all those), my time is a "joke" and I don't deserve a finishers medal or T-shirt. That article really got me steamed up, even though I know it shouldn't. The plus side is, I saw one letter to the editor that I really got a kick out of:

To the Sports Editor:

I couldn’t agree more with the women’s cross-country coach Adrienne Wald, who said, “It’s a joke to run a marathon” in six or more hours.

In 2007, at age 70, I completed my 32nd marathon. I take great pride in telling people I did it in 2 hours 245 minutes 28 seconds.

Peter H. Reader

Portland, Ore.

That definitely put a smile on my face. I guess there is a reason I've done 4 ultras this year and only 2 marathons. Ultra runners are much more all inclusive and welcoming. Although I do wonder how many hundreds of marathoners the writer had to interview to find the two elitist snobs that were willing to have their remarks quoted. I've only run across one jerk in real life who said after I told him my time of 4:58, "oh, you took your time, then." Of course I athlinked his ass when I got home and saw that he had only run one marathon and his time was 4:38 and he was 24 years younger than me at the time.

Wow, this post had a lot more ranting than I had intended, but at least now I can concentrate my efforts on my next event. The Peachtree City 50K in less than two weeks!

Cumberland Trail 50K Race Report

2009-10-15T10:16:00.005-04:00

This year has been a year of firsts for me. (Not bad for a 50 year old!) Every time I accomplish a new challenging task, I think, it can't get any better than this. My first marathon, my first ultra, my first 8 hour run. This race did not disappoint either. It was my first trail ultra, I was expecting to be tested both physically and mentally, and I was. And when I crossed the finish line, once again the thought that crossed my mind was, "It doesn't get any better than this!"

When I got to the race start it was dark with a light rain. Susan Donnelly gave us last minute instructions, lined us up behind the bicycle that would lead us down the paved path to the actual trail part of the course and we were off. I quickly established myself at the very back and settled into an easy pace. Within a mile we were on single track and starting our way on the Cumberland Trail. I think that running in the dark with a headlamp actually helped me out. I couldn't see far enough ahead to see the massive climb. All I could see was the next several yards, and anyone can climb 10 yards. After about 45 minutes I could hear the workers at the first aid station cheering, they could see my headlamp working its way up. The aid station workers were all fantastic, I think the volunteers at this race outnumbered the runners.

The next section was the steep climb up Cross Mountain. As it was still pretty dark, I didn't feel overwhelmed by the 2000' climb in the next 2.5 miles. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other. I remember a lot of rocks stairs, log stairs, slipping, and my glasses fogging up. One interesting side note, in these conditions my glasses were a very effective heart rate monitor. Every time my heart rate got above 160, my glasses would fog up. This section took me about 1 hour and 15 minutes, and boy was I glad to get to the top.

The next section was listed as 1.6 miles, but I think it was a little bit longer. I don't remember much and it took me about 33 minutes.

Now we come to what I call the middle section. It was 6.5 miles between aid stations. Initially downhill with some runnable sections, stream crossings, technical running. Then it was uphill and we turned off the single track on to an ATV trail that climbed the second major climb of the course. There were several runnable sections, but I found that my lack of trail running held me back. I was very tentative, especially on the downhill sections where I could have made up some time. It was on this section that I added about a mile to my run. The trail came down to a stream, then turned left to cross the stream. I failed to make the left turn and continued straight ahead. I was now on what I think was a jeep trail that was very flat and fast. I remember thinking about all the time I was making up flying down the road. After about 5 minutes, I started thinking, "wait a minute, I think this is too easy". I looked for trail markings (the trail was very well marked, I don't think you could go more than 50 yards without seeing some kind of marking) and didn't see any. Then I looked down for muddy foot prints (I was at the very back, remember, and there were always muddy foot prints to follow) and didn't see any. Oh crap, I missed a turn. I got out the course description that I was carrying with me, nope, this wasn't on the course description. So, I turned around and ran back. When I got to where I went wrong, I saw that not only did I miss about 4 red streamers and flags, I also crawled over not one, but TWO logs that were placed across the wrong way that I went. So, I crossed the stream and continued on my way. I almost started beating myself up about the lost time, but then I said to myself, "hey, look at the bright side, the way back is going to be one mile shorter!" I was about halfway through this middle section when the winner, Byron Backer came racing down the trail. I think his DNA should be tested, because I think he is part mountain goat. He won with an incredible time of 5:26. As I moved up the ATV trail, I started to see the other runners coming down, and by this time I was asking variations of the question, "Am I there yet?" Finally I could see the heads of the aid station workers about 30 feet directly above me, I remember thinking of asking them to lower a rope to help me climb the last bit to the aid station. This middle section took me over 2 hours. I guess I did cause some consternation while I was on my little detour. Sweeper Rob had passed me while I was off course, so when he arrived at this aid station and I hadn't been through yet, they started wondering what had happened to me. So when I arrived, I could hear shouts of "She's Here!"

Finally we got some "rest" from the technical up and down workout. This next section was on a gravel road and then through a meadow to the turnaround point. Near the turnaround was the highlight of the run. A huge mama elk was in the meadow for the entire race, just standing there watching the crazy people run through her territory. I would guess I passed not more than 50 feet from where she was standing. This easy 4 mile section took about 50 minutes.

The return took me just about as long. Even though it was net downhill, my tentative inexperience running trails kept me from making up any time. There was never a time where I felt that I couldn't do it, but there was a question of how long it would take me. Sweeper Rob Apple saw me looking at my watch a couple of times and he told me not to worry about cutoff times, but I still wanted to make a good showing. Finally, I got to the paved greenway into Cove Lake State Park, and knew I would finish. I actually started choking up with emotion at this time as I looked at my watch and saw that I had been accomplishing "relentless forward motion" for more than 10 hours, longer than I had ever done before. Then at last, I saw the finish line and the crowd cheering for me! I felt a fantastic sense of accomplishment as I crossed the line (even though my finish line photo may not look like it). Susan congratulated me and handed me my finishers award, an awesome SIGG water bottle with the race logo. Then, I got not a congratulatory handshake, but a big hug.

Post race refreshments included pizza and soda and I got to talk to some very experienced ultra runners and get advice on future races and training.

All in all an awesome experience, everything I was expecting and then some.

Now, how did I do with goal accomplishment? Lets review:
1. Don't get eaten by a bear. Check
2. Don't get gnawed on by smaller mammals. Check
3. Don't get bitten by any reptiles. Check
4. Don't get shot by over-anxious hunters. Check
5. Don't get lost. I'm going with a famous historical Cumberland Trail dude by the name of Daniel Boone and say I wasn't lost, just bewildered, Check
6. Don't fall down more than 3 times. There were a few times on some steep climb places where I slipped and did a slow lowering of my center of gravity, and a couple of times I pitched forward and caught myself with my water bottle, but I never did a full velocity fall on my knees or butt, so I'm saying Check
7. Don't break any bones. Check
8. Stay hydrated and electrolyted. Check, I think this is my strong suit, I was able to eat and drink the entire 10 hours and never had any stomach issues.
9. Successfully accomplish peeing and maybe pooping in the woods. Missed this one, I didn't have to stop once for bodily functions.
10. Run (or at least shuffle fast) into the aid stations. I missed this goal at one aid station, the one that had an almost vertical climb to get to.
11. Smile at the aid stations. Check. I couldn't help but smile at the loud cheering reception I got as I approached each aid station (being the last person may have had something to do with it).
12. Thank the aid station volunteers. Check
13. Stay positive. Check. I think this is my second strongest asset.
14. Make all the cutoff times. Nope, I did make the turnaround time, but my inexperience on downhills kept me from making the next two.
15. Finish within the 10 hour time limit. Nope, although the official time limit was increased to 10.5 hours.
16. Finish with a smile. Check (even though the picture looks like a grimace, trust me, its a smile!)
17. HAVE FUN! Check, CHECK, and CHECK!

Now for everyone that has stayed with me this far, here are some pictures courtesy of Van Young and Ray Smith.

OK, I don't have the technological skills to post their pictures on my blog, but you can see them here and here. Please go take a look, the course was absolutely gorgeous.

I Did It!

2009-10-10T18:47:00.003-04:00

I finished the Cumberland Trail 50K in 10:16. Boy that is a tough course. Although Race Director Susan is a sadist, she is a sadist with a heart of gold and presented me with my finishers award, even though I was 16 minutes past the cutoff. I accomplished 13 out of 17 of my goals, not bad for picking one doozy of an ultra for my first one. Full race report to follow.

One Week To Go

2009-10-03T16:42:00.002-04:00

I'm in taper mode and have extra time to think about my upcoming Cumberland Trail 50K. This run will have a lot of firsts for me. Its my first trail ultra, the first race with cutoff times to worry about, the first race where I'll need a headlamp, the first race that I'll probably finish last, and a whole lot more. I'll be the first to admit, I'm in way over my head with this race, but I'm determined to finish within the cutoff time since the race director says the finisher awards are going to be great.

So, in light of the challenges that face me, I've come up with a list of goals for my first trail 50K.

1. Don't get eaten by a bear
2. Don't get gnawed on by smaller mammals
3. Don't get bitten by any reptiles
4. Don't get shot by over-anxious hunters (It's apparently bow-hunting season)
5. Don't get lost
6. Don't fall down more than 3 times
7. Don't break any bones
Boy I sure have a lot of don'ts!
8. Stay hydrated and electrolyted
9. Successfully accomplish peeing and maybe pooping in the woods
10. Run (or at least shuffle fast) into the aid stations
11. Smile at the aid stations
12. Thank the aid station volunteers
13. Stay positive
14. Make all the cutoff times
15. Finish within the 10 hour time limit
16. Finish with a smile

And the number one goal:

HAVE FUN!

Return to Stone Mountain

2009-09-24T15:14:00.008-04:00

I drove to Stone Mountain with every intention of kicking it's butt, however, my butt was what got kicked. My excuses are numerous: it was hotter than last time, it was more humid than last time, I was slightly dehydrated, I think I'm on the verge of overtraining, and I went up too fast during my first ascent. In fact, my first up and down time was a full two minutes faster than it was two weeks ago. But boy did I pay the price the second time up. I could tell you that the reason I stopped several times was to take some pictures, but that would be a lie. The fact is, I was totally pooped. Hopefully I learned some things from today about pacing up steep climbs that I can use in a little more than two weeks. It was also good for me to practice keeping going even when my legs felt like lead. Good thing its almost taper time, I think this is the first time I've actually looked forward to the taper.

Here are the pictures:

This doesn't look too bad, just a little hike in the woods.

Now its getting steeper.

Are we there yet?

Cheaters getting off the gondola.

The rewarding view after getting to the top. Its a little too hazy in this picture, but that's the Atlanta skyline way down below.

Hill Repeats

2009-09-17T11:59:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I ran what I thought at the time (notice the past tense) was a great hill workout. There is a half mile hill (.47 miles according to Garmin) that climbs 100 feet. My calculator says that is about a 4.0 incline. My plan was to run up twice, power walk up once, and repeat for a total of an hour and 40 minutes. I ran down the hill at a medium pace for recovery. Keep in mind that less than two years ago, I couldn't make it up this hill once without maxing out my heart rate and being forced to walk.

My times for the uphill repeats were:
5:16 (11:01 pace) (My first marathon was 11:24 pace on a flat course)
5:39 (11:47 pace)
7:31 (15:49 pace) (Power walk which was faster than the pace I'll have to maintain at my upcoming 50K)
5:26 (11:26 pace)
5:40 (11:55 pace)
7:37 (16:04 pace)
5:41 (12:01 pace)
5:37 (11:53 pace)

I did 8.57 miles total in 1:40 for an average pace of 11:40. I was very happy with the result, especially since the temperature was 80 degrees with high humidity.

Then I read my brother's race report from the Superior Trail 50 mile race he completed this weekend.

Then I got an email from Susan Donnelly who is race directing the Cumberland Trail 50K I am running in about 3 weeks. She also ran at Superior, but she ran the 100 mile option, this after running the Mont Blanc 166K a mere two weeks prior to that. I had asked her, if she happened to run into my brother, to casually mention to my brother that her race was much tougher, but to not tell me if it actually was. (You know, kind of get some sibling one-upmanship) She did look for my brother, but since they were running at different times, they never did get to meet each other. Then, apparently she forgot about the not telling me if it actually was tougher part. Here a few quotes from her email. "Believe me, your race will be a comparable challenge to his. They have an easier course." "It's going to be a small, intimate group (15 with several more possibles, only one other woman) of really good runners" (the bolding is mine). At least I've got second place female locked up!

This will definitely be my most challenging run to date. I'm looking forward with anticipation and a whole lot of trepidation. I'm working on a list of goals for this race which I will post in the future. (One of them is: Don't get eaten by a bear)

I'm In!

2009-09-09T16:30:00.002-04:00

I wasn't even drinking an adult beverage at the time, but I've registered for the 50 mile option of the Umstead 100 next March. Good thing I type fast, because apparently it sold out in less than 10 minutes. This ultra thing is getting to be thing for me, even folks at work are asking about when my next crazy endeavor is. Every race I seem to try some new or more difficult, where will it end, who knows?

Now I'm Scared

2009-09-03T14:13:00.004-04:00

Since the 50K I'm running next month promises not only hills, but mountains, I figured I better get some hill training under my belt. When I was flying last week, I noticed that Stone Mountain (the world's largest 2nd place trophy) looked pretty vertical and wondered if there were any trails up it. So, I checked it out on the internet and sure enough, there was a trail that went all the way to the top. From the website, it looked to be a little over a mile with about 600' of elevation gain. From what I've learned about the Cumberland Trail 50K, the climb up Cross Mountain is 1900' of elevation gain, three times the Stone Mountain climb!

This morning the weather looked good, so I decided to drive up there and give power hiking up a mountain a try. First I had to battle Atlanta morning rush hour traffic. I finally arrived and decided I would go up and down the mountain three times. That would give me a total climb equal to the first climb on my 50K. The first part wasn't too bad, and I easily maintained the 19:20 pace that I'll have to average to make the time cutoffs. However, the trail quickly became more technical with rocks and roots, and then became very steep. There is one section that is so steep, they have handrails to hold on to. I didn't use them on the way up, but I did use them on the way down to keep from falling. The first time up took me 23:28 and was at a 22:15 pace with 680' of climb. The trip down wasn't a whole lot faster, since it was too technical, too steep, or both to get going very fast. The downhill took me 17:53 which was a 17:17 pace. Second time up was 23:27 pace and down was 17:42 pace. Third time, I went only 3/4 mile up (but it did include the steepest part) and pace was 23:38 up and 17:38 down. Overall I covered 5.65 miles in 1:54:44 for a 20:18 pace.

Here's where the scary part comes in. I have to cover 31 miles in 10 hours which is the aforementioned 19:21 pace. As you can see, my average pace this morning was about a minute slower. I'm hoping that there will be some runnable sections on the course to make up some time, because if it is all technical ups and downs, I'm going to be in big trouble! I plan on doing this at least one more time in the next month, along with the little ups and downs in my neighborhood.

For anyone interested here is what Mr Garmin said my run looked like:

Oh, and next time I'll try to remember my camera, the views from the top of the mountain were incredible.

Great Track Workout Today

2009-08-24T10:48:00.007-04:00

My very first interval workout on the track was about 6 weeks ago and I was very happy with it. My assignment then was 8 x 400 at 2:21 per interval. I ended up doing them in about 2:13. This time coach made things tougher. My assignment was 3 x 400, 2 x 800, 3 x 400. My plan was to run the 400s in under 2:15 and the 800s in under 4:40.

The weather this time was perfect, 60 degrees, it almost felt chilly after the hot days we've been having. I ran 1.5 miles at a 12:00+ pace as a warmup, and then got down to business.

1st 400: 2:08.5 (ut oh, I'm starting out too fast, I'll be dead by the time I finish)
2nd 400: 2:09.5 (ok, a little slower, but I still need to slow down more)
3rd 400: 2:07.2 (no! I said slow down, and now I have the dreaded 800s to do)
1st 800: 4:27.7 (boy, that hurt, and I'm still faster than I planned)
2nd 800: 4:30.4 (little closer to my planned pace, now all I have left are 3 easy peasy 400s)
4th 400: 2:09.6 (maybe I really am faster than I was a month ago)
5th 400: 2:06.5 (only one lap to go, maybe I can run it under 2:00?)
6th 400: 1:53.9 (yes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

I finished up with about 4 miles at about 11:30ish pace for a total of 8.7 miles in 1:40. Grade for this workout an A+!

On a final note did anyone see the IAAF men's marathon on Saturday. The number 2 guy really impressed me. He manage to puke and maintain his 5ish minute mile pace at the same time.

What Did I Do Now?

2009-08-21T11:46:00.002-04:00

I have read in other people's blogs about signing up for races after having a few adult beverages and I never thought it would happen to me. Well, never say never. I had a very long and tiring work week and was relaxing with some wine. Then I started catching up on some blogs and saw that veteran ultra runner Susan Donnelly was going to be race directing the inaugural Cumberland Trail 50K in Tennessee. I remember thinking, wow, that looks to be challenging, maybe I should sign up and run that. The next thing I knew, I was clicking on the "submit" button and I was entered!

Now in the light of day, I'm looking at more of the details. The course description contains words like rock staircase, switchbacks, 1900' climb, and stream crossing. What have I gotten myself into? I'm going to plan to "run" this as more of a power hike outing with occasional bits of running, unlike my previous ultras which were running interspersed with walk breaks. There is a time limit of 10 hours, which I should be able to do.

Now I'm off to run some hills to get in shape!

Tough Workout

2009-08-19T09:09:00.002-04:00

This week I was expecting to have a tempo run assignment from my coach, but he decided to mix it up a bit. Instead of a 4 mile tempo run, he suggested "spicing things up a bit" and run one mile at recovery pace, one mile at tempo pace, and repeat that four times for a total of eight miles. I was going to be in Flint, MI for my tempo run day, and there is a cemetery near our hotel that has a flat one mile loop, perfect for my run. Unfortunately our company changed hotels that we use. I researched the new hotel online and saw that it was within one block of the Flint River Trail. The website had pictures of smiling runners and families on bikes, and I thought, perfect! I should have known that what looks good on the internet isn't always the same in real life. The first 3/4 mile was as advertised, but then the path crossed a very busy road with no crosswalk. Then, about 1/4 mile after that, the neighborhood became bad, bad, very bad. We're talking burned out, boarded up buildings, two-toned cadillac pimpmobiles, and lots of gang graffiti. Then, I saw that the trail went under the Interstate bridge, a perfect hiding place for someone wanting to use my IPhone and Garmin to finance their drug habit. I quickly turned around and picked up my pace. For the rest of my run, I just ran back and forth along the safe 3/4 mile stretch.

As far as the run itself goes, I'm giving myself a solid C. For me, recovery pace is 12:00 miles, and a good tempo run pace for 4 miles is 10:30. The weather was a little warm, 80 degrees, with high humidity and no breeze. Here's how I did:

Mile 1 - 11:56
Mile 2 - 10:24
Mile 3 - 12:00
Mile 4 - 10:24
Mile 5 - 12:13 (heat is starting to get to me)
Mile 6 - 10:34
Mile 7 - 12:17
Mile 8 - First half mile in 5:22, then I died and walked the last half mile in 8:00

Can't wait to see what coach has in store for me next week!

Recovered

2009-08-13T11:23:00.000-04:00

I guess that 8 hour run took more out of me than I thought. That and I was fighting off a head cold last week. However, I'm back to normal again and training for my next race, the Darkside Peachtree City 50K on November 8th. This race is run on the golfcart paths in Peachtree City. It looks like they had 31 runners last year, so it should be a small fun race.

Mr. Garmin has returned from intensive care in Olathe, Kansas. For anyone with a dead Garmin that is outside it's warranty, I highly recommend their repair program. It cost me $79 and I basically got back a good-as-new Garmin 305 in less than two weeks. I think they also put in new guts because it seems to grab satellites about twice as fast as my old one did.

Hot 2 Trot Race Report

2009-08-03T19:04:00.000-04:00

Yes it was hot as advertised, but what a great event. I got there about 30 minutes early, and signed in and got my race number. Instead of the standard T-shirt, we got towels with the race logo printed on them. I actually used the towel during the race to wipe the sweat off my face, it really came in handy. Then I went back to my car, put foot potion on my feet and my number on my shirt. I also got to talk a bit with DavidRay and met Christian who was celebrating his 37th birthday and was planning on running at least 37 miles. Race director Sarah gave us final instructions (number one rule was "don't die"), we walked up the street about a block so the field of 50 runners would have time to spread out a bit, and then we were off.

It was a beautiful course and the trail was in perfect condition. Just wet enough to be soft, but not so wet as to be muddy. There was a boardwalk section that was slippery early in the day, and one "hill". I'm exaggerating when I say it was 20 feet high, but it was a good excuse to walk for a bit. The 1.12 mile loop actually seemed to get shorter with each lap for about the first four hours, but for me, one section that got longer each lap was the 2 block stretch on the street just prior to the lap counting station and the awesome lap counters. The fully stocked aid station was right after that and "Cold Water Dude" made sure everyone kept their water bottles filled.

I saw some people out on the trail that I had run with during the Darkside 8 Hour run. One gal was Karen who was running this as a training run for the Lean Horse 100 mile run later this month. I also saw Tom on the course, when I talked to him for a bit, he was hoping to cover at least 26.2 miles which would give him 301 marathons or greater. (I checked the results and he did reach 26.79 miles, even though he hadn't run since memorial day due to an illness!) I also ran a lap with fellow blogger DavidRay, check out his race report here, he always has an awesome report with great pictures.

As far as my race went, I don't think it could have gone any better. As disappointed as I was with my effort at Grandma's marathon, take the inverse of that, and that's as happy with my effort on Saturday. I started out slow running 8.5 minutes and walking 1.5 minutes. My plan was to maintain that for 4 hours and then add more walking for the last 4 hours. I actually was able to maintain my original pace for 6 hours and then went with 3.5 minutes running and 1.5 minutes walking. The hydration, electrolytation (yes its a new word I invented) and nutrition all went very well. I carried a water bottle and took a swallow or two every 10 minutes, took an S-cap every 40 minutes the first 4 hours and every 30 minutes the last 4 hours, ate something about every hour (the boiled potatoes dipped in salt seemed to hit the spot, plus I had a total of about 3 Oreo cookies), and had a cup of Gatorade about every hour. The last 3 hours, I substituted Coke for the Gatorade and that seemed to hit the spot. I had absolutely no cramping, sore legs, swollen hands, or anything else that one expects during an ultra. The only problem that came up was that after the race when I took my shoes and socks off, I noticed that two toenails were casulties. Somehow, I managed to get blisters UNDER the toenails. (no I won't show pictures, but if you google blister under toenail you'll see pictures that look exactly like my toes) After the race we had grilled hamburgers and leftover aid station goodies.

There were some very speedy people out on the trail. One gal (who I'm sure was less than half my age) named Kate seemed to lap me almost every lap. She managed to run more miles than the old male course record and covered an amazing 52.46 miles. Two guys ran 48 laps, setting a new male course record of 53.57 miles. As for me, I ran 30 laps for a total of 33.48 miles. I ran 16 laps the first 4 hours and 14 laps the last 4 hours. So I was very consistent and didn't slow down much at all. The heat acclimation runs the previous weeks really helped me, and I felt 100% better than I did during my last race.

Finally I want to leave you with a video that Rahn made of the hundred of pictures he took during the race. When you see a person with a white shirt and blue cap zip by, that's me. The best place to see me is around the 2:45 mark.

Hot To Trot Scouting Report

2009-07-31T18:04:00.000-04:00

There are no running specialty stores down where I live, so normally I drive up to Atlanta to the Big Peach Running Company to try on new shoes about once a year. I noticed on the web site that they also had a store in Decatur which is where the Hot To Trot run will be tomorrow. So....I killed two birds with one stone. I got some new shoes (New Balance 1062) and then drove out to the Clyde Shepherd Nature Preserve to get a sneak peek at the terrain.

It looks to be a fairly tame course, mostly covered with wood chips, but with the potential to be muddy after 50 pairs of feet run over it 30-40 times. There are no big hills, but there are some ups and downs. There are also some places with roots and rocks to navigate. The path we'll take tomorrow wasn't marked, but I did take some representative pictures.

It also felt like it could be very mosquitoey, so my bug spray is already in the car.

No New 310XT

2009-07-30T10:22:00.000-04:00

I had been hoping to be sporting the new Garmin 310XT by now, but alas, it was not to be. When I ordered it from Amazon, I was given an approximate shipping date of July 24th. Well July 24th came, and I checked my email 2-3 times (ok, it was closer to 10) hoping to get notification that my new best friend had been shipped and was on its way. Finally on the 25th, I got an email from Amazon. They had to back order it and it wouldn't ship until the middle of SEPTEMBER! So, it was time for option #2, rescusitate the original Mr Garmin. So, that's where I'm at now, Mr Garmin is in Kansas getting new innards and I'm running with a bare wrist. Its been difficult for me trying to train without knowing my heart rate. I would say I use the heart rate part of the watch for 75% of my information and the time/distance/pace part for about 25% of my information. Guess I'll just have to use the tried and true "talk test" for the Hot To Trot 8 Hour run on Saturday.

As far as training goes, I was able to get in a 4 hour and a 3 hour run/walk the last 2 weekends. For me, a ratio of 8.5 minutes running/1.5 minutes walking keeps me going for the longest time. So I will be starting with that on Saturday. I'm really looking forward to it, looks like there is a good chance for rain, so I'll probably wear shoes that are coming up on retirement mileage.