Rio Del Lago 2016 Edition

Well Hell!  I can't seem to keep up with anything lately.

I thought I would / should start keeping this maybe a bit more up to date if for no other reason than to keep me sane?

So after my failure at Run Rabbit Run because my lack of willpower!  I could have and should have finished that.  The more I think about it the more I realize I should have finished.

Rio Del Lago 2016 Edition

My training going into this had been lackluster at best, I think the highest milage I got in between RRR and RDL was 26 mile week?  I would have to go look it up.  This new job blah blah blah excuse excuse excuse...  I have excuses but they all mean nothing (David and Megan Roche on Time Management.  If I really want to make this a hobby worth pursuing then I need to put in the time my friends (John's Blog for example) do!

So a few weeks before race day I notice that Amy is looking for pacers I thought her hubby would pace her, but with their son maybe they couldn't get time away.  After she found a few volunteers, she messaged me and said John was all mine.  I had already turned down David to pace me because I didn't want to waste anybody's time.

I told John thanks and I would take his help but I turned very schizophrenic about this as the race day got closer and my training waned.  I told him about 2 weeks before not to bother it would be a waste of his time.  He said he was going to go and he would have his running shoes if I needed...

This is a fairly flat not super technical course.


Let's fast forward to race morning - I am actually feeling ok I knew this was going to just be a slow sufferfest, so I was resigned to that.

The start of RDL is 18 / 19 miles of flatish bike trail.  I went slow and tried to stay slow.  I did finish that section a bit faster than I should have in retrospect and that might have been my downfall.  I hadn't been training with any longer runs and my body was going to rebel.

I go through Beal's point (the start / finish) and head out to finally hit some trails, fireroad at first then some single track and the dreaded "meat grinder".  I was still feeling ok, but something was off.  At about mile 30+ I text John and tell him I need him.  He said ok of course!  I will get back to him later, but let me just give you the short version - without him I would never have finished, period and end of story!

Went through the meat grinder and some other parts - got scared to death by a photographer.

At about mile 40 with about 5 more miles to get to Overlook and see John I tell him I am quitting and that I just want a beer.

I also hear from my sister and tell her the same thing.  She said to wait and just give it to the next aid station - in my mind I said no :)

I am tired and I haven't pee'd in the past 40 miles while taking in a lot of fluid and some salt.  I think my body just didn't know what was going on since I have been a lazy f#$.

Of course I am f'ing tired but the pee'ing problem was going to be bad later.

Long story long I get to the next mini aid station before a 2 mile climb (easy climb though).  I am still pissed off tired and not feeling great.

I get into Overlook and I don't see John, the aid station worker gets my drop bag with head lamp and heavier jacket.  I get some food and start packing my stuff as an automatic response.  I finally try to look for john then pull out my phone and text him.

We finally find each other and then I start heading out.  He asked me if I was serious about the beer and I told him yes so he runs back and gets it when I start telling him my woes before it dawns on me I didn't quit and we made it out of the aid station.

He won't let me drink the whole beer, I am sad and still not pee'ing.  I was moving ok up to No Hands Bridge, this is when John said something flipped I stopped moving as well (could have been the big f'ing hill that we had to climb out :) )

We travel along and at one point I stop to try and pee and my right calf cramps up so bad it is a knot, John tries to massage it out and move my foot!  I was yelling so bad that someone came back to see if John was trying to kill me :) (I think he was).  From this point on I am moving slower and slower (20+ minute miles), I am not going to finish :(  I am getting a bit dizzy on the trail and John is keeping me on the trail.  People are passing me left and right.  One happens to be a DR, so John does a quick consult around my headache, lack of urination, cramping, and dizziness.  To me I am finished at the next aid station.  Especially since it is 8+ miles to the next aid station after this.

We finally get into that aid station, John talks to the medic, I don't remember much, just eating a lot of broth and grilled cheese.  I took some of Melanie's pain medication that I had with me, since the medic said it couldn't hurt.  We just left the aid station.  All this time I feel extremely bad for John since this isn't a pacer duty he is used to, he is very fast and his friends are very fast.  :(

After about 5 to 10 minutes out of that aid station, I started running (that might be a bit much but to me I felt like I was flying).  I was actually moving through the course and we made up a lot of time over the next 3 or 4 hours.

It all came crashing down around Overlook, I was still moving but pain medication was wearing off.  I continued to move ok and we were able to get through the last few aid stations.  John kept me moving I passed someone twice my age I think as my last big push ;)

Above is the race analysis you can kind of see what I had described.  

I finished.  I was happy and sad but this was the race I deserved.  Actually a lot more than I deserved.  I wouldn't have finished if John wasn't taking care of me for over half that race! 

Amy got third place woman!  And finished 6+ hours ahead of me :)  She is amazing, this is coming off of a long term injury!  She is awesome!

I now have my Western States Qualifier.  3 years now so that should be 15% chance or so maybe a little lower.  

That is it, just a free flow of words, I am not going to go back to edit grammar and make it more interesting.

*Addition - I can't stress enough how helpful John was - especially when I remember that I had originally waved him off pacing me.  I know he had his shoes in his car, but I don't think he was completely ready to pull an all nighter with me.

This was to qualify for WS100, but now I feel I have to go back and do it again because I know if I actually train for this I can do it sub-24 I have to believe that.

The Bear 100 2015 - From mid pack to feeling like DFL

The hook: As I was meandering my way through the last 5 or 6 miles of this race I had a pocket full of pancakes in one ziplock and a pocket full of bacon in the other.  I was in the middle of the woods in a race called "The Bear", you can see my dilemma here.

From before the beginning;

I needed to do a "qualifier race" for Western States and I was talking with John about it he suggested a race called The Bear 100.  The great thing about this race is that it is both a qualifier for WS and Hardrock.  Amy was also planning on running it, so we could pool resources.  (Now picture this 80 plus miles into it, I am talking to myself about John's "suggestions").

Due to working full time and family, it is tough to train as hard as I should.  I didn't lose the weight I should have going into this...  That always makes me mad, because if I was serious as I should be / want to be I would drop the weight needed to be successful.  So blah blah blah a bunch of excuses.  I still felt pretty good going into the race.

I used Frank's ultrasplits site to come up with a few scenarios I thought were best can middle of the road cases.  Worst case was just finish the race, it is my only qualifier on deck as I don't get to race as much as some others (I am looking at you Jean :) ).

I won't bore you too much with details - I would say I peaked out at mid 70's for weekly mileage with about 10k of vertical.  I should have been doing more, I just didn't.  I also joined a gym sort of thing called "Orange Theory"- it is a HR based workout for an hour at a time.  I really just needed something other than running to provide some cross training.  It is a very good workout that I think helps me, and I think it will continue to help me.  I just need to keep up my weekly mileage ongoing.

Fast forward to the race...  Amy had to pull out with an injury so I decided to just fly in a couple of days early.  Flying into Salt Lake City and then driving a couple of hours into Logan.  I met up with Dan Burke and his crew Mike, we did packet pickup and dinner.  We also got to meet up in the morning of the race.  I slept great actually (I used some over the counter sleeping aid - melatonin), and woke up ready to race.  Had my standard english muffin, peanut butter and banana breakfast before race.

The race started pretty uneventfully - from a park and then some suburb streets to a long single track climb.  I tucked in with folks going about my speed and tucked in.  The first bit I just took it easy. For the first 6 aid stations mile 45 I spent a total of 6 minutes in aid stations and hovered around 75th to 70th I got to Temple Fork at 10hours and 12 minutes.  Pretty respectable this was about 10k of climbing.  Coming out of this was going to be one of the longest climbs and this is where it all started to go down hill for me.  I had a hard time keeping the gels down - I had started to use their gels (hammer) for the last couple of aid stations and they weren't sitting well.  During this climb and the heat with the elevation I think that is what did me in.  I started throwing up and really had a very hard time.  Looking back what I should have done when I got to the next aid station was sit for a bit and just regroup - I think if I had done that, maybe spent 20 minutes just settling my stomach and then headed out it would have saved my race.  As it was I ran in, got some calories (broth) and then got out of there.

I just tried to play catchup from that point running / trotting when I could and trying to keep gels down.  I threw up a few more times and really wasn't moving too well.  At some point I met up with Ryan he and I had been playing leap frog for quite a while and decided to run together - I know now that he slowed down to help me try to save my race.  I can't emphasize how important he was!  I know I am only spending a couple of sentences on our time together, but he really saved my race. At this point I hadn't given up completely on the sub 30 hour buckle.  As the major point in our race we climbed down into mile 85 together and that is when I completely fell apart.  I sent Ryan on his way, and I was trying to choke down some broth, but I started shaking so bad I couldn't even get it to my mouth.  I tried to get up to leave, but the aid station people weren't having any of that.  They covered me with blankets and I honestly don't remember much when I did look at my watch, I realized I had been in the aid station for over an hour.  I was starting to hyperventilate a bit and decided if I was going to get out I needed to do it now.  I slowed my breathing as best I could and got some deep breaths.  Got some broth and electrolytes and I was able to stand up and start moving.  ARG almost an hour and a half, they said I went into shock but well who knows I was just happy get out of there!  The nice folks at the aid station walked with me for about a half a mile to make sure I didn't fall over.  I knew then I was just turning this into a 15 mile hump, just keep moving.

I started to hallucinate a bit as I was coming into the last aid station about a mile or two out of there I kept seeing people or cars in the middle of the forest but when I got closer I realized it was just branches.  As I made it into the last aid station they all looked at me and said they were about to send a search party for me (I think they were joking.)  Once I got sat down for a few minutes I had some pancakes and bacon and was able to keep it down, it was so nice and filling after throwing up anything I ate for the past 10 hours or so.  I had them pack me a baggy full of both and started the long hike up and out of that aid station.  After a mile hike up I started to think that is when I decided that carrying pancakes and bacon through the woods probably wasn't my smartest idea but it was highly unlikely I would run across any critters :)

Then the final challenge - about a 3 mile descent that I probably would have enjoyed any other time but after my feet and slowness I was just crawling down this.  But the end was in site - I could see Bear Lake and what I thought was the line to the finish :)  Well after coming down through this we actually had to go back up a little hill and then back down to the finish - all stuff I could and should have ran, but just didn't have it in me.

I finished with my head down at 31 hours 40 minutes.  I immediately said I would never do this race again.  But then within a few hours I thought I could do this much better and I will need to come back and get that sub 30 belt buckle.

Now just a quick bullet point list of the good and bad with some lessons learned.

The good;

• Training was ok
• Having a change of shoes from the Kiger 3's to the Wildhorse 3 at mile 61 was probably one of my better decisions - Wildhorse has a rock plate of sorts and I think I would use the kigers for anything at 50 miles or under.  
• Finishing the race no matter what
• Finding a friend (thanks again Ryan)

The bad;

• Not taking help when it was offered (Sachin I should have taken you up on that offer) next time for sure!
• Not having enough of my own gels - I don't like hammer gels now even thinking about them kinda makes me sick

The ugly;

• Driving back to the airport right after the race - that was ugly!!!  Sitting on the airplane wasn't good.

That is it for now - I may go through and update this I just wanted to spend a few minutes and write something up.