It all started a week ago on Monday, May 3oth. I met my sister Heidi at a great little Indian restaurant in Wheat Ridge. As we caught up on life (as we do on a weekly basis now) the topic eventually turned to running. The conversation went something like this:
Heidi: "So, I was thinking of maybe signing up for the North Fork 50k race"
Me: "Nice! When is it?"
Heidi: "It's on Saturday"
Me: "THIS Saturday???"
Heidi: "Yup! You should sign up and do it to if you are interested, we could go together!"
*Very slight pause
Me: "That is at Buffalo Creek right? Only about an hour from here?"
Heidi: "Yes, I'm going to do it more as a training run"
Me: "Sounds fun, let me check with Sarah and see if I might be able to join you!"
Fast forward to Wednesday morning and I'm signing up for the 50k (31 mile) race that is too take place 3 short days from that time. When I told Heidi I'd signed up she laughed and said "Sarah isn't going to encourage you to have dinner with me!" Fortunately, my amazing girlfriend was able to come to the finish and join the party :)
"Tapering" is the process of decreasing your training load (miles, intensity etc.) the week or two weeks prior to a race. I find that tapering really does help me on race day, with fresh legs and more energy. I decided to view this race as more of a training run as well, which was why my only "tapering" including changing a 6 mile speed workout on Wed morning to a "regular" 6 mile run and on my "double" Thursdays I changed my evening workout to 4 easy miles instead of 9. I think it helped... a little.
The race, was, well, interesting. Every race is a different experience and I learn such different things about myself at each race. There was about 4,000 feet of climbing at this race, with a little less than half of that occurring in the first 6 miles. I felt pretty good on the climb, keeping a nice even pace. Then, at mile 7 trouble hit. I have yet to get through an Ultra without having to overcome some sort of substantial obstacle. Obstacles have included: heat, cold, snow, nausea, GI issues, lack of nutrition, headaches, muscle cramps, dehydration and sprained ankles. The major issue at this race was lightheadedness. Looking back I'm not sure if it might have been the altitude as it is higher then Denver out at Buffalo Creek and being early in the summer I haven't done much altitude training yet (mostly due to snow higher up). Whatever it was, miles 7 - 15 were ROUGH. I was glad i wasn't going for a PR as I had to hike the majority of that time, I could job a little but kept feeling like I would topple over and would return to hiking. I thought about quitting. My head would tell me "it's not your day", "you are going SO slow", "you should quit now before it gets worse", "you will NEVER finish Moab 240, you should totally give up running", and so on and so forth.
The best thing I've learned from Ultra running is that I always have more to give. I just kept telling myself to put one foot in front of the other and always KEEP MOVING FORWARD! Eventually things got better and although it wasn't a "great" race for me I had SO much fun with Heidi and Sarah, friends I met out on the trails, spending over 8 hours out in nature exercising, enjoying a beautiful, sunny day and learning more about myself and how to keep pushing forward! One of the "mantras" in Ultra running is "Relentless Forward Progress" which I love and is a principle I try and carry with me in every aspect of my life when difficulties arise and I feel like quitting. As David Goggin's says "I don't stop when I'm tired, I stop when I'm done!"
Oh yes, as is the case in many Ultra's, this course had a few "bonus" miles, finishing at around 33.2 miles instead of the actual 31 miles (50k)
Heidi and I celebrating both finishing the 50k (her much faster than me!)
Ultra's, mostly on trails, are just so interesting! Sometimes the only thing showing me where to go are the occasional, but very helpful, blue ribbons marking the path!
At 5 foot 2 inches the first time Sarah gave me a piggyback ride I thought I was going to crush her (I'm 6 foot tall and not exactly tiny!) but she is dang strong!