I started running marathons back in the summer of 2006 and for a while I had a similar problem that other people had, the dreaded black toenail. It goes black, looks gross, is uncomfortable and takes weeks to fully recover. After losing enough of them, I decided to be proactive and just get rid of them. Permanently.
Black toenails come from a variety of causes, including dropping a 50 pound box on your toe. (Long story. It was college…) If your toenail dies, basically it means it has undergone a trauma and is no longer ‘connected’ to the skin underneath, your body begins a process to build a new toenail under the old one. WIth the old one no longer in the loop, so to speak, it becomes black and remains only as a shield protecting the new one. When the new one is ready to see the world, the blackened toenail falls off, usually with little pain.
My dying toenails were coming from running my marathons relatively (to my training runs) ‘fast’. With each step, my toes were getting jammed into the toebox, the sexy term for the front of shoe. After 3ish hours of this, the toenails got so much banging around that I got blisters literally underneath the toenail and just outside of them. It was this blister that caused separation of the toenail from the rest of the toe and hence ‘killed’ the toenail.
This process can take a few weeks to recover and that whole time your nail is tender. If you press down (or kick something with it) on the nail you are putting pressure on that newish, and hence tender, burgeoning toenail. You end up trying to baby it so as to not disrupt the delicate recovery. Well, once you have had more than a few of these and you are running 1-2 marathons a month losing a toenail or two every race, you get impatient.
So, after losing maybe a dozen or so nails, I started to be a little proactive. I was experienced enough to know immediately following a race upon removing my shoes and socks which toenails, if left for 2 weeks, would blacken and fall off. What I decided to do was speed up the recovery process by further traumatizing the nail. I cut it off. Clip, clip, pull. It might take a few tries maybe even a day or so, but since there was blister under there, I could remove it soon after the race before the toenail would try, and invariably fail, to get back to where it was. Again, I knew from experience that it would try, fail, and then it would turn on the ‘make a new toenail’ operation and I was just helping out.
Now here was the beauty of the system. The blackened toenail is a covering that protects the new nail underneath whilst it grows. By completely removing that protection, the exposed area (no protection! no nail!) goes into hyper overdrive and a new, albeit weak, nail appeared quickly and after 2 days, it was not tender at all. Yes, I could go from traumatized toenail that was going to die to new toenail with no real pain in about 48 hours. That 48 hours, however, was rough.
Think of it this way. You have to go through so much pain/recovery to get your new nail. You can take your time, weeks in most cases, with it being slightly uncomfortable and tender much of that time, or you can have lots of pain for 2 days and be done. I would load it up with neosporin and wrap it in sterile bandages and walk funny for a day, and ta-da! New nail!
So now I have a method to my madness, as predicted, people think I am off my rocker doing this minor surgery on my own. One time, I was removing one of my big-toe toenails (which hurt way more than the others, but losing those was rare) my young daughter who was maybe 7 years old at the time really wanted to watch me do the removal. I knew that this one was going to hurt really bad and I said to her “Salacia, what do you do if after I do this, I fall over and look like I fell asleep?” (aka pass out) She turns her head slightly to the side and says “call 9-11?”. That still remains my favorite two sentence conversation I have ever had with my daughter.
Soon after, my soon-to-be wife finds this article about Marshall Ulrich where he talks about how he had all his toenails permanently removed because he had similar problems to mine. She reads it and thinks ‘What a crazy dude’, and then immediately forwards it to me knowing I will appreciate the article. My eyes were opened! Genius! There was just one small problem. Recovery from having all 10 nails removed at once is long (several months) and you essentially have to stop running for a least a few weeks. I can’t handle that.
The procedure is both simple and common, when done by a podiatrist. It is a common procedure for people with really bad ingrown toenails, a fact that is nice to know as my health insurance would cover all of my ‘procedures’. The procedure goes like this: local anesthetic is applied through the entire toe, which really freaking hurts, but then, when numb, they remove the nail and then apply some phenol to the area. As a chemist I know the value of phenol as a basic organic reactant (the simplest aromatic alcohol, don’t ya know) but I certainly did not learn THIS reactivity in Orgo.
Remember what happens when you just rip off a toenail without a new one underneath ready to go? Your body turns on the ‘hurry up! we need a new toenail, quick!’ operation because something that is never supposed to be ‘exposed’ now is. Well, phenol seems to block that entire physiological process. and your body does weird stuff. The recovery is several weeks (uncomfortable for a few days) because it keep trying to make a new nail and failing so it resorts to basically just scabbing it over. What you have is sortof like a scab-toenail combination. You peel that off, and another one appears, more scab like, less toenail like. After 3-4 generations of that, you have toughened skin (no scab) where you use to have a toenails growing. It is the same color as the rest of your skin and it doesn’t look that bad. You actually have to be staring at my toes for a while before you would even notice I have no toenails. Its really (now) not that gross.
So recovery for this procedure is rough, especially if the toenails you are removing were nice and healthy when you came into the podiatrist that day. Doing all 10 at once? No sir, not me. But I did the next best thing. I had a standing ‘date’ with my podiatrist. I would run races on the weekend, and by Sunday night I would know if I was going to lose any nails. If there were such death-row toenails, I would call up his office Monday morning and go in and have that one or two removed (and treated with phenol) on Monday afternoon, before the new toenail growth process got going. This process took about 12 months of racing, needles, ripping, treating, pain killing drugs until I had reduced the number of toenails I possessed down to zero. With each treatment, there is a 10% chance it will come back in some form, like a partial real nail growing back, and sure enough, one of my toes needed to be treated twice. So technically, I have had 11 toenails removed.
Since I lost my last one a few years ago, I have gotten very few blisters on my toes, possibly due to better form or better shoes but I know at least it is partially due to my toes now being nail-less. People wonder why I did it, and I always ask the follow up question ‘why do you need your toenails? You ain’t climbing trees barefoot anymore, so why not make my life easier?’ Nobody ever has a good response to that one.
Of course, if I become a barefoot runner, getting rid of my toenails was a moot point. Oh well.
Sunday, July 8, 2012
Sunday, May 27, 2012
2012 Med City Marathons Results
3:49:29
70/427 Overall
6/32 Age
My 14th career marathon back in May 2008 was a fun experience. I was visiting friends in La Crescent, MN for the Memorial Day holiday weekend. I got little sleep that weekend, had to wake up at 4am race morning to get my packet, and then make the bus. WIth all that, I managed to win the race in under 2:55.
Flash forward to Memorial Day weekend 2012. I gave up speed a long time ago and settled more on ultra distances instead of marathons and I find myself back in La Cresent, MN. And once again, I decide to run the Med CIty marathon, but this time as a Badwater 135 training run. The weather forecast indicated the temperature would reach 90 degrees, so it was perfect for me wearing 3 layers of running clothes, hat, and gloves to mimic being -freaky- hot. Sadly, it was only 80 degrees when I crossed the finish line, but it was still a good training run.
The morning was very pleasant and overcast, with temperature in the low 60’s at the start. Within moments of the start, the sky opened up and was blue. The first 8 miles are pretty much straight east and of course I left my sunglasses in my car which was annoying.
When you are running a marathon and you want it to be an ultra marathon-feeling training run, you have to be creative. I wanted to beat myself down as much as possible so I would have to ‘work’ to finish well. As such, I didn’t do anything resembling carbo-loading the days before (in fact, I ate less than normal) I slept little the few days before the race and I consumed not a single calorie of fuel during the nearly 4 hour run, with water and electrolytes being the only thing I put down. Since it was not that hot at the beginning, I decided to work the first half of the race to try really hard to bonk as fast as possible, hoping to make the last part hard for me without glycogen and adrenaline. That meant going out with the 3:25 pace team from the beginning and hanging with them to the halfway mark. While 7:55 is not a super fast pace for me, it was in 65 degree weather with my winter running gear on.
At mile 14, temperature was now over 70 and my energy was starting to drop. I was drinking electrolytes in my hand held water bottle (refilled twice during the race) and drinking 2 cups of water at every aid station. By mile 18 I had seriously bonked and was dead tired, feeling about the same as mile 70 in a Hundo, as my ‘r
When running in hot weather your brain can do wonky things and I knew that, so I was paying very close attention to my ‘brain’ including doing simple math (“what is 6 time 9” level of difficulty) as a test of mental awareness. At mile 23 or so, I decided the math was getting just a little difficult so I downed some additional electrolyte pills and within a mile, my head was noticeably better. This was very much a training run, and yes, that was one of the important things I was testing. I love it when a plan comes together, and everything did, except the weather which did eventually hit 90, but 1.5 hours after I crossed the finish line.unning’ responded accordingly, walking about 30% of the time. Again, this technically was a marathon, but for me it was a serious ultra training run.
The post race support was awesome including a great spread of food including pulled pork sandwiches and beer. A quick shower at the local Y and then I had a quick lunch with Sommer, a good running friend who recently moved to the Twin Cities who was down to do the 20 mile training run (one of the options at this race). One of the cool things about facebook is I now have running friends all over the country, and I don’t get to see any of them as often as I wish. So when I do get the chance, it is always enjoyable.
Big ticket ‘lessons’
- Tape toes (like old times) when it is going to be hot.
- Electrolyte tabs always on you, do basic math in your head to test its function. Also, take some at first sign of muscle tightness.
- If you are going to use marathons as ultra training, enter them carbo-depleted.
70/427 Overall
6/32 Age
My 14th career marathon back in May 2008 was a fun experience. I was visiting friends in La Crescent, MN for the Memorial Day holiday weekend. I got little sleep that weekend, had to wake up at 4am race morning to get my packet, and then make the bus. WIth all that, I managed to win the race in under 2:55.
Flash forward to Memorial Day weekend 2012. I gave up speed a long time ago and settled more on ultra distances instead of marathons and I find myself back in La Cresent, MN. And once again, I decide to run the Med CIty marathon, but this time as a Badwater 135 training run. The weather forecast indicated the temperature would reach 90 degrees, so it was perfect for me wearing 3 layers of running clothes, hat, and gloves to mimic being -freaky- hot. Sadly, it was only 80 degrees when I crossed the finish line, but it was still a good training run.
The morning was very pleasant and overcast, with temperature in the low 60’s at the start. Within moments of the start, the sky opened up and was blue. The first 8 miles are pretty much straight east and of course I left my sunglasses in my car which was annoying.
When you are running a marathon and you want it to be an ultra marathon-feeling training run, you have to be creative. I wanted to beat myself down as much as possible so I would have to ‘work’ to finish well. As such, I didn’t do anything resembling carbo-loading the days before (in fact, I ate less than normal) I slept little the few days before the race and I consumed not a single calorie of fuel during the nearly 4 hour run, with water and electrolytes being the only thing I put down. Since it was not that hot at the beginning, I decided to work the first half of the race to try really hard to bonk as fast as possible, hoping to make the last part hard for me without glycogen and adrenaline. That meant going out with the 3:25 pace team from the beginning and hanging with them to the halfway mark. While 7:55 is not a super fast pace for me, it was in 65 degree weather with my winter running gear on.
At mile 14, temperature was now over 70 and my energy was starting to drop. I was drinking electrolytes in my hand held water bottle (refilled twice during the race) and drinking 2 cups of water at every aid station. By mile 18 I had seriously bonked and was dead tired, feeling about the same as mile 70 in a Hundo, as my ‘r
When running in hot weather your brain can do wonky things and I knew that, so I was paying very close attention to my ‘brain’ including doing simple math (“what is 6 time 9” level of difficulty) as a test of mental awareness. At mile 23 or so, I decided the math was getting just a little difficult so I downed some additional electrolyte pills and within a mile, my head was noticeably better. This was very much a training run, and yes, that was one of the important things I was testing. I love it when a plan comes together, and everything did, except the weather which did eventually hit 90, but 1.5 hours after I crossed the finish line.unning’ responded accordingly, walking about 30% of the time. Again, this technically was a marathon, but for me it was a serious ultra training run.
The post race support was awesome including a great spread of food including pulled pork sandwiches and beer. A quick shower at the local Y and then I had a quick lunch with Sommer, a good running friend who recently moved to the Twin Cities who was down to do the 20 mile training run (one of the options at this race). One of the cool things about facebook is I now have running friends all over the country, and I don’t get to see any of them as often as I wish. So when I do get the chance, it is always enjoyable.
Big ticket ‘lessons’
- Tape toes (like old times) when it is going to be hot.
- Electrolyte tabs always on you, do basic math in your head to test its function. Also, take some at first sign of muscle tightness.
- If you are going to use marathons as ultra training, enter them carbo-depleted.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
2012 Qualifier Marathon Results
3:44:47 82/465 overall
This race was a nice small inaugural race that was only a ~2 hour drive away. In my 100in1 quest, I probably would have run this anyways, but I was asked to be an official pacer for it, which means I got a free entry, which makes it even cooler. This would by 3rd official pacing gig for the pacing company I run for, and I really enjoyed doing this. As a pacer, one of my responsibilities is to pull a shift at the ‘expo’ before the race.
As an inaugural, there were only ~500 marathoners, so the expo was pretty small. We shared the booth with the Motorola Motoactiv sales rep (we all got one to use/keep as they are a sponsor for our pacer company) Our job at the expo is to answer standard questions have about the pacers but with such a small expo, there were not a lot of people with questions. Right next to our booth was the famous Bill Rodgers, who won four Boston marathons and four New York marathons in the late 1970s. He has had a high end running store for many years in Boston and he is at this expo selling several books as signing autographs. We had some great conversations with him, and I even had him sign my race bib. It is always nice to meet real, honest, and friendly legends of your sport.
After the expo, the pacer team (7 of us) got together for a fine meal at a local italian restaurant. As always, the team was made up of very nice people, all with fun running stories. There were two first timers, and they did great the next day but they were understandably nervous mere hours before. The only pacer I knew from previous experience was Pacer Chris who I credit with helping me get into the pacing gig. He was the 3:10 pacer back in St. Louis a few years ago and I ran with him for over half the race and chatted with him about pacing. Within 2 months, I paced my first marathon in Fargo.
Race morning was un-exciting and early as we needed to get to the finish line and be bussed to start and be there roughly an hour before the gun. As pacers, we need to be very visible before the start if the race so people can find us and ask any last minute questions. It was going to get hot and we all knew it, and that was the most popular topic of discussion. This race was built to be fast (It is call the ‘Qualifier’ marathon for a reason) and the course itself was, but the weather was not going to have it. It started out pleasant in the low 60’s, but it would hit 80+ degrees by the time I rolled by the finish line, and got worse for the people behind me. It definitely took its toll on the runners.
At the start of the race, as usual, I had a large contingent of people with me, about 40 which is huge considering there were only 450 finishers.
As a pacer, my job is to run my miles stone-cold-even pace. At each mile marker, I checked my watch and compared it to my handy pace chart which gave elapsed time for such a pace. I went back and forth in the range of 12 seconds under and 15 second over all day, which is pretty darn good. I normally drop about 40-50% of my runner by mile 10, and today was no different being down to about 15 people hanging with me. As we crossed the halfway point (which I missed by < 5 seconds) I was down to about 8 people holding on, but then the sun started to heat up everything and everyone and runners who were in front of me were dropping back quick. I was consistently passing people every few minutes as the temperature increased.
I was down to one lone person with me at about mile 19 and he hung on for only another mile and a half before he dropped back. As with most of the other pacers I had nobody with me the last miles. On hot days such as this, being a pacer is actually difficult. As you get tired and hot, you have to increase your effort at the exact right rate to keep your net pace even. It takes a lot of mental focus as the day goes on. I enjoy it as a challenge, though. I crossed the Finish right on schedule, 13 seconds before my goal time and was glad to finish when I did as the temperature was still climbing. The post race party was fun, including free beer, pizza and shaded tables. After I had my fill, I headed back home feeling good about yet another successful pacing assignment.
This race was a nice small inaugural race that was only a ~2 hour drive away. In my 100in1 quest, I probably would have run this anyways, but I was asked to be an official pacer for it, which means I got a free entry, which makes it even cooler. This would by 3rd official pacing gig for the pacing company I run for, and I really enjoyed doing this. As a pacer, one of my responsibilities is to pull a shift at the ‘expo’ before the race.
As an inaugural, there were only ~500 marathoners, so the expo was pretty small. We shared the booth with the Motorola Motoactiv sales rep (we all got one to use/keep as they are a sponsor for our pacer company) Our job at the expo is to answer standard questions have about the pacers but with such a small expo, there were not a lot of people with questions. Right next to our booth was the famous Bill Rodgers, who won four Boston marathons and four New York marathons in the late 1970s. He has had a high end running store for many years in Boston and he is at this expo selling several books as signing autographs. We had some great conversations with him, and I even had him sign my race bib. It is always nice to meet real, honest, and friendly legends of your sport.
After the expo, the pacer team (7 of us) got together for a fine meal at a local italian restaurant. As always, the team was made up of very nice people, all with fun running stories. There were two first timers, and they did great the next day but they were understandably nervous mere hours before. The only pacer I knew from previous experience was Pacer Chris who I credit with helping me get into the pacing gig. He was the 3:10 pacer back in St. Louis a few years ago and I ran with him for over half the race and chatted with him about pacing. Within 2 months, I paced my first marathon in Fargo.
Race morning was un-exciting and early as we needed to get to the finish line and be bussed to start and be there roughly an hour before the gun. As pacers, we need to be very visible before the start if the race so people can find us and ask any last minute questions. It was going to get hot and we all knew it, and that was the most popular topic of discussion. This race was built to be fast (It is call the ‘Qualifier’ marathon for a reason) and the course itself was, but the weather was not going to have it. It started out pleasant in the low 60’s, but it would hit 80+ degrees by the time I rolled by the finish line, and got worse for the people behind me. It definitely took its toll on the runners.
At the start of the race, as usual, I had a large contingent of people with me, about 40 which is huge considering there were only 450 finishers.As a pacer, my job is to run my miles stone-cold-even pace. At each mile marker, I checked my watch and compared it to my handy pace chart which gave elapsed time for such a pace. I went back and forth in the range of 12 seconds under and 15 second over all day, which is pretty darn good. I normally drop about 40-50% of my runner by mile 10, and today was no different being down to about 15 people hanging with me. As we crossed the halfway point (which I missed by < 5 seconds) I was down to about 8 people holding on, but then the sun started to heat up everything and everyone and runners who were in front of me were dropping back quick. I was consistently passing people every few minutes as the temperature increased.
I was down to one lone person with me at about mile 19 and he hung on for only another mile and a half before he dropped back. As with most of the other pacers I had nobody with me the last miles. On hot days such as this, being a pacer is actually difficult. As you get tired and hot, you have to increase your effort at the exact right rate to keep your net pace even. It takes a lot of mental focus as the day goes on. I enjoy it as a challenge, though. I crossed the Finish right on schedule, 13 seconds before my goal time and was glad to finish when I did as the temperature was still climbing. The post race party was fun, including free beer, pizza and shaded tables. After I had my fill, I headed back home feeling good about yet another successful pacing assignment.
Sunday, May 6, 2012
2012 Kalamazoo Marathon Results (Or: Dress Too Warm on Purpose and Help a Friend)
3:23:12
47/702 Overall
6/75 Age
A few weeks ago, I was asked (and I accepted) to help crew an Italian runner in the 2012 Badwater 135 Ultramarathon. Running that race is on my bucket list and everyone says that if you want to get in, it really helps to have crewed/paced one before. To to start my training, I decided to run the Kalamazoo marathon wearing way too many clothes to mimic hot weather running. For a first attempt at such training, I think it worked quite well.
Misty and I decided to make a day of it in Kalamazoo and she decided o do the 5K walk while I was running the marathon. This is at least the 4th time we have done this and we both enjoy it. We left the house at 5:45 am and got to the crowded start line (Today there was a full marathon, a 1/2 marathon, a 5K run and a 5K walk) We got lucky and snuck into a good parking spot, grabbed our numbers and then I got dressed.
I wanted to be hot, and so for this first ‘test’, I wore 3 long sleeve running shirts, 2 pairs of running pants, a warm weather running cap, and gloves. It was basically the outfit I would wear if it was ~15 degrees out. Sadly, it was about 50 degrees at race start so I was not that warm at the start, but it would get uncomfortable which today was a good thing. Only a few people noticed my overdressing which is fine as I was actually trying to be subtle about it so as to answer fewer questions.
Misty and I got to the start line and while I was waiting around, I found John Y, my barefoot running friend. He was standing in socks, but had planned on ditching them right before the race. Sadly, John is moving in a few weeks and I will miss him dearly. A really nice guy who I enjoyed chatting with on long runs. After I chatted with him, I kissed my lovely wife goodbye and I moved up closer to the start looking for another friend, Brian Walsh, a runner that I met at a RUT fat ass race last fall. A graduate student at UofM and avid (and pretty good) ultra runner, he actually ran the No Wimps challenge (1/2 + 50K) last weekend like I did, so it was nice when I found him again. After chatting with him for a little while we decided to run together at the start and I figured I would play it by ‘feel’ not knowing how the extra clothes would affect me. His marathon PR is 3:39, which is slow considering what he is capable of in both shorter and longer distances. He had told me in previous conversations that he just can’t figure out the marathon distance. I decided early that I was going to try to get him to a new marathon PR so people would stop giving him grief for such a slow marathon ‘record’. I knew it would take my mind off my own heat issues and staying with him chatting for the race would make it fly by, and it did. Thats called a ‘Win-Win’.
The race course fairly simple, running all through Kalamazoo area including Western Michigan University. There were a total 14 well run aid stations, each with dozens of anxious and excited volunteers. There were a few thousand runners total of all the racers, but the crowd support was as awesome as the aid stations. Always cheering, even us strangers throughout the race. I swear every intersection had 2-3 police officer/EMS/fire-fighters holding traffic for us runners. It is rare to see a city come out and support a race much more than this. Having seen too many under-supported races in my career, this was great. I helped that is was a beautiful day.
Brian and I crossed the 1/2 marathon split at about 1:37 which made Brian happy, but it was mile 20+ that he was afraid of as that is where he usually blows up. The temperature did slowly increase all day and I didn’t start feeling really ‘hot’ until about mile 17. At its worst, I think it ‘felt’ about 95 degrees in my running outfit, even though it was only ~65 degrees out. I try to learn something new every race and what I learned this race was I need to wear more clothes if I want to mimic 100+ degrees. Granted, had I wore the ‘correct’ amount for this experiment, I probably would not have been able to hang with Brian, so I guess that made it all ok.
The course contained a handful of loooong hills that all seemed to be late in the race and were of course, not fun. As we came up to one particularly long hill at about mile 21, seeing it spurred Brian to say ‘I would be ok with walking this hill’. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but it was something to the effect of ‘No’. We had slowed a little and took a little bit of time at aid stations, especially the last handful to get extra water. I ended up drinking about 2-3 more than I normally do in a marathon, and Brian drinks a lot all the time. They had water and something called ‘Gu Brew’ which is Gu’s attempt at a gatorade-style drink. I was unimpressed.
The crowds grew as we approached the finish cheering us on and we both came in faster than expected, so both our wives missed us as we crossed the finish line. I had told Misty to start looking for me around 3:30, and well, Brian’s PR is 3:39. So when we rolled in at 3:23, there were no friendly faces nearby, but they were very excited when we -did- find each other. Love all around.
A funny thing happened when I did my handstand. The timing mat (which is where I normally do it) was slippery and I failed on my first attempt. So, for the first time, I backed up 6 steps and did it again, this time with better success. There is probably no photo evidence of either attempt, but it’s the principle, damnit.
We wandered over to Brian’s car (the local beer garden) and chatted for a little while talking about the great day. Misty and I said our goodbyes and headed off but not before I was able to get a quick shower before leaving for lunch. Misty after finishing the 5K had gone back to the car, cleaned up and even took a nice nap before I even crossed the finish line. I was jealous, but it is always awesome to see her at race end.
We had a few hours yet before we got kids back, so we had a relaxed late lunch at local Applebee’s where we sat and took our sweet time eating our meal while we played pinochle, our favorite 2 person card game. It really was a great excursion with an awesome race, quality time alone with my lovely bride, and a beautiful day. I hope to run this one again, and you know how infrequently I say that…
47/702 Overall
6/75 Age
A few weeks ago, I was asked (and I accepted) to help crew an Italian runner in the 2012 Badwater 135 Ultramarathon. Running that race is on my bucket list and everyone says that if you want to get in, it really helps to have crewed/paced one before. To to start my training, I decided to run the Kalamazoo marathon wearing way too many clothes to mimic hot weather running. For a first attempt at such training, I think it worked quite well.Misty and I decided to make a day of it in Kalamazoo and she decided o do the 5K walk while I was running the marathon. This is at least the 4th time we have done this and we both enjoy it. We left the house at 5:45 am and got to the crowded start line (Today there was a full marathon, a 1/2 marathon, a 5K run and a 5K walk) We got lucky and snuck into a good parking spot, grabbed our numbers and then I got dressed.
I wanted to be hot, and so for this first ‘test’, I wore 3 long sleeve running shirts, 2 pairs of running pants, a warm weather running cap, and gloves. It was basically the outfit I would wear if it was ~15 degrees out. Sadly, it was about 50 degrees at race start so I was not that warm at the start, but it would get uncomfortable which today was a good thing. Only a few people noticed my overdressing which is fine as I was actually trying to be subtle about it so as to answer fewer questions.
Misty and I got to the start line and while I was waiting around, I found John Y, my barefoot running friend. He was standing in socks, but had planned on ditching them right before the race. Sadly, John is moving in a few weeks and I will miss him dearly. A really nice guy who I enjoyed chatting with on long runs. After I chatted with him, I kissed my lovely wife goodbye and I moved up closer to the start looking for another friend, Brian Walsh, a runner that I met at a RUT fat ass race last fall. A graduate student at UofM and avid (and pretty good) ultra runner, he actually ran the No Wimps challenge (1/2 + 50K) last weekend like I did, so it was nice when I found him again. After chatting with him for a little while we decided to run together at the start and I figured I would play it by ‘feel’ not knowing how the extra clothes would affect me. His marathon PR is 3:39, which is slow considering what he is capable of in both shorter and longer distances. He had told me in previous conversations that he just can’t figure out the marathon distance. I decided early that I was going to try to get him to a new marathon PR so people would stop giving him grief for such a slow marathon ‘record’. I knew it would take my mind off my own heat issues and staying with him chatting for the race would make it fly by, and it did. Thats called a ‘Win-Win’.
The race course fairly simple, running all through Kalamazoo area including Western Michigan University. There were a total 14 well run aid stations, each with dozens of anxious and excited volunteers. There were a few thousand runners total of all the racers, but the crowd support was as awesome as the aid stations. Always cheering, even us strangers throughout the race. I swear every intersection had 2-3 police officer/EMS/fire-fighters holding traffic for us runners. It is rare to see a city come out and support a race much more than this. Having seen too many under-supported races in my career, this was great. I helped that is was a beautiful day.
Brian and I crossed the 1/2 marathon split at about 1:37 which made Brian happy, but it was mile 20+ that he was afraid of as that is where he usually blows up. The temperature did slowly increase all day and I didn’t start feeling really ‘hot’ until about mile 17. At its worst, I think it ‘felt’ about 95 degrees in my running outfit, even though it was only ~65 degrees out. I try to learn something new every race and what I learned this race was I need to wear more clothes if I want to mimic 100+ degrees. Granted, had I wore the ‘correct’ amount for this experiment, I probably would not have been able to hang with Brian, so I guess that made it all ok.
The course contained a handful of loooong hills that all seemed to be late in the race and were of course, not fun. As we came up to one particularly long hill at about mile 21, seeing it spurred Brian to say ‘I would be ok with walking this hill’. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but it was something to the effect of ‘No’. We had slowed a little and took a little bit of time at aid stations, especially the last handful to get extra water. I ended up drinking about 2-3 more than I normally do in a marathon, and Brian drinks a lot all the time. They had water and something called ‘Gu Brew’ which is Gu’s attempt at a gatorade-style drink. I was unimpressed.
The crowds grew as we approached the finish cheering us on and we both came in faster than expected, so both our wives missed us as we crossed the finish line. I had told Misty to start looking for me around 3:30, and well, Brian’s PR is 3:39. So when we rolled in at 3:23, there were no friendly faces nearby, but they were very excited when we -did- find each other. Love all around.
A funny thing happened when I did my handstand. The timing mat (which is where I normally do it) was slippery and I failed on my first attempt. So, for the first time, I backed up 6 steps and did it again, this time with better success. There is probably no photo evidence of either attempt, but it’s the principle, damnit.
We wandered over to Brian’s car (the local beer garden) and chatted for a little while talking about the great day. Misty and I said our goodbyes and headed off but not before I was able to get a quick shower before leaving for lunch. Misty after finishing the 5K had gone back to the car, cleaned up and even took a nice nap before I even crossed the finish line. I was jealous, but it is always awesome to see her at race end.We had a few hours yet before we got kids back, so we had a relaxed late lunch at local Applebee’s where we sat and took our sweet time eating our meal while we played pinochle, our favorite 2 person card game. It really was a great excursion with an awesome race, quality time alone with my lovely bride, and a beautiful day. I hope to run this one again, and you know how infrequently I say that…
Sunday, April 29, 2012
2012 Trail 50K Results
4:33:29
9/147 overall
2/12 Age
So, now for the fun run, the second in the weekend of the ‘No Wimps’ Challenge. While I have done ‘doubles’ before running marathons on consecutive days and a few Hundos, doing a half marathon and then a 50K the next day on rough trail is a little different,. You don’t totally sluff of one. I didn’t wimp out yesterday, but I saved some in the tank for the 50K, as ultras are more my thing. I thought of the half marathon as a warm-up race.
I slept well, after a good run the previous day but had to get up a little earlier to make the 7:30 am start for the 50K. As I was pulling into the parking lot, the temp was 29 degrees and would get up to a whopping 32 at race start. Since I knew the temperature would be 60 by race end, I actually had to think about what to wear. For the first time in a while, I wore an outermost layer of a cotton t-shirt knowing that I would ditch it, which I did at mile 4 aid station. I also wore my nice nike rain jacket which folds into itself as a nice pouch that I took off after the first 13.1 mile loop. There was no real wind, and no clouds either which made for beautiful race weather. It is days like this that I love living in Michigan. The winters can be a little harsh, but spring and summer are gorgeous.
The 50K involved doing the half marathon course (same as yesterday) twice and then a quick 5 mile loop that met up with the 13.1 mile loop the last 2 miles. I ran lap 1 a little too fast, which is no surprise. I met up with a local running beast Ryan C at about mile 10 and ran with him until the end of lap 1 (13.1 miles) which I crossed in 1:49, only 6 min slower than the previous days half marathon. Ryan then took off and finished in 4:12 which is awesome, expecially considering he took a wrong turn and added some distance to his run.
I knew that my first loop was faster than I wanted to go, so as soon as I started my second long loop, I dialed it back a little bit, finishing loop 2 in ~3:53. My goal for this race was to run smart, which I like to think I did. I knew this course was brutal, especially doing 31 miles on it. Up, down, concentrating so hard not to trip, etc. I wanted to make sure I did not take any walk breaks, which for this course is tough, especially the one hill (done 3 times) about 1.5 miles from the end of the loops. I was successful in that endeavor, while trudging slowly up the hills all day long, never slowing to a walk. That is a victory in itself, if you ask me.
After I came through the 26.2 mile point, I still had the 5 mile loop to do. What was cool is that about 400m into that 5 mile loop, I got a little spring in my step. I didn’t speed up that much, but my mental state was much better. Here was more evidence of my ‘not trying hard yields better results’ theory. I think my long hard 30-40 mile training days paid off as my body was not tired at all, even though I was 39 miles into my 44 mile racing weekend.
I crossed the finish line and felt great. The handstand was one of my nicer ones, being able to hold it for at least 5 full seconds. I got to then collect my hardware including another mug for 2nd place in my age group, a 50K finishers medal, and then an additional medal for completing the ‘No Wimps’ challenge as well as a t-shirt for the feat. There were several of my RUT friends who also completed the series as well, all good folk.
I stayed around to watch many of them finish or at least come through the marathon point in the 50K. Everyone seemed happy in their efforts today and were in good spirits. This is what trail racing is supposed to be. Pure energy and fun for everyone. I said my goodbyes to those who were there and headed home to spend the afternoon with my lovely wife and a good meal. A wonderful finish to a long but very fun weekend of racing.
9/147 overall
2/12 Age
So, now for the fun run, the second in the weekend of the ‘No Wimps’ Challenge. While I have done ‘doubles’ before running marathons on consecutive days and a few Hundos, doing a half marathon and then a 50K the next day on rough trail is a little different,. You don’t totally sluff of one. I didn’t wimp out yesterday, but I saved some in the tank for the 50K, as ultras are more my thing. I thought of the half marathon as a warm-up race.I slept well, after a good run the previous day but had to get up a little earlier to make the 7:30 am start for the 50K. As I was pulling into the parking lot, the temp was 29 degrees and would get up to a whopping 32 at race start. Since I knew the temperature would be 60 by race end, I actually had to think about what to wear. For the first time in a while, I wore an outermost layer of a cotton t-shirt knowing that I would ditch it, which I did at mile 4 aid station. I also wore my nice nike rain jacket which folds into itself as a nice pouch that I took off after the first 13.1 mile loop. There was no real wind, and no clouds either which made for beautiful race weather. It is days like this that I love living in Michigan. The winters can be a little harsh, but spring and summer are gorgeous.
The 50K involved doing the half marathon course (same as yesterday) twice and then a quick 5 mile loop that met up with the 13.1 mile loop the last 2 miles. I ran lap 1 a little too fast, which is no surprise. I met up with a local running beast Ryan C at about mile 10 and ran with him until the end of lap 1 (13.1 miles) which I crossed in 1:49, only 6 min slower than the previous days half marathon. Ryan then took off and finished in 4:12 which is awesome, expecially considering he took a wrong turn and added some distance to his run.
I knew that my first loop was faster than I wanted to go, so as soon as I started my second long loop, I dialed it back a little bit, finishing loop 2 in ~3:53. My goal for this race was to run smart, which I like to think I did. I knew this course was brutal, especially doing 31 miles on it. Up, down, concentrating so hard not to trip, etc. I wanted to make sure I did not take any walk breaks, which for this course is tough, especially the one hill (done 3 times) about 1.5 miles from the end of the loops. I was successful in that endeavor, while trudging slowly up the hills all day long, never slowing to a walk. That is a victory in itself, if you ask me.
After I came through the 26.2 mile point, I still had the 5 mile loop to do. What was cool is that about 400m into that 5 mile loop, I got a little spring in my step. I didn’t speed up that much, but my mental state was much better. Here was more evidence of my ‘not trying hard yields better results’ theory. I think my long hard 30-40 mile training days paid off as my body was not tired at all, even though I was 39 miles into my 44 mile racing weekend.
I crossed the finish line and felt great. The handstand was one of my nicer ones, being able to hold it for at least 5 full seconds. I got to then collect my hardware including another mug for 2nd place in my age group, a 50K finishers medal, and then an additional medal for completing the ‘No Wimps’ challenge as well as a t-shirt for the feat. There were several of my RUT friends who also completed the series as well, all good folk.
I stayed around to watch many of them finish or at least come through the marathon point in the 50K. Everyone seemed happy in their efforts today and were in good spirits. This is what trail racing is supposed to be. Pure energy and fun for everyone. I said my goodbyes to those who were there and headed home to spend the afternoon with my lovely wife and a good meal. A wonderful finish to a long but very fun weekend of racing.
Saturday, April 28, 2012
2012 Trail Half Marathon Results
1:43:05
26/839 overall
4/82 age
So the trail marathon has been around for a few years and they have had a half marathon associated with it as well but to be a little different, they decided to have the massive (>850 runners) half marathon on Saturday and then the trail marathon and 50K on Sunday. With races on consecutive days, why not take more of people’s money and have them run -two- races. What was born was the ‘No Wimps Challenge’. This is the toughest 13.1 mile loop I know and having to do it once on Saturday and 2.5 times on Sunday, I knew it would be tough but fun, so I signed up for the half/50K set and tried to run the two races ‘smart’, which is something I am still working on it seems.
The famous ‘poto’ trail is quite rough. There are zillions of small hills, a handful of long ones, everywhere roots, rocks, uneven terrain and even sections of sand just to change it up. It is maintained by a local mountain biking group and they like (for some reason) to have a bumpy ride, which is why the course is so rough. There are few sections where you can stretch your legs out and get into some semblance of even pace so the course is just brutal all the way around. No PR’s are ever set here.
I got to the race venue about an hour before start in time to see yet another beautiful pre-race sunrise and met up with some friends including Pizza dude, Matt. He and I run marathons at roughly the same speed and since he had run a 100 mile race 2 weeks previous, and me running a 100 3 weeks previous, we decided to run together for the half. He had indicated that he wanted to run the half marathon hard and then go easy on the 50K, and I sort of wanted to do the opposite, so our pace for the half worked well together.
We started out together chatting a little and I left him behind about mile 3, but then he caught up with me at mile 7 and then left me behind for a mile or so and I caught up and we ran the rest of the way together. I have run with Matt enough to know the man does not have any idea what the term ‘even pace’ means. His pace was going all over the place which was driving me nuts. I enjoyed his company enough, that I didn’t mind his erratic speed.
There were four aid stations on the course, reasonably well spaced. Matt’s wife, Paula, a really good runner in her own right, was at one station and had been telling people for days that she was excited to throw gummy bears at me when I came by. Sure enough, when I came by she grabbed the bag and started whipping them at me. I stopped and said ‘Can i just have one handed to me?’ and she obliged. All the folks at the aid stations were of course awesome and helpful, but I anticipated nothing less. There is a special place in heaven for aid station workers..
So Matt and I were going along at a good 7:45ish pace feeling like we were going to finish well and at about mile 11 two guys caught up with us and we found out one of them was in our (35-39) age group. Well, Matt and I didn’t want to lose that place, so we stepped it up a little bit, leaving them at the last long hill. It worked so that at mile 12 we glanced back and saw we lost them so drew it back a smidge. There was no prize money, so we were fine. When we ran together on Jan 1 at a friends Fat Ass marathon, we decided to cross the finish line at exactly the same moment for the ‘tie’. We decided to do the same thing here with no sprint to the end, but instead just trying to cross as as close to the same time as possible and let the computer figure it out. Turns out, Matt beat me by 3/10ths of a second. The difference between 3rd and 4th in my age group was the length of my arm. Oh well.
A rare 1/2 marathon finishers medal as well as a cool age award mug completed the haul. I also got some blood on my toe. Seems I leaked a bunch of blood out of my pinky toe, enough that the show was a nice red near the wound. It felt fine during the race,and would only bother me the first 10 miles of the next day’s race.
I had to get going soon after race end as I had to make it back to town for Commencement ceremonies at the college I teach at. I did manage to have enough time to stop at Applebee’s for my post-race/pre-race meal. I am not sure if I was replenishing from the half or prepping for the 50K. Either way, the meal was delish.
26/839 overall
4/82 age
So the trail marathon has been around for a few years and they have had a half marathon associated with it as well but to be a little different, they decided to have the massive (>850 runners) half marathon on Saturday and then the trail marathon and 50K on Sunday. With races on consecutive days, why not take more of people’s money and have them run -two- races. What was born was the ‘No Wimps Challenge’. This is the toughest 13.1 mile loop I know and having to do it once on Saturday and 2.5 times on Sunday, I knew it would be tough but fun, so I signed up for the half/50K set and tried to run the two races ‘smart’, which is something I am still working on it seems.The famous ‘poto’ trail is quite rough. There are zillions of small hills, a handful of long ones, everywhere roots, rocks, uneven terrain and even sections of sand just to change it up. It is maintained by a local mountain biking group and they like (for some reason) to have a bumpy ride, which is why the course is so rough. There are few sections where you can stretch your legs out and get into some semblance of even pace so the course is just brutal all the way around. No PR’s are ever set here.
I got to the race venue about an hour before start in time to see yet another beautiful pre-race sunrise and met up with some friends including Pizza dude, Matt. He and I run marathons at roughly the same speed and since he had run a 100 mile race 2 weeks previous, and me running a 100 3 weeks previous, we decided to run together for the half. He had indicated that he wanted to run the half marathon hard and then go easy on the 50K, and I sort of wanted to do the opposite, so our pace for the half worked well together.We started out together chatting a little and I left him behind about mile 3, but then he caught up with me at mile 7 and then left me behind for a mile or so and I caught up and we ran the rest of the way together. I have run with Matt enough to know the man does not have any idea what the term ‘even pace’ means. His pace was going all over the place which was driving me nuts. I enjoyed his company enough, that I didn’t mind his erratic speed.
There were four aid stations on the course, reasonably well spaced. Matt’s wife, Paula, a really good runner in her own right, was at one station and had been telling people for days that she was excited to throw gummy bears at me when I came by. Sure enough, when I came by she grabbed the bag and started whipping them at me. I stopped and said ‘Can i just have one handed to me?’ and she obliged. All the folks at the aid stations were of course awesome and helpful, but I anticipated nothing less. There is a special place in heaven for aid station workers..
So Matt and I were going along at a good 7:45ish pace feeling like we were going to finish well and at about mile 11 two guys caught up with us and we found out one of them was in our (35-39) age group. Well, Matt and I didn’t want to lose that place, so we stepped it up a little bit, leaving them at the last long hill. It worked so that at mile 12 we glanced back and saw we lost them so drew it back a smidge. There was no prize money, so we were fine. When we ran together on Jan 1 at a friends Fat Ass marathon, we decided to cross the finish line at exactly the same moment for the ‘tie’. We decided to do the same thing here with no sprint to the end, but instead just trying to cross as as close to the same time as possible and let the computer figure it out. Turns out, Matt beat me by 3/10ths of a second. The difference between 3rd and 4th in my age group was the length of my arm. Oh well.
A rare 1/2 marathon finishers medal as well as a cool age award mug completed the haul. I also got some blood on my toe. Seems I leaked a bunch of blood out of my pinky toe, enough that the show was a nice red near the wound. It felt fine during the race,and would only bother me the first 10 miles of the next day’s race.
I had to get going soon after race end as I had to make it back to town for Commencement ceremonies at the college I teach at. I did manage to have enough time to stop at Applebee’s for my post-race/pre-race meal. I am not sure if I was replenishing from the half or prepping for the 50K. Either way, the meal was delish.
Saturday, April 7, 2012
2012 Philly 100 Results (Or: What happens when it all comes together)
16:59:59
1/16 Overall
My First 100 Miler Win!
So I have known for quite some time that I am not a really strong racer, mentally. I am, however, very focused in my training and my legs are very strong. This race was the first full test of a new training/racing plan and it worked like a charm. For the last few months I was consistently doing ~100 mile weeks but instead of 12-15 miles everyday, I was doing two 30-40+ mile -days- per week. While these long days (sometimes including 50 milers) were tough in the beginning, I recovered quicker and quicker each time I did them. My goal for this race was to train hard and show up to the race start and not ‘think’ too much about the race and simply let muscle memory do the lions share of the work. My brain was more of an observer, thinking only of what do to do the next time I hit my aid station. When I try hard and focus on my ‘racing’ I end up blowing up and doing quite poorly. This race was very different, but in a good way.
The LONG weekend started with a poor night of sleeping Thursday night and getting up at 5:30 am to head to the Detroit area to pick up my running buddy, Ryan, who was making the trip with me. Turns out, he didn’t sleep well either that night. We had a long uneventful drive to the far side of Pennsylvania and and got to Carmen’s house about 4:30 in the afternoon. Carmen is an old high school friend of mine who I reconnected with on facebook a few years ago. She has followed my running lately and been very supportive. When she found out I was going to be in town for the race, she was happy to host us for dinner. The homemade chicken marsala was delish, complemented by pleasant dinner conversation. It was awesome to see her again, and I was glad I was able to. We still had an hour into town to our hotel for that night so we left around 7:00 pm and stopped at a local grocery store to pick up fresh fruit and last minute supplies. Earlier in the week I had gone to the store and bought standard ultra food (candy, salty snacks, etc) not knowing what I would want to eat during the race. I decided to buy lots of different kinds of food so I would have plenty to choose from during the race. 100 milers are unique in that your ‘tastes’ generally vary during your all-day runs. By 8:45 pm Friday, I was in bed and slept harder than I ever have the night before a race.
This was the 4th running of the Philly 100 and this is very much a ‘fat ass’ race. You must support yourself completely so no aid, no entry fee, no shirt, no bib, no nothing. Ryan and I arrived at the start/finish about 45 minutes before the start and got a parking spot about 150 meters off the loop. The back of Misty’s (new to her) Prius would be our aid station for the day. Ryan and I threw all our food, drink, and gear in the back and with each loop the mess got a little worse. We tried to be organized so it was not that bad, even at the end of the day. The race course itself was an 8.4 mile loop that we would be doing 12 times for a grand total of 100.8 miles. The race director wasn’t much of one, but more like the caretaker of the website. In fact, she gave the pre-race briefing (standard instructions) and told us to email her our times when we were done. She then went home, having finished her run the night before. Since it was a fat ass race, some people started early, and some started late. As such, I had to wait a few days to get official results.
The race started just before sunrise and I think we all started the course in the ‘clockwise’ direction. Since it was 12 mile loops (each 8.4 miles long) and we were sort of on our own, we were free to change directions as we pleased after each loop. I varied up a bit ending up running clockwise 5 times and counter-clockwise 7 times. The first half of the first loop was very gentle and laid back. I knew I wanted to start very easy, so I started running with Kristin, a nice woman from Maryland. We chatted for several miles and her husband, Michael, caught up to us about halfway through the loop. He stopped a few times for ‘personal’ reasons involving the digestive system and would catch back up. We swapped standard running stories and she told me that her first 100 mile race was Western States, which is like saying your first marathon was Boston. I told her I was seriously jealous and she acknowledged that most people she told were as well. We got back to the cars after our first loop in about 1:16, which was just fine for me. A quick stop to eat something small and we headed out for a second loop together. Again, her husband joined us on and off, and about halfway through my second loop she dropped back and I continued on with Michael. He was just as nice as his wife and so the conversation was equally pleasant. We ended lap 2 in a net time of 2:37 (lap 2 being 1:21) together and started lap 3 still chatting. About halfway through that lap he stopped again for a short time and I said goodbye and started off on the rest of my trek running by myself, a condition that would remain with me the rest of the day.
I ran lap 3 in about 1:18 having picked up the pace when I became alone, but not too much for a net time of 3:55, after a total of just over 25 miles. Obviously, nothing too speedy but that was ok. My last 100 mile race I did the first 25 miles in 3:30 and ended in a total time of over 21 hours. This race was not about running fast, it was about running consistent. You have heard the phrase ‘this isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon’ to talk about some long range project. Well, this ain’t a marathon, it’s roughly 4 times that. A lot can change in a day of running, so starting slow and saving your strength for later is always smart. Too bad I rarely do it, until now.
I should note here, that lap times I give all have a little error bar on them as I was at my car 2-4 minutes each lap and I was inconsistent as to exactly when I looked at my watch. I was paying attention enough to know I was running each loop at almost even pace and that’s all I cared about. Normally I spend very little time at aid stations but by necessity I had to take more time at this race, and it seemed to have helped. My brains sole purpose this day was to be a good coach, especially when I got to my aid station. WIth each and every stop, I would open the back hatch of the car and start the drill. Do I need any pills? Where am I chaffing? Slap some lotion on there. Time to change shoes? Re-fill handheld with more rocket fuel. Drink an entire bottle of Avitae, a great caffeinated water . Grab a handful of fruit and either scarf it down quick (blueberries) or grab a handful for the next loop (grapes). Update facebook as appropriate and get back out on the course.
With 25% of the race over and my initial adrenaline gone, I was finally getting into the long-haul groove of the middle half of the race, by far the most un-exciting. Just staying sane and moving was the biggest requirements. The course loop is very popular amongst the locals, the route going along the river where several major colleges and universities crew teams practice and compete. All day long I saw rowers as singles and groups as large as 8 out on the river rowing away. There were bikers and runners by the hundreds during the course of the day as well. With sunny skies and temps between 50 and 65 all day, why not. The only real weather ‘problem’ would be the wind which was 15-20 mph at its worst. During this middle portion I ran a majority of the loops counterclockwise as I thought that was the best route to combat the wind based on the course. With so many bystanders and us racers not having bibs, it was hard to tell who was running the ultra and who was just a local doing their daily run. Eventually after you have seen the same person for 5+ hours, they were more recognizable. I am sure it was easier to recognize me in my dyed hair. Friendly banter was exchanged whenever we saw one another because that is just how ultrarunners roll.
Two friends, Kino and Steven from New York City came down to help out and setup an aid station for the ultra runners. They went all out and got a wide variety of standard ultra fare and gave it to any ultra runner who wanted it. They were about 2 miles away from the turn, and so I used them mostly for a water only station, but occasionally had some salty food. They were so nice to do that and even though they left before the race was over, they left the remaining food for us late night runners. Awesome friends they are!
I hit the halfway point in 8 hours flat. I have had 50 mile splits of under 8 hours a few times, but the second half is usually my downfall, succumbing to a death march everytime. Today, however, I felt good and stable, my body giving no complaints at all. Muscle memory was doing its job, remembering exactly how it feels to run 50 miles in a day and not giving much of a fuss. Sure, I had some small blisters and ‘hot spots’ that required attention. I changed my shoes every 25 miles, but never any major issues of consequence. Halfway done, no problem.
Loops 7-9 were all in put down in the 1:25 range. After mile 50 I was doing short walks breaks of 300-400m in length. By lap 9 there were exactly 4 of them per loop, about every 2 miles. The only tough part was getting back ‘into’ running after each walk break. Once you get going it’s not that bad, but those first few meters are tough on the brain, so I chose to deliberately think about something else every time I was restarting and it worked. After loop 8 I finally pulled out my iPod and started the techno. Always the plan (techno when getting tired and sun going down) and it had the desired effect, with lap 9 finished 7 minutes FASTER than lap 8. That’s some good tunage.
I hit the mile 75 mark (lap 9) in 12:25. 1:30 loops from here on out was my goal and just hold it together and keep doing the same thing. I had been very good about taking my electrolyte pills, amino acid pills, and tylenol on a regular basis which all helped body and soul. The night before Beast of Burden 100 I heard some bad things about taking ibuprofen during ultras and it scared me. Apparently tylenol works as good and is not as bad for your health. Of course, the amount of tylenol I was taking was high and dangerous outside of running an ultra. I won’t tell you how many I took, but know it was more than would be considered healthy. To that accusation, I would counter running 100 miles in one day is not exact ‘healthy’ either.
After 10 laps, finally it was starting to feel like real work. I rolled back to the car after loop 84 miles in 13:58. The sun was almost down so I grabbed my headlamp. One of the things I learned from Beast of Burden 100 was that I need to have lots of light when I am running after the sun sets. I even had a second light that I was going to wear around my waist but I did not grab it. The path we were running on was well lit and I could have safely ran without my one headlamp on most of the way, but I kept it on to keep my brain reminded of the fact that I was running and it was not bedtime. My brain did a good job all day, never focusing on the pain or soreness I felt. If it had been permitted to ‘listen’ to such internal monologue it would have send notice for me to walk the rest of the way because that is what has happened in the other five 100 milers I have run. Today however, my brain was only allowed to listen and record notes, it was not allowed to send direction to my legs. My brain listened to the pain and suffering, but chose to ignore it. It kept good tabs on my needs regarding fueling and such and that worked perfect. I tried to use my brain as a disembodied personal coach who did not quite understand what I was feeling and had little sympathy for me anyways but listened to my needs and provided for me when I needed it. I know it sounds weird, but just trust me this mental ‘game’ I played is what got me under 17 and without that game, I would have run much slower.
I rolled the second-to-last-lap in 1:32 (15:30 elapsed) which meant I had a possibility of running sub 17 for the entire race. My (not publicized beforehand) goal was to break 19, so I knew I could totally sluff off (walk? crawl?) the last lap and still beat my goal. Knowing that conditions were not going to be this perfect for a probably a few races, I decided to just try to hang on and if 17 came, then great, if not, no problem. I felt so awesome and the fact that I was not at death-march mode by mile 91 was amazing in and of itself. I went back and forth about trying to break 17 about 1000 times that last loop, which helped me go fast ‘enough’ I guess. At about 16:56 I passed Ryan near the Art Museum which is only maybe 600m from the finish. He was walking his last lap and taking a break to take pictures with the Rocky statue. He saw me coming and screamed ‘Four minutes! Move!’ which of course I was doing to the best of my ability already, but I thought I had a little more buffer than I did. I swear I looked at my watch 8 times in the last 3 minutes, trying to judge whether or not I was gonna make it. The last 200m were me running as fast as I could (after 100 miles) which felt like a wicked sprint. As I crossed the line in the sidewalk I started my watch I started at 6 am that morning and it read 16:59:59. I stared at it for a long while not believing I hit it that close.
Since it was a low key FA race, there were only a few people who were crewing for other runners there. Nothing exciting, no cheering, no medal, no nothing except me basking in happiness. Everything had come together for a great finish. I wandered back to my car and made the last phone call I would ever make with that phone to my lovely wife telling her about my race. Ryan came by a few minutes later and he told me he was done too, stopping after 67.2 miles. He had walked the last two laps to kill time waiting for me to finish. We chatted for a few minutes with Michael who was at his car for a quick break. I don’t remember how many more laps he had, but I think it was two. We put on some more clothes and got ready to head out as our hotel was 35 minutes away. As we were getting ready to leave I realized I needed to drink some more water and Ryan had poured out our only remaining non caffeinated water. We still some some Avitae water, but I didn’t need caffeine now at the end, I wanted to sleep. Ryan offered me some ginger ale reminding me that might help my stomach which was just a little upset. Cool, so we got in the car and started the drive. It took less than 5 minutes for my body to reject the ginger ale. What is sad is that I knew it would beforehand if I had thought for a second. I have consumed carbonated beverages immediately following marathons and been horribly sick just minutes later. Sure enough, driving at 70 mph down the turnpike and I had to pull over to get out of the car to puke. I feared a cop would see me and pull over and the ensuing questions would be ‘weird’. Normally guys puking on the side of the road at 11:30pm on Saturday are not sober. I got back in the car and made it another 15 minutes before I had to get out and do it again, eventually my ejections turning into dry heaves, and those hurt.
We finally got near the hotel and Ryan was hungry so we stopped at a Wendy’s and grabbed some food and it was here that I realized I didn’t know where my phone was. We used Ryan’s to call mine and no sound came from anywhere in the car. We looked and found nothing. Ryan asked ‘Did you leave it on top of the car at the race?’ and I stopped and say ‘Crap’. Yup, that’s exactly what happened. I dropped Ryan off and took his phone (to help me find mine) and headed back onto the turnpike to return to the race start, a 35 minute drive back. Remember, I have been up for a few hours before now, and this drive sucked. I got back to where the car had been parked and found nothing. There was a small group of people nearby (recently finished runners and their crew) and asked them, and nothing. I followed the road that I covered when we first left and found nothing. After 20 minutes or so I gave up the ghost and went back to the hotel, yes another 35 minute drive. I finally got back to the hotel and tried to get some sleep. My legs were in hyper-recovery mode so my body was burning the midnight oil doing all that cool physiology muscle recovery stuff and enough of my brain was needed to be be active that I couldn’t sleep much at all. About 6:30 Sunday morning I got up and took a shower [Yes, I slept in my nasty race clothes that I had been wearing all day long, but I did not care, they weren’t my sheets ] then Ryan and I went down for the hotel breakfast which was un-exciting.
We packed up our stuff and started our long long road trip back to Michigan, stopping 4 times for me to get more caffeine in me. Ryan drove a little while so I could get an hour or so long nap. I ended up pulling into my driveway at about 7:30 Sunday night and I was amazed how well my legs were. They were only a little worse off than they are after a hard marathon. It only took me a few days after this race for my legs to effectively recover. The 50 mile training days paid off at all levels of this weekend, including recovery. I will walk for a few days, get some easy eliptical time, but I expect next week I will be back to pseudo-normal training schedule.
So, here is the take home message which is probably only useful for me. I give you
How to be successful in Hundo’s if your name is Mark Ott
- Train hard. The more you sweat in training, the less you bleed in battle.
- During ultras, you really only need to eat fresh fruit. Get lots, including some variety and pre-package in ziploc bags if you can. Grapes and blueberries were good on the stomach, but the raspberries were not so good. Pineapple and green apple seem to also be stable.
- Rocket fuel works. Gatorade/carbo-pro/electrolyte powder combination worked well. You still need to drink plenty of water. I drank 16 oz of rocket fuel and another 20 oz of water every loop, the temp never got above 65 and my pee was still a dark yellow. Drink more.
- Caffeinated water (Avitae!) worked great, caffeine tabs also helped.
- Regular supplies of Tylenol and amino acid tablets and additional electrolyte pills kept the brain content.
1/16 Overall
My First 100 Miler Win!
So I have known for quite some time that I am not a really strong racer, mentally. I am, however, very focused in my training and my legs are very strong. This race was the first full test of a new training/racing plan and it worked like a charm. For the last few months I was consistently doing ~100 mile weeks but instead of 12-15 miles everyday, I was doing two 30-40+ mile -days- per week. While these long days (sometimes including 50 milers) were tough in the beginning, I recovered quicker and quicker each time I did them. My goal for this race was to train hard and show up to the race start and not ‘think’ too much about the race and simply let muscle memory do the lions share of the work. My brain was more of an observer, thinking only of what do to do the next time I hit my aid station. When I try hard and focus on my ‘racing’ I end up blowing up and doing quite poorly. This race was very different, but in a good way.The LONG weekend started with a poor night of sleeping Thursday night and getting up at 5:30 am to head to the Detroit area to pick up my running buddy, Ryan, who was making the trip with me. Turns out, he didn’t sleep well either that night. We had a long uneventful drive to the far side of Pennsylvania and and got to Carmen’s house about 4:30 in the afternoon. Carmen is an old high school friend of mine who I reconnected with on facebook a few years ago. She has followed my running lately and been very supportive. When she found out I was going to be in town for the race, she was happy to host us for dinner. The homemade chicken marsala was delish, complemented by pleasant dinner conversation. It was awesome to see her again, and I was glad I was able to. We still had an hour into town to our hotel for that night so we left around 7:00 pm and stopped at a local grocery store to pick up fresh fruit and last minute supplies. Earlier in the week I had gone to the store and bought standard ultra food (candy, salty snacks, etc) not knowing what I would want to eat during the race. I decided to buy lots of different kinds of food so I would have plenty to choose from during the race. 100 milers are unique in that your ‘tastes’ generally vary during your all-day runs. By 8:45 pm Friday, I was in bed and slept harder than I ever have the night before a race.
This was the 4th running of the Philly 100 and this is very much a ‘fat ass’ race. You must support yourself completely so no aid, no entry fee, no shirt, no bib, no nothing. Ryan and I arrived at the start/finish about 45 minutes before the start and got a parking spot about 150 meters off the loop. The back of Misty’s (new to her) Prius would be our aid station for the day. Ryan and I threw all our food, drink, and gear in the back and with each loop the mess got a little worse. We tried to be organized so it was not that bad, even at the end of the day. The race course itself was an 8.4 mile loop that we would be doing 12 times for a grand total of 100.8 miles. The race director wasn’t much of one, but more like the caretaker of the website. In fact, she gave the pre-race briefing (standard instructions) and told us to email her our times when we were done. She then went home, having finished her run the night before. Since it was a fat ass race, some people started early, and some started late. As such, I had to wait a few days to get official results.
The race started just before sunrise and I think we all started the course in the ‘clockwise’ direction. Since it was 12 mile loops (each 8.4 miles long) and we were sort of on our own, we were free to change directions as we pleased after each loop. I varied up a bit ending up running clockwise 5 times and counter-clockwise 7 times. The first half of the first loop was very gentle and laid back. I knew I wanted to start very easy, so I started running with Kristin, a nice woman from Maryland. We chatted for several miles and her husband, Michael, caught up to us about halfway through the loop. He stopped a few times for ‘personal’ reasons involving the digestive system and would catch back up. We swapped standard running stories and she told me that her first 100 mile race was Western States, which is like saying your first marathon was Boston. I told her I was seriously jealous and she acknowledged that most people she told were as well. We got back to the cars after our first loop in about 1:16, which was just fine for me. A quick stop to eat something small and we headed out for a second loop together. Again, her husband joined us on and off, and about halfway through my second loop she dropped back and I continued on with Michael. He was just as nice as his wife and so the conversation was equally pleasant. We ended lap 2 in a net time of 2:37 (lap 2 being 1:21) together and started lap 3 still chatting. About halfway through that lap he stopped again for a short time and I said goodbye and started off on the rest of my trek running by myself, a condition that would remain with me the rest of the day.
I ran lap 3 in about 1:18 having picked up the pace when I became alone, but not too much for a net time of 3:55, after a total of just over 25 miles. Obviously, nothing too speedy but that was ok. My last 100 mile race I did the first 25 miles in 3:30 and ended in a total time of over 21 hours. This race was not about running fast, it was about running consistent. You have heard the phrase ‘this isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon’ to talk about some long range project. Well, this ain’t a marathon, it’s roughly 4 times that. A lot can change in a day of running, so starting slow and saving your strength for later is always smart. Too bad I rarely do it, until now.
I should note here, that lap times I give all have a little error bar on them as I was at my car 2-4 minutes each lap and I was inconsistent as to exactly when I looked at my watch. I was paying attention enough to know I was running each loop at almost even pace and that’s all I cared about. Normally I spend very little time at aid stations but by necessity I had to take more time at this race, and it seemed to have helped. My brains sole purpose this day was to be a good coach, especially when I got to my aid station. WIth each and every stop, I would open the back hatch of the car and start the drill. Do I need any pills? Where am I chaffing? Slap some lotion on there. Time to change shoes? Re-fill handheld with more rocket fuel. Drink an entire bottle of Avitae, a great caffeinated water . Grab a handful of fruit and either scarf it down quick (blueberries) or grab a handful for the next loop (grapes). Update facebook as appropriate and get back out on the course.
With 25% of the race over and my initial adrenaline gone, I was finally getting into the long-haul groove of the middle half of the race, by far the most un-exciting. Just staying sane and moving was the biggest requirements. The course loop is very popular amongst the locals, the route going along the river where several major colleges and universities crew teams practice and compete. All day long I saw rowers as singles and groups as large as 8 out on the river rowing away. There were bikers and runners by the hundreds during the course of the day as well. With sunny skies and temps between 50 and 65 all day, why not. The only real weather ‘problem’ would be the wind which was 15-20 mph at its worst. During this middle portion I ran a majority of the loops counterclockwise as I thought that was the best route to combat the wind based on the course. With so many bystanders and us racers not having bibs, it was hard to tell who was running the ultra and who was just a local doing their daily run. Eventually after you have seen the same person for 5+ hours, they were more recognizable. I am sure it was easier to recognize me in my dyed hair. Friendly banter was exchanged whenever we saw one another because that is just how ultrarunners roll.
Two friends, Kino and Steven from New York City came down to help out and setup an aid station for the ultra runners. They went all out and got a wide variety of standard ultra fare and gave it to any ultra runner who wanted it. They were about 2 miles away from the turn, and so I used them mostly for a water only station, but occasionally had some salty food. They were so nice to do that and even though they left before the race was over, they left the remaining food for us late night runners. Awesome friends they are!I hit the halfway point in 8 hours flat. I have had 50 mile splits of under 8 hours a few times, but the second half is usually my downfall, succumbing to a death march everytime. Today, however, I felt good and stable, my body giving no complaints at all. Muscle memory was doing its job, remembering exactly how it feels to run 50 miles in a day and not giving much of a fuss. Sure, I had some small blisters and ‘hot spots’ that required attention. I changed my shoes every 25 miles, but never any major issues of consequence. Halfway done, no problem.
Loops 7-9 were all in put down in the 1:25 range. After mile 50 I was doing short walks breaks of 300-400m in length. By lap 9 there were exactly 4 of them per loop, about every 2 miles. The only tough part was getting back ‘into’ running after each walk break. Once you get going it’s not that bad, but those first few meters are tough on the brain, so I chose to deliberately think about something else every time I was restarting and it worked. After loop 8 I finally pulled out my iPod and started the techno. Always the plan (techno when getting tired and sun going down) and it had the desired effect, with lap 9 finished 7 minutes FASTER than lap 8. That’s some good tunage.
I hit the mile 75 mark (lap 9) in 12:25. 1:30 loops from here on out was my goal and just hold it together and keep doing the same thing. I had been very good about taking my electrolyte pills, amino acid pills, and tylenol on a regular basis which all helped body and soul. The night before Beast of Burden 100 I heard some bad things about taking ibuprofen during ultras and it scared me. Apparently tylenol works as good and is not as bad for your health. Of course, the amount of tylenol I was taking was high and dangerous outside of running an ultra. I won’t tell you how many I took, but know it was more than would be considered healthy. To that accusation, I would counter running 100 miles in one day is not exact ‘healthy’ either.
After 10 laps, finally it was starting to feel like real work. I rolled back to the car after loop 84 miles in 13:58. The sun was almost down so I grabbed my headlamp. One of the things I learned from Beast of Burden 100 was that I need to have lots of light when I am running after the sun sets. I even had a second light that I was going to wear around my waist but I did not grab it. The path we were running on was well lit and I could have safely ran without my one headlamp on most of the way, but I kept it on to keep my brain reminded of the fact that I was running and it was not bedtime. My brain did a good job all day, never focusing on the pain or soreness I felt. If it had been permitted to ‘listen’ to such internal monologue it would have send notice for me to walk the rest of the way because that is what has happened in the other five 100 milers I have run. Today however, my brain was only allowed to listen and record notes, it was not allowed to send direction to my legs. My brain listened to the pain and suffering, but chose to ignore it. It kept good tabs on my needs regarding fueling and such and that worked perfect. I tried to use my brain as a disembodied personal coach who did not quite understand what I was feeling and had little sympathy for me anyways but listened to my needs and provided for me when I needed it. I know it sounds weird, but just trust me this mental ‘game’ I played is what got me under 17 and without that game, I would have run much slower.
I rolled the second-to-last-lap in 1:32 (15:30 elapsed) which meant I had a possibility of running sub 17 for the entire race. My (not publicized beforehand) goal was to break 19, so I knew I could totally sluff off (walk? crawl?) the last lap and still beat my goal. Knowing that conditions were not going to be this perfect for a probably a few races, I decided to just try to hang on and if 17 came, then great, if not, no problem. I felt so awesome and the fact that I was not at death-march mode by mile 91 was amazing in and of itself. I went back and forth about trying to break 17 about 1000 times that last loop, which helped me go fast ‘enough’ I guess. At about 16:56 I passed Ryan near the Art Museum which is only maybe 600m from the finish. He was walking his last lap and taking a break to take pictures with the Rocky statue. He saw me coming and screamed ‘Four minutes! Move!’ which of course I was doing to the best of my ability already, but I thought I had a little more buffer than I did. I swear I looked at my watch 8 times in the last 3 minutes, trying to judge whether or not I was gonna make it. The last 200m were me running as fast as I could (after 100 miles) which felt like a wicked sprint. As I crossed the line in the sidewalk I started my watch I started at 6 am that morning and it read 16:59:59. I stared at it for a long while not believing I hit it that close.
Since it was a low key FA race, there were only a few people who were crewing for other runners there. Nothing exciting, no cheering, no medal, no nothing except me basking in happiness. Everything had come together for a great finish. I wandered back to my car and made the last phone call I would ever make with that phone to my lovely wife telling her about my race. Ryan came by a few minutes later and he told me he was done too, stopping after 67.2 miles. He had walked the last two laps to kill time waiting for me to finish. We chatted for a few minutes with Michael who was at his car for a quick break. I don’t remember how many more laps he had, but I think it was two. We put on some more clothes and got ready to head out as our hotel was 35 minutes away. As we were getting ready to leave I realized I needed to drink some more water and Ryan had poured out our only remaining non caffeinated water. We still some some Avitae water, but I didn’t need caffeine now at the end, I wanted to sleep. Ryan offered me some ginger ale reminding me that might help my stomach which was just a little upset. Cool, so we got in the car and started the drive. It took less than 5 minutes for my body to reject the ginger ale. What is sad is that I knew it would beforehand if I had thought for a second. I have consumed carbonated beverages immediately following marathons and been horribly sick just minutes later. Sure enough, driving at 70 mph down the turnpike and I had to pull over to get out of the car to puke. I feared a cop would see me and pull over and the ensuing questions would be ‘weird’. Normally guys puking on the side of the road at 11:30pm on Saturday are not sober. I got back in the car and made it another 15 minutes before I had to get out and do it again, eventually my ejections turning into dry heaves, and those hurt.
We finally got near the hotel and Ryan was hungry so we stopped at a Wendy’s and grabbed some food and it was here that I realized I didn’t know where my phone was. We used Ryan’s to call mine and no sound came from anywhere in the car. We looked and found nothing. Ryan asked ‘Did you leave it on top of the car at the race?’ and I stopped and say ‘Crap’. Yup, that’s exactly what happened. I dropped Ryan off and took his phone (to help me find mine) and headed back onto the turnpike to return to the race start, a 35 minute drive back. Remember, I have been up for a few hours before now, and this drive sucked. I got back to where the car had been parked and found nothing. There was a small group of people nearby (recently finished runners and their crew) and asked them, and nothing. I followed the road that I covered when we first left and found nothing. After 20 minutes or so I gave up the ghost and went back to the hotel, yes another 35 minute drive. I finally got back to the hotel and tried to get some sleep. My legs were in hyper-recovery mode so my body was burning the midnight oil doing all that cool physiology muscle recovery stuff and enough of my brain was needed to be be active that I couldn’t sleep much at all. About 6:30 Sunday morning I got up and took a shower [Yes, I slept in my nasty race clothes that I had been wearing all day long, but I did not care, they weren’t my sheets ] then Ryan and I went down for the hotel breakfast which was un-exciting.We packed up our stuff and started our long long road trip back to Michigan, stopping 4 times for me to get more caffeine in me. Ryan drove a little while so I could get an hour or so long nap. I ended up pulling into my driveway at about 7:30 Sunday night and I was amazed how well my legs were. They were only a little worse off than they are after a hard marathon. It only took me a few days after this race for my legs to effectively recover. The 50 mile training days paid off at all levels of this weekend, including recovery. I will walk for a few days, get some easy eliptical time, but I expect next week I will be back to pseudo-normal training schedule.
So, here is the take home message which is probably only useful for me. I give you
How to be successful in Hundo’s if your name is Mark Ott
- Train hard. The more you sweat in training, the less you bleed in battle.
- During ultras, you really only need to eat fresh fruit. Get lots, including some variety and pre-package in ziploc bags if you can. Grapes and blueberries were good on the stomach, but the raspberries were not so good. Pineapple and green apple seem to also be stable.
- Rocket fuel works. Gatorade/carbo-pro/electrolyte powder combination worked well. You still need to drink plenty of water. I drank 16 oz of rocket fuel and another 20 oz of water every loop, the temp never got above 65 and my pee was still a dark yellow. Drink more.
- Caffeinated water (Avitae!) worked great, caffeine tabs also helped.
- Regular supplies of Tylenol and amino acid tablets and additional electrolyte pills kept the brain content.
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