Fall Races (aka "Catching Up")

Yes, I was successful at Schloss... and several races after that.  In fact, it seems every weekend for the last three months I was racing, running, or resting.  And by resting, I mean only running 15-20 miles instead of 26 or more.  Because the only way I will remember is to write about them (and thank goodness for pictures) here is a brief summary:

The Big Schloss...I have to devote some time to this because it was epic, I tell you.  The rain, the thunder, the lightning.  Pounding down the side of a mountain with little rivers at my feet, the huge drops pelting my face as the thunder boomed loud and near.  It was amazing.  There are some runs that I feel like I am flying and this was one of them.  The views, even through the clouds and persistent rain, were amazing.  It was just cool enough to be pleasant, and this run felt as close to effortless as can be. 

A week later (or maybe two?) and it was the Women's Half Marathon.  I can't remember how many times I have completed this race, but it is an annual Evil Sister reunion, and missing it is not an option.  While a bit warm for me, I did  just fine and had a pretty good run.  Nothing compares to the camaraderie of this race and the singing send off of "Happy Trails"  by VHTRC men is priceless.

Another week, and another 50K. This was Blue's Cruise, and a new one for me.  When I registered for this, I was looking for a race that would be a supported long distance, but not too technical or rocky, since I was running a marathon just a week later.  I didn't pay much attention to the distance (very close to Philly) and I definitely wasn't banking on the swarms of bees that attacked my knees and thighs early in the race.

I had these welts all over my legs and knees

The  race circumvents a lake, and sounds pleasant enough, but there were stretches that were long and less than scenic.  I didn't have my camera so I couldn't capture the prison that highlighted the long 5 miles to the finish.  Not sure I would do this again, but the folks were great and it served the purpose.

I'll stop here, because my next few races were marathons, and the Patapsco 50K.  They deserve their own post since each one was a great race as well as some freaky anomaly of speed that caught me by surprise!  (I realize that waiting until 3 months after a race is probably not considered an official "report", but hey, life.

Big Schloss or Bust

So this is what I am doing this weekend...

The big Schloss.  I haven't run a successful 50K since May and I am more than a little nervous that it won't go well, but I am also more determined that it will.  At least that is what I told myself all this weekend as I ran 38 miles of trails to cram for this event. 

can you say "unprepared"

Its not like I haven't been training.  I ran the A-10 last weekend, and for the first time in 11 years, did not spend the afternoon dying on the couch.  It was hot, but I ran it like a trail race, nice and calm, and while my time was pretty abysmal, I felt terrific afterwards.   This road race is historically the day before my kids start school, and since I usually wait until Sunday afternoon before the first day to get school supplies, I end up at Staples looking like a dehydrated zombie.

But I actually felt pretty good after, and since I had gotten to the start at 3:30 am, I had a prime parking spot and got out of there zip quick.   A stealth change in the car and I was perky enough to stop at IKEA on my way home AND I even built the storage organizer I bought.  Now that was an endurance event.

I only want to finish Big Schloss.  No lofty time goals or PRs.   Just get me to the end to restore my confidence and I'll be a happy camper.  I mean, its only a 31 mile mountain run. What could possibly go wrong?

Two Fails and a Drop

July was not kind to me.  For some asinine reason, I thought signing up for three 50Ks on three consecutive weekends was a good idea.

Catoctin was to be the first, and a redemption run.  I ran it two years ago in not ideal circumstances, and came in 3 minutes over the 9:15 cut off time.  This year, I thought I would give it another shot, and since I had been doing weeks of 18-22 mile long runs, it seemed a pretty sure thing.  Yeah...no.

My head was  not in the game and while I made the first few cut offs, by the time I was headed to the Manor area, I  pretty much gave up.  This is a tough race to begin with, and being a million mental miles away for the first half did not help.  As I arrived at the stream and tried to gracefully cross it, the aid workers told me there was no hurry, and that was not what I wanted to hear.  But I admitted defeat and spent the rest of the day floating in the pool.
 

My next race was the summer edition of Rosaryville.  I did this last year and was pleased that I finished in a not horrible time since it was a)summer and b)hot.  The course is MUCH easier than Catoctin and there was some other members of my running group going, so it looked to be a fun day.  And then this:

and this:

It wasn't looking good.  I loaded my hydration pack with ice, took an extra bottle of ice, and wore next to nothing, but was still baking just 10 miles in.  I tried so hard to tough it out for the full 50K, but somewhere after 15 miles I just shut down, went back to the finish and settled for a 25K medal.  Not my proudest moment, but I had puddles in my shoes and just could not drink enough to rehydrate.

So that left me with the last of my 50Ks for the month, and I ultimately had to drop out of that due to family schedule things.

Since July was less than successful, I have decided to take August off, at least until the A-10 the last weekend and concentrate on just running for fun.  I'll wait until September to start worrying about the 50 miler I signed up for today.

Ragnar (More Mud Please)

Sometimes, things become so ridiculous, they are hilarious.  That was my experience with the Ragnar Trail Relay this past weekend.  I'm pretty sure that none of us were quite prepared for the condition of the trails, and that might have been a very good thing!

This was the first time any of us had attempted a Ragnar race, therefore our expectations were in line with other relays we had done, except we would not be on the roads. There was camping involved, and that always spells fun.

Part of our two teams of 16 headed out Thursday to set up camp and prepare for the rest of the teams' arrival on Friday.  It seemed all was going well until we got this message:


Seems a storm rolled through after everything was set up and there was carnage everywhere.  A few had lost all bedding and dry gear and so a plan was made to resupply.  I am sure I wasn't the only one rethinking my packing list (and yet rain boots still didn't seem an obvious choice!!)  When we arrived Friday, it was damp, but not raining, and we were able to do our set up.  On the bright side, staking the tents down was like a knife through butter - no mallet necessary!

now they know how to set up a tent!

Since I was the 4th runner of 8, I had some time to get my tent assembled and get somewhat organized.  My one man tent was pretty small, but did the job and it was on a high spot.  That was going to REALLY come in handy later.  I had packed everything in waterproof bags, so I knew my stuff would stay pretty dry.  Oh, did I mention we were set up about 1/4 mile from the "hub" where the relay exchanges would take place.  This will become important later....
After getting set up, we walked to the start and were able to get a feel for where we would be spending the next two days, in and out of the exchanges, eating, buying way too much merchandise, and warming up by the fire.  Sometime during this adventure, it started raining again.  Gently at first, and then a full out downpour.  Luckily I had packed my raincoat.  Unfortunately, it was in my tent!  I was wearing a heavy ERR sweatshirt that was increasingly becoming more and more soaked.  After a while, when we sent our runners off, I headed back to the tents as the rain picked up in intensity.  Bad decision. Remember when I said we were about 1/4 mile from the staging area?  Yeah, well do you know how wet a sweatshirt can get in the time it takes to jog that far??  
I suspect Ragar knew what they were doing when they had long sleeved shirts, jackets and sweats in their sale tent in the end of June. 

Perfect...just what I am looking for!

Each runner had to do three loops on three different trails.  Green, Yellow and Red.   The concept sounded so easy but man, I could not keep straight what color I was suppose to be doing.  I think it was the race director's fault...he made the comment on the "informational video" that it was just like a stop light, but in reverse - from the bottom up.  The tricky part was that was for the TEAM, not each runner.  And being #4, I just couldn't keep track of my order.  My stop light was all messed up, going from Green to Red and ending with Yellow.  Thankfully I had Cassie, who was also runner #4 on the second team to keep me on track.  Because nothing makes sense at 11 pm in the pouring rain, and it makes even less sense at 8 in the morning (again in the pouring rain) with little sleep.

My favorite leg was the night run.  I have done plenty of night runs before, and have liked them all, but with the rain, the mud, the technical, rocky trail, I really felt like a little kid just out there having a blast.  The muddy puddles were so deep and thick that I came very close to losing my shoes.  The mud was just coating everything, and with the added challenge of crawling over boulders, I just had to stop and laugh.  People were falling and slipping all over the place.  There were parts that were so beautiful with just the glow of my headlamp.  This was called the "Swamp Trail" for obvious reasons. I was running so well, with absolutely  no fear and in my own world of happiness, that it is no surprise that with 2/10 of a mile to go, I missed the very obvious sign to continue straight and headed up the road.  It took a bit of time for me to realize that 1)no one was following me and 2) this was a heck of a lot longer than it should be before I turned and got back on track.  Poor Rick, who saw my name on the board with only 2/10th to go had to wait 15 minutes for me to come in.  I tend to zone out when I am really loving trail running and this wasn't a great time for that!! But I crossed the bridge and was done with the second trail.

Bridge in daylight...and no rain.

 After a couple hours sleep, I woke to get ready for the third run.  Everyone had said how beautiful the yellow trail was, and I was excited to run it and take pictures.  As we made our way back to the start we found that there was  no water, a storm was moving in, and all the legs were asked to double up to get folks done sooner.  There was a sense of urgency (aka: fear) in everyone from the RD to the participants. After having the campsite almost taken out Thursday, no one wanted a repeat of that, especially this late in the game.  The yellow trail did not disappoint.  It was fantastic.  From the rocky footing among the ferns to the pine forest, I was loving it all.  And then the rain started, and I loved it even more.  Pouring, drenching rain filtering through the pines on a cushioned trail, up and down.  Perfect!

I could have run this trail forever, but my teammates were breaking camp and loading the cars in the storms so I hurried along.  The footing at the end was pretty hilarious and I am glad that I was pretty well healed coming into this race! 

mud photos courtesy of Cassie Smink

Once back, I did a pretty poor job at cleaning off and changed while we waited for our last runners to return. They were doing the Red loop, and while it wasn't dark, and no longer raining, I am certain it was still pretty tough!  We all made it back and lived to tell the story.  Finished with some celebratory beverages, cool multi-tool medals and memories of a damn fine weekend.

Runner Gone Rogue 1&2

Switchbacks, Snakes and Sliding Boards

So running is never without its inherent risks, especially trail running.  Who would have known one of my most debilitating injuries would come from falling down a sliding board!

I mean, this maybe...but a sliding board??

But yeah, 15 miles into a 20 mile run, I thought it might be fun to go down a vintage wooden slide, and the combination of being wet from sweat, along with not sitting down fast enough caused a full out butt fall.

This doesn't look dangerous at all!

 My tail bone is just beginning to forgive me more than 7 weeks later.  Curiously enough, running didn't hurt at all, in fact, nothing standing hurt, and if I could stand 24/7 for the almost two months it took to heal, it wouldn't have been a problem at all.  It was all that pesky driving, eating, and working that were tricky.

But at least since I could still run, I could train for Holy Cowan's Gap.  It had been almost two months since I ran an ultra, and the itch was starting.  Feeling somewhat of a failure after two attempts at 100 miles, I wanted something that would test my ability to persist/complete something really hard.  I was going to wait until Catoctin in the summer, but really needed a day in the woods, so what the heck.  Even Coach's descriptive email didn't deter me from entering:
 
The course starts with a quite steep medium long rocky climb.  From there it crosses a lot of plateau (you see this in the video) and a lot of rolling hills, and forested and open areas.  Really quite beautiful.  At some point you go into the woods and go slowly downhill, turn right and start up a stream.  No trail, just stream.  With water, ferns, and mud.  It gets steeper and after you don't think it can get much more steep you have to scramble up a hillside to a road.  Cross the road and the world tilts really steeply up.  I mean steep.  Get that done and it is a mixed bag of  geography until you are back at the picnic pavillion.  Out on the northern loop.  Probably 5 miles to the stupid steep hill.  But once you cross the ridge you scramble across a boulder field.  Just a pile of huge rocks, finally out onto a forest road and then you begin to go up again.  And if just gets steeper and steeper and the trail is not maintained, and you are laughing and crying and cussing and screaming at the sky  like a madman until you get over the top and make your way back down.  And then when you don't think it can get worse....you go up again.  And it gets steeper and steeper and you are laughing and crying and cussing and screaming at the sky  like a madman until you get over the top and make your way back down. And then its five miles or so  back to the BBQ... (sounds fun, right???)
 
.For this race, because it is tough, you have to be accepted, so I anxiously awaited my letter.  Even though I have run lots of ultras, I have struggled on a few of the harder ones.  When I saw my name on the entrants list, it occurred to me that now I HAD to finish this! 

To fully appreciate this accomplishment, you probably should take a look at this short video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2_Mei3Rugo
Especially notice how happy all the runners are going up the very straight trails on the mountain.  I really like the runner who says "with all this room, why not have switchbacks??"  Great point.  I guess they are not just for making runners dizzy.  As much as I was up for a challenge, I must admit that the last two times up the mountain were not pretty.

To make this run more super fun, we even came across a rattler hissing on the side of the trail.  Lucky for us, Don talked nice to it, so it calmed down pretty fast.

The views from this run were amazing, and it was a great day out there.  It took me 9++ hours to complete the 31 miles, and it was hard, but the calf massage, great food, wonderful people and beautiful scenery sure made it more than worth it.  I would do it again in a heartbeat!

Pretty Damn Counterculture

Well, I have been MIA for a while, but now that I can actually breath again, I will try to do a quick catch up of my adventures in the last 2 months.   I really wasn't despondent over failing at Umstead, I promise.

I  mean, it was bad and all, but who has time for any kind of emotion when you are on to the next thing before the day is out.  I knew that next up was the AOR race, and last year, that really helped throw me right back into running.  And who can't feel somewhat better dressed like this:

This year I was in van two, which was torturous due to all the waiting. 

I was dressed and ready to run at 4:30 am Friday morning and did not run a step until close to 3 pm that afternoon, and that wasn't even my scheduled leg!  But it was a lot of fun and despite my ADHD tendencies, I was able to calm down enough to get some sleep.  We passed through one gorgeous site after another, from the actual course to the "borrowed" house where we caught a couple hours of down time.

There is nothing like a van load of six sweaty runners to make you forget about your troubles. Even taking a mile and a half detour on leg 10 did not dampen my spirit, and the 3 am run through Antietam was nothing short of incredible.

replace candles with glowsticks and it almost looked like this...well not really

 So between AOR and my latest race, there was a trip to NYC, a trip to Ocean City (both for work) and a couple very long runs in the Massanutten Mountains and on the Appalachian Trail.   I kept training to run long, but hadn't really picked out a good race.  I just knew that I had to do something to prove to myself that I COULD.  Hmmm, that Cowan's Gap looks interesting.  Yes, we ultra runners are a very strange breed.  Case in point...the article below.  The big fear that ultra running is becoming too popular, because, you know, so many people want to strap water on their back, pack toilet paper and take off into the woods for multiple hours (or days) at a time!

.I especially like "...Calm down. Ultrarunning is still pretty damn counterculture."
http://www.outsideonline.com/1977961/reality-check-ultrarunning-not-mainstream


It may just be our quirky-ness that makes ultrarunners interesting and annoying at the same time.