July: Training Blues and OCR

Since Mount Mitchell in February, this has been almost a lost six months for me on the training and racing front.  My fitness level has been consistently mediocre.  I ran a very uninspired race at the Mount Penn Mudfest in April and otherwise have only two "races" to my name: a two-mile road race on St. Patrick's Day that I ran only for the chance to win a year's worth of free beer (which I lost by one second); and the Montrail Uphill Challenge at Western States.  I had plans to race the Prospect Mountain Hill Race, the Ice Age 50K, the Loon Mountain race and the Cayuga Trails 50M, none of which actually happened.  More upsetting is the fact that I've just felt consistently poorly for at least several weeks.  There are a lot of factors.  The weather, for one, has taken its toll on me.  I generally run poorly in the heat and am notoriously slow at acclimatizing; the past few months have been particularly tough for me in that regard.  Not helping that has been my so-so fitness level and the fact that I'm about 10 pounds heavier than I'd like to be, due to a terribly stressful May and June that saw me running must less and eating much worse than normal.  Even taking all this into account, though, I haven't been able to explain the lack of pep and the absence of motivation I've encountered in the past several weeks. Part of it might be related to canceling all those races, which has a de-motivating effect.  But I can't tell if it's a combination of all these things (pretty likely), or if there is something underneath everything.  I went to my doctor two weeks ago for a panel of blood tests, which all came back pretty normal, so that's good, and the past two weeks or so is probably the best stretch of training I've had in two months.  So maybe the worm is starting to turn.  [UPDATE: You can skip to the bottom of this endless, pointless post to find out what the problem is!]

Two weeks ago I jumped into the Survival Race, one of the myriad obstacle course races (OCRs) that are currently infesting the country.  I had a brief fling with OCRs a few years ago at the Warrior Dash, and since I've been a little light on the blog, I'll regale you with my interminable Warrior Dash story before I wrap this up here.

Warrior Dash is one of the first OCR series and arguably one of the most successful, at least from a numbers and financial standpoint.  They started with one race in 2009, grew to about ten in 2010, and now have 35 races spread throughout the year, many of which are two-day affairs.  Each site will see between four thousand and ten thousand runners for the weekend, split into 500-person waves, cover a 5K course with 10-14 obstacles.  Nowadays Warrior Dash is viewed with some contempt by "serious" obstacle course racers who deride it for being too short, too easy, or not electro-shockey enough, and it seems that Spartan Race and Tough Mudder have drawn away a lot of these uber-competitive Crossfitters; but Red Frog Promotions certainly doesn't seem to mind cashing the millions of dollars laid out by the less discerning members of the species.

ANYWAY, when Warrior Dash first came to New York in 2010, I ran it with a bunch of friends from New Paltz.  Several things attracted me that first year.  First, it seemed like a fun idea--obstacles, mud, beer.  Whatever, looked like a good time.  Two, it was at Windham Mountain, which is only about an hour away and would actually set up pretty well for me as a race course, given that it would involve climbing up the ski slope for the first half of the race.  But the part that really had me excited was the helmet:

The top three is each age group received small helmet-shaped trophies, which were pretty cool, but the top three overall got actual, full-on, life-sized metal viking helmets.  I was all in.  Top three in a race with over 9,000 people seemed unlikely, but I figured the race would attract a lot of non-competitive people out for some good time and beer, and with the uphill start, maybe I could pull it off.

Long story short (too late!): That first year, in 2010, we rented a slope-side condo with some friends, hung out until late drinking the night before, and then woke up to run the first heat of the day, when the course would be clear and we'd have the best chance of a fast time.  I won the wave by about 45 seconds and then stood around all day waiting to see if the time would hold up; it did for several hours, until I got knocked back into third at around 1pm, and then into fourth at around 4:30, just before the end of the day.  The next year was a similar story: won the first wave of the day; waited around to get knocked off the leaderboard late; wound up fifth overall; went home with an age group trophy for the second year in a row feeling very disappointed.

In 2012 I was ready to swear it off, but the lure of the helmet was too much to resist.  Rather than subject myself to the ultimate torture of running early and then waiting around all day watching the leaderboard, though, I decided to drive up late in the day and just run the last wave.  The course would be crowded, but at least I'd know right away where I stood.

The course was packed from about the one-mile mark on, but I navigated my way quickly through some very crowded obstacles without losing too much time.  When I crossed the line I had a pretty good idea that I had done it, and within half an hour or so I confirmed it: I had won!  I couldn't believe it.  After three years of trying, I was going to have a viking helmet.  I sipped a beer, waiting for the awards ceremony, trying to contain my excitement until my name was called.  And I reached the podium, and was handed...a crappy plastic mug and a keychain.  Those cheap fucking bastards had gotten rid of the helmets.

There's a great scene in Jerry Maguire where Rod Tidwell tries to tell Jerry his Reebok story, which he eventually boils down to: "Fuck Reebok."  That's my Warrior Dash story.  Fuck Warrior Dash.

So, obviously, that was it for me and OCR.  The nurses at work were awesome, they pitched in and bought me a real helmet for my birthday:

So when they asked me to join their team for the Survival Race this year, I kind of had to do it, to pay them back if nothing else.

Obstacle course races are pretty stupid.  They are ridiculously contrived, and they are all pretty much the same, and for every 500-person wave they send off every thirty minutes, there are probably three people that can actually run.  But, if you're going to do one every two or three years, I guess they're pretty fun.  The Survival Race obstacles were fairly similar to those I was familiar with from Warrior Dash, with a couple of difficult exceptions--a rope climb, a tire carry, a couple of tougher walls.  The water crossings were disgusting and the mud pit was VERY disgusting and I probably should be on antibiotics afterwards.  But even in my half-fit state I was able to overtake all of the fast starters within the first mile and win the first wave, which stood up to win the day:

Home > Results > Survival Race New Windsor

  ^PDF

5K Run M
BIB#	NAME	LOCATION	AGE	M/F	OA	AG	FINISH
1532	Friedman, Jason	Ny, NY	38	M	1	1	00:26:35.1
7545	Manza, Christopher	,	27	M	2	1	00:27:29.7
7056	Bell, Mitchell	,	15	M	3	1	00:27:56.9
7945	Sullivan, Sean	,	28	M	4	2	00:28:16.5
1597	Wiles, Joe	Ny, NY	40	M	5	1	00:28:23.5
5K Run F
BIB#	NAME	LOCATION	AGE	M/F	OA	AG	FINISH
1645	Libutti, Veronica	Ny, NY	21	F	1	1	00:30:37.4
7439	Judge, Carolyn	,	23	F	2	2	00:34:29.8
7024	Angell, Kylie	,	24	F	3	3	00:34:30.3
7533	Magill, Kimberly	,	26	F	4	1	00:35:03.9
7905	Somma, Liberty	,	37	F	5	1	00:35:52.9

UPDATE: So, my aforementioned lab work?  Lyme disease.  I'm about a week into the antibiotics and feeling significantly better, so maybe the fall racing season won't be a total wash after all.

Western States Weekend in Review

OK, I didn't accomplish all of my goals for my trip to Squaw Valley.  In fact, if you want to be technical about it, I accomplished one of five.  I did get to meet some awesome folks, including some of the world's best ultrarunners, and got a couple of leads on how I might move forward with my little side project.   But no, we didn't get Glen into the top 10.   No, I wasn't a contender in the Montrail Uphill Challenge.  No, I didn't PR in the beer mile.  I didn't even drink any Russian River!  (Though I did get some.  More on that later.)  A bit disappointed?  Maybe a little.  Bad weekend?  No way.

I reached Sacramento Wednesday evening, grabbed a quick hour on the roads, and a quick dinner before bed.  Thursday morning I suffered through the agony of US-Germany game on the cracked screen of my iPad, as the hotel's ESPN was out of order.  I walked to the gas station next to the hotel to grab a six pack of Budweiser, which I needed...for later.  Then I met Glen, his dad, and his son for the drive to Squaw, where we would meet up with his mom, his brother Mike, and his brother's SO, Anne, completing our six-person support team for the weekend.  

We reached Squaw Valley around 3 pm, about a hour before the start on the First Unofficial Unsanctioned Western States Beer Mile.  For those not familiar, a beer mile is a one-mile race, usually run on a track, that requires the "athlete" to drink one 12-oz beer before each quarter mile.   I won't get into all the myriad rules and regulations that govern this event, but please rest assured that they are numerous and very specific.  There is no track in Squaw Valley, so some genius decided the best way to do this would be to hike the first mile of the Western States course--again, for those not familiar, a switchbacking uphill dirt road at about a 12-15% grade--leaving our beers every quarter-mile, then race back down.  To me, this sounded like the worst idea I've ever heard, but nobody seemed to care what I thought, so our little three-man field hiked up the road, beer in tow.  Eventually, we picked up a fourth runner; none of these guys were over 27, and all of them, as it turned out, could drink me under the table.  It didn't start out too bad;

Beer #3
photo: Jamie Lynch

after two beers and half a mile, I was still in good shape to break 10 minutes, and was at least keeping contact with the other guys--we were generally drinking together--but by the fourth beer, things started looking like this:

And this:

Oh no.
photo: Jamie Lynch

We had decided beforehand that the usual penalty for puking--an extra lap--wasn't applicable, since we didn't know where we would turn around to get that done, and we figured running downhill with a belly full of beer was enough of a handicap/punishment.  The Facebook page that had organized the event expected 35-40 people, which made the field of four a little surprising, but it turned out all those people just wanted to show up and watch us be stupid, since we were greeted by a sizable, if slightly bemused crowd, including Grand Slam record holder Ian Sharman, and a bunch of people with video cameras.

As you can see from my Garmin data, I ran an 11:56 (the final split is an error of me re-setting my watch), not a great showing.  But I was clearly on sub-10 pace until the final beer--actually I was through 1200 meters and three beers in under 7 minutes.  Looks like I spent right around 6:00 actually running and about 6:00 drinking and puking.

So needless to say I went to bed Thursday night not feeling my best.  I woke up on Friday morning not feeling any better--stiff, tired, with a pounding headache.  I attributed it partly to the altitude (about 6500') and partly to the hangover, though honestly, most of the Budweiser was in the dirt four hundred meters up the left side of the Western States Trail.  Part of the point of the trip was to run the Montrail Uphill Challenge, though, so I forced myself out to the starting line.  It's a pretty cool event; Montrail is the presenting sponsor of Western States and they basically put on this free event with a bunch of swag, including t-shirts, pint glasses, and of course, something for a bunch of antsy ultra geeks to do while we're all waiting around for the big race to start.

The race is run on the first 6k of the WS course itself, which climbs about 2500' to Emigrant Pass--about a 13% grade. (How the runners go another 97 miles after doing this on race day, I'll never know.)  I like uphills, especially runnable, non-technical ones, so I was pretty excited and thought maybe I could be up front in the top 10 or so.  What I didn't take into account was that the entire ultra world is in Squaw Valley for states, and that there are a TON of incredible runners who are there to crew or pace for other incredible runners.  I don't know who exactly was there, but I saw sponsored athletes from Hoka, Altra, adidas, and Salomon.  Didn't see them for long, of course.  It was a hammerfest, and was an absolutely brutal mix of running and power-hiking.  I was hoping to run under 45 minutes, and actually ran 39:33 (the course was a little shorter than I thought, as we didn't run the final few hundred meters to the monument atop the Pass, but that stretch is mostly very gradual and I think I would have been about 43 minutes had we gone the whole way).   But in that field I was barely in the top 30.  (Yes, I got chicked, just once.)  All four of us beer milers ran the race.  Perhaps not surprisingly, we finished in reverse order of the previous day.  Our late starter, who had organized the beer mile (and who would have won it easily had he not spotted us at least a quarter mile), crushed us wearing an honest-to-god pair of huaraches; but I saw my other two new best friends on my jog back down.

My headache had abated during the race, but it returned after lunch, as we organized our bags and made our plans with Glen for the next day.  By that evening I couldn't wait to get down from the altitude.  I got about 6 hours of sleep before waking up around 3:30 to get ready for the 5am start.  We headed over with Glen, who seemed in good spirits, and spent a few minutes chatting with Dylan Bowman near the starting line before the gun went off.

DBo, Speedgoat Karl, and the other leaders at the start.
photo: Mike Redpath

We walked back the the hotel, packed, and left quickly.  I felt a little bit better on the drive out of the valley, but when we stopped to buy sandwiches for the long day ahead, my headache was in full force, and I was feeling pretty nauseous.  I bought some extra ibuprofen at the grocery store, which helped some, and took one of the Zofran pills I had brought along in case Glen ran into some stomach problems during his race.  We drove out to Robinson Flat, the 30-mile mark and the first aid station accessible to crew members.

Crewing an ultra is pretty fun, but it is a LOT of waiting around, and let me just say thank you to anyone who has ever crewed me in the past.  Basically, you rush to the aid station, spend some time unpacking all your stuff and getting ready for your runner, and then you just sit around waiting for them to come, which can be several hours.  Then they come, and unless you're doing a crappy job or they're really having a problem, you see them for about 90 seconds before they start running again.  Then you pack up and race to the next point so you can wait for another few hours.  It sounds awful, but it's actually pretty cool, especially at a huge event like WS where you can watch the best ultrarunners in the world.  I wish I had been feeling better and could have read a book or something, but I spent many of the next eight hours feeling awful, so that was kind of a bummer.

Getting support at Robinson Flat.
photo: Mike Redpath

ANYWAY, Robinson Flat was awesome.  The drugs had kicked in and I felt pretty good; it was still early on in the race so the wait wasn't too long.  The front runners showed up about an hour after we go there, a who's who of the sport--Max King, Rob Krar, Dylan Bowman, Miguel Heras, Karl Meltzer, Ryan Sandes, Scott Wolfe, Nick Clark, Yassine Diboun, Ian Sharman, Brendan Davies, Pam Smith, Kaci Leichtig, Nikki Kimball, Meghan Arbogast, Emily Harrison, Stephanie Howe....you get the picture, sorry.  For a fanboy like me it was heaven.  I won't go into details of the elite races, there is a ton of coverage out there and you can read at your leisure, but it was super-exciting.   We were expecting Glen at around 10:15, but he was about half an hour behind that, which didn't bode well for the rest of the day.  Given the stacked field, we knew going in that getting Glen a fourth top-10 finish was pretty unlikely; however, we thought a strong, smart race in the 18-19 hour range might sneak into the top 20.  Already, though, his pace was more in line with a 19:30, and his place was in the 70s; moreover, he didn't look great, already struggling a little bit as the morning was starting to heat up.  We were anxious as we headed off to Michigan Bluff, the 55-mile mark.

Michigan Bluff is one of the largest and busiest aid stations on the course.  Also, since most people are there in the middle of the day, and since there is very little shade, it is also one of the hottest aid stations, except for those deep in the canyons, which are not accessible by crew.   We got in about 12:30, now expecting Glen closer to 3:30 than the 2:30 we had initially planned.   We also met up here with Christian Fitting, an elite ultrarunner from the Bay Area, who would be pacing Glen from Foresthill, mile 62, to mile 80 at Green Gate, where I would take over.  By this point, though, my participation was in doubt.  The drugs wore off, my headache came back along with my nausea, and then I started having chills, to the point where I was leaving one of the few shady areas to sit in the sun so I would stop shivering.  Before he left to get set up at Foresthill, Christian looked at me and offered to pace my 20-mile segment as well.  I told him I'd be fine, but secretly I was pretty worried.  My only saving grace was that with Glen struggling I knew I wouldn't have to run too fast; I figured I could stumble through a bunch of 20-minute miles even with a fever.

Glen and I at Michigan Bluff, mile 55.
photo: Mike Redpath

I took another dose of ibuprofen and some Tylenol and slowly started to feel better.  Glen made it in at 4:30--now on pace to run about 22 hours.  He didn't look great, but I didn't think he looked any worse than he had at Robinson Flat six hours before, and after a brief two minutes moved his way back out onto the trail.  We packed up and rushed over to Foresthill.  By the time we got there, around 5 pm, I was feeling much better, and thankfully from that point on whatever I had been dealing with for the past few days seemed out of my system.  Glen rolled through at 6 pm on the button, starting to look a little better himself, and he and Christian headed down Cal Street; we wouldn't see them again until mile 80.  I went over to the Ultrarunner Podcast tent and dropped off some Yard Owl beer for Eric Schrantz, who pulled a couple of these out of his cooler for me:

I almost kissed him.

We replenished our supplies and headed over to Green Gate, the aid station at 80 miles where I would take over pacing duties from Christian.  Tracking the runner updates on my phone, it seemed that Glen and Christian had found a nice rhythm, running 12-minute pace for a nice stretch of miles between 62 and 70; but by the time they reached the American River crossing at mile 78, he struggles had resumed, and Glen hiked the steep uphill from mile 78-80 in about 45 minutes.  He reached us still in relatively good spirits, though.  The pressure was off, and Glen is experienced and strong enough to know that he would be able to finish, and could likely hike most of the way in and still finish in under 24 hours.  But for the first time in three days, I was feeling good and ready to run, and I wasn't about to let him off the hook that easily.  I strapped on my Ultimate Direction AK hydration vest and we headed down the trail.

The first two miles were a struggle.  Glen's main problem at this point was blisters, which prevented him from running downhill at any kind of reasonable pace, so we moved slowly through some technical downhill sections and covered the first two miles in about 34 minutes.  But as the trail flattened out and the running became easier, Glen seemed to recover some; I gave him a Zofran which settled his stomach and helped him get in a few more calories, and we started running 13-minute pace down into the Auburn Lakes aid station at mile 85.

The aid stations at WS are unbelievable: packed with volunteers, any kind of food or drink you could want, fantastic energy.  We blew through quickly, feeling refreshed, and found some great rhythm on some wonderfully runnable trails, resuming our 12-13 minute pace.  Before I knew it we had reached Brown's Bar at mile 89.9.  I was having a blast and feeling great.  Glen seemed to be recovering some strength.  "Born to Run" blasted over the loudspeakers and we stormed into the aid station and got refills of our bottles from two-time WS champ Hal Koerner.

We ran through the night.  Visibility with our headlamps was pretty good, and the trail was just the most gorgeously runnable singletrack you could possibly imagine.  West Coast trail runners, you have no idea how lucky you guys are.  Glen hung tough, not flying by any means, but clicking off solid miles and passing folks about every thirty minutes or so, particularly at the aid stations, which we moved through very efficiently.

At the finish, finally.
photo: Mike Redpath

By No Hands Bridge (96.8 miles), I was really in Glen's ear about trying to break 22 hours.  It was a silly thing to care about at this point, but I knew I'd be more satisfied--and I had a feeling Glen would too--if we achieved this small victory.  And from the businesslike way he responded, digging deeper, pushing the pace, and using minimal walk breaks, it seemed he had begun to care about it too.  We dug our way up the steep, seemingly interminable climb through Robie Point and passed through the final aid station without stopping.  With one mile to go, I told Glen we needed a 10:30 to get in under 22 hours.  He grunted, dug deep, and started really running.  Finally we reached the Placer High stadium track, running near eight minute pace, and flew around the final 300 meters, getting him home in 21:58:48 for his sixth sub-24 hour silver belt buckle at Western States.  It may not have been the finish we had hoped for, but it was extremely satisfying nonetheless.  In a year that has been pretty frustrating for me from a running standpoint, this was one of the better days.

A man, his beer, and his buckle.
photo: Mike Redpath

#realheroes
photo: Mike Redpath

#seeyouinsquaw

Holy crap, I haven't blogged in awhile.  I've had some increased responsibility at work, blah, blah, which has cut into my free time a bit, but I mostly haven't written because I haven't had much to write about, running-wise.  (I've been trying to get Lexi to pick up the slack a bit, but softball kept her very busy this spring.)  I've raced only once since Mount Mitchell, running the Mount Penn Mudfest 15K outside Reading, PA in April.  This was I think my sixth or seventh time at Mudfest, a race which I absolutely used to love but which underwent a change in race management this year and, unfortunately, a complete revamp of the course.  Now, instead of a technical but joyously runnable course that I can absolutely hammer, it's yet another trail run in the northeastern US so choked with rocks it prevents establishing almost any rhythm whatsoever.  Rather than just go on another rant about how much I hate that crap, I'll spare everybody and just say that I did not enjoy the trip and won't be returning.  Oh well.

But that's been it from a running standpoint.  Even training has been mediocre at best.  I had a work situation in May that I'm not going to get into but that ate up a ton of time and energy, to the point where I took nearly as many days off in May (seven) as I did in all of 2013 (thirteen).  For the second year in a row I registered for the Ice Age 50K and then bailed last-minute.  I had plans to run the Prospect Mountain Hill Race in Lake George in mid-May but couldn't get out of work.  I considered trying to get into the Great Adirondack Trail Run and then remembered how much I hate shit like that.  When Jodi went to Orlando in mid-May for a conference, I was at pretty low ebb, trying to figure out when I might race again (July? September?).

And then Glen Redpath, a three-time top-10 finisher at Western States, said, "Why don't you come pace me at States this year?"  Now this is normally something I'll just answer "no" to right away.  It's not like I can leave Jodi with the kids for five days at the drop of a hat.  But this came at the perfect time; with Jodi just having finished a little "me time" of her own, I was due for a little trip.  And while my fitness isn't quite up to racing snuff, this was exactly the sort of thing I needed to get motivated again.

So I'm heading out in two days for Western States, the site of my first experience with ultra marathons ever (I was a medical volunteer in 2005).  The goals of the trip are: (1) pace Glen to hopefully another top-10; (2) run well at the Montrail Uphill Challenge on Friday, hopefully up front if I'm feeling good; (3) set a beer mile PR; (4) drink a shit-ton of Russian River; (5) meet a whole bunch of people and maybe make some contacts who can help me launch my top-secret ultra rankings project, which I'll reveal more about when it starts progressing some.  If everything goes well and I feel like my fitness is ok, I may head up to Loon Mountain the first weekend of July for the national mountain running championships the following weekend.  But I'll post some stuff from Squaw if I can stay sober enough at night to work the iPad.

Race Report: Mount Mitchell Challenge

As bucket-list races go, it may not be Boston, Western States, or UTMB, but for East Coast trail runners, the Mount Mitchell Challenge and Black Mountain Marathon is certainly on the list.  First run in 1998, the MMC is a 40-mile race to the top, and back, of the tallest mountain in the eastern United States.  The race starts in the small town of Black Mountain, about 10 miles east of Asheville, NC (aka Beer City USA), at an elevation of 2360', and climbs to the top of Mount Mitchell, at 6684'.  The companion race, or "fun run" as it's sometimes known, is the Black Mountain Marathon, which runs concurrently with the Challenge until reaching the Blue Ridge Parkway (5340') and then heading back down to the finish.

This was my second trip to Mount Mitchell.  In 2011, I had one of the best races of my life there, placing fifth in an elite field, running 5:18 for the rugged 40 miles.  Needless to say, the race carried some strong positive associations for me.  But it was not just the fact that I had run well there before that made me excited to return.  The course is about 80% trail, and has nearly twenty miles of climbing, but with very few exceptions, the trail is quite runnable, and the grade is gentle enough to be steadily climbed at a solid pace--right in my wheelhouse.

Me, Mike, and Alex at the start in 2011

Just like in 2011, I made the trip with my good friends Mike Halstead and Alex Sherwood, who had first attempted the Black Mountain Marathon in 2008 (Alex third, Mike eighth).  Mike had a fantastic race in 2011 as well, finishing second overall, but Alex started the race despite coming in with an injury and was forced to drop only five miles in.  That injury lingered for the next two years, and it's really only in the past six months that he's started running regularly again.  To say he was returning to the race with unfinished business in mind would be a hell of an understatement.  Also joining us was our frequent training partner Brian Hickey, who was recovering from an injury of his own but is a fantastic hill runner when healthy; two other local veteran ultra runners, Joe Brown and Charlie Gadol; and two friends and accomplished ultra guys from NYC, Glen Redpath and Brian Oestrike.

I came in to the race confident.  Training in the past couple of months has gone quite well.  I was able to get up to a peak of nearly 110 miles per week, with a four-week stretch before the taper of nearly 380 miles, and a ton of steady work on the local hills.  Unfortunately my legs were not quite 100% coming in due to our family's vacation plans.  Our itinerary initially called for us to ski in Park City, UT from the Friday through the Monday before the race (I know, tough life, right?) before traveling to Charlotte on Tuesday and making our way to the race later in the week. Five days to recover from skiing would have been perfect.  However, our flight west on Thursday got cancelled, and we were unable to fly out until Sunday, which meant we skied from Monday to Wednesday, three days before race day.  By Saturday morning, most of my ski-related soreness was gone, and my legs were feeling mostly normal, but pretty early in the day's climbing, I could tell I didn't have my usual pep, and the climb was not nearly as effortless as it had been in 2011.

RD Jay Curwen gives us last-minute advice

The race starts with 2-3 miles of flat to minimally uphill running on pavement, and I ran at the back of the lead pack with Alex, trying to stay as smooth and relaxed as possible.  Jason Bryant of La Sportiva, the 2008 Challenge winner and several times a member of the US team for the World Mountain Running Championship and the World Trail Championship races, set the early pace, followed by locals Shaun Pope and Paul Scouten, Pearl Izumi's Johnathan Allen, and Dane Mitchell from Colorado, who had been leading this race in 2011 when he fell and dislocated his shoulder near the summit.  Jason was pushing the pace, and by the time we hit the first steep climb and headed into the trails, we were strung out in single file, and I was losing ground quickly.  I struggled to find a comfortable rhythm and quickly found most of the pack pulling away from me.  Right around the 40-minute mark I caught a root and went down pretty hard, scraping up my elbows.  My handheld water bottle absorbed a lot of the impact, but the plastic strap fixing the cap atop the bottle was cracked in the fall, and for the remainder of the race I had to take the cap off the bottle with one hand and hold it while drinking with the other hand.

Just after I fell, Mike caught me from behind.  Not a great sign; while Mike is an awesome downhill runner, I am usually a stronger climber, and even though I was running 14 miles more than him this day, I still wasn't expecting to see him at any point on the uphill.  It was a blessing in disguise, though, as it allowed be to refocus mentally and finally find some kind of rhythm.  I wasn't feeling great by any means, but I was able to stick with him for the next twenty minutes or so, until he pulled away out of AS#2.

For the next hour or so I tried to climb as best I could.  The trails were wet, but at this point still mostly clear of snow and ice.  I stuck to what rhythm I could find and picked off a couple of marathoners, knowing now that only Alex, Mike, and the top 6 in the Challenge were ahead of me.  Then, about two miles from the Parkway, I started to catch brief glimpses of Paul Scouten up ahead of me by about a minute.  I hadn't seen any Challengers for nearly 90 minutes, so this was a bit of a lift, and I pressed on, trying to keep the tempo up.  I reached the Parkway only about 20 seconds behind Paul, and I got a huge mental boost seeing Mike and the Alex leaving the aid station at the marathon turnaround to head back down the mountain 1-2 overall.  Buoyed by their strong running, I put my head down and went after Paul.

I caught him about a mile later, just before we left the paved road of the Parkway and ducked onto the Buncombe Horse Trail, at 16.5 miles.  I was a bit distressed that my splits at both the Parkway at the BHT were nearly 10 minutes slower than my race from 2011.  But, there was nothing to do about that now, and I finally felt like I had some momentum.  At over 5500' of elevation, the BHT is a mostly gradual climb that still had significant snow and ice in between its numerous stream crossings, making for some slow going.  I felt like Paul was struggling to keep contact, though, so I tried to press my advantage and gain as much ground as I could.  It worked, a bit; I put about a minute on him over the next three miles.  But that gap disappeared almost immediately on the steep, extremely technical final 2K to the summit.  Paul blew by me and disappeared up the trail; I walked most of the final mile, jogging a few treacherous steps here and there and usually winding up flat on my back as a result.  Finally, after covering miles 19.5-21 in 30 minutes, I reached the summit in 3:18.  I was about eighteen minutes behind my 2011 pace at this point, but I was surprised to see Johnathan Allen leaving the summit shortly before I arrived, less than two minutes ahead, and I knew Paul would be just in front of him.  The knowledge that I was still within striking distance of them helped me attack the start of the long downhill as best as my tired legs would allow.  About a mile beyond the summit, I passed early leader Jason Bryant, moved into fifth, and pressed onward.

After 45 minutes of paved downhill, I made it back to the Parkway aid station at the marathon turnaround, now with twelve miles to go.  Brian Oestrike had dropped at this point due to a rib injury, so he led the volunteers in a bit of cheering and told me that I was only a couple of minutes behind Paul and Johnathan in third and fourth.  Hearing this excited me enough that I blew right through the AS without taking on any extra nutrition.  Probably not the smartest move, but I was finally feeling good and thought I might be able to reel them in.  Not to be, however.  I held a decent pace for the next four miles, holding about 7:00/mile despite some wet and nasty footing; but past that point I started to tire badly and moved into survival mode.  The amazing Aliza Lapierre blew by me with five miles to go on her way to a dominant victory in the women's race.

The incomparable Aliza Lapierre

I focused on sticking with my nutrition and just moving forward, limped down the insanely steep stretch from 36-37 with tears in my eyes, and filled by bottle with Coke at the last aid station for the final 5K.  About a minute further along, the pressure from the carbonation in the bottle built up enough to pop the cap off the bottle.  Unfortunately, the cap was no longer tethered to the bottle, so it flew up and smacked me in the face.  Cursing, I stumbled toward the finish, staggering past some of the marathoners and checking over my shoulder every few minutes to make sure no one was sneaking up behind me.  And then, as I reached the flat cinder loop around the pond, half a mile from the finish, someone was there.  He smiled at me when I looked over my shoulder and said, "Hey."  I thought, shit.  I couldn't believe that after five and a half hours of running I was going to have to sprint to defend my spot, but there it was.  I tossed my water bottle to Alex and took off.  It wasn't fast, and it certainly wasn't pretty, but it worked, and I held on to sixth overall, fifth male.

Ugh.

Chillin'.

All in all, I was relatively pleased with my performance.  I wasn't with my time; my 5:44:57 was nearly a half hour slower than my breakthrough race in 2011, and nearly an hour behind Dane Mitchell's dominant CR performance for the win.  And I was disappointed to know that if I had run up to my ability, as demonstrated by that 2011 race (and I think my fitness level this year was, at the very least, comparable, if not better), I could have finished third against a very, very solid field of athletes. On the positive side, however, I felt like I was able to gut out a solid, satisfying result despite clearly not having my "A" game.  I felt like my ongoing experiments with nutrition--mostly relying on GU and Roctane, GU Brew, and S! caps--served me well on the day.  In terms of mental toughness, I gave myself a solid B+.  And I beat my good friend Glen for only the second time ever, and the first time on a trail course--a small victory perhaps, but Glen is one of the best 100-mile runners in the country, so I'll certainly take it.

Alex with Sara, our beer goddess.

The rest of our contingent had an excellent day, other than Brian O.'s DNF.  Mike, Alex, and Brian Hickey hit the marathon turnaround 1-2-4 overall, which was amazing.  Of all of us, Mike is really the only great downhill runner, and he had himself another great race to finish second overall again, for the second straight time.  Alex and Brian hung tough, despite each only having injury-limited buildups to the race and not getting a ton of long runs in training; there were some struggles over the final 10K, but they held on to finish 9th and 12th, respectively.  Joe and Charlie had good days out as well, and there was tons of good beer at the finish courtesy of Mike's friend Sara.  As usual, RD Jay Curwen and his team did an amazing job of putting on a top notch event that truly is a bucket list race in an incredibly beautiful part of the country.  Great race, friends, beer: what more could you ask for?  A song from North Carolina's best band?  OK, fine:

Gear Review: Gore Windstopper Jacket

I'm not going to lie--I've been forced inside on the treadmill this winter with a little more regularity than I'd like.  Part of that is a new work schedule; after eight years of working the night shift, I've gone back to a mix of days and nights.  On days when I'm working at 7 or even 9 am, it's a lot easier to throw on a pair of shorts and stagger upstairs to the treadmill for an early morning run than it is to face layering up for an hour in single-digit temps.  And I don't want to complain, but it's been damn cold here!  I'm no big fan of the treadmill, but they call it the path of least resistance for a reason, no?

I have a new piece of gear this winter, though, that's been getting me out the door more consistently on those near-zero days: my GORE Essential Windstopper soft shell jacket.  GORE is known mostly for their cycling apparel, and I'm sure you could run in their bike stuff, or bike in their run stuff, or whatever.  This one is from their running collection, but it doesn't matter.  It's a soft shell jacket, which means it's nice and stretchy and flexible, without the limitation of range of motion you often find with windproof outer layers.  It is very lightweight.  It is, as the name implies, windproof, and though it makes no claims to be waterproof or even water-repellent, I've found it to be surprisingly moisture-resistent while running in a variety of conditions.  I did have a recent 15-miler with my friend Ian during a fairly steady downpour that overwhelmed it a bit, but I'll take it.

The greatest property of the jacket is its surprising warmth for its weight.  It is a very thin, very light shell, but due in part to its wind-blocking capability, it is incredibly warm.  How warm?  When I started today's run at 11 am, my phone told me it was 9 degrees.  I wore the jacket over a long sleeve and a short sleeve tech shirt and had to ditch the long sleeve halfway.  Put it this way.  On a day when my face looks like this:

I can wear the jacket

with a short sleeve t-shirt AND NOTHING ELSE.

The last thing I'll say about it is, it's damn sharp-looking.  I'm not sponsored by GORE (though I certainly wouldn't mind!); I bought this jacket with my own money.  You should too.

I'm in the process of putting together my 2014 race schedule.  I've got a pretty good sense of what I'd like to run, but I'm already wait listed at one of my target races, and a couple of the others haven't opened yet, so I'll wait a bit until I post a full 2014 schedule on the site.  My first race, though, will be the Mount Mitchell Challenge in Black Mountain, NC on February 22.  Mount Mitchell is the highest peak in the eastern US, and the Challenge is a 40-miler to the top of the mountain and back.  It's a great race that I ran for the first time in 2011, when I had a really good day,  and I'm hoping to have another good one in four weeks.  Plus the race is just outside Asheville, aka Beer City USA, so, you know.  I used to work Coach Roy Benson's running camps in Asheville when I was a collegian, and it remains one of my favorite mountain cities.  Actually, when I was a high school camper there, in 1991, my counselor was a local triathlon hotshot named Jay Curwen...who is now the race director for Mount Mitchell.