Lighthouse 100

Run June 11, 2022

When I signed up for the 2020 version of the Lighthouse 100 it was with the idea of cherry-picking (Michigan pun intended) a win in a hundo. Not that it was a given by any stretch, but a road course with winning times in the 17-18 hour range seemed like a place where I might finally score an overall at the 100-mile distance. A lot has happened since then.

Most pertinent, in the intervening two years of deferrals for COVID and then heart surgery, I've picked up three wins in other 100's. The heart problem meant no quality workouts for over six months, so my endurance is great, but my road speed is off. And, I'm not getting any younger. So, finally arriving at the start line in 2022, it's with the simple goal of running "well" and I don't bother refining the criteria beyond that.

Kate, who has been to northern Michigan in June before, decides that crewing a 100 is a reasonable price to pay for turning this into a vacation so we head off to Traverse City a couple days in advance with lodging in Charlevoix booked for after. I make her a google map of all the places we'll meet; basically every five miles. We are up at 4:30 to head to the start at Mission Point, taking along Michael Eriks who will be met by his crew on the course.

The start is at 6AM which, through combination of Daylight Savings Time and oddly drawn time zones, coincides with sunrise (the asymmetrical sunset not coming until 9:30PM). The morning is pleasantly cool and the lead group of eight knocks out the first mile in 8:50. When the second mile comes up in 8:40, I decide that I should forego the company and settle into a more sustainable pace.

Kate and I have agreed on a system where she will text me the mileage of where she is stopped and I'll text her what I need so she can have it ready when I get there. For our first meeting at 8.7 miles, I'm mostly concerned about where the bathroom is as my insides are definitely not responding well to the effort. Fortunately, this stop is at a small grocery that opens at 7AM, so I can take care of that while she refills my water bottle.

By the aid station in Traverse City (mile 20), I'm in trouble again and cut across the park lawn to go straight to the bathrooms where Kate is waiting with some Imodium. I run back out to the parking lot, but can't find the actual aid station among all the crew vehicles. I decide to just press on. I ask one of the other runners where the aid station was and he says, "right by the timing mat". Oh crap, I had forgotten that there was a mat at this one. Now I have no choice but to go back. Back at the parking lot, I finally do find the aid station; if one could dignify it as such. It's just a card table with no sign or canopy. I hate giving volunteers crap, but this is really bad; especially given that missing it could mean disqualification. I grumble a bit and get on my way. I'll be running 101 miles today.

One could argue that, in the context of a hundo, an extra mile won't likely make a difference, but that hasn't been my experience. Sure, I've run a handful of them where there was nobody within half an hour ahead or behind, but in the vast majority of them, I've been in a dogfight at the finish. Still, there's nothing to be done about it and trying to get it back by knocking out some fast miles would be suicidal, so I just try (with limited success) to put it out of my head.

Balancing the frustration of losing 15 minutes to intestinal issues and extra distance is the fact that it is a very fine day on a very pretty course. The run down the peninsula has been glorious. As the course turns east, we leave the water for a bit and the scenery becomes a bit more bland. Not ugly, mind you, just more like what I see every day running backroads to and from work. It starts to make the whole thing feel more like a training run (albeit a long one) and the next 25 miles to the "halfway" point (47.6) at Elk Rapids go smoothly.

Kate, who has never crewed before is fully into the rhythm of it now and our stops take mere seconds, usually followed by a short walk break while I consume the contents of the bag she hands me. While the forecast calls for rain, it's still quite sunny and getting warm. I feel like I'm doing a pretty good job of keeping my fluids up and I'm not yet fighting my usual second-half nausea.

Shortly into the second half, we do get some relief from cloud cover. We also get a wooded section along Torch Lake which gives plenty of shade for about 6 miles. Kate gives me a water handup and then heads to Charlevoix to check into our lodging there. I'll go through the next aid station uncrewed and then meet her about an hour after that.

At least, that's the plan. Leaving the aid station, the course turns onto Michigan Highway 31 for a truly dreadful section. The highway is open, exposed, and busy. It's not dangerous - the shoulder is plenty wide - it's just soul-crushing to be running slowly while so many cars blow by.

There's a light drizzle that comes and goes. It feels good, especially when accompanied by a breeze, but it also causes the little stones in the shoulder to stick to the bottoms of my shoes. Inevitably, one of them gets flicked into my other shoe. There's no chance of getting the shoe on and off without sitting down this late in the race. I run with it for about a quarter mile and am about to resign myself to having to stop and sit down in the shoulder (which won't be easy with my current range of motion) when I come across another crew which is happy to lend me a chair. They offer me water and food as well and, while I need neither, it's another reminder of why I keep doing these things. Sure, it's a competition, but it's also a collaboration. Nobody wants to see a DNF. I know of no other sport that operates this way.

By the time I get to our planned rendezvous at mile 63, the hour of running on the highway has turned my brain has turned to mush. I haven't seen any course markings in several miles and I'm wondering if maybe this isn't just bad course design; maybe I'm not on the course at all. I have the GPS track loaded into my watch (the only reason I wear one as I always do my pacing by feel) and it seems to be lining up OK but, as I pass an intersection that looks like it might be the spot, I panic when I don't see Kate and the car. I text to ask if she really is waiting on Highway 31, and she says she is, at the Eastport Market. The sign I just passed said Eastport; I must have missed her. I text her saying I must have passed and then come around a bend just in time to see her pulling out of a parking lot to find me. I text again and call her back. No time is lost, but I can feel my emotions are teetering on collapse, which is pretty much what always happens around 10 hours into these things.

Fortunately, we turn off the highway soon after and the return to small roads does help get my mind back in order. Also helping is the fact that, while my emotions may be all over the place, my digestive tract is now behaving and my legs, which have been fine all race, are giving no indication that they need an adjustment to the pace. Given my problems in the first quarter of the race, I had given up on the idea of any kind of competitive finish, but I notice that I'm not seeing many crew cars anymore. Either the lead group has held together remarkably well or I've passed enough of them that I'm into the rarified air of the top few. At the next aid station at the Church in Norwood, the latter is confirmed. They aren't sure because the leaders are mixed in with the tail end of the "50" (which started at noon at the aforementioned "halfway"), but they think I'm in fourth for the 100.

At any rate, I generally don't think about placements until late in the race and there's still more than a marathon to go. Shortly after leaving the church, I catch the end of the 50-mile field, so it will be pretty hard to know where I stand from here in. No matter, my primary goal for the daylight hours is to make it to Charlevoix because, yes this is silly, I've already written the song for the race and the lyrics don't work as well if I don't get there by sunset. That's only ten miles away and I've got two and a half hours to do it, so I don't press.

I get to Charlevoix at 8:50 just as it starts to rain. It's been sprinkling off and on for a while, but this is bona-fide rain. Crew isn't allowed at the Charlevoix aid station because it's on a residential street. Fortunately, I had Kate wait for me at the drawbridge just past the aid so if it's up when I get there, I can at least use the time to do something useful. I bolt down some noodles at the aid station as quick as I can so I can get my rain gear from Kate at the bridge.

At the pre-race meeting, we had been warned that Charlevoix might be rather bustling on a Saturday night during peak tourism season. Apparently, light rain and a brisk wind is all it takes to shoo the visitors off the streets because I have the main drag to myself as I head down to the bridge. I quickly change my shirt, putting on a fresh base layer and also don my rain jacket. I am barely across the bridge when the bells ring that it is going up. It seems that things are indeed going my way and, as the steady rain becomes hard, cold rain, I realize that these are the types of conditions that often bring on a late-race collapse in others whereas I tend to do OK; it's time to make a go of this thing.

I don't up my pace, I just dispense with the walk breaks. That has the effect of knocking my average speed from around 11 minutes per mile to 10. Kate meets me three more times (one being the final official aid station with 12 to go). With five to go, the rain has gone back to a light mist and visibility is very poor. Fortunately, the course is now on a bike path, so there's no danger of getting hit.

I'm passing 50-mile runners pretty regularly, but it seems like there's another light a few hundred yards back that's keeping pace with me. Could I actually be getting caught from behind? That's pretty rare for me, especially when I'm running well, but my arrogance does not go so far as thinking I'm the only person who knows how to finish a race. I text Kate and tell her to go straight to the finish; I need to focus on nothing but running for these last few miles.

I drop my pace to 9:15. That's not going to feel good tomorrow, but right now, the legs comply. I don't dare look back, but I do get to a kink in the path where I can take a quick glance and the light is still closing. Faster than 9:15 at this stage? Anybody that good should already be ahead of me. I run the next in 9:25 and can feel my legs getting wobbly. Two and a half miles to go and the path takes a sharp turn onto the main road. THE LIGHT IS RIGHT BEHIND ME! Wait a minute. It's a bicycle! Who rides 8:30 miles on a bicycle at midnight in the rain?

I jog it in.

I end up in third overall with a time of 18:45. The win was well out of reach (17:55) but, yes, that extra mile did matter as second was only a couple minutes ahead. I don't fret over it. I generally bucket results as win, podium, age group win, finished so, in my mind, it's a distinction without a difference.

As I've written before, there are good results and good runs and the two don't always line up. This turned out to be a fine competitive result, but the run was off the charts. Never before have I run a 100 without having a single bad mile. Sure, there were a few 16-minute miles through Charlevoix with the noodle eating and changing clothes and all. But, that's just it. They were 16-minute miles, not 16-minute stops; forward progress all the time. Every mile that didn't involve an aid station or crew stop was under 12. And, although it turned out to be a comically nonsensical threat, there was plenty there for a fight to the finish.

So, this has to go on the rather short list of races that were great all around.

As for the event itself, there were rough edges. The stretch along Highway 31 being the most egregious. A quick review of aerial photos shows that there aren't a lot of great options; there just isn't much room between Torch Lake and Lake Michigan. However, some creative course setting could have cut the distance on the highway down considerably and there were other places where the course could have been shortened to keep the total distance right. The incognito aid station in Traverse City, well, as far as I know, I'm the only one who missed it (though nobody in the parking lot seemed to know where it was either), so maybe that one's on me. On the upside, the volunteers were great and the some of the scenery was quite nice. I generally don't repeat hundreds, so I probably won't do it again, but I wouldn't talk anybody out of it either.

And, while a lot of the orchards have been replaced with vineyards, if fast road ultras are your thing, this is one Michigan cherry that qualifies as low-hanging fruit.

Link to the Song.

Booneville 100

Run September 4, 2021

When I signed up for the Booneville Backroads 100, held just outside Des Moines Iowa, I was thinking this could be a really good race for me. Well, it's not the first time I've been wrong.

The course at Booneville is anything but flat. Almost every mile contains some sort of small hill. But, they are fairly small and the total elevation gain is only around 6,000 feet, which isn't high, even by Midwest standards (GPS watches, which always overstate such things claim more like 7500 but I'm going with what the contour map says). The grades are steep enough that walking them isn't just a viable strategy, it's pretty much the only strategy. The surface is almost entirely gravel road. If this all sounds like a Gravel Grinder, you're not wrong. The route is just the sort of thing the gravel bike crowd seeks out.

My reference point for this race is the Heartland 100, which has a similar profile and is also held on gravel (sharing many roads with the famed Dirty Kanza gravel grinder). As I finished Heartland in just over 20 hours, that seems like a reasonable expectation for this one as well. Except for one problem: this has been a dreadful year for my running.

A stress fracture in the spring masked a larger issue with my heart that wasn't actually corrected by surgery until 10 days before Booneville. During the preceding months, I had been able to run slowly for a long time (even completing the Silver Rush 50 in Leadville), but would completely shut down the minute I tried running at even my normal training pace. While the surgery is successful at getting my heart back online, I'm not cleared to run again until the week of the race. The cardiologist doesn't think there's any real danger in running it but states the obvious: I probably won't do as well as I normally would.

Undaunted, I head off to Iowa. For some reason, Google routes me through a bunch of little towns rather than just taking the 4-lane highway across the state. Passing through Eldon, I spot a little sign simply stating, "American Gothic House". Really? Well, I guess it had to be painted somewhere and the middle of Iowa is a pretty believable spot for that somewhere to be. These random roadside finds are a favorite for me and I happily add 10 minutes to my trip to see what is probably the world's most famous farmhouse. The stoic couple have long since passed, but the visitor center has costumes and props if you want to try to recreate the work with your own image. I defer to Grant Wood's judgement and make no attempt to improve on his masterpiece.

I wake at 3AM and complete the short drive to the start by 4:30, half an hour before the gun. The morning is cool for early September (70F) but the dew point is only a couple degrees behind, leaving a heavy dampness over everything. As usual for ultras, I don't bother warming up. Much less usual, I am wearing a watch. The course is not marked and, while I have a map and cue sheets, it's pretty easy to blow by a turn in the latter stages of a 100, so I want to have mileage hacks to work from. My own GPS watch is only good for about 3 hours, so I borrowed one that can go the distance from Matt Corriel.

The 100-mile and 100-kilometer fields start together as each will follow the same big loop around Madison County, returning to the start/finish at 62 miles. The 100-milers will then go back out the same way, but shortcut the loop to finish their distance. The combined field is nearly 100 runners but spreads out quickly with me about a quarter of the way deep.

The opening few miles provide enough hills to vindicate my general strategy of walking the hills and running everything else. At an easy jog and assertive walk, I'm able to cover each of the 10 miles to the first aid station in less than 12 minutes (20-hour pace). There's no porta-potty at the aid station and my current needs are more than "pee behind a tree". I come prepared for such situations, but it makes the stop a few minutes longer than I'd like. As I drop my headlamp and reflective vest into my drop bag, I note that my jersey is completely soaked through. It may not feel hot, but I'm obviously going through a lot of fluids.

The subsequent 11 miles to the next aid station contain two of the larger hills on the course, but I'm still keeping a good pace and the effort level feels right. The selection of real food (as opposed to gels and candy, which I generally avoid in ultras) is fairly limited. Fortunately, I have brought some of my own to augment and I'm being pretty careful about keeping my eating and drinking caught up with my effort.

I hit 25 miles at 9:43AM (4:43 elapsed), which is just slightly slower than where I'd expect to be if a sub- 20 was the target. That's fine, I wasn't really expecting to pull that off. Plus, we are about to hit the infamous B-roads; minimum maintenance roads that only tractors and true off-road vehicles can get through. Four of us are running together and as we pass the signs warning drivers to think twice about continuing, we are pleased to find that, despite yesterday's rain, the footing is fairly good. There are obvious goopy sections that we avoid, but most of it is reasonably firm. The grade is slightly downhill and we continue at an easy jog for a hundred yards at which point we step in it...

Yes, I have an advanced degree in engineering and I get the physics of unbalanced reciprocating motion. But, being able to solve a system of differential equations does not prepare you for the visceral experience. Put an extra pound of water in your pack and you hardly notice it. Put a pound of mud on the bottom of your shoe and your stride immediately devolves into chaos. There's no good way to slow down as the treads of our trail shoes are now completely encased in mud. We stagger down the hill, pinwheeling our arms to maintain some sort of balance and manage to stay upright. Walking the rest of the road starts to seem like a really good idea, especially since we're now heading back uphill.

At the end of the section is a significant descent, but it's steep enough that a lot of rock has been added to the mix to keep the road from washing out completely. It's still just mud with rocks, not a proper gravel road, but we are able to run it gingerly. After a mile, we are back on real gravel again, but only for a few hundred yards before we're hit with another section, and this one is not even pretending to disguise the depth of the mud.

It's only a mile and a half long, but it's completely flat, which means drainage is non-existent. The only way to make any forward progress is to run on the very edge of the road, brushing up against the thick wall of vegetation lining the track. In the process, I manage to piss off some hornets, one of which stings me on the neck. While I'm loudly cursing that event, another one flies in my mouth and stings the inside of my lip. Fortunately, this section is immediately followed by the third aid station and I find that some ginger ale does a fine job of neutralizing the sting.

Leaving the aid station, I decide now is a good time for my first extended walk break. Rather than just walking the big hill out of the station, I walk a whole mile and try to listen to any complaints that might be bubbling up from the engine room. I don't have to listen very hard. My hips are not happy. That's a bit odd for me, but one never knows which body part is going to start whining first in an ultra. Far more concerning is what happens when I try to get back to running; I can't. Well, OK, I can run for a quarter mile, but then things start shutting down. I walk some more and try again. Same result. Something is going seriously wrong.

This ain't my first rodeo. I know what to do. Keep moving at whatever pace works until things come back. Unless you're legitimately injured (I'm not) they always do. I walk the next three miles and try running again. It's not much better. Ironically, the only section that really seems runnable is the short section of B-road that I had expected to walk. It isn't that muddy and the soft surface feels better at a running stride. I walk into the aid station at mile 40 wondering just what is going on. I've fallen apart this quickly due to heat stroke, but that's clearly not the problem here. The skeletal muscles are just calling it quits and the race isn't even half over.

I take a long stop, about 15 minutes, at the aid station. There's a decision to be made. I'm obviously not going to enjoy the rest of this race. However, the whole point of ultras is continuing when you'd rather quit, so that's not really an issue. My threshold for dropping out of a race is pretty simple: serious injury or the very real possibility of harm due to continuing (like, crossing a mountain pass while lightening is hitting the ground). Neither of those is true. However, there is a somewhat related concern: I have to drive home. The plan was to finish sometime between midnight and 5AM. That would give me time to get back to the hotel and get some sleep before the trip. Assuming that I'll be walking most of the way from here, we're looking at a 7AM finish on the very optimistic side and maybe as late as 9 or 10. Even with my late checkout, that means driving home on basically no sleep. I decide that if I finish the 100K loop by 7PM, I'll continue, hoping for a finish less than 12 hours later and at least a nap at the hotel. Otherwise, I'll drop down. For those not familiar with the parlance, a drop down is when two or more distances start together and you decide to switch from a longer to a shorter mid-race. It's technically not a Did Not Finish since you did finish a legit event, but it's still not what you wanted to do.

In retrospect, there was an obvious remedy to this dilemma: just stay in Des Moines another night. The bed and hot tub at the Drury Inn are every bit as nice as my own and I don't have any big plans for Labor Day. But, as is often the case when a race is going to hell, the right answer didn't even occur to me. Marginally refreshed from the rest, I run the next mile through the little town of Winterset (it would be a real shame to not run one of the few paved sections of the course). Once back on gravel, it's back to mostly walking, though I am able to run the downhills, the longest of which brings me to the water drop at the Hogback bridge.

After filling my bottles, I sit down to rest and take in the Hogback bridge. I've never seen the movie, so maybe I'm missing some really important context, but I don't understand the appeal of the Bridges of Madison County. There's none of the ornate trim common to covered bridges in New England. Nor do they have the majestic beam of the Amish covered bridges in Pennsylvania and Ohio, wide enough for a four-abreast team of horses to pass. They just look like somebody stuck a big Jenga box across a river. They don't even have a high-peaked roof to shed the snow, which is supposedly the reason you'd ever build a covered bridge in the first place. I realize I may have just pissed off a bunch of readers from Iowa, but one of the advantages of growing up in New York is that you don't worry too much about that. Plus, I already gave Iowa props for American Gothic and that endorsement loses a lot of credibility if I pretend that these bridges have any merit beyond keeping your feet dry crossing a river. At any rate, if spending a few minutes denigrating a bridge is preferable to making forward progress, you're definitely not having a good race.

The five miles from the bridge to the next aid station at Covered Bridges Winery are truly a slog. The sun is out now and this section doesn't have a lot of shade. I can still run the downhills, but nothing else and it's getting hot enough that even my walking pace is way off. The aid station only has one chair and its occupant doesn't look like he's going anywhere soon, so I just lie down in the grass in the shade of the winery sign. After a 15-minute nap, I head out again. Slowly.

There's no chance of getting back to the 100K finish by 7PM. In fact, I'm worried that I might not even get to the next aid station by dark. I have a light with me, but the last mile to the aid station is B-road and I really would prefer to be able to spot the deepest mud before I step in it.

After a few miles of walking (on one of the only extended flat sections of the course - it would have been a great time to run if my legs were around), I finally get to a downhill and start running. That transition is enough to set off a pack of four dogs who reside at the house I'm passing. Only one of them seems interested in actually biting me; the others are merely offering moral support in the form of very loud barking. Your brain is pretty good at overriding the "I'm tired" switch in survival situations, and I manage to move my leg quick enough to evade the first two attempts at my flesh. At that point, the dog recognizes that, rather than backing up, I'm stepping towards him and yelling quite loudly. As is typically the case, this is enough to get him to rethink the engagement (which is, I guess, why we breed dogs and shoot wolves). After another minute of barking and shouting, they decide it's not worth the bother, but it has spoiled my opportunity to run downhill.

At the base of the same hill, I note that I've got a fair bit of gravel in my shoe and use the rail of the bridge (not a revered Madison County Covered Bridge, just a generic concrete bridge) to take off my shoe. Even with my foot on the rail, I'm so stiff I can barely reach my shoe. It occurs to me that if I drop my shoe in the drink, I am really screwed. So, I try really hard not to do that and manage to get the shoe back on.

I get to the last B-road with the sun still well in the sky and stagger into the 58-mile aid station. It's already almost 7PM, so I don't stay long. If I'm going to stop in another 4 miles, I might as well just get it over with. The last 4 miles is fairly easy; just rolling enough that I have a fair bit of downhill to run without struggling on the uphills. I come into the finish just before 8PM.

Again, in retrospect, I really wish I had thought about simply staying in Iowa another day because it's clear the worst is behind me. This is normal for 100's: a big trough followed by a general recovery. The trough is usually much later in the race, and there's no guarantee you won't go in the tank a second time but, generally speaking, once you start to feel better, you keep feeling better.

However, that thought did not occur to me and I tell the Race Director, Brad, that I'm going to drop down to the 100K. He's disappointed, as any RD is when someone bails on a hundo, but he doesn't try to talk me out of it. I get my official finisher hat and mug for the 100K and pack up my stuff.

Between the unmarked course and the spartan aid stations, I'd put this race in the category of "lightly supported." That's not a bad thing as long as the race organization makes that clear. I felt they did, though some others caught short on aid. There seems to be an assumption that you run this one with a crew. Running it without requires a fair bit of planning. If you want the Gravel Grinder on Foot experience with full amenities, you'd probably do better to run Heartland. If you don't need as much, this race has a lot to recommend it. The B-roads are a unique experience, the course is quite pretty, and (unlike heartland, which literally has 1 tree on the entire route) the course never goes more than a couple miles with offering some shade.

So, will I go back to try to run the full 100 miles? I truly don't know. I'd like to, but only if I think I can run it reasonably well. I don't really mind moving slow on singletrack but walking roads just doesn't inspire me. This should have been a good course for me and it's not clear why it wasn't. As recently as February 2020, I was still winning these things outright. Not every time, of course, but typically in the hunt and beating all comers a few times a year. A few OK but not great runs last fall didn't bother me; I was just happy that races were happening again. This year, the wheels have come completely off. Yes, there have been some injuries and heart surgery is not a small thing, but assessing age is kind of like assessing global warming: you have to keep asking if it's just a bad year or the new normal. At any rate, the descent to mediocrity has been astonishingly steep.

Fortunately, none of this has dampened my love for running. If I'm just going to be one of those old guys who's out there forever, so be it. I just need to plan accordingly. If I still have a few good results left in me, so much the better.

Contrary to previous 100's, I wrote the song for this one before I did the race. I just felt like I had a handle on the vibe and I knew I could change it after if I wanted to. I consider re-writing the verse since "quit, I never will" is perhaps a bit hypocritical in light of the drop down. I prefer to think of it as aspirational. Maybe next time I'll sing it for another 38 miles.

And, here it is. (Note, depending on your browser settings, this may start playing immediately).

Ozark Trail 100

Run November 7, 2020

I imagine most people will remember 2020 for what they didn’t get to do. In an odd twist, this year’s pandemic provided me an opportunity to try something new. Not entirely new – I’ve run plenty of hundreds before – but specifically, the Ozark Trail 100. The previous eleven runnings have conflicted with a non-profit gala that Kate and I are always invited to. With big, indoor gatherings off the table, I was released from my obligation of eating and drinking at a 5-star hotel and freed to run 100 miles over fist-sized rocks buried in leaves.

This is not something I’m particularly good at. My years of heavy orienteering training made me pretty adept at moving quickly over bad footing. However, turn the pace down to 100-mile speed and I’m stumbling all over the place. I spent a few years trying to fix that with very limited success. I finally decided to just stop trying and instead resolved to not run slowly when the footing is bad. If I can’t run at least as fast as my normal training pace, I walk.

The OT provides plenty of excuses to take a walk break. The hills are incessant. They aren’t particularly large (the tallest is 400 feet of local relief; most are around half that), but you rarely go much more than a mile without encountering one. So, my strategy is fairly simple: walk this hills, run everything else at easy/long training pace, which is 11-12 minutes/mile on this terrain. Factoring in the walks and time lost at aid stations and it looks like a sub-24 is doable, but far from certain.

Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention The Abyss. We’ll get to that. But, since I’ve already tipped my hand, I’ll note that I go into this one not only expecting it, but expecting it to be so bad that I don’t just lose an hour or two, I drop out entirely. Therefore, I recruit a crew to keep me from doing just that. Matt Coriell, Emily Korsch, and Scott “Erl” Erlandson step up. Erl breaks his ankle a few weeks prior to the event, so he won’t be able to pace, but insists he still wants to be part of the effort. I invite them over for dinner a few weeks in advance and we lay out the plan. Matt will crew the first half of the race, starting to pace at 40 miles. Emily and Erl will come down Saturday afternoon with Emily taking over pacing from 65-94. I’ll run the last seven in on my own. Arithmetically-inclined readers will deduce that the course is actually a mile long.

Matt and I drive down to Bass River Resort on Friday afternoon. This pleasant campground (which is actually on the Courtois River; there is no Bass River in Missouri as far as I know) serves as race HQ and finish line. Check in takes only a few minutes, even with the COVID precautions in place. Everyone does a fine job of respecting the social distance guidelines, which is a pleasant relief given how badly much of Missouri is handling this. I place my drop bags and we go for a short run to loosen up. We spend the evening around a campfire with a few other crews. The Abyss comes up and I end up talking about it more than I’d like.

The alarm goes off at 2:50AM, but I’m already awake. I rarely sleep well the night before a race. Fortunately, I haven’t found it matters as long as I’ve had good rest in the preceding week. We pass the busses on the way to the start and I’m actually the first competitor to check in. It also means I have first dibs on the porta-john. The busses arrive a few minutes later and as I exit, I find there is now a waiting line. That’s one race I’ve won today!

Race Director Paul Schoenlaub gives us a brief sendoff and fires the horn at 6AM. The sky is starting to lighten, but we all have lamps for the opening out and back on the narrow forest road which spreads the field. Passing back through the start at 3 miles, I shed my top layer and give it to Matt. This race is notorious for being cold but, if we’re in shorts and shirts at dawn, this is just going to be one more thing that’s different in 2020.

Shortly after the out and back, we turn onto the OT. The first few miles are easy running along the ridge, but then we hit what is objectively the toughest part of the course: the five miles of steep, rocky climbs and descents heading into Sutton Bluff (with a calf-deep river crossing thrown in for good measure). This is mitigated by the fact that it’s very early in the race and we’re all feeling up to the task. I run in a group of six and we chat happily as we trudge up and down the steep bluffs between Bee Creek and the Black River.

Sutton Bluff at 14 miles is a crewed station, so Matt is there. I don’t really need much at this point as it’s still cool enough that I haven’t lost much fluid. I grab some sandwiches and refill my bottle and am on my way fairly quickly. It’s 8:40AM, so I’m a little ahead of schedule, but I attribute that to the fact that the running conditions are pretty ideal at this point.

Leaving the station, I’m on my own as all the members of our group take varying time with their crews. I cover the next two sections (classic singletrack made slightly more technical due to the leaves hiding the rocks underneath) easily and get to the Johnson Hollow aid station (24.6 miles) just before 11AM. So far, so good, but I’m beginning to notice the heat. Fellow SLUGs Tommy and Jen Doias are manning the station and give me some encouragement while warning me to keep my fluids and electrolytes topped up.

The next section starts with one of the largest climbs of the course, affording a beautiful view of the Brushy Creek valley. I’m starting to understand why, despite the tough trail, this race has such a devoted following: it’s not the majesty of the western mountains, but it is astoundingly pleasant. I’m also starting to think that my left foot is in trouble. The multiple creek crossings have left enough sand in my shoe that the bottom of the big toe is getting raw. I stop to clean out my sock as best I can. There’s no blister there, but the skin is clearly distressed. I know I have a change of socks at the next aid station, so I try to stay as light on my feet as I can until then.

The sock change at Gunstock Hollow is a game changer. I spend a few extra minutes at the aid station to let my feet dry before putting the new socks on. Everything feels good again. There is the problem of water, however. I had figured it wouldn’t get hot enough to need more than my 16oz waist bottle until mid-afternoon. With almost 9 miles between me and my pack at the next aid station, that assumption is looking a bit suspect. I throw in more walk breaks, but still run dry about 15 minutes before reaching Brooks Creek (40 miles) where Matt is waiting to pace.

It’s only 2:30, so I’m right on the pace I would have set to break 24. But, I know the heat has taken a toll and that I’m going to have some very slow sections ahead. I tell Matt we’re not clock-watching; the goal is just to keep moving best I can. I lead for the next section which, with seven climbs in 7.2 miles, is one of the hilliest of the course. Along with my pack came my poles and I put them to use. At the next aid station, I pick up my waist light from my drop bin. This should be the equipment arrangement for the rest of the night though (fortunately, as it turns out) I have contingencies.

Not long into the next section, the sun sets and the lights come on. Despite the cooler temps brought by night, my pace continues to flag. We are now walking a good bit of the level ground as well as the climbs. We have found the edge of The Abyss. Those wanting a longer treatise on The Abyss, can find it in my earlier race report from Potawatomi. The short version is that, in the third quarter of a 100, I come face to face with true despair. Part of it is physical, but it is the depth of emotion that is really staggering. Its occurance is a near certainty (I’ve had 2 hundreds where it was mild, in the other 11 it was full force) and, despite the trauma, it is much of the appeal of running 100's for me. It's a dark place that makes the light that much brighter. But, right now, it is very dark. Matt does a fine job of keeping us moving, albeit slowly, while I deal with my inner demons.

At the next aid station, Matt brings me some soup, which helps quite a bit. I stay long enough to eat that and get some other fluids down. We head out shortly before 7PM. In 16 miles, I’ve slipped from being right on expected pace to my most pessimistic projection. I tell Matt that any chance of a sub-24 is gone and we just need to be focused on forward progress. We trudge back into the woods. Then my light dies.

It’s been a bit finicky lately. I bought it used last fall and it served me well at Rocky Raccoon 100 and a few other shorter runs. At the faux Leadville this summer (about 20 of us lined up to run some or all of the course even though the race was cancelled) the switch started giving me fits. I took it apart and re-soldered some of the connections but, apparently that wasn’t enough. Now it is dead. Changing batteries makes no difference. It gives off a brief flicker and then nothing. This, of course, is why I ALWAYS have my headlamp with me in a 100. I don’t like running by headlamp, but it’s very easy to carry a 1oz headlamp on your head and they tend to be simpler by design so less likely to fail. At this speed, it really doesn’t matter. We push on.

While I’m physically a wreck, my emotions are holding up better than usual. No doubt a result of having Matt on hand. He remains upbeat, talks a bit, but not too much, and doesn’t forget to point out that this course is perhaps even more beautiful under a cloudless night sky lit by a half moon. Our progress is so slow that I worry we’ll miss my most pessimistic projection at Hazel Creek and cause some worry. We arrive at 9:50, ten minutes ahead of that. Nobody was worried; I’m only the 15th runner to arrive as just about everybody else has been slowed by the conditions as well. Emily (who has read the aforementioned Potawatomi report) asks if I’m in The Abyss. “Very much so.”

The stop at Hazel Creek is uplifting. Many of the local trail running community are there, waiting to crew or pace. They come by to offer encouragement. Meanwhile Erl springs into action (as much as one can with a cast on one’s leg) and takes care of my every need. I switch to my handheld light, which a really great light, but means I won’t be able to use poles. I change shoes and socks as the Hazel crossing was over a foot deep. I’d love to stay, but this is the time of the race when stopping is very dangerous. Emily leads back onto the trail before inertia set in.

The conversation with Emily is quite different, but no less helpful. We have a longer relationship to draw on, though it’s still not much of a dialogue as I’m not up to full sentences at this point. I do find, however, that I can run. I feel like I am coming out the other side of The Abyss. Until I’m not. Halfway through the 8-mile leg, I’m back to only being able to run for short sections. By the aid station, all the walking has left me with blisters on my right foot. Emily does a quick field dressing on them, noting that we’ll have better first aid available at crewed Berryman station in five miles.

Those five miles take quite a while and include a very frosty stream crossing followed by the big hike up the ridge to Berryman Campground. Erl is there and, as at Hazel, is quick to tend to my nourishment while Emily properly tapes up the blister.

We again set out at a decent pace only to have me go in the tank again after about 2 miles. This is by far the oddest version of The Abyss that I’ve had to deal with. It’s not as deep as it usually gets. But, it’s not going away, either. I attempt to articulate it to Emily, “I don’t know what I’m doing.” She responds with some alarm, “You don’t know where you are or what race you’re in?” As a veteran of several multi-day events, she’s familiar with the hallucinations that come with extreme distance. I calm her with the reassurance that I haven’t lost my mind, I just don’t have a good read on what’s going on in there.

At Beecher Spring, the artesian well just off the trail, we stop to refill water. Whether it’s the stop, the wonderful spring water, or just the time for it to pass, I can’t say but, as we head up the hill, I realize that this time I really am ascending the far side of The Abyss and there won’t be a subsequent relapse. We jog into the festive aid station run by Daily Run Club and the familiar faces further buoy my mood. We leave knowing we will run the bulk of the remaining 14 miles.

The sun rises during the next leg to the last aid station at 94.4 miles. For the first time in the second half of the race, we are passing people rather than being passed. At the aid station, Emily’s duties are complete other than bringing me some tater tots from the table. Erl takes my pack as my waist bottle will be plenty for the final six and a half miles.

The last leg is pretty much how anybody would want to finish a race. I’m running well, the morning weather is again perfect, and I pick off one more position for good measure. Despite the presence of three significant climbs, it’s my fastest leg of the entire race (roughly 10-minute miles) except for the opening miles on the road. I finish in 17th place at 9:23AM (27 hours, 23 minutes). I would have liked to have done a bit better but I can’t say that I’m disappointed. It was a tough day and nearly half the field dropped. While my ride through The Abyss was a bit wilder than usual, I think that was largely because Matt and Emily kept doing such a good job of arresting my fall. I’m pretty sure I would have quit if I had been on my own.

The OT 100 is a great race. I’m glad I did it. I’m also about as beat up as I’ve ever been after a race right now. So, if I have to wait for the next 100-year pandemic to run it again, I think I’m OK with that.

Oh, you wanted pictures? Well, then, you have to listen to the song.

Hennepin 100

Run October 5, 2019
Watermarked Photos by Mile90 Photography
Other photos by Jenny El Tee and me

It was love at first sight. Shortly before the 2018 running of the Hennepin Hundred, a picture of the finisher buckle was posted on Facebook. Most 100-mile buckles are cool in their own way, but this one was more than that. It was beautiful. I wanted one. That’s a pretty vain reason to run 100 miles, but I’ve never claimed that ultrarunning is a noble pursuit.

Adding to the appeal was the presence of a larger buckle, boldly proclaiming "sub-24" for all who get the task done in less than a day. While there’s no such thing as certainty in an ultra, running a flat 100 on a gravel path in under 24 hours is in the category of “reasonable expectations” for me. As I had just spent six months preparing for a sub-3 effort at Chicago, to be held on the same weekend as Hennepin, I had to defer love for a year. I signed up for the 2019 edition as soon as registration opened.

The original plan was to simply cover the course and collect my buckle, perhaps making some new friends along the way. However, a string of really good results (starting with Chicago) had me thinking maybe I should take a crack at my Personal Record. That was set 9 years ago on a fairly flat road course in excellent conditions. To have any chance of beating that, I'll need every advantage I can get. Specifically, I'll need a crew.

Fast food at mile 40

The difference between walking through an aid station while someone hands you exactly what you want versus having to refill bottles and pick out food from the table can save 1-2 minutes at each station. In a fast ultra like this, that’s a difference that matters. As the race falls on one of the busiest race weekends of the year, none of the locals volunteer (either that or I’ve just been more of a jackass than usual lately, but we’ll go with the first explanation). I put out a call to the Hennepin training group and find a couple pacers who are willing to pass the daytime crewing me for the first 54 miles. That’s good enough as I usually have to stop to drink broth at the nighttime stations anyway.

I arrive just before the pre-race meeting at 5PM Friday. After getting my number, I go for a quick jog on the canal path to get a read on the surface. It turns out the path is paved (albeit badly) near the finish, so I don’t get any help in deciding whether to run in trail shoes. The consensus among veterans is that road shoes are fine, so I decide I’ll go with my road shoes and leave my trail shoes at the 31-mile aid station in case the first third of the race changes my mind.

By the time I get back, my impromptu crew of Jenny and Jeremy have arrived. We sort through supplies and then grab dinner at a local brew pub. There’s a campground a few miles away, but no camping allowed at the finish. In my view, the only advantage of camping is having a place to crash right when I’m done. If I have to drive, I might as well enjoy the comfort of a real bed. After dinner, I cross the river to Iowa and spend the night at a hotel in Le Claire.

I get back to the finish well ahead of the 5AM bus departure, happily snagging a parking spot very close to the line. While technically point to point, the course is shaped more like a “T” with the stem pointing north. We’ll run south from Sterling for 32 miles, then do an out-and-back to the east getting back to the junction at 69 miles. Then the final 31 west to the finish. Since the bus is taking the direct route, the ride to the start takes less than an hour.

The race starts promptly at 7 and, after a mile of sorting, I find myself around 20 deep in the field of 500. Two hundred of those are in the 50 and I have no way of knowing how many of them are ahead, but I also don’t care. I am running this one purely for time. The goal is to be under my PR of 17 hours, 50 minutes. To do that, I’ll need to be focusing exclusively on my own progress.

After another mile or so along the north side of the Rock River, we cross on a dam and start our journey south on the actual canal. As at the far end, the path is old asphalt with chip seal. I hate to squander a fast surface, so I don’t take any walk breaks prior to aid station 1. That has me hitting the station a couple minutes ahead of my most optimistic pacing.

While I'll need to start taking walk breaks soon, I'm not worried about starting just a bit quick. However, I might be outrunning my crew. They were planning on getting to aid station 2 (the first crew accessible station) at 8:30, figuring I'd arrive about five minutes later. At current pace, I’ll cover the first 10 miles in under 90 minutes. Indeed, I roll into station 2 at 8:28 and leave just as they are getting out of the car. It’s not a big deal as the weather is cool enough that I still have a fair bit of water with me so I don’t have to refill a bottle.

The path is now a mix of dirt and gravel and I start taking my regular walk breaks. Since the aid station spacing is pretty consistently 4-6 miles, my plan is to walk out of each aid station swapping supplies with crew (where accessible) and eating and drinking. I also take another minute or two in the middle of each leg. I also take the opportunity to text my crew and tell them not to worry about the missed exchange.

At the third station, we hook up. The exchange is very efficient as we walk the whole time. I take enough that I won’t have to stop at all at the fourth station (which is not accessible to crew). The leg to 5 is only 3 miles, so I skip the midway walk break. We have another efficient exchange, though Jenny insists I take a few seconds as I’m leaving so she can get a shot of me going through the “Sharknado”. Station 6 is also closed to crew and this time I do stop to fill a bottle as the sun is out and it’s getting a bit warm.

On the way to 7, I’m caught by Tracy Kilvinger who is leading the women’s field in the 50. I’ve been running by myself pretty much the whole way, so I match her speed and we chat for a bit. The conversation is a welcome respite. With its tree-lined sides and rustic path, the canal is pleasant enough, but it looks pretty much the same the whole way. After staring at it for four hours, a distraction is welcome.

Station 7 is the junction of the T. The routing in and out is a little convoluted, so the organizers have planted lots of directional signs to keep people from missing the station or heading out on the wrong path. We arrive right at noon, which means I’m still about five minutes ahead of my best predicted pace of 9:30/mile. The early morning was ideal running conditions and, even at midday, it’s pretty nice. There’s also been quite a bit more paved trail than I was expecting and even the dirt/gravel sections are a fairly fast surface. Still, this pace definitely carries some risk. There are two choices: 1) start taking some extended walk breaks in hopes of getting some recovery or 2) go all in. It’s actually a pretty easy choice. I’ve never been able to “fix” overcooking the early part of a race. If I’ve really gone out to fast, I’m going to get clobbered tonight no matter what. Might as well see if there’s a super special result in there.

Tracy doesn’t take a walk break out of the station, so I’m back on my own. Of course, since there are no hills and hardly any turns, I can still see her even as her lead over me grows to a quarter mile. While my body is holding up just fine, I start feeling a bit depressed. It’s early for that; I usually don’t wrestle with negative thoughts until nightfall. Unlike a trail 100, I don’t really have to pay much attention to where I’m putting my feet, so I decide I can let my mind wander a bit. I start writing my race song.

I usually wait until after a race to write a song about it. Most of them are pathetically silly. The only one I’ll perform in public is the one I wrote for Leadville. But, this one starts to come together pretty quickly with a quick beat that matches my cadence. In just a few miles, I’ve got a chorus worked out and some decent rhymes for the verses. Singing it to myself buoys my spirits. The miles pass quickly and, since all the aid stations on this part of the course are crew accessible, I zip through them losing no time at all. I arrive at the 50-mile finish at 2:25PM, still a few minutes ahead of expectations.

Uh oh

We’ve actually only covered 47 miles so far. Both the 50 and 100 continue the out-and-back for a bit longer. The 50 turn comes first and I give Tracy a cheer as she passes me heading to the line for her win. The turnaround for the 100 runners is another 2 miles out and there’s a small aid station at the turn. I take my usual walk break and take a look at the sky. I’m no meteorologist, but I’ve lived in the Midwest long enough to know that when the clouds have holes in the bottoms, you might want to think about moving your picnic inside. I put my phone in a plastic bag but first use it to make a rough recording my song so I won’t forget it in the hazy miles to come.

The rain is light at first, though the distant rumbling of thunder erases any doubts that heavier stuff is coming. Back at the 50-mile finish (now 54 miles for me), I get my last exchange from Jenny and Jeremy. We stop and take a minute to check I have everything I need since anything I leave here will be unavailable for the rest of the race. We wish each other well and I am off on my own for the miles remaining.

Laura, about the time we passed.

Well, sort of. As I’m now heading back towards the junction, I’m passing lots of runners coming the other way. A few of them I know, but I exchange greetings with all of them. Laura Eriks (who will go on to run her first sub-24) gives me a hug. The rain is quite heavy now and there's a bit of a wind. It’s a bit chilly on my increasingly depleted body. I could get out my jacket, but I want to keep that dry for the night when I might really need it. I’m hoping the forecast holds and the rain clears before 6PM because I know I have a dry shirt waiting at the junction and I should get there shortly after that.

The rain does abate, but the path, which had been excellent footing in the dry is now covered in a thin layer of green ooze that is just about the slipperiest surface short of an ice rink. Fortunately, having recognized it after the first couple slips (neither resulting in a fall), it’s easy to spot and I just run in the grass when I get to a mossy section.

Between the cold rain, the slick surface, having to stop at aid stations, and just general fatigue, my trip back to the junction is about a minute per mile slower than the trip out to the turnaround. This doesn’t alarm me as I always slow down in the third quarter of a hundred. In fact, I’m quite surprised by how good I feel as I don my dry shirt and clip on my light. The PR is still very much in reach; 12-minute miles will do it. That’s not slow in the context of late-race miles at night, but it’s a lot slower than I’ve been going.

By the next aid station at 74.7 miles it’s completely dark. It’s taken over an hour to cover the nearly six miles, so my pace is still slipping. The next leg is five miles and it takes nearly an hour. I’m a bit surprised that I’m still keeping food down (I’m usually reduced to just fluids after 100K) and happily take a grilled cheese sandwich as I walk out of the station.

It’s only four miles to the aid at 83.8, but I’m finding I have to take walk breaks every 15 minutes now and the breaks are getting longer. I can feel the PR slipping away and rather than think it through clearly and collecting myself, I panic and go through the station too quickly, leaving my sugar foods (some clif blocks and a gel) on the table as I get a fresh battery out of my pockets. I haven’t been eating much sugar, mainly because it tends to come right back up at this point in the race. However, the cold has had me burning calories quicker than usual and I can feel my blood sugar levels getting low.

There’s not much I can do about that until the next aid station at 88. Once there, I shed my pack, figuring I can go with just a single bottle for the remainder of the race. I then spend a minute trying to attach it to my drop bag as best I can so it will get returned to the finish. I also shed my jacket as there’s no further chance of rain and the night air is cool, but not cold. And, I head on my way.

It’s the sort of mistake you make when you’ve been running for 15 hours. But, 100’s don’t forgive such errors. It takes two miles before I realize that I forgot to do the ONE THING that I absolutely had to do: eat some sugar. I have no food on me and, at 6.6 miles, this is one of the longest legs. I try taking walk breaks every 10 minutes to ward off the crash that will certainly come. Perhaps it helps but, at mile 92, I’m toast. My vision blurs and I’m no longer able to even walk a straight line much less run. It takes 45 minutes to stagger the remaining 2.5 miles into the aid station.

The PR is gone but, with only a bit over five miles to go, there’s really no decision to be made. I simply need to eat and hang here until my sugar levels come back and then finish the race. I collapse into a chair while a woman named Leanne who is waiting to pace another runner runs and gets me things to eat. I drink several cups of soda and also eat some gummy bears. Knowing how dangerous it is to sit too long by a fire at an aid station, I ask Leanne to make sure I get up in five minutes. I then rest my head in my hands and hope that my sugar levels will come back in that amount of time.

In five minutes, Leanne gives me a nudge and offers to run alongside me for a bit. I immediately accept the offer. We walk the first couple hundred yards as I unstiffen my legs and then break into an easy jog. A mile out, she says she has to get back to meet her runner and wishes me luck the rest of the way.

The dizziness and blurred vision is gone and I feel like I’m thinking a bit more clearly. I try to remember my song, but I keep getting it wrong. I'm glad I recorded it back at mile 55, because I seem to recall thinking it was one of my better ones. (Having re-recorded it in my basement, I still think that. granted, it's a low bar, but it's here if you want to give it a listen: WARNING, depending on your browser, this link might start playing immediately). I start to look for landmarks from yesterday’s reconnaissance run, but I’m still too far out for that. With about three miles to go, I spot a headlamp ahead. I’ve been catching 50K walkers all night as that distance started from the junction an hour before I came through. However, this runner seems to be moving too well to be a 7-hour 50K’er. If I’m just seeing them now, I must be gaining. It’s time to see if there’s anything left. This is a race, after all.

The increase in pace is remarkably painless. I can feel the effort, of course, but that’s all it is: effort. None of the agony that usually goes with a race gone bad. I start to realize that this race never went bad. The legs were always there, my pacing was aggressive but not overly so. I just missed refueling at a really bad time. I’m now recognizing the trail from yesterday; there’s less than fifteen minutes to go. I catch and pass the runner just before we go under the interstate which is a mile from the finish. I continue to press all the way to the line crossing in 18:17:59. I’m officially fifth overall, first “master” (master has become a somewhat ambiguous term; it used to mean 40+ but here, as with several other races I’ve done lately, it means 50+).


In contrast with the monolithic path just completed, the finish area has so many options, it’s hard to decide what to do first. There’s hot food in the pavilion, showers and cots at the firehouse, clean clothes in my car, and PEOPLE. One of the best parts of finishing an ultra is the feeling of rejoining a community. You perceive it on the course, where aid is freely given and received from strangers simply because that's what the task requires. But, at the finish, you wrap yourself in it. It is the warm joy of being with those who understand that to be truly full one must first be truly empty. It really is so much more than a buckle. But, I still love that buckle.

Mother Road 100

With Hennepin in the immediate offing and so many first-timers running, I thought about putting together a post on what expect. Instead, I'm going to jump in the way back machine and repost a story written by a guy with my name who was trying to run his first.

Run November 13-14, 2010
Text by Eric Buckley
Photos by Jeff Carlson and John Pollihan

"Because it's there." Mallory's famous line has been used to describe all sorts of nutty pursuits. I've never really worried about it much. There's no law that says our recreational activities need to have any rationale whatsoever, much less one that makes sense. I signed up for the Mother Road 100. I don't know why and I don't really care. I just did.

And, so did 200 other folks, including fellow SLUG John Pollihan. We travel together, making the drive to Tulsa much more enjoyable. Like me, his previous long distance is about two thirds of what we'll be attempting. That means we'll be running our previous long, running for another hour or so, and still have a full marathon to go. We decide not to think about it that way.

In Catoosa (the actual finish town, just east of Tulsa), we meet my college cycling teammate, Jeff Carlson, who will be crewing for us. We pick up our race packets which are actually pretty nice gym bags stocked with all sorts of free stuff ranging from blister kits to beer. We decide to weigh in before dinner, so we can eat all we want and not have to worry about an artificially high weight in the morning. (As with getting drunk, one of the symptoms of severe dehydration is that you lose the ability to recognize the problem. Thus, some 100's have you weigh in before and during the event and pull you if you've lost too much). That out of the way, we head out for dinner at an Italian joint followed by desert at Krispy Kreme.

At 6:45 the next morning we leave for the start in Baxter Springs, Kansas (it's not even in the same state!). The trip helps drive home just how far we'll be going. We'll be running back more or less following the route of the original Route 66. Of course, not much of the original road exists anymore, a fact highlighted by the presence of one of the original bricks in each one of our race packets; certainly one of my more memorable race souvenirs.

Before the start: ignorance is bliss

Since we've already weighed in, there isn't much to do at the start except decide what to wear. The skies are overcast and there's a stiff breeze to go with the crisp fall temps. The forecast calls for clearing and a high near 60F. John and I both decide to go with a base layer under our shirts. John wears shorts while I don long pants.

We are called up a few minutes before 9AM and sent off with a surprisingly loud bang. I'm not sure what it was they fired, but it was a lot bigger than a pistol. In comical contrast, the field ambles off - the leaders laying down a pace that even the most recreational of joggers could match.

Although we have no agreement in place, John and I pair up immediately. Neither of us is harboring any aspirations beyond getting to the finish line, so we might as well keep each other company. We chat with some of the other runners and the miles go by easily. About 25 minutes in, we hit a small rise in the road. While the course has no major hills, there are many little rolls. We had already planned on taking frequent walk breaks to keep our legs from stiffening up, so we make this the first one. After 90 seconds, we start jogging again.

Making friends on the road

At 65 minutes, we make a turn and find ourselves at the Quapaw aid station (7.2 miles). Oops, we're supposed to be running 10-minute miles. It doesn't seem like we could possibly run any slower, but we try to back off. It doesn't work; despite two walk breaks the next leg (6.5 miles to Commerce) takes 61 minutes. On the next leg (4 miles to Miami) I stumble, literally, on an effective method to slow us down: I trip over a coil of wire in the shoulder and go down fairly hard. We walk for a bit while I assess the damage (all superficial) and finish the leg in 41 minutes. At the aid station we shed our base layers, (revealing a fair bit of missing skin from both knees and elbows) and give them to Jeff. It's bad enough that I've been hospital twice this year after mountain bike incidents; now it appears I can't even go for a road run without tearing myself up.

Three miles into the next leg we hit the part of the course that I've been looking forward to: a section of the original highway. I've never been much of a nostalgia buff, but I am an engineer by training and I'm always amazed at what passed for infrastructure just a century ago. When I saw roads like this in Italy, it was easy to put them in the context of "built long ago." But, my Grandparents had just bought their their shiny new Model A when this highway was built. It's not that old, but it looks like it could have been laid down by Romans (actually, the Roman roads in Italy are in a lot better shape). This crumbling, 10-foot wide track was the modern miracle that made it possible to drive a car from one coast to the other. John makes the observation that, if it hadn't rained yesterday, the passing crew vehicles would be kicking up enough dust to make this a scene from the Grapes of Wrath.

Interstate highway, circa 1927

We turn back onto the main highway and hit the Narcissa aid station (25.5 miles). If this was a marathon, we might be able to see the finish line from here. Instead, we're faced with repeating what we just did three more times. Oddly, that doesn't seem particularly daunting. Getting here at 1:01PM means we're still running a bit too fast, but it's still slower than we would go on a normal long run, so we can't be tearing ourselves up too badly. (Normal is something of an oxymoron when applied to ultrarunner training; a "normal long run" is often well beyond marathon distance.) We know we'll feel differently later, but right now we both feel pretty good.

We take a bit longer at the aid station and walk a bit before getting back to running. At 9 miles, this section is one of the longest. That doesn't really bother us because Jeff is doing such a good job of supporting us between stations. What is a little dismal is that we are running on a perfectly straight road for five miles. We've run out of things to talk about, so we just stare at the I-44 overpass getting imperceptibly closer for about 45 minutes. Enduring that monotony is rewarded with another few miles of the original grade and then it's in to Affton for our first weigh-in. The sky has cleared, but it's still relatively cool so there's no danger on that front; we're both within two pounds of last evening's reading. The aid station is manned by a friendly crew and well stocked with both hot and cold items. We resist the temptation to linger and head out in good spirits.

Fun while it lasted

The next leg is another long one (9.6 miles). Jeff stops at 4 miles to hand me another water bottle. A mile after that the road turns due west. We'll be heading straight that way for the next eight miles and we'll have a bit of a breeze in our faces. We've been taking turns on the front on all the westward sections so far and just as I'm about to suggest we go single file again, John says he wants to drop off the pace. This comes as a bit of a shock to me as he seemed to be doing just fine only moments ago. He assures me he's not in any trouble; he just wants to take some longer walk breaks. We wish each other well and part. The 60 miles remaining is nearly as far as I've ever run and I'll be running it alone.

At the end of the leg is the first of the "unmanned" aid stations. It's a table with a water jug, some crackers, and gel. Minimally sufficient, yes, but I'm sure glad Jeff is there to give me something I actually want from our supplies. I wish him the best as his job is about to get a lot more difficult with John and I split. I'm glad to hear him say that John is running again and looks OK. Sometimes that first long walk break is the beginning of the end. I forget to ask Jeff how long the next leg is, but as I'm setting out I notice a sign that says, "Vinita 6". Well, that could mean anything from 5 to 7, plus, I'm not sure exactly where in Vinita the 50-mile mark is, but, it's 4:06PM, I could make it, no, that's crazy, don't try to run fast now, but really, sub-8 for 50, that would make the day a success right there, and then you'd spend the next 10 hours wishing you hadn't, but, damn. After wrestling with it for a few minutes, I decide that there will be plenty of opportunities to run a 50 under 8 and spoiling my first 100 is not the best way to achieve that. I plod on, taking my 90-second walk breaks every 20 minutes or so.

It turns out it's only five miles to the next aid station, but the 50-mile mark is a ways beyond. It's another weigh-in and I've lost 1 more pound. With night falling, there's not much chance of losing another 8 before the final check at 78 miles. I gulp down a couple cups of electrolyte drink, grab a cookie, and continue; still thinking I might just make 50 under 8. I tell Jeff to meet me at the timer and I'll take a longer break there. It's not to be as I hit the timing mat in 8:01. I'm not particularly disappointed; in fact, I'm rather proud of myself for showing a bit of restraint. With the sun about to go down, I grab a complete change of clothes from Jeff including long pants and a wind jacket. There's a fitness center right next to the timer and they are happy to let me use their locker room rather than change in the parking lot. Between that, getting some food, and putting on my lights, it's a fairly long stop, but it was a good time for a mental break. I head out into the setting sun feeling refreshed.

In contrast to the first half of the course, which was predominantly small roads, the second half is pretty much a straight shot to Catoosa on the current US66, with some contorted routes through the small towns along the way. The shoulder is generally good, but there are a few areas where there isn't much running room. Because I have to be ready to jump off into the grass in response to an oncoming car, I'm running my headlamp on high beam. It occurs to me that I've never tried to go all the way through the night with this light on full and if the batteries go, I'm in deep trouble. When I see Jeff at the next aid station (another unmanned table), I ask him to round up some AAA batteries. He's more efficient than I expect and at the next (unmanned) station just 3.5 miles later he has a pack of batteries procured from a convenience store as well as an update on John. He's slowed, but is showing no sign of quit.

A mile into the next leg, I pass 100K. This is now officially my longest run ever. And, frankly, it's feeling like it. Nothing is in trouble, but I definitely feel off. Jeff catches up with me halfway through the leg. When I say I've lost the pace he responds, "Unless my math is wrong, you're still doing 12-minute miles." I'm sure he meant for that to cheer me up, but it has the opposite effect. I knew I had slowed, but I didn't think it was that bad. I shuffle off into the night cursing my early pace, the narrow highway, the oncoming cars, the current budget deficit, and anything else that happens to pop into my head. Mostly, I'm ticked that this new pace means I won't be done until around 4AM (and that assumes I don't slow down any further; not exactly a safe assumption at this point). I had always known that it was possible this would take 20 hours or more, but the first half had gone so well, I had set the expectation in my mind I'd finish in around 2 (17 hours) and be showered and tucked in bed by 3. I get to the Chelsea aid station (67 miles) at 8:25PM in about as foul a mood as I'm capable of.

And that's really too bad because what happens next is one of my least proud moments in 40 years of running. The signs point to the parking lot of a motel for the aid station, but I don't see any aid. I'm now feeling panic on top of frustration because I've only been memorizing the route one leg at a time and have no idea which way I should go if I can't find the station. A man in the parking lot points me to one of the rooms and says, "It's in there." I open the door. Nobody is inside, but the aid station worker comes hustling up the sidewalk and enters behind me.

"Is this a weigh in?"
"Nope, that's at 78," he says cheerfully.
"Is there any reason I'm in this room?" I ask, every bit as pissy as it sounds.
"Well, I don't know, what do you need?"
"I need to run."

And that's the thanks he gets for staying up all night to take care of my ass. What's really sad is that, from the brief look I got of it, it was a really fine aid station. There were crock pots full of hot soup and chili, cookies, sandwiches, trail mix, several types of drinks. Basically all the stuff the unmanned stations lacked. Outside I grab a bottle from Jeff and mutter something about wanting a soda. He hands me the race bible so I can look at the next leg. It's currently open to the leg I just finished. On each leg, there's a "tip" for runners. Some are helpful, some are funny, some are silly, but I really should have read this one sooner. It's a single word: "Relax."

It's certainly true that hanging out at an aid station is pretty much the worst thing you can do when you're struggling. One may have to go slow, but keep going. Stopping is a very short step from quitting. But, seriously, would it have been that big a deal to take 15 seconds to politely grab a handful of nuts and thank him for his efforts? I head on down the road wondering if I'm just too much of a jackass to be an ultrarunner.

"Coke, Diet Coke, or Mountain Dew?" asks Jeff as he hops out of his truck two miles later. It's like having a genie except that there's apparently no limit on the number of wishes. "I think I need full strength, let's go with the Dew." I don't try to chug it; I clearly need to get myself composed. I walk for about ten minutes, taking small sips until it's gone. Then I run. And run. And run.

The next aid station is unmanned, so I just grab a bottle from Jeff. "Weigh in at the next one in three miles," he reminds me. "I'm not worried about my weight, it's the three miles." But, truthfully, the worst has passed. I'm tired, but I'm not fighting it anymore. I just let myself move at whatever pace feels right. Surprisingly, that pace turns out to be 10 minutes per mile and half an hour later I arrive at the famed TATUR station.

The Tulsa Area Trail Ultra Runners are your typical bunch of nuts who think this sort of thing is a great way to spend the night. The aid station is surrounded by Tiki torches and they're playing an eclectic mix of songs loud enough to be fun without assaulting the senses of defenseless runners. As expected, the weigh in is a non-event. With the extra clothes on, I register just a pound under my baseline. I'm feeling good enough now that hanging around a bunch of kindred spirits for a few minutes doesn't seem like such a bad idea. Jeff changes the batteries in my headlamp while I put down some soup and coffee. The hosts invite me to sit by the bonfire, but I know not to cross that line. I shout goodbye to the happy group warming their hands and head back off feeling the best I've felt since, well, since the race started.

I'm reminded of something the Car Talk guys once said about used cars. People see their repair bills going up each year and want to sell the car before they get too high. What they don't realize is that they don't keep going up, after a while they level off and the old car can be kept quite cheaply for a really long time. It seems my body is doing the same thing. Everything hurts a bit, but nothing is getting worse. The miles keep going by at about a 10-minute pace with 90-second walk breaks thrown in every 20 minutes or so. Jeff shows up every few miles to offer assistance, then hurries back to John who is experiencing a similar recovery.

At the Claymore aid station (86.5 miles) I find two people manning the table. Then, I realize they aren't volunteers, they're wearing race numbers. It's been so long since I've seen another competitor, I'd almost forgotten that this is a race. They don't look particularly concerned about losing a position, but I decide to give one final push out of the aid station just to be sure, covering the next four miles in under 40 minutes. That's pretty much the last straw for my body and I take the Coke from Jeff and walk a bit. I'm going to fall off the pace again, but I'm close enough now that I know I can deal with it.

The final aid station at Verdigris comes 6.9 miles from the finish. It's yet another unmanned station and I again think of how truly dismal the second half of this race would have been without Jeff. It's not that I can't subsist on crackers and water; it's the complete lack of human contact that would have had me spiraling into depression. I look at the final leg and I simply can't keep it in my head. There are only ten turns, but as soon as I look away from the map, I forget them. The first 4 miles follow the highway, so I tell Jeff to go check on John then meet me at the first turn. He'll have to lead me in from there.

The highway crosses three bridges en route to the first turn, one of which is quite long. There's no shoulder to speak of and a thick fog has rolled in. At 2AM, only a few cars pass, but it's still right up against my safety threshold. My recreational activities result in periodic injuries, some of which are quite serious, but all these pale compared to what happens to you if you get hit by a car. On the far side of the last bridge is Jeff. He says John is power walking and in decent spirits, so he's got time to get me in before going back to him.

The plan is simple and works well. Jeff drives ahead to the next turn and waits for me to arrive, pointing me the right way. It seems silly, but this is about all the complexity my brain can handle at this point. The course markings are adequate, but having him at each turn relieves a lot of anxiety. I'm down to just 10 minutes of running between walk breaks, but still making reasonable time. Cresting the last hill with a mile to go, I can see Catoosa High School. A lap around the track and under the finish banner completes the odyssey. My time is 17 hours and 50 minutes, putting me in sixth place overall, about 2 hours behind the winner.

Inside the school there's a decent spread and they offer to cook me something hot if I want it. I'm just happy to be done in time that I can get some use out of my hotel room, so I pass on the food. Even though it's only a couple hundred meters, Jeff drives me over to the hotel and carries my bags upstairs before heading back out to tend to John. I take a quick shower and lie down, but I'm too sore to sleep. John arrives at the room around 5AM, having also met both our "official" goal of finishing and "unofficial" goal of finishing under 20 hours. Since I can't sleep anyway, I decide to get up to leave the bed for Jeff (he declines, saying he's too wired) and head downstairs to soak in the hot tub. Despite the sign clearly stating the pool opens at 8AM, the manager happily turns the lights on for me. I have to say the service we got at the Hampton was quite outstanding all weekend.

The trip home is a happy one as both John and I admire our new belt buckles. John, who did manage some sleep, does most of the driving. There are some comical moments as we pry ourselves out of the car to switch seats.

I'm still getting my arms around the whole experience. In terms of the activity itself, it's probably the hardest physical thing I've done. If one includes the preparation, a competitive marathon is considerably tougher. The miles between 60 and 70 were not much fun, but the rest of the race was. It was particularly interesting to see that a nearly complete recovery was possible after feeling like I'd gone in the tank for good. A valuable lesson there. I'd rather do long runs on trail, but I think doing this as a first try was a good call, especially with a crew as good as Jeff.

At any rate, while I still have no idea why I do this stuff, I'm glad I did.

Heart of America

Run September 2, 2019 - see note at bottom for photo credits

For me, the marathon is the longest “paced” race. By that, I mean a race where I run the entire distance at basically the same speed. In ultras, I make frequent pace adjustments depending on the terrain, conditions, and how my body is responding. At marathon distance or less, I decide the pace and force my body to either deal with it or collapse. Given that ultimatum, the legs and lungs go with the first option for around two and a half hours. That means I’m dealing with a body that is in outright revolt for the last half hour of a marathon and my pace usually does falter a bit, but my times for the first and second halves are usually within a minute of each other.

Then, there’s Heart of America. Nominally a road marathon, in that it’s an accurately measured course on roads and bike paths, it runs more like an ultra. I’ve run it twice before, both times finishing around 20th overall and second in my age group with times of 3:20 and 3:18. That apparent consistency is belied by mile splits ranging from low 6’s to over 9 minutes. As the finisher medal proudly proclaims: “Heat, Humidity, Hills. No extra charge.”

Fog descending on the start area

The Columbia Track Club has mounted a feeble defense against the heat by setting the start time at 6AM. The early hour crimps my normal pre-race routine a bit. I usually like to be up at least three hours before the start, but decide I’ll make do with two and get out of bed just before 4AM for my 30-minute pre-run. For Labor Day in Missouri, it’s downright chilly; not even 70 degrees. The humidity, on the other hand, is within a point or two of 100%. There’s a thin layer of fog hovering about 15 feet off the ground.

At 5:30, I jog the half mile from the meet hotel to the start and run another mile or so to get loose. The fog layer is both thicker and closer to the ground than an hour ago. In an oddity unique to this race, nobody wants to toe the line. Maybe it’s some sort of weird Columbia thing and I’ve missed the memo, but in all three years I’ve run this, there’s been a gap between the field and the start banner. I know there are faster runners in the field, but I wind up on the front row with only three others and even we are a couple feet shy of the line. I suppose, in this age of chip timing, you could make a case that it’s objectively faster to take a running start at the line than to be right on it, but, c’mon, that’s just silly in the context of a three hour race.

A handful of runners shoot off at well under 3-hour pace. I settle in with the next group which includes perennial finisher Andy Emerson of Columbia. Andy has the longest active streak of finishes. That streak is the only reason he’s in the race this year. He ran 148 miles in a 48-hour ultra last weekend and doesn’t think it’s very likely he’ll repeat last year’s 3rd place performance. As he’s about my speed and over 50, I’d normally be keeping an eye on him but, if he beats me a week after that effort, I’m just going to quit running altogether. I’m surprised he’s even taking it out this fast. Then again, it’s pretty hard to argue finishing strategy with someone who’s brought it home 16 years in a row.

By mile 4, the fog has descended all the way to the ground. I had brought my clip-on light to avoid stepping in a pothole in the dark. Now, I decide to leave it on in hopes it makes me a bit more visible to cars. This might not have been the best day to go with the grey and black outfit.

Our group has been reduced to four. Now heading south, the undulations begin. Andy drops off on one of the rolls. The first big climb comes at mile 7 and our remaining trio shatters entirely with me in the middle. While I don’t generally fret over positions in the first half of a race, I decide that keeping the next runner in sight will help with motivation. The fog is quite thick at the top of the hill, so even his 100m lead means I only catch the occasional glimpse of his outline.

Mile 9 comes at 66 minutes, which is in line with my rough target of 3:10-3:15. The second hour of a marathon is usually my best running and the next couple miles are gentle downhill on gravel, which is good terrain for me. It seems a good time to push a bit. I close the gap to the runner ahead at the base of the descent and keep the pace firm to make the pass stick.

We follow the Missouri River for half a mile, passing a campground where a good number of spectators have decided to stop to cheer. Among them are a few SMUT (Sunday Morning Ultra Training; Columbia’s ultrarunning club) runners who recognize me and give some encouragement. While certainly appreciated, it’s not really necessary. I’m in remarkably good spirits for this stage of the race. Knocking out a couple 6:40 miles on a long descent can have that effect. The course moves from the gravel road to the Katy Trail (also gravel, but actually a lot smoother than the road) for a mile. I pull back on the reigns just a bit knowing what follows the trail: Easley Hill.

The field trudges up Easley

Boston’s Heartbreak Hill is rightly enshrined as the most famous ascent in running. It’s placement at the most critical point in such a prestigious race is unrivaled. However, if you are talking to someone who really knows running and drop the name “Easley Hill”, there’s a good chance they’ll know you’re referring to the climb off the river at Heart of America. This race is small, but it’s been going for 60 consecutive years and word of this sort of thing does get out. Twice the height and slightly steeper than Heartbreak, there are three plausible approaches: 1) walk it, 2) run it very slowly, 3) run it right and hope you don’t pay too much for it later.

Most choose option 1. In a race where the second half heat can be crippling, this is the sensible choice. Option 2 doesn’t get many takers, but it worked fine for me in both of my previous outings. Today is going well and, while the humidity is crazy high, it’s still fairly cool. This seems like a day where taking a chance is in order.

I’ve found I can get away with 2 or 3 tempo surges in a marathon as long as I get back to m-pace after five minutes or so (Daniels, the training manual I pull most of my ideas from has a bunch of workouts specifically designed to enhance this ability). The problem is that it takes more like 8 minutes to run Easley. I’ve already put in a 10-minute push on the descent. As the second half has no major obstacles, another long surge seems risky but feasible.

I switch to tempo pace for the climb, passing the only relay team still ahead of me. Nobody comes by! With half the race to go, there’s no particular reason to be excited about this fact. However, given the drubbing I took on the first climb, it is something of a confidence builder to hold my own on the big one. History suggests that I have somewhere between 30 and 45 minutes of solid running before my pace degrades to “whatever’s left”. It’s time to start running this like a real marathon.

The next six miles are me in my sweet spot. Aside from a nasty valley between 17 and 18, the road is gently rolling. I’m tired enough that the pace feels solid but it doesn’t really hurt yet. Temperatures are still in the 70’s despite the fact the fog is completely gone and the sun is starting to break through. I knock out one 7:10 mile after another; never deviating by more than a few seconds, picking off another place in the process. Stretches like this are what keep me coming back to the marathon. There’s nothing euphoric about it. It’s the simple satisfaction of doing a hard thing well.

At mile 19 the course returns to gravel. This is a change from previous years when we stayed on the highway. While I’m delighted that we’ve traded the dreadful run-in on the shoulder of a busy highway for a picturesque trip through the woods on a country road, it does call my shoe choice into question. In total, nearly a third of the course is off pavement and the Zoom Flys are definitely road shoes. In addition to having crappy grip on the loose surface, they offer very little rock protection and my feet are getting a bit beat up. It doesn’t cost me much time, but a stiffer sole and a bit more tread would have been worth an extra ounce on each foot.

Leaving the gravel at 22, we then get an out and back section around Phillips Lake. I catch one of the runners ahead of me before the turn and see only two more on their way back, the closest being a couple minutes ahead. There’s not much chance of closing that in the three miles remaining and nobody behind is moving faster than me, so I just focus on staying as close to my pace as I can.  Leaving the lake, I pass Andy coming the other way. It looks like he’ll finish under 3:30. 8-minute miles on this course a week after a 2-day ultra. I give him a shout out for turning in what has to be the most impressive performance of the day.

Running up the hill from the lake, the various members of my body have finally taken to torches and pitchforks in protest of the effort. Something in my side lets go. It feels like a stitch, but it’s way too high on the rib cage. Knowing I have some cushion behind, I back off and run an 8:10 for mile 25. The pain relents, giving me the face-saving pleasure of getting back on pace for the final mile rather than staggering in.

I cross the line in 3:12:49, good for seventh overall and first in my age group. I had hoped for the Masters win, but the sixth place runner was 41, so no luck there. That small frustration does not spoil the day for me. While the new course is a bit easier than the old one and the weather was unseasonably nice, there’s no question that this was the best I’ve ever run this race. In fact, one could look at my half marathon splits (96:36/96:13) and conclude I ran this “longest paced race” darn near perfectly. And, I’ll just delete the mile splits from my watch and let one believe that.

Note on photography (Race Directors Please Read!)

The opening photo is from SMUT runner Abigail Rolbiecki-Adams who was roaming the course on bike. The medal shot is by me. The rest are by Mile 90 Photography. They’ve been the official photographers at many races I’ve done and they always do a great job. Furthermore, they get the fact that many of us simply want some pictures to show friends and put on blog posts. If you want a nice print in frame, they are happy to have that business but, unlike many race photographers, they aren’t going to gouge you for a digital image. They also don’t insist that the organizer cordon off the start and finish so you can’t even get friends or family to take their own pictures for you. They charge the race a shooting fee and you can download the digital photos for personal use for free. EVERY runner I have ever talked to about this would happily pay an extra $5-10 on the entry fee to have this arrangement. I, personally, have signed up for more than one race simply because the info page mentioned Mile 90 would be there. It indicates more than good photos. It shows the race director would rather pay for a service that the runners want than get a kickback from a provider that just wants to fleece them. Hire these folks and I’ll come to your race. Others will, too.