This is my long race report so sit back, relax, and strap on your seatbelt (You never been on a ride like this befo' with a producer who can rap and control the maestro)
I was a little nervous on Friday but since it was a 3 loop course, we could drop out after 2 loops if it was brutal. This wasn't a key race for me so if I quit it really wouldn't matter. The only race that matters this year is 9 weeks away. I had a nice dinner on Friday night and I was off to bed by 8:30 for an early morning rise.
The race started near Old Man's Cave which is about 90 minutes from my house. Doing the math...Registration at 6:30, 30-minute cushion, 90-minute drive, an hour to pound coffee, alarm set for 3:30. Strangely, I had no problem getting up. I crammed a few cups of coffee and headed into the darkness on southbound Route 33. Southern Ohio is very sparsely populated (and sparsely educated but that is not important). It was a nice drive until I had to make a roadside stop on a dark road thanks to the volume of coffee I had consumed. I was amazed at the number of stars in the sky.
Registration was uneventful. Grab a bib number, grab a chip, grab some safety pins, grab a t-shirt, grab some crappy free stuff and go back to the truck. I relaxed for about 20 minutes until Nemo and E arrived.
For those that don't know, Nemo is dating a great girl. For a while I thought she was made up person despite the fact that I was told I had met her. She was an integral part of the day so we'll be calling her E. I think she works for the FBI or Witness Protection or some crazy stuff.
It seems the Ultra crowd is a little less formal than the marathon crowd is. Everyone gathered nonchalantly at the start line around 6:50. The Hocking Hills Forrest Marshall gave some final instructions and there were a few course questions. At about 7:15 the Race Marshall said 3-2-1-go and 60 of us headed off into the woods.
Nemo and I were not in any rush. We settled into the middle of the pack and started chatting. We were always intending to hold a “conversational pace”. Since this was the first of 3 loops, we took some time to comment on the first few miles. I can’t say much good about the first 3 miles. We were on the road and the road was up and then down. The down was steep and that really hurt. At about mile 3 we turned into the woods for a steep climb. This was the first of a few sections that were best handled by walking. You could have run up but it really wouldn’t have done much good.
Here is a “Cliff Note” of the first lap…
Road uphill and down – not pleasant
Up and down in the woods – very pleasant
Through Cantwell Cliffs off and on roads – OK
Lake to Old Man’s Cave – awesome trail running
Through Camp Grounds – good crowd but I didn’t like it
Through the woods back to road – lot of roots but down hill
Road back to Start – up hill on the road; totally sucked.
So that was the very simplistic review of the course. Generally, my feelings for each section didn’t change much so that’s about all I’m going to say about the course. I was running in the woods on a beautiful Saturday morning in September. Sure there were some unpleasant section but really…I was outside in the fall in the Midwest on a sunny Saturday. Not a lot could make that unpleasant.
First loop went quick. We grabbed some fuel that we stashed at the start and picked up E at the 2 hour mark exactly as planned. Nemo and I were happy to have someone else to chat with. Before the run, I thought E was fictional and she thought I only wore flashing Bunny Ears and danced. We took turns running at the front while playing fun little games like “If you could have any Super Hero power”. It was a laughable 12 miles. Thanks a ton to E for the help on the second loop. I’m sure I would have done fine without you but I’m not sure about Nemo.
As we were rolling back in from the second loop we started talking about the (optional) third loop. My reasoning was this…”someday I’ll do an ultra marathon. I’m already 24 miles into this so if I don’t do it today, I’ll have to run this far to get close again.” I wasn’t hurting so we decided to keep on going.
We refueled at the start and set off on the 3rd loop with the exact same split as the first. 2 hours for the 1st loop and 2 hours for the 2nd loop. We were on target for about 6:10 or so. Shortly after the 3rd loop started, I looked at my GPS and mentioned to Nemo that this was the longest run we’d ever done. We hit the 27 mile mark and we now we are in unexplored territory.
Things got real quiet after mile 29. I hit a low spot and was really wishing I would have stopped. I think Nemo was feeling similar but we didn’t talk much. After some caffeine and sugar I picked back up at mile 30 and was feeling good. Nemo was cramping up a bit and wanted to be left alone. He, like me, doesn’t want company during suffer times. He wanted to be alone so I just moved along. The remaining 6 miles were a mix of highs and lows which I was coming to expect. Over a 4 mile stretch there are time when you feel like you could go forever and there are times when you just want to quit. There are times when you feel proud and times when you wonder why you do this stupid stuff. I just try not to take those immediate emotions too seriously.
I unceremoniously climbed to the finish line and finished in 6:15:10. It was different from other races. It wasn’t the wall-to-wall roar and echo like coming in to Boylston Street in Boston where you tear up and feel goose bumps. It isn’t the circus calling of “You are an Ironman” by Mike Riley. No, ultra finish is like 3 people who happen to be walking by the finish giving a “hey nice job”. I liked it. Will I do it again? When is that Mohican 50 Miler…
Oh by the way...Nemo and I tied as the big winners in the Poll. MD got a surprising 2nd in the poll with a strong 3rd place overall. GS was a very big disappointment with only 1 beer for the OU vs. OSU tailgate and football game. Seriously, who would have thought that "1" would be the lowest score? {Shaking my head in shame}
1 comment:
Hi there
Awesome post, just want to say thanks for the share
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