Holiday Lake 50k++ Race Report

Days before the race everyone wanted to know, "are they still going to have that race? in the SNOW?? really?" One of the many reasons I have a growing passion for these races, they barely ever cancel. Sitting here trying to think of why an ultra race would be cancelled . . . .

1. Cold weather/possible chances of hypothermia . . .. scratch that...this isn't your neighborhood 5k . . unless its too cold to move your legs, the race will be held.

2. Its too dark. . .. get a headlamp . . if those are too expensive make a torch out of old t-shirts and gasoline.

3. The t-shirts didn't get shipped on time?? As cool as the t-shirts were at Holiday Lake for 2010 I have yet to run into anyone that runs ultras...just for the t-shirts . . .and they were there on time.

4. The course disappeared? If we can't see a trail we can't run. I had yet to experience this problem but like anything, the longer you stick with something the more you learn and yes the course disappeared under 5 or 6 inches of snow the whole time. Luckily it was very well marked.

5. Nobody showed up to the start?? Sorry race still happened, everyone DNF'ed.

6. There is no water left in the country?? Thats gotta be it...nope... Luckily for Holiday Lake this year we stayed plenty hydrated eating snow flying off the sneakers of the people in front of us.

Like I said though, these are far from complaints. This type of intensity is what pulled me into this community last year and is what will keep me coming back.

Now, onto the race.
I was ill-prepared and I will write this report through the lessons that I have learned this weekend. Lets just say the few days prior to the race my mind was all over the place (Organic Chemistry and Biotechnology in Human Civilization tests, working at a flower shop on Valentines weekend, a slight scare of the end of my running by throwing my back out and being immobile on the couch for 2 days).

Lesson #1. Don't be ill prepared. Especially mentally. Just don't.

Take off from Blacksburg around 8:00 pm, with no map, my running gear, a sleeping bag, two bagels, and an almost dead cell phone battery.

Lesson #2. When you think you have all your running gear, you don't. Lay it out the night before.
Lesson #3. When the race director sends out multiple emails about available lodging, take advantage of it. Don't try to sleep in your nissan stanza, first off, you don't fit. Second off, its snowing outside.
Lesson #4. One bagela and a Naproxen(pain killer for the recently thrown out back) is not a sufficient 50k breakfast.
Lesson #5. If you normally wake up at 9 AM and the race starts at 6:30 AM, make sure your phone is charged, with all 28 alarms set. Luckily, predawn headlights beaming through a frosty windshield served as a sufficient alarm this time.

So arriving around 11:30 after getting lost in Farmville, I decided it not to be in my best interest to go barging in on 200 sleeping runners shining a head lamp around and looking for a place to put a sleeping bag down. The stanza will do for the night. 27 different sleeping positions later, the first set of headlights crossed my windshield and I knew race time was approaching. Getting out of the sleeping bag it felt like about 15 degrees outside, I have no idea as to the actual temperature but I knew I was going to wear my windbreakers to run in today.

Lesson #6 If you're not going to bring your race gear, dont make your backup plan a pair of cotton long johns and a fleece jacket.

OK...now that I have my race gear on (see picture above, Oh yeah..and Alex...sorry I stole your gloves before I left) lets do this thing! Ironically I think the start of the race was where my whole week/day started to turn around. First a prayer and then the singing of the Star Spangled Banner, a very cool tradition at Holiday Lake. Sometimes you start to wonder what you are doing with your life in college, last night this is the time when you got home from the "Coconut Bangers Ball" and now you are standing in rural Virginia watching snowflakes bounce off of headlamps and singing the star spangled banner with 268 amazing runners.

Lesson #7 These people make me smile and I don't even know them.

Ready?? GO!! Tromp tromp tromp...up the icy paved road we go....Something is missing though. Ohhhhhhh boy. I forgot my headphones. Crucial mistake. I've never run an ultra without headphones. Should I run back to my car? Oh boy. Oh no. Wait wait...this is a loop so I could always snag them when I go through the halfway point... OHHH NO!

Lesson #8 (that I realized at about mile 7) I forget I even have headphones in after about 2 miles anyway. This whole time I thought it had such a big effect on my race . . . I beg to differ now.

Half a mile up the road we made our first turn, I was running with the front four. Being the only one with a headlamp after they missed a few turns, I was leading the way. Breaking trail for the whole race?? Not my typical position and I knew I would burn out by mile ten at this rate. (By the way...I think we all owe a cheers to Matt, Jordan, and Cameron to a truly amazing performance knowing that they were running about twice as hard as the rest of us breaking trail the for 16 miles!) The first three miles were my favorite part of the race, it was still dark, snow falling hard, running lakeside on some single track with about 17 other guys/gals. Other than crunching snow and the occasional "holler if you want to pass!", it was tranquil. The first aid station came in what felt like minutes and the pack started to break up. I decided to try to stay with the three others that broke out in front. Then we crossed the creek and the guy behind me asked, "was that the creek?"

Lesson #9 If its jumpable. It's not the creek. Not in ultras.

Then we hit the creek and yeah...hit it. The two guys in front of me plowed right into the thing in true ultra fashion, when I saw them I wanted to shout like I would if Virginia Tech won the NCAA basketball championship in double OT. It was truely a kodak moment and I was stoked. It was cold but wool socks limited the effects of that.

We continued on at a good pace and every now and again someone would drop off of our little pack and then all of a sudden I got nauseous from watching the guys feet that was running in front of me, looking back this could have been an effect of the pain killer but when it happened, it was intense. Aid station 3 and then we swung back down to the lake and the turn around was in sight. I dropped off the pack. I dropped off the pack and got reallll tired.

Lesson #10 Carbohydrates??? OHHH YEAHHHH. Not as much a lesson learned as just a mistake. A bagel, dosen't cut it and I kept putting off eating the clif bars I had in my camel back.

Made it to the turn around in about 2 hours 27 minutes, threw my water bottles to the side and got some drinks and sandwhich slices but made sure not to spend any more than 2 minutes as I had plenty of foods and water in my camelback for the 2nd half of the race. After the turnaround I was running in about tenth place. Due to the very narrow trail along the lake it was really hard to keep a consistent pace with people coming the opposite direction constantly. Between the halfway point and going back to the next aid station I did quite a bit of walking and lost quite a bit of time. As people would catch up I would try to motivate myself to run with them for a bit but could not keep the pace and finally somewhere in between the last two aid stations I found a group of guys that were running a a comfortable pace for me. Once again, I had started a WEEEEE bit too hard. After passing the last aid station and getting back down to the lake I ran and talked with Bert Hatchell all the way into the finish line, another reason why I love these races, just some cool people! Bert and I ran it in together in true style not sprinting it in and battling for 31st and 32nd, just being two guys out there for a good solid fun time knowing that we both had a great accomplishment under our belt for the day.

Lesson #11 Good positive folks all around, gotta love it.

Well immediately after the finish it was back to Blacksburg to finish up the Valentines day deliveries at the flower shop, and then the best nap ever. Congrats to all of you that ran Holiday Lake this year, truly fantastic that there was such a great finishing percentage!

Totals on the day -
Distance = 32 miles
Time = 5 hours 47 minutes 6 seconds
Shoutout = Bert Hatchell, had a great time running the last few miles with you, cool dude!

Bridle Trails 50k Race Report

Going into this race I was a bit nervous, having only run one 12 mile and one 5 mile run since my last 50k on December 19th. Well, physically I was nervous. Mentally I was more psyched than ever just to be running in lovely Seattle! New part of the country, beautiful spruce forests, and currenty the warmest place in the country. So I made it my goal to set a new PR for myself (under 5:02:39) and to come in at a higher place than my last race , the Seashore Nature Trail 50k.

The race was scheduled to start at 3 pm but ended up starting a bit late. They started the 5 mile race at 3:05, the 10 mile at 3:10 and the 50k relay, pair, and solo at 3:18. Being a horse park and so close to the ocean and lakes, I was not expecting the Bridle Trails State Park to have any hills at all. Boy was I wrong. About half a mile into the race, we went straight up for about 100 yards. At this point I was running in the lead pack with three other guys that were on relay teams and passing people from the 5 mile and 10 mile race about every fifteen feet. After about 3 miles I decided to back off their pace a bit as I knew that they had to only do 1 lap each while I had to do 6 laps of the 5.2 mile loop. All in all I still ran the first two laps very fast, as a lot of people from the 10 mile race were on the course I would just make it my goal to keep catching the next one in front of me.

Halfway through lap 3 the course started getting dark, and rather than using my head lamp I tried to let my eyes acclamate to the dark. This worked just until the end of the lap and I threw my headlamp on starting lap 4. Lap 4 was when the cramps really started to hit. Having not done much training in general for this race and in addition NO elevation training, the hills were starting to strain my muscles quite a bit. The downhills irritating my vastus medialis (one of the four muscles of the quadricep) and the uphills irritating my semitendinosus (part of the hamstring) and my gastrocnemius (calf muscle).




















Lap 4 and 5 were a mixture between some really hardcore powerwalking (I'm talking arms swinging, I should probably have been wearing a neon jumpsuit and a headband powerwalking) and trying to run but failing every 300 yards because my muscles would tense up again. So finally I decided to walk it out for almost all of lap 5 so I could hopefully run some of lap 6 and still get my goal of my PR and rank.

Finishing lap 5 I had about one hour to complete the last 5.2 mile loop which would be possible, but I would have to run some. Noticing that my cramping was coming from mostly the uphills and downhills I decided to run all the flat sections on lap 6. This proved effective and I could run just about half of the loop. All in all I came in 18th place with a time of 4 hours 50 minutes, hitting both goals! Bridle Trails I would say has to be one of the most beautiful courses I have run on and although it was a loop (which tend to get boring), the single track trail, surrounding environment and plant life had my mind fully captivated throughout the race, so cheers to the Seattle Running Company for holding a great ultra!

Totals on the Day -
Miles - 31.1 miles
Time - 4 hours 50 mins
Song - Ozone - Dragostea Din Tei
Shoutout - Steph Stepanchick! for coming to watch! So good to see you and I hope your feet have warmed up by the time you read this.

Totals on the day -
Miles = 5
Time = 37 mins 39 secs
Shoutout = Anyone who gets on the treadmill and turns it up to 13 mph and runs for 30 seconds then turns it off and walks out

Go Green!

So I ran into a bit of a problem today. I promised my bosses that I would go into work to deliver 4 flower arrangements. Then I realized, I probably wouldn't even be working a whole hour because I only had to drive to two places for these 4 arrangements. Living 15 minutes (12 miles) away from work I realized the amount of money I would spend on gas getting there and back would be equal to or less than the amount of money I would make at work. DILEMNA.

The quick solution -

Thought 1) My sister and Mark are driving to town at 11 AM.
Thought 2) I have a ride to town.
Thought 3) I need a ride back from town.
Thought 4) I have 2 legs and a pair of shoes.
Thought 5) Run!
Thought 6) Go Green and less carbon emissions!
Thought 7) Stop global warming!
Thought 8) Save the world!
Thought 9) Utopian society where LOOOVEE replaces all the bad things in the world.
Thought 10) Lets be realistic, back to thought 6.

Ended up having an excellent run home from town which started out a bit rough but once I found my groove it was a breeze. The temperature was around 40 and I was drinking pedialyte and water to hydrate as well as wearing a long sleeve shirt and shorts. It couldn't have felt better!

Totals on the Day:
Miles - 12.07
Time - 1 hour 33 minutes
Shoutout - Lets give it up forrrr the inventors of canned dog food.

Seashore Nature Trail 50k

Caution: If you get uneasy about nasty weather conditions, please read no further.

Race Report:
It's Wednesday the 16th and the forecast for Virginia Beach says 46 degrees and sunny, perfect!

It's Thursday the 17th and the forecast for Virginia Beach says 42 degrees and rainy.

Its Friday the 18th and the forecast for Virginia Beach says 39 degrees and rain/snow.

It's Saturday the 19th, we have been running for 5 hours in the rain and mud, the temperature has dropped from 49 to 35 degrees.

Going into the Seashorne Nature Trail 50k I expected to be cold, I just didn't know how cold. Feeling slightly unprepared with the nature of my gear (such as a cotton shirt) I tried to stay on the positive side and use the cold to help me run faster to stay warm.

To emphasize a bit on the weather we can start with the sheer numbers of people that decided to race. The entry cap on the race was 250 people. 244 people payed seventy dollars to run. 190 people showed up to packet pickup. 160 people started the race at 7:30 AM. 148 people finished the race.

Getting out of Lisa's car was probably the hardest part of the morning, Alex and I stretched for about 5 minutes in the car until about 7:20 and with barely any warm up at all, we toed the start line. I started fast, as usual but due to a change in the course route the night before the race, none of the turns or trails were marked....so 0.5 miles into the race and leading the pack I missed the first turn only too see everyone running off into the woods about 20 seconds later so I had a slight adventure through the woods to get back on track. So....off to a good start.

The next 3.5 miles of the course was a trail through the woods.
The next 3.5 miles of the course was a muddy trail through the woods.
The next 3.5 miles of the course was a muddy, wet, dirty trail through the woods.
The next 3.5 miles of the course was a muddy, wet, dirty, spawn of satan trail through the woods.

Following this section we had 1.5 miles on the road which picked up the pace quite a bit with the solid terrain. At the end of the road section was the end of the first of six (5 mile loops). So back down the road and back through the muddy, wet, dirty, spawn of satan trail through the woods and we were done with ten miles.

Lets think, 160 people running down the same trail each 6 times = 960 people running across a given point. To answer your question, YES the trail did get worse, muddier, wetter, dirtier, and actually just turned into the devil himself.

It just so happens that the paved 1.5 mile section of road was right next to the bay. The first out and back on this section was great, getting off the muddy trail was a wonder and paces increased. The second out and back on this section got some people wondering, coming around the last bend before the turnaround there was a 100 yard section of the road covered ankle deep in water.....oh right....the bay....is effected by the tides. Looking forward to out and back #3!

20.5 miles into the race starting loop 3 (Race time= 2 hours 47 minutes) is when things started going downhill, the temperature had been decreasing steadily throughout the race, the rain was picking up, and ......then I got leg cramps. After multiple attempts at trying to run, I decided to just walk out most of the rest of the race. Was this because I didn't replenish my electrolytes?? Possibly, but after seeing that the first place guy was now walking and cramped up along with multiple others I concluded that it was a result of the cold weather and rain/not having the appropriate gear. Approaching the paved section on loop 3, I saw 5 runners splashing knee deep (waist deep on some!) through the 100 yard section of road. The tide had come in and now we had to make two passes of this ice cold water (ice cold to the point I thought I would cramp up just walking through it and fall over and have to crawl out).

I walked the last ten miles at about a 4.5 mph pace and finished up in 5:02:39. 18th pace in the 1-39 age group and 38th place overall. There was a professional photography company taking pictures at the race so take a look at them here. If you click on the blue link on the side that says Event Photos, then on 2009 Photos, then on Seashore Nature Trail 50k, you can type in a bib number to find photos. My bib number was 227.

Totals on the day:
Miles = 31.07
Time = 5:02:39
Shoutouts - Alex, for finishing his first ultra and being a trooper
Lisa, for being an awesome support crew, can't wait till you run one with us!

Oh yeah.....we have to wake up early

So the Seashore Nature Trail 50k starts at 7:30 AM. So I say last night, "I'm going to wake up at 6:45 and run for an hour before breakfast." Oh it all sounded so simple last night. Well I woke up and it was freezing, running to the gym was essentially shoe skiing across black ice.

So at the gym "alright lets run 9 miles an hour for one hour...ok...lets just do 8 miles an hour its early. Well...here we are 20 minutes in...lets just walk for a bit, its early. Ok 30 minutes, lets run again pick it up...40 minutes..ok lets walk, IT'S EARLY!

All in all I had a wopping day of 6.5 miles in 57 minutes. Next went do D2 breakfast, and fell asleep for thirty minutes with my head next to my plate of pancakes. So I learned my lesson, train your body to be awake for the time you are racing. We'll see how it goes on Saturday.

Totals on the day -
Miles- 6.5
Time - 57 minutes
Shoutout - The only other person at the gym at 7 AM, whoever you are.
Lesson - Wake up before you run.

Training Brek

Having a hard time looking at this picture, maybe breakfast this morning will explain why. . . .

2 cups OJ
2 sausage links
3 pieces of bacon
1 Blueberry French Toast Souffle
1 scoop cinnamon apples
10 hard boiled eggs (only the white protein part, don't worry health nuts!)

I suppose you could say...training has started.



Totals on the day:
Miles - 8.00
Time - 59:39

I'll take that!

So as soon as I vouch to stop running on the treadmill so much, guess where I end up today? On the treadmill, ohhhh you know just for a quick little jog. It was one of those days that I woke up and felt like I had to run very far which is great because those are the days that you go running and your 12 miles in and you feel like its been 10 minutes.

The first hour all I listened to was my newly discovered song claiming Billboards Number 95 in the year 1996. Back for Good by Take That. Next hour, listened to the Black Eyed Peas - Where is the Love on repeat. So 2 hours in and at 14.7 miles I was feeling great and kept going without any breaks until 20.7 miles with a time of 2 hours and 37 minutes. Well the last few miles were the roughest and I decided to stop at 25 on the day.

As nervous as I'm getting for the upcoming Seashore Nature Trail 50k, today reinforced some confidence that I can meet my goal of having a sub 4 hour finish.

Totals on the day -
Miles = 25
Time = 3 hours 27 minutes
Song - Take That - Back for Good
Shoutout - The girl who helped Alex and I out by getting us some water when we ran out, she saved us!

Huckleberry

First time running down the Huckleberry in a while and I almost forgot how great it is. Alex and I ran out to the mall and then back down 460, stopped the run a little short to eat. Oh yeah...I almost forgot the race is in ...16 days....boom goes the dynamite.

Miles on the day: 11.2

Time: 1 hour 45 mins

Shoutout goes to everyone who can do the googly eye

I'll be back

Today I think I decided I'm done running on the treadmill so much and that I'm going back to the Florida Keys this May for a second go.

Miles on the Day: 10 miles

Time - 92 minutes