Huntsville Marathon #4

The week before this race I had been feeling good. Got a couple of 7 mile runs done and took it easy the two days before the race. I was feeling good the night before but wasn't liking the forecast which seemed to show temperatures getting warmer and warmer. It was looking to be in the mid 70's around the time I was hoping to finish. Even warmer if I finished later.
 

This race has a later start than most other races, in one way its good as I don't have to get up so early, but it can make it tough around midday with no shade. 
I picked up Marisa and Elvia and headed to Huntsville. It was cool in Huntsville and I hoped it would be cooler up the top, but from experience it isn't always.  We loaded onto the buses and headed up towards Monte Cristo. We got there, I had a sweatshirt on but realized I didn't need it.

 

We met up with different friends, got pictures taken and before we knew it they wanted us to load up the drop bags and work our way to the start line. Saw a black guy who was quite thin and tall and I commented to someone he's the one I wanted to beat today, they laughed. It turned out he won the race and was from Kenya. After a few visits to the potties we had all made our way to the start line. The shirt was already off as it wasn't even chilly.
And we were off running.

I felt good at the start. My goals for the race were to first try to get a sub 4:00. If I didn't do that, I wanted to at least PR which would mean about a 4:12 or better finish. I had my pace chart printed on my arms and for the first 16 miles wanted an 8:30/m pace. I needed to bank time for the final 5 or 6 miles and wanted to use the ease of the downhill.

The first 5 miles my pace was going well. 8:05, 7:58, 8:35, 8:13 and 8:43. My overall pace so far was 8:18. It wasn't a hard pace for me with the downhill. At almost every aid station I would fuel, drink, and dump one cup of water on my head. They had a great variety of foods, bananas, gu, pretzels, swedish fish, oranges...
The second 5 miles were about the same, 8:08, 8:31, 8:05, 8:33 and 8:28. Still going strong and feeling good. It was during this time that I even dreamed that maybe I'll surprise myself and get close to a BQ, yeah right, dream on. I was 1:39 ahead of my goal at 10 miles into the course of 1:25:00 into the race and at an overall 8:20/m pace. But the temperature was slowly climbing.  I ran a few miles with Sue Mantyla and she kept me company. Its amazing how the time will click by so easily when you have someone to talk to. I lost her at one of the aid stations where I got some GU, slice of orange and some drinks.
This race was one that I did well with keeping up with the intake of food and water. Its something I am not always consistent with.

I reached the half marathon mat at 1:50:01, still at my pacing chart goal. Now only 3 more miles at this pace then I could ease off to a 10:00 pace until mile 23. This is where it got more difficult for me.  The next two miles were both 9:25, the incline had flattened out some. At the 15 mile aid station I had no choice but to use the portapotty.

That made mile 16 very close to a 12:00 mile. I was now 13 seconds per mile or 4 minutes and 49 seconds behind my goal at that point. I was now realizing I couldn't make up that kind of time as the following miles would be difficult for me. For the next 3 miles I was close to the 10:00 pace but not quite. I had my garmin virtual partner set at a 9:07 pace which is what I needed at the end. At mile 19 I was still below that pace but knew I couldn't do a 9:07 pace for the final 7.2 miles. So now my goal would be to at least PR. Jonathan caught up to me around this point and motioned for me to hang with him. I did for maybe 2 or 3 tenths of a mile then had to drop back as I was spent and there was no way I could keep that pace. So I watched him slowly get further and further ahead of me as I ran/walked my way the rest of the course.

I thought the community really supported this race. People were out in their front yards cheering on the runners, there were people playing bagpipes, or their boom box type things, cheer leaders cheering us on, hundreds of sheep staring at us as we hobbled past them. I'm sure I saw Shaun the sheep in there with them. Around mile 23 I knew a PR was now also out the window for me, so for the final miles I just decided to enjoy the scenery and the support etc. I took a few pictures and kept plodding forward knowing the finish line wasn't that far away.

The heat was terrible and I was having memories of the first time I ran this race. I had no idea what my finish time would be that race and picked 4:00 but ended up finishing around 5:13. 4 years later its dejavu. Same finish goal, but the ending was at least stronger this year than in 2012. I ended up finishing in 4:27:28. Out of my 12 marathons its my 3rd fastest and about 14 minutes slower than my finish time last year in the cold rain and 4 minutes slower than Utah Valley earlier this year.
Hopefully next year Huntsville will start earlier and will give us much cooler weather! But its still my favorite marathon in Utah and I will keep encouraging people to run it with me. It may not be as big as some of the others or at glitzy, but they do a super job with all aspects of the race. Is there room for improvement? Sure, but thats true for every race. I love Revel Big Cottonwood, but they need decals :) Vigor Big Cottonwood? They need better medals, Some of the others? Volunteers need to be back from the finish mat to give runners room to slow down rather than handing the medals to them on the timing mat. No race is perfect, but if it was, what would us runners complain about!

Panic at the Start of the 15th Ogden Marathon

WHAT a day! Wet, windy at times and cold, but in spite of the miserable weather it was awesome to hear about so many people getting PRs and Qualifying for Boston at the 15th Odgen Marathon this morning! Too many people to try to list.
I arrived at the bus loading area around 4:50, saw Eric Nelson, then Ryan Delany. I was supposed to meet up with Marisa but was having doubts about finding her amoungst the 5000+ people attempting to get on the buses. After giving the bus driver a little assistance so he could get out of the bus so we could get in the bus. We piled on, Ryan and I settled down into comfortable seats (compared to the school bus seats) and lo and behold who sits in front of us, but Marisa, Heather and Mandy, Marisa's neighbor. What are the odds they'd be on the same bus as us?
THE skies looked promising at first and I thought we may luck out. While waiting for the start it tried snowing a little, then the sun shone
and it felt so warm, but quickly disappeared again. It was difficult to decide what to wear for the race. Marisa was torn not knowing if she should wear shorts or capris. She was lucky to choose the capris. I took off the plastic bags inside my shoes as I thought I shouldn't need them. I had short smart wool socks and I had noticed the upper part of the bag was irritating my ankles below the compression sleeves. I also put away the big garbage bag with the hole for my head, as I had a rain jacket I thought would work just as well. Marisa and Heather decided they needed to make one more trip to the porta-potties, then the announcements for drop bags were being made warning us we were running out of time. Ryan took all of our drop bags, but we
still had Marisa's drop bag and her hydration belt but no Marisa. With a 2 minute warning we decided to put her bag in the truck. Then we heard over the loud speaker something about Mandy, so we rushed over to the announcers truck and there was Marisa panicing that she didn't have her hydration belt, including her MP3 player and she couldn't find us, plus still had things she didn't want to carry in the race. Items
dropped at aid stations in the race were going to be donated so that wasn't an option. We decided to throw her extra stuff into a black garbage bag and hope for the best that she could retrieve it at
the end even though it didn't have a tag or number on it. We got it into the truck just as they were closing the door. Panic over.
THE rain was still holding off when the gun went to start the race, but that was soon to change. I would guess not more than a half a mile it started drizzling. I had a cap that kept the rain out of my eyes, but I could feel the rain cooling the rest of my body. Marisa and I kept a pretty consistent pace to start, we were running slightly ahead of the 4:30 pacer but she eventually passed us. We met up with Julianna and Andrea and I was able to get their picture.
OUR hands were feeling the cold. Marisa had given me some hand warmers which I was carrying in my hydration belt so we pulled them out, opened them and stuck them inside our soaked gloves.
I think I've felt more heat from day old used tea bags! If anything it was tepid, they may have even been sucking the heat that remained in our fingers to heat themselves up. Marisa's wasn't working either and I figured they must have gone past their expiry date if they have one. My feet stayed cool, but comfortable even though they got very wet, thanks to the smart socks. And no blisters at the end of the race either.

BOTH of us were wanting to use the porta-potties but at each aid station there were lines of people so we held off until the Half start where we figured there'd be tons of units with no lines.
We were so wrong. There were hardly any there and there as a long line of people. I'm sure we wasted 5 minutes or more before we crossed the 13.1 timing pads. We also met up with Ruthie and Royce at this point. The race had timing pads at numerous points of the race and at each one I wondered if anyone was watching our time. Turned out Katie was stalking us! So cool to hear about later.
AFTER this point is the part of the race I really don't like. The hills on the west side of the lake. But for some reason they didn't seem so bad in

this years race and were over in no time. Mile 14 at the top of a hill, the aid station had one volunteer who was totally wound up. She had more excitement than all the runners put together. She was pretty cool.
BY mile 17 I was struggling to keep up with Marisa. She's a strong little runner! The effects of very little training, excess weight, plus 2 hours of sleep the night before were taking its toll. Picture taking had come to a halt as I couldn't use my fingers to operate the camera and by this point I pretty much had finished off my skittles and bagel, plus had some bananas at the aid stations.

MARISA was a little ahead of me around mile 18 and the 5:00 pacer passed me then passed her. I pointed this out to her and that gave her the incentive she needed! She steamed ahead. I was able to keep her in my sights for a few miles but soon she was gone.
MILE 20 I was done. 6 miles to go and I knew they were going to be slow. A girl passed me and complained she was so cold. All she had on was shorts and what looked like a bathing suit top with a cheap .99 cent clear rain coat. I was freezing, I couldn't imagine how she felt. At the next aid station I saw a chair with a bunch of emergency blankets so asked if I could take one for that girl.

I did, ran up to her and asked if she wanted it, she seemed appreciative, but just wouldn't walk or slow down so I could get it to her in a way she could use it. But I finally did and off I went, leaving her to sort it ut. Soon after though she caught up to me and passed and she kind of had it over one arm like she was going to get rid of it. I figured if she did, I would grab it and use it myself. When we left the road to get onto the paved trail, there it was strung over the bridge railing. It was mine and I wore that thing to the finish! Not sure if it helped much but who knows, without it I could have taken even longer to finish.

A number of times in the race we saw the guy who had a bathing suit on, no shirt, with a towel over his neck and snorkle and mask. He ran the whole marathon dressed like that! I'm not sure how he didn't get hypothermia in that cold!
JOSHUA Hansen was waiting at the home stretch and it was so nice to see a familiar face! He had run the half marathon that morning. I finally crossed the finish line, clicked off my garmin and had no idea what the finish time was. I knew it wasn't good though. I grabbed a tiny can of coke and started looking for Marisa, then saw Heather crossing the finish line. What a trooper, she had cut her finish time by a huge amount from her previous marathons, but I cringed when she showed me her chaffing on the inside of her upper thighs. It looked so painful! When I got home it turned out I had the same chaffing, but nothing like she had.
HEATHER suggested we get our drop bags which I had totally forgotten about. That gave me a chance to put some warm pants on until I got to the car. We made our ways to our cars and it turned out Marisa was in Heathers waiting. She DID find her black bag in the lost and found! They drove over to my car after a bit and we talked a little about the race, Marisa saying she was so happy she went with the capris. I told her next time I'll have to wear capris! That will be a sight!

My first Ultra, the Buffalo 50 mile race.

After 4 and a half months of training, 810 miles of running, race day was finally here. I took the day off the evening prior to the race so I could relax. I went to bed around 8:45 and was up at 3 to go meet Laura and her husband who were giving me a ride to Antelope Island. It was around 5:15 when we arrived, placed our drop bags to be delivered to the aid stations, saw many familiar faces, and were given about a 5 minute warning the race was to begin.

6 am on the dot the race started. It was very dark and cool seeing all the lamps of the runners ahead of me spreading out and snaking up the trail on the hillside. I was running with Robin with Jason just behind us and noticed my watch was showing me not keeping up with the virtual partner. It was driving me crazy so I finally stopped on the side, paused my garmin and reset the VP to 14:23, the finish pace I wanted as a goal which would get me across the finish line in 12 hours. I lost track of Robin after doing this. A ways ahead of me I could see runners lights reflecting off a flag that was being carried by three runners from the Red White and Blue group. Turns out Robin was with them.
I was using a hydration pack for the race. In the bladder I had 48 oz of gatorade, and I had a 22 oz bottle of water up front. I figured the gatorade would last the whole race and the bottle would be fast to fill up at the aid stations.
We ran for almost an hour using our headlamps. I had thought I had a pretty good one, but soon discovered mine was pathetic compared to others which totally lit up the trail, creating a shadow of me and made my light look like a dim candle. I need to find out where to get one of those lights!
The sun was coming up and the sky was starting to glow and soon the lights were turned off just before the first aid station at Elephant head just short of 6 miles. From there we had a 3 mile out and back along Elephant head and we had to get a sticker to show we ran to the end. I think I was at about a 13:00/m pace at this time.
I had been fueling on Welsh cakes and skittles and I had a drop bag at the Elephant head aid station and picked up another stash of Welsh cakes to carry with me. On the out and back I saw a lot of people I knew. Laura, Chris Andersen, Dave, Chris Pope, Eric, Jason and I'm sure there were others.
From there we continued south and we had some nice downhill which helped with the pace, but I knew this would all be gone once we were going up the switch backs.
Climbing the switch backs was slow. I would run for short distances but didn't want to spend all my energy going up there so didn't over do it. A girl caught up to me and we visited for a short time as we climbed but she was much stronger than me and quickly added space between us. I also stopped for mother nature around this area behind some rocks. The climb seemed to keep going forever even though in reality its only a 600' climb over less than 2 miles.
When I got to the top I saw the group with the flag and there was a runner on the ground.
It was the girl I had visited with for a short time on the switch backs. They were wrapping her hand and lower arm. Apparently she fell and broke her wrist. Her name was Christine. There was a worker with a walkie talkie with her and after she had a sling set up I asked if anyone was going to walk with her and the volunteer said she was, so I took off down the trail. I hadn't gone very far when I turned around and Christine
was going a pretty good speed down the trail catching up to me. I ended up cleaning her bottle off so she could get a drink and followed her into the Elephant head aid station. I asked her how the volunteer got there so quickly and it just happened she had just come around the corner after it happened.
This would be the last time we'd be at this aid station which was mile 14. A number of people I knew there. The only one I talked to was Kelli who knew me but I didn't recognize her. She took a picture of me, I got some coke and ginger snaps while a volunteer filled up my water bottle.
I also got half a bagel from my drop bag and put the drop bag in the area to show the bag was done with and it could be taken back to the start. From there we dropped back into the lower area. I passed Janet, Heather and Joycelyn doing their races coming up that hill. There was one hill to climb after the one tree as we made our way back to the start/finish which would be mile 19.
It was a nice site to see the start/finish in the distance knowing a good portion of the race was going to be done and I was feeling pretty good. With the pause with the downed runner my pace was around 13:30/m by the time I got to the aid station at the finish line. I stopped for a moment at the aid station which was about a 1/4 mile from the finish, and got some coke. Not realizing they were reusing the cups, I drank and automatically dropped the cup into the garbage. I felt bad about it but I had no idea. I avoided the bathrooms etc there as I didn't want to lose more time.
From the start we crossed over to the east side of the island, its mainly a slow gradual climb and then a short drop down the hill to the aid station. I got some coke, and visited with
Susette and Cory who were about 2 miles ahead of me. They had just finished the out and back to the north point on the island, I then headed north. When I got to the end of the trail, they had a couple of arrows on the ground showing this is where you turn and and run back, which I proceeded to do. I looked for stickers to show we did it, but there were none.
I blew through the aid station this time and kept going south. I was at 22.6 miles at the aid station. From there all the way to the ranch and back was fairly flat rolling terrain with lots of buffalo.
I visited with one guy who said his running partner broke her wrist. I told him I had seen her. He ran ahead and after awhile I passed him on his phone. I gave him a thumbs up and kept going. At mile 25 I called my wife to let her know where I was at. It was 11:40 a.m., which gave me 6 hrs and 50 minutes to do the last 25 miles. I was doing well with an average 13:38/m pace by this point. My goal for the first 25 miles was between 13 and 14:00/m pace so I was inside that goal.
Shortly after the phone call I realized I was getting blisters from my shoes. I had a fresh pair at the Lower Frary aid station with clean socks etc. That aid station I would be passing through at mile 27.5 and mile 38.8. I had thought about having a drop bag at the Garr Ranch but the Lower Frary made much more sense.
I saw one group of buffalo trying to cross the trail, but they were spooked with all the runners, finally they stampeded across leaving one on the west side of the trail, he/she kept hesitating, I kept moving south and all of a sudden it started running, straight towards me. I had no place to go so just stood still. It just ran a short distance and turned itself on a dime and headed the other direction towards the road and the cars. Those things move fast and are sure agile!
It was a pleasant site seeing the aid station as I crested a small hill. I got my bag, put the clean socks and shoes on, had two drinks of coke, visited for a few moments with Chris Pope who told me the wheels had fallen off for his race. He was cramping pretty badly, then I was back out running.
With the blisters and the temperature getting a lot warmer I found one of the toughest parts of the race was between mile 25 and mile 30.
My shirt came off around mile 28 after the aid station. I was hydrating lots and trying my best to ignore the pain in my feet. I had also set myself up for a nice sunburn in the shape of my hydration pack!
Around this time I was getting texts from Angela Castro who was trying to find her way onto the island and meet up with me to pace me from the ranch going north for the last 17 miles. There was a long lineup at the gate which was delaying her. This must be one of the busiest days of the year for the park.
I had been watching my garmin and finally hit mile 30. I was into a distance I had never run before. I had previously done 30 miles on the Jordan River Trail, but its paved which I think is much easier. From there the miles seemed to be easier, or at least I wasn't watching my watch as much maybe. The fresh shoes and socks helped a bit, but the blisters had formed and nothing was going to heal them except not running. I passed so many people heading north, Susette and Cory, Brian Passey, Chris and Annette, Dave and Mimi.
I made it to the ranch which was mile 33. I waited for awhile there. They had run out of coke, so I had some gingerale, plus some boiled potatoes dipped in salt, while I ate and drank, the volunteer filled up my water bottle. I also found out at the ranch that Christine's running partner had left the race to go be with Christine as she was going into surgery and having a plate put in her wrist. The volunteers recorded my bib # and I headed north thinking I might meet Angela at the trail crossing over the road about 1.5 miles north of the ranch. She wasn't able to make it there so the next option was to meet her at the Lower Frary aid station. As I was going north I passed all the runners who were behind me.
Laura wasn't feeling too well, but she was a trooper and just kept moving along. She was worried she wouldn't make the cutoff. There were two cutoffs in that area. 2:30 at the ranch, 3:30 at the Lower Frary aid station. It was about 2:02 when I left the ranch so I was okay with that cutoff. I was a little worried about the second cutoff, but it worked out fine. The race director had also said they weren't hard cutoffs. If the runner wasn't doing a death march they'd let them keep going. Jason was just behind Laura and had been having lots of cramps so he was struggling a bit.  He had offered to run the race with me a few days prior but it didn't work out that way. Leaving the ranch one runner went ahead of me and I tried like crazy to catch up to her but just couldn't. I think having that goal at least kept me going and helped my pace a bit. As I came around one corner I could see the LF aid station about 2 miles ahead and I sent Angela a text saying I see it. She was there waiting for me, but she got on the trail and headed south to meet up with me.

She was super excited to see me which sure helps the moral. We went through the aid station together. I had been running for 9.5 hours by this time and done 38.8 miles. More coke. The miles clicked by after that, albeit slowly. I was watching my average pace get slower and slower. By mile 40 I was at a 14:46 pace.
Just before 5 pm we made it to the Mountain View Aid station. Its around mile 43.6. We had just over 6 miles to go, 2 miles to the final aid station where I knew Christy was volunteering, then 4 miles around the north end of the island and we would be done. From that aid station its a climb up to the road, then more of a climb heading towards the finish but the signs directed us north. We could see lots of cars up on top of the hillside and thought at first the aid station was up there. Fortunately it wasn't. There was no more long climbs, just a fairly flat obstacle type course with boulders everywhere with the trail snaking around them.
At one point we came across some buffalo that was very close to the road. Angela picked up her pace passing them, and I didn't blame her!
I was struggling to keep my legs running and it was painful running down a small hill towards the last aid station. I heard Christy calling my name and she came running up to give me a great big hug before I got to the station. More coke and potatoes with salt and we were gone again.
As we circled the northern most mountain on the Island we expected to see the finish line tent around each corner. It finally did show but seemed to take forever. I told Angela that I thought the course would be a bit short and I said, if its less than 2 tenths of a mile I'd run after the finish line to make up the difference to 50 miles. If it was more, forget it, I'd just change the info in connect.garmin. By this time I knew we weren't going to cross the finish line before 6:30pm. With one mile to go it was 6:30.
Heading down a dirt road, Angela said, lets run at least as far as the porta potty. We did that, but we kept running instead of walking after it. I can't remember if we took a walk break between there and the finish line, but it seemed like we at least put on the appearance that I was running. We turned left and we could hear the cow bells and cheering at the finish line. The end was near!
The feeling of finally crossing the finish line was like a load taken off my shoulders. 50 miles were done! Seeing familiar faces was incredible.
We have such a close friendship in our running groups and each one is so very supportive of the others. I had my finishers mug which I will protect with my life. I checked my watch, 49.88 miles. I gripped my mug tightly and took off and did that last 0.12 miles. Much better, the watch now showed 50.01 miles.

My name is Robert, and I am an Ultra Runner!

It was beautiful seeing Laura cross the finish line, she was so emotional and I believe this picture sums up the race totally.