Race Results: Autumn Leaves 50 mile

The bright blue and white beams of our headlamps strained to cut through the fog in the cold fall air. Millions of mysteriously suspended water droplets reflected back most of the light from our lamps forcing us to focus on the ground directly at our feet instead of the asphalt bike trail meandering in front of us. Having just been released from the starting line in Champoeg State Park in Newberg, Oregon, in an typical predawn no-nonsense ultramarathon starting ceremony ("You guys ready, great, 5,4,3,2,1,go....have fun.", says the race director, without pausing, in a quiet subdued voice.), approximately forty of the competitors in the fifty mile race embarked into the fog. I settled in right behind the seven guys who, knowing the course, took the lead to show the rest of us the way. As we ran passed the parking lot lined with the tents, tables and assorted folding furniture of the support crews, we entered the fog and slowed to a pedestrian pace for fear of ramming one of the many posts sprouting from the middle of the path designed to prevent speeding bicycles and four abreast baby joggers. This went on for about a mile and and a half before two more experienced runners broke away into the morning and left the pack. Shortly after their departure one of the five pack leaders rolled his ankle on the abrupt edge of the asphalt and, screaming in frustration and pain, stopped. His compatriots abruptly stopped with him to attend to what may have been a race ending lapse in concentration leaving ME leading the chase pack. Many emotions and potty words streamed through my head as the fading batteries in my mini-headlamp threw out less and less light. Fortunately the solidly packed heard of runners just behind me had so many lamps that I could see my multifaceted shadow stretch out in front of me. Glimpses of the leaders were fleeting as the trail wound through the park, but they were there and they weren't far, and it was early in the race, so I did what any freaked out ultra runner would do; I bridged the gap and caught them. It took only a few minutes to reel them in just to have them ease back on the pace and let ME TAKE THE LEAD, assuming I knew the course better than they did, great. This most unfortunate event occurred around mile five just as the course left the security of the bike trail and entered the woods, double great! My headlamp was dangerously close to dead by now and the morning air, still soupy with fog, had the much anticipated ever so slightest hint of dawn as I entered the most protected part of the run. I slowed to a crawl, rotating my head back and forth to get a dim view of the bushes that defined the wood chip trail's edges. This technique successfully aided me in reaching a manned checkpoint and large expanse of freshly plowed field. "Am I heading to you?", I asked the little light. "Yup, up here and around the fence line.", said the light. "Thanks.", and with that the two gents caught me and silently glided by disappearing into the fog. I was caught by a few others prior to reaching the end of the first lap at the 6.25 mile checkpoint. As I approached the turn-around, the second wave of fifty mile starters and all the fifty kilometer racers were just leaving the starting line. It was a surreal sight to have close to one hundred bobbing headlamps rapidly approaching through the dense wet air. A few comments about going the wrong way and salmon swimming upstream and I arrived at the electronic mats that read my race chip and signaled a quiet "beep", lap one done, seven to go. Lap one was a bit faster than the race plan allowed for, at 1:01:51, and my crewman, Bob, let me have it in a loving and positively supportive manner, "Slow down, you still have forty three and three quarter miles left." Thanks for pointing that out, now give me some water and a few fig newtons. Lap two went well as the sunrise slowly approached. My headlamp was useless at this point but forgetting to take it off I let the batteries burn out. The turn around point at three and one quarter miles out was a small orange cone in the middle of the path manned by two well bundled volunteers with clipboards recording race numbers and counting laps, a thankless job. Just prior to reaching the turnaround point I was greeted by all the "salmon" I had seen at the end of my first lap and promptly blinded by over sixty super bright headlamps. How often we forget headlamp etiquette: don't shine your light straight into someones face in the dark, it's rude and BLINDING. I stopped and slowly walked to the cone while my seared retina recovered from the onslaught of forty eight thousand candle power. Just to feel better about myself I passed a few of the "salmon" chalking them up and road kills; a term defining any runner passed and never seen again. Right around ten miles in I settled into my race pace of slightly over ten minute miles. Lap two ended at dawn; twelve and one half mile done: 1:04:23/2:06:19. Lap three was comfortable but altogether uneventful save the discovery of caffeinated Hammer Gel packets at the aid stations: 1:05:19/3:11:38. Lap four was much the same with a little sunshine added to warm the body in between heavily shaded woodsy trails. Twenty five miles down and, as Bob would so annoyingly remind me, "Only twenty five to go and I feel great, How do you feel?" Hurling my mostly empty water bottle at him I threatened to shoot him; the crew team across the parking lot howled with encouragement as we all laughed: 1:04:44/4:16:23. Lap five was interesting; chaffing began, my stomach rebelled a bit, joints went in and out of pain and muscles were reaching to places they hadn't been for a while. Actually it had been over fourteen years since I toed the line of an official ultramarathon: Western States 100 back in 1997.(I have been keeping myself plenty busy with long trail runs and various adventures in the mean time.) I slowed a bit trying to deal with the pains, chaffing and stomach issues. I had prepared to suffer during laps five and six but when I actually got to the suffering I decided that I liked thinking about it instead of actually experiencing it. But this is nothing I hadn't done before and it was familiar. That's what got me through, as Bob said, "You've been here before and your experience will pull you through." Lap five: 1:07:16/5:23:40. Now the fun really began; thirty one and a quarter miles into the fifty mile event. Bob joined me for the first mile and a bit. It was nice to have accompaniment but it's hard to be pleasurable while it feel like someone is hitting your quads with a baseball bat every step. We ran together up to the first aid station, a pop up tent covering a grocery/candy store/first aid kit strewn out on tables. He stopped there and I continued on the black ribbon into the woods. I was slogging through the middle of the race in much the manner I had anticipated, knowing that at some point I would enter a deep recess of my mind and join a new running partner. I rejoined Bob and we discussed food, water and donning my ipod. I came through the turn around at the end of lap six in serious pain desperately wanting caffeine and music to boost my spirits and distract my mind: 1:22:44/6:46:24. During the preceding lap six my pace had dropped dramatically, about three minutes per mile to around 13:15/mile. Lap seven was a repeat of lap six with Bob escorting me to the aid station and picking me up for the return mile except that the sun was breaking through the clouds and I had music, and the beat helped me shave forty five seconds off each mile placing my pace in the 12:30/mile area. Somewhere near mile five of lap seven I broke through. It's a very difficult experience to describe when the natural painkillers in our bodies combine with the will to continue. Pain becomes white noise, you leave the normal A/Ox4 (Alert and Oriented to person, place, time and event) and enter a realm of deepness. I slowly drifted to that deep area during mile forty four and at the end of lap seven I told Bob I was ready to "drop the hammer" and begin "the race", it only took eight hours and forty three and three quarter miles to get there: 1:18:17/8:04:41. I set my jaw, tossed off my water bottle, gave a mental war cry and rattled off an 8:30 mile, only five and one quarter miles to go. I had made the decision to race. I could run slow and be in pain or run fast and be in pain, either way the pain remained. So with tears streaming down my face, I embraced the truth and with the well timed intro of U2's "Where The Streets Have No Name" in my ears I cranked through the remaining five miles with my ever present running partner who built me to run like this, "...fully alive!" Lap eight: 1:00:49, my fastest lap of the day. Final time for 50 miles 9:05:31. At the finish line I heard the welcoming final beep of the timing computer, received my finisher medal and belt buckle. I bent over hands on knees while a volunteer carefully untied my right shoe to remove my timing chip and stood uneasy enjoying the rotation of the earth and trying not to puke on her head, really I could actually feel the earth rotating, or maybe it was all the Oreo cookies I had eaten in the past two hours. When we got back to the car it took a few minutes to come back to full awareness. Then I looked at Bob and said, "Where is the closest Starbucks? I NEED a coffee." Tony

Running Thoughts

I am often asked, “What do you think about when you are running?” For years I would run without music but now with all these new miniaturized ipods and such it is a lot easier to enjoy some tunes on a run. It seems to add a bit of motivation and distract from pain on long runs. My thoughts still meander much like a high mountain spring creek, more so on the longer runs than on shorted runs. Shorter runs seem be to the time to mentally clear my desk and create lists….

“…okay 5 mile loop, I think my fastest time on this loop is around 40 minutes, it could be way faster but for the hills, yup it is the hills that slow me down, watch the gravel, the driveway is .25 miles long, I gotta get through this so the boys don’t play to much Wii while I’m gone, going in to Mexico in November for a week need to pack: shorts, socks, snorkeling gear, snorkeling in the Bahamas on the Bimini Road that was fun and in Guam with Amy, bad sunburn, also need to pack more light clothes, the kids stuff, sun-block, camera, does Cheryl have a photo shoot tonight?, look at the size of the pine cones from that tree, the squirrels that take them must be huge or just demented like the critter from Ice Age, “Ball of Confusion, that’s what the world is today, hey hey……..Ball of Confusion…”, beautiful clouds, is that a deer or a tree stump, it’s a deer and a buck too, where is my gun?, Monroe Fire Department station #32 – how you boys doing?, Look both ways when crossing the street, 12:30 to this point I remember when it use to be 16:00, up that road is the 3 mile loop, I could do figure 8 and make it a 8 mile run, no wait I’d be covering less distance, it would be a 5 mile loop with two times over the middle part so it would only be an 7 mile loop, which way would be faster?, pretty flowers, new paint stripes, how do they make the little reflective balls in the paint?, I hate the new reflective vests at work, “Does this vest make me look fat? No it is the bunker gear that makes you look fat, the vest just brings more attention to it!”, “…Do you really want to live foreveeeerrrrrrrrr???......Forever Young…..”, cool old car, more pine cones, If a mile is 5280 feet and my stride is around 7 feet how many steps in a mile?…..can’t do that one… I’ll count: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5……78…..126, I love this song, 145 I think, ugh I lost count, I should just do it on a track and not have music, laundry, groceries: veggies, milk, eggs, “I’d like to buy some cheese and some butter.” Robin Williams is so funny, The boys need to do their reading when I get back, oh they trimmed the trees in their driveway and it looks nice now I can see around the corner and wont get hit by a car, the last crash we went on was a just a car vs. guard rail and I’ll we got to do was set up cones and disconnect the battery, I need a new batter for my other running watch and the heart-rate band but that needs to be mailed in and will cost $50, my heart is still beating so screw it, cpr 100 beats per minute and push to you feel ribs breaking, “….the Reflex, flex flex flex flex flex….buh dum dum dum….”, ooo a quarter, remember that time you saw a pair of Oakley sunglasses and didn’t pick them up and on your way back they were gone?, bag of pot definitely the most bizarre thing I’v ever found running, need to add an epi pen to the list for Mexico, I wonder if the turtles will be laying eggs on the beach, okay two miles down and the hills begin drive the arms and knees just a bit more, 17:30, that’s 17 divided by two, uh, 16 by 2 is 8 minute miles and 1 would add another 30 seconds for 8 thirties and 3 more seconds would add 15 more seconds per mile so right at 8:45 per mile good pace, feels a bit slower but whatever, “…..riding on the metroooooo….”, that train ride in Japan was weird, I wonder what the radiation is doing now?, oh yeah gotta make an appt for my year end physical, that’s the house with the mean dog, where’s a rock, I could just do it David style and kill the bear and lion with my bare hands, and this rock…….and stick, how does it work when you see rocks and your mind says don’s step on that and you foot lands just to the side of the rock, that’s cool, like skiing moguls you pick a line and go , but I always crash, I’ll stick to running, those folks still have that dead car in the yard and the blackberries are slowly eating it, “Feed me Seymour feed me!!!”, top of the hill and then one flat-ish mile, nice, mow the yard, pick up the dog poop, spray the weeds in the driveway, get the trash to the end of the driveway, order more gravel for the driveway, PAVE THE DRIVEWAY, the ranch in Montana has a 23 mile long driveway you should be happy, “…baby this town rips the bones from your back, it’s a death trap, it’s a suicide wrap, we gotta get out while we’re young, baby we were born to Ruuuunnnnn…”, gotta get that book back from Bob, crap I forgot to renew the tabs on the Honda, I want a Hummer they are getting cheap now, maybe an older style Land Rover, “I’ll sit here in the car while Mike tags the ferocious lion currently feeding on its latest kill and protecting its young”, glass is a liquid, taco salad for dinner tonight, snot shot oops got my shoe, Mile 4 at the intersection looks like I’m going to be at 35 minutes right on pace 34 divided by 2 is 17…..plus half of one is 30 same as mile 2 so still on 8:45 pace even with the hills, nice, going to finish the marathon in first place!! Ahead of the Kenyans the old white guy from Monroe comes from behind to win at Boston, “looks like a 4 iron here at Augusta, little bit of wind in his eyes I guess as he…..oh IT’S IN THE HOLE……”, hey look two different trees growing out of that dead stump, Halloween candy the good kind not that sugar free crap the lady down the street use to give us and no pencils either, bean dip and nacho chips for tomorrow night, Oh gotta get flip-flops for Gabe in Mexico, Jon’s got soccer practice at 5:00 tonight, another house for sale, more pine cones?, this is the pine cone run, oh drip of sweat right in the middle of my sunglasses, blurry vision in one eye GREAT!, now I swerve to miss a pine cone get hit by a car end up in the hospital and no one will know that I just beat the Kenyans or who I am, well maybe the medics, I wonder if M*A*S*H is on HULU I should check, oh I feel a blister on my toes from my last long run, hard to tell which toe it is on, 5 miles at the turn here at the driveway, “…Mia Hee Mi Ya Who My ya Ha My ya Haha…….”, sharp pokey gravel step carefully, MORE PINE CONES, stream with fish in it under the road, no deer in the field, winter is coming better clean out the fireplace, are there pine cones in Mexico?, potty, shower, food, homework and off to soccer practice, mile 5, 44:30 little fast at the finish but it is downhill , whatever, still beat the Kenyans and didn’t get hit by a car.

Tony