Remember this moment! Do not forget this feeling! I need to figure out a way to remember exactly how shitty this feels. NO MORE POST-RACE AMNESIA. NO MORE POST-RACE EUPHORIA. Euphoria? Let's be honest -- the feeling after an ultra is typically different from the high sane people get after a marathon, it's more like exhausted relief followed by some bonding with a bunch of other weirdos over the suffering just experienced. Deal: get through the next 30-35 miles and you never-ever have to do this again. No Wasatch. No Whiteriver. No more running?! Just walk your ass to the finish line, throw away all your running gear, and take up a sensible hobby like brewing beer for the rest of the summer.
Help: I want to start by thanking both my pacer and crew. Pete and Cara were awesome. I say this with only a little shame, but this was one of those days that sans pacer, I would have probably bailed at some point. Actually, I know the exact point -- well, too be honest miles 60-75 are such a blur that I don't really know the point -- when I would have bailed. But the moment -- whenever and wherever it was -- came when I looked at Pete and said, "Do you think I should DNF?" Thankfully, he lied to me and said, "No way." I know he was lying because around mile 90 when things were going better and the question was no longer about finishing, but rather about how much of the lost time we could make up during the final miles, Pete told me there had been a few moments during the night when he kind of figured we were going to have to bail on finishing.
Course: Wild, rugged, and beautiful. Before the race (this is a brand new course) there had been some discussion and general confusion about how tough a course this was going to be -- in particular elevation numbers were bouncing all over the place from 18,000 to 26,000. I would suggest the best way to describe the difficulty and vertical in future course descriptions would be to simply say there is enough of both and to not worry about the actual numbers. I am guessing everyone that ran with some sort of GPS got different data when trying to track the vertical, so the truth might as well be told: the course goes up, it goes down, and it swings around. But in either case, the terrain was amazing. There were some epic desert moments as well as some solid mountain running periods; there were pretty tight sections of single-track and some faster pieces of dirt road that threw one into the mode of Fire on the Mountain's loneliness of the long distance runner. Maybe the best word to describe the sum of the whole would be variety.
First 50: Patient. Solid-pacing. Group running. Music. Consistent eating. I full-on enjoyed the first 50 miles and felt like I was running well and with a good amount of intelligence. One of the early highlights for me was running in a train of about 15-20 runners through some of the coolest single-track I have ever run on during a race. The course does an amazing job of letting you experience the rugged scenery of the Utah desert right from the start. The pace was perfect and I knew to a greater or lesser extent about a half dozen of the other people in the group, which made me feel both comfortable and silently social. Almost the entire way to the turnaround point at mile 50 went as well as any race can go with me simply stoked to take in the views and to run either solo listening to music or in a small group that included John and Matt from just north of here in good old northern Utah -- I have run with John at Squaw Peak a couple of times before.
Vomit: I threw up so many times between mile 50 and mile 75 that Pete and I sorta lost track, but there were at least 10 individual sessions (2-3 times per session) with the final one taking me momentarily over the edge. I don't think I cried, but I sure wanted to curl up in the fetal position and just pass out. My pre-race plan had involved ignoring all stomach issues and to just keep running. Not to stop in any aid stations and wallow about my tummy feeling sickly. Just keep choking down clifshots and everything will eventually work itself out. That was the plan and I was sticking to it. The fact that I was in the Top 10 at the turnaround added some stubbornness to this strategy. I was still running fairly well and didn't want to give up on a solid finishing time/place -- I even passed a couple of people on the return climb up to Pink Cliffs. The only problem was that more was coming out than was going in and the longer this continued the more trouble I was going to eventually be in . . . I don't remember which aid station finally saw Plan A thrown out the window and received the extended pleasure of my company, but I do remember it was dark and cold. It took a while, but Pete nursed me back to some semblance of sanity as I sipped on broth, nibbled away at potatoes, and ate some noodles. A fellow vegan even gave me some papaya enzyme pill to help the digestion process get started again -- he gave me his holistic assurance it was safe. My only thought as I swallowed was that worse case scenario the night might change completely if it weren't safe.
Death March: I wandered from aid station to aid station getting in whatever calories I could. Realizing that the pace we were moving at could mean a long-long trek ahead, I simply forced myself to forget we still had more than a marathon ahead. At one point, I swear to gawd 100 people passed us in the blink of an eye. Were we standing still? One-foot, one-foot.
Racing: When we left the Proctor Canyon Aid Station (mile 81) I fully intended to walk to the finish. Up-down. Technical. Easy. Who cared? It was going to be a long walk, but we were obviously going to finish. And then all of the sudden, we were running again. And not only running, we were actually starting to pass random stragglers here and there along the way. Strange moments of recognition caught before and shortly after the sunrise made it all the more special. We were all on the trail together: physically and emotionally raw to the world. What a most excellent experience shared with strangers and friends alike.
Data: 27th place. 26 hours 50ish minutes. And I now have 6 100 mile finishes. And 6 fancy belt buckles. No belt. But lots of cool buckles.
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