Before the Start
Discussions of pre-race preparation and activities are written up separately.
The Start
Although I was staying probably 100 yards from the starting line (at the Squaw Valley Lodge), race day still starts well in advance of the official start when my alarm goes off at 3:30 a.m., giving me plenty of time to get dressed, apply sunscreen (at 4:00 a.m.! what a concept!), eat some breakfast (two yogurts and tea, with sugar for once instead of Equal!), take care of business, and get over to the starting line to check in around 4:30 a.m. I pin my race number to my Ultimate waist pack (the only thing guaranteed to make it to the finish, since I plan to change my hat and shirt and am prepared for the possibility of changing my shorts as well) and sit, relax, and contemplate the upcoming day. Just 10 minutes before race time I need to visit the bathroom again, and thanks to the proximity of my room I'm able to get back there, do my business, and return to the starting line in plenty of time. A last goodbye to Debi who I won't see for 15 hours or so, and I'm ready to roll. I'm feeling surprisingly calm, confident. At the last race I did, the Dipsea, I had to be ready to give it my all from the starting gun, anything less and I wouldn't make my goal, so it was a stressful situation. Here I don't have any particular goal, and I plan to start (and continue and finish) at a measured pace, well within myself, so there's no reason to be nervous, on that score, anyway.
The field awaits the start and, at 5:00 a.m., we're off! We're at the base of the Squaw Valley ski area and, after about 30 yards of flat, the route starts up the hill on what I assume is a service road, which will take us from the start at 6200' to Emigrant Pass at 8700'. The route is gently graded, with lots of switchbacks, and in a shorter event could easily be run, but I haven't the slightest intention of running anything but the one or two 30-40 yards stretches where it flattens out; there will be plenty of running ahead. But I've trained myself to be a fast walker, and I intend to make good time to the top. I pass some people I know (Catra Corbett and Ron Adams are two I remember) and, just before the end of the first climb at High Camp, Andy Black passes me. Just as expected! Andy is the most "sensible starter" of anyone I know, and even though he always beats me easily (in this race he'll go on to finish 35th, 6 hours ahead of me!) it is a tradition that he always passes me sometime after the start of the race. This must have happened in a half dozen races. Here it has taken him the better part of an hour.
After High Camp I (and everyone
else) run on a level stretch for a short while, and then we reach the first aid station
at 4.5 miles.To this point I've had a handheld water bottle with me, but the bottle
in my waist pack has been empty since I wanted to minimize weight on the first uphill.
Now it's time to fill it up with electrolyte drink. The bad news - the electrolyte
for today is green Gatorade, my (and, as far as I can tell, everyone's) least favorite
drink. But I'm counting on it for survival, and I'll just have to tough out the taste.
We leave the aid station, and then there's a second, informal one, offering what
they claim are Bloody Marys and bagels. I pass. A short climb and we've reached Emigrant
Pass, top of the first climb. Stopping, and looking back, we see (for the first and
last time) Lake
Tahoe; turning and looking
ahead, we can see the next
20 miles of the route,
through the Granite Chief Wilderness area. Time for some descent (and some actual
running!). We're off the fireroad we've been on since the start, and on to some lovely,
if technical, trail (lots of rocks and hence lots of attention must be paid to foot
placement). It's beautiful
country.
The High Country
This is what trail runners live for. The day is just beginning (6:30 a.m.) and I've got miles and miles of beautiful trail to look forward to. We're on a ridge where the visibility extends for miles, and it's a gorgeous day. A lake appears off the left, one more treat for the eyes. Gary Wang passes me, as does Andy Black a second time, after stopping for a bathroom break. It worries me a bit because I know both are likely headed for sub-24-hour times, Andy substantially so, and the fact that I'm running with them after nearly 10 miles could mean I'm going out too fast, the one thing that everyone warns against in the sternest of tones. But here is where my preparation comes in. Because I'm running, as I have in my last two races, with a watch with the face taped over with black electrical tape, allowing me to record all my splits but to have no idea of what they are until the end of the race when I take the tape off. If I knew at this point that I was substantially ahead of 24-hour pace, I'd probably expend energy worrying about that fact, or I might respond by slowing down unneccessarily. On the other hand, if I knew I was on 24.5 hour pace, I'm sure I'd be sorely tempted to speed up just a bit, to see if I could get to that magic 24-hour barrier. But I didn't know anything of the sort. What I DID know was that I was running comfortably, "within myself," at a pace I felt I could sustain indefinitely.
Unbelievably, Andy now passes me a THIRD time - evidently he drank a lot before the race started! This time he generously offers to take my picture; when he leaves me this time, it's for good.
We pass through the first major aid station, Lyon Ridge, where I grab my usual fare - a couple potato pieces, a couple cookies, and a cup of coke - while the aid station personnel refill my water and Gatorade bottles. I'm in and out in just over a minute (1:12 by my watch as I learn later), which is my goal for most aid stations. Even though I don't think I have a good chance to go under 24 hours (the "silver buckle time"), I still have every intention of going as fast as I can and achieving my best possible time, be it 24 1/2 hours, 26 hours, or 28 hours. With more than 20 aid stations, achieving that goal means, among other things, don't waste unneccessary time at aid stations. Of course I want to make sure I get what I need. But if I need to rest, I can do that while walking slowly forward, and if I need to chat, there's plenty of time for that after the race. Leaving the aid station is a bit tricky, since I have one handheld water bottle and all the food in my hands, but again, eating it while walking (or slowly jogging, depending on the terrain) forward will get me to the finish a LOT faster than trying to eat it all at the aid station.
After Lyon Ridge there's more beautiful trail (actually there's a nearly endless supply, almost 100 miles worth :-) on this run), including Cougar Rock, where the race photographer takes the first of several "official" pictures. I'm still wearing my "insert" glasses (Bolle) without the dark lenses in front as a leftover from the early a.m., pretty soon, as there is more and more sun, I insert the lenses for better protection from the sun during the day. I take a few more pictures of trails and views and what I think is Elephant's Trunk, a lovely rock formation. The one thing I fail to get a picture of is snow. Some years there has been LOTS of snow on the trail, but this year, even though it seemed this winter like there was a lot of snow on the ground, it's essentially all gone from the trail by race day. Two or three times we run over a patch of snow maybe 10 feet wide, and I can see how it could make the run more difficult if it were more extensive because each time we do, my feet slip just a little bit. I've read stories of people slipping and falling and with just a few seconds of experience I can see how easy that would be. But I avoid the problem on this day.
We hit some fireroad, most folks take a walking break, and pretty soon we're into the first major aid station, Robinson Flat, where my first weigh-in and first drop bag await. My weight had been measured as 168 pre-race, and the periodic weigh-ins are one of the few "outside influences" that can stop your forward progress in this race, because if you lose more than 5% of your body weight, you'll be stopped and made to rehydrate and refuel. 168 was a bogus number; my "real" weight before the race was undoubtedly closer to 172 and several people I talked to said that the scales at the weigh-in were 3-4 pounds light. Maybe they set them that way on purpose, I don't know, but I wasn't complaining, since the less my pre-race weight, the less likelihood of getting stopped for weight loss during the race. When I stepped on the scale, it read 168, but the person recording said "166." I said "Wait, it says 168" and they said "No, it's 2 pounds off." Well I really doubt I had lost 2 pounds at this point since I had been drinking and eating well, but no matter.
Robinson Flat is at 24.6 miles (this year; in past years it was further along, due to a fire-caused course change), one-fourth of the way through the race. I'm feeling fine, just another day on the trail, still well within my capability and with no problems in evidence. As I came into the aid station, someone had asked if I had a drop bag, and when I'm done with the weigh-in, it's waiting for me. I reapply Body Glide to my inner thighs, change the sweatband on my forehead, and I'm ready to go.The three previous aid stations have taken me a total of 3 minutes "down time"; this one, with the weigh-in and minor gear change, takes 2:45. Just what I was hoping for (although again, the actual numbers were only known to me after the race; during the race, I only knew I was moving quickly without wasting time, which was one way I intended to finish the race in the minimal possible time).
A word now about shoes. For a year or so I've been running in Asics (Gel Nandi). These have done very well by me, but they're a little tight in the toebox, which makes them not the best choice for downhill running. There are 23,000 feet of downhill in Western States, so I'd been searching for an alternative for quite a while. Just two weeks before the race, I finally found a pair of New Balance 904 which seemed to fit me well and have a bit more room in the forefoot. Unfortunately, though, since I was already into my taper, the longest run I was able to test the New Balances on was a 10-miler. This was enough to know they really were very comfortable, and good on the downhills, but really not long enough to know how they would feel, and how my feet and legs would feel, after 25 miles, or 50, or 75. I decided to take a chance and start with the New Balances on race day, but as a hedge, I had other shoes in my drop bags at 25, 62, and 78 miles. But now, at the 25-mile point, everything is fine, so I leave the change of shoes in the bag and press on.
As I leave the aid station I hear a "Hey Steve" and there's Sophia Lewis, one of many people I spot during the day who I know. I ran this race without a crew, so no one would be particularly "there for me" at the various aid stations, but since I'm a semi-local (from Northern California), I know lots of people, and its certainly a nice, if momentary, boost to get a word of encouragement as I go by.
After Robinson Flat there's a "new" course section, Little Bald Mtn. Everything's new to me, I've never seen any of the course, but this section has been added to this year's route to replace another section closed by fire earlier in the year. It's a beautiful addition. At one point, I reach an open area with beautiful views, and as I stop to take a picture, the runner behind me offers to take it with me in it, so I graciously accept. In the next mile or so I take one picture and another; it's just too beautiful not to share. Since I've been talking about how I'm trying to move in and out of aid stations in under a minute, it might seem strange that I feel no hesitation at stopping to take so many pictures, but coming into the race I'd "given myself permission" to do this. This is my first 100-mile race, and, although I make no statements at this time about future intentions, it's possible it will be my last (even if I want to do more, you never know what will happen that might prevent that from happening). If it increases my final time, so be it, but I'm determined to take home memories that won't fade.
The Canyons - Bury my Race at Wounded Knee
After Little Bald Mtn. aid station
we enter the section known as "the canyons". The first is Deep Canyon,
where after descending I find myself heading up a long, fairly steep, fireroad. As
on the initial climb out of Squaw Valley, I walk like a man possessed, passing other
runners as we head uphill. Near the top, it starts leveling out, and spectators (other
people's crew) start appearing well in advance of the aid station, so I run a bit
just to impress the fans. :-) There's a whole section here that becomes a blur to
me, unfamiliar as I am with the course, there's the Deep Canyon aid station, then
Dusty Corners, and Last Chance. I remember seeing Chuck Baughman cheering me at one
aid station, and Doug White and Susan Tamburro helping out at another, and Kirk Boisseree
at least twice; I'm not sure who was where. I've made a lot of friends over the last
year training for this race, and I'm seeing many of them today. I'm moving well,
but somewhere in here (was it coming downhill following the Deep Canyon aid station?),
I start to feel a little pain in my knees which slows me more than I'd like on the
downhill; I remember Jim Magill passing me right about this time.
At Last Chance I have a "mini drop bag" consisting of a single water bottle,
so I'll have three bottles (one on the waist with electrolyte, one in each hand with
water) for the two killer uphills on the course, Devil's Thumb and El Dorado Canyon.
It's often over 100 degrees in these canyons, and the extra water may be necessary,
although at the moment it doesn't seem that hot. It's a little after 2 in the afternoon
when I leave Last Chance, headed down into Deadwood Canyon (although again, I don't
know that at the time).
I'm expecting a steep canyon, and at first I'm surprised as the running immediately out of Last Chance is quite gentle downhill. Eventually, closer to the bottom of the canyon (1500' lower than the top), it steepens. Everything is still going fine when, more or less out of the blue, lightning strikes. All of a sudden both my knees "lock up," I can barely bend them. I limp down the hill stiff-legged like Chester from Gunsmoke, but it's difficult to say the least - painful on the one hand, and losing incredible amounts of time on the other. Rob Smith, a guy from B.C. who I met in line during the pre-race medical check, passes me here, along with Monica Scholz, famous for running 23 100-mile races last year. There's a saying in ultrarunning "It doesn't always get worse" and I hope so because if I'm in this much pain to the finish, I'm not going to make it.
Where did this problem come from? One possibility, mentioned above, is the shoes. I have had a couple races in the past where I developed a knee problem like this; one year (1996) at Skyline 50K, I walked the last 12 miles due to a similar problem. And a couple years ago at John Medinger's birthday run (the "Epiphany Ultra"), I bailed at the 20M mark instead of going on to 50K for similar reasons. But I haven't had that problem in a long time, and in my mind I've attributed the problem to the shoes I was wearing. Since I've switched to a new brand for this race, that certainly could be it. But later, I remember that a couple weeks ago, while doing an easy bike ride as part of my taper, I had a silly "not paying attention catch your bike wheel on something tip over at slow speed" crash where I landed exactly on the right knee (by knee, just to clarify, I really mean the outside of the knee, undoubtedly some tendon or something, not the actual knee or kneecap itself). It hurt for several days, but had seemed ok on some runs after that. And finally, there's the possibility that all the loose rock and off-camber foot landings in the "high country" had twisted my knee and caused this problem. Of course I don't really know what caused the problem, and at the time it doesn't matter; the only thing I seize on is that I'd better change my shoes on the chance that maybe that will help. We'll see.
At the bottom of the descent there's a bridge over Deadwood Creek, where I pause to take a picture. It's beauty belies the reputed hellish character of the upcoming climb - the famous Devil's Thumb. I start up and at first the pain persists. But because the walking motion I'm doing is different from running, pretty soon it eases, and I'm able to resume my fast stride. It's steep, but not horrendously so, certainly no worse than many of the climbs I've done in training. To me, this isn't an obstacle; it's an opportunity. Uphills are my strength, and if I'm going to make good time relative to other runners (which in turn means a good absolute time), this is one of the sections where it's going to happen. I repass Monica on the uphill, along with probably a dozen others.
When I finally reach the aid station, though, I have to pay the price for my effort, bending over at the aid station table and taking a couple minutes to recompose myself before I'm ready to eat or otherwise proceed with business. My weight, meanwhile, is now 171, where it will remain (plus or minus one) for the entire remainder of the run. "Officially" I've gained 3 pounds since the start; really, I probably haven't changed a bit. After I recompose myself I grab my drop bag and go through another "transition" - reapply both Body Glide and, because it's mid-afternoon and its been almost 12 hours since I did so, #48 sunscreen as well. Figuring I'd arrive here dripping sweat with a wet shirt, I change into a dry shirt and yet another dry headband as well; in reality I wasn't sweating that much, and probably could have dispensed with the change. Because of the knee problem, I had been hoping to change shoes here, on the hope that a different shoe might change the stresses on my knee, but I realize that my next pair of shoes is at Foresthill, mile 62, and not here, so I'm going to have to soldier on. I grab some coke and two brownies and am on my way out of the aid station when I spot a timely portapotty, so I put the food down and spend a few minutes inside. No sense digging holes on the side of the trail if you don't have to! By the time I leave, I've spent 15 minutes at this aid station, but you "gotta do what you gotta do," and I don't beat myself up over it, because I know that for once, moving slowly through an aid station was simply a necessity. Once again, the fact that I can't see my watch, and don't have any idea what time it is nor what "pace" I'm on, serves me well.
Leaving Devil's Thumb there's a gentle downhill at first, and I'm walking fast, but it's not a running pace and others start to pass me, Catra Corbett among others. At one point I decide to see if I can run, and I try a bit, but it hurts, and my right knee in particular just isn't bending like it should. As a result, before very long it catches on a rock and I tumble to the ground, sustaining minor "road rash" on my left arm and hip. Well, so much for trying to run. This canyon, like the last one, is surprisingly mild (i.e., not as steep as I had been expecting) on the downhill, but I can't take advantage. It's frustrating, but I walk as fast as I can, figuring to make up some time on the next uphill.
At the bottom is the El Dorado Creek aid station, where former race winner Brian Purcell refills my bottle while we have a brief conversation about our mutual friend Brad Smith and the fortunes of HP (Brian works at Agilent). It's the most I've said to anyone all day. :-) Then the bottles are filled and I'm off, pressing uphill as hard as I can.
Thinking about 100 milesA note on the distance. At this point in the race I'm at 53 miles and, although I don't know it at the time, just past 12 hours. It's further than I've ever run before (50 miles was the previous maximum), and about equivalent to the longest time (12:15 at the Diablo 50M race earlier this year). But, amazingly enough, the thought never crosses my mind, and it isn't just because I'm not looking at my watch (since I DO know the distance). When I was contemplating this race, and in awe of a distance that was so much further than anything I'd ever done before, I asked for advice about coping with the fact that, whenver I had finished a 50-mile race, or a 31-mile race, or even many 20-mile training runs, the idea that I could have then gone right out and done the whole thing over again was completely out of the question. So, given that, how could I even think about running 100 miles? Perhaps the most common advice for coping with this psychologically was the classic "just run from aid station to aid station." In other words, break the distance down into small chunks, like 5-6 miles, and at any one point, just focus on running 5 miles (or whatever) further. To me, this seemed like a very negative, defeatist way to approach things. One person, though, suggested what I consider to be nearly the opposite - the "wrap your mind around the whole distance" approach. In other words, the reason why, in a 31-mile race, that I couldn't remotely contemplate doing the whole thing over again once I finished, wasn't that I was going at a faster pace; obviously I would have to crank my pace back a bit to do a 100-mile race. The reason is that, when doing a 31-mile race, when I reach 25 miles my mind is thinking "just 6 miles until I'm done" and, regardless of whether I put in any kind of physical push to the finish, my mind is gearing itself up to cease its effort at mile 31. So in this race, from the time I took my first step in Squaw Valley, there was only one distance thought in my mind - 100 miles to Auburn. Since I was unfamiliar with the course, I never (except once at night) even concerned myself with the distance to the next aid station - I knew they would appear periodically, in time for me to replenish my liquids and grab some food. Other than that, they had no significance. I was originally thinking I'd use the "countdown method" once I got past 50 miles ("only 40 miles to go...only 30 miles to go") but even that is a bit negative and defeatist and in fact that thought never occured to me either until the 90-mile mark when the miles to go hits single digits. So for me, this idea of "wrap your mind around 100 miles right from the start," combined with my "don't wear a watch (or wear one taped over)" idea, worked perfectly. |
Back to the race, the course now heads up El Dorado Canyon, the second of the 1-2 punch that knocks a lot of people for a loop. But again, I knew that if I had any strength left as a runner, my ability to push the pace with a very fast walk up this long (1800' climb, 2.8 miles) ascent was it, and so I did, passing numerous people along the way, including (for at least the second time in the race) Catra.
At the top, there was John Medinger greeting me. I swear the man was everywhere, I think I saw him at three different aid stations during my race. Unlike Devil's Thumb, I was in and out of Michigan Bluff in a minute and a half, even with a weight check. I was pushing hard, and even if I couldn't run, I intended to keep doing so as long as I could. As with most aid stations, I leave with food in my hand; this time it's a couple turkey "sandwiches" (actually 2" square "mini" sandwiches) and a cup of Coke. Five more miles of trail, mostly fireroad, and the course emerges for the first of two brief interludes on the road as it hits Bath Rd. on the outskirts of Foresthill. At first there was a nice uphill, and then as it levelled out there goes Catra again! Leapfrog! As I got further along Bath Rd., there to my surprise was my wife Debi, taking my picture and saying hello! I update her on my physical condition and she struggles to keep up with me as I keep up my fast walk pace into town and the major aid station at Foresthill School.
This will be another major transition for me as I again change shirts, headbands, and reapply Body Glide. Debi changes my shoes and socks for me, reapplying vaseline to my toes as she does so. Unfortunately, the shoes I've got at this aid station are my Nike Durhams, which are my "blister shoes" - the shoes that caused me bad blisters at the Firetrails 50-miler last year. I've put them here, thinking I would only wear them (if I did at all, of course) for 16 miles until the Rucky Chucky river crossing at mile 78, where a dry pair of my preferred Asics await me on the far side.
Since I hurt my knee I've been
taking Advil, a couple every hour, to try to moderate the pain, so I replenish my
supply from my drop bag. As a final step, I ditch my cap, which I won't be needing
any more, and grab
my headlamp and mount it on my forehead (over
the sweatband, which works well to ease the pressure on the forehead). My headlamp
is a 3-LED Petzl headlamp. You can get brighter headlamps, but they're heavier and
I really felt the light weight was important to me. You can get a lot brighter handheld
flashlights, but I like to have my hands free, one to hold a water bottle and another
for eating food. So the head it is. I also have two additional "headlights"
- two single LED (green) Photon Micro 3's, the size of a quarter, which are incredibly
bright individually and two of them are plenty of light to light a trail, especially
if you are running at a modest pace. Since, like no one else I have ever seen, I
wear my waist pack with the bottle on the front, I've cleverly duct-taped the two to the
bottom of my waist pack.
The bad news is that one of them has been flaky since the day I got it. We shall
see.
Here Comes
the Night
Debi walks with me the few blocks through Foresthill; we separate as I make the turn which will lead me to the "California St." section of the trail. I'll see her tomorrow. :-) Almost all racers leave Foresthill with a "pacer", whose job is not so much pacing as being a trail companion, talking with the runner through the night to make sure they don't fall asleep or fall off the trail, encourage them to run if they start walking too much, encourage them to eat if they don't seem to be eating enough, etc. I'm one of the few who is leaving Foresthill alone. When I took on this challenge, I took it on as a completely personal challenge. While I respect the right of others to run the race as they choose, for me, I no more wanted someone pushing me mentally than I wanted them pushing me physically (which would, of course, be illegal). This was my challenge, not just physically, but psychologically as well. I would confront the night demons alone. I had spent hundreds of hours training, and most of those were done alone. I was ready for the challenge. If anything, I was going to make it tougher on myself. During training in recent months, to deal with long hours of loneliness on the trail, I've been running with an iPod which gives me 10 continuous hours of a huge selection of music from my collection to listen to. In the race, I've decided against it. The main reason is that, when I think back on the race, and I think about a certain section of trail, I don't want to be thinking about Bruce Springsteen or Patti Smith or whoever else I was listening to at the time; I want only the sights and sounds of the trail and the race in my mind. If I need help staying awake, I have No-Doz. :-)
When I return to the trail, twilight has begun. At first the trail is downhill, which is mildly depressing since once again I can't take advantage, but I walk on. Over the course of the next 15 miles, the route is pretty much flat or rolling, with no major climbs or descents, so I'll be able to make good time. As has been the case since Deadwood Creek back at mile 46, I'm "hammering" - walking as fast as I possibly can, combining a rapid turnover with a long stride. I'm panting the entire time, and my heart rate is elevated, so I'm paying a price, but if I can't run, this is the only way I'm going to make time.
Eventually night falls and I start to use my lights. My flaky green light, which hadn't been working when I tested it at the start of the race, has suddenly come back to life, so at first I use my two green headlights, leaving the headlamp off. There are two reasons I prefer them if possible. As a minor matter, the green LEDs are said to preserve your night vision. But most importantly, because the light on my forehead comes from a higher angle, and essentially from the same angle as my eyes, it "washes out" the trail, making the entire trail look flat and hiding rocks, roots, and other surface indentations (this is one of the things I learned during some night "test runs" in the preparation phase for the race). By contrast, because the green lights are at waist level, they cause the various surface purturbations to cast shadows, and make it more likely I won't trip. So I start with the green lights, and use them for quite a while. After a while, however, three things become clear: first, with the exception of a few "rock-hopping stream crossings", the trail is actually not very "technical", i.e., really pretty much a simple dirt trail (albeit a beautiful one). Second, when I come to a section involving hairpin turns, rather than just straight or gently curved sections, I realize that swiveling my belly so the light will "lead" my path doesn't really work very well. And third, when I come to a few places where I need to scan the way ahead to find the ribbons and glow sticks which mark the path, the waist mounted light isn't very good for that either. So, while I continue to switch back and forth between the two lights, more and more I start using the headlamp in lieu of the waist lights. Eventually, the one flaky green light stops working, and that pretty much seals its fate; it will be the headlamp from here on in.
I'm alone, and the feeling of running (ok, fast walking, I'm still not running) through the night is just wonderful. I managed to get in three test runs at night at home, and twice got hassled by rangers in the process (all the trails near where I live are in parks or other lands which are officially closed at night). I did manage to "sneak around" and get out on the trail for a run, but spent the whole time feeling furtive, thinking every light (including a moon low in the sky!) was a ranger coming for me, turning off my lights when I came to a trail intersection, etc. It wasn't the best experience. But here, where I'm legal (at least during this race; I don't know what the general rules are here), being on the trail at night is marvelous. It's cool, which is one reason after the heat of the day why it's feeling so good, but also, there's just something about being in the little cocoon defined by your lights that's really neat, the complete opposite of the running I'd done early in the day, running along ridges with visibility extending for 50 miles.
I might have found the experience a bit more unsettling had I really been completely alone all night, but of course that wasn't the case. Not only was I arriving at an aid station every hour or so, with their little island of light and humanity (and food and drink) breaking the night, but also every once in a while I would pass (yes, even though I was walking) or be passed by someone. Somewhere in here I must have passed Catra (for at least the third time!) and her pacer Jim Winne, because I remember Jim saying hello. At another point I found myself ahead of Geri Kilgariff who was pacing Randy Gehrke. Geri is someone I know from online, not personally, but she recognized me from behind since I was wearing my Stevens Creek shirt, the one I had made up for the Stevens Creek 50K I held on my birthday. The shirt has a striking picture of Stevens Creek on the back, and there were at least three other people I saw during the race wearing it - I think it might have been the single most popular shirt on race day. Improbably, racing down the trail at 10 or 11 at night, I carried on a conversation with Geri about the history of Stevens Creek and the Stephens party; it was the longest conversation I had all day.
Pretty soon I lost track of Geri; either her runner slowed, or else I moved through an aid station a lot faster than they did. Throughout the night, I was maintaining my daily "pace" of about a minute per aid station, two if a weigh-in was required. Whip in, refill the bottles, grab some food and go. I'm a man on a mission (finishing as fast as I can), and even if that mission has been rather severely compromised by the fact that I can't run a step, I'm not giving up. I even trim my time a bit by taking not only food but a cup of Coke from the aid station as well. Earlier, I had taken the time to drink the Coke at the aid station so I wouldn't have to worry about the cup; now, I leave with the cup and, when I'm done with it, I crumple it up and hook it on the strap on my waist pack, to be turned in at the next aid station.
I'm worried by just one thing, which is that I do seem to be losing my appetite. I'm not taking nearly as much food at aid stations as I was earlier in the day. I've stopped eating potatoes and cookies and often the only thing appealing to me is melon, which is easier to get down but less nutritious). And what I do take takes forever to get down. At one aid station, for example, I left with a small cheese sandwich (again, small = about 2" square) and a small ham sandwich, which I stack to make a ham, cheese, and carbohydrate (white bread) sandwich. I then take mouse-sized bites out of this sandwich, chew each bite for the longest time, and probably take about 10 minutes to eat something which under normal circumstances I could down in about 15 seconds. But I'm not feeling queasy in the slightest, which is one thing that seems to plague people in long races, and at least so far my energy level is holding up, so I guess I was getting "enough."
Actually I'm worried about another thing as well, which is that I continue to take Advil, I'm probably up to a dozen or more by now, and I know that too much can be a problem for the kidneys. Now one of the things that you always hear about 100-mile runs, regardless of Advil, is that you have to keep drinking and make sure your kidneys keep working (so that you're not just retaining the water you drink, but processing it). I've been drinking well since the start, but during the day I rarely had to pee. From time to time I would stop basically to "force it," eventually producing a tiny trickle for my efforts. It wasn't much, but enough to reassure me that the kidneys were still working. The color was fairly dark, which normally would indicate dehydration, but I was guessing it might be influenced by the horrible green Gatorade I was drinking. Now, at night, it became evident that I was simply losing most of the water during the day as sweat, because now I really had to go. Pretty much a steady-state thing - one bottle in, one bottle out. :-) But this was a very good thing, because it made me feel like my kidneys were still working well. As an added benefit, somewhere during the night I decided I was sick of Gatorade and had had enough of it, and switched to two bottles of water, and as a result, my urine became clear, which was also a good thing.
Over the River and Through the Woods
Distances stretched out at night, and it seemed to take forever to get from aid station to aid station. Of course it DID take longer than it "should", since I was walking, and I would also constantly mistake the glow of a glow stick marking the trail for the glow of lights from the next aid station, which was somewhat frustrating. But eventually, I found myself off the single track and on a fireroad along the river, and I could sense that the famous Rucky Chucky river crossing was just ahead. For reasons I don't quite understand, there are major aid stations on both sides of the river, but I skipped right through the first one and headed down to the river after a quick hello to Buddy Pohl, someone I've run with in races a couple times since his pace is fairly close to mine. People I know are everywhere! The entry to the river is tricky, with lots of rocks and no simple path to follow, but I take my time. I had to take off my waist belt to get weighed on the near side (they always weigh you without any extra gear), and instead of putting it back on, I had draped it around my neck to keep it as far away from the water as possible. Mainly this is to keep my camera dry, of course.
One of my few worries before the race was the possibility of my calves cramping up as I entered the cold water (I have had a lot of problems with cramping over the years), but there's no problem on that score. Nor does the water seem particularly cold, or maybe I'm just brain-addled enough that I don't notice. I was still mentally alert though. As I got to the middle of the river, where the water came up to the bottom of my running shorts, the volunteer holding the cable (and ready to assist me) says "Watch out there's a hole here." I look down (you can see because there are glow sticks periodically on the bottom of the river, and the water is quite clear) and see a rock about a foot further along. I say "Can't I just step on the rock and avoid the hole?" and he says "Uh, sure" and I do and so I avoid the hole. Boy, that was tough. One of the volunteers says "Good morning" to me and the significance immediately dawns on me as I say, "Is it morning?" and he says "Yes." This is the first time all day I've had any idea what time it is, but I still don't "really" know and that's just fine.
Another thing happens in the river, which is that, about half way across, all of a sudden I have a sharp pain on my left heel which is some kind of blister. I don't know if a blister just popped in the cold water, or maybe it had already popped but the cold water hitting it just caused the sharp pain, but I now know, as I hadn't until this point, that I have a blister problem. Damn Nikes! When I exit the river, I know I have a dry pair of Asics awaiting me in my drop bag, so a decision confronts me. There are 22 miles to go. To change my shoes, I'm going to have to sit down, which could be a problem right there (I might cramp up or tighten up and compromise my ability to move on), remove my shoes and socks, dry off (I have a towel ready for that), and put on the new gear. I decide the heck with it, I'm just going to push on. I do grab the towel, dry off my thighs, and apply Body Glide and change to a dry headband for the last time (I'm not a particularly sweaty person, but my eyes seem to be very sensitive to sweat, which is why I've been assiduously changing my headband every 25 miles). I have all kinds of other supplies here ready for every eventuality (long sleeve shirt, long tights, gloves, vaseline, dry shorts, and more; pretty much anything there's the slightest chance I'll need), but I leave them. I do grab a light windjacket to wrap around my waist in case it gets colder. So far I'm doing just fine in my short-sleeve shirt, but I don't know what the early morning hours will bring, and better safe than sorry. I also have Ivy Block, since I know the trail ahead has lots of poison oak, but I make a conscious decision to save time and forget about applying that too. I hope I won't regret that one!
The Homestretch
There's a sharp climb coming out of the river toward the next aid station at Green Gate, but, as before and improbably, I'm looking forward to the climb as the one strength I've got left. I race out of the aid station, heading up the fireroad at full stride, passing people on the way. Halfway, some idiots with a jeep or something seem to be stuck, and then after I pass they manage to get unstuck and come driving uphill past me, kicking up dust in the process. Thanks a lot! What was that all about? Anyway, stuff happens, and if I've learned anything in the course of preparation for this race, it's how to deal with it. In the words of one-hit wonder Matthew Wilder, "Ain't Nothin' Gonna' Break My Stride." Thankfully, the blister doesn't seem to bothering me at all, basically I've just lucked out. Because when I developed a blister in the Firetrails 50, it happened in such a way as to be painful with every step, and forced me to alter my gait to deal with it. Tonight, that hasn't happened. There isn't much luck involved in doing a race like this, but there is some, and this is my dose.
At the top, I again breeze in and out of the aid station with a quick hello to Barry Fisher, who I haven't seen since he was checking in runners back at 4:30 this morning. I'm at mile 80 at this point, but I'm still not thinking about that; I'm focussed on one thing - 100 miles, and pushing forward step after step to get there. It's well after midnight now, and I have NoDoz with me should I need it, but remarkably I haven't felt drowsy in the slightest. Between the hard effort I'm putting out, and the steady input of Coke, I guess that's been enough to keep me awake. The last time I stayed awake all night was more than 25 years ago, the night I finished my thesis. I finished the writing in the wee hours, and then had to spend a few hours at a Xerox machine making copies to hand in to my thesis committee that morning. As I finished, my body went into convulsions! I was hoping that wouldn't happen here. :-)
In and out of the Auburn Lake Trails aid station at mile 85, and then some trail which looked vaguely familiar since I had run it during the Way Too Cool 50K (formerly Cool Canyon Crawl 50K). What looked even more familiar, and eerie in the dark, was the plentiful poison oak which lined the trail in this section. For a guy who's not that great at recognizing poison oak in the daytime, I felt like I was doing a remarkable job avoiding contact, although mainly I was accomplishing that by avoiding contact with anything which looked like it was living or once had been. :-) Eventually, though, some contact was made, and I was pretty much convinced I was doomed, but as I write this almost a week later, it becomes evident I had been successful (because if I HAD made any contact whatsoever, it's guaranteed I'd be covered with it by now). So a minor success was achieved!
At one point the familiar sounds of "oldies" break the night, and I know I'm approaching the famous "Brown's Bar" aid station, manned by the Hash House Harriers. The sight is mildly diverting, but my appreciation is dimmed by the smell of the barn off in the distance. I'm in and out in under a minute, carrying my repast (I think this was the one with the ham and cheese sandwich) and nibbling as I walk off into the night. There are only ten miles to go. I CAN DO THIS!
Now up to this point I had never looked at my watch. My original plan was to remove the tape once I reached Highway 49, 6.5 miles from the finish, just in case I might be able to push a little harder to reach some special mark, be it 24, 25, or 26 hours. But for the past couple hours, because I've had to walk and as a result been going a lot slower than I had been expecting, my mind has started speculating about reaching the finish before the cutoff (30 hours), calculating times, etc.; just what I didn't want to do, and all because I DIDN'T know what time it was. I suddenly realized that the reason I had the tape was to prevent myself from going too hard but that at this point, I was going as hard as I possibly could and had been doing so for more than 40 miles. So I took the tape off and learned that it was just under 24 hours as I left Brown's Bar. That meant I had 6 hours to go 10 miles! Well, I knew I could do that even if I had to crawl, so my worries were eased, and I could go back to "just doing it" without worrying about the time. The timing of all this was interesting, because just a few minutes later I happened to notice my watch (Nike SDM Triax 100) read "24:00". It doesn't record more than 24 hours!! Well, so much for recording my last few splits; I'll have to rely on the race's official numbers.
Well, 24 hours means one thing - it will be getting light soon! And sure enough, not too long after I leave Brown's Bar and reach a stretch along the river, visibility returns. I'm going a little slower now, either my insufficient eating or 45 miles of hammering have caught up with me, but fortunately the beautiful scenery keeps my spirits high. Then, two quick doses of minor bad news. First, a stone under my left heel is really annoying me, and second, I suddenly realize that here I am down by the river and before I cross the river I have to climb all the way up to the Highway 49 crossing, hundreds of feet above the river. This doesn't look like much on the topo map of the race, but at this point is like adding insult to injury. I find a rock to put my foot up on, loosen my shoe and think I flick out a stone, but after I put it back on and continue I realize I've been fooled; the annoying rock is still there. I've tolerated hundreds of little rocks (one at a time!) in my shoes over the years, usually I'm pretty tolerant of minor annoyances like that, and/or I can wiggle my foot and get the rock into a "better place." But this one is right on the bottom of my heel, is really annoying, and I can't seem to move it. I finally decide it must be inside my sock, but I can't find another place to put my foot up and get it out, so I'll just have to grit my teeth and wait for the aid station.
Even though it's a tiny fraction of earlier climbs to Devil's Thumb and Michigan Bluff, for some reason this particular climb seems long and hard, possibly because it wasn't really something I was anticipating. But eventually it ends, and I'm crossing 49 into the last "major" aid station at mile 93.5. I put my foot up on a fence, remove the stone from the sock, get weighed in for the last time, and leave. With so little mileage to go, I figure one bottle of water is enough, no need to carry extra weight; instead I fill the second bottle about 1/4 full with Coke so I drink that "on the fly."
Adding more insult to injury, although we've climbed from the river up to this crossing, we're not done, and there are several hundred more feet of climbing to do on the other side of the highway before we're allowed to start descending. Randy Gehrke passes me here, with a new pacer; he's ditched Geri somewhere along the way (some people use just one pacer, some use two, and a few, like me, use none). I push up the hill until finally it flattens out in a meadow. The sun is definitely up now.
At this point I'm passed by Kristina Irvin, wearing her Stevens Creek T-shirt; yet another person I've played leapfrog with 2 or 3 times during the race. Being passed, and losing position in the race, has no intrinsic significance to me whatsoever, but it is frustrating wishing my body had cooperated and I had been able to run. It becomes even more frustrating as the trail heads downhill toward the river, and I'm not only unable to run, but even my walking is slowed because, as on the previous downhills, it just hurts more and I have to hobble and waddle downhill, rather than striding forcefully. As an indication of how much time I am losing, Kristina passed me 5 miles from the finish, and she finished a half hour ahead of me.
Eventually I approach the famous "No-Hands Bridge", where one of the volunteers takes my picture; my jacket is still around my waist, where it's been all night. Another 1/4 water bottle full of Coke and I'm off across the bridge (which used to have no railings, hence the name), pausing in the middle to take a picture of the beautiful American River rushing underneath. At the far side the route goes along the river on an exposed fireroad (formerly a railroad bed) and although it's only 7 in the morning, the heat is beating down and I feel hotter than I've been since the race started. But I can smell the barn (no wait, that's just some horse droppings on the trail!) and push on. The route switches to singletrack and climbs back up the hill toward Auburn and Robie Point, adding a few more insults to injury by descending into not one, not two, but three little creek canyons on the way uphill. But finally, there's the road and the last aid station, I don't even pause for water here, just shout my number and continue on up the (paved road) hill. A few more blocks and the final frustration as the route finally turns downhill for the very last time, and I can't do anything about it. I had long ago decided that, even if my legs would somehow let me run a bit, I would NOT run on the track, but rather walk to the finish in honor of my 55 miles of walking. But I wouldn't have minded running these few blocks downhill TO the track. But I couldn't, the knee was just too stiff to allow it.
So I kept walking, until finally I spotted my friend Andy Robles just outside the track, and then my wife Debi. Into the track, throw off my jacket and waist belt so I'll look good for the pictures (cleverly forgetting that my race number was on the pack!), and start the last lap. Out of the blue in front of me there's Bill Finkbeiner, who had been pacing deaf runner Patty Haskins earlier in the race (because she's deaf, she was allowed a pacer for the full 100 miles); I traded places with the two of them a half-dozen times during the race but haven't seen them in hours. Evididently Patty had dropped and Bill decided to finish the race as an official finisher by himself; I'm sure he had not been in front of me. Then a few seconds later who passes me but Catra! She told me later that she didn't want to, but my "friend" Jim had urged her to pass me. I had no problem with that at all, of course; she deserved to have as good a finish as she was able to. The fact that I wasn't running wasn't her fault!
And so I walked my way steadily around the final lap. I heard the announcer reading my "bio", which told the audience that my "proudest athletic achievement" was being the four-time consecutive winner of the Oakland SPCA dog run with my (now deceased) Welsh Terrier Nicky. Nicky was one of the reasons I got into (and stayed with) running; the first race I did in the "modern era" (I did run cross-country in high school, but that was nearly 40 years ago) was back in 1988 when I entered the Palo Alto 5K "Dog's Best Friend" run with Nicky. Besides my shorts, the only thing that accompanied me for the entire 100 miles of this race was a bandanna which was given away (for the dog!) at one of those races (we ran it every year for many years). I had dedicated the race to Nicky's memory, and was proud to hear him talked about as I neared the end of my journey. Nicky's enthusiasm for running was an important part of what kept me motivated for many years - the dog just loved to run.
I pause for one final picture in front of the finish line and then take the last few steps and cross the line in 27:28:15, getting my finisher's medal from Race Director Greg Soderlund. It's a beautiful medal, even if misleading (the medal reads "100 miles, One Day" which might have been a hope of mine but definitely not an accomplishment). I "know" I "could" do better than 27:28, *maybe* even reach the magic 24 hour barrier, if everything went right, but of course one of the points of 100-mile races is that everything DOESN'T always go right, and one of the challenges is being able to cope, both physically and mentally, with whatever the race throws at you. I was (and am) darned proud of my ability to push on even when I developed a knee problem that wouldn't let me run a single step for 55 miles, and darned proud of being able to push hard enough, for long enough, to finish in a time of 27:28 with that kind of handicap. Maybe I'll be back again to try to get closer to my "limit", maybe not, but even if I don't, I'll be very happy with what I accomplished on June 29-30, 2002. One-third of the people who started at 5 a.m. Saturday didn't make it to the finish line, and I could have easily been one of them. I wasn't.
Time to Sit Down
The race over, it was time for exhaustion to set in, and Andy and Debi helped me immensely by finding a chair, setting it up in the shade, and helping to lower me into it. My legs were stiffening up rapidly and I was really pretty much incapable of anything for quite a while. At one point I had to go to the bathroom, but couldn't find a convenient tree. :-) The thought of walking all the way across the track (100 yards!) to the bathroom was completely intimidating, and I couldn't handle it for the longest time! Eventually Andy and Debi got my shoes and socks off and dragged me over to a hose to wash off my filthy legs (it's a very dusty trail); the cold water hitting my calves was fine, the cold water hitting my blister, just like in the river hours before, hurt like heck!
We watched other runners finish, including Don Lundell and Gillian Robinson, who had been my "partners in crime" on my longest night run, and my teachers in the ways of flashlights. I was particularly happy for Gillian, who had dropped out of last year's race with an injury (and got immortalized in the race video for her troubles :-) ). I rested a little more, changed into some clean clothes (without dealing with a shower in-between, which was WAY beyond my stiff body's capabilities), and headed off with Debi to the banquet. I had recovered a bit of my appetite, and forced myself to eat, knowing that I needed the sustenance. Then came the awards ceremony, where first the top female and male finishers got their medals, and winner Scott Jurek his trophy, and then finally, and almost unbearably given the intense heat in this closed gymnasium which was WAY worse than anything I encountered on the trail, the name and time of every single finisher is read, as one by one, they receive their buckle (silver for a sub-24 -hour finish, brass for sub-30 hour) and get a handshake. It was nice to see people I know (and even those I didn't) getting recognized for their accomplishments; I just wish there was air conditioning! Finally it was my turn and I got my buckle. It's a very nice buckle; I might even have to buy a belt to go with it! More likely I'll figure out how to mount it on my wall. I would have liked to stay to watch the rest of the finishers, but I just couldn't handle it, and we had to go pick up our dogs from "dog camp" anyway, so Debi went to get the car (it was a whole block and a half away; I couldn't handle that!) and off we went. At that time our Prius looked like it always did; now there's one little change - a license plate frame reading "Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run". I had refrained from buying any amount of race "stuff" in the extensive store before the start of the race; if I didn't finish I might have felt I didn't deserve it. But I took a chance on the license plate frame; I'm glad I did. After the medals are put away, it will be a daily reminder of my accomplishment. It wasn't my most difficult athletic accomplishment physically; my qualifying for the 100th Boston Marathon back in 1995 takes that honor. But this was certainly my most difficult athletic accomplishment mentally, hands down.
Final Thoughts
People like to say that finishing Western States (or any 100-mile race) "makes you a different person", that you've had to "look into the depths of your soul" and similar things. Obviously I speak only for myself, and only for this one experience, but as far as I'm concerned this is very much overinflated. Yes, I now know I can "run" 100 miles, when less than a year ago 31 seemed to be the edge of my capabilities. Really, that's not much of a change, and certainly no change in my "core being." People talk about how tough this race is, but frankly, some of the training runs I did preparing for this race were a lot tougher. Because in this race there were people to feed and otherwise assist me along the whole way, and a medal, buckle, and a certain "glory" waiting at the end as a reward for sticking it out, whereas in most of the training runs I've done, I've been completely alone, and pushing myself to complete my planned workout (like a 4x repeat of a 10-mile loop at Rancho San Antonio) has been a mental and physical challenge with no reward other than the knowledge that I was now better prepared for Western States. If anything toughened me up, it was as much workouts like that as it was finishing the race itself.
It is said that "the journey is the reward." I think that's true. But for me, the "journey" wasn't just the 100 miles between Squaw Valley and Auburn, although that was of course one heck of a beautiful and rewarding journey. But the real journey that was the reward starts with the six months I spent training for this race (and, of course, the years of running before that giving myself a "base" from which to start for those six months). The people I've met and had the opportunity to run with along the way, the miles of trails that I've been able to enjoy, the beautiful vistas, the feeling of accomplishment after finishing a tough training run with no one and no medal waiting at the finish line. If I could have been given a pill to magically put me in shape so I could have just showed up on the starting line and run the race, it wouldn't have been nearly as satisfying a journey. Because even during the race itself, part of the reward is seeing how all my training paid off. It's pretty much a classic icing on the cake thing. The cake (the training) was MOST of the journey, and most of the reward, but it wouldn't have tasted nearly as good without the icing (the race and the finish).
Anyway, hopefully the journey here has been some minor reward for the reader, and you have learned a little about what it takes to run 100 miles over some of the most beautiful trails anywhere. If you haven't already, make sure to look at the pictures!
