Tale of three shoes

Last year it was the tale of three races. This year I can break it down into the tale of three shoes.

This is the third year for me doing this race.  Close to home, easy trails, nice location, great RD. What’s not to like about?  How about the weather.  First year was the hottest of the year Temps approaching, or over 100. Second year high temps, monsoon rains and flash floods.  What would this year bring?

This year they changed things up a little. It’s now in May instead of July, no 6 and 12 hour versions and it started Friday night @ 7:30 pm.  That left me with less time to train since I can’t seem to get in long runs in the winter. I won’t even talk about my lack of running motivation either.

I had been tracking the weather on (in)accuweather for several days and while I didn’t dig into it real deep it looked like warm with showers.  Not too bad.  Friday we headed up early getting there around 3-3:30.  Set up our canopy and looked at the weather. Now it was showing possibility of heavier rain.  Then Bert-o and his wife strolled back in and had some things in plastic containers. All our stuff was in non waterproof bags. DW decided to go home and came back with a couple of containers, a tent and some extra rope to tie things down in case it got windy. While DW was gone I went over and talked with Bert-o then took a short walk to look over some of the course.  DW came back and we set up the tent and I took a short nap and then it was time to run.

                                                                                           Shoe #1

I started off wearing my Bondi’s.  The most cushioned, and easily able to handle the current conditions.  I started in my usual back of the pack and realized that I actually had to jog to keep up with some of the walkers .   I felt no real need to hurry and warmed up on the first lap without stressing myself.  I had decided to mostly run with no stops until it got dark.  I figured that would let me bank some miles and I’d walk a lot at night anyway so I wasn’t worried about wearing myself out.  Once it got dark I got out the light and decided to run holding it in my hand.  Too much bobbing, so on the head it went. Saw several fast walkers with knuckle lights. I think the bobbing and bouncing of the lights would make me sick .  There was some light spritzing of rain going on at times.  For some reason this race is always a blur to me when I try to remember what happened.  I think it’s because of the running on the same terrain, so it’s difficult to remember things by what happened on a certain hill, or in a certain hollow since everything just keeps repeating.  I know that I ran steady until dark then walked more but kept a good pace.  The temp also dropped enough that I put on gloves and a long sleeve shirt.  Around lap #14 or so it started to rain enough that the Bondi’s weren’t cutting it anymore so I changed into my Asics Gel Scouts. But before I could do that I stepped the wrong way on something and turned over my left ankle……………..the bad one to start with .  Looking at my times that may have been at the start of lap 11 as I walked a lot for two laps after that until things got better.

                                             Shoe #2

The Asisc's have a pretty aggressive lug on them but are worn down some. These are certainly my minimalistic shoe and have been used mostly for short trail runs and snow runs.  A good shoe for not being padded up, I have always liked them. Too bad they were a closeout.  Anyway, right around this time I decided to lay down and take a nap. Part of this was due to the rain starting and the prediction being that it would move through.  It apparently rained fairly hard while I was sleeping but the temp didn’t drop too much.  DW was sleeping in the vehicle and had charged my watch. She woke me up and I headed back out onto the trail. A trail that now had a bunch of muddy spots. I recall doing quite a few laps before getting really tired but the time clock tells me that I only did three laps. Then both of my lights started failing. Not a problem I had plenty of batteries. Those I easily found. What I couldn’t find was my Leatherman to open up the damn thing.  I ended up in the vehicle and used a paperclip to loosen the screw.  In the warm vehicle I decided to try to dry my gloves and ended up falling asleep.  When I woke up I felt warm in the vehicle so out I headed, into a nice wind and rain.  I immediately started shivering so bad I could barely function. I went over to the aid station and had a large bowl of chicken noodle soup. I was shaking so hard I could barely eat it.

They kept this going all night. Didn't help too much though when the rain is coming down.  The Agnew sanctuaries in the background.

They had a fire going and I stood over that while trying to eat. Finally finished, I decided to try a loop. After jogging and slopping through the first 400-500 yards I finally started to warm up some.  By this time the trail was getting slippery and there weren’t many runners out, or at least I wasn’t seeing them.  I knew that I should be cautious but I pushed the speed a little too fast and while running through a larger water hole managed to flip my left ankle yet again.  That required more walking which led to me getting cold. I knew that I could probably continue on the ankle but without running I couldn’t stay warm, so after six laps I pulled back into the vehicle.  It was about time for DW to get up anyway for her 2^nd aid station shift.  This time I had eaten something first and slept quite well waking up feeling fresh.  I took my time getting ready to run again, visiting the Agnew sanctuary again (no I didn't go over the mats twice, I have some personal pride).  By now the trail was a mess. Slopping through the cold water felt good on the ankle with the whole foot being numb.  Better than being painful, right?

This was about 1/2 way up my calves. Couldn't run through it because of the sticks in the bottom catching my feet but it was nice and cold.  I splashed through it more then trying to get around it.

The Asisc’s were handling the mud pretty good. The problem is that my feet were taking a beating on the stones of the rail trail.  I remarked to another runner that it was time for a shoe change and they commented that they had thought about it but decided not to bother because they didn’t want to see what the damage was .  At this time the feet were feeling pretty good as far as friction went. The mud made for a great lubricant .

                                                                                                   Shoe #3

Changing from the Asiscs to my Speedgoats took some time.  It was just difficult to peel the socks off there was so much mud in them.  Getting a fresh pair of shoes and socks on was invigorating.  Of course after the first lap they were already trashed. I quickly realized that the Speedgoats were not as good at keeping the fine stones out.  It was right around this time that Bert-o just about lapped me again. This time though we walked the lap and chatted.  After this it was just lap the course, eat, drink and repeat with frequent stops at the Agnew sanctuary.  The mud was actually starting to dry up some and it was possible to find some decent footing on the edges of the trail. The problem was the mud was getting thicker and I just about lost a shoe numerous times in addition to it using even more energy. I settled into a rhythm of slip and slide through the lower muddy trail, and run the dry upper trail.  My initial goal had been 100k.  I did scale that back to 50 miles when things were looking bad in the morning.  I then decided to do a few extra laps above that so I could say that I had a PR on the distance. Even changed into my Tussey Mountainback shirt to remind me of my 50 mile PR. Once on those laps I did the math and thought that I could walk out a 100k.

By the end of the day this was mud across to the tree. I was keeping up some speed by hugging the left side and holding onto the tree. Speed as in just above a crawl. My watch would often show my pace through here at a 30 min/mile.

Again, though, it started to rain. Now things got really bad. I haven’t found any pictures that really show how bad the one part of the lower course actually got.  I will say though that at one point I did see a herd of water buffalo standing by the course and they said no way in hell would they tackle it .  Of my last 11 laps the first 10  were quite consistent time wise.  The last one was just a slow miserable slog. I had decided that I would most likely quit after getting to the 100k mark.  I knew that lap 44 was most likely my last and with no danger of the cutoff I just stumbled along. Basically I just shut down. I’m still not sure if my body shut down first or if my mind went first but at the end of the lap I had no will to continue. I made sure that I had made the 100k mark and when it was confirmed, I quit. Just couldn’t face the mud for another round.

The "Hill".  It may not be real long, it may not be real steep, but try climbing it when it's covered in creamy peanut butter .

The aftermath

We tore down and just dumped stuff in the vehicle, a benefit of only being 38 miles from home.  I didn’t feel like eating but should have because as soon as we left I was hungry. A small burger from BK and some fries was all I could manage.  I was caked with at least a ½ inch of mud on my legs and my shoes felt like they were filled with gravel.  No good pictures because they didn’t really show the mess.

Not my legs, but you get the picture. By the end of the day I think I was caked up worse, especially in the front.

I came home and it was really, really cold. So cold that I filled a sprinkling can with hot water to wash my legs off, just couldn’t stand the thought of using the cold garden hose. Got a hot shower, ate a little and collapsed across the bed and fell asleep.  Sometime later DW woke me up trying to get into bed. For some reason she wouldn’t just hook a rope to my ankles and pull me the right way, she felt I needed to crawl around myself . For some reason this triggered a really weird dream. How to describe it???? Something like a cross between some weird anatomy/biology, a alien body from a scifi movie and horrible German BMW engineering.  Let’s just say that in the dream I kept wondering if I should be concerned about it .  Woke up the next morning and decided to try going to church.  Quickly realized that neither foot was going to fit into dress shoes so I dressed down and wore hikers.  After services were over I made sure I was walking as normal as possible. I just wasn’t in the mood for someone to start asking questions then start telling me about how much they ache because they are getting old.  The left ankle and foot is still quite swollen but not at all painful, not sure what the swelling is from since there is no pain.

                                       The Shoes

Since I started this as a tale of three shoes I figured I put in a little more. The Bondi’s would have carried me through the entire thing if it hadn’t rained.  The Asisc’s did well.  For moderate mud they had good traction. The Speedgoats were better in that department but left in too much mud. I was literally walking on a ½ inch of mud in the shoe when I finished.  The drive home was interesting. First the Bondi’s woke up and started laughing at the other two for stinking like wet mud. Then the Asiscs started calling the Bondi’s fat baldies, so the Bondi’s fired back that at least they didn't need to be changed out because the stones were hurting the bottom of my feet. Then the Speedgoats got into the mix gloating that they had to finish things out because the other two couldn’t, so the Asisc’s  were yelling back that at least they held out the fine stones that were grating my feet.  I got home and threw them all out on the back porch in the cold rain to cool off for awhile .  Took me a hour to hose them off on Tuesday. Two pairs of socks may be toast.

                                           Final thoughts

I liked the evening start.  That way I was running tired through the daylight. If I would have been running that tired at night I would have slept more.  I do better eating real food and eating often. I did use quite a bit of Perpetuem but no Tailwind or Gels. Stomach fared out pretty well. Chicken corn soup, toasted cheese, pierogies, yum.   I really, really, really wish I would have went to the aid station after my last round, took a ½ hour break then just slowly walked the course with DW’s cell phone. I could have gotten some good pictures. As it was I have none of my own due to my regular camera not functioning well. And then I  was too afraid to carry a cell phone because I didn’t want to drop it in the mud. Not sure when I’ll run again because of the swelling in the ankle. I’ll probably just walk, hike and ride bike for awhile.

Photo Credits:  All came from Facebook posts.

Unfortunate for me that they changed the date this year to conflict with D3. I really liked the race last year despite the rain and mud and would have loved to join you again.

sounds like you embraced the suck  

nice job on your pr- you really earned it!

would gaiters have helped?  I wear gaiters year round (different ones depending on the time of the year)

I'm really glad you stuck it out to your goal.  Huge Congrats for that!  Do you remember telling me in the morning that you wouldn't make 100K?  Well, if you're going to get a distance PR, it may as well be in epic conditions and effort.  I wish I spent time at the aid station, but since DW was not in a social mood, I made all my stops at camp.  Maybe next time.  Loved the tale of 3 shoes format too.... great writing!  And I'm glad you mentioned peanut butter hill.  Every time going up it the next morning, I kept trying a different route.  Eventually, since everyone else was going left or right, I found that going right up the middle became easiest (relatively speaking).  I hope your ankle gets better soon and you recover quickly.  Awesome job!

Thanks for the RR and pics.  Hopefully the ankle swelling has gone down by now?  Would not have been my cup of tea.  I'm fine with rainy wet conditions but I hate ankle-deep mud that sucks your shoes off or seeps down inside the top of the shoe or hides what might be lurking in the deep muddy puddles.  Great job on reaching your goal!

Nice job on the 100k DD 👍🏻