Joyful - The Chattanooga Mountains Stage Race

 

Joyful.  If I have to sum up my experience running the 3 day Chattanooga Mountains Stage Race put on by Wild Trails and Rock/Creek Outfitters, that would be it.  I had a smile on my face for all 60 miles.  I loved every single second of it.  It was amazing.

                                                               Leaving on a jet plane with Mary

The trip started on Wednesday as Miss Mary Leonard and I boarded a plane to Atlanta where we had a 2.5 hour layover.  Chattanooga is a 2 hour drive from Atlanta, but we made the most of the time walking up and down the long hallway where the train runs between terminals and catching up on long overdue conversations that we didn't get to have training since I spent most of the training time inside in the gym due to my stress fracture.  Once to Chattanooga, my parents dropped a car off with us, and we met up with two of my dearest long-time friends, Katie and Kadi.

 

Dinner at Community Pie with some lovely ladies

We had a cheese-filled dinner and some great conversation and then made our way home to my parents' house.  We were supposed to be meeting another Austinite, Katie V., at this time, but she sadly was unable to come at the last minute due to an injury.  We brought her with us in spirit, though, we would much rather have had her there in person.

Tennessee flower garden at the park where we did our shake-out run

Thursday, we did not set an alarm and lazily rolled out of bed late morning, went for a shake-out jog and had lunch with my mom followed by specialty chocolates at an old favorite coffee shop of mine, Rembrandt's.  So far, the fueling was not as strict as I had planned, but Mary did not seemed concerned, so I decided not to be either.

 

Picking up our race packets at Rock/Creek!! 

Finally, it was time to head to packet pick-up and to meet up with Chris, a Kansas City native that we had met once in person through Katie V. when he visited Austin.  At packet pick-up, my nerves were high.  Everyone in line looked to me like an amazing runner.  I was feeling a bit overwhelmed by the mileage - not of any one day - but the total, and the fact that they were back-to-back-to-back, which I had never done due to limited run training from my foot injury.  I was worried I wouldn't make the cut-off times and would get cut from the race.  While we were there, though, Kris with a 'K', one of the race directors, came over and introduced herself and talked to us for a while about the courses, what to look out for, the good parts, the bad parts, the slippery parts, the rocky parts.  Her happy, welcoming spirit put me at ease a little as she assured me that there were plenty of people there 'just trying to finish' too, and that not everyone was a rockstar runner like I was imagining.  We saw Kris all three days of the race (she ran it too), and from just that one encounter at packet pick-up, she remembered all our names and always came up and chatted with us.  Really great lady.  The conversation with Kris put me at ease, and then the three of us left to go to the Tennessee Aquarium once the sudden torrential downpour ended (it had been sunny without a cloud in the sky at lunch).

Mary, Chris and I at the TN Aquarium (and some Aurelia jellyfish).  Chris earns the name 'Ripsaw' here for admiring a fish by the same name. It stuck and was how he was addressed the rest of the weekend.

The Riverbend festival was also going on this week, and this night Lynyrd Skynyrd was the headliner.  This band always makes me think of Chattanooga (the reason why is a good story for a run someday), so I liked the fact that we could see their tour bus from the inside of the aquarium.  We had intentions of going to Riverbend one day while we were there.  We wanted to play Riverbend Bingo, a game described to us by Katie and Kadi where you make up your own board that consisted of things like 'guy with a mullet' and 'super sunburned lady' and other stereotypical Tennessee festival-goer squares, but the race ended up taking up most of our days, and we never made it.  We got home later than we wanted and quickly got our race gear packed and breakfast and post-race food ready and hit the hay.

 

Look closely and you can see 'Lynyrd Skynyrd' written on the tour bus.  

A view of the Riverbend Festival from behind.

 

'Sup dog?  Getting a high 5 from this pup in downtown Chatt

Walking back from the aquarium.  That's Lookout Mountain in the background.  Otherwise known as 'Day 2'

Day 1 - Raccoon Mountain - 18 miles

View from the drive to the Day 1 race start.  Clouds sitting on the river below.

The alarm went off at 5 AM, and I promptly got up and got dressed.  The new puppy woke my mom up too, so she came down and made me my coffee and Mary's hot water for her tea (thanks, Mom!) and took some pictures for us and sent us on our way.  Raccoon Mountain is the one mountain I didn't know very well.  Funnily, it is the only one I'd ever run on as there was one cross-country course up there (though not on the trails, of course, but along the long dam), but overall, I'd been up the other two mountains exponentially more times.  On the way up the mountain, 'Your Body is a Wonderland' came on the radio, which resulted in many a fun joke throughout the weekend.  This was one of the first of many a good hard laughs I had with Mary this weekend.  We arrived and found Chris and Luigi (another Austinite that I was just meeting for the first time) who had driven up from the Crash Pad, a cool, new hostel in downtown Chattanooga.  Everyone was all smiles and full of energy.

A shout out to Katie V. who trained so hard but was unable to come last minute due to injury.  She's already said she's going next year, though.  I just may be back too.  Katie - you were greatly missed, but thought of often!

Mary and I went to get our shirts that hadn't been ready the day before.  They were a pretty green color with the '3 days 3 mountains 60 miles' logo on the front.  We could also see the finishers jackets, Marmot wind/rain resistant jackets with the same logo and 'Finisher' on the sleeve.  These jackets would be the talk of the race all three days.  They looked pretty sweet and served as some level of motivation for a lot of folks.

Lined up on the startine, day 1

There is a John Hartford song in which he sings, 'Today it may be natural, sitting here discussing it; Tomorrow just as natural to be gone", and just like that, one second we were standing at the start line discussing the 3 days to come, and the next the clock had started, and we were off through the chute and into the woods.  It wasn't long (100m?) before we made a left turn off the paved road and onto a trail, and the whole group of 260 people came to a screeching halt as we filed one at a time onto the trail forming what had to be a mile long conga line.  There was no passing.  Where you were when you got on the trail was pretty much where you were through the first aid station at about 5 miles.  There were a couple of moments where you could get in front of a person or two, but they were few and far between, so whatever the pace of the group was your pace.  Of course my shoe came untied - first time ever in a race - so, when I hopped to the side to tie it, the conga line continued on past me and Mary, Chris and Luigi disappeared into the distance.  I didn't mind going slowly with the group.  In fact, I decided it was a good thing, because the first day was all about conserving energy.  There were two days after today, so my biggest challenge, I figured, was keeping myself from going out too strong and leaving myself with nothing on Sunday.  I did wish I was up with my posse, though, so I could chat with them, but I chatted instead with the people I was now surrounded by.  This was the beginning of three days of happy conversations with happy people from all around the area in the middle of beautiful woodsy areas.  Yes, the trails were beautiful, but it was the people that really made the race what it was.  I made all kinds of trail buddies.  Some people I ran with at some point all three days, others just one or two days.  Some for several miles, others for a short section, but all of the people I talked to provided good conversation and a genuine feeling of support and well-wishing.  Sometimes the person I talked to dropped me and went ahead, but never without thanking me for the talk and wishing me good luck.  Sometimes I was the one bounding away yelling back the same things to them.  This feeling of camaraderie lasted all three days, and is one of the reasons this race was so special.

 Left: Me on the far right, coming out into a field where an aid station is set up, about to go into the small intestines.  Right: Mary looking like a gazelle, bounding through the woods

One part of this trail is called the 'Small Intestines'.  It is a long section of switchback upon switchback upon switchback, first down, then back up, never very steep or if so, not for very long, but mostly gradual inclines and declines through the woods.  There were a couple points where you could look up and down and see a moving line of runners stretched out over these switchbacks.  It was fun to yell to Mary every few minutes as we passed by each other again and again in this section.

The 'Small Intestines' - a long section of switchback after switchback and a mile or two of runners stretched out along it

I ran for a while with a girl who I found out had been Arkansas's ultrarunner of the year last year.  I got a little nervous when she told me this thinking I should not be here with her but rather further back on the trail.  Am I going too fast?  Surely she knows better how to run these races.  My worries dissipated a little while later, though, when she came bounding out of nowhere (I had gotten in front of her) with about 4 miles to go and blew by me on a downhill.  I hung with her for a bit, then forced myself to let her go.  The trail overall was very runnable, and had it been a single-day race, we could have logged pretty fast times on it, I think.  But everyone was sitting back and making sure to leave some in the tank as each day was supposed to get progressively more difficult.  I walked on several hills that I didn't need to, but decided to in order to conserve the legs.  Looking back, I probably could have gone harder that first day, but I'm glad I didn't because I assured myself energy and legs for days 2 and 3.

Luigi finished first out of the four of us in 2:41, then me at 3:08 (30th place of the females), Mary at 3:13 and Chris at 3:17.  The cut-off time was 4 hours, and we had easily made it.  Afterward, we were sitting in the coldest water I have ever been in when a girl came sprinting out of the woods, and everyone started cheering loudly.  She crossed the finish line at 3:59:13 just barely in time.  We later met a guy who finished at 4:06 who wasn't allowed to continue the next day (who, to his credit, still came out days 2 and 3 and volunteered at the aid stations - and with a smile on his face too) and another who crossed at 4:01:12 and was cut.  They were serious about the cut-off times!  This instilled an appropriate amount of nerves for the next day, because even though we had plenty of time today and they give us a little extra time the next two days, tomorrow was 4 miles longer and a harder course.....and we would have 18 miles on our legs already from today.

My parents' puppy, Molly, helps Mary with the foam roller by deciding to chew her bone on Mary's leg.

This race is all about recovery.  I had my routine down with a recovery drink immediately after finishing, then shortly after that a protein drink.  We would then go for lunch, and afterward, I would just continue eating and drinking water water water, then a little foam rolling, some ibuprofren and sleep.

 

Mary's foot sausage.  The seed for many a joke over the course of the weekend.

Mary's recovery also included some ice in the form of a frozen sausage log on her foot (sorry, Mom - her foot was clean, though!).  This also resulted in many a joke the rest of the weekend.  Sleep came much later than planned as we had headed back out from my parents house (20 minutes out of downtown) back to the Crash Pad where the race organizers had a keg and were showing pictures from the day (all the beds at the Crash Pad were filled with runners in the race).  We went to eat and didn't order until nine o'clock.  9:00!!  We had wanted to be home by 9:00!!  Oh well.  Nothing to do about it now.  The fatigue was starting to set in, though, so we chowed down our dinners and got home and got into bed by 11-something.

Day 2 - Lookout Mountain - 22 miles

Start/Finish of Day 2

5:00 came earlier than it had the day before.  My alarm went off, and I immediately did a quick inventory - no apparent injuries or severe soreness.  Okay, that's a good sign.  We repeated the routine from the day before with my mom making my coffee and Mary's water for her tea (thanks, Mom!).  Mary packed up the car (again), and we headed out.  Today's race was actually on the Georgia side of Lookout.  I spent many a night on Lookout Mountain as a high schooler.  Many of my closest friends lived up there both on the Tennessee and Georgia sides, and I used to drive up and down that thing weekly.  I never ran up there, though, so today's race would be a first for that.  We got to the Lula Lake Land Trust property, and I immediately fell in love with it.  It was all forest all around.  No buildings.  No roads except the gravel one we came in on.  There was a river right next to the start/finish and a wooden bridge going over it.  Very picturesque.

 

Everyone's all smiles at the start.  

I waited a few minutes to hit up the Port-a-Potty.  BIG MISTAKE.  I got in line at 7:36 (race starts at 8:00) thinking 24 minutes is surely enough time for this line to work it's way through the three Port-a-Potties that had been brought there.  Um, wrong!  I didn't get to the front of the line until 3 minutes to the start.  Luckily, Mary had read my mind and brought me my hydration pack and taken my towel I was using as a jacket (it was chilly in the mornings!) so I wouldn't have to run back to the car before the start.  I managed to get out and to the start line with about 1:30 to spare.  We started off this day in the back.  We were taking the perspective of start back and pass people instead of the reverse.

 Lula Lake Falls

Today's course started off running by Lula Lake Falls, a beautiful waterfall dropping into beautifully teal green water.  Shortly after this was the section we'd heard about where you had to hold on to ropes to get up it was so steep.  Much like day 1, this was a bottlenecking point where we stood in line waiting our turn to go up.  Someone in the back called out, 'On your left!!' and everyone laughed.  The trail here, we noticed, was lined with poison ivy, and somewhere along the way I got in it.  For anyone who witnessed the Armageddon of poison ivy that ensued on my legs in 8th grade, you can understand that I was a little nervous, but knock on wood, just a couple little spots but nothing serious has appeared, so I think I'm in the clear.

Some runners coming down the so-steep-you-need-a-rope section of the trail.

At the top of the rope climb, we ran along the edge of the mountain with beautiful views off to our left for a mile or so, then down into the woods to finish out the first 5 mile loop, passing an aid station at the start/finish.  I LOVE my new hydration backpack I ran with.  I had lots of pockets and so was able to carry dates with me to use for fuel instead of having to rely solely on gels, which get painfully sweet by the end of a long race.  I just ate the gels and dates I had with me and only stopped at aid stations long enough to refill my water.

The next section was a lollipop out to and around Covenant College.  Somewhere along the stick of the lollipop, just before entering the loop of it (the pop?), a guy appeared sprinting toward me and running the wrong way.  I was so confused.  What was going on?  Then I realized that was the first place guy already on his way back.  Holy wow.  This dude is fast!  I checked my watch - 1:27 - and looked for landmarks around me to be able to note when I was passing back by this way.  Second place wasn't far behind.  I clapped and cheered for him since I understood what was going on now (first place guy just got a very confused stare from me - sorry!).  Then third came along shortly after that, then I was up on the loop and didn't see anymore fast guys.  When I finally came back by the place where I had seen first place, my watch said 2:20.  Wow.  Just wow.  Those guys are fast.  I ran back toward the start/finish through forest lined with ferns and covered in tall, tall, tall trees.  The trees were my favorite.  I love tall trees.  I miss them.  I didn't realized how much I missed them until I spent three wonderful days under them.

Back to the start/finish.  One more loop to go - the same as the first one, but in the opposite direction and with a little something extra at the end.  As I passed by the aid station there, I could hear the announcer calling out finishers.  These people were a good 6 miles ahead of me, and they weren't even the first ones!  There were a lot of really good runners in this race.  The last loop was fun.  I felt good and ran most of the long uphill back up to the ridgeline then picked it up on the slight descent back to the steep downhill with the ropes.  The 'bonus' section added on on the way back was a little hard to run because of the rocks and being slippery, but it was really beautiful with bright green moss on the rocks and the little creek to your side.  We finished by crossing a river just before the finish line.

As I came in, they announced my name and said, 'Number 233, Laura Dugan, with a BIG smile on her face!'.  Two days in a row I finished smiling.  Those of you who have seen me run other races know that I am usually not smiling at the end, but you just couldn't help but smile here.  I finished in 3:44 (15th place female), very surprised and happy to have run it sub-4.  Luigi came across at 3:33, Mary at 4:08 and Chris at 4:19.

Today's ice bath was just as bone-chillingly cold as yesterday's, though, it came with an added bonus - as they were pouring the leftover cooler ice in, a beer fell in with it - just as Mary was saying she desired one

We went to eat again and met up with another dear old friend of mine, Christy, at a burrito place.  We sat and chatted for a while, then headed home to shower and get ready for the next day.  We couldn't pull ourselves back out to the Crash Pad that night as the fatigue was catching up, so we went to eat with my parents and got home early to get ready for the last day.  Mary kindly reminded me a few times to pack my nutrition, and we got to bed nice and early.

Day 3 - Signal Mountain - 20 miles

 '3' for day 3!!  We made it to day 3!  Only 20 miles to go.....

"Day 3 is ridiculous."  These were the words of a Chattanooga Mountains Stage Race veteran in the ice bath on day 1.  Day 3 was indeed ridiculous from a rocky point of view.  The race started out running down Signal Mountain to Suck Creek.  Let me repeat for those who know the area.  We ran down Signal to Suck Creek and then back up the way we came.  Well, 'run' is a strong word here.  We gingerly worked our way down to Suck Creek in a single file (this was today's bottlenecking section) to the aid station, turned right around and hiked back up.  This was another place where we got to witness the front runners' incredible ability as they passed us coming back up.  Mary was fairly convinced the front guy used a cheetah when out of sight of the other runners.  This may be true, but even just on his feet, he was ridiculously fast.  We all would step off the single track and let them pass as they blasted by us in the opposite direction in this section. 

Today's course consisted of many suspension bridges over beautiful creeks that got wobblier as you got out to the center and trails along a ridgeline with magnificent views of the Tennessee River gorge.

And then there were the rocks upon rocks upon rocks, but different kinds of rocks from the ones we run on all the time in Texas.  They were bigger, and awkwardly shaped, and wet and covered in moss and thus, quite slippery and difficult to find any sort of rhythm through them.  For a long section that one of my trail buddies referred to as the 'Rock Garden' it was run two steps, walk 10 as we worked our way over the rocks.  And the trail was narrow here, and the drop-off to the side long and steep if you were to slip.  After the Rock Garden came a set of stairs,

 
then finally the most beautiful aid station ever.

 
I was again blowing through aid stations, arriving with my pack off and bladder already open ready to be filled.  I used my own food and didn't partake of any of the awesome array of goodies provided by the race, so I tended to pass a chunk of people at each one that decided to stop and hang out there for a few minutes.  I had been conserving my legs and my energy for 2 days and 9 miles.  I was feeling good, so I gave myself the green light to go for it.  From this point on, I went into race mode, picking up the pace and running every runnable thing.

There was about a quarter mile on the road as we went from one trail to another, and in this time, we passed an assisted living home where the residents were on the porch clapping and cheering us as we came by.  I was in glee club in high school and remember doing a performance there one time.  Like Lookout, I spent many a night on Signal Mountain too.  In elementary school, I begged my parents to move there as all my best friends lived there (they just chuckled).  It felt like home running on this mountain, under these trees.

Back in the woods again and down a descent.  I passed a fair number of people on descents, bounding down.  All the Texas trail running prepared me well for that.  It was in this section that I had my 10 minutes of....well, what's the opposite of coordination?  In this time, I did a slip-and-sit sort of fall, took two people off-trail, ran into a tree, then fell outright on my left shin.  It was after the second fall that I slapped myself in the face and got myself together.  I think fatigue + excitement + increased pace were the culprits.  After this, I began to realize that I had about 6 miles left.  I had run 54 miles over the last three days, and I only had 6 miles left.  I immediately became very emotional as I realized that this wonderful, beautiful, amazing race was coming to its end.  I forced myself to ease up on the race mentality and make sure to take in as much as I could, because it was going to be over before I knew it, and who knew when I'd get to come back and run here again, and never would it be with all these exact same people that had made this weekend so special for me.

I came to the very last aid station.  3.6 miles to the finish line.  This is it.  This is the very last push.  The whole rest of the way just about was a dirt road/wide gravel trail.  It was extremely runnable, the most runnable section of the day, so I opened up and went for it.  After climbing a Hill of Life-esque sort of hill, most of the way was flat or downhill, and I flew.  I was running so fast.  I looked down a couple times and saw 7:45 and 8:00 paces on my watch (fast for trail, for me).  I was blowing by people.  We would exchange a 'good job! or a 'keep it up, almost there!'  As I passed one guy, he said to me, 'Almost there!', to which I replied, 'I know!  I'm kind-of sad about it!', though, he didn't seem to share the same sentiment.  Very last hill - I could hear the finish, almost see the opening in the trees.  I thought about walking, then I called on one of the quotes I had in a Ziploc bag in my pack that I had put there in case times got tough and I needed some motivation, 'Your body will argue there is no justifiable reason to continue, at which point you must call on your spirit, which fortunately functions independently of logic.'  I recalled this quote and forbade myself to walk.  I will let my spirit carry me up.  I came out of the woods just a little behind another girl.  In any other race, I would have sprinted in and tried to pass her, but this wasn't that kind of race - not for where I fell in the ranks, at least, so I picked it up but didn't pass her.  The announcers called out my name as I entered the final curve....'Lara Zoeller!!'  Wait, that's not my name!  So I threw my hands in the air and yelled 'Dugan!!' as I neared the finish line.  They then said 'Laura Dugan!!', and I thought they were correcting themselves.  It wasn't until I was talking to that girl later that I found out SHE was Lara Zoeller, and they were calling out her finish.  Oops.  Oh well.

 Before

After - FINISHERS!!!

Luigi had already finished (3:39 - wow!), and so I waited for Mary and Chris to come through.  Chris came through all smiles at 4:37 and Mary at 4:45.  I gave each a big hug as they finished, and I was trying to talk Mary into getting her finisher's jacket when she crossed as I know she favored the blue one, and those were dwindling.  I would say, 'Go get your jacket!' to which she would reply, 'We have to go get Becca!!'  Becca is another Texan we met at packet pick-up and with whom Mary had run most of day 3 with.  Mary had gotten in front in those last few miles and done the same thing I had, which was open up and run.  We repeated this exchange two or three times before Mary looked at me sternly and yelled, 'WE HAVE TO GO GET BECCA!!!!!'  It was, in her words, a Forrest Gump moment and Becca was her Lieutenant Dan.  I had a pretzel in my hand, and I had told my legs we were done running for a few days, but suddenly, spawned by Mary's urgency, I was running again, pretzel in hand, back out on the course with Mary right behind (she had gone to get her jacket) to look for Becca and run her in.

Looking back, I understand the sense of urgency as there was a 5 hour cut-off, and when we left it was probably at about 4:48 or 4:49.  Mary had run with Becca all day, and she wanted to make sure Becca made it under the 5 hour cut-off time.  About a quarter mile or so down the trail, we found her.  We turned around and ran with her the last stretch of the trail, Mary encouraging her the whole way.  She crossed the finish at 4:52, eight minutes to spare.  The last official runner came across at 4:59:25.  I was on the massage table, but I heard the remaining crowd go crazy as she was apparently sprinting through the grass to the finish.  Mary talked to her after, and she said, 'I have never been so happy to come in last place.'  All the runners who finished after the 5 hour mark still got their finisher's jacket, but their times aren't listed on the official results.  Of the 260 registrants, 167 finished all three days within the time limits.

My overall results for the three days came out as such:
Total time: 10:59:31
FINISHER!!
13th place female
4th place in my age group

I got a chance to test out my finisher's jacket Tuesday morning in Austin during the brief morning rain

While on the massage table (my left knee and right ankle and arch had been talking smack for most of the day), the guy on the table next to me said, 'Hey!  Are you the crazy girl who said she was SAD she was almost done?'  We laughed about that a little, but I was sad, and simultaneously immensely happy.  I did it.  We did it.  We ran 60 miles in three days on three different mountains over some extremely technical trail and very steep inclines and declines.  And we had a blast while doing it. 

After the massage, we got in the ice bath again.  Today wasn't nearly as cold as days 1 and 2 had been, but while in there, they dumped out the cooler ice into it and then some dry ice that made for some pretty cool pictures.

Then, that was it.  Luigi and Chris took off for Atlanta as they had flights to catch, and Mary and I headed home (but not before I drove her through my old high school that was on the way).  My sister and her family had come up for Father's Day, and we celebrated with cupcakes and presents and went to dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  I told Mary she is now an honorary Dugan, though, I'm not sure that's an honor - I'll leave it to her to decide that (we are an odd bunch, though, she seemed to fit in just fine).  Seriously, though, I am so grateful and appreciative to my family and my Chattanooga friends too for letting me come and be completely selfish and self-centered this weekend and for working around my schedule, and to Mary for agreeing back in January to go on this adventure with me and to Chris and Luigi for sharing it with me and to all my new trail buddies whom I will hopefully see at more races in the future (I will be back to that area to race again - it is too beautiful not to return).  It was a wonderful weekend of running and friendship and family and home.  It is something I will treasure forever. 

One of those quotes that I ran with is by T.S. Eliot and says, 'Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far they can go." I was afraid this race might be too far, and that I would not be able to go the distance.  I had not trained like I wanted, and I had never attempted three consecutive days of long runs.  I proved myself wrong, however, and it only motivates me to see how much further I can go - in running as well as in life.  This adventure is in the books, but I know there are so many adventures still to come, so many mountains yet to climb, and I cannot wait.

Bandera 50k

The Bandera mud run 50k finally happened this past Saturday.  I had been thinking about this race since I ran the 25k last year (my first ever trail race), and it's a little hard to believe that it's already come and gone.  Though, it definitely very much happened....I have the scrapes and blisters and chafing to prove it.

The weather reports had been all over the place leading up to the race.  The first one when we were 10 days out predicted a low of 23 degrees and a high of 72.  What?  How do you plan for that when you're expecting to run for at least 5 hours and with a temperature range like that, you'll likely start at about 25 and end at 65 degrees?  It's just not possible.  As the day got closer, though, the reports became a little more reasonable, settling at a low of 37 and high of 62 for a few days.  Thirty-seven sounds cold, but when you're running, 40-45 degrees or so is about perfect.  By the day before, however, the reports were calling for temps between 58 and 62 (read: hot in running terms) and there was a chance of rain, though, it was low and not supposed to start till later in the day, so overall, it would be warm but otherwise not too terrible.

Well, my roommate and I were the first ones to Bandera on Friday afternoon, and so we started setting up our camp.  We had a whole big crew meeting us down there, mostly a bunch of other folks from our boot camp where we work (Synergy Fitness), but I also knew a few folks from my other running group that were coming down and a few more folks from Austin as well.  I love that I'm knowing more and more people in the running community and seeing more and more friendly faces before, during and after the races.  But I digress...

Home sweet camp

We got our campsite set up, picked up our packets (coincidentally, my bib number was my goal time) and listened to the trail briefing before a few of us went into town for a pasta dinner at a local restaurant.  Afterward, I got dropped back off at the campsite, put my drop bag together, laid out all my clothes, my shoes, bib, watch, chip, etc.  I tried to hang out for a little bit with everyone, but I was getting pretty nervous, and I wanted a good night sleep before my 5 AM wake-up, so I crawled in my tent and put my headphones on and listened to some calming/motivating music before falling asleep early.

My race packet including my bib, which was, coincidentally, my goal time

At about 5AM, I'm awakened to the sound of rain.  Oh no!!  Please don't tell me it's raining!  Well, it wasn't, thank goodness, but it had rained during the night and everything was soaked (note to self: add 'new tent' to list of things to eventually buy).  I was dry because my sleeping bag was on top of my sleeping pads, but the rest of the floor of my tent was wet or at least damp everywhere.  Luckily, my clothes were dry (though, it wouldn't have made much difference anyway - they were completely soaked with sweat within the first 15 minutes of running).  The 'rain' I had heard was just water falling off the branches onto my tent when the wind blew.  I knew immediately that my time goal had just been changed.  I make up a lot of my uphill time going fast on the downhills, but with slippery rocks, that wasn't going to happen.

I got up, had my breakfast of two mangoes, a banana and some dates and got dressed.  Everyone was milling about and talking in the campsite area, but I was too nervous to be out there chatting, so I slipped away back to my tent to lay down and listen to music while doing some stretches.  Finally, at about 7:00, we left to walk to our respective start lines.  All three races started at a different point, which was nice because the course goes to single track pretty quickly, and it was hard enough to position yourself where you wanted to be amongst just the other runners in your race.

 Joe, Billy, Me and Ty just before the race starts

The 50k start was about a 1/4 mile away, so we used the opportunity to warm up a little and jogged over there.  As it turns out, slippery rocks would be the least of my worries.  Everywhere where there weren't rocks, the course was muddy.  It was a sticky, sticky mud that collected on the bottom of your shoes and wouldn't fall off.  So, by the time we even got to the start line, we were all already scraping mud off the bottom of our shoes.  Then, what I had been waiting for and daydreaming about for a year finally became a reality as the last seconds were counted down and we were off and slipping running, and the race was on.

Billy, Joe and I heading off to the 50k start line

The first 10 miles contained four huge hills all in a row.  They were the same four hills that were the last 10 miles of the relay leg I ran in October.  I was a little concerned about having them first and tiring out my legs so quickly so early on, and that is, indeed, what happened.  By the time I got through those first ten miles, my quads were screaming.  The mud just made it worse.  When you weren't slipping, you were having to use extra energy to unstick your foot from the ground, so I had used up a lot more energy than anticipated by the time I rolled into the Nachos aid station at mile 10.

Elevation profile for the 50k course

Miles 10-15 were tough.  I went to a dark place, and I honestly don't remember much of them.  My legs were shot, and I still had 21 miles to go.  That was difficult to bear.  Tougher still was that crews weren't allowed at Nachos, so after seeing my friends that were helping me out at mile five in the middle of the hills, I had to wait until arriving at Chapas at mile 15 before seeing them again.  I finally started to feel myself coming out of the fog as I neared Chapas.  There, I saw Courtney and Kat, whom I am ever so grateful for.  Courtney always had my gels and salt tabs ready to go amongst other things that she thought I might want.  Then she and the aid station volunteers (who were also awesome) would grab my water bottle(s) (I started carrying two after Chapas - I was sweating sooo much and running out of water between stations) and refill them for me allowing me to just rest and recoup for a minute.

Best race crew ever!!  Courtney and Kat made all the difference at the aid stations.

After Chapas, I was rejuvenated.  Half way done!!  On the downward slope now.  AND, the next (and last) two aid stations were actually the same one - Cross Roads.  We passed by there at miles 21 and again at 26 on the other side.  For some reason, this was very comforting.  I took off from Chapas with determination and renewed grit.  It was slow-going at first, but as my mental state improved, so did my pace.  Some of the mantras and thoughts that got me through the tough spots were 'You only get to do your first 50k once' and 'Just keep moving' and 'One foot in front of the other'.  Writing those now, they don't really seem too inspiring, but that's what was pushing me forward at the time. 

What I saw for two miles as I trudged through the stickiest mud ever

The last two miles before Cross-Roads was a stretch of muddy field that was so, so difficult.  The mud just caked up on your shoes, an inch or two thick on the bottom AND the sides.  It made your foot feel 10 pounds heavier and with every step, you had to unsuction your foot from the ground.  What should have been a fast stretch used to make up for some of that slow uphill time suddenly became a time stopper.  I had stopped looking at the time or my pace somewhere around mile 11 or 12 when I finally realized that my time goal was just a dream (that likely contributed to the 'dark place' as well), but still, I didn't like going this slow.  Runners were stopping and trying to scrape the mud from their shoes on the barbwire fence, some were just walking.  The only thing that kept me from slowing to a walk during the last mile of it was being able to see Cross Roads approaching and that was enough of a boost to push me out of that damn field (excuse my French) and back onto the rocky path.  

Cross-roads aid station

  
I hit Cross-roads 1 feeling good, well, as good as one can feel after having run 21 miles over mountains and through mud.  I guess I mean good in terms of my head.  Yeah, my legs were tired.  They hurt.  My feet hurt.  I had scratches and was bleeding from running through the sotol bushes.  I had a raw spot on the back of my left heel that was getting worse and worse.  I had blisters forming on at least two toes.  But, mentally, I was ready to go.  Last 10 miles.  No problem.  Let's do it!  I took off from the Cross-roads station and headed out toward the Three Sisters hills.

I was moving along fine, or so I felt, yet at one point near the end of the third of the three sisters, I happened to glance back and saw a girl with red numbers on her bib just 50m behind me.  At this point, I was thinking I had a good hold on 5th place based on information given to me back at mile 5 and counting of how many 50k gals had passed me and how many I had passed (both had only happened a couple times, I thought).  So, I was quite surprised to see this girl sneaking up on me.  I was about 6 miles from the end, and long past any hopes of my time goal, and I was not about to give up my place too.  So, I turned it on.  Once I summitted the hill, I immediately started running again and didn't stop till I got to the (last!!) aid station.  I sucked down two gels this time, inhaled my two salt tabs and took off with just one filled water bottle for this last, shorter stretch, the whole time feeling the pressure of this girl being right on my tail.  The adrenaline rush from feeling chased mixed with the elation of only having 4.5 more miles to go gave me the boost I needed to sprint (well, it felt like sprinting, though, at the VERY most, it was maybe an 8:30 or 9:00 pace, but at that point - that was an all out sprint) out of Cross-roads 2 and toward the finish.

 Trying to move through the last aid station as quickly as possible because of another 50k girl right on my tail....or so I thought

Those last 4.5 miles were tough.  I was pushing myself as hard as I could.  Every time I slowed to walk an uphill (side note: my definition of 'hill' had changed significantly since the beginning of the race), I would look back expecting to see her right there.  I would walk a few steps then to get myself started again, I would count down 3.....2.....1....GO! and pick up my feet to start running again.  I got to the last (and by far most evil) hill, Lucky Peak.  If you look at the elevation profile above of the course, you can see that it is basically a completely vertical ascent followed by a completely vertical descent - a straight line up and down really.  I had to run that darn hill twice last year in the 25k - Joe puts it at the very beginning and very end of the race, but it seemed infinitely taller and steeper this year.  It took everything I had no to stop and stand still while working my way up, because I knew if I stopped, I wouldn't be able to get back started again.  There was a 100k woman behind me a ways that I had passed a quarter mile back from Lucky who nearly passed me by the time I got to the top!!  This woman was amazing.  How she had the strength to power up that hill like she did is beyond me - and this was with knowing that she still had another lap to go.  Incredible.  I turned around and cheered for her and told her she was awesome, then made the final descent on my beaten up quads down the other side.  

Victory!!!  I just ran 31 miles and finished my first 50k in killer conditions.

The finish line was close.  I could taste it.  I passed the 'Last Chance' aid station for the 100kers and knew I had a half mile to go.  A half mile seemed like an eternity, but since I've been running with one of my running groups (the Ship of Fools) where we do weekly track workouts, I've learned to think about that last half mile of a race as 'just an 800' instead.  Two times around the track (well about 2 1/2 on our short track) y ya.  Done.  Unfortunately, that last half mile was all mud, but I guess, in some way, it wouldn't have been right if it weren't.  I finally came out of the woods and rounded the corner to the finish line in 5:57.  Thirty-seven minutes slower than my goal time, but under 6 hours and in 7th place overall, so I'll take it.  The girl that I thought was hot on my tail that was the impetus for me going 'fast' in those last 6 miles finished 7 minutes back from me.  I also found out that I'd won my age group (the top 5 finishers got overall awards, then age groups started after that), and that the award was this awesome metal donkey (I love Tejas Trails trophies).

   Done!! 7th place overall and first in my age group

My friends were waiting for me at the finish and quickly got me a drink and gave me high fives and hugs.  Three friends had finished before me, all of us within 20 minutes of each other.  More friends came in a little while later.  The 25k runners were there too and we all started sharing stories and congratulating each other.

  Brian (25k), Joe (50k), me and Billy (50k) at the finish line.  I'm just resting my eyes a little...

Some of us went into town where Courtney and Joe kindly let me use the shower in their bunkhouse (though, I think Courtney was just as happy that I showered as I was - I was pretty disgusting) and I finally got to eat my celebratory doughnuts.  I had a maple-covered and a glazed cake-style one.  Delicious.  I knew the sotol scratches on my legs were going to sting in the water, but I wasn't at all prepared for the horrible chafing burns on my back from my sports bra.  I got under the water and nearly let out a shriek as the warm water hit them.  I was really confused for a minute thinking, 'How in the world did I get sotol scratches on my back?!', but then I realized that it must be chafing.  I had used body glide under my arms where I've had chafing issues before, but didn't even think about putting it on my back.  Lesson definitely learned.  The rubbed areas have since converted into large scabs that go all the way across my back.  Other battle wounds include the sotol scratches, blisters on 6 out of 10 toes (some toes with multiple blisters) and general overall soreness.

**Disclaimer:  If you're easily bothered by cuts, blisters and the sort, don't look at these next pictures**

 

 Battle wounds.  Left: one of the worst blisters, this toe actually had at least two, the one you see plus one under the toenail (those hurt worse); Center: the chafing on my back from my sports bra; Right: scratches up and down my legs from the sotol bushes

 Did I mention it was a little muddy out there?

After showering, we ate at a restaurant and booked it back to cheer on our friend running the 100k.  When we got back, we found him at our campsite.  He had completed 48 miles (out of 62) and had to withdraw due to an IT band injury.  He was pretty upset, but all of us were (and are) extremely proud of what he did out there.  Forty-eight miles at Bandera on a good weather conditions day would be amazing.  In the kind of conditions we had that day, it was an incredible feat.   I have no doubt that the next big race he does, he will knock it out of the park.

A cold front was coming in, which meant big gusts of wind and dropping temperatures.  Those that were leaving that night or staying in town quickly took off for their warm cars or hotel rooms respectively.  My roommate and I wandered over the finish line to see who all was hanging out.  There weren't that many folks that we knew, so we hung out for a little while at camp chatting a bit before finally calling it a night around 8:30.  It took a little while to fall asleep with the wind whipping around outside and the occasional cheers coming in from the finish line as a 100ker would finish (the cut-off time was 7:00 AM the next morning, so some folks were out there all night long), but once I did, I slept well. We got up early the next morning, broke down camp and made our way back to Austin.

So, my first 50k did not go the way I imagined it.  Part of me is a little disappointed in my time, but most of me is pretty darn proud for doing it, and for doing it in the crazy conditions that we were given.  I really had a blast overall, and I am so grateful that I got to share it with some pretty awesome people.  I'm already thinking about the next big thing.  Well, I guess the next big thing is the Austin marathon in nearly 4 weeks now (yikes!).  I'm hoping to qualify for Boston 2014 there, so fingers crossed we have a better weather day on February 17th than we did on January 12th.  The next big trail thing for me might be the Chattanooga Mountain Stage Race.  It's 3 days, 3 mountains, 60 miles total.  Each day you go up and over one of three different mountains.  I'm from Chattanooga, and I think this would be an awesome and incredibly difficult race (which makes me want to do it even more).  There are time cutoffs for each day that I think I could make (you have to keep a 13 min/mile pace).  Even my moving average for Bandera in these conditions was 11:12/mile, but it makes a difference having a night to sleep that allows your muscles to get sore and stiffen.  It will take a lot of training to do it, but I think I can.

Anyway, Bandera 50k is in the books.  I can't ever do my first 50k again, but I wouldn't take the option of doing it over on a nice, cool, dry day even if I had the chance, because this is the way it was (hot, humid, muddy), so this is the way it was supposed to be.  It was definitely an adventure and a pretty awesome one at that.

Here's a video I got from YouTube that shows the rockiness, steepness and muddiness of the course: