Training Log Archive: verticalwandererIn the 7 days ending Jun 11, 2017:
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Wednesday Jun 7, 2017 #
Run race (TAF Grimace 50 miler) 17:30:00 [3] 56.0 mi (18:45 / mi)
shoes: Superior (Dark Blue)
Short version:
DNF!! (well, not in time anyway)
Long version:
I felt good going into this race, had some really tough long training runs in the hills in San Diego and then had a good rest and felt fresh at the start. I had a plan to start very slowly and actually forced myself to stick to it as everyone else flew out of the gate I hung toward the back and committed to running my own race (at the time, I had no idea exactly how true this would be.)
The first aid station was at around 17km and I rolled in feeling great. I had drank one flask of Perpetuem along the way, so I stopped to refill and grabbed a food bag out of my pack (boiled egg, sweet potatoes and bacon with lots of salt) as well as a handfull of snacks off the table and I was off again after a couple of minutes.
Along the next stretch I was running and chatting with a Dutch guy for about an hour and eventually he had to stop to pee and said that he would try to catch up, so I was back to running alone. Shortly after the course cut out of the forest onto a paved road for a bit, then back onto a forest road. The course was very well marked with white chalk arrows on the ground at every turn and little orange signs on trees.
As soon as the course had turned onto the forest road, it started to drop down a long steady hill and I was just cruising along following the white arrows and not thinking much at all. Pretty soon a mountain bike came flying down the trail, but it was a double track, so it was no big deal....then another bike....then a couple more....then groups every so often. I remember thinking that it was a bit strange that there were so many bikes, but it is Belgium and people love to ride here. Soon I also started to wonder where my next aid station was as there were no mileage markers on the course, but I felt like it should be soon as I had been going for a long while since the last one.
Finally, I came to the bottom of this long forest road and saw a tent in the distance.....Ahhhh, my aid station! As soon as I started to get a bit closer, I wondered why so many of the runners had stopped for so long at this station and I caught up to them....the entire race was only 60-some people and there must have been more than 20 at the aid station. As I approached and saw the table, there were hundreds of cups of gatorade and water and I simultaneously realized that everybody at the table was in bike gear, not running gear.
The guy at the table said something in French and I explained that I didn't understand what he was trying to say. He didn't speak English, but got the point across that this was not my table. I thanked him for the gatorade asked (with the help of one of the bikers) if my aid station was close by. He just said "wrong path, up mountain" Somehow I had gotten on the path of a mountain bike race and all the white arrows that I had been mindlessly following down the mountain were for their race!
My heart sunk as my mind scrambled to try to remember the last time I saw one of the little orange signs. I could not remember one and was kicking myself for never even realizing, but I turned around and started heading back up the mountain. By this time the bulk of the mountain bike race had reached this part of the course and there were hundreds of bikes coming down as I was going up.
As I walked further and further up trying to find my trail again, I tried to cheer myself up thinking that my original thought was that I would finish in something like 10-11 hours and the cutoff was not until 13 hours, so a couple extra miles was not ideal, but I was still fine.
I walked further and further up until just after the paved road had turned onto the forest road, my path had cut off the forest road right into the woods where there was no trail at all!! That said, it was well marked with the orange signs and I am not sure how my brain had just dismissed the little orange signs and just followed the white arrows.
I was back on the path and still felt good and strong. I was not sure exactly how much time I lost, but I guessed it was about an hour (turns out it was 1.5) and about 3 mile (turns out it was almost double that with a LONG climb back up). Still, I was committed to pushing on and at this point was bummed, but still felt like I would have no problem finishing.
A few miles further from where I regained my path, I came across a neatly stacked pile of garbage bags in the middle of the forest. I immediately realized that this was where my aid station WAS, but everybody was gone. I started to panic a bit bc I was also out of water at this point. I stopped and started to look through the bags and saw that there were some still full 2L bottles of water under the bags. I was grateful for my food bags in my pack. I ate one there and staged the last one I had in there in an outside pocket. I mixed 2 more Perpetuem flasks with the last of the powder I had on hand and refilled my water.
As I started running again, I was thinking about my next aid station at 42 km and that is where my drop bag would be to get 3 more food bags, another ziplock full of Perpetuem, dry shoes and clothes, etc. Then it hit me, if this aid station was closed, I needed to make sure that the next one was not! Luckily the race director's phone number was on the back of my bib, so I called him and explained what had happened. His English was not perfect, but we could communicate. I told him that I had lost a lot of time and he asked if I was pulling out of the race. I told him that I was not, but I really needed all my stuff in my drop bag. He said that it would be no problem and that he would call the aid station and make sure that they waited for me. He even asked for my bib #. I breathed a big sigh of relief to know that they would be there and started running again.
At this point, I knew that the aid station was at 42km, and I knew how far I had run bc I had my GPS, but I didn't know exactly how far along the trail Iwas bc of the "detour". So, I was running and running and along the way finished my last 2 flasks of Perpetuem and my last 2 food bags. I had also finished most of my water and my GPS was reading something like 34 miles. I had not seen any sign of an aid station this time, and I knew that they were supposed to be waiting for me, but I must have already passed it! They must not have waited. My heart sank again, but then I remembered that for the drop bags, there were 2 bins that you could choose from, one at 42km and one at 56km. I thought maybe bc I had called so late, that my bag would be at the 56km station, so I pressed on.
Somewhere shortly after I made this decision, I completely ran out of water and only had 3 gels left in my pockets for fuel. Still not knowing exactly where I was, I did not know how much further the 56km was, but I started to slow down. I thought I should call again and clarify that I was still coming and that I must be past 42km but not sure how much further until 56km. I took my phone out and there was no service! I pushed on.
The further I went, the worse I felt. I ate a gel and felt a little better, but I was so thirsty and the gel just made that worse. I soon realized that I was in full on bonk mode out in the middle of the forest. I had not seen a road for miles and miles and I just wanted to be done with the race, but my only option was to keep going. Once I hit 40 miles on my GPS I felt very confident that I also missed the 56km aid station.
Dread set in and now I had not run at all for a long time and even walking was getting slower and slower and slower. Along the way I had also eaten both my other gels without water to just try to keep moving out to where I could get cell reception. As I walked through the forest, the flat parts were ok, the uphills were tough, but the downhills were brutal on my shot legs.
All together there was 2000m of vertical gain and loss, so this happened a lot and the further I went, the worst it got until finally I felt like I was just staggering on stumps. So badly I just wanted to sit down, but I knew that if I did it would be 100x harder to get up and go again. I would check my phone all the time, and eventually I got the 10% message, then it just died. My mind started to play tricks on me too. I was hearing people talking even though I was out in the middle of nowhere. Then as I was hiking up a steep hill, I looked down and there was a huge snake that made me jump so hard that I fell over backward. As I got up I looked and there was literally nothing at all near the path. Later I saw people and dogs walking toward me on the path that turned out to be trees.
Finally, I saw a little church at the top of a hill, only this time it was really there. I got up to it and it was all locked up. I banged on the door and a monk came out. He was very kind and spoke perfect English. I told him the story and explained that I really needed water badly and asked if he had any. He said that he did not, but pointed me down a path away from my marked trail and said that about 1km down the hill there was a spring where he got his water. He also apologized that he did not have anything at all to offer me to eat, because he was up there fasting and meditating. I thanked him and headed down the other path to get water.
I drank and drank and filled my pack and still did not feel great, but felt much better. I thought about trying to ask him again what the quickest way back to civilization was, and in retrospect I should have, but I instead just kept following my trail. At least now I had water. The going was slow and I was miserable. I ended up drinking all that water over the next several hours and had also run out of salt tablets somewhere along the way. After much more of the same it got dark and finally I got back to the parking lot at about 2330. I was an absolute mess.
In my car I had a recovery drink, more water and the electrolyte fizz tabs, but I knew I needed calories badly. At this point, the little village was all shut down, but I managed to find a coke machine and got 2. That got me out to the main highway where I raided a gas station and bought a ton of salty chips and snacks. Truth be told, I had no business driving as I was still seeing stuff on the highway, but I was certainly not thinking clearly and just wanted to get home.
All is well that ends well, but that was BRUTAL! I emailed the race organizers the next day to ask about my bag. The same race director that I talked to wrote me back and apologized profusely after I told him the whole story. He said that he had called the aid station where my bag was supposed to be and told them to keep an eye out for me. Later, they called him back and said that I had stopped by and got my bag, but I guess they had confused me for someone else. They said that another racer had dropped out of the race and they thought that my unclaimed drop bag must have been his. Luckily Monday was a holiday here as I could barely walk. Did a lot of soaking in a hot tub and sleeping. Tuesday was not much better, but I had to go to work and now today, I am starting to feel better and have been walking and foam rolling lot.
DNF!! (well, not in time anyway)
Long version:
I felt good going into this race, had some really tough long training runs in the hills in San Diego and then had a good rest and felt fresh at the start. I had a plan to start very slowly and actually forced myself to stick to it as everyone else flew out of the gate I hung toward the back and committed to running my own race (at the time, I had no idea exactly how true this would be.)
The first aid station was at around 17km and I rolled in feeling great. I had drank one flask of Perpetuem along the way, so I stopped to refill and grabbed a food bag out of my pack (boiled egg, sweet potatoes and bacon with lots of salt) as well as a handfull of snacks off the table and I was off again after a couple of minutes.
Along the next stretch I was running and chatting with a Dutch guy for about an hour and eventually he had to stop to pee and said that he would try to catch up, so I was back to running alone. Shortly after the course cut out of the forest onto a paved road for a bit, then back onto a forest road. The course was very well marked with white chalk arrows on the ground at every turn and little orange signs on trees.
As soon as the course had turned onto the forest road, it started to drop down a long steady hill and I was just cruising along following the white arrows and not thinking much at all. Pretty soon a mountain bike came flying down the trail, but it was a double track, so it was no big deal....then another bike....then a couple more....then groups every so often. I remember thinking that it was a bit strange that there were so many bikes, but it is Belgium and people love to ride here. Soon I also started to wonder where my next aid station was as there were no mileage markers on the course, but I felt like it should be soon as I had been going for a long while since the last one.
Finally, I came to the bottom of this long forest road and saw a tent in the distance.....Ahhhh, my aid station! As soon as I started to get a bit closer, I wondered why so many of the runners had stopped for so long at this station and I caught up to them....the entire race was only 60-some people and there must have been more than 20 at the aid station. As I approached and saw the table, there were hundreds of cups of gatorade and water and I simultaneously realized that everybody at the table was in bike gear, not running gear.
The guy at the table said something in French and I explained that I didn't understand what he was trying to say. He didn't speak English, but got the point across that this was not my table. I thanked him for the gatorade asked (with the help of one of the bikers) if my aid station was close by. He just said "wrong path, up mountain" Somehow I had gotten on the path of a mountain bike race and all the white arrows that I had been mindlessly following down the mountain were for their race!
My heart sunk as my mind scrambled to try to remember the last time I saw one of the little orange signs. I could not remember one and was kicking myself for never even realizing, but I turned around and started heading back up the mountain. By this time the bulk of the mountain bike race had reached this part of the course and there were hundreds of bikes coming down as I was going up.
As I walked further and further up trying to find my trail again, I tried to cheer myself up thinking that my original thought was that I would finish in something like 10-11 hours and the cutoff was not until 13 hours, so a couple extra miles was not ideal, but I was still fine.
I walked further and further up until just after the paved road had turned onto the forest road, my path had cut off the forest road right into the woods where there was no trail at all!! That said, it was well marked with the orange signs and I am not sure how my brain had just dismissed the little orange signs and just followed the white arrows.
I was back on the path and still felt good and strong. I was not sure exactly how much time I lost, but I guessed it was about an hour (turns out it was 1.5) and about 3 mile (turns out it was almost double that with a LONG climb back up). Still, I was committed to pushing on and at this point was bummed, but still felt like I would have no problem finishing.
A few miles further from where I regained my path, I came across a neatly stacked pile of garbage bags in the middle of the forest. I immediately realized that this was where my aid station WAS, but everybody was gone. I started to panic a bit bc I was also out of water at this point. I stopped and started to look through the bags and saw that there were some still full 2L bottles of water under the bags. I was grateful for my food bags in my pack. I ate one there and staged the last one I had in there in an outside pocket. I mixed 2 more Perpetuem flasks with the last of the powder I had on hand and refilled my water.
As I started running again, I was thinking about my next aid station at 42 km and that is where my drop bag would be to get 3 more food bags, another ziplock full of Perpetuem, dry shoes and clothes, etc. Then it hit me, if this aid station was closed, I needed to make sure that the next one was not! Luckily the race director's phone number was on the back of my bib, so I called him and explained what had happened. His English was not perfect, but we could communicate. I told him that I had lost a lot of time and he asked if I was pulling out of the race. I told him that I was not, but I really needed all my stuff in my drop bag. He said that it would be no problem and that he would call the aid station and make sure that they waited for me. He even asked for my bib #. I breathed a big sigh of relief to know that they would be there and started running again.
At this point, I knew that the aid station was at 42km, and I knew how far I had run bc I had my GPS, but I didn't know exactly how far along the trail Iwas bc of the "detour". So, I was running and running and along the way finished my last 2 flasks of Perpetuem and my last 2 food bags. I had also finished most of my water and my GPS was reading something like 34 miles. I had not seen any sign of an aid station this time, and I knew that they were supposed to be waiting for me, but I must have already passed it! They must not have waited. My heart sank again, but then I remembered that for the drop bags, there were 2 bins that you could choose from, one at 42km and one at 56km. I thought maybe bc I had called so late, that my bag would be at the 56km station, so I pressed on.
Somewhere shortly after I made this decision, I completely ran out of water and only had 3 gels left in my pockets for fuel. Still not knowing exactly where I was, I did not know how much further the 56km was, but I started to slow down. I thought I should call again and clarify that I was still coming and that I must be past 42km but not sure how much further until 56km. I took my phone out and there was no service! I pushed on.
The further I went, the worse I felt. I ate a gel and felt a little better, but I was so thirsty and the gel just made that worse. I soon realized that I was in full on bonk mode out in the middle of the forest. I had not seen a road for miles and miles and I just wanted to be done with the race, but my only option was to keep going. Once I hit 40 miles on my GPS I felt very confident that I also missed the 56km aid station.
Dread set in and now I had not run at all for a long time and even walking was getting slower and slower and slower. Along the way I had also eaten both my other gels without water to just try to keep moving out to where I could get cell reception. As I walked through the forest, the flat parts were ok, the uphills were tough, but the downhills were brutal on my shot legs.
All together there was 2000m of vertical gain and loss, so this happened a lot and the further I went, the worst it got until finally I felt like I was just staggering on stumps. So badly I just wanted to sit down, but I knew that if I did it would be 100x harder to get up and go again. I would check my phone all the time, and eventually I got the 10% message, then it just died. My mind started to play tricks on me too. I was hearing people talking even though I was out in the middle of nowhere. Then as I was hiking up a steep hill, I looked down and there was a huge snake that made me jump so hard that I fell over backward. As I got up I looked and there was literally nothing at all near the path. Later I saw people and dogs walking toward me on the path that turned out to be trees.
Finally, I saw a little church at the top of a hill, only this time it was really there. I got up to it and it was all locked up. I banged on the door and a monk came out. He was very kind and spoke perfect English. I told him the story and explained that I really needed water badly and asked if he had any. He said that he did not, but pointed me down a path away from my marked trail and said that about 1km down the hill there was a spring where he got his water. He also apologized that he did not have anything at all to offer me to eat, because he was up there fasting and meditating. I thanked him and headed down the other path to get water.
I drank and drank and filled my pack and still did not feel great, but felt much better. I thought about trying to ask him again what the quickest way back to civilization was, and in retrospect I should have, but I instead just kept following my trail. At least now I had water. The going was slow and I was miserable. I ended up drinking all that water over the next several hours and had also run out of salt tablets somewhere along the way. After much more of the same it got dark and finally I got back to the parking lot at about 2330. I was an absolute mess.
In my car I had a recovery drink, more water and the electrolyte fizz tabs, but I knew I needed calories badly. At this point, the little village was all shut down, but I managed to find a coke machine and got 2. That got me out to the main highway where I raided a gas station and bought a ton of salty chips and snacks. Truth be told, I had no business driving as I was still seeing stuff on the highway, but I was certainly not thinking clearly and just wanted to get home.
All is well that ends well, but that was BRUTAL! I emailed the race organizers the next day to ask about my bag. The same race director that I talked to wrote me back and apologized profusely after I told him the whole story. He said that he had called the aid station where my bag was supposed to be and told them to keep an eye out for me. Later, they called him back and said that I had stopped by and got my bag, but I guess they had confused me for someone else. They said that another racer had dropped out of the race and they thought that my unclaimed drop bag must have been his. Luckily Monday was a holiday here as I could barely walk. Did a lot of soaking in a hot tub and sleeping. Tuesday was not much better, but I had to go to work and now today, I am starting to feel better and have been walking and foam rolling lot.