Training Log Archive: Bash

If you weren't refreshing Twitter all weekend, here is a Barkley Marathons update:

1) John Kelly has become the 15th finisher since the race began in 1986. Last year he was the 3rd and final runner to head out on Loop 5 but he fell asleep just beyond the gate and lost so much time that he had to withdraw. He finished at 59:30, just half an hour ahead of the 60-hr cut-off at 1:42 p.m. today.

2) Five runners completed the Fun Run, which involves navigating 3 loops of the course for a total of 60+ challenging miles that must be completed within 40 hrs.

3) No women completed the Fun Run this year and no woman has ever finished the full Barkley. :(

4) Many of us were cheering for former adventure racer Gary Robbins to become the first Canadian to finish Barkley after he came close in 2016 but got lost on the final loop. He had logged some fantastic training, including thousands of feet of climbing on a Vancouver trail. He and John Kelly ran the first 4 loops together, then did the final loop in opposite directions, as required by the rules.

Sadly, Gary was not an official finisher. He arrived 6 seconds past the 60-hr cut-off with all the book pages (proof of reaching CPs) in the correct order. However, he arrived from the wrong direction after getting turned around in the fog and descending the wrong mountain, which would be grounds for DQ even if he arrived on time.

For a couple of gut wrenching videos for any endurance athlete, see Gary's finish partway down this page. What a class act! Canadian Running Magazine will post more details here as the story gets sorted out.
http://runningmagazine.ca/2017-barkley-marathons-r...
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UPDATE: Canadian Running Magazine has posted an updated story that explains things in more detail and provides some of the dialogue that was difficult to hear in the videos. UPDATE #2: Oh, and here's the link! :) http://runningmagazine.ca/story-ages-known-details...
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Unless you were following really closely, you would have missed a major controversy. Crews and spectators aren't permitted to access the runners except at the base camp and the tower, and they aren't permitted to receive aid anywhere except base camp. Canadian Running Magazine and Salomon Running posted a video of Gary talking with support crew who had apparently come to see him at a location where media were permitted but not crews. It's confusing because these are all experienced people who should have known better, and it's hard to imagine that his crew would do something to get him in trouble. Maybe they had some special permission but that is also hard to imagine. I'm sure the story will come out. The video was taken down quickly.

He didn't receive any physical aid but as he ran by, he described an alteration to be made to a particular pair of shoes for the next lap. He spent 55 minutes in camp at his next transition between loops so he didn't gain any time advantage from this. He was so sleep-deprived and focused that he probably didn't process the fact that his crew shouldn't have been with the media at that spot. There was an outcry from a vocal minority and if he had finished, it's quite possible that Laz would have DQed him. One year Laz DQed two finishers because they traveled 200 m on the wrong side of a creek in a 60-hr race!

'Bent and I met Browner and her pooches, Scout and Contour, for a run at Hilton Falls. The plan was for 'Bent and Scout to do a loop on their own so they could run faster for awhile; Browner and I would run with Contour. However, Scout would have none of that ("Where's Mummy?!?!?!") so it wasn't long before 'Bent had to return and run with us.

The trail conditions, weather and company were excellent! I never got into a groove; my body may have been in shock from doing a 3-hr road bike ride out of the blue. (Ow, my neck!) We refuelled with brunch at Grill Daddy, then 'Bent and I headed to the velodrome to watch Flight win her 2nd Canadian Track Championship of the weekend!

Goose, Coach LD, 'Bent and I went for a destination ride on the (mostly) paved Humber Trail from its new terminus at Claireville Conservation Area to the Toronto waterfront. I was worried about using my mountain bike with such a strong group so 'Bent and I spent some time last night setting up Princess (my road bike).

Browner, who knows me pretty well, said, "You HAVE a road bike?" I looked back in my AP log to find the last time I rode Princess outdoors instead of on the trainer. It looks like it was the Horseshoe Centurion 50K race in July 2012 - yikes! I worried about whether Princess could keep it together after all that time in the basement but nothing happened except a screw that fell off the water bottle cage, dropping my bottle and leaving my pump flailing. I had worried about more spectacular failures so that was fine.

It was chilly when we started out and I was glad for all my layers. We tried to strike a happy medium between keeping up a decent pace and being polite when we met pedestrians and dogs. Except for the final few kilometres, the trail wasn't too busy. There were several construction projects along the route but we were able to get through, even when signs said the trail was closed. We rode through some muddy, soft sections that weren't great on a road bike but Princess sucked it up.



We arrived in Browner's old neighbourhood by Lake Ontario and had a great lunch at Cafe Cocoa.

And then we rode back to Claireville! Time deducted for a couple of longer stops.

Always read the fine print.
http://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-...

Snow!!

Thanks to Funderstorm for today's treadmill video: Ginger Runner's interview of Jamil Coury before this weekend's Barkley Marathons.

If you are interested in following the Barkley, information and cell signal are scarce but the best place to watch is Twitter. You don't need an account.
Search for:

1) @keithdunn
and
2) #BM100

The start time is unknown. It could be anytime between Friday midnight and Saturday noon. It will be announced to runners by the blowing of a conch shell one hour in advance. Then the race starts when the RD Lazarus Lake lights a cigarette. There is a 60-hr cut-off.

One of the big stories is Gary Robbins' attempt to become the first Canadian ever to finish Barkley. He made it most of the way in his first attempt in 2016 before a nav error and a bonk. This year he attended some orienteering meets in Vancouver and he's been doing huge training weeks with monster elevation gains. He's looking good but anything can happen. Of more than 1,000 people who have attempted the race, only 14 individuals have been able to finish it, some of them more than once.

Mike Wardian and Jamil Coury are two other talented runners to watch. No woman has ever finished the Barkley so I will be cheering for all the women. Canada's Nicki Rehn is not returning this year.
http://www.mattmahoney.net/barkley/

The woman who originally placed 8th at Around The Bay on the weekend was wearing two chips - one for herself and one for a male friend. “This is something that is personal that people may or may not understand,” she said. Um, no, you don't get to play that card.

Also, she missed the 20K split - just zoomed straight from the 15K timing mat to the 30K finish line, running the final 15K in an unbelievable 50 minutes after taking 1:07 to do the first 15K. Pretty impressive for someone who ran ATB in 3:23 two years ago! Her story - that she was hurt and got help but just wanted to cross the finish line - might have been a tiny bit believable if she hadn't already been caught cheating with two chips. What amazes me is that people don't realize how hard it is to get away with cheating. She wasn't the only one caught.
http://runningmagazine.ca/around-the-bay-30k-disqu...

Midday run on gravel roads plus a 2 km test of the Palgrave East single track, which was mucky and slow and will need to dry out a lot more. For some reason, I felt great today. I chatted with two men who are coming back to Palgrave Forest tomorrow to do some drone filming for a Stephen King movie. "We need shots of the wilderness!" Cool, apparently I live in the wilderness. :)

This was my first run in the redesigned Salomon Sense Ultras. So far, I really like them! Lightweight, comfortable, stable and a relatively wide toe box. The tread isn't as aggressive as my beloved Speedcross but it was fine for today. While it's still muddy here, I should test them on a steep hill and see how it goes.