So we have several ultras on the calendar for the summer (including a new distance for Sonny 100K!) and this race was the first of them. I had initially picked it out because it involves running up and down a ski hill a total of 5x during the race, and I wanted to get in some good hill training as both of our other races are Midwest hilly (and we live in flatlander land). It also helped that the race was comparatively cheap and was in Grand Rapids, an area I ran never run in.
Stupidly, I let myself be psyched out by my ultrasignup.com estimated finish time of 6 hours and 13 minutes, and decided to aim to six and a half hours. I knew the race was going to be hilly, but I thought since my last 50K had taken me 6 hours, I should have this in the bag. Having a time goal made me nervous though, and I definitely felt a weird combination of anxiety and complacency (its
only a 50K). We tapered the week of the race only, but otherwise didn't change our training plan.
The day before the race Sonny and I both took a half day and set off round the lake. We dropped the dogs off at our favorite kennel near Grace's place then headed north. I had spent some time on the internet and found some camping spots in Manistee National Forest. We were hoping to keep the weekend budget-friendly, and to be honest were sick of the sounds and smells of cheap hotels. Instead of spending the money on a Motel 6, we bought an air mattress meant for the back of our Jeep (or for our tent). Fun fact: at some point you magically become old enough that sleeping directly on the ground hurts too much. The plan was to check out the camping situation in the Manistee before and maybe after the race. Luckily, my internet searching paid off as the site was perfect.
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| Heck yeah $10/night |
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| There were only 5 sites and they were all quite large with plenty of space between them. |
We settled in and I cooked dinner, then we enjoyed some blueberries from our CSA and split a beer. After dinner we walked around a bit to stretch our legs and to see if we could find the North Country Trail which passes nearby.
We went to bed early as we were going to have to wake up rather early for the race. Unfortunately for us, it was very hot out, and didn't even cool down much at night. Sleeping in the Jeep was pretty sweltering, but without screens opening a window meant attack of the mosquitos. The sweating eventually prevailed and neither of us got much sleep from the 1-2 punch combo. Normally, this wouldn't matter to me, but I hadn't slept well the previous night either due to the heat. This meant race morning I was a groggy little monster. Luckily, Sonny has had to put up with me for many years and knows to just roll his eyes at my growls.
We grabbed our bibs and signed in for the race without incident. Sonny even got randomly chosen to win a jar of local honey and I scored some Merril socks (always need more socks). It was already pretty warm and humid out at 6 am EDT (5 am our time) which was not boding well. We did last minute prepping, and I tried to put lube everywhere as I was worried about chaffing. I'd just had a spectacular spate of it on our last big training run due to similar weather conditions that just kept everything soaking wet. Luckily, I had brought a complete change of clothes so I could swap out if needed, and we had a nice drop bin set up. The course was a 10K loop that we would do 5x, culminating in running up then down a ski hill.
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| View from the top |
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| Squiggly spaghetti mess |
After the typical low key trail running brief and start, we were off! It was still pretty dark and you really couldn't see much. We ended up running in a pack of runners, several of whom were talkative. I settled in and listened to them chatter, joining in every now and then. By the end of the first loop, we had all introduced ourselves and decided to hang out for the time being. The trail we ran on was built as a mountain biking loop, and is VERY switchback-filled. It meant that no one's watch did a good job of recording pace or distance. As such, I had no idea how I was doing speed-wise til we finished a loop. I did know, however, that it was HOT and MUGGY and I could tell that my effort and pace were affected. I focused on doing no harm and power-hiking all the hills with purpose. We finished the first loop ten minutes slower than I wanted and I immediately let go of all time goal thoughts and decided to just focus on consistency and form on the ski hill. Lap two was identical to the first and we moved on to three. After the third lap I needed to use the bathroom and apply some more body glide as I was thoroughly soaked. Amanda, one of the runners we were caravanning with set off first asking us to catch her. Sarah, the other left the aid station after us and thus our littler troop was split. The fun part about the odd course, however, was the fact that you would constantly see other runners, even if they were at different parts of the loop than you due to the intestinal folding of the path. So, we kept seeing Amanda through the trees and she would holler at us to catch her, but Sonny and I decided to maintain our pace. I do think we had sped up a bit compared to running in the group and I was feeling surprisingly good for the fourth loop, which I expected to be the worst.
My hubris quickly caught me though as I caught my foot on some infinitesimal root and went flying through the air, landing superman style, then skidding and rolling all the way off the trail. Sonny said it was quite the incredible fall, and I got covered in dirt all down one side of my body. I took a moment to get my breath back into my body then stood up. In a giddy moment, Sonny and I both burst out laughing for awhile. I had two skinned knees, one bleeding pretty good, I'd jammed my wrist by landing on it, and my whole left leg felt unhappy and tight. I walked it off for a bit then started running again. In the weird way of trail running, I was oddly proud of my ridiculous appearance, and I really regret not getting a photo right away, because when we hit the next aid station, the volunteers set to work cleaning me up. We got most of the dirt off my knees and washed off the blood then used an alcohol wipe to try to clean the wounds. There were little rocks and twigs embedded in my skin and I eventually gave up as it was all just taking too much time. We finished the loop and it was much slower than the first three. Sonny tried to get me to see the medical tent to get it cleaned up, but the staff member was working on another runner and asked me to wait. I wavered, and wasted too much time, before decided this was stupid and I might as well finish the race first. The good part about all this was we ran back into Sarah who said she was really glad to see us as her last loop had been alone and she was struggling a bit. We told her to get on the pain train and set off on the last loop.
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| Clean arm, dirty arm |
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| After cleaning |
Normally, at the end of a race I get this awesome burst of energy and am always astonished at how much I still have in reserve despite hours of feeling like I gave my all. This race however, was not like that. Sonny took the lead and set the pace and pulled us along. We were far past my time goals and would be lucky if we broke 7 hours. Sonny gave it his best and pulled Sarah and I along at a good clip. I went into robot mode and just ran nearly non-stop as I realized it hurt me whether I was walking or running. The left leg was very cranky and adding a good bit of pain to my load. I kept waiting for my typical burst and grinding it out til I got there. We ended up trying to help a runner who was having terrible cramps in his legs, but there wasn't much to do. After thanking the volunteers at the aid station and exclaiming how nice it would be to never see them again we counted down through the various landmarks of the loop until FINALLY it was time for the last ski hill. By this point I was grunting and whimpering a bit, but Sonny and Sarah kept up a steady stream of encouragement and we made it up the hill. It felt so good to unwind the legs and fly down for the last time.
7:06:57
Overall:26 Female:11
Afterwards we got our shoes off (very minor blistering yay!), and sat in the cold stream. We found Amanda who had finished just before us and got a photo to remember.
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| Its astonishing how slow sitting down was |
We walked gingerly over to the cafe on the deck and got a post race beer each. Relaxing with our legs up, we talked with other races and members of the Western Michigan trails runners who are all pretty fast and gave me some advice on running in the area. Overall a fun time. Once we had recovered enough, we headed back to the campsite to relax. We ended up falling asleep at 7 pm and slept all the way through until 8 am the next morning. The new air mattress was pretty great!
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| Our finisher's awards were metal pint glasses |
