Sometimes you don’t realize how much something has consumed you, has
driven your decision making, either sub-consciously or overtly, until it’s
gone. For me, that something has been
the Leadville 100. Since the day I registered on January 1st, I’ve
had one focus and one focus only: train for Leadville. At some point in the last days before the
race I realized that I couldn’t remember the last time I had slept past 5:30
AM. Most normal people cut loose a bit
on the weekends, stay up late, drink a few beers and sleep in the next
day. I was typically in bed by 9:00 or 9:30
and up at 4:00 to squeeze in 5-8 hours of running. Add in real-life stuff like coaching
baseball, softball, football and basketball and just trying in general to not become
some dirty, stinky-ass, half-stranger to your family, and some weekends became
quite the juggling act. I’d like to
think I made it through without putting running first more often than not but,
in reality, training for an ultra is a fairly selfish act. If you’re going to do it right (as in, if you’re
going to train at a level that will actually prepare you for the race), you’re
going to make some sacrifices in other parts of your life. Hence stumbling out of bed at 4:00 AM on a perfectly
good Saturday morning and pondering the absurdity of the entire endeavor. Truly, the running part of training for a 100
mile race is easy. It’s the logistics of
putting in the time that’s hard. Lucky
for me, I have an incredibly understanding and supportive wife (who also
happens to be a runner, which helps) and two kids who have never known anything
different….I think they assume that the amount of running that their parents do
is par for the course for ALL parents.
While I certainly trained hard for my other two 100s, I don’t know that
the same level of focus was there. Both
of them, Lean Horse and Bighorn, were somewhat of a known quantity since I had
run shorter distances a those events before and was familiar with the
respective courses. Leadville was a
whole other beast; an almost totally unknown nemesis. While I had seen a couple of sections of the
course from a vehicle a couple of years ago, I had never really set foot on it,
much less run any of it. And then, of
course, there’s the elevation. The city
of Leadville itself sits at 10,200 feet.
The “low” point of the course is 9,200 feet. Upon reaching said low point, you immediately
ascend to the high point of 12,600 feet.
That’s no joke. I mean, trees don’t
even grow up there for Christ’s sake. That
should probably be a clue of some kind.
So, with a healthy respect and a good bit of fear of the Leadville
course, I set about training the best I knew how with the trails available to
me in the Black Hills. The training
itself really wasn’t all that different from what I did for Bighorn last year. In fact, I did a lot of cutting and pasting
from my Bighorn plan when I sat down in February to devise my Leadville
schedule. I upped the weekly miles a
bit and vowed to do as many of the long runs as possible on trails, a vow I
ultimately did a fairly good job of keeping.
The simple fact is that there is no way to simulate the high altitude of
Leadville in the Black Hills. I figured
the next best thing was to get my legs and lungs used to running up and down
hills and hope for the best. Crow Peak,
just outside of Spearfish, became one of my go-to trails for achieving max
elevation gain (and loss) per mile.
Three or four consecutive summits of Crow always left my legs feeling
pleasantly jello-ish, but at the same time every time I set foot on the summit
and saw the sign that said “Crow Peak Summit, 5670 Feet), I couldn’t help but
think that the race I was training for STARTED at almost twice that elevation.
Despite the uncertainty of just how I would be able to handle a course
at such high altitude, I set a big goal for Leadville: finish in under 25 hours. At many 100s, sub-24 is the de facto “big”
goal; finish the race in one day. I
guess at some point the organizers of Leadville decided its difficulty
warranted an extra hour to earn the “big buckle” (which is, in reality, quite
large). I figured if I was going to go,
I was going to go big. But, at the same
time, heeding the advice of others who had run the race, I was also planning to
run smart; to not chase the sub-25 goal too aggressively and subsequently not
finish at all. With a typical finish
rate somewhere in the 50-60% range, just finishing Leadville isn’t a given by
any means. I certainly didn’t intend to
invest several months and 1800+ miles of training, not to mention a good bit of
money in the form registration fees, shoes, clothing, food, travel, etc. to
come home from Leadville empty-handed, with my first ever 100 mile DNF hanging
over me.
While the actual running of a 100 mile race can be a solo endeavor, and
my first 100 at Lean Horse was completed entirely solo, sans pacers or crew,
many participants bring along a cadre of crew members and pacers that assist
the runner at designated stops along the way and run/walk along with the runner
in the 2nd half of the race.
Ultra races are designed in such a way that having a crew isn’t
necessary; you can get by just fine on the supplies provided at the aid
stations. But, having a crew allows you
to have your own personal items and volunteers to cater directly to your needs,
not to mention the oft-overlooked advantage of seeing some familiar faces every
few hours. Pacers can be an even bigger
help, especially in an event such as Leadville.
At most races, the act of “muling” (i.e., the pacer carrying supplies
for their runner) is strictly forbidden.
Hell, it’s forbidden at the Black Hills 100, the race that I
co-direct. Leadville is one of, if not
the only, exception (I don’t know of any others off-hand). In a nod to the old-time hardrock miners and
their pack burros that the race was inspired by, pacers are allowed to carry
anything the runner wants them to, with the exception of the runner themself,
of course. Besides that, it doesn’t hurt
to have someone with fresh legs and, more importantly, a clear head to
accompany you in the middle of the night after 15+ hours of running. For Leadville, I put out a call for help that
was graciously answered by running friends Carolyn and Neil, who offered to
crew (they both still think the actual running of a 100 mile race is totally
insane, but I’m convinced I can turn them toward the dark side). I was also able to line up two pacers,
Johnathan and Mike. In a nod to the
unselfish nature of ultrarunners, and runners in general, Johnathan was on
board to pace two separate sections (about 20 miles total) just a week before
his first 100 mile race at Lean Horse.
Mike happily agreed to pace me the last 13.5 miles after already pacing
another runner, Nick Clark, who would end up finishing 2nd overall,
earlier in the night. And Neil, who is
recovering from Achilles surgery and was not really planning on pacing at all,
jumped in to join for a bit as well.
Maybe all of us runners, and ultrarunners especially, are totally insane
in the eyes of the non-runners out there, but you’ll never meet a nicer, more
selfless group of crazy-ass people in your life.
I made the trip down to Leadville in two parts, driving as far as Fort
Collins, where I bunked at Mike’s place, on Wednesday night. That left me with a short 3 hour drive to
Leadville on Thursday. As luck would
have it, my friend Paul was hired on by Lifetime Fitness, which organizes the
Leadville Race Series, in June and he and his wife Katie had offered up their
couch for the weekend. I happily
accepted as I had quickly discovered upon registering for the event that
lodging in Leadville during race weekend was a book- a-year-in-advance kind of
deal (small, old mining town with 2600 residents + a couple thousand
runners/crew/family/friends = zero lodging).
Besides the big advantage of being free, the ability to relax in a house
rather than a hotel room (or tent) can’t be understated. And, I got to play Chutes and Ladders and Candyland for the first time in forever
(thanks Wilson!).
As for altitude acclimation, there seems to be two schools of
thought. Either get to high altitude 2
or 3 weeks in advance and train there or get there within a couple of days of
the race and dive into the deep end before your body realizes what the hell you’re
doing. Obviously, I chose Option B and
hoped for the best. I spent Thursday
getting checked in at race headquarters and doing some shopping downtown. Friday was the pre-race briefing and expo and
just general sitting around and making sure all my gear was organized. Neil arrived Friday afternoon and we went
over my planned arrival times at each crew location and what gear I might need. With a fairly ridiculous start time of 4:00
AM, I headed off to bed fairly early, around 9:00 and was actually able to
sleep pretty well, right up until my 2:00 alarm.
After getting dressed and eating some breakfast, I found Johnathan
sleeping outside in the yard, having arrived overnight along with fellow Black
Hills residents Jim and Sara, who would be pacing/crewing for another friend of
theirs. I caught a ride to the start
line with them and milled around a bit until it was time to line up. Often, in those final moments before the gun
fires, I find myself wondering what in the hell I’ve gotten myself into and
questioning why I’m really about to put myself through this. At Leadville it was different. I was very calm and relaxed and just ready to
get going. In no time, we were off.
Start to Mayqueen (0 to 13.5
miles)
The race starts off with a few miles of downhill along paved and then
dirt roads exiting Leadville before jumping onto the rolling, but mostly flat,
single-track trail around Turquoise Lake.
One piece of advice I’d heard from many sources was to not go too fast
on this section, which is fairly easy to do with the downhill and adrenaline of
the start working in conjunction. I did
start out fairly fast on the roads, but didn’t feel like I was really overdoing
it too much. Once on the Turquoise Lake
trail, you fall into a conga line of 900+ runners and passing can be
difficult. I tried to be patient when
the pace slowed along this section, but there were moments when the pace
started to feel ridiculously slow and I ended up jumping off trail to pass
clogs of runners. I’m not sure how many
times I repeated the phrase “On your left, thank you”, but it was a lot. My goal was to reach Mayqueen at 6:10 AM. I got to Mayqueen at 6:10. Woulda been a few minutes faster if not for a
stop to crap in the woods along the way. Off to a good start. Because I’d heard that the congestion here
was a real bitch in the morning, I had told my crew to not even bother and just
meet me for the first time at the second aid station, Fish Hatchery. So, I made quick trip through the aid station
and grabbed some M&Ms and a PB and J for the road.
Mayqueen to Fish Hatchery (13.5
to 23.5 miles)
This section features the first real climb of the race as you exit
Mayqueen campground and climb Sugarloaf Pass via the Colorado Trail and
Hagerman Road. My legs were feeling good
and I ended up running much of the trail section and then falling into a
run/walk along the road. The climb went
by fairly quickly and it was time to descend the infamous Powerline. As the name suggests, the descent into Fish
Hatchery is along a powerline corridor that is washed out in many places and
features a few steep pitches alternated with flatter, easier downhill
running. This section would become the
bane of my existence later on, but early in the morning it all felt fairly free
and easy, although I did have to make another stop to crap in the woods (this
would be last one of the day, thankfully).
My goal had been to reach Fish Hatchery by 8:05 AM and I rolled in at
8:13. If not for that crap, I would’ve
been nearly dead on again. I found my
crew (or, more accurately, they found me) right away and quickly refilled my
hydration pack and restocked the fuels I had consumed (I was going off of GUs,
Clif Bars and Honey Stinger waffles for the most part). They also had a PB and J ready to go, which I
took for the road. In no time I was out
and on my way for what I was hoping would be a quick section to Twin Lakes.
Fish Hatchery to Twin Lakes
(23.5 to 39.5 miles)
There is actually another aid station (Half Pipe) in between here at
about mile 29 and a crew location a couple
of miles before that, but I had told my crew to skip ahead again to Twin Lakes
to try and avoid congestion. I
anticipated that this section would go by fairly quickly since it starts out
with a few miles of paved and then dirt roads, all of which are fairly
flat. Oddly enough, this was the first
time all day that I really started to feel like the elevation was affecting
me. Those road sections just were not as
easy to run as they should’ve been and I ended up taking some unplanned walking
breaks along the way. After the Half
Pipe crew zone, the course takes to some two track trails through the Half Pipe
aid station and then eventually on to the Colorado Trail again. I was still struggling a bit to find a rhythm
along the road section, but finally found the groove once I hit the single
track. The thing about it was that I
didn’t seem to be the only one struggling in this section….everyone around me
seemed to be in the same boat.
Regardless, by the time the trail descended into Twin Lakes, I was
feeling really good and, although the section overall felt ridiculously slow
and it felt like I had lost a ton of time, I came into Twin at 11:19, compared
to my goal of 11:10, so I’d basically only lost one additional minute. Given that all of my goal times for the day
were fairly arbitrary and unscientific, I was totally fine with that.
 |
| Cruising Through Half Pipe (photo courtesy of Jim Hadd) |
I did have a moment of near-panic when I couldn’t find my crew right
away upon arriving at the aid station.
The thing about this aid station is that it’s friggin huge. You pass through the aid station tent itself
(which I passed straight through without grabbing anything) and then continue
along some roads that are lined shoulder to shoulder with waiting crews. Before long, I ran out of road and was being
ushered onto the trail exiting the aid station, but still hadn’t seen my crew. I now faced the dilemma of turning back to
see if I had just missed them or continuing on.
As I paused to consider the options, I heard Carolyn’s angelic voice
calling my name (seriously, the amount of relief I felt just then was
substantial). They were positioned just
down the trail from where I was, along the exit from the aid station. Neil had been positioned somewhere earlier,
but we had somehow missed each other. No
big deal in the end as Carolyn and Johnathan quickly got me refilled and
refueled and set me up with my trekking poles and stuffed a jacket, hat and
gloves into my pack for the ascent up and over the infamous Hope Pass.
Twin Lakes to Winfield (39.5 to
50 miles)
This is perhaps the most iconic section of the Leadville Trail 100; the
climb up and over Hope Pass (and then back up and over). At 12,600 feet, it represents the high point
of the course. Just below the pass
itself is the Hope aid station, often referred to as “Hopeless”. Aid station supplies for Hope are carried up
the mountain on a pack train of llamas, creating the surreal experience of ascending
the trail above treeline to come into a field of grazing llamas. The climb starts after the only real creek
crossing of the day just past Twin Lakes.
After running the flat trails to the base of the Hope climb, it was pure
hiking mode after that. I put the new
trekking poles to good use but was quickly feeling the effects of the
climb. This was the 2nd time
that I felt like the altitude was taking a toll. Granted, this climb wouldn’t be all that easy
at lower elevation after 40 miles, but being at 10,000+ feet certainly didn’t
help. It felt like I was absolutely
crawling up that hill, probably because I damn near was. I just didn’t have any push in my climbing
legs. I stopped a few times to drink
some water and at one point forced myself to choke down a GU, which took some
considerable effort, but it went down and, more importantly, stayed down. My stomach felt fine, and had all day, I just
didn’t have much of an appetite at that point.
Just below tree line the race leader at the time, Mike Aish, came
bombing down the hill. Not long after,
Ian Sharman ran by in hot pursuit (he would eventually pass Aish and hold on
for the win).
 |
| Llamas at Hope Pass (photo courtesy of Jim Hadd) |
By the time I got down the other side of the pass to the new Winfield
trail, I was feeling pretty good again, but at some point along here I realized
that I had made a totally stupid and careless mistake up at the Hope aid
station. Upon arriving at the aid station,
a volunteer had asked me if I needed my pack re-filled with water. I reached back to feel how full the hydration
bladder was and it felt almost full, so I declined. Well, turns out that what I had felt wasn’t
the water in the bladder, but my jacket and hat and gloves bundled up in the
exterior pocket. By the time I got down
to the Winfield trail, my hydration bladder was in fact almost empty. I guess I was drinking more water than I had
thought, which was a good thing, but now I was almost certainly going to run
dry before the Winfield aid station, which wasn’t so good. As it turned out, I only ended up going about
a mile and a half without water, so not a huge deal, but it also could’ve been
easily prevented.
Winfield is a ghost town that springs to life for the Leadville 100 and
was quite the madhouse when I arrived.
From all the crew reports I’ve heard, including the account of my own
crew, getting into Winfield with all of the race traffic was quite a
chore. In fact, at one point my crew was
so concerned that they wouldn’t make it into the aid station before I arrived
that Johnathan jumped out of the car and took off running the last couple of
miles to the aid station, hauling a bunch of random crap he thought I might
need with him. Thankfully, another crew
who had gotten past the gridlock stopped and gave him a ride and by the time I
got there my entire crew had made it in.
My projected arrival at Winfield had been 2:30 PM and I arrived exactly
at 3:00, not bad considering I had already been behind my projected time
leaving Twin Lakes and spent a little bit of extra time at Hope. I’ve run 50 mile races (Quad Rock and
Bighorn) in longer than 11 hours, so the fact that I was able to cover the
first half of a 100 in exactly 11 hours was encouraging (or, it meant that I
had gone WAY too fast).
 |
| Re-stocking at Winfield (honestly not sure who took this picture) |
Immediately upon arriving, I was told I had to weigh in. The scale showed me down 8 pounds from my
pre-race weight, a fact that earned me a dirty look from the otherwise
nice-looking old lady who was recording weights. She told me to get into the aid tent and eat
and drink, which I promptly did (she seemed serious and I wasn’t about to argue
with her). Johnathan followed me into
the aid tent, where I grabbed a cup of ramen noodle soup and some Coke. As I fumbled around with my trekking poles
and two cups, I told Johnathan to hold the soup cup for me. Not having been brought up to speed yet on
the allowance of muling at Leadville, he immediately said, “No, I don’t want to
get you disqualified.” Ah, so
innocent. I smiled and told him it was
perfectly legit and was, in fact, encouraged here and that he would be carrying
much more than a cup of soup for me in the very near future. Upon that news, we quickly transferred all of
my extra gear (jacket, hat, gloves) to his pack, leaving me with just my water
pack and trekking poles. Carolyn and
Neil had my pack ready to go when I exited the aid tent and with that Johnathan
and I were off to tackle the 2nd half of the race.
Winfield to Twin Lakes (50 to
60.5 miles)
It’s amazing how having someone with you can take your mind off of things and just make you feel better. Granted, by the time I reached Winfield I was feeling pretty decent anyway, but having Johnathan along for the return trip over Hope helped take my mind off the fact that I did indeed have to make a return trip over Hope. Although the climb back up is shorter, it’s also steeper, but we made fairly good progress. And although Johnathan was pacing for the first time in an ultra, he took to it like an old pro, subtly reminding me every 15-20 minutes that I should probably drink some water, or take an S-cap, or eat a gel. I didn’t always feel like doing any of those things, in fact sometimes I wanted to stab him in the eye with a trekking pole, but knowing that it was for my own good, I grudgingly obliged. I won’t say that the climb back up Hope was easy, but it certainly went better than the first climb had. As soon as I hit the top, I thrust my trekking poles back at Johnathan for him to carry and ran down into the aid station, feeling much better than I had the first time I had arrived there. I didn’t get waylayed by the friendly medical lady this time and after drinking some Coke and ramen noodles (this would be my standard fuel for the remainder of the run as solid foods just weren’t appetizing anymore), I collected my hydration pack that Johnathan had refilled for me and took off downhill while Johnathan hung back to take pictures of the llamas (he was really excited about those damn llamas).
 |
| Descending Hope Pass (photo courtesy of Johnathan Karol) |
The descent down Hope back to Twin Lakes went by in a blur. I ran the whole way, feeling great and
passing several others who had passed me on the previous ascent. At one point, we came upon a hiker heading up
the hill, holding his bloody nose. I
paused to ask if he was okay before I realized that it was Paul, heading up to
check on the Hope aid station. We gave
him crap because, theoretically, he should be acclimated by now and not suffering
altitude-induced nose bleeds. At another
point in the descent I had to tell Johnathan not to pick up the glow sticks he
was finding on the trail. Being the Good
Samaritan that he is, he thought they were trash and was just trying to help
out. Thankfully, he only picked up one
or two before I realized what was going on.
In no time, we were back at Twin Lakes and Johnathan’s first pacing leg
for the day was done. My goal had been
to reach Twin Lakes by 6:00 PM and we checked in at 6:32, basically holding the
pace that I had been on for the last few sections.
I found my crew right away this time, as Carolyn and Neil were at the
same place I had found Carolyn and Johnathan the first time through. I ditched the trekking poles, gathered my
jacket, hat and gloves from Johnathan and also grabbed a portable charger to
charge my Garmin while I ran the next section (as an aside, this is the first
time I’ve ever done this and it worked like a charm, allowing me to record the
entire run on my Garmin 910….the only downside was that I couldn’t see my time
or pace while it was charging since it only shows the percent charged and time
of day while charging). I also grabbed a
handheld bottle and filled it with Coke as I was done with GUs or any solid
food at that point and wanted to have some form of calories with me.
Twin Lakes to Half Pipe (60.5 to
72.5 miles)
Heading out of Twin Lakes is a decent climb, but one that isn’t nearly
as steep or strenuous as the double crossing of Hope. I was able to hike it fairly strongly and
once it was over I alternated running and walking as appropriate on the rolling
sections of road and Colorado trail leading back to the Half Pipe aid
station. I didn’t have a pacer for this
section, but felt fine doing it solo and ended up running a bit with other
runners and their pacers. Somewhere
along this section it got dark enough that I had to dig into my pack for my
headlamp and turn it on before reaching the Half Pipe aid station. Once there, I refilled my pack with water and
my handheld with Coke and grabbed some more ramen soup and some watermelon
before heading out toward the Half Pipe crew zone a couple of miles past the
aid station. While I had told my crew to
skip that location on the outbound leg, I decided it might be a good idea to
meet them there inbound in case I needed anything. When I got there, Neil was ready to pace the
next 4 mile section of roads to Fish Hatchery, something that hadn’t been
planned beforehand, but was welcome nonetheless. Having restocked everything at the actual aid
station, I didn’t really need anything at the crew zone, although I did ditch
the charger since my Garmin was back to 100% and would have plenty of juice to
make it to the finish. The question was,
how much juice did I have left??
Half Pipe to Fish Hatchery (72.5
to 76.5 miles)
Having just recently completed rehab from Achilles surgery in the
spring and in the process of working his way back into running shape, I think
Neil was a little concerned about being able to keep the pace with me. His concerns were quickly assuaged when he
realized what kind of pace it was he would have to maintain. The miles had started to take their toll and
my legs and feet just weren’t into it anymore.
We alternated running and walking down the road, maintaining something
around a 15:00/mile pace, maybe just a tad faster if I hit a good little
downhill stretch and was really able to hammer it (say, 12:00/mile pace). The
worst part of this section is that you can see the lights of Fish Hatchery
basically all the way from the Half Pipe crew zone. I commented to Neil more than once that those
damn lights weren’t getting any closer.
He assured me that they were but, damn, it wasn’t happening very fast.
We did eventually get there, however, and it was again Johnathan’s turn
to babysit me over a tough climb, one that will live in my nightmares for many
weeks to come.
Fish Hatchery to Mayqueen (76.5
to 86.5 miles)
Upon arriving at Fish Hatchery at 10:27 PM (27 minutes behind my goal),
I was still solidy on sub-25 pace and, in fact, was almost exactly on sub-24
pace. But I knew that the next section
would make or break my ability to achieve either of those landmarks. The Powerline climb has crushed many dreams
at Leadville. I had heard various horror
stories about it beforehand, but until you experience it you simply can not
fathom how sadistically cruel it is.
Some say it has three or four false summits. Others say there are six. I think I lost count at 27, give or
take. I told Johnathan on at least three
occasions, “If that’s not the real top, I’m going to sit down and cry”. On none of those occasions was it the top
but, to my credit, I didn’t actually sit down and cry (although I wanted to). Also, my headlamp was starting to play tricks
on me. Stumps along the trail were
turning into deer, and I saw hundreds of snakes on the trail, all of which
turned out to be branches or roots upon closer inspection. I kept repeating to Johnathan, “It’s never going
to end, it’s never going to end” and “someone must’ve moved the trail markers,
this hill wasn’t this long when we ran down it”. It was, quite honestly, like one of the nine
circles of Hell from Dante’s Inferno. By
the time we actually did reach the top, an hour and a half later, I was a bit
out of it. My legs were shot, my feet
were raw and my brain was addled. I
wanted so very badly to be able to run the relatively gentle downhill road down
the other side, but I just couldn’t run for more than 50 yards at a time. In fact, I was having trouble just staying
awake, as my headlight beam shining on long, straight, monotonous stretches of
road was lulling me to sleep. Any
realistic shot I had at finishing in under 25 hours evaporated as I walked down
that road, unable to make up any of the time had bled away on the trudge up
Powerline. I was able to pick the pace
up a bit, and wake up, once we hit the Colorado trail again and the
technicality of the single track gave me something to think about and focus on,
but it was too little, too late (and not that fast, regardless) at that
point.
We rolled into Mayqueen at 2:06 AM, over an hour behind my goal time of
1:00 and a half hour behind sub-25 pace, the first time I’d been behind sub-25
pace all day. That left me with 2 hours
and 53 minutes to cover the last 13.5 miles and finish in under 25 hours. Under normal circumstances, a ridiculously easy
feat, but nothing is ridiculously easy after 86.5 miles. Mike was waiting to take me the rest of the
way into Leadville and he was much more confident about my abilities to earn
the big buckle than I was, but I warned him that this last section would likely
be a long, slow hike around Turquoise Lake.
Ever confident, he said something along the lines of “We won’t rule
sub-25 out” and off we went.
Mayqueen to Leadville (86.5 to
100 miles)
Although by this point I had basically come to terms with the fact that
I was not going home with a big buckle, I also knew that I was going to finish
and probably finish with a fairly respectable time. I was actually kind of concerned that I would
finish painfully close to 25 hours and Mike and I had a conversation about how
it’s almost preferable to finish in say, the 25:30-26:00 range, than to be
within sight of the finish when the clock clicks over to 25:00:00. So, yeah, I was sandbagging a bit, but the
reality was that I just didn’t have enough juice in the tank to make up the
time I needed to make up.
As we started the trip around Turquoise Lake, Mike initially made good
on his vow not to rule sub-25 out and tried to encourage me to test the running
legs. And, amazingly, they actually
responded a bit at first and we covered maybe a half-mile at a fairly
respectable (for that point in the race) clip.
But, my 2nd wind (or maybe it was my 22nd wind?)
didn’t last long and before long we were hiking again. By that point, it wasn’t my legs that were
the problem as much as it was my feet. I
had been feeling some blisters forming for quite some time and the balls of
both feet were absolutely excruciating whenever I landed wrong on a rock or
root, making it exceedingly difficult to run any kind of decent pace on the
suddenly technical trail (none of those rocks or roots were there in the
morning, I swear to God). So, we spent
the time hiking catching each other up on the goings-ons of the day and
enjoying the view of the nearly full moon reflecting off of Turquoise Lake and,
after the moon set, the brilliant starscape and Milky Way up above. The stars really do look closer high up in
the mountains, far removed from any form of artificial light or air pollution.
The long trip around Turquoise Lake actually passed by relatively
quickly, but by the time we reached the roads leading back into Leadville, I
had totally forgotten just how long we had to travel on those roads to reach the
finish. In the morning, on the way out
early in the race, those roads had gone by in a flash. For some reason, in my mind, I was expecting
to leave the Turquoise Lake trail and be back in town soon after, but that’s
not the case. First, you have to cover a
couple of miles of dirt roads before hitting the Boulevard, a three mile long,
straight stretch of road that rises at a gradual but steady pitch up toward
Leadville. I honestly barely even
remember running down the Boulevard on Saturday morning, but I won’t soon
forget hiking up it on Sunday morning.
Like Powerline, I swore several times that it was never going to
end. I could see the headlamps of
another runner and their pacer maybe a quarter of a mile up ahead of us and,
every once in awhile, the headlamps would disappear, which would lead me to
believe that they had reached the end of the Boulevard and turned off, which
meant we soon would too. But, alas, it
always turned out that they had just disappeared over a small rise and would
come back into view a short time later, revealing that I still had a long ways
to go. I knew that we should be getting
closer to Leadville, but there was no indication that we were getting anywhere
at all…all I could see was a seemingly never ending, straight stretch of road
lined with a wall of trees on each side with no streetlights or any other indications
of an approaching town in sight. I was
so out of it by this point that if Mike hadn’t been with me, I ‘m pretty sure I
would’ve become convinced that I had taken a wrong turn and was not in fact
even on the right road. Eventually,
though, the end of the Boulevard did appear up ahead (way up ahead) and Mike
said we still had a shot at sub-26, a totally arbitrary and meaningless goal,
but one that became suddenly very critical to achieve. I couldn’t run at all thanks to the blisters
on my feet, but I could power hike like a sonofabitch, so that’s what I did.
Upon reaching the end of the Boulevard, you find yourself suddenly in
Leadville (after no indication that it even exists for the last few miles, it’s
just suddenly there). A left turn
followed by a quick right deposits you onto 6th Street, the final
stretch of road to the finish. 6th
street starts of with a short hill, which means you can’t actually see the
finish until you approach the crest of that hill. I gotta tell ya, there are few sights more
glorious than seeing the finish arch and red carpet up ahead when you do crest
that first rise. Of course, nothing at
Leadville comes easily, so after that first rise and a subsequent short
downhill on 6th, you have to finish on an uphill. Although by this point it was obvious I would
finish in under 26 hours, I initially had thoughts of running it in all the way
from the top of the first rise. Those
thoughts vanished after two running strides sent bolts of agony up from my
blistered feet. Back to powerhike mode,
but I vowed that, painful or not, I would run across the finish line. As I neared the red carpet, I heard the
finish line announcer say my name and “What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger”
playing over the PA system. At the end
of the red carpet, I started in on something that may have resembled a
run. It hurt like hell, but I did it
anyway and held true on my vow to run across the finish. 25:53:14. Immediately after crossing the
line, Marilee, the original race director of Leadville, was there to put my
finisher’s medal around my neck and give me a hug. She said, “Welcome home”, to which I replied “It’s
good to be home.” After that I was met by
Neil, Carolyn, Mike, Johnathan and Paul and I believe my exact words to them
were “Holy fucking shit.” How poetic,
huh?
 |
| From L to R: Neil, myself, Carolyn and Johnathan in the med tent post-race. |
My feet on fire and the rest of my body freezing in the pre-dawn
30-some degree temps, I made a bee line for the med tent to get my feet looked
at. The medical volunteers didn’t seem
too concerned with my blistered feet, but they did take notice when I started feeling
nauseous soon after finishing. After taking
my blood pressure and pulse-ox, they gave me some Tums and Carolyn brought me
some chicken broth. Those things,
combined with a blanket and seat next to a heater, soon had me feeling much
better and I was ready to head out for a shower and a quick post-race celebratory
breakfast at the coffee shop before the crew started to disperse in their
separate directions.
Aftermath
I guess the first question is: am I disappointed? Short answer: no. Yeah, I wanted a big buckle, but I also
wanted a finish, and I feel like I fought the good fight to earn it. 943 people started the Leadville 100 this
year. 494 finished, a finish rate of
52%. Finishing any 100 is never a given,
much less a 100 such as Leadville, so I won’t take that fact for granted. Will I go back to try and get a big
buckle? I honestly don’t know right now;
much too soon to think about that. I don’t
even know when I’m going to run again, much less what event I’ll run next.
 |
| Finisher's swag: buckle and jacket (photo courtesy of Johnathan Karol) |
Physically, my legs were sore the remainder of the day on Sunday, but a
couple of days later they feel fine. My
feet, on the other hand, are another matter.
I’ve suffered from blisters in each of my 100 milers now, something that
I’ll have to try and remedy in the future, but I’ve never suffered like
this. Two days later and I can still
barely walk because the balls of my feet are so raw and painful and my feet are
so swollen. I’m not sure of the cause,
but I sure hope I can figure it out before the next one (yes, despite all this
pain, there will almost certainly be a next one).
I’ve said thank you to all of these people multiple times already, but
it deserves repeating here in writing for all eternity. So, thank you to Neil, Carolyn, Johnathan and
Mike for your support on the course, whether pacing or crewing. Having friendly faces out there was
invaluable, especially in the wee hours of the morning when I wasn’t quite all
there mentally. Paul and Katie, thank
you for a place to sleep and cook and just hang out over the weekend. And, last but most certainly not least, thank
you to Shannon and Caiden and Chloe for putting up with my obsession and for
your support. Hey, I’m not running this
weekend, we should do something!
Oh, and I slept until 6:30 this morning. It was awesome.
