PCT50km: Suck it Up!

On Saturday, July 28, 2007 I had the privilege of running the Mt Hood Pacific Crest Trail Ultramarathon50 km race. It was lots of fun, talked with lots of great people and had an other opportunity to learn more about running.

The short story is that I had a great race with minor impact from my recovering ankle. I took it slightly easy on the downhill and was very careful to watch the trail for roots, rocks and holes. Never a tumble on this run.

4th overall, 2nd in my age group. 4:49:28
Splits:
Little Crater - 57:28
FS58 - 26:40
Hwy 26 - 40:07
TurnAround - 13:20
Hwy 26 - 10:57
FS58 - 46:25
Little Crater - 28
Finish - 1:06:21 (argh!)

Happy to be back running hard.

With the course change to not do the out and back to Little Crater Lake I had a little trouble telling if I had run the first section too fast. Likely I did but I do remember telling myself to slow down several times. Still learning.

I climbed well in the steeper sections between Little Crater and FS59 and established myself in a healthy second place for most of the race. I even enjoyed the out and back from Hwy 26!

On the way back down I was not going quite as fast as I would have hoped on the downhills. I believe I was starting to run out of fuel and likely slightly dehydrated. Eat more, drink more :-)
I was moved to 3rd when Rob Nelly came up moving like the wind on the downhills past FS58. We ran together for a little while until the Little Crater Aid station on the way back...then he was gone.

Then the not so fun part of the race: bonking and calf cramps for the last 5 miles.

I am trying to get smarter racing learning from my friends but I made 2 mistakes here AGAIN:

• I was not drinking enough and I ran out of gels.

Tums and S caps did help and are now forever part of my plan.
As mentioned on the ultra mailing list it may have been that I just plain hit the limit of my training. I have not seen too many long runs in the last 4 weeks ;-)

For Waldo I am going to two hand held bottles for the aqua and for the space to store the extra gels!
Planning on attempting to follow Olga's advice for 1.5 water bottles every 10 miles. I did 1.5 for 30 miles :-(

I also had the "fun" of seeing a bear cub out on the course. Cute little guy but I think we both freaked each other out. He went straight up a tree and I ran a pretty fast quarter mile!

Trisha stepped up and worked about 4 hours at the FS 58 Aid station. She did a great job as my "crew". Good practice for when we help out Stacey in the fall!
Trisha also came up with a running mantra that most of us will need during some part of a race: Suck it up!

It was really fun hangin' out at the end of the race as most of my friends were running the 50 miler! Ultra's are cool that way in that almost everyone from the fastest to the slowest mill around after the race to chat and get to know each other a little better...and eat hamburgers! A whole weird sub-culture :-).

And, speaking of weird... please ask Caroline and Dave S about their new "trail" names: Rocket Fat Jackson, and Lady Jane tenthStreet???

Olga and Monika put on a great race which I highly recommend.
Great course, great swag and lots of aid and friendly, helpful volunteers.
Jeff W does an amazing job as well with all the work and the burgers!
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE keep the 50km race!

I also highly recommend soaking your legs in Timothy Lake post race!