Old Man Still running

Taper week....who hoo!  Just an easy seven miles on the treadmill to keep things loose and scare away the taper pains.   7x8:00x3.5%

Rocky Raccoon weather this Saturday looks perfect to me.  Cold start mid-20s (can really push that first 20 miles hard), warming up to mid-50s, cooling to about 40 by finish.  No heat, no rain!  Mud in places could be an issue, but blast on through it!  Humidity only 50%.

The no-headphones debate continues on the races' facebook blog.  It is interesting to that those who chime in and are so negative toward people who use them haven't even run a 100-mile race before, yet they want to see them banned.

Here's a funny exchange:

Runner: "One of the things that I like about trail running is the friendliness of the fellow runners. When you add headphones (like on the roads) people become very unfriendly - no smile, wave, nod, or howdy. Besides, if someone can't handle using his own brain for entertainment, makes me wonder how much he likes his own self? To me, it's a time to think things through, review classnotes, to do lists, listen to nature, make new friends as they jet by."

My reply: "Yes, same old endless argument. People who like to listen to music while running are mentally weak, unattached from nature, unfriendly, not alert, so we need to put in a rule so we can make them be better runners like us. I don’t buy it at all and I go both ways in my use. I find all 100-mile runners to be generally a fantastic, friendly, completive, mentally strong group. Some are in a zone and aren’t going to say hi to everyone, that is fine, after all, it is a race. But let’s not impose rules to make people run exactly the way we think is “right.” Barefoot/Hokas, headlamps/handhelds, meat/no-meat, music/no-music, and on and on. Live and let live, run and let run."

Same treadmill routine.  7x8:00x4%   Legs feel good.  Weight a little lower than last year.  Mileage base higher than last year.  But I'm a year closer to the grave this year.  Only worry is the tooth socket.  Seems to be getting a little bit better, but still starts aching bad when I run.  Oh well, will keep my mind off the other aches and pains.

The goal is to go sub-20 hours for the first time in a 100-mile race.

More of the same.  Treadmill  8x7:30x3.5%

I wrote a somewhat controversial, opinionated piece on my blog to make myself quit thinking about this race director stuff.  Spit out my thoughts, we shall see if anyone notices it.

http://www.crockettclan.org/blog/?p=608

No running, just sleeping.  Only a few miles so far this week, but I'm still confident that I will end up on top of the mileage board this week...ha, ha.

The stress today is the Houston weather, and storms across the country.  Many runners won't being coming.  Their flights have been cancelled.  Continental and Southwest cancelled nearly every flight into Houston this evening and tomorrow morning.  Looks like I'll be OK, my flight is in the afternoon.  It looks like we have a very good chance having at least an inch of snow on the course at the start.  I'm very phyched about that.  So many runners will slow down.  I plan to cruise fast.  The starting temperature will be close to 20 degrees!  Wind chill close to 10. It will warm up to 51 in the afternoon and then probably be near freezing when I finish.  Very good.   Far away from the hot temps a few years ago there when the heat melted me.

Made it to Texas just fine.  Roads were dry all the way to Huntsville. Good to see friends.  No snow on course.  Wood bridges will be icy.  Online tracking ultralive.net.  5am MST.

Detailed report at:

I wrote up my detailed report for Rocky Raccoon 100.  http://www.crockettclan.org/blog/?p=612

Here's the short version, still only had some cat namps.  This was my 4th time running Rocky.  I hoped to break 20 hours, but didn't make it because of some issues, but still had a great run and my best placement ever there.

The temperature in the morning was 21 degrees, very fridged, so I wore long tights and long sleeves.   I goofed at the start, was still preparing when I heard the count-down, so I had to pass more than a 100 runners until I caught up with those running fast.   My first 20-mile loop was 3:00:30, a little faster than scheduled.

It was so fun to see ultrarunning heros on the out and backs running, Karl Melzer, Scott Jerek, Anton Krupicka, Hal Koerner, and Mike Wolfe.

On Loop 2, I had terrible pain in the gut that cost me about 15 minutes.   I completed that loop in 3:41.  After that loop, I took a very long stop, including a 15 minute bathroom break and I changed out of my warm clothes.   Now I was running with a slower crowd but was able to pass a bunch.

Loop 3 was thrilling.   At mile 56.5, Karl Melzer lapped me and I was able to hang with him.   I wondered how long I could.   I had been running lazy so had some good energy.  In fact I ran ahead of him for a couple miles.  We ran together into the start/finish area at mile 60.  I thanked him for waking me up and he complimented me on my pace.  We had run between 7:30 and 9:15 miles for 3.5 miles.   Including my very long break, my loop was 4:05.  Thanks to that crazy frantic run at the end of the loop I was only about 15 minutes behind my schedule.

Karl was much quicker than me at his drop bag, so I couldn't keep running with him.  I needed to gather my jacket and gloves for the night.  I needed to hustle, because I needed to run the next six miles before sunset to get my flashlight.  I succeded and was ahead of last year's pace by 15 minutes or so.

It got cold pretty fast, but if I pushed the pace, I became pretty warm.  I finished loop 4 at 9:25 p.m.   Karl was in the tent, his race finished. He asked how I was doing.  My problem now was that I was bonking, low in calories.   My stomach just wasn't very happy and wouldn't let me run very fast.   The 4th Loop was 4:40.   I knew that my quest for a sub-20 was now gone.  I could PR if I recovered.   I was lapping tons of runners.  Some realized it and said they wished they were on loop 5 too.

Loop 5, was very, very tough.  I just couldn't intake enough food and when I slowed, I started to get pretty cold.  I was still wearing shorts, but had two longsleeves on and a fleece over my face to help with the cold wind.   I tried very hard to at least keep at 15:00 pace going.  The final loop was a slow 5:56. I even had to sit down at a couple aid stations to recover and get warm.  I lost my motivation to care about my finish time, I just wanted to get it done and get in a warm bed.

For the last 8 miles, I just made sure that no one passed me.  One guy caught up with a mile to go, but he was power walking, so I ran on ahead and his light disappeard.

I finished at 3:22 a.m. for a 21:22, and by 4:30 a.m. was showered and resting in my motel room.  Amazingly I felt great, better than usual, probably because of that slow finish and cool weather.   After a few cat naps, at 8:30 a.m. I was back at the park to watch some friends finish.  Next I went to the awards at 11:00 a.m. and was shocked that I won an award for 3rd place Masters (age 50+)  That had been one of my goals for the race, to place in masters.   My time was slower than last year, but my placement much higher, probably because of the tough cold weather.  There were about 316 starters and I finished 34th.  Not bad for a very, very competitive field, with some of the best ultrarunners in the world.

I flew home and arrived before halftime of the Super Bowl.