My short report: My 4th visit to Across the Years, this year held at Glendale, AZ at Camelback Park, site of the Doger's spring training using a 1.05-mile loop track. 72, 48, and 24-hour races are held over a 3-day period. I decided to run the 48-hour race and start on Day #2 of the event. My son Kevin was also going to run the 48-hour in order to reach 100 miles. My Brother Bob started the 24-hour race, hoping to also reach 100 miles. It was fun to start a race with both of them. Looking at the entrants list I felt confident, but there were race day changes due to cancelled flights as runners signed up for the 72-hour, instead ran the 48-hour on Day #2. Included was Volodymyr Balatskyy who ran 211 miles in November at Ultracentric. There is no way I could compete with that. Also John Geesler who I know well is a former world-class timed event runner who has held several records at this event. Oh well. The first marathon went pretty well. I led the others for quite awhile and almost lapped John Geesler. I was also leading at times all the 24-hour runners that started that day. My marathon split was a little under 4 hours, not blazing fast, but good for a 48-hour run. Bob and Kevin were doing fine. I lapped Kevin every 3-5 miles. Bob was steady, rarely ever walking. When I lapped him, he would speed up. I think I never was more than 4 laps ahead of him. My 50-mile split was somewhere around nine hours I think, or less. Can't remember for sure. I had really given up keeping track of pace because I was a few miles behind last year's PR pace for the first day. John Geelser took the lead and eventually lapped me in the evening. Vaoldymyr was ahead of me by about a half lap. The competition was good. The Day #1 48-hour runners who were in the lead all stopped for some reason, with the top guy doing 125 miles. I knew we would pass that. But, eventually my leg started to hurt. I was distressed about it and slowed down. I knew that John would slow down as he has in recent years, and he did, but Volodymyr kept running strong into the night and began lapping me. Kevin slowed down to a constant walk and once he hit around 65 miles went to sleep in the heated car. By that point, I had given up trying to compete and worked more with Kevin, going to the car to check on him. I would almost catch up to John, but then take a lap off for one reason or another. Morning was coming and I was concerned about Bob reaching 100 in time. He never really stopped very long at after one of my long stops was only 1 mile behind me. He was confident that he would make it. I encouraged him to try to do a lap or two over 100 in order to jump in the standings because tons of runners stop at 100, just wanting the distance and buckle. I pushed it a bit harder. I reached 100 miles at 22:37:34, almost three hours slower than last year. That was discouraging. Bob did 102 miles by the 24-hour limit and I reached 105 miles. Not bad, that would have placed 3rd place over-all in the 24-hour race, but a far cry from my 117 miles last year on day one. I then stopped for a very long rest, well over an hour. My thought was, instead of crashing on night #2 for 4-5 hours, I would try to take shorter, more frequent rests. During Day #1, I had stopped for about an hour. Bob packed up and announced he was going to start driving home to LA. He got his buckle and seemed very pleased. He did super. I rested, worked on my feet and prepared for Day #2. However, has I started to run, my leg hurt badly in the fracture area. Yes, I could block the pain out and still run like crazy, but I decided I would not. I would just slow down to pain-free pace and be very careful. It wasn't worth it to again seriously injure myself. So, for Day #2, I just concentrated on helping Kevin. I hoped to at least reach 125 miles. Kevin chugged on, passing 70 miles. His top speed was 20-minute miles, but with stops, he averaged 2.5 mph. This would take a very long time. But I enjoyed the day, socialized with others and took some long hour breaks. Eventually I quit, washed up, and dressed in my jeans and street shoes. But it was boring and a little chilly just sitting around, so each time I would get back up and walk some laps with Kevin. Since I was in jeans and poor shoes, it forced me to go slowly. As evening came, I walked a lap or two with John Geesler. It was good to talk with him. I walked with others who were impressed with Kevin's continued effort. Kevin was really suffering with sore and blistered feet. I told him the plan would be that once he reached 100 miles, we would go get a hotel room, and come back in the morning in time to do one more lap so he would jump in the standings. But I started to feel great again. The pain went away. I started to have thoughts about continuing through the night to post some big miles. But by 10:30 p.m. I walked the last two laps with Kevin and I felt thrashed with sore feet from walking so much. I decided to shut it down. I was at mile 129, tied with the runner in 4th place, but two women runners who I had been over ten miles ahead of, were now close behind. Kevin reached 100 miles in about 37 and a half hours. He was pleased to be done and reach that goal. I heard him say "never again" and I chuckled. I said the same thing after several of my finishes. We checked into a nearby hotel. It was good to shower and get in bed. Sleep didn't come for over an hour, but I finally conked out. The next time I checked the clock, it was 7 a.m. I somehow got Kevin up and dragged him back to the park. I was now feeling really good again and from the car directly went to the track and started running at 10:00 pace. I was dressed in jeans and my street shoes, with wallet, keys, and cell phone still in my pockets, but I didn't care. I would try to see how many more miles I could get in before the finish. I was now the fastest on the track again and received complements. I shed layers after a lap and was just in a light shirt and jeans even though it was 30 degrees. I pushed the pace. I was pleased to see Kevin walking slowly, doing that last lap. It was great fun. Toward the end, I ran with friend Matt who had just passed 100 miles. I timed my last couple laps in order to reach 135 miles. When I finished, I was shocked to see that the board listed my in 3rd place. (Turns out I was 3rd male, a female runner had 137 miles, so I finished in 4th overall our of 42 runners.) Kevin finished tied for 18th place. So, overall, thing went well. My leg seems fine, it just spooked me into running seriously for only one day. I probably should have left the hotel about 2 a.m. and put in another 25 miles. Oh well. Could have done it. I received a nice trophy for being the 3rd place male. Across the Years is a great race, I'm sure I will return. My career miles there are now around 600 miles in four years.
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