19 November 2016

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Sharing some miles with trail runner extraordinaire and team mate Dink Taylor.
After my DNF at Pinhoti, I had gone back and forth about running this race this year. While my hip injury had disappeared as fast as it had appeared during the race, I really wasn't trained to race JFK. My body still felt tired and I knew it would be a bad idea to toe the line, but I was going to travel to Maryland anyway, since my wife was running her first JFK and we had a whole Fleet Feet team going, so I figured I might as well slug it out for my third consecutive JFK finish. After all, it was already paid for:-)

05 November 2016

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It took me quite some time to even get started on deciding whether I wanted to write this one.After all, I'm probably the only one that has accumulated 3 (three), yes 3 DNFs at the Pinhoti 100. Granted, I also had my best ever 100 mile race performance there in 2014, but those finishes usually only ever last until the next race, at least for me.

I had prepared for this race. The A goal was the same as in 2014, which I missed then as well and the B goal was "just" to PR, which would not be easy, either. Initially, I went back to my training log from 2014. What better way to repeat a performance than to follow the same regimen, right? After about a week, I decided to go a different route. The old training just felt stale, I needed something new. I decided to reach Rob Youngren. Not only had I done quite a few training sessions with him last year as he was getting ready for Hardrock and I was training for UTMB, but I always could depend on him for general training advise as well. After all, this guy had already done anything and everything I ever want to do and not only that, he had usually done it multiple times and excelled at it as well, so why the hell wouldn't I turn to him when the time came for a proper training plan.

And with that, Rob hooked me up with a great training plan and I started hitting the road (and some times trails) the first week of August. I spent the first month base building, followed by a slow ramp up in mileage and some quality track and tempo sessions added to keep the body guessing. Training progressed well, I never missed a session or took a shortcut. Training mileage peaked at 90 miles during "the Blitz" week. I started taper 2 weeks from race day.


Race week was slightly more chaotic than usual to say the least, but I made it to Heflin in time to grab dinner with many of my Huntsville running buddies before heading to the hotel to prep my running gear and turn in for the night. Rob was along for the ride to crew at first and pace later and my wife Anya would join to help crew/pace Saturday morning. I would see her at Mount Cheaha at mile 42 for the first time, where I was still feeling fantastic.


Wer arrived at the campground (race start) with plenty of time to spare, allowing me to chat with some fellow runners, but somehow things were a little off. I'm still not sure what it was, but things were just a little off. I wasn't carrying my pace chart, I didn't use the elevation tattoo that I had purchased just for this event and I missed the Huntsville group photo. I know I know, who cares, but it was just a weird vibe for me.

The race started and I fell in in the middle somewhere. As soon as we hit the single track, things slowed down to a walk. While the pace picked up soon after, it stayed slow and that probably ensured that I didn't go out too fast. After a while I checked my watch and decided to start passing some folks. I was moving well and the first miles ticked by pretty quickly and thankfully uneventful. I continued to do an internal system check to make sure I ate, drank and didn't have any physical issues. All was well.

In fact, when I got to the top of Mount Cheaha, the first of three major climbs, I couldn't believe how quickly I managed that and how good I felt, even with the warmer than usual temps. This is always my favorite part of the race as almost all crew teams are still here waiting for their runners and there's a level of excitement as everyone is looking for their runners to make their way to the top.

Rob and Anya and Ryan were there taking care of me and while I was feeling great, I wasn't in the mood for much food and Anya later told me she could see that I wasn't my usual chipper ultra self. I headed out after a short break in a chair to eat some food to tackle Blue Hell. I continued to move well as I came through the next aid station, but as I approached mile 49-50, I started to have pain in my left hip bone. This was an unknown issue and it worried me. It quickly started to get worse with every incline. I had no idea what was going on.I still had tons of time, so I decided to try to wait it out by slowing down in hopes of it possibly going away again. No...such...luck. I still had a ways to go and when I finally arrived at mile 55 at Adams Gap to pick up Rob as my pacer, I had already made my peace to quit. I had had plenty of time to come up with reasons and answers to any thing my crew would say to coax me along. No way was I gonna keep going...and then I did anyway. I figured 5 more miles would be all Rob would need to see that I was truly done and that my hip pain really was the issue, not the usual pain that comes with running 100 mies.

Unfortunately, my crew didn't know that and decided that I thought that they could probably coax me some extra miles by delaying when I would see my crew and vehicle again. As a result, Anya was asleep and out of cell coverage as poor Rob had to watch me limp from climb to climb struggling with each left step. It was ugly and when we finally made it to mile 68, there was no longer a question what I needed to do. I was looking forward for a hotel bed and some warm food. The regrets would surely follow the next morning no matter how valid my reason for dropping....and they did.



Regardless of how badly this DNF still gnaws on me, this race continues to be one of my favorite events. It's a beautiful point to point race close to home and put on by some of the nicest peeps you'll ever meet. Eventually, I will get over it. I'm sure ultrasignup.com will ease my pain as I build my racing schedule for 2017.

22 October 2016

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Top 4 runners at Wade Mountain Trail Marathon.
The inaugural Wade Mountain Trail Marathon was a success for me. It was meant as my final long run before starting my Pinhoti taper. I knew I wanted to run a relaxed pace, but I also knew that I was willing and able to push towards the end, if there was any change of doing well, since I was headed into my taper, so no reason to take it easy.

01 October 2016

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Thanks, Jobie Williams, for making me look like I still had spring in my step.
This race was kind of a last minute decision for me. My training plan for Pinhoti called for a 30 mile long run that day and a race sounded way more appealing than yet another solo long run. I caught a ride with Cary Long, who had also arranged for a sweet "house sitting" gig at Daniel Lucas' home, who happened to be out of town and strangely enough was comfortable with Cary and myself staying at his house unsupervised. Two thing stood out from our stay at Daniel's house. First, we tripped the home security system and spent roughly an hour waiting for the SWAT team to bust down the door while sitting on the living room in our boxers with bags of white powder in our hands. It would have looked really really bad. This is the short version, Cary already described the details in his blog post and a recent podcast interview on East Coast Trail & Ultra Runners. Second, we couldn’t get the coffee maker to work as our combined IQ apparently wasn’t enough to operate Daniel’s fancy espresso machine. That meant no coffee first thing in the morning, which could (but thankfully didn’t) throw a wrinkle into my morning routine.

18 September 2016

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It's easy to smile when you don't know exactly what lies ahead:-)
Training for and running ultras in Huntsville, Alabama, it doesn't take long until you hear about two things, the Mountain Mist 50K and the mystical Barkley Marathons. In case you didn't know, Huntsville is one of the original meccas of ultra-running. Don't believe it? Just check out ultrasignup.com and other related sites featuring ultra race results from the 80s and 90s and you'll notice quite a few wins and course records by local Huntsville runners. In other words, there are more than your normal number of "ultra studs per capita" that call Huntsville their home and when you consider doing a particular ultra marathon anywhere in the US, there is usually one of those local studs available to give you info about that race, because he or she had won it a few years earlier or at least done extremely well. It doesn't matter if it's a 50K, a 100 miler or a multi-day event, these guys have done it and excelled at it. But unlike these races scattered around the continental US, Mountain Mist and Barkley usually come up without anyone asking about it. Mountain Mist is the local premier ultra race and the Barkley Marathons had legendary cult status around here long before Netflix.

28 August 2016

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The bounty of my labor.
It had been a while since I'd toed the starting line of an ultra marathon. The longest time between ultras for a while. In fact, crossing the finish line at the Cruel Jewel 100 Miler, I was ready to take a serious break from ultras. It was time to recover and do some stuff just for fun. Not that I don't love running, but training for an ultra is always a serious time commitment and it requires one to be somewhat serious about their training. Anyway, I decided to just run for fun and not race for a while, I started to dabble a little in mountain biking and road cycling, attempted a couple of MTB time trials and logged a few century rides on my newly acquired road bike. But it was time to get back for some fun in the mountains. Heck, I couldn't even remember the last time I ran a local 5K. I started to look at my calendar and it looked pretty blank. Time to fill 'er up. The Yeti Snakebite 50K had been on my calendar, but I wasn't even close to tackle this race as a competitor, so I decided to start properly training again in August and to use the Yeti as a fun training race with friends. I knew a lot of other Huntsville runners would be there, so hopefully I would have some company as I trudged through the woods.

15 May 2016

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The Huntsville crew just before things got real.
After completing my toughest and most epic race to date at last year's UTMB, I wasn't sure if that level of difficulty could ever be matched by another 100 mile race other than the famed Hard Rock 100. And then I signed up for the Cruel Jewel 100. You'd think I would have known better than to do that. After all, I had run the Cruel Jewel 50 Miler last year in preparation for UTMB. Well, the mind of an ultrarunner is a funny thing, I guess. We somehow have the ability to forget all the misery we endure during these events. So Thursday afternoon after I left the office, I grabbed my bags, jumped into my car and headed over to my buddy Paul's house to meet him and Jerry before all of us piled into his car along with our gear for the four hour road trip to Vogel State Park.

01 May 2016

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Extremely fortunate circumstances had me in Europe during the Ultra-Trail Barcelona 100K. I decided to sign up for it as my final tune-up race for the Cruel Jewel 100 Miler two weeks later. I arrived the evening before the race, picked up my packet and returned back to my hotel. No point in sticking around for any prerace briefing...it was in Spanish only. This would actually be the theme with pretty much anything, but I managed.


As soon as I arrived at the hotel, I picked up a large pizza pie to go and settled into my room. I knew I would have to get up around 4AM to make it to the race start in the beautiful Parc Natural del Garraf, a large park where the Garraf Massif is located, just outside Barcelona in the Catalonian Coastal Range. I spent some time studying the race information while eating my pizza, trying to piece together enough information to find my way to the starting line. Unfortunately, the English version of their website seems to have been largely neglected, but I wasn't deterred by that.


 I was pretty sure I had all of the mandatory gear required for this race. Most European mountain races of 30 miles or longer often have mandatory kit requirements and this race was no different. Along with a medical note from my doc in the US I also needed an emergency whistle, emergency blanket, seam sealed rain jacket, cup, ability to carry at least 1 liter of water and a fully charged cell phone. The mandatory gear lists posted on the Spanish website vs. the English version vs. the various emails didn't match, but I was pretty sure I had it covered.


I also packed trekking poles (both as training for Cruel Jewel 100 and because this course's elevation profile was no picnic), a USB charger for my Garmin Fenix 3 and various gels for fuel, just in case I couldn't handle the aid station food. Luckily, food selection at aid stations wasn't a problem at all.


I arrived at the race start, found convenient parking along a side street and made it with plenty of time to spare. We would have to go through a mandatory gear check still prior to the race and I still had to drop off my drop bag. It had started to rain lightly and it was still dark. I was struggling to find anyone comfortable to speak English with me. Finally, I found a Swiss runner that luckily spoke German and a bit of Spanish, so we were able to find the local gym that served as the main hub for the race for folks to leave their finish line bags and drop of their drop bags. I had brought an extra pair of shoes, socks, shirt and socks for the 70K aid station along with some extra gels. I ended up not needing the extra fuel, but the shoes and fresh clothes came in very handy. Those extra shoes coupled with some foot powder allowed me to stay blister free for the entire race.


Even though race officials and volunteers arrived rather late to finish setting up everything, the race was started on time. The rain had become more constant and would continue for a few hours. There were about 200 or so runners, most of them Spanish with a couple of other nationalities represented. I think there might have been one more American in the race, but I never saw him. Along with the UTBCN 100K, there were races covering 70K, a marathon, a 21K and a few shorter distance races for kids.


Thankfully, I had hooked up with a Spaniard and a Swiss runner just before the start and the Spaniard and I decided to run the early part of the race together. This was a training race for me and I had no intention of pushing the pace at all. I was hoping for a rough finishing time of 15-16 hours, hiking the ups and running the flats and downs. I didn't know what to expect from the terrain. After some early road miles to leave the small town of Begues and some jeep dirt roads, we finally started to get on to some single track trails. These trails were definitely not of the tame variety. These mountains might not be tall, but they were extremely technical and rocky and runners were sent all the way down to sea level a couple of times. However, those trips down the mountains came with some truly spectacular views, sometimes making it impossible to distinguish where the sky ended and the Mediterranean Sea began.


I kept a controlled pace and made my way from aid station to aid station, keeping a close eye on my fluids, food and sodium levels. Aid station distances ranged from 6 to 16k. Humidity levels were low, so carrying two bottles proved to be enough. Temperatures stayed fairly level and mild throughout the day, but it did get warm on the climbs.


Since I wasn't "racing", I did take the time to "smell the roses" here and there to capture at least couple of pictures of this amazing scenery. The rain subsided a couple of hours into the run, but I kept on the rain jackets for a couple more hours. The wind on the ridges was a bit chilly and I wanted to stay warm, but as soon as the sun continued to stay ahead of the cloud cover, I stuffed the jacket into my pack.

Early on there continued to be runners ahead of me as well as behind me creating a bit of a train, but nothing that really made me change my desired pace. Before long, I was running on my own and I was fine with that. I had an iPod with me, but i never made use of it. I continued to enjoy the scenery as the miles ticked away.


One of the aid stations in the town of Garraf was actually situated at a beach on the Mediterranean Sea and required us to run on the beach for a very short section, absolutely stunning. I continued to feel great, even issues with the upper of my running shoes very early in the race as a result of a very technical downhill did not create foot issues. I made it to kilometer 70 without a hitch, changed shoes and clothes, extended my trekking poles and got back to work. I had chosen not to use them until this point to "reward" myself of sorts. It was the correct decision. I continued on, mostly on my own and only occasionally seeing other runners along the way. The field had stretched significantly by now and the 70k and other distance runners were no longer on the same course either.


Everything continued to go perfectly...until...12k from the finish. During a short but extremely steep climb requiring both hands and feet (night had fallen at this point), my headlamp and hat had blocked my view from a rather large limb hanging across the trail and boom! I hit the top of my head stopping me dead in my tracks along with everyone else behind me. There were 4 guys stuck behind me as I was having to collect my thoughts before carrying on. A couple of Ukrainians behind me suggested to take off my hat to inspect the damage and as I took off my hat, blood trickled down my face, oh good.


Thankfully, one of them had an alcohol antiseptic wipe. It stung a bit, but it it cleaned the wound. I knew I was still 12k from the finish, so my next concern was the severity of the cut and would it require stitches to which the guy behind be responded "Nah, you'll be fine, no stitches needed. I should know, I'm a doctor from Ukraine." That truly was a relief as I was worried I had another 12k to cover before I could get any necessary medical attention.


I pulled a buff over my head, put my headlamp back on and continued on. One would hope that this would be the only hitch during the race, but not so. Literally 2 miles from the finish the markings became confusing, pointing us in two directions. There were three separate groups at this point and we all independently chose the same path, the wrong one of course.


3 miles later, we still hadn't reached the finish line and it dawned on us that we might be lost. We were in the valley and close to approaching a village. Unfortunately, it was not "our" village with the finish line. This is where opinions diverged two Spaniards decided to backtrack all the way back up the mountain to try to find the correct and current course markings, a couple of Ukrainians and I decided to try to find the shortest way back as Google still had us well over 2 miles from the finish.


As luck would have it, there was no direct line back to the other valley and village, so we ended up climbing back up the same mountain as well. As we reached the top, we came upon proper course markings. Thank god, we were back on course. We now had 2 miles left to the finish, but we had already covered close to 6 extra miles. Time to get to work and get this thing done.


I rolled into the finish line after 17 hours and 4 minutes, 4 minutes after midnight on my 45th birthday. I crossed under the arch, received my finisher's medal, took a quick pic and headed to the ambulance to get patched up before walking back to the gym for some food and a nice hot shower before driving back to Barcelona. I was walking and not limping. I was feeling great, both mentally and physically. This gave me some much needed confidence leading into taper mode for the Cruel Jewel 100 Miler.


If you find yourself in Spain at the end of April and want to do a beautiful and well organized race AND collect a few UTMB points to boot, sign up for this one. It has everything a trail and mountain runner could want. As always, feel free to hit me up here or on Facebook for more details about this event.



18 April 2016

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Team Nuun
I had never run Boston, so when I got a qualifying time of 3:02 at the 2014 Rocket City Marathon, I couldn't wait to sign up. I know, I know, initially I said all I cared about was a BQ, actually running the race wasn't that important. I guess I was wrong about that one. Luckily, my wife agreed to come along. Would not have been the same without her there. We were able to split a room with a couple of our friends (Kelsey and Andrew) just a couple of blocks fro the finish. Andrew knew the area and chose the hotel, which was perfect.

20 March 2016

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Huntsville ultra runners were well represented at this year's GDR.
I had run the Georgia Death Race for the first time last year and really had no intention of running it again. After all, why would you want to suffer the same way more than once:-) However, I changed my mind after I decided to sign up for the Cruel Jewel 100 Miler as my goal race for the year. What better way to get ready then to run part of the course during the GDR. In addition, the course was reversed this year to reflect the direction it was originally intended to be run in, but had to be changed last year due to heavy rainfalls. This would mean an entirely different race experience. The weather was also going to be much better than last year, when fog and 24 hour downpours made it impossible to enjoy any of the scenery. On top of all of that, we had 10 Huntsville runners sign up for this thing, including most of my regular training crew. How could I turn that down:-)

20 February 2016

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Cool shirt and pretty sweet award.
The Black Warrior 50K was only my third ultra marathon in early 2010. Since then I've logged many a miles and ultra distance races. I remember the horse trails very vividly from that year, frozen pot holes that could threaten some serious ankle injuries. Luckily, none of that materialized and I finished the race in one piece. Fast forward six year. I had just finished another Mountain Mist 50K and decided not to join my local running buddies at Mt. Cheaha 50K this year. Last year's edition had left me with an unpleasant ankle injury, which I did not want to repeat this year. I figured why not go back to Black Warrior to give it another go.

24 January 2016

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Seeded at Mountain Mist for the very first time.
I had had been training pretty hard for this year's edition of the Mountain Mist. I hit my A goal last year, so I had high hopes and expectations of myself for this year's go-around. While I did travel for work in the weeks leading up to Mountain Mist, luckily my destination was Switzerland, so I was able to do some training runs in a very appropriate climate and environment (Swiss Alps). After my disappointing run at the Rocket City Marathon, I was hitting a pretty low point in my running and training. I hadn't really shown any speed ever since coming back from an ankle injury at Mt. Cheaha 50K in February of last year and UTMB hadn't done much for my speed either, but I did finish that thing, so there's that:-) I had started to hit the second half of the Mountain Mist course pretty much on a weekly basis, even throwing in one back to back run of said section on a Friday night followed by a Saturday morning.

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