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The off season

It’s been a while since my last post.  I changed fitness priorities for the winter.  I’m trying once again to sort out my injury problems before the ultra training grind starts again.  So I de-prioritized running and started doing a pretty heavy strength routine along with regular flexibility work.  And honestly, this is the best my heels have felt in years.  They almost never hurt and I mostly just forget about them.  The exceptions to that mostly come after long snowboarding weekends and running after snowboarding.  But the difference from now to last year is dramatic.  I remember limping constantly in our January Jackson Hole trip last year.  Now, i mostly don’t notice anything.

So this is of course without doing much running.  I’m getting in 2-3 times per week typically, but nothing more than an hour or so of light running.  Nothing long, nothing fast.  And I’m not doing it often enough to really build my stamina.  For now I’m mostly just trying to maintain until strength season is over.  But the good news is that an hour of running doesn’t seem to bother my heels at all.  But it can be really hard because my legs are usually dead.

As for the strength, it’s going okay.  I’m approaching novice weight levels.  That doesn’t sound great, but considering I hadn’t lifted a barbell since high school before this, I think I’m starting to make some progress.  There was definitely some shakiness early on because a lot of stabilizing muscles were really weak.  But the point of the routine was all compound movements to get all of that stuff.  So after 4-6 weeks I started to feel stable.  Grain of salt here because I didn’t necessarily know where to start with some of the weights, but I think I’ve settled in to the right range on all of it now.  The numbers are November 29th, which was when I was cleared to lift again after my Melanoma surgery to now:

Bench Press: 135 => 175 Military Press: 80 => 110 Barbell Row:  135 => 185 Deadlift: 185 => 275 Squat: 135 => 185

The numbers aren’t 1 rep maxes.  It’s my low rep weight to prioritize pure strength.  The initial idea behind the workout was 5 sets of 5 reps.  Day 1 is Squat, Bench, Row.  Day 2 is Squat, Military, 1 set of Deadlifts.  Switch workouts every other day.  So I’ve been lifting Monday, Wednesday, Friday and trying to run Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday if not snowboarding.  One of the first changes I made was changing Day 2 to be a full 5 sets of Deadlifts, Military, then some other muscle group that I didn’t feel like I was getting - like calves.  I just didn’t want to do squats every workout and I felt like I needed the back and posterior chain strength from the deadlifts for my heel injuries.

I seemed to regress on bench press after being sick and going to Park City for a week over New Years.  But every other lift continued to get stronger.  So I changed things again.  Now, instead of doing 5x5 reps of everything at high weight I do 4x5 at high weight, then 1x10 or so at 65% of normal and then 1x whatever I can handle at 50% of normal.  The idea is to keep the heavy strength portion of the workout but add full muscle depletion at the end with lower weight.  It definitely helped me push through my bench press plateau and it’s absolutely killed my legs.  I’m curious to see how it all goes after I take 4 days off for a ski trip this weekend and can fully recover.

I’ve also been doing a bunch of lower body stretching in between sets while I lift.  I figure I need to rest anyway so might as well put that time to use.  So between the strength and the flexibility everything is feeling better.  I have another 3-4 weeks of this before I take a week off in Thailand and then start working on running again.

As to nutrition, I started with the bodybuilder mindset that I needed to eat extra to maximize muscle development.  But I abandoned that after New Year’s and I’m now trying to walk the mythical line of losing fat and gaining muscle at the same time.  I’m sure I’m missing out on some potential muscle mass this way, but I’d rather not have to drop a bunch of extra fat when I’m done.  It seems to be mostly working but some days I’m just completely exhausted.  This week especially has been hard.  I did a double of day 1 lifting and running Monday, day 2 lifting Tuesday, running today, and day 1 lifting again tomorrow.  I figure I can go a little harder than normal since I’m taking 4 days off after that.

So yeah, it’s all going well right now.  I’m curious to see how things hold up once I start building running volume again.  It’s bound to be a little tough, but I can’t wait to see what it feels like to not be running on legs that I killed in the gym the day before every time.

#Runner #running #runblr #trail running #ultra running

[scottrunsultras]

Short update

I’ve been delaying this for a while.  But figured I’d get it out there.  Since my last update I was diagnosed with melanoma.  Luckily, it was caught very early and removed without complication or more invasive surgery.  No lasting issues aside from a higher risk of getting it again.  So folks, go to the dermatologist and get your skin checked yearly.  If I’d been lazy about that, it could have been much worse.

As for training, I’m focusing om a strength routine called the Stronglifts 5x5.  It’s uncomplicated enough that I think I can stick to it for 2 or 3 months.  the goal right now is to focus on strength and flexibility to hopefully be injury free for running season.  We’ll see how that goes.  

#running #Runner #runblog #trail running #ultra running

[scottrunsultras]

Colossal Vail 50

Little bit of a late summary because I got distracted (more on that later).  All in all, I’m disappointed.  I maybe shouldn’t be, but that’s what happens when you’re overly goal-based in something like ultra running.  It’s a recipe for misery to set any sort of time goals going into a course you’ve never run - I realize that.  But if I didn’t aim high, I wouldn’t have anything to keep me from slow-walking during the tough times.  Every ultra runner needs that extra motivation to push through the inevitable lows.  Some just have it internally.  Some have the competition factor.  I have arbitrary times.  Stupid, I know.  But pushing for that arbitrary sub-29:00 helped me find a way to jog after 35 miles of death-marching Leadville.

Anyway, long story short, I caught a chest cold a week before the race.  I started taking zinc lozenges and stopped exercising completely.  I felt pretty awful Tuesday through Thursday, but seemed to bottom out Wednesday and start getting better.  I actually felt pretty good Saturday morning.  But I knew about a mile into the race that my legs just didn’t have anything in them.  In training I felt pretty good about getting to mile 20-25 before feeling any meaningful fatigue.  I maybe made it to mile 5 in the race.

I can’t help being sick, but I could have trained better.  Somehow I got the impression that the course was easy.  Not a lot of climbing.  And I somehow conflated this race withe Javelina.  I guess I figured they were both in Arizona.  But the southern Arizona trails are no joke.  It was pretty damned rocky most of the time.  So there I am, having not run a trail since Leadville and wearing my road shoes.  It is what it is.  Injuries prevented me from doing much trail work this year.  So I did what I could.

The heat also beat me up a little.  It was in the 80′s, probably 10 degrees warmer than average.  And it was breezy.  So sweat evaporated instantly.  I didn’t feel terrible, but I was definitely dehydrated.  My stomach wasn’t super off, but I still struggled to eat enough.  All the usual warm weather ultra troubles.  I thought I had the heat dialed in, but I guess not.  My biggest mistake here was not having a way of keeping my drop bag gatorade cold.  I lived on gu, cheetoes, and gatorade in the 90 degree heat of Javelina last year.  But i just couldn’t force myself to drink warm gatorade and drank maybe 1/4 of what I had available.

Lots of excuses.  Some valid, some bad planning.  The end result was a 10:39.  Good for 14th out of 54 starters.  So not terrible.  I hit my intermediate goals of a sub-5:00 marathon and a sub-6:00 50k.  And I didn’t have any completely awful miles.  But I really thought this was a real opportunity to go sub-10:00 on a legit 50 (I’ve done it on a flat course in South Carolina).  Maybe next year.

So with that, the season is over.  My heels held up pretty well, so I’m making progress on my injuries.  No real setbacks in that regard.  I think I’m going to spend 2-3 months doing a strength training program to see if that helps me stave off injuries in 2020.  I’ll do some running, probably speed work.  But the main goal until February will probably be raw, full body strength and flexibility.  Unless I win the lottery and get into Western States...

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running

[scottrunsultras]

So, the race went well

I finished #13 overall (of 745) at the Temecula Half Marathon last weekend.  It’s the first time I’ve raced a half marathon in almost 6 years.  I guess my fastest days aren’t necessarily behind me.  I cut 2:48 off my PR and finished just slightly over 1:30, with 1:30 being my near-impossible stretch goal going into it.

Here’s the comparison of my previous PR to last weekend’s race.  I blew the doors off despite a more difficult course.

I probably screwed myself by going out too conservatively.  I didn’t know what the difference in altitude would do for me (4000 feet lower at the race than in Boulder).  So I went out at PR pace and just got faster from there.  The race went pretty much exactly as I’d envisioned it.  20 seconds faster on the flats than what I’m used to, survive the uphills however I can, and free mileage on the downhills.  I should have gone faster in the downhill miles 9 and 10, but I was still worried about burning up at that point so I didn’t want to redline with 3-4 miles left.  I went into mile 13 knowing I needed to finish the race in the 5:00′s to go under 1:30 but just didn’t have the raw speed to pull it off.  The fastest I ran in training was flat 6:00′s so I didn’t have a 5:50 when I needed it.  Oh well, maybe next time.

I have this little tidbit from strava to make me feel better:

So I guess technically I’m a 1:30 half marathoner now.

My legs are still a little beat from the race, but not much time to rest.  I’m going to try for 26.2 tomorrow as a final long run before the Colossal Vail 50 in two weeks.  I feel stronger and fitter than I did going into Javelina last year, and that race was pretty great for me.  I think it’s finally time for that elusive sub-10:00 (legit) 50 mile finish.

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running

[scottrunsultras]

Race coming up this weekend

I guess it’s been more than a month since my last post.  The plan after coming back from Europe was to prioritize my injury recovery because my feet/heels felt awful.  That was mainly done through a lot of strength and flexibility work.  I spent 2-3 weeks doing strength first and running second.  I did a lot of squats, trying to strengthen all of my legs including my glutes.  I did a lot of plyometric workouts.  I ate well.  I stretched a lot.  I wore 5 different pairs of shoes with varying heel drops and cushioning.  And guess what?  It seems to be working.  My feet get stiff sometimes.  Especially when I’m wearing less cushioned, lower drop shoes.  But My heels are not a major problem at the moment.  No knee pain.  Very rare knee irritation.  Much more of a forefoot stride.  And this is with turning up the mileage the last couple of weeks.

My first good run was a week or so after getting back from Europe.  I did 12 miles at 7:43 pace, which is a run that I probably haven’t done in years.  So while it took me 5 weeks to bounce back from Leadville, that felt great.  And that gave me the confidence to start pushing my mileage and effort level back up in hopes of being ready for some races.  I was eyeing the Temecula half marathon (my wife is running it) and my stretch goal was the Colossal Vail 50 miler outside of Tucson if I could somehow get back in ultra shape.  So I pushed.  Every run was in the 7:00′s.  A tempo run and an interval run every week.  The next weekend I did 17 miles at a 7:58.  Then 3 days later, 20 miles at 8:15.  Last weekend I did 22 miles at 8:20.  The goal was to take it somewhat light since my half marathon is next weekend.  It felt so easy at 16 that I ran the last 10k in the mid 7:00′s.  Mile 22 scraped in at 6:59.  Nothing gives me more confidence as an endurance runner than 20 miles feeling easy.  

So yeah, I feel pretty good going into this half marathon.  This morning I did my traditional race-week Monday tempo run.  4.5 miles at a flat 7:00 on legs that were still a bit tired from Saturday.  7:00 is my target pace for the race.  I have no idea if I can do it.  I definitely wouldn’t be able to do it in Colorado.  But 4000 feet lower in elevation?  That’s like 15% more oxygen.  Maybe it’s doable.  I think that on a great day I could probably hit a 7:15-7:20 half marathon on a flat course in the Denver area.  I did 7 miles at that pace last week and wasn’t dying at the end.  Will that 15% more oxygen + taper + race food get me there?  Not sure.  There’s also some non-trivial uphill in this race that’s going to make it interesting.  The hope is that the downhills will be free mileage so I can redline the uphills if I have to.  We’ll see.  No matter what, I think I’m looking at a personal top 3 half marathon performance.  Not bad after not being able to walk without pain 5 weeks ago.  Time to rest up and get strong.

And yeah, I signed up for the 50 in Tucson, too.  

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running

[scottrunsultras]

7 year blog birthday

7 years ago I created this blog as a way to publicly hold myself accountable and document the process as I trained for my first 50 mile ultra.  To that point I’d finished two 50k’s and neither was that great.  But I was at a place in my life where I needed something to focus on while I watched the calendar move.  We were living in Twentynine Palms, California at the time and honestly, it kind of sucked.  So this process was a good distraction.

My first 50 was the Leona Divide 50 in socal.  And I was pretty terrible.  Cramps, dehydration, nausea, blisters, and a 12:30 or so finish.  There weren’t many good moments, but it was the start of a process and the first chance to really learn something about longer distances.  It’s hard to practice ultras.  So there’s a lot of race day trial and error.  About a month later I ran the Ranier to Ruston 50 that finished in my home town of Tacoma, Washington.  It was a little long - about 53 miles - and I finished in under 11 hours.  The route and terrain was mostly easy, but still... 50 miles.

Shortly after that my family and I moved to Beaufort, South Carolina and I got to experience running in real heat and humidity.  The desert was tough, but nothing like this.  Apparently my body handles heat okay because I thrived.  To that point I’d still never managed to pace myself properly in a marathon and was still cramping and blowing up at the end.  Then came the Wambaw Swamp Stomp 50, just north of Charleston.  And somehow, for one day, I managed to kill all my bad finish demons and finished in 8:28.  I still don’t know how that happened.  I almost completely imploded at mile 29, fought through it, and kept the wheels on for all 50 miles.  That was a trajectory changing moment for me.  Though I seldom had a race like that again, I knew somewhere inside me it was possible.

A couple of months later I finished the Waldo 100k, my first race at that distance.  I was pretty worried about the 16 hour cutoff going from sea level to some altitude and complete flatlands to mountains.  But I had a good day until about mile 55 and finished in 14:24.

Then I made a pretty bad mistake that is still costing me 5 years later.  I was so overconfident that I immediately started hard marathon training after Waldo.  I got over-training syndrome, didn’t recognize it, tried to push through it, and got terrible plantar fasciitis.  Despite that, I ran my first sub-5:00 50k (on a VERY easy course) and PRed a few marathons.  But the plantar was the first step in the achilles injuries that have been plaguing me for 4+ years now.

I moved to Boulder that next spring and despite the injuries really tried to embrace the mountains and the altitude.  I severely sprained and slightly broke my ankle on July 4th, 2015 (didn’t know the extent of the injury at the time).  Then I ran a 10:42 White River 50 three weeks later.  Rather than shutting it down for the year, I felt a lot of ridiculous pressure to get a Western States qualifier, despite having no intention or confidence in running a 100 miler.  So I once again pushed too hard, over-trained, and promptly DNFed the Cuyamaca 100k near San Diego.  My first ever DNF.

2016 had a few unimpressive performances.  I started physical therapy and eventually got the plantar fasciitis under control.  But my heels were getting worse.  I finished the season by finishing my second 100k, limping at last 2/3 of it.  But for some reason I was still convinced that I could just rest a couple of months and it would get better.  And at that point, I decided to take the real plunge and try to prove myself a real Colorado ultrarunner - I signed up for the Leadville 100.

2017 was entirely focused on training for Leadville.  I was still having pretty bad injury problems, but I was registered and determined.  I hired Sage Canaday and Sandy Nypaver as coaches, ran 6 days per week, injured my ankle badly enough to need a steroid injection the week before the race and toed the starting line.  I won’t recap the whole ordeal.  But very long story very short: the injuries didn’t stop me.  But poor nutrition and hydration coupled with severe altitude sickness did.  And I scored my second DNF at the 62 mile Twin Lakes aid station.

I was demoralized for months after that.  I tried as hard as I could to figure out what I did wrong and how to fix it.  It haunted me.  But as a momentary psychological band-aid, I went to Arizona and finished the Javelina Jundred.  It was no Leadville, but it was my first buckle and my first time running (figuratively) through the night.  

In 2018 I did the most racing I’ve ever done.  I raced at basically every distance: 5k, 10k, marathon, 50k, 40 miles, 50 miles, 64 miles, and wrapped up the year at Javelina again.  I pulled out another transcendent performance and cut almost 4.5 hours of the previous year’s time, finishing in 22:14.  My first sub-24 buckle.

2019 was more injury problems.  I’m still having heel issues, though at many times they seem to be improving.  This year I had major knee issues until April, giving me 4 months to basically train from nothing to Leadville again.  I won’t recap the race again, but I got it this time.

So that’s the 7 year blog summary.  I’m up to 16 marathon and 20 ultra finishes.  And with a Leadville finish for this year, I’m finally committed to doing what it takes to fix my achilles problems.  It’s going to be frustrating and difficult, but it’s time.  I have this dream every year of being able to train and race without pain.  It hasn’t happened in 5+ years but I also haven’t given it my full attention.  It’s funny how easy it is to convince myself to train for a 100 mile race through perpetual pain but i can’t convince myself to take the time in the day to do flexibility, mobility, and strength work to hopefully fix it.  Maybe 2020 will be the year.

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #scottfixeshisachilles

[scottrunsultras]

Leadville 100 recap

It took a while to fully process the experience.  I suffered from some post-race depression.  I wasn’t sure what to think.  I told myself that i was about 50/50 disappointed and proud.  But I think it felt more like 80/20.  But I think that was just the depression talking.  Yeah, I had performance goals going into the race.  And at no point did I ever consider “finishing” to be good enough, even if I tried to convince myself that it was.  But an amazing amount of life happens in the course of 30 hours on your feet in the thin air of the Colorado Sawatch Mountain Range.  And as I’ve thought about it, talked to my wife/crew chief/final pacer, as well as other friends who were either there or have ultra experience themselves, I think I’ve finally managed to full understand the experience and what it meant to me.

image: 3:30 am Saturday morning.  Heading to the start line.

Let me start with the week leading up to the race.  It was pretty rough.  I had a burning anxiety that I just couldn’t get under control.  Part of it may have been the taper.  It seemed to do its job because I had a ton of energy.  But I was also constantly visualizing the race, constantly thinking and rethinking the logistics of aid stations and what I needed to bring.  I also had stomach problems the entire week leading into the race - another likely byproduct of the anxiety.  I was mostly super excited to do the race.  There wasn’t any fear like last time I attempted Leadville.  It was absolutely a positive stress.  But it was exhausting.  And there was still, in the back of my mind, a pressure to finish after DNFing my last attempt.  

I attributed my previous DNF to dehydration.  And I still think that was a big part of it.  But the reality was probably closer to altitude sickness, made more pronounced by dehydration.  So I was extra focused on hydration and nutrition going into race day.  Probably overly focused.  But I was convinced that the only way I would fail is due to another crushing gastro-intestinal breakdown like last time.  It doesn’t help that the thin, dry air of Leadville sucks the moisture from your body unlike anything I experience in Boulder.  So I drank a ton of water the 36 or so hours prior to the race.  An absolute ton.  It seemed like the right thing to do.

I also get very anxious about sleeping.  I never sleep well the night before a race.  And I hit rock bottom last year the night before the Never Summer 100k by literally not sleeping at all.  Instead just laying in my tent for hours stressing about not being able to sleep - making it impossible to relax and actually doze off.  I’ve resorted to meds for sleep in races since then.  Before Javelina last fall I intentionally overdosed a little on Benadryl and it worked out great.  I did the same on Friday night, and actually slept a bit.  Probably in the neighborhood of 4 good hours - which isn’t bad considering I had to wake up at 2:30.  But I also felt... weird that night.  I told myself it was the Benadryl.  I wouldn’t say I was hallucinating, but I felt just mentally off.  I’d been freaking out about getting sick all week and was convinced that it hit me the night before the race.  Luckily I felt okay when I woke up.  My legs felt strong.  My stomach was mostly okay.  No real aches or pains from chronic achilles and ankle injuries.  I felt good and excited and ready to go.

I went out way too fast last time I ran this - doing the easy early section in the 7:00′s.  Between that and bombing the final descent of Powerline my legs were shot by the marathon point of the race.  I was determined to not let that happen this time.  My barometer for success began with how well I ran from 25-35, an extended slightly uphill but more or less easy section.  So I went out easy and ran the first 13 mile section in a bit over 2 hours.  Probably within 5 minutes of whatever my goal would have been if I’d cared.  But I knew that part didn’t really matter.

In the second section of the race - Mayqueen to Outward Bound, including the infamous Powerline - things started to get bleak.  On the 1 mile easy dirt road section just past the single-track Colorado Trail section, my stomach was killing me.  My entire nutrition plan had already fallen apart.  In my training runs I’d eat a granola bar of some sort every 30 minutes.  And I could go on for hours like that.  In my 9 hour big training run for the race, I did that the entire time and my stomach was thrilled.  This time my stomach was upset with solid food after the first hour.  

I made the conscious decision to try to settle things with electrolytes so I ate some salt tablets and started relying much more on Gatorade than water, and 30 minutes or so later I started to feel a little better.  But from that point on, every 30 minutes I’d have to force myself to eat and I was always unhappy about it.

image: Outward Bound Aid Station. Mile 24.

After leaving my crew at Outward Bound, things actually got a bit better.  This was the first test section for me and it went great.  Long, easy, semi-uphill miles.  I even hit a high point around the top of the climb on the way to Twin Lakes and flew down the hill.  I did that 15 mile section in a little less than 3 hours.  And while I was steadily losing time to my 25 hour goal time, I felt pretty good.  Then the logistical nightmare started.

Due to avalanches, the road to the halfway point, Winfield, was closed to crews and pacers.  So they had to take a shuttle from Twin Lakes.  So literally every crew, pacer, and spectator was parked at Twin Lakes.  From what I was told, the line of cars along the highway reached 5 miles long.  So when I got into the Twin Lakes Aid Station, I couldn’t find my crew... because they weren’t there.  So I walked back and forth for 10-15 minutes looking for them and spotted the crew of a friend from work also running the race.  I had shoes to change in to for the monster climb coming up and food/drinks... with my missing crew.  So I scrounged up some Gatorade from a stranger and prepared myself to cross a river and hike over a 12,600′ pass in my road shoes.  Then, right before getting back on the trail, I spotted my kids.  My wife had dropped them off on the side of the road with my crew bags and told them to find me.  They got there about 60 seconds before I left.

image: Hope Pass Llamas

So with proper food and trail shoes, I started the Hope Pass climb.  It went fine.  It’s a difficult, but beautiful and rewarding section of the race.  The section near Winfield was harder than I remembered, but I finished the 12 mile section in a little under 4 hours, cruising into the half way point a bit under 12 hours.

This time my crew was there and ready.  They apparently spent almost 2 hours in line to get on a shuttle, so they hadn’t been there for long.  But I got what I needed - a grilled cheese sandwich and a reload on gatorade and gus.  My stomach still wasn’t happy and I was heading into the section that ruined me last time.  So I had a definitely plan.  I had 3.5 miles until the major climb started.  So I gave myself 2.5 miles for my stomach to relax from what I ate at Winfield - then forced down a gu and a granola bar and resigned myself to not eating again until I got to the top of the pass. It didn’t feel good, but I didn’t puke - so it worked.

image: Hope Pass Part 2

The way down was fine.  Not easy - 4 miles of 800 feet per mile of vertical drop 15 hours into a race is pretty rough on the quads - but it was fine.  I had a great pacer for this section, who kept me super entertained with some great conversation.  And the peak crossing once again took about 4 hours - better than I had mentally planned going into the race but I’d lost so much time at Aid Stations and on the first crossing, the 25 hour dream was dead.

image: River Crossing heading back to Twin Lakes

Twin Lakes Inbound was good.  My crew was there and much more relaxed this time.  My pacers were there.  My wife brought me tacos.  i changed my shoes and socks and grabbed some cold weather layers and started the night section of the race.  That’s when things really started to grind.  This was the second test section for myself.  After a climb from 9,200 to 10,600 feet, I had a very long easy section.  Mostly downhill, reasonably smooth.  If I was going to have a good finish, this would be where it came from.  But it didn’t happen.  I told myself once it started going downhill I’d start running.  But my feet were trashed from blisters and my stomach was still giving me problems.  I felt like if I really pushed myself, I’d puke.  So I kept giving myself more time.  But more time didn’t help.  And the more time I gave myself, the more accustomed I got to hiking easy terrain - to the point that I couldn’t find it in myself to really run anymore.  So I’d shamble at 13:00′s on some sections, but actual running seemed to be over.  And that’s when the despair kicked in.

Staring down 50k of walking in the dark is hard to deal with.  I kept looking at my watch and thinking, “my god I have 10 hours left of this.”  In the back of my mind I felt like I’d still hit some high points and be able to turn it around, but it never happened.  I switched pacers again at Outward Bound, going into the last hard part of the race.  It was only 11 miles until the next aid station, but I had a big climb.  Once again I told myself that once I got to the top I’d dig deep and run down.  But I couldn’t.  My feet hurt so much that any rocks at all made things impossible.  And even on the smooth sections I only managed to run 13:00-14:00 minute miles.  My stomach still felt terrible.  It just never got better.

On this section I started to realize some mistakes that I’d made.  According to my pacer, I peed 8 times in this 11 mile section.  And it dawned on me that I drank too much during the race and in the days coming in to the race.  I’d always laughed off hyponatremia and the idea of drinking when thirsty, mostly because most of my races have been in hot weather.  But it looks like it may have bit me, though luckily only mildly.  Once I made this realization I ate the rest of my salt tablets and mostly stopped drinking except for the occasional sip of Gatorade.  It was 4am and 37 degrees.  I definitely wasn’t sweating.

I came into Mayqueen just before 5:00am, an hour under the cutoff.  And once again lost my crew.  After using the restroom I spent a good 10 minutes wandering back and forth looking for them - too tired to walk fast or yell anyone’s name.  I finally found my wife, decked out in her pacer gear, ready to pull me through the final 13 miles.

She did her best to encourage me.  “Run the easy sections.  Stumble the downhills.”  And I tried.  But my feet hurt so much that if there were any rocks at all I just couldn’t do it.  And the first 4 miles of the Turqoise Lake trail are pretty rocky.  So I did the best I could.  The finish still seemed impossibly far away, but I knew I’d get there at least.  Once the trail smoothed out I started to slow jog it a bit.  At this point, 27 hours into the race, my stomach finally started to feel normal.  I was no longer nauseous and I actually started to feel hungry. But I couldn’t stomach gus at this point so I was surviving on a snack bag of trail mix and some gatorade.  I couldn’t tell the difference between hunger and nausea so I was still afraid of throwing up.  But I was getting close and needed a goal to keep myself from slumping my shoulders and walking it in.  So I pushed to get under the 29 hour mark.

The sun came up, it started to get warm, and we pushed the long uphill back into Leadville.  I power hiked the ups and jogged the downs.  I passed at least a dozen people.  We turned the corner at the high school and started up the final real uphill.  I told my wife we’d start running once we got over the top.  And once we reached the crest, I turned to her and told her: “let’s blow the doors off.”  So we ran down the hill.  The first real running I’d done in more than 10 hours.  We were in the 7:00′s when the downhill turned back up into the final few blocks before the finish line.  I started running faster and dropped my wife.  I was in the 6:00′s going up the hill passing more people.  Then my son jumped in at the last minute and ran across the line with me.

28 hours.  44 minutes.  101 miles.  15,000 feet of climbing.  All mostly at or above 10,000 feet of elevation.  This is a hard fucking race.  And while I missed my stretch goal by several hours, it’s an honor to have finished it.  

I first heard of the Leadville 100 when I read Born to Run back in 2009.  It seemed mind-blowlingly impossible.  Apparently it wasn’t.

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #leadville 100

[scottrunsultras]

28:44. Recap hopefully coming tomorrow.

#runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #leadville 100

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LT100 Eve

Briefing is in 15 minutes. I didn't sleep super well last night - the altitude makes things difficult. Thin, very dry air. But I don't feel tired so it's fine I guess. It all seems a little impossible now, but I'm trying to not let myself think about the full scope of what I'm about to do. Mostly ignoring the last 25 miles when I visualize. Can't plan for that anyway.

Weather forecast is currently perfect. High of 68. Clear skies overnight. Very close to a full moon. It's going to be fun. This is what really drives me. This is my opportunity this year for the full 100 mile experience. Time to get excited.

#runner #running #runblr #runblog #trailrunning #ultra running #leadville 100

[scottrunsultras]

3 days left

I’m tired of waiting and would start the race right now if I could.  I guess the taper is doing its job.

Did strides on the treadmill this morning to keep my fast twitch muscle fibers awake and active.  Another day off tomorrow.  1.5-2 mile jog Friday.  Then the fun starts at 4:00 am on Saturday.

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #leadville 100

[scottrunsultras]

Leadville 100 in 9 days

I haven’t updated much this summer.  It was just the typical grind to being in ultra shape.  Quick recap: I suffered from some knee injuries until the beginning of April.  Then a Canadian Osteopath magically fixed it and I’ve been ramping up ever since.  So just about 4 months later, here I am.  I had a 34 mile, 8500 feet of climb peak run two Sundays ago.  Then last Sunday I did 21 miles to wrap up 80+ miles in a few hours more than 7 days.  I started tapering this week, but still trying to stay sharp - tempo run + a 45 minute strength workout Tuesday and intervals + a 45 minute strength workout today.  It was surprisingly easy - almost relaxing until about the last 15 minutes of the strength work.  Everything seems to be coming together.

A couple of weeks ago I did a tempo run for the first time in months.  I’d been focused on long runs and intervals mostly.  I fought through about a 6 week ankle injury, so I wasn’t doing much in the way of trails or vert.  Anyway, the tempo run killed me.  I was sore for days.  It actually hurt to sit going into my 34 mile peak run.  But it was a good lesson.  So I’ve crammed in tempo runs the last two weeks, doing the same workout progressively faster and with no real after-effects.  And now all of a sudden, my legs feel strong as hell.

I basically treated my 100 mile training like marathon training.  Except somewhat longer long runs.  Lots of speed work.  Lots of strength work.  I also finally, after 9 years of running, figured out how to run slow on recovery days.  So I got a lot of great practice just plodding along on dead legs.  My peak run put 7500 feet of climbing in the first half and then I just tried to run easier stuff - figuring that’s good practice for the race.  It went okay.

I feel pretty good at this point - with a week of tapering still in front of me.  My standard injuries feel better than normal.  The osteopath really is a sorcerer.  Sucks to have to wait another week.  I’d do it Saturday and feel great about it.  But I’ll be patient.

#running #Runner #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #leadville 100

[scottrunsultras]

Meanwhile, in Telluride.

Confronting my fear of heights by doing the Via Ferrata. Three hours of massive exposure and 600 foot cliff faces. It was pretty incredible.

We come here every year and spend almost the entire time talking about what it would take to live here. Maybe someday.

#via ferrata #telluride

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Ups and downs

It’s been almost two months since my last update.  Things were going super well with training for a while.  Then I got some terrible lingering cold that weakened me for a good three weeks.  By the time I felt better, I was going into race week for the Leadville Marathon.  So my good habits pretty much fell apart.  I stopped doing strength work because I either felt too weak, didn’t want to trash myself before the race, or was too trashed by the race itself.  I stopped foam rolling because I got lazy and felt I didn’t need to.  I stopped stretching as much.  I stopped running speed workouts in an attempt to crank up my long runs.  So yeah, I completely got away from the things that had me feeling so good in early to mid May.

The race went okay.  I wasn’t really prepared for it at all.  Going from a 20 mile easy long run to a marathon at 10,600+ feet with 4000 feet of climbing.  But I still finished in the top 30% and somehow managed to score a golden ticket to the 2020 Leadville 100. 

Then I went to Yellowstone/Jackson Hole for a week and had a pretty awful run last weekend when I thought it was time to really turn things up.  My ankle has been bothering me a lot and my heels, which didn’t really hurt at all in mid May, flared up really badly during the race and have been bothering me since.  So after bottoming out last weekend on a planned 20+ mile trail run that turned into an 11 mile mostly hike, I decided that I needed to get back to the things that were working.

So back to the early May plan: Every week I do 2 full body HIIT workouts, 1 interval workout, and eat super clean.  Then I need to keep pushing my long runs on the weekends and hopefully somehow find a way to work in trails/vert.  But I need to prioritize.  And if I have to cut the trails to work on strength and injury recovery, then so be it.  Luckily the Leadville 100 is about 70% easyish terrain and I won’t be running any of the tough uphills at 10,000 feet anyway.  I ran a great Javelina by just pushing my easy long runs and focusing on running fast.  Leadville is obviously a different beast that Javelina, but if I can run the easy stuff, it’s okay if I’m a little slower on the hard stuff.  Hopefully I can bounce back in time.

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running

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One month later

So this time last month was my last update here.  Epic powder day.  not really running but cautiously optimistic that the osteopath fixed my knee.  Well, it looks like he did.  It got progressively better since that appointment and with a little extra help from dry needling, it all feels totally fine now.  I’ve been disciplined about strength work in that month, doing aggressive HIIT workouts on back to back days every week with a day after to recover.  After a week or two of that I started running before/after the workout to start building my mileage base again.  

And now, basically 5 weeks removed from not running at all, I have my long run back up to 15 miles (going for 17-18 on Saturday), I did my first legit trail run on Monday and ran a personal best (10.5 miles, 2700 feet if climbing) in 2 hours flat, and yesterday did 12 x 325m intervals at 6:18 and followed that up with the most aggressive HIIT workout that I could find.  I’ve also lost 12-15 pounds since January.  So yeah, things are going much better.

In light of this, I signed up for the Leadville Marathon in mid June.  I figure it’s a good excuse to run a race and bathe in the thin 13,000 foot air.  Then the Leadville 100 is in mid August.  After being super pessimistic about this summer for months due to my knee, I’m feeling good now and I’m excited about what’s coming up.  So support your local osteopath.  They just might be able to fix a months old knee injury in a single 45 minute appointment.

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #osteopathy

[scottrunsultras]

One last powder day. 10" in the last day. One last opportunity to try some new, hard runs. And I think I ticked the last 3 runs that I hadn't tried off the list. Lots of trees today. Some pretty steep and at times super tight. It was actually a lot of fun and I managed to narrowly avoid impaling myself. Nice end to the season.

Going to try to bring the kids up for skiing Sunday morning. The snow will suck so I'm probably done snowboarding for the year. I lost count of the number of days I went to the local place (eldora) but I'm pretty sure I had 40+ days on the mountain this season.

Now I can focus on running. Hopefully the knee starts to cooperate.

#runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #snowboarding

[scottrunsultras]

Dry Needling, Shockwave, and Osteopaths

Super heavy week last week.  Trying really hard to get my knee back together so I can actually start running again.  Going to give it another try in a couple of hours.

Wednesday: Heavy HIIT workout followed by my most intense session of dry needling ever.  She got 4 or 5 different areas.  Trying really hard to loosen up my left hip.

Thursday: Another heavy HIIT workout on dead muscles from the previous day.  Followed by Shockwave treatment for my left knee and IT Band.  And then he decided to be nice and also do shockwave on both heels, which was incredibly painful.  That left me sore for a couple of days.

Friday: I saw an osteopath to check everything out and see if he could fix the root cause of my knee issues.  He immediately saw that my left hip was higher than my right and tracked that down to an out of place rib, which he put back.  He then went through my entire body and put everything back where it should be.  And fixed an enormous trigger point in my left calf.  He seemed pretty confident that it would help.  Said I should take 48 hours off from physical activity to let things recover.  Oops.

Saturday: The family was in NYC so I took a solo ski/snowboarding trip.  Saturday was Copper Mountain.  I spent about 2.5 hours working on learning how to ski before getting on my snowboard to explore a bit.  The snow sucked so I spent the last 2 hours riding 100% switch on greens - trying to get comfortable doing that.  I ended up feeling pretty comfortable with it by the end.

Sunday: Exhausted at this point, I took a crapload of caffeine and got back on the skis at Winter Park.  The first run was catastrophic.  No confidence, tons of snowplowing, not a single decent turn from the top of the gondola to the bottom.  I almost gave up but gave it one more try on the shorter lift - and something clicked.  Suddenly I figured it out and went from big, looping, semi-parallel turns to pointing straight down the mountain and doing proper parallels.  I looked like a real skier on steep greens.  Obviously a lot of work to do to get on to harder stuff, but I figured it out.  Then I took that confidence boost and spent the afternoon bombing blue runs on my snowboard.  Definitely going faster from a consistency and top speed standpoint than I’ve ever gone before.

I’m really stoked on the skiing thing.  I had a goal to learn how to ski this year, by skipping the standard snowplow progression and going directly to proper turning.  It ended up taking me about 10 hours from first time on skis to getting it.  Now I just have to remember how to do it again next season.  

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running #snowboarding

[scottrunsultras]

Well, that didn’t work

I ran 4 days in a row, thinking to myself that a small amount of running will hopefully help keep me in shape while my IT band heals.  So I was trying to skate on the edge of discomfort and not go too far over.  But it didn’t really go well.  It didn’t hurt much, but it was uncomfortable enough that I started to ask myself what’s the point?  So I went skiing on Tuesday and more or less decided to shut down running until it didn’t hurt anymore.  If that time ever happens, I’ll start building up again.  For my own sanity I’m trying to figure out ways to keep moving the needle on my fitness.  It gives me something to look forward to.  I’ve had that in snowboarding all winter, but that’s going to end soon.  But I’m slowly getting to the point of accepting it for what it is.  I tried for 4 months to train through it and it didn’t heal.

I signed up for a 3 pack of shockwave (EPAT) treatments.  I had my first one last Friday.  It hurt, but not nearly as much as I expected.  And there was basically no residual pain.  Things were sore, but not much more than normal.  I’m going to have dude hammer my achilles in addition to my knee with it tomorrow, which scares me a little.  But might as well go all out.  And I had a pretty brutal dry needling session today.  She got 4 different areas on my left upper leg, hip, and glute.  My hip is super tight and the mobility is terrible.  Not sure how much today helped, but hopefully at least a little.

So the new plan is basically to get outside and get exercise in whichever way I can that doesn’t hurt.  I’ll probably get back to doing old 2007 Insanity workouts.  I did one today and then hiked a 15% gradient mile and my knee held up okay.  And once a week, I’ll try to run 4 miles.  And if I get no knee pain at all, I’ll keep running.  Otherwise I’ll wait until the next week.  And if June rolls around and I’m still doing this, then the 2019 Leadville dream is over.  That would be super disappointing.  But I think after all of these years I’ve reached my limit on running through pain.

#Runner #running #runblr #runblog #trail running #ultra running