Today my running club, the Prospect Park Track Club, held their annual Cherry Tree 10 mile race and relay. Billed as a "race for the hardcore", it has been one of my favourite (and, truth be told, only) winter races for quite a few years now. I have a large collection of Cherry Tree race t-shirts. These are among my favourite of all race t-shirts in that I actually still wear them while running, rather than storing them in the back of the closet and forgetting about them.
The race consists of three loops of Prospect Park, one of my regular running haunts. This was to be the second year in a row that I did not run the race. I was on "running spouse" duty. Ever since our daughter Bijs made an appearance into our lives, my wife Lauren has demanded that this race is hers. Instead of running, I took on the more arduous task of pushing the stroller, singing Frere Jacques for hours and hours, and reminding our daughter that Mummy hasn't disappeared forever. Running spouse duty was quite hard. However, I did get to see all the runners as they whizzed by multiple times. It was inspiring and salutory. "I need to work harder on my running", I said to myself, as Bijs and I retired to Connecticut Muffin for hot chococate and bagels while Lauren completed her third lap of the park.
We cheered Lauren as she finished the race. She looked exhausted but very happy. Bijs and I were very proud of her. We went back to Connecticut Muffin for more bagels. I was pretty exhausted by this point, so we went home and tried to return to bed.
I found this beautiful quote on the kickrunners.com forums:
"Perhaps the genius of ultra running is its supreme lack of utility. It makes no sense in a world of space ships and supercomputers to run vast distances on foot. There is no money in it and no fame, frequently not even the approval of peers. But as poets, apostles and philosophers have insisted from the dawn of time, there is more to life than logic and common sense. The ultra runners know this instinctively. And they know something else that is lost on the sedentary. They understand, perhaps better than anyone, that the doors to the spirit will swing open with physical effort. In running such long and taxing distances they answer a call from the deepest realms of their being -- a call that asks who they are."
Ever since running the JFK 50 miler at the end of November, I have been in a bit of a running slump. At first I had planned to take a complete month off from running after the race. I was inspired to do so after reading an article on Scott Jurek's blog, where he describes how he takes four to six weeks of complete rest from running at the end of every year to recharge his batteries, mentally and physically. The blog article goes on to describe how some Kenyan runners also take a long break from running at the end of every season, sometimes not running a step for two months. I decided to give it a try. It was much harder than I imagined. In fact I found not running at all to be quite a bit harder than training for an ultramarathon. I found it to be so hard that I started cheating. I started doing little three or four mile runs a couple of times a week. I needed to do this in order to maintain some mental equilibrium. My cheating got worse: I started doing six miles runs from Brooklyn over the Manhattan and Williamsburg bridges to and from Manhattan. Finally I accepted that I had failed to achieve my goal of a complete break from running. I cannot live without running, even for a few weeks. This was my first ever DNF (Did Not Finish). This is why I am not Scott Jurek. I now have a lot more admiration for people who do not run. I had no idea how difficult this is.
Despite failing at not running at all, after six weeks I also found it difficult to become motivated to run a lot and resume hard training. So for a while now I have been running in "maintenance mode", just enough to stay sane, but no more. But I miss the long distance runs, and I miss running in the woods and falling flat on my face as I trip over hidden tree roots. I needed something to motivate me to start running hard again.
At last I have finally found the motivation I am looking for. Last week I signed up for the North Face Bear Mountain Endurance Challenge. This is series of races, from 10K to 50 miles, taking place over the weekend of May 8th-9th in Bear Mountain and Harriman State Parks, about 50 miles north of New York City. I registered for the 50K race. I was tempted to register for the 50 mile race, however from the description of the course on the website this sounds extremely challenging:
"The 50-Mile course has roughly 9,000 feet of elevation gain over technical, rocky trails with multiple shallow stream crossings and hiking sections." "The North Face Endurance Challenge in Bear Mountain is likely as tough as any endurance trail run this area could offer," said Brian Duncanson, race ambassador and course designer.
This clip from a previous year gives some idea of the terrain:
Yesterday, after work (I work in Westchester), I drove up to Bear Mountain to get an idea of what I had signed up for. I ran up Bear Mountain, just as it was getting dark. It was everything I love about running on trails. It was very hilly, very beautiful, a little scary, and very challenging. I am not sure I will be ready to run 31 miles on this type of terrain by the beginning of May. But I am going to try. I plan to go to Bear Mountain at least once a week up until race day, to get some experience of running in this environment. One day I would like to be able to complete the full 50 mile distance, maybe next year, maybe the year after. It seems daunting. So now I have a goal. The running slump is over.
It has been one month since I ran my first 50 mile race, the JFK 50 miler, and now I finally have the time and the motivation to write a race report. Not sure why it has taken so long. While I had a great race, I somehow lost all interest in running for a quite a while afterwards (and regained a strong interest in sleeping, eating chocolate and drinking beer). I am only just starting to get back to regular running right now. A similar thing happened after my first marathon, so maybe this is what my body needs after tackling a new long distance challenge.
The JFK 50 miler is one of America's oldest and largest ultramarathons, attracting elite athletes and first-timers from all over the country. I have wanted to run this race for a number of years now. The challenge of running 50 miles was irresistible to me, feeling both achievable after running multiple marathons, and yet at the same time also seeming very daunting. With my advancing middle age making me more aware of how little time I have left on this Earth, I finally summoned up the courage to register during the summer. To ensure I wouldn't try to back out, I announced my intentions, to the complete indifference of everyone I knew. Overwhemed by encouragement, I started a training schedule that consisted mostly of weekend back to back long runs, along with a few long distance races (two full marathons and a 50K).
The race takes place on the Saturday of the weekend before Thanksgiving. I started to become very nervous about a week before, even though my training had gone fairly well. I started to look for ways to back out. My wife dismissed all my excuses and told me that I was going to run the race, whether I liked it or not. We set out with our daughter for the 4 hour drive from New York to Hagerstown, Maryland on the Friday before Thanksgiving. After checking into the hotel and picking up the race packet, my wife quickly located the hipster part of town (identified by two coffee shops and a group of people with placards demonstrating for transgendered rights). We ate an excellent meal at the Rhubarb House restaurant, and then returned to the hotel for an early night.
I woke up at 5:30 the next morning after 2 hours of interrupted sleep, and we left just after 6am for the 7am start. Unfortunately I had assumed that the start of the race would be somewhere near to Hagerstown, which was where the race packet pickup was. But after checking the race instructions (something I should have done the night before) we saw that it was over 20 miles away in the town of Boonsboro. We made it to the start line just after the race had started. I started the race completely on my own, slowly jogging up the main street of Boonsboro towards the Appalachian Trail, where I caught up with the back of the pack.
The race itself has three distinct sections. The first section involves a three mile climb up to the Appalachian Trail, which is followed for another 13 miles or so on the Trail. This was beautiful in the early morning mist, although hilly and very rocky, making running very difficult at times. Most of the people around me walked a large part of the race here. I became frustrated at times that I couldn't run far without tripping over hidden roots and rocks and landing on my face (something I did twice, to the concern of people around me). I ran for a while with a guy wearing a tuxedo, who told me he had ran 100 miles in the same tuxedo in Vermont the month earlier.
After around three hours the course wound steeply down the side of a hill to leave the Appalachian Trail at around mile 16. We came across a big aid station with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which I munched on gratefully. I was beginning to feel a little tired at this point. We then started the second part of the course, 26 miles on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal towpath. This part of the race is infamous for being long and monotonous. However after 3 hours on the Appalachian Trail I was grateful for an opportunity to zone out a little while running. I actually found the towpath to be quite scenic, and even beautiful in parts. I met my wife and daughter at mile 27, at which point I was feeling strong again. This gave me a big boost, and we ran together for 3 miles. Everyone passing us by looked longingly at our daughter tucked in a blanket in the running stroller, and offered to swap places with her.
There were aid stations every three or four miles, which gave me something to focus on once fatigue started to set in around mile 32. Having researched the race in the months before, I had read that people often encounter two "walls" during a 50 mile race: one around 20 miles, similar to the one in the marathon, and another bigger wall after 30 miles. My training had prepared me for the 20 mile wall, which was not really a problem. After 32 miles, I hit a period of fatigue which lasted for about 10 miles. I settled into a pattern of running for 5 minutes and walking for 1 minute. I had to force myself to keep to this routine as the miles passed by, even though I was very tempted to reverse it. This felt like a real mental challenge and test of will. It didn't feel any worse than the wall in the marathon, it just lasted much longer.
I had my photo taken with Santa Claus at the mile 34 aid station, where I wasn't feeling that great.
We finally left the towpath at mile 42, and began the last section along a windy road through rolling farmland. This was once again quite beautiful, although the rolling hills at this point were challenging. I ran the downhills and walked the uphills. After a few more miles the afternoon turned into evening and I started to feel better. I was able to run without walk breaks for the last few miles. During the last mile of the race, which went through the town of Williamsport, I become emotional and teary. It felt like such a long and epic day of running. I crossed the finish line in darkness with a time of 10 hours 35 minutes: not great, but not bad for a first 50 miler. I felt wonderful at the end, and could have carried on running. My wife and daughter met me at the finish line and dragged me to the car and back to the hotel for a shower and food.
I truly loved running this race, even the painful parts. It felt very special. I remained on a high for a few days afterwards, and was even able to walk down stairs a week later. I will be back for more. I'm hooked!
This last weekend we were visiting family in Narragansett, Rhode Island. My mother-in-law made us cheesecake. Her cheesecake is the best cheesecake in the world, and I ate lots of it. Fortunately, our visit coincided with the Amica marathon, which was taking place in nearby Newport. Since a serving of cheesecake (at 2.8 ounces, about 1/6th of the entire cake) has around 250 calories, running a marathon would allow me to eat two entire cakes and not put on weight (I expect to burn at least 3000 calories while running a marathon). I had also heard that the course was very scenic, but this was a secondary consideration. After downing a few beers on Saturday night the deal was sealed: no more cheesecake or beer until I brought back a medal from the race.
I woke up at 5am on Sunday to the sound of heavy rain. I left the house a little later and drove 15 miles in the dark to the race start in downtown Newport. The weather conditions were truly abysmal. It was cold (in the 40's), windy and raining hard. The rain was a cold rain, which later turned to a hard hail. The race website later characterized the conditions as being the worst imaginable for running. My wife later told me that when I didn't drop out of the race she really, seriously began to have concerns about my mental state.
The marathon started at 8am, and two minutes later I was questioning the wisdom of what I was doing. My shoes filled with freezing cold water and I was completely soaked. The course was a point to point race, first passing through downtown Newport before heading into some picturesque neighbourhoods with the large historic mansions Newport is famous for. We ran for a while along a road by the seashore, where the weather was at it's worst. In addition to the lashings of rain and wind, waves crashed over the seawall onto the course. The scenery was dramatic at times, and wild. I found myself sometimes running but almost stationary, stopped by a wall of wind. I began to feel I was participating in something special, a legendary race, tales of which would be passed down the generations.
I reached at halfway point a little after two hours, when many half-marathoners finished their races, leaving the field a little barer. The second half of the race was less interesting than the first, being a couple of out and backs along roads in and out of Newport. Actually this part of the race was quite boring, and I don't have many memories of it. I finished in my worst marathon time ever, 4 hours 23 minutes. However I was very happy to have finished and considered this an achievement. In retrospect if I were to do this race again, I would only do the half marathon, which was extremely scenic, rather than the full. Even though this would mean eating less cheesecake.
I wasn't sure whether I would be able to make this race. The previous week I was suffering from quite a bad chest infection, picked up on my way home from Greece. My voice was hoarse and I was short of breath. I was worried I might have swine flu. Finally, the day before the race, I went to see a doctor. I was told to take some Tylenol and get some rest. I took the lack of concern from my doctor as an encouraging sign and started preparing for the race for the following day.
The race was set in Amish country, in the rolling hills of southeastern Pennsylvania. This is the furthest I have ever driven to and from a race in a single day, at close to 260 miles round trip. It was an important part of my training for the JFK 50 miler in November, since at 5 miles longer than the marathon it gave me an opportunity to run the longest distance I needed for my training program. It was also a trail run, which would be good practice for the first 16 miles of the JFK race which takes place on the Appalachian trail.
The race was hosted by the Pagoda Racers and their website claimed it was suitable to introduce newcomers to the world of ultra trail running with a course that was "very runnable but challenging enough to make it interesting to everybody". I later found the first part of this statement to be a lie. Here is the elevation profile for the race:
While the race did not have huge climbs, there was a lot of up and down for most of the trail, which ran through woods and fields. Furthermore, at mile 10 (and again at mile 20 - the course was an out and back) was Skislope Hill: 300 ft of elevation gain in less than half a mile. The trail was covered in tree roots and stones. I tripped and fell several times on the roots, as did most people I spoke to. Fortunately I was carrying hand held water bottles in both hands, which were very useful for cushioning my falls.
The aid stations, at every 3-4 miles, were very well stocked with Heed (my favorite Gatorade-like drink), chocolate goodies and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (very yummy). At one aid station they were grilling beef burgers. Towards the end of the race I was given cold wet towels that were placed on my head and back to cool me in down in the heat.
I spent the first half of the race running in groups of 3 or 4 people, which I found to be very pleasant and social. We referred to each other by the states we had traveled from. I was New York, and spent quite a bit of time running with West Virginia and Massachusetts. I ran the second half of the race on my own, when most of the field had become very spread out. At one point I realized I had lost the trail when I ended up at the shore of a lake with nowhere to go, necessitating retracing my steps a half mile. I didn't really hit the wall like I usually do during a marathon. I think the enforced walking breaks during the very hilly sections and my overall very slow pace as a result of running on trails helped conserve my energy. I actually felt better at the end of the race than I usually do in a marathon. I finished in a fairly slow 6 hours 21 minutes. I was happy with this time given the terrain and the fact that this was my first trail race.
Trail running is very different from road running and for me requires some new running skills. The race seemed more social than the marathons I have run in, and the beauty of the countryside helped keep my mind off the difficulties of running the course. I could definitely become hooked, and will be looking to do some more trail races in the future.
The other night I went to see Dean Karnazes give a talk at Symphony Space as part of the North Face Never Stop Exploring Speaker Series. Having read Dean's book "Ultramarathon Man: Confessions of all All-Night Runner" a couple of years ago, I was intrigued to see what Fitness Magazine claims "might just be the fittest man in the world" looks like in person. Dean seems to be quite a controversial figure in the ultrarunning world. He has raised awareness of the sport through his book and media appearances. On the other hand, some people resent the attention he receives at the expense of more competitive runners. There is no doubting he is an impressive athlete: running 350 miles non-stop and winning the Badwater 135 mile race in Death Valley in 2004. When someone asks how your run was, how often do you get to say it was OK for the first two nights, but the third night without sleep was a little psychotic?
Seeing Dean in person makes me realize he is clearly at a very different level of fitness and conditioning than the rest of us, in the same way that the Kenyan runners who lead the pack of the New York marathon are physically very different to the runners that follow. As well as being very lean, he is also surprisingly muscular. He doesn't look like a skinny runner. As a former weight lifter who likes to drink beer, I found this quite heartening. I wanted to go to the gym and lift some weights after seeing him.
Since most of the audience were runners, the majority having run marathons or longer races, I was hoping to hear Dean talk about what it takes to run crazy distances like 350 miles. What sort of training is needed for such an event? How much harder is it running 350 miles than running 50 miles or 100 miles? How do you explain to your wife that you want to go on a three day run? What we saw was a video of Dean on the Dave Letterman show, which was entertaining, and some anecdotes about his 50 marathons in 50 states in 50 days tour. He did talk a little about the why's and how's of extreme running, but not enough in my opinion. I would really like to hear him talk about his achievements from the point of view of someone who one day might also be tempted to do something a little crazy. Overall I had an entertaining, if not enlightening, evening.
