For Christmas last year I was given a gift card to Chapters. I love nothing more than spending a few hours in a bookstore sipping on a coffee and browsing, so this gift was just perfect. While browsing, I happened across Born To Run by Christopher McDougall. As the title suggests, it's a book about running; about running a lot. McDougall writes about his experience with the Tarahumara Indians, a group renowned for their ability to run for an incredibly long time over an incredibly long distance, and with the Leadville 100, a 100 mile race through the mountains of Colorado. He explains how the ability to run long distances is unique to humans, and explores the implications that this has had for our development as a species. The book finishes with him running an ultra marathon in the Tarahumara territory.
I've been a runner for a couple years now; I started in 2011 because of a bet, and over the preceding year and a half I had run a handful of smaller races. I enjoyed running, but wasn't dedicating much time to the hobby. I ran when I wanted to rather than by using a plan, and I was averaging less than 6 or 7 miles per week. Born to Run, though, is an incredibly compelling read; I finished the book in a single sitting, and at the end all I wanted to do was to get outside and run. I set a series of targeted running goals for 2013, including a 5k and marathon time, but I wanted more. So in January I signed up for an ultra-marathon: the Dirty Girls Run, a 24 hour race across trails in Mansfield, Ontario. Timed races have no minimum distances, but to get my belt buckle (marathons give medals, ultra-marathons give belt buckles) I would need to run 120km.
I post on a running and fitness forum, and when I announced my goals for 2013 there, the reaction was less than positive. People were understandably warning me against setting such an aggresive goal. Just training for an ultra-marathon often includes running 70 mile weeks. Don't worry, I said, I won't even get close to 70 mile weeks! My plan from the get-go was to jump up to 25 mile weeks right away, and to top out somewhere in the range of 40-50 miles. I took the negative feedback as fuel for my training. That fuel helped carry me through long runs in January and February, running in six inches of snow and ice and -20C weather. It helped carry me through training runs of 4+ hours leading up to the race when I would blow up and need to walk home. And in August of last year, it helped carry me through the race itself.
The race was on August 10th, 2013. My crew and I (read: my brother and I) drove down to Mansfield the night before, and got a few hours of sleep in before the 8am start time. There were about 40 of us. I started out at the front of the pack, not because I thought I ought to be a front runner, but because I didn't want to have to wait on the single track trails. As it turns out, this was the ideal place for me, and for the first hour or so I kept pace with the leaders. The race was set up over an 8km loop, so we would return to camp 14 times before we were done. When I got back to camp after that first lap, in a little under an hour, I felt really strong. One lap down, fourteen to go.
Really strong is a phrase I repeated to myself many times over the proceeding 12 hours. It took me that amount of time to finish the first 10 laps - 50 miles. I felt strong and others described me as looking strong. It was a fantastic feeling; even though my training hadn't been perfect, everything was coming together. I ran when I felt like running and walked when I felt like walking, and I was on top of both my foot maintenance and my nutrition (this is crucial in an ultra-marathon). It was the ideal first 50 mile race.
The problem, of course, is that the race was not 50 miles, and the 12 hour mark is when it all started to fall apart. My body was incapable of handling the distance. My back started to hurt, my legs started to hurt more, and I stopped taking care of my feet and my food. The first 10 laps took 12 hours; the last 4 laps took 9. And that was it, that was all I had. I wrapped it up at 5am on Sunday morning, 21 hours from when I started, one lap, 8km, short of my final goal.
The next morning was hard. I was a wreck both physically and mentally and had to drive back to Ottawa on little sleep. I was not, however, all that depressed about my results. I had failed in achieving my goal, but I could look at myself and honestly say that while I could have done more in the months leading up to the race, on race day itself I gave everything I had. And next year, come August 9th, 2014, I'll be back in Mansfield, Ontario, to do it all again. This time I'll earn my buckle.
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