Collegiate Peaks 25 mile trail race 2013 race report.
When Matt decided to run the Collegiate Peaks 50 miler this year to help prepare him to run in high altitudes for the Leadville 100 in August, I thought, "Oh! I want to run there! I bet it's beautiful!" After having done two 50k runs this year already, I even thought maybe I'd do the 50 miler. It would only be my second 50 miler, but what an incredible place to do it.
Then I came to my senses and remembered that (a) that one 50 miler was HARD, (b) that one 50 miler was at a MUCH lower elevation, (c) the only running at high elevation I've done was when we were up in Twin Lakes for Leadville 2010, and I kinda wanted to die, and that was less than 5 miles. And I looked at the elevation profile.
Austin's off-the-bottom-of-the-chart elevation edited in red for clarity.
25 miles it is!
Matt and I decided to road trip up, because we enjoy road trips, and because it might save us a little money. We left Thursday and got all the way to Trinidad, Colorado ("Sex Change Capital of the World", as we were informed by several people, though our Days Inn really didn't advertise that fact), crashed there overnight, then pushed in the last few hours on Friday morning.
Since we couldn't check in to our hotel until 3pm, we met up with David (also running the 25 miler) and Betsy (David's amazing sherpa, who very kindly took care of all of us) around noon at the race start site for a little shake out run. We changed in the bathroom and went out to tackle the last part of the course as an out and back. And it was haaaaard. Straight uphill (which at least meant the last part of the real race would be straight downhill), and I could feel the elevation. Matt was in front leading, kindly running at a pace that would let me keep up with him, and David was behind me. I was somewhat reassured to hear that David was breathing just as hard as I was. Our pace was moderate but our effort was ridiculously high for that pace, and our breathing very labored. Hooboy.
We got to a logical turnaround point, and stopped to look at the view (aka breathe heavily), then turned around to head back down. And wheeeeeeeeeee! Downhill was a whole lot easier and more fun. That was reassuring at least. But at the end of the run I definitely had concerns about how running the next day would feel.
Hanging out after our shake-out run. (Taken by Betsy)
The rest of the day was a bit of a whirlwind, with lunch, hotel check-in, shower, gear prep, packet pickup, dinner, then early bedtime. I didn't really have a chance to consider the race until that night, as I climbed into bed, and I admit, I was a bit concerned. I knew that this distance at this elevation was going to be challenge for me, and I really didn't want the whole experience to be miserable, so I decided to do something I'd never done before: run with my camera. Too often I spend an entire trail race just staring at my feet, trying not to faceplant, and I didn't want to end up doing that and miss out on the incredible views in the mountains. So I reorganized my water backpack a bit to accommodate my camera, adjusted my expectations, calmed my nerves, and was able to fall asleep easily and slept relatively soundly.
The race started at 6:30am, but it was about 2 minutes away from our hotel, so we rolled out of bed at the blissfully late hour of 4:30am, ate, digested, got ready, and hit the road just before 6. Even leaving that late, we still got parked easily and had plenty of time for a bathroom trip, a picture, and lots of shivering. It was 28 degrees and dry, quite the change from our 70 degrees with 90% humidity morning norms in Austin.
Since David and Betsy flew up, we drove up Betsy's quilt for her, for just this circumstance!
The 25 and 50 milers started together, with the 25 milers doing one loop of the course, and the 50 milers doing that same loop, then turning around and doing it again in reverse (clockwise the first time, counter the second). I lined up near the back of the relatively small field, not wanting to get caught up in the people going out too fast. My only goal was to finish and to have as much fun and feel as good as possible while doing it. I hadn't looked at past results, and really wasn't sure what to expect, so I threw together some back of the envelope math based on nothing scientific to come up with a potential finish time, as follows. 25 miles is 6 miles shorter than a 50k. But this was at elevation, so it would probably take me just about as long to run 25 miles at elevation as it would to run 50k closer to sea level. And then I had to factor in the two intense, prolonged climbs. My 3 50ks have been 6:13, 7:10 and 6:25, so I figured 7 hours was probably a good estimate.
Group photo before the start: Matt, me, David and Betsy.
So, chatting with Matt, freezing my ass off, Betsy wanders off to try to get a better vantage point for race start pictures, and then suddenly the people in front of us were running! No pomp or circumstance to this race start.
Matt!
Matt had forewarned me that this was a very kind start for a trail race. Unlike trail races where it's pretty important that you seed yourself correctly lest you end up caught up in faster runners, starting faster than you want, or stuck behind slower folks who force you to walk, this race starts out letting the runners spread out wide. It does briefly go to singletrack after a few minutes, but then immediately widens up again as it goes out onto a paved road.
A little singletrack. And that's David in the black shirt ahead of me.
Running on the road as the sun comes up. I don't know any of those people in front of me.
It was a beautiful morning. The temperature was cold, but the sun was out to warm things up a bit, especially once we were running. The scenery, mountains surrounding us, was beautiful. The runners were all smiling and chatting. And boy, was I breathing pretty hard for only having run for about 5 minutes on a flat, paved road. Damn you, elevation.
But I just kept slowing down until my breathing was under control, and began to practice my running-while-photographing skills. It took me a few tries to figure out the best technique for getting the camera out and turning it on and snapping a random picture. With the sun and the movement, there was no way to see what I was actually photographing, and I did have some fear that I would end up with a camera full of either blurry pictures, or even NO pictures (I couldn't be sure it was doing anything when I hit the button, really), but I kept diligently pulling it out to document my run.
Hey, why not a horrible self-portrait?! Stay tuned for a headband story later! (Much later!)
I had been told that the race started on the road, but I had gotten the impression that it was pretty brief. 2 miles later, I started to wonder whether we were ever going to leave the paved road and actually run on a trail. I would have worn my road shoes if I knew this was a road run!
The road unpaved itself eventually.
And then after giving up on us ever turning off the road onto a trail.. the road sorta just became a trail. The paved road stopped being paved and became a dirt jeep trail. Then a minute later, the jeep trail turned sharply and became somewhat more single track. And what had been a steady, low-intensity false flat for the first few miles became a noticeable climb.
A more for-real trail.
The next few miles were sort of a blur. Lots of steady climbing, with some short, rolling downhills. I was still clumped up with a fair number of other runners at this point, and I sort of tried to take my cue from them as to when I should walk. I don't typically walk up hills unless they're very steep or very technical (or both), but I'd been warned several times that I should expect to have to walk out there. So I just did it when everyone else did, unless it felt too easy, and then I'd pass those folks and move up to the next group and take my cues from them.
Scenery.
We went through a section of sand, and I thought, "Aha! It's that section of sand that Matt warned me about. This sucks, but at least it's relatively early in the race, and my legs aren't horribly tired yet."
Up and up and up we went. Mostly pretty gradual climbs, and lots of false flats, where you could feel the hill even if you couldn't really see it. Speaking of seeing, I was having a very difficult time with my vision. I typically don't do trail runs with my sunglasses, because tree cover makes it too dark to use them consistently, and the second I put them up on top of my head, they get covered in sweat and are never usable again. So I didn't bother to bring them, figuring that would be the case here, and also that the forecast called for partly cloudy. Well, it was full sun, and there was basically zero tree cover. I expended a ton of energy squinting the entire race, and it was definitely my biggest regret in the run, not wearing my sunglasses.
Painfully squinty.
But, hey, if that's my biggest regret, the race couldn't have been too bad, huh?
Running alongside a stream. Kinda gives you an idea of how exposed almost the entire course was, though, which is why we all ended up mildly sunburned even wearing sunscreen.
I was still enjoying myself. Breathing hard, walking the uphills, having trouble working the stupid nozzle on my water backpack (I recently got a new bladder for the pack, and the nozzle is really hard to open and close, even painfully so, and by the end I was alternating which hand I used to open and close it, to give my bruised fingers some relief), but overall having a good time.
Random pretty.
Man, some of these hills were ridiculous, though. Not technical. Barely any of this course was in any way technical. Lots of kind jeep trail, very few rocks, lots of opportunity to actually enjoy the scenery without having to watch your feet. But then I'd look up and the runners ahead of me would be slowly slogging up what appeared to be a vertical wall. Yeah, even without taking cues from others, I was walking up those hills, gasping to try to breathe what little oxygen was available. And warming up from those slogs, too. I had my long sleeves pushed up to my elbows, and my gloves pushed down to my palms. I had skipped the first aid station, but figured I'd stop at the next one to refill my water and strip down a bit.
This is one of the worst hills. You, of course, can't at all tell from this picture. But that is a very long, very steep hill.
Up, up, up, up, up. I was still mostly running with joy, but I was also getting a bit tired. A very tired joy is what I was running with. And I have to admit, I hadn't really looked at the elevation profile any closer than noting that there were two peaks. I didn't know when the peaks were or when they ended. And I wasn't even half done with the run yet.
But then, right when I really needed a pick-me-up, there was an aid station ahead!
As I ran up, I stripped off my pack and opened it up, then had to repeatedly ask, "Water? Water? Water?" as they tried to pour Heed (yuck) in my pack. Finally I found the guy with the water jug (Heed and water look remarkably similar, but do NOT taste similar), and he filled my pack back up. I zipped things back up, then went over to the side and clumsily, with a few false starts, managed to dump all my trash, pull out some new gels from the inaccessible-while-running back of my pack and shove them in the front, and fill that newly-opened space in the back with my gloves that I'd been carrying in my hands the last few miles (technically Betsy's gloves, which she was kind enough to loan me, because I couldn't find mine that morning and decided that I didn't need them; turns out, 28 degrees needs them). I slung my pack back on, buckled it up, put the straw thing back in place... then realized I'd completely failed to take off my long-sleeved shirt. So undid the pack again, shrugged it off, dumped it on the ground, took off the shirt carefully so it wouldn't pull all of my hair out of its moorings, tied it around my waist, adjusted it so that it was below my race number, and then finally picked my pack up and strapped it back on again.
As I started to head down the trail, I finally actually looked up and noticed that all that stupid uphill I'd run had gotten me to the top of a mountain with an amazing view, so I wasted a few more seconds grabbing my camera, flagging down a volunteer, and asking him to take my picture. Time well spent.
Peak! (Wishing I had sunglasses.)
And THEN I started running again.
Having a short break was enough to give me renewed energy and vigor. On top of THAT, I WAS FINALLY RUNNING DOWNHILL! This was our reward for all of that uphill slog: unfettered, non-technical, joyful downhill running. I had a huge grin on my face, and fortunately there was a photographer right there to document my downhill joy.
Downhill!!!!
The downhill actually went on for a really, really long time, with a few short ups mixed in, which I mostly walked. I'd gotten the hang of this "walk the uphills" thing, and didn't need to cheat off others' papers anymore. The downhills had a lot of great views, too, which I tried to document as I barreled down the hills, and in many cases those photos turned out very blurry. I'm glad I took way too many photos, just so I'd end up with some good ones.
Downhills make for good views. Also see those guys ahead of me? They were joking and jeering and scoring each other on their attempted face plants and generally just being fun and ridiculous every time I saw them. Until the finish line, because evidently I passed them at some point, and the guy in the reddish shirt crossed looking like death. Not sure what happened to him, but it wasn't good.
Speaking of good things, they all must come to an end, and I knew there were two peaks to contend with, and I'd only conquered one, so soon enough the climbing started again. This time it was muuuuch worse, though.
I mentioned the vertical hills on the last peak climb. Those were hard and frustrating, but you could see the hill, and you knew why it was so hard. This second climb was insidious.
First the ground turned sandy again. I had thought we had done the sandy part, but evidently there was more. "Okay, sand sucks, but I can get through it. It sure is making it hard to run, though. Why can't I run? Why is everyone ahead of me walking? WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?!"
If you look at the elevation chart (did I mention that I didn't, really?), miles 14 through 18 are basically one giant false flat. On sand. It looks flat. It looks like there's no reason you shouldn't be able to run it. And then you start running. And you sink in the sand. And it's stupidly hard. And then you're walking again. And you're in good company, because everyone is walking. And you can see others around you doing the same thing. They start running, run for 5 seconds, then put their heads down sadly and resume walking.
Miles of this. It doesn't look like deep sand. It doesn't look like it's uphill. But everyone ahead of me is walking.
I'm already at elevation, unable to breathe well, so I'm not running a stellar pace here. But do you know how long it takes to basically walk 4 miles on sand? Me neither. I refused to look at my watch. But I can tell you that it felt like it took at least 2 hours. So much for my 7 hour 25 miler.
(I probably should have looked up exactly what the effects of running at high altitude were. I knew it was hard to breathe, but hadn't considered the impact on my legs, which just felt.. tired. No energy, no turnover. Because, hey, it turns out, no oxygen to the legs, either. Also this article mentions the swelling in the hands. I was really enjoying the ridiculous sausage fingers. I was glad that I don't wear rings, at least.)
But I kept slogging, because (a) I knew the last few miles had to be downhill, based on my most cursory of glances at the elevation chart, and (b) there was really no other choice. There had been a girl at the 2nd aid station, where I'd stripped down, and I heard her trying to figure out how she could end her race there (not sure what was wrong with her), and they basically told her she could either walk the 11 miles back to the start/finish line, or wait there at the aid station until someone drove out, which would probably be many, many, many hours. So onward and upward I went! Very slowly.
The good(?) news is, the trail eventually got steeper, which meant that the sand mostly disappeared, and at least the steeper trail meant that your brain could understand why walking was necessary. False flats are a real mindfuck.
And the REALLY good news is that this second peak was higher than the first. Which meant.. snow! When Betsy and David flew in on Thursday, there had been some snow on the ground in Buena Vista, but then the temps were in the 50s on Thursday and Friday, so by the time we got there, there was no snow to be found. I was really hoping that there would be some at the higher elevations, and sure enough, here it was! Now.. when I say snow, I don't mean it was a winter wonderland. I just mean that there was white, patchy icy stuff on the ground in small clumps.
Snow!!!!! (What? It's SOME snow. Shut up.)
But I live in central Texas, so that's a billion times more snow than I've seen in years, so even with the ceaseless climbing, I had a smile on my face.
Okay, so that's about as much as there ever was. But it's more than we ever get in Austin!
And as a bonus, as I glanced up ahead of me to see if there was any end in sight to the ceaseless climbing, I saw a familiar form! Black compression socks, white compression sleeves, backward hat.. that looks like my husband! Oooh. Wait. That's not good. My husband is much faster than I am, and should be miles ahead of me.
When I finally established it was him, I wanted to go see how he was doing. Except he was still pretty far ahead of me. And we were still climbing. And we were all walking. And running was HARD. So I'd run for 10 seconds, then walk until my heart rate came down a bit, then run again. People kept cheering for me as I'd pass them, and I just kinda grimace-smiled, but if I'd had enough air, I would have said I was just trying to catch up to my husband, or else there's no way I'd be running. "Running". Generous term.
But eventually I did catch him, and touched the back of his arm to get his attention, since (a) he was listening to his mp3 player, and (b) I couldn't produce sounds that weren't panting/wheezing.
He took out an earbud, and I asked him what was going wrong. He tried to play it off like I was just doing better than him, as he'd been insisting before the race that I was going to pass him (under normal circumstances, even with him doing twice the distance, he's MUCH faster than I am), but then he admitted that he was having GI problems and desperately needed a portapotty.
I somehow didn't realize this before agreeing to marry him, but my husband will not poop in the woods. He requires at least some sort of pseudo-bathroom. I probably still would have married him if I'd known that, but I still feel like I should have known that earlier.
Had it been ME, I would have just ducked off into the woods and taken care of that. That's why I carry toilet paper. I figured that's why HE carried toilet paper. But there had been no portapotty at the last aid station, so he hadn't been able to go. And things were not going well in his innards.
We walked together for a while, and I tried to lift his spirits as much as I could, given how much I was struggling, and then I ended up slowly pulling ahead of him as it flattened out a bit and I was able to run more.
Husband AND snow! MY race was improved by these things, even if his wasn't.
As such, I came into the aid station at the peak before him, to establish that, in fact, that was no portapotty at that aid station. Matt had told me he thought there would be one at every aid station, but it looked like there would only be one at the very first aid station. My heart sank when I saw that. I felt so bad for Matt, who would have to continue to suffer. I knew I couldn't let it impact my race, and I definitely knew he wouldn't want it to impact my race, but I couldn't help but feel sad.
I also felt kinda hungry, so I stopped long enough to look at the aid station table and see what they had. I really wanted Coke, but they only had water and Heed, so I grabbed a water, and the potato chips looked kinda good, so I grabbed a handful of those. I started walking with my hands full, dropped 2 potato chips on the ground, jammed one in my mouth, realized they weren't really all that appealing, threw 2 more chips away, downed half my cup of water, threw the cup away as well, and started out running again, with a volunteer telling me to enjoy the downhill. As I ran out, I heard Matt running in, telling me he loved me. I felt slightly better that at least he felt good enough to encourage me, even after he must have already seen that there was no portapotty.
Now some downhill! I wanted to believe that it was all downhill from there to the finish line, but I'd heard some people as I passed them earlier discussing that there were still a few nasty uphills. So I kept my joy a bit in check. And there were a few more hard climbs, but they were relatively short, when compared to the ceaseless peak climbs, and eventually I realized that, with only 4 miles or so to go, and knowing the last 1-2 are basically pure downhill, there was only a very limited potential left for painful uphill. I was gonna make it!
Downhill!
I was SO INCREDIBLY GLAD that I had decided to do the 25 miler. I couldn't even begin to wrap my mind around turning around and doing that again. This amazing downhill I was enjoying would become one of those ceaseless, plodding uphills back to the peak, and then again to the next peak. I felt so bad for Matt, and a little afraid he would have to stop at the halfway point if he couldn't resolve his GI issues. He really needed to have a decent race. I really needed him to have a decent race.
Fortunately right around that time, as I was running downhill, being passed left and right (I'd pass people on the uphills, they'd pass me on the downhills), I glanced behind me to see Matt coming! He tore by me, looking really strong, and I was glad that he felt good enough to really use the downhills. Maybe his race could still turn around.
More downhill!
During this downhill, I finally started to see the 50 miler front runners coming back on their second loop. The leader was many minutes ahead of the next guy, then they started to come closer together, then a smattering of women all pretty close together, and eventually I was seeing people coming back toward me pretty regularly. It made things a little more interesting, since I was now running down a narrower trail lined with trees, often in a narrowish canyon, and a few times I stepped off the trail to let them come through. They had a lot more race left than I did.
I passed the last aid station, and the volunteers cheered for me, and one declared that I had the sparkliest headband in the race. I threw my arms up in the air and yelled, "I win!!!"
Right. The headband. I bought this sparkly gold headband quite some time ago, and have worn it for several races. It's gotten maybe 1 comment per race, and I feel it is fabulous enough to deserve MANY more comments. And this race, I finally felt like it got the recognition it deserved! I probably had 10 other runners, and several volunteers, comment on how much they liked it. Yay, headband!
In fact, I mention it in this ridiculous video I decided to make in the last few miles of the race. I'd just run through that aid station, my watch had just beeped for mile 22, and I had almost caught back up to Matt again. You can hear how out of breath I am.
I caught back up to Matt again on a minor hill, just as I decided to take one more gu. He was walking up the hill, also eating, so I asked if I could join him for a snack, and we walked together a second and ate and I tried to feel out how he was doing. He was pretty physically uncomfortable, but seemed relatively positive when he wasn't moaning in pain, so I told him I loved him, then started running again for my last push to the finish line.
I started into the section we'd run backward the day before, and started seeing the landmarks Matt had told me about. The correctional facility in the distance!
Happiest I've ever been to see a correctional facility! (It's on the left there.)
The shiny metal roofs. The stream. An unexpected photographer. I was getting close.
Unexpected photographer as I barreled down the hill!
The last section is probably the most technical of the entire course, so I made sure to be cautious, because that would be a ridiculous time to end up injuring myself, but I pushed as hard as I felt comfortable, passing one woman on one of the two little short, steep uphills on the way down.
And then there was the bridge! I was almost done!
I didn't take a picture while running, but here's Betsy and the bridge after the race.
I ran across the bridge, hung a left toward the community center, ... then realized I had no idea where exactly to go or how far I had left to run. I hadn't really figured out how the race ended or where the finish line was. But the flour markings on the ground were still visible, and they guided me up and around the corner into the parking lot, where I saw Betsy and David cheering at their car! Betsy frantically dug out her camera, and I threw her some obligatory jazz hands, then gave it whatever I had left as I headed toward the finish line.
Obligatory jazz hands! Taken by Betsy.
I had a good giggle at the "finish line", which was just a narrow doorway of pvc pipe with "FINISH" printed above it. A little different from the chaos of, say, an Ironman finish line, with its flashing lights and cheering crowds and general circus atmosphere.
FINISHLINE
But it was the most welcome sight in the world at that moment, and I crossed it with joy.
And then tried to walk off without my medal. Fortunately they didn't let me.
After
As I'd run in, I'd yelled at Betsy and David that Matt was right behind me, which I'm pretty sure they found reassuring. I know I'd been expecting that Matt would come through first, then David, then me. When Betsy saw David and then me without having seen Matt, I'm sure they were concerned.
But sure enough, Matt was right behind me, and we went into sherpa mode immediately, and helped him refill and restock his pack, as he ran off to the bathroom finally, and got a little bit of relief. Enough that he headed right back out after we got him all resituated. I walked him out through the parking lot as he ate his peanut butter and nutella sandwich and drank part of a Coke. He then blew a snot rocket on me. And then handed me the nasty other half of his sandwich. Then choked on his Coke and coughed it all over the ground, and me. And I reflected on how it's a good thing I loved this guy, because I had already needed a shower just from the race, but now I REALLY needed one.
Matt about to head out for another 25 miles.
But soon enough he was done with sandwich and Coke, handed me the remains of both, and headed back out for another 25 miles. I couldn't even imagine doing so. So impressed by his strength and commitment. And insanity.
I trekked back to Betsy and David's car and Betsy helped me clean off some of the Coke and nutella, and then we settled in for.. well, a wait. I finally had a chance to look at my watch, and realized I'd run a ~5:05. Woah! That was unexpected. I mean, it was pretty far back in the 25 miler field, but much better than I was expecting, based on my baseless calculations.
But since Matt had come in right after me, that meant that, if he continued to feel physically bad, probably the BEST case scenario was another 5 hours before we saw him again. Maybe 4:30 if things turned around for him. Maybe a lot more if they didn't.
We did our cold soak in the river. Rather, I was supposed to do a cold soak, and I suckered everyone else into joining me. Of course, our cold soak was about 45 seconds long at max, because that water was RIDICULOUSLY COLD. I guess since it's mostly snow melt, that makes sense.
So, so cold. Painfully cold.
The only way to recover from that was with beer.
David and his PBR.
So we spent the next few hours snacking, drinking, joking about the brilliance of our "train low, race high" strategy, going to get some actual food once we realized it would be a while before dinner happened, chatting with friends, strangers and new friends, and cheering for other runners finishing or starting their second lap. And then eventually finishing their 50 miler.
Betsy and HER PBR.
As time passed, the sun faded. The temperature dropped. A storm was obviously off in the distance, fortunately not the direction that the runners were running. But it was moving ever closer to us, and was obviously full of fluffy snow. And then it started to sprinkle on us. Then got harder, until eventually we moved into the car. Then we got paranoid we wouldn't see him coming in, so we drove the car up the path a little, so we could see people coming in down the road.
The weather moving in behind us, obscuring the mountains.
5 hours went by. Then 5.5. Then 6. We were a little concerned that, if he ended up getting a ride back in, we'd never know, and since I'd moved our car, he wouldn't find the car, which is where he'd put his phone at the halfway point, and he wouldn't be able to find Betsy and David's car, or any of us, and the whole situation just sounded kinda bad. But we still had faith that he was out there, and running. So we sat in the car in the rain, and whenever a runner would come by, we'd roll down the windows and cheer for them. I really hoped Matt was doing okay. At this point, we had put on all the clothes we'd brought (I now had a warm long-sleeved shirt, a hoodie, a warm hat, gloves, pants and long socks), and we were still cold. And Matt had ditched his long-sleeved shirt for his second loop, and was in just a sleeveless singlet. And if he was reduced to just walking, he'd presumably be very, very cold and miserable.
And then, after many times of perking our ears up, then sadly saying, "No, that's not him.." .. it was him! We rolled down the windows and cheered our fool heads off, then threw the car into gear and quickly drove away from him, which felt kinda rude. But we drove back to our spot at the finish line, jumped out of the car, and prepared to cheer him in. I handed my phone to Betsy to take a video of him finishing, and ran down to the actual finish line. I said, "My husband's coming in! His name is Matt!" and so when he came around the corner, everyone there (okay, so it was like 5 people at that point, given the bad weather) cheered Matt in by name.
Finish chute.
Matt looked incredibly focused and determined, but obviously ready to be DONE. And then he was.
FINISHED.
And Betsy's video of Matt powering in to the finish line (and me refusing to kiss him).
After after
It turned out his GI problems had progressed, and he had been unable to keep anything down starting around mile 28. Any food he took in just came right back up, then his water pack bladder busted, so he could only get water at the aid stations, then it was raining and 45 degrees, and well, basically it's amazing that he was able to finish, much less as strongly as he did.
So proud. Also I'm wearing 100x more clothes than Matt.
We got him warmed up, got some water in him, then eventually all went out for celebratory red pepper porters, which seemed to sit just fine for him, and for all of us.
Celebratory beers and sunburns.
And then the next day we visited some snow and gawked at some wildlife in Leadville, then drove straight from Leadville to Austin without stopping (except for gas and snacks), for an exhausting whirlwind of a weekend.
Finally, we found the real snow!
I honestly don't know if I'll do that race again. I mean, it's a great race, it's beautiful, I loved the town, but MAN, running at elevation was hard. The Pike's Peak Marathon was on my list of things to do eventually, and given that it's at even higher elevation, and is 13 miles straight up.. I'm not sure I really need to do that. We'll see, given a little time and distance between me and the race.
But overall, I'm glad I did it. I'm proud of my performance. I did exactly what I needed to do to get to the finish line while having as much fun as possible. I didn't beat myself up about walking so much, I had a lot of fun snapping pictures on the run, and I finished strong. I'm even more proud of Matt, super proud of David, who beat us all, and eternally grateful to Betsy for taking such good care of all of us!
Celebratory snow angel!
Then I came to my senses and remembered that (a) that one 50 miler was HARD, (b) that one 50 miler was at a MUCH lower elevation, (c) the only running at high elevation I've done was when we were up in Twin Lakes for Leadville 2010, and I kinda wanted to die, and that was less than 5 miles. And I looked at the elevation profile.
Austin's off-the-bottom-of-the-chart elevation edited in red for clarity.
25 miles it is!
Matt and I decided to road trip up, because we enjoy road trips, and because it might save us a little money. We left Thursday and got all the way to Trinidad, Colorado ("Sex Change Capital of the World", as we were informed by several people, though our Days Inn really didn't advertise that fact), crashed there overnight, then pushed in the last few hours on Friday morning.
Since we couldn't check in to our hotel until 3pm, we met up with David (also running the 25 miler) and Betsy (David's amazing sherpa, who very kindly took care of all of us) around noon at the race start site for a little shake out run. We changed in the bathroom and went out to tackle the last part of the course as an out and back. And it was haaaaard. Straight uphill (which at least meant the last part of the real race would be straight downhill), and I could feel the elevation. Matt was in front leading, kindly running at a pace that would let me keep up with him, and David was behind me. I was somewhat reassured to hear that David was breathing just as hard as I was. Our pace was moderate but our effort was ridiculously high for that pace, and our breathing very labored. Hooboy.
We got to a logical turnaround point, and stopped to look at the view (aka breathe heavily), then turned around to head back down. And wheeeeeeeeeee! Downhill was a whole lot easier and more fun. That was reassuring at least. But at the end of the run I definitely had concerns about how running the next day would feel.
Hanging out after our shake-out run. (Taken by Betsy)
The rest of the day was a bit of a whirlwind, with lunch, hotel check-in, shower, gear prep, packet pickup, dinner, then early bedtime. I didn't really have a chance to consider the race until that night, as I climbed into bed, and I admit, I was a bit concerned. I knew that this distance at this elevation was going to be challenge for me, and I really didn't want the whole experience to be miserable, so I decided to do something I'd never done before: run with my camera. Too often I spend an entire trail race just staring at my feet, trying not to faceplant, and I didn't want to end up doing that and miss out on the incredible views in the mountains. So I reorganized my water backpack a bit to accommodate my camera, adjusted my expectations, calmed my nerves, and was able to fall asleep easily and slept relatively soundly.
The race started at 6:30am, but it was about 2 minutes away from our hotel, so we rolled out of bed at the blissfully late hour of 4:30am, ate, digested, got ready, and hit the road just before 6. Even leaving that late, we still got parked easily and had plenty of time for a bathroom trip, a picture, and lots of shivering. It was 28 degrees and dry, quite the change from our 70 degrees with 90% humidity morning norms in Austin.
Since David and Betsy flew up, we drove up Betsy's quilt for her, for just this circumstance!
The 25 and 50 milers started together, with the 25 milers doing one loop of the course, and the 50 milers doing that same loop, then turning around and doing it again in reverse (clockwise the first time, counter the second). I lined up near the back of the relatively small field, not wanting to get caught up in the people going out too fast. My only goal was to finish and to have as much fun and feel as good as possible while doing it. I hadn't looked at past results, and really wasn't sure what to expect, so I threw together some back of the envelope math based on nothing scientific to come up with a potential finish time, as follows. 25 miles is 6 miles shorter than a 50k. But this was at elevation, so it would probably take me just about as long to run 25 miles at elevation as it would to run 50k closer to sea level. And then I had to factor in the two intense, prolonged climbs. My 3 50ks have been 6:13, 7:10 and 6:25, so I figured 7 hours was probably a good estimate.
Group photo before the start: Matt, me, David and Betsy.
So, chatting with Matt, freezing my ass off, Betsy wanders off to try to get a better vantage point for race start pictures, and then suddenly the people in front of us were running! No pomp or circumstance to this race start.
Matt!
Matt had forewarned me that this was a very kind start for a trail race. Unlike trail races where it's pretty important that you seed yourself correctly lest you end up caught up in faster runners, starting faster than you want, or stuck behind slower folks who force you to walk, this race starts out letting the runners spread out wide. It does briefly go to singletrack after a few minutes, but then immediately widens up again as it goes out onto a paved road.
A little singletrack. And that's David in the black shirt ahead of me.
Running on the road as the sun comes up. I don't know any of those people in front of me.
It was a beautiful morning. The temperature was cold, but the sun was out to warm things up a bit, especially once we were running. The scenery, mountains surrounding us, was beautiful. The runners were all smiling and chatting. And boy, was I breathing pretty hard for only having run for about 5 minutes on a flat, paved road. Damn you, elevation.
But I just kept slowing down until my breathing was under control, and began to practice my running-while-photographing skills. It took me a few tries to figure out the best technique for getting the camera out and turning it on and snapping a random picture. With the sun and the movement, there was no way to see what I was actually photographing, and I did have some fear that I would end up with a camera full of either blurry pictures, or even NO pictures (I couldn't be sure it was doing anything when I hit the button, really), but I kept diligently pulling it out to document my run.
Hey, why not a horrible self-portrait?! Stay tuned for a headband story later! (Much later!)
I had been told that the race started on the road, but I had gotten the impression that it was pretty brief. 2 miles later, I started to wonder whether we were ever going to leave the paved road and actually run on a trail. I would have worn my road shoes if I knew this was a road run!
The road unpaved itself eventually.
And then after giving up on us ever turning off the road onto a trail.. the road sorta just became a trail. The paved road stopped being paved and became a dirt jeep trail. Then a minute later, the jeep trail turned sharply and became somewhat more single track. And what had been a steady, low-intensity false flat for the first few miles became a noticeable climb.
A more for-real trail.
The next few miles were sort of a blur. Lots of steady climbing, with some short, rolling downhills. I was still clumped up with a fair number of other runners at this point, and I sort of tried to take my cue from them as to when I should walk. I don't typically walk up hills unless they're very steep or very technical (or both), but I'd been warned several times that I should expect to have to walk out there. So I just did it when everyone else did, unless it felt too easy, and then I'd pass those folks and move up to the next group and take my cues from them.
Scenery.
We went through a section of sand, and I thought, "Aha! It's that section of sand that Matt warned me about. This sucks, but at least it's relatively early in the race, and my legs aren't horribly tired yet."
Up and up and up we went. Mostly pretty gradual climbs, and lots of false flats, where you could feel the hill even if you couldn't really see it. Speaking of seeing, I was having a very difficult time with my vision. I typically don't do trail runs with my sunglasses, because tree cover makes it too dark to use them consistently, and the second I put them up on top of my head, they get covered in sweat and are never usable again. So I didn't bother to bring them, figuring that would be the case here, and also that the forecast called for partly cloudy. Well, it was full sun, and there was basically zero tree cover. I expended a ton of energy squinting the entire race, and it was definitely my biggest regret in the run, not wearing my sunglasses.
Painfully squinty.
But, hey, if that's my biggest regret, the race couldn't have been too bad, huh?
Running alongside a stream. Kinda gives you an idea of how exposed almost the entire course was, though, which is why we all ended up mildly sunburned even wearing sunscreen.
I was still enjoying myself. Breathing hard, walking the uphills, having trouble working the stupid nozzle on my water backpack (I recently got a new bladder for the pack, and the nozzle is really hard to open and close, even painfully so, and by the end I was alternating which hand I used to open and close it, to give my bruised fingers some relief), but overall having a good time.
Random pretty.
Man, some of these hills were ridiculous, though. Not technical. Barely any of this course was in any way technical. Lots of kind jeep trail, very few rocks, lots of opportunity to actually enjoy the scenery without having to watch your feet. But then I'd look up and the runners ahead of me would be slowly slogging up what appeared to be a vertical wall. Yeah, even without taking cues from others, I was walking up those hills, gasping to try to breathe what little oxygen was available. And warming up from those slogs, too. I had my long sleeves pushed up to my elbows, and my gloves pushed down to my palms. I had skipped the first aid station, but figured I'd stop at the next one to refill my water and strip down a bit.
This is one of the worst hills. You, of course, can't at all tell from this picture. But that is a very long, very steep hill.
Up, up, up, up, up. I was still mostly running with joy, but I was also getting a bit tired. A very tired joy is what I was running with. And I have to admit, I hadn't really looked at the elevation profile any closer than noting that there were two peaks. I didn't know when the peaks were or when they ended. And I wasn't even half done with the run yet.
But then, right when I really needed a pick-me-up, there was an aid station ahead!
As I ran up, I stripped off my pack and opened it up, then had to repeatedly ask, "Water? Water? Water?" as they tried to pour Heed (yuck) in my pack. Finally I found the guy with the water jug (Heed and water look remarkably similar, but do NOT taste similar), and he filled my pack back up. I zipped things back up, then went over to the side and clumsily, with a few false starts, managed to dump all my trash, pull out some new gels from the inaccessible-while-running back of my pack and shove them in the front, and fill that newly-opened space in the back with my gloves that I'd been carrying in my hands the last few miles (technically Betsy's gloves, which she was kind enough to loan me, because I couldn't find mine that morning and decided that I didn't need them; turns out, 28 degrees needs them). I slung my pack back on, buckled it up, put the straw thing back in place... then realized I'd completely failed to take off my long-sleeved shirt. So undid the pack again, shrugged it off, dumped it on the ground, took off the shirt carefully so it wouldn't pull all of my hair out of its moorings, tied it around my waist, adjusted it so that it was below my race number, and then finally picked my pack up and strapped it back on again.
As I started to head down the trail, I finally actually looked up and noticed that all that stupid uphill I'd run had gotten me to the top of a mountain with an amazing view, so I wasted a few more seconds grabbing my camera, flagging down a volunteer, and asking him to take my picture. Time well spent.
Peak! (Wishing I had sunglasses.)
And THEN I started running again.
Having a short break was enough to give me renewed energy and vigor. On top of THAT, I WAS FINALLY RUNNING DOWNHILL! This was our reward for all of that uphill slog: unfettered, non-technical, joyful downhill running. I had a huge grin on my face, and fortunately there was a photographer right there to document my downhill joy.
Downhill!!!!
The downhill actually went on for a really, really long time, with a few short ups mixed in, which I mostly walked. I'd gotten the hang of this "walk the uphills" thing, and didn't need to cheat off others' papers anymore. The downhills had a lot of great views, too, which I tried to document as I barreled down the hills, and in many cases those photos turned out very blurry. I'm glad I took way too many photos, just so I'd end up with some good ones.
Downhills make for good views. Also see those guys ahead of me? They were joking and jeering and scoring each other on their attempted face plants and generally just being fun and ridiculous every time I saw them. Until the finish line, because evidently I passed them at some point, and the guy in the reddish shirt crossed looking like death. Not sure what happened to him, but it wasn't good.
Speaking of good things, they all must come to an end, and I knew there were two peaks to contend with, and I'd only conquered one, so soon enough the climbing started again. This time it was muuuuch worse, though.
I mentioned the vertical hills on the last peak climb. Those were hard and frustrating, but you could see the hill, and you knew why it was so hard. This second climb was insidious.
First the ground turned sandy again. I had thought we had done the sandy part, but evidently there was more. "Okay, sand sucks, but I can get through it. It sure is making it hard to run, though. Why can't I run? Why is everyone ahead of me walking? WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?!"
If you look at the elevation chart (did I mention that I didn't, really?), miles 14 through 18 are basically one giant false flat. On sand. It looks flat. It looks like there's no reason you shouldn't be able to run it. And then you start running. And you sink in the sand. And it's stupidly hard. And then you're walking again. And you're in good company, because everyone is walking. And you can see others around you doing the same thing. They start running, run for 5 seconds, then put their heads down sadly and resume walking.
Miles of this. It doesn't look like deep sand. It doesn't look like it's uphill. But everyone ahead of me is walking.
I'm already at elevation, unable to breathe well, so I'm not running a stellar pace here. But do you know how long it takes to basically walk 4 miles on sand? Me neither. I refused to look at my watch. But I can tell you that it felt like it took at least 2 hours. So much for my 7 hour 25 miler.
(I probably should have looked up exactly what the effects of running at high altitude were. I knew it was hard to breathe, but hadn't considered the impact on my legs, which just felt.. tired. No energy, no turnover. Because, hey, it turns out, no oxygen to the legs, either. Also this article mentions the swelling in the hands. I was really enjoying the ridiculous sausage fingers. I was glad that I don't wear rings, at least.)
But I kept slogging, because (a) I knew the last few miles had to be downhill, based on my most cursory of glances at the elevation chart, and (b) there was really no other choice. There had been a girl at the 2nd aid station, where I'd stripped down, and I heard her trying to figure out how she could end her race there (not sure what was wrong with her), and they basically told her she could either walk the 11 miles back to the start/finish line, or wait there at the aid station until someone drove out, which would probably be many, many, many hours. So onward and upward I went! Very slowly.
The good(?) news is, the trail eventually got steeper, which meant that the sand mostly disappeared, and at least the steeper trail meant that your brain could understand why walking was necessary. False flats are a real mindfuck.
And the REALLY good news is that this second peak was higher than the first. Which meant.. snow! When Betsy and David flew in on Thursday, there had been some snow on the ground in Buena Vista, but then the temps were in the 50s on Thursday and Friday, so by the time we got there, there was no snow to be found. I was really hoping that there would be some at the higher elevations, and sure enough, here it was! Now.. when I say snow, I don't mean it was a winter wonderland. I just mean that there was white, patchy icy stuff on the ground in small clumps.
Snow!!!!! (What? It's SOME snow. Shut up.)
But I live in central Texas, so that's a billion times more snow than I've seen in years, so even with the ceaseless climbing, I had a smile on my face.
Okay, so that's about as much as there ever was. But it's more than we ever get in Austin!
And as a bonus, as I glanced up ahead of me to see if there was any end in sight to the ceaseless climbing, I saw a familiar form! Black compression socks, white compression sleeves, backward hat.. that looks like my husband! Oooh. Wait. That's not good. My husband is much faster than I am, and should be miles ahead of me.
When I finally established it was him, I wanted to go see how he was doing. Except he was still pretty far ahead of me. And we were still climbing. And we were all walking. And running was HARD. So I'd run for 10 seconds, then walk until my heart rate came down a bit, then run again. People kept cheering for me as I'd pass them, and I just kinda grimace-smiled, but if I'd had enough air, I would have said I was just trying to catch up to my husband, or else there's no way I'd be running. "Running". Generous term.
But eventually I did catch him, and touched the back of his arm to get his attention, since (a) he was listening to his mp3 player, and (b) I couldn't produce sounds that weren't panting/wheezing.
He took out an earbud, and I asked him what was going wrong. He tried to play it off like I was just doing better than him, as he'd been insisting before the race that I was going to pass him (under normal circumstances, even with him doing twice the distance, he's MUCH faster than I am), but then he admitted that he was having GI problems and desperately needed a portapotty.
I somehow didn't realize this before agreeing to marry him, but my husband will not poop in the woods. He requires at least some sort of pseudo-bathroom. I probably still would have married him if I'd known that, but I still feel like I should have known that earlier.
Had it been ME, I would have just ducked off into the woods and taken care of that. That's why I carry toilet paper. I figured that's why HE carried toilet paper. But there had been no portapotty at the last aid station, so he hadn't been able to go. And things were not going well in his innards.
We walked together for a while, and I tried to lift his spirits as much as I could, given how much I was struggling, and then I ended up slowly pulling ahead of him as it flattened out a bit and I was able to run more.
Husband AND snow! MY race was improved by these things, even if his wasn't.
As such, I came into the aid station at the peak before him, to establish that, in fact, that was no portapotty at that aid station. Matt had told me he thought there would be one at every aid station, but it looked like there would only be one at the very first aid station. My heart sank when I saw that. I felt so bad for Matt, who would have to continue to suffer. I knew I couldn't let it impact my race, and I definitely knew he wouldn't want it to impact my race, but I couldn't help but feel sad.
I also felt kinda hungry, so I stopped long enough to look at the aid station table and see what they had. I really wanted Coke, but they only had water and Heed, so I grabbed a water, and the potato chips looked kinda good, so I grabbed a handful of those. I started walking with my hands full, dropped 2 potato chips on the ground, jammed one in my mouth, realized they weren't really all that appealing, threw 2 more chips away, downed half my cup of water, threw the cup away as well, and started out running again, with a volunteer telling me to enjoy the downhill. As I ran out, I heard Matt running in, telling me he loved me. I felt slightly better that at least he felt good enough to encourage me, even after he must have already seen that there was no portapotty.
Now some downhill! I wanted to believe that it was all downhill from there to the finish line, but I'd heard some people as I passed them earlier discussing that there were still a few nasty uphills. So I kept my joy a bit in check. And there were a few more hard climbs, but they were relatively short, when compared to the ceaseless peak climbs, and eventually I realized that, with only 4 miles or so to go, and knowing the last 1-2 are basically pure downhill, there was only a very limited potential left for painful uphill. I was gonna make it!
Downhill!
I was SO INCREDIBLY GLAD that I had decided to do the 25 miler. I couldn't even begin to wrap my mind around turning around and doing that again. This amazing downhill I was enjoying would become one of those ceaseless, plodding uphills back to the peak, and then again to the next peak. I felt so bad for Matt, and a little afraid he would have to stop at the halfway point if he couldn't resolve his GI issues. He really needed to have a decent race. I really needed him to have a decent race.
Fortunately right around that time, as I was running downhill, being passed left and right (I'd pass people on the uphills, they'd pass me on the downhills), I glanced behind me to see Matt coming! He tore by me, looking really strong, and I was glad that he felt good enough to really use the downhills. Maybe his race could still turn around.
More downhill!
During this downhill, I finally started to see the 50 miler front runners coming back on their second loop. The leader was many minutes ahead of the next guy, then they started to come closer together, then a smattering of women all pretty close together, and eventually I was seeing people coming back toward me pretty regularly. It made things a little more interesting, since I was now running down a narrower trail lined with trees, often in a narrowish canyon, and a few times I stepped off the trail to let them come through. They had a lot more race left than I did.
I passed the last aid station, and the volunteers cheered for me, and one declared that I had the sparkliest headband in the race. I threw my arms up in the air and yelled, "I win!!!"
Right. The headband. I bought this sparkly gold headband quite some time ago, and have worn it for several races. It's gotten maybe 1 comment per race, and I feel it is fabulous enough to deserve MANY more comments. And this race, I finally felt like it got the recognition it deserved! I probably had 10 other runners, and several volunteers, comment on how much they liked it. Yay, headband!
In fact, I mention it in this ridiculous video I decided to make in the last few miles of the race. I'd just run through that aid station, my watch had just beeped for mile 22, and I had almost caught back up to Matt again. You can hear how out of breath I am.
Click to viewI caught back up to Matt again on a minor hill, just as I decided to take one more gu. He was walking up the hill, also eating, so I asked if I could join him for a snack, and we walked together a second and ate and I tried to feel out how he was doing. He was pretty physically uncomfortable, but seemed relatively positive when he wasn't moaning in pain, so I told him I loved him, then started running again for my last push to the finish line.
I started into the section we'd run backward the day before, and started seeing the landmarks Matt had told me about. The correctional facility in the distance!
Happiest I've ever been to see a correctional facility! (It's on the left there.)
The shiny metal roofs. The stream. An unexpected photographer. I was getting close.
Unexpected photographer as I barreled down the hill!
The last section is probably the most technical of the entire course, so I made sure to be cautious, because that would be a ridiculous time to end up injuring myself, but I pushed as hard as I felt comfortable, passing one woman on one of the two little short, steep uphills on the way down.
And then there was the bridge! I was almost done!
I didn't take a picture while running, but here's Betsy and the bridge after the race.
I ran across the bridge, hung a left toward the community center, ... then realized I had no idea where exactly to go or how far I had left to run. I hadn't really figured out how the race ended or where the finish line was. But the flour markings on the ground were still visible, and they guided me up and around the corner into the parking lot, where I saw Betsy and David cheering at their car! Betsy frantically dug out her camera, and I threw her some obligatory jazz hands, then gave it whatever I had left as I headed toward the finish line.
Obligatory jazz hands! Taken by Betsy.
I had a good giggle at the "finish line", which was just a narrow doorway of pvc pipe with "FINISH" printed above it. A little different from the chaos of, say, an Ironman finish line, with its flashing lights and cheering crowds and general circus atmosphere.
FINISHLINE
But it was the most welcome sight in the world at that moment, and I crossed it with joy.
And then tried to walk off without my medal. Fortunately they didn't let me.
After
As I'd run in, I'd yelled at Betsy and David that Matt was right behind me, which I'm pretty sure they found reassuring. I know I'd been expecting that Matt would come through first, then David, then me. When Betsy saw David and then me without having seen Matt, I'm sure they were concerned.
But sure enough, Matt was right behind me, and we went into sherpa mode immediately, and helped him refill and restock his pack, as he ran off to the bathroom finally, and got a little bit of relief. Enough that he headed right back out after we got him all resituated. I walked him out through the parking lot as he ate his peanut butter and nutella sandwich and drank part of a Coke. He then blew a snot rocket on me. And then handed me the nasty other half of his sandwich. Then choked on his Coke and coughed it all over the ground, and me. And I reflected on how it's a good thing I loved this guy, because I had already needed a shower just from the race, but now I REALLY needed one.
Matt about to head out for another 25 miles.
But soon enough he was done with sandwich and Coke, handed me the remains of both, and headed back out for another 25 miles. I couldn't even imagine doing so. So impressed by his strength and commitment. And insanity.
I trekked back to Betsy and David's car and Betsy helped me clean off some of the Coke and nutella, and then we settled in for.. well, a wait. I finally had a chance to look at my watch, and realized I'd run a ~5:05. Woah! That was unexpected. I mean, it was pretty far back in the 25 miler field, but much better than I was expecting, based on my baseless calculations.
But since Matt had come in right after me, that meant that, if he continued to feel physically bad, probably the BEST case scenario was another 5 hours before we saw him again. Maybe 4:30 if things turned around for him. Maybe a lot more if they didn't.
We did our cold soak in the river. Rather, I was supposed to do a cold soak, and I suckered everyone else into joining me. Of course, our cold soak was about 45 seconds long at max, because that water was RIDICULOUSLY COLD. I guess since it's mostly snow melt, that makes sense.
So, so cold. Painfully cold.
The only way to recover from that was with beer.
David and his PBR.
So we spent the next few hours snacking, drinking, joking about the brilliance of our "train low, race high" strategy, going to get some actual food once we realized it would be a while before dinner happened, chatting with friends, strangers and new friends, and cheering for other runners finishing or starting their second lap. And then eventually finishing their 50 miler.
Betsy and HER PBR.
As time passed, the sun faded. The temperature dropped. A storm was obviously off in the distance, fortunately not the direction that the runners were running. But it was moving ever closer to us, and was obviously full of fluffy snow. And then it started to sprinkle on us. Then got harder, until eventually we moved into the car. Then we got paranoid we wouldn't see him coming in, so we drove the car up the path a little, so we could see people coming in down the road.
The weather moving in behind us, obscuring the mountains.
5 hours went by. Then 5.5. Then 6. We were a little concerned that, if he ended up getting a ride back in, we'd never know, and since I'd moved our car, he wouldn't find the car, which is where he'd put his phone at the halfway point, and he wouldn't be able to find Betsy and David's car, or any of us, and the whole situation just sounded kinda bad. But we still had faith that he was out there, and running. So we sat in the car in the rain, and whenever a runner would come by, we'd roll down the windows and cheer for them. I really hoped Matt was doing okay. At this point, we had put on all the clothes we'd brought (I now had a warm long-sleeved shirt, a hoodie, a warm hat, gloves, pants and long socks), and we were still cold. And Matt had ditched his long-sleeved shirt for his second loop, and was in just a sleeveless singlet. And if he was reduced to just walking, he'd presumably be very, very cold and miserable.
And then, after many times of perking our ears up, then sadly saying, "No, that's not him.." .. it was him! We rolled down the windows and cheered our fool heads off, then threw the car into gear and quickly drove away from him, which felt kinda rude. But we drove back to our spot at the finish line, jumped out of the car, and prepared to cheer him in. I handed my phone to Betsy to take a video of him finishing, and ran down to the actual finish line. I said, "My husband's coming in! His name is Matt!" and so when he came around the corner, everyone there (okay, so it was like 5 people at that point, given the bad weather) cheered Matt in by name.
Finish chute.
Matt looked incredibly focused and determined, but obviously ready to be DONE. And then he was.
FINISHED.
And Betsy's video of Matt powering in to the finish line (and me refusing to kiss him).
After after
It turned out his GI problems had progressed, and he had been unable to keep anything down starting around mile 28. Any food he took in just came right back up, then his water pack bladder busted, so he could only get water at the aid stations, then it was raining and 45 degrees, and well, basically it's amazing that he was able to finish, much less as strongly as he did.
So proud. Also I'm wearing 100x more clothes than Matt.
We got him warmed up, got some water in him, then eventually all went out for celebratory red pepper porters, which seemed to sit just fine for him, and for all of us.
Celebratory beers and sunburns.
And then the next day we visited some snow and gawked at some wildlife in Leadville, then drove straight from Leadville to Austin without stopping (except for gas and snacks), for an exhausting whirlwind of a weekend.
Finally, we found the real snow!
I honestly don't know if I'll do that race again. I mean, it's a great race, it's beautiful, I loved the town, but MAN, running at elevation was hard. The Pike's Peak Marathon was on my list of things to do eventually, and given that it's at even higher elevation, and is 13 miles straight up.. I'm not sure I really need to do that. We'll see, given a little time and distance between me and the race.
But overall, I'm glad I did it. I'm proud of my performance. I did exactly what I needed to do to get to the finish line while having as much fun as possible. I didn't beat myself up about walking so much, I had a lot of fun snapping pictures on the run, and I finished strong. I'm even more proud of Matt, super proud of David, who beat us all, and eternally grateful to Betsy for taking such good care of all of us!
Celebratory snow angel!