Don’t stop, don’t give up, keep trying, keep trying, never give up….. If
you have a small child or children and own a tv, that should sound familiar.
It’s from Yo Gabba Gabba and it was my mantra for the first 75 miles of the
Tahoe Rim Trail 100 mile endurance run. The song itself has a catchy tune and I
repeated it to myself in its original composition, whether running downhill on
the quad busting red house loop, or crawling up the 2000’ ski run at diamond
peak, don’t stop, don’t give up, keep trying, keep trying, never give up,
you’ll get it right.
The weeks leading up to TRT I was
working with very low mileage on my training schedule, I had begun my taper
quite early, more than 3 weeks out at least. I guess you could call it strategy
but not really since I had my reasons for not running as much. I had run at
Geoff Roes Mountain Ultrarunning Camp in Alaska for a week and everyday in
every direction the views of snow capped mountain peaks were absolutely
stunning. We ran on a different trail everyday and each was uniquely different,
whether it was more technical, covered in snow, lush rainforest like or more of
a bushwack. A group of ten campers along with some of the locals and Geoff
Roes, we ran, we talked running, we ate great food and slept all in the beauty
of Juneau, AK. Then I returned to Fresno, Ca where there were no snow covered
mountains, the 10 day forecast was all 100+ deg, I had to return to work and I
just wasn’t as excited to get out and run along the canal. With that my mileage
dropped and I didn’t run anything over a 50 mile week from about mid June up
until TRT. I was kind of worried that may have hurt my performance at TRT but I
had put in tons of vert and decent mileage leading up to my early taper so I
had to remain confident that I had put in the work.
The
drive from Clovis, Ca to Carson City, where packet pick up and lodging is,
should take about 5 hours, it took my wife, son and I a bit longer but we still
made it on time to pickup my bib, get weighed in and attend a race meeting. We
stayed at the Days INN in Carson, which is cheap but it’s also a dump, if you
plan to take your family along I don’t recommend staying at the Days Inn. I
would spend a couple extra bucks and stay somewhere decent. We didn’t eat out
the day before the race we actually prepared a bunch of food, some Quinoa
salad, potato and been burritos and fruit. It was a good change of pace to have
our food prepared and with us, it meant less money spent during the trip and
kept us out of restaurants that could end up on Kitchen nightmares.
Race
Morning: I woke up from my wonderful 3hrs of sleep at 0230 am, I had all my
stuff laid out and ready to go, got dressed and headed out of the hotel room as
quietly as I could. My wife and son were going to meet me later on at Diamond
Peak, so I took a cab over to the plaza hotel where a good amount of runners
were waiting around for a shuttle to take us over to Spooner Lake where the
race starts. Once at the start of the race I kind of milled about got some
coffee, took a dump and waited for 0500 to come around so we could get this
thing started.
Start
to 1st Aid Hobart mile 6. I started off extremely slow, the one
thing I have learned from running ultra distances is patience and there is no
point in taking off running 7 min miles to the first aid station. So I took it
nice and slow up some switchbacks, fire roads and more single track to Hobart
Station. Hobart is a badass aid station, they have a bar (serving alcohol) and
it serves Ensure smoothies, had a wide array of food, snacks, gels and Ice! I
love me some Ice!
Hobart
to Tunnel Creek mile 11: This portion of the run brings you up onto a sweet
ridge where you get wonderful views of Lake Tahoe and back over into Carson.
Then it’s a smooth downhill portion for the next few miles and then you’re at
Tunnel Creek. Once again another sweet aid station with tons of grub and
awesome volunteers, I also had my drop bag at this A.S. I put extra gels, red
bull, some tailwind powder and Izzie drinks, couldn’t think of much else to put
in there but that seemed to be just enough.
Tunnel
Creek, Red House Loop to Tunnel Creek Again: This loop is another 6 miles or so
and it takes you out of tunnel creek and then down to a loop that drops
quickly. I love running downhill but this shit was steep, soft and rocky so it
turned out to be one of those descents where you can’t fully let loose. Once
you get to the bottom of the descent it takes you back up a little at a time
towards the Red House aid station and then you do some more climbing that
gradually get steeper as you get closer to tunnel creek again.
Tunnel
Creek to Bull Wheel: this is a short single track section with lots of big
rocks along the way, not too much climbing or descending and before you know it
you’re at Bull Wheel. This aid station is also the same aid station that you
end up at once you get to the top of the diamond peak ski run, which is the
next stop from this aid station.
From
Bull Wheel to Diamond Peak#1 23ish to mile 30: For some reason this seemed like
a never ending section, partly because it was getting extremely warm by this
time of day and it was more exposed than the rest of the course thus far. The
last four miles of this section are all downhill and takes you on a series of
mountain bike switchbacks all the way down to a small creek and then down into
the Diamond Peak Ski resort. Diamond peak is easy access for your crew to meet
you at mile 30, the ski resort is right off the main road and has a parking
lot. I hung out here for a few minutes with my wife and family who came out see
me, I also got sprayed down by a wonderful hose they had going around the
corner because now the heat was starting to really pick up and it was hot just
sitting around. My buddy Eddie was running the 50 mile race which started at
0600 and he came into this aid station about 10 minutes after I got there, I
went over and talked to him for a minute and we decided to take off from there
together.
Diamond
peak back up to Bull Wheel/Tunnel Creek #3: This is where shit gets real, from
diamond peak you start going up a 1.8 mile ski run that takes you up 2000’.
This hill/mountain starts out relatively tame and somewhat runable as it kind
of winds up towards a middle chair lift. Once you round the next corner is
where most of the gain occurs and it’s stupid steep. As Eddie and I were hiking
this portion, with sun beating down, making forward progress was made even more
difficult with the soft sand like dirt underfoot and I had just switched from
NB 110’s to my Kinvaras which have little to no traction on slick surfaces. In
just that short section of the race I saw three people quit, one lady was beat
red in the face and looked as if she’d puked her guts out, another with a
relieved look on her face and race number crumbled up in her hand and the last
was a 50 mile runner who I believe was in first place at the time. Stuff like
that doesn’t happen at any race I’ve been to so far, I hear of people DNF’ing
afterwards or maybe see one person take a bad spill and hang out at the aid
station but never just 3 people literally minutes apart turn around and
retreat. One part of me was pumped up because quitting didn’t even cross my
mind and another part of was thinking “oh, crap I have to do this again at mile
80!”
Well
I made it to the top of that climb and my legs were feeling pretty shot so I
hiked for a good 1/2 mile or so until my quads quit screaming at me and took
off on the way back to Tunnel Creek. Once back at TC aid station I topped off
my bottles and headed back towards Hobart feeling good in spite of the heat and
the killer hill I had climbed. The next 14ish miles went by pretty smoothly, I
stopped at Hobart got some relief from the heat in the shade of the tent and
headed off to Snow Valley which is the high point of the course at approx.
9000’. The climb to Snow Valley wouldn’t be that bad on a typical cool mountain
day but with temps in the 90’s and the lack of shade en route to this A.S. made
it much harder. The Snow Valley aid station was my favorite, a group of boy
scouts and some of their leaders operated it, and these young men were on
point! As I approached the Aid Station they had scoped out my bib number with
binoculars and checked it out on their computer to find my info, I was greeted
by name with a young man running towards me hands extended for my water bottles
asking me what I needed. They had and awesome spread of prepared food, snacks
and drinks, the other cool thing is all the food items had clear lids that were
labeled, kept everything fresh and easy to locate. From here it was about 7
miles back to the half way point 5 of which are gentle downhill miles and the
last 2 relatively flat on the way back to the lake.
At
mile 50 I weighed in and was only 1lb off my baseline weight, which was awesome
considering the heat. My family had set up in the shade and had food and drink
ready to go, I wasn’t in a big hurry though. Before I sat down I checked the
time on my watch because I wanted to rest, cool off and take in some calories
before I took off but I also didn’t want to stay longer than necessary. Luckily
I had brought a variety of things for my family to meet me with at this half
way mark and at Diamond Peak, because I was having a hard time eating solid
food everything felt so dry in my mouth like I couldn’t chew and swallow it. I
had some Naked brand fruit drinks that have a good amount of calories in them
and they went down smooth and were refreshing at the same time other than that
I didn’t eat much else at this point, I had gone through about 10 gels and a
couple bottles of tailwind and I wasn’t that hungry. After about 20 minutes I
decided it was time to get back out on the trail on my way back out I ran into
my buddy Eddie who I ran with for a few miles on the course but he eventually
took off and finished his 50 mile race 16th place in about 10:30. I
was happy I ran into him because I wasn’t really ready to head back out, I
talked with him about the race for a few minutes and after that was truly ready
to grind out the next 50 miles.
I
was going to meet my wife at mile 80 and she was going to be my safety
runner/pacer for the last 20 miles and I was totally looking forward to having
some company. The 30 miles from mile 50 to 80 were rather uneventful, the sun
went down headlamps went on, and I was just taking it 1 mile at a time staying
positive and making sure that I was drinking and taking in electrolytes all the
while. I’d say about mile 70 is when things started to get difficult my quads
were aching from all the downhill and I was truly feeling the effects of sleep
deprivation now that it was dark. From the switch backs leading down into
tunnel creek I had passed about 20 runners and from tunnel creek to Bull Wheel
I had only seen 1 or two other runners, both of which were on their way back
toward the finish! I was struggling to find ways to motivate my self to keep
moving with a sense of purpose until I saw a head lamp in the distance with
about 7 miles left to mile 80. I picked up my pace and focused on catching the
runner ahead of me. I rounded a corner and saw that headlamp was only 20 yards
ahead but wasn’t moving, there were two guys, a pacer and his runner, leaning
up against a rock puking his guts out, I had been excited to catch them until I
realized they were doing much worse than me. After passing them I started
dragging and found a nice rock to sit down on, then I saw lights coming a ways
back that were coming my way and I thought “don’t stop, don’t give up, keep
trying, keep trying!” I wasn’t going to let anyone catch me that I had already
passed and I was coming up to the 4 mile downhill section that takes you into
Diamond peak so I figured that would help me keep moving. I stopped for just a
minute before making the turn onto the downhill section when I saw two runners
heading straight at me and as they passed we exchanged a “good job/good work”,
it wasn’t the same two that I had seen earlier puking near the rock but a guy
and girl. From the 50-mile mark I had been passing runners and even though I
was in no way going to win or place it was fun and it served as motivation
along the way, but now I was getting passed and it sucked. I got up from my
rock and started running and thought “no effing way! They can pass me leaving
diamond peak but they won’t beat me there!” From what I could tell I started
hauling ass, although I probably looked and moved like an injured elderly
person shuffling down trail, regardless I caught the two that had passed me in
just over a mile and with a mile to the aid station I passed two more runners,
I was pumped!
Running
into the Diamond peak parking lot my pump from passing people on the way in was
starting to wear off as the reality of having to go back up that stupid ass
climb set in. My wife was waiting for me, pack and pacer bib on ready to go, I
could tell she was really excited to start running. We hung out at the Diamond
peak for about 10 minutes, I changed my shirt and tried to eat some solid food
then topped off my bottles and headed out. The climb wasn’t as bad the second
time around since the sun wasn’t beating down on me and I also had my pacer
with me and she kept me from getting into a negative mindset.
The
last 20 miles consisted of me attempting to run, then hiking, then slowly
walking and then sitting on a rock for a minute. Things pretty much went like
that for the whole way back and also me trying to lie down and convince my wife
that I just needed to take a nap, but she wouldn’t let me. Had my wife not been
out there to pace me in the last 20 miles I don’t know what would have
happened, I may have missed the cut off after taking a 2 hour nap off the side
of the trail, she kept me moving and was a source positive motivation the
entire time she was with me. I was able to somewhat pull myself together, with
the help of a couple double caffeinated Clif gels and some coffee, to keep a
steady moving pace for last 7 miles into the finish. Coming into the finish was
an amazing feeling and I was overwhelmed with happiness in knowing that I had
just finished the Tahoe Rim Trail 100 mile run. While hanging around the finish
and talking about the race I learned how much carnage had actually taken place
with some 75 (43%) runners dropping from the 100-mile race that day. I received my hand made belt buckle and it was engraved with my finish time (28:07:15) and the year right there in the finish area.
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| Taken just before the 50 mile mark |
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| Meeting my sexy pacer @ mile 80 |
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| At the Finish! |
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| My new buckle! |
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