35 Miler
As many of you know, I have been
thinking about doing the Whitewater Center 50 miler this fall.
Yesterday, I decided to give myself a little taste of what it would be
like.
Omitting the 1st lap, I
focused on what it would be like to run last two full laps plus a
little more during the day. I parked my car along the course so it
became my official aid station. I ran roughly 10+ miles of the lower
loop, hit up my car to refuel, and then headed out on the East Main
loop.
The first lap went by better than
expected. My legs were staying underneath me. I attributed most of it
to following Martin's suggestions. He encouraged me to try food other
gels and chews. Foods which maintained my blood sugar and not having
it bouncing up and down. The chews and gels left me feeling great for about the 30 minutes, then I would feel like I was dragging car along behind me.
I found that I liked
some of the apple sauce based ones best but I couldn't stomach the more
paste type. After just a few bytes, I literally tossed it back in the
bag. Strawberry fig newton of all things were my favorite. I made
sure to use the ones without corn syrup.
This was pretty much a solo effort
until I started the 2nd loop of the East Main trail. This
guy, later I learned his name, Justin, dropped in behind me. I offer
to let him pass but he were more interested in having some one to share
the miles. We chatted back and forth about training, shoes, races. I
learned that he was training for the WWC 50 miler as well and is
looking for a time around 12 hours. Ironically, our chit-chat was
picking up our pace. I ran this section well faster than I had
expected. I didn't realize how much I was feeding off the energy have
just having someone else there. At least until we exited the trail
and went our separate ways. But it was good to share the miles.
I finished this 35 miles in 6 hours and
56 minutes. This was total time. As I wanted to include the time that
it took me to refuel at the aid stations.
I'd like to hit one 40 miler before
race day just to get the feel of it.
By the way, when I finished, I was
plenty tired. I walked back to my car, opened the trunk, and just set
there are a few minutes. I had not desire to even move.
Then, today, I ran another 10 on the
trails. My legs were a little stiff in the opening miles, but once I got
warmed up, I felt pretty good despite having run 35 yesterday.
Cool Down Runner
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