I was pretty confident I would finish under the 10 hour cutoff but beyond that, I wasn't sure what to expect. I told friends and family I was shooting for 7 hours (2pm finish) +/- an hour to give them an idea of when to expect me. Privately, I thought 6.5 hours would be a great time. Resting at 7500' the night before the race, my heart-rate felt a little elevated. I checked my pulse, 46 bpm. I don't time it regularly but that is pretty freakin slow. Seemed like all the work I'd put into training had paid off. Now it was time to execute.
I arrived in Manitou Springs, Sunday morning, about an hour early for the 7am start. I was worried about finding a parking spot but that turned out to be a non-event and I probably could have showed up 20 minutes before and still had plenty of time. My plan was to start out easy at a reasonable pace. I had heard that some people go hard the first 1.5 miles on the road to get a good place in line before it becomes single file on the lower sections of the Barr Trail. The idea of pushing the pace one mile into a potential six hour race seemed crazy to me so I lined up near the back of the pack and calmly waited to cross the start after the gun sounded.
Outside of some hiking the previous few days I had pretty much been relaxing the week before the race. My last run was on Tuesday. I planned to squeeze in one more but it never happened. Needless to say I was quite rested and itching to run. As we made our way through town and passed the railway station, I felt great. An older gentleman had a stereo in the back of his truck playing the theme from 'Chariots of Fire'. As we passed he remarked that the next time we heard the song we would be almost home.
Leaving the asphalt, the path quickly narrowed and then became single file. I began to alternate running and walking, following the lead of the runners ahead of me. It was rather slow going but even at this pace the effort was significant. I kept checking my watch; first mile was 9:00, next few were between 12:00 and 15:00. This felt like a good pace and the miles began to tick by.
Once above No Name Creek, the trail flattened out some and became wide enough to easily pass. This was definitely the easiest section; I took advantage and picked up the pace a bit. I cruised through Bob's Road and Barr Camp aid stations, taking in mostly Gatorade and water along with handfuls of random snacks. Checking my watch I was still averaging well under 15:00 minute miles and I briefly contemplated the idea of a sub 6 hour finish. And then reality set in.
At about 9 miles (~11000') my stomach started to go south and my head began to throb until I thought it was going to explode. It was better when I slowed down and so I did. Running turned into a run-walk, then a fast walk, then a slower walk. Whatever was necessary just to keep moving forward. I'm sorry to say there was absolutely no running in the last two miles to the summit. Around this time runners who had already made the turn began to fly by on their way back to town. I couldn't believe how quickly they were moving down the trail.
At some point, spectators and volunteers began to appear on the rocks along the trail. I remember clearly a volunteer saying, 'welcome to the 16 Golden Stairs'. More like 16 switchbacks! The last mile was something like 28:00 and I hit the turn around in 3:51:00. Still under my original goal of 4 hours but I was a bit disappointed I had slowed down so much in the last few miles. I think I was really feeling the altitude because I got a bit emotional about reaching the top. I remember thinking it was silly because I still had so far left to go.
A few family members were there and I yelled to them my revised estimated finishing time of 'one-thirty'. I yelled it several times until they gave me the thumbs up and then I was gone. I didn't want to spend another minute on the top of that mountain. Unbeknownst to me one-thirty had somehow been interpreted as an hour and a half. This immediately spread via text to friends and family who now rushed to get ready at the finish for my unexpectedly early arrival. I'm glad my family has such faith in me but an hour and a half would have put me in the top five times for the descent. Needless to say they would spend quite a while at the finish looking for me and wondering what happened.
As I approached A-Frame aid station and 10 miles to go, I decided to eat a caffeinated gel. I've found in other long races that a little caffeine actually seems to settle my stomach. I was hoping it would do the trick this time, otherwise this was going to be a very long descent. A mile beyond A-Frame and I started to feel worlds better. The decreasing altitude probably contributed but regardless, I took advantage and started to descend like I knew I could. 15 minute miles became 12 minutes and then 10. I began to claw back the time I felt I'd lost.
It was around this time that I neglected to pick up my foot to clear a root and did a complete wipe-out. Although it was a warm day and I'm generally a warm runner, I had refused to remove my light gloves knowing that they might save me if I did indeed take a fall. Now, that decision really paid off. I caught myself fully on both hands and only lightly scraped my left leg. My palms began to sting almost immediately but I figured there wasn't much point in checking the damage so I didn't bother to look. Instead I dusted myself off and set out again, quickly recovering my previous pace with the aid of some added adrenaline. I ended up covering the last six miles in 51 minutes. Quite an unusual experience to run such a long race and feel stronger and stronger as you approach the finish.
True to his word, 'Chariots of Fire' was still blaring as I hit the asphalt and really started to pour on the speed. I finished up with a 6:56 last mile and nearly ran right into the medical tent. I immediately had the overwhelming urge to vomit and was hovering over the nearest trash can until a volunteer said if I didn't need medical I needed to make room for those that did.
It looked like a MASH unit in there. I recognized a woman I'd seen earlier in the race lying down with blood all over her shirt. It was at this point I remembered my own fall. I slowly peeled off my gloves to find...not a scratch; gloves had worked like a charm.
I made up enough time on lower section to finish in 6:20:25; 198th overall and 10 minutes faster than I was hoping for. Due to the mix up at the summit everyone else was expecting me almost an hour earlier but thankfully they stuck it out and it was amazing to have so much support waiting for me at the finish. Not sure what's after this. Nothing much on my calendar other than a local cross country series this fall. No doubt I'll be looking for another challenge before long. I'm excited to see where running will take me next.
