Seasons Change

I’ve had a lot on my mind recently. Many of those thoughts I’ve wanted to pen out and post. Unfortunately, life has been a little crazy and time to sit down has become less and less abundant. All of my attention has been poured into the doctorate program and recovering from 12 hour learning days.

When I originally got into the program, I felt that by not working and being a full time student that I would be able to maintain my running program and continue to improve. There have been milestones I wanted to reach and goals that I became engrossed with for a few years now. I was finally hoping that this year was my year to break into those goals. A string of disappointing performances (and even a couple unfinished performances) has proven me wrong.

School is tougher than I anticipated. It eats up way more time than I thought it would and wears me down more than training ever has. And it certainly is not conducive to reaching the goals I set forth. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely appreciate the opportunity to learn and have worked hard to succeed there. I love learning and the similar feeling that it shares with training and racing. But I’m realizing my limits.

Recently, I had a run up on the beautiful trails of the Bear 100 course. I was amazed at the beauty of the wilderness around me and a feeling of excitement for race day built with each mile. Around the Tony Grove area, I began to notice that the trees and grasses were showing signs of summers fade. Colors that represent changing of the seasons were starting to turn like the blooming flowers and shades of spring that I could’ve sworn were showing just last week.

I noticed a single red leaf among the many shades of green. He was solid and bold in color, moving forward with the inevitable changing of seasons. The tree will lose his bud, but only for a season. All things will turn and eventually this leaf will grow back. Seasons are a wonderful opportunity for growth and expansion. All things come and go but it’s their fall, winter and spring preparations that allow for a strong summer growth.

Seasons are changing

This leaf inspired me to go forth in my season. Now is not the time to focus on running. Rather, it’s a time to focus on the future. Much like a fall and winter harvest, it’s my time to prepare for the next season of growth and exuberance. Competitively racing cannot be my focus. But as I focus on school, I can balance creating a stronger base with added strength training and shorter distance speed to work into my endurance when the time is appropriate. Setting up the opportunity for the best success in the next “season” of my ultra running career.

That’s not to say that I won’t be racing and training for the next two and half years, but it will be with a different reason and focus and definitely less frequently. School is the priority and setting up my future will be the focus.

Inspired by the many bold trees that didn’t hesitate to move forward with the seasons on my last run, I too must move forward to prepare for the changes that are taking place in life. It’s not easy and almost seems like I’m stepping backwards, but I boldly face the newest season knowing that my summer will come around again and I’ll be stronger and better for having properly prepared myself and utilized the purpose of each changing season in my life.

SKYLINE 50

The goal in any race, for me, is to discover myself through the entire journey that each course has to offer. Part of that journey includes pushing yourself to a certain physical and mental space that provides that opportunity to transcend. Once I find myself in this capacity, I feel primal and singular in my focus of getting to that finish line. Each step is a new movement and each blink offers a new view to be taken in. I’ve become completely broken down and have the opportunity to rebuild myself. You can learn a lot about who you are when everything but your core has been stripped away.

                                                  

This is the reason I do what I do on a regular basis. I want to learn more about myself. But in order to get to that special place, I have to ride the edge. Find myself at that brink of broken down enough to rebuild or too far broken for repair. Only at this crossroad is there enough balance where one can sustain an acute awareness of self while transcending just beyond, playing on each side of the fence as you please.

I couldn’t begin to recap this adventure without giving appreciation to the RD’s for putting together a legitimate mountain 50 mile race in a very under appreciated part of the Wasatch Range. The Willard basin and associated James, Willard, Ben Lomond and Lewis peaks are some great routes. And to be able to start at the valley floor and climb to each of the 4 peaks in one route of that distance is a rare finding. The course was marked well, aid stations were great and the course was challenging. Don’t even get me started on the Thai food at the finish line!

After a short night of sleep and a 3:45 wake up alarm, I gobbled down a ProBar and got ready for the day ahead. Not much to do other than throw some clothes, socks and shoes on, stash some VFuel in my belt and fill up my handheld. I was very calm before this race. I knew that there was some great local talent that was going to be there and it was going to take some hard work to crack the podium, but I wasn’t here for that. As per usual, I toe’d the line just excited to approach the course and have a lot of fun over the next 51.5 miles.

With a few words of caution about the course being lightly marked and a 10 second countdown, we were off. I let Mark Hammond and Pablo head out in the lead. Mark was coming off a win at Squaw 50 and his ego would be wanting to take the lead and Pablo is notorious for charging out hard with the hopes of hanging on. I was happy to let them attack the first couple miles and few thousand feet of gain while I enjoyed the first climb and took advantage of the technical down hill on the back end, where I’m comfortable pushing hard.

Around mile 4, a small chase pack of two others and myself were commenting on how ridiculous this route was. It went from asphalt road to AV trail to less maintained ATV trail to single track to abandoned trail to deer trail to scrub oak and washout. About to the traverse, we noticed that we were following faded orange ski patrol markers instead of the pink markers of the course. We “quickly” shwacked back down the mountain to the trail turn off and back on the course. On the way up to James Peak, DJ mentioned that we lost a little over and hour with 4 extra miles and over 1500 feet of vert. We pressed on and climbed away, just having fun and chipping away at the course.

Unfortunately, our little detour started a chain of events that really threw a wrench in the spokes for the rest of the day. By the time we hit the peak, I had been out of water for a while and was looking forward to the aid station at the top. Frustratingly, it was already closed up and driving off by the time we got there. The sun was getting hot and exposure was plentiful.

The view down from James Peak

We ran into the sweeper on the course and he mentioned that runners 1 and 2 (Mark and Pablo) never ran back to the course and actually just cut across the ridge and short cut the course, resulting in a DQ. We realized that without those two in the mix anymore, there was still a possibility to crunch into the top 5 if we still ran the race we planned on and added in that lost hour.

We set to work scrambling across the ridge and bombing down to Avon Rd where AS 2 was waiting for us. We had passed a couple runners and spirits were certainly high. Unfortunately, so was the temperature. I realized I had been going on for 2 hours without any water and it was taking its toll. I passed the next few AS with the hopes of being able to rehydrate and keep moving hard for that top 5 position.

The sun was more intense than the cloud cover I had expected and I was so caught up in having fun and running hard that I didn’t realize the hole I was digging. After getting to the top of Willard Rd, was excited to reach the saddle and cool breeze up there. That section from the saddle, across Willard and Ben Lomond peaks, and down to the divide is one of my favorite sections of trail in the Wasatch. It’s elevated, fun, technical and totally fast runnable terrain. Not to mention the wild flowers up there were in FULL bloom and absolutely gorgeous.

On the saddle looking at Ben Lomond 

On the way down, I was pushing super hard to catch back up to DJ. He dropped me on the uphill road when I started to feel a little exhausted from the sun/dehydration and didn’t want to run the risk of overheating. I remember thinking he looked super strong as he pulled away. I passed another dozen runners on the way down and was having a blast. Legs were moving well, although a little tender from the hard push up and down the mountains.

My body felt like it was fatiguing fast, just a result of the hard work over the last handful of hours, right? I could tell that I was dehydrated pretty good with the chills and not sweating, nowhere I haven’t been before. The muscle pain was getting pretty intense comparing to my perceived effort.  Part way down to the divide I noticed that my lower back was a little tender but chalked it up to all that pounding downhill and stabilizing the core. A little nausea and some puking? That’s just he heat and hard effort coming into play… no biggie. Wait, what was problem number one? I was starting to get a little foggy.

Earlier in the day looking focused and running strong

I got to the AS at mile 37 (41 for me) and was pretty familiar with the miles coming up. With a 3 mile climb and 10 miles of downhill/flat to go, I knew I was within striking distance and it energized me. My body felt relatively good and I was still moving fast. I ran into the bathroom do some quick business. This is when my whole day changed.

As anyone who’s monitoring their body would do, I checked the coloration of the urea to see what state my body was in and what it was trying to tell me. When I saw what could easily be described as freshly pressed apple cider, I started to think something was up. I’ve been dehydrated before, but this was a different color pallet than I was used to. There was a little irritation with my kidneys but I brushed it off as I was excited to go hunting on the course for the next couple hours.

While I sat there, my sense and my ego argued back and forth. My senses told me something needed to be addressed but my ego said, “run and run hard, your legs still feel good!”

Being someone who prides himself on racing sensically, I couldn’t ignore what was going on, even if my body felt relatively good. I decided to give up a couple minutes to chug bottles of ice water and try to pee again. Fifteen minutes later I was in the bathroom trying to push some thing out. I got the same results but this time an incredible pain in my left kidney. That’s when it hit me… rhabdomyolysis. I wasn’t completely in the rhabdo stage yet, but potential kidney failure is nothing to mess with and I was knocking on its door. At that point I decided it wasn’t worth even marching out a finish and called it a day.

You can take my bib, but the smile is staying!

I headed to the finish line where I was happy to see so many friends succeed in this race and gut out incredibly tough days. DJ did end up placing 4^th OA and behind Mark and Pablo (so I believe his official standing is 2^nd place). He’s humble and won’t brag, so I ‘ll have to do it for him. Tara Summers placed 1^st female for her very first ultra distance event and totally set a new CR. Matt Williams gutted out a terrible day on the legs for a strong finish. Their performances inspired me to come back again next year prepared and ready to work hard on the course.

DJ and I laughing about the added adventure we had earlier that day

So I’ve been asked a lot about Rhabdomyolysis and why I thought that could be a something of concern. Fortunately for me, I have been a medical student for a few years and studied up on this quite a bit. When muscle is damaged, a protein called myoglobin is released into the bloodstream. It is then filtered out of the body by the kidneys, where it is broken down and excreted from the body. During normal running, the kidneys can handle the load and flush out the myoglobin without any issues.

However, when extreme amounts of muscle breakdown occur, the kidneys become overloaded, inflammation occurs and kidney cells are damaged, potentially leading to kidney failure. My run itself wasn’t enough to cause rhabdo, but if you combine the severe dehydration putting strain on the kidneys and increasing the ratio of myoglobin in the kidney and the heat exhaustion that breakss down more muscle than usual, you have a perfect storm where rhabdo is a much higher possibility. Not to mention; ANY TIME THERE IS URINE IN THE BLOOD, IT’S NOT GOOD!

Urine and blood tests are the only way to determine for certain that you are in full-blown rhabdo. But that’s not to say that you can’t look out for the signs and symptoms; fatigue, muscle pain, lower back pain, and most importantly sanguineous urea (bloody pee). As runners, we are all used to rather dark urine during concerted efforts, even orange at times. But whenever there is a brown or red tint to it then you should be very concerned. Think of it in terms of beer. Light beer, your fine. Pale ale, probably ought to hydrate a bit more. IPA, you’re messing with the line. Dark beer or lager, you’ve dug too deep and the only race you’re doing is racing to the hospital.

Best poster ever!

Mine that day was somewhere in-between the later two. It was dark enough that I knew the consequences of continuing on and its just wasn't worth the risk. I’m not one to race with my ego. After all, racing is just an opportunity for a long run where I don’t have to carry all my own supplies. Of course I like to perform well and push hard, but that’s all ancillary to having fun and spending time in the mountains.

GEAR USED:

Threads: GORE Running Magnitude compression shorts & singlet

Socks: Injinji quarter length trail 2.0

Fuel: VFuel powder (ginger lime) and gels (fudge brownie)

Shades: Westwood charcoal glasses

Hydration: UltrAspire Iso Versa handheld and Quantum belt

Kicks: ALTRA’s Superior 2.0 

The Next Big Step

Life is a constant state of change. Giving us opportunity for growth and adaptation.

Last year I made the leap into racing 100 mile trails after adapting to trails the year prior to that. I’ve had a lot of fun learning about myself in ways that only pushing through 100 miles of mountain trails can afford the opportunity. I’ve appreciated the encouragement of my friends, family and the community that supports this sport.

Before I decided to go all out in trail and ultra running, I was a student for many years. Working and attending classes full time left little time for training the way that I needed to. Running was for fun and only happened whenever time allowed. I thoroughly enjoyed school and educational fitness to me is something that I appreciate just as much as physical fitness accomplishments.

A few weeks ago, I received the opportunity at the University of Utah to attend the Doctorates program for Physical Therapy… joining the ranks of such inspirations as Nikki Kimball, Kaci Lickteig and Scott Jurek. I'll be packing up and heading back down south to SLC, birthplace of my love for running and trails. Back to the campus that began my thirst for knowledge of the human body to lap up and satiate that thirst even more. 

Foothills above the U of U... my new playground

Unfortunately it’s going to affect my trail running abilities and the time I’m able to dedicate to my mountains. Who knows what the future will bring in terms of competing and trail running adventures. But that’s kind of the beauty in life… we don’t know. That’s what keeps it an adventure.

I’ve always made it a challenge in training to take the higher trail and embrace the difficulties in order to gain a better perspective, stronger endurance challenges and, if nothing else, a better view. I don’t compete in races because it’s easy or because I’m good at it, because they aren’t and I’m not. I compete and train and run and climb and summit for the challenges they offer and for how it changes me for the better. I’m excited to take on this next challenge and look forward to seeing how I can implement my new found knowledge into my training.

I look up to such great examples as Jason and Andy Dorais and how they were able to properly balance doctorates programs, families and training in the mountains. Fellow teammates, the Puzey brothers (Jacob and Rivers) are doing the same thing right now. And of course another semi-local inspiration, Luke Nelson did the same thing through his PA program. Although I have a hard time comparing myself to these amazing athletes, I know it can be done.

So what does this all mean in the end? Likely that I’ll have to make compromises and it won’t be easy to balance all things in life. I have a supportive wife who deserves a little doting and I’ll need to be cognizant of life beyond running and work towards a career as a Physical Therapist. Competition will have become a tamed desire. I’m not walking away, but I’m also not chasing aggressively for the next couple years.

My mountains will now be my therapy. My quick escape from the workloads I’ll be muscling through. The trails where tempo sessions and hill repeats once became my sole focus will now become my playground to have fun and enjoy. I’ll never give up my wasatch and the intrinsic sustaining satisfaction of a hard effort will still be a reason for lacing up my shoes. They are my lifestyle and so beyond just a hobby or passion.

Repeats up U Hill anyone?

I’ve been extremely blessed to have those who’ve supported me and continue to show support through this change. Adventures in life are meant to be reflected upon and spark a memory or thought provoking, “how did I survive that”. 

This is no different. Life will change, I will adapt, and adventure will ensue. 

Opportunities to Grow... Buffalo Run 50

“In the middle of a difficulty lays opportunity” is a phrase by Albert Einstein that I have come to sincerely appreciate. And based on my race at the Antelope Island Buffalo Run 50, there was an opportunity to be had.

Antelope Island Buffalo Run is one of my favorite races of the year. RD Jim Skaggs puts on a great local race and the island is always a blast to run. Throw out various trail-running distances from 25k to 100 miles, add 850 runners (most of which are your friends) and it becomes a party.

My first introduction to ultra marathon started here a couple years ago. My good friend Craig Lloyd was running 100 miles, like only idiots do, and I wanted to see him do it. I got talked into volunteering out at the Mountain View AS, where I could see him running the long out and back twice. It was a terribly windy and cold night and remember half dead zombies stumbling into our AS all night… many of whom were ready to call their adventure to an end.

Craig’s goal was to run under 18 if he could, but certainly under 19 hours. When the clock struck 18:05, I decided to run back from the finish line and bring him in. I met him a couple miles up trail and we had a short embrace and did what we needed to in order to get him home. I wasn’t easy on him and he worked hard, but he also came in at 18:58. To see someone transcend themselves for that intrinsic reward to cross a barren finish line got me hooked on this sport.

Flash forward a couple years, a few races on the island later, and I planned on toeing the line for the 50 miler for the second time. Despite having been undertrained due to numerous niggles here and there, my goals were quite high. I wanted to break the 7hour mark and ultimately end up on the podium. Although my distance training wasn’t what I wanted it to be, I’ve been consistently running harder and faster than I had the year previous. I knew I was more fit and faster than ever to attack the hills and cruise the flats at a comfortable pace that should have put me under 6:45. I’ve been training new, dieting new and trying new nutrition/electrolytes for the season and this was the perfect place to try them out and see the results.

We unceremoniously lined up for Jim’s last minute do’s and don’ts of the course. I calmly shared a few jokes, put my headphones in and settled into my pace the second I saw the heard of runners surge forward. We rounded the dirt road onto the trail and it was obvious who wanted to make it a race.

Moving super well early on

Right away we hit a long sustained climb and the field separated. I made sure to maintain my own pace and listened to my body as we climbed so I didn’t bury myself in the first couple miles of the race. My strategy wasn’t to really let go until the we got done with the first 19 mile loop and were out on the east side of the island were the trail tends to be really flat and runnable. One runner bolted off into the distance and I didn’t give chase, just let him run off. I wasn’t willing to sacrifice my day just to keep up in the first handful of miles.

A few miles into the run and after the 2^nd short little pain in ass climb, I was greeted by the Elephant Head AS which was run by all my friends in the Wasatch Mountain Wrangler group. Always a little burst of energy seeing that crew, including Craig. I was glad to know there were another 2 stops at this AS during this loop of the course as the group boosted my moral, probably more than they realized.

We headed out on the actual Elephant Head out and back as sun was starting to light up the trails and bring life to the race. I settled into a comfortable pace and was really just trying to enjoy the course since this section is one of my favorite sections of trail of the day.

My legs felt strong, mind was free, energy was great, music was hitting the pace and my smile was big. By the time I finished the 19 mile loop, I was spot on for pace and it was looking forward to settling into my grind it out pace on the flats and cruising my way into my goals. I was comfortably sitting in 4^th and within a couple minutes of 1^st. It was close knit but I knew the flats and exposed heat of the next 25 mile out and back would separate the podium placement eventually.

It took a handful of miles to get there but by the time mile 25 rolled around, I hit my stride and started moving really well at a comfortable pace. I hit the turn around of the out and back within a couple minutes of 1^st and 2^nd and was itching to hit mile 40 so I could make my move. I was just ahead of schedule and both of them were looking a little fatigued. My ego smiled to know that I was hunting them down and they were only getting slower. I got a great rejuvenation from seeing my wife and father who were crewing me. They reminded me that this was my game plan and it was time to do what I like to do in late in the race… turn it on.

Somewhere along the 5 miles stretch to the next aid station, I started feeling some cramps approaching. No problem, I started drinking more and slammed a few extra salt pills. I’ve never really had full-blown cramps before so I wasn’t super worried about it. I left that aid station and made the quick little climb out of there and started doing my thing on the downhill when it struck. Full on muscle spasm cramps in my left quad and right calve. It was severe enough to actually tip me over right on the trail. I massaged it out and took off again. Only to be stopped 200 yards later with the same thing.

This terrible cycle continued all the way to the finish line. My legs didn’t want to maintain anything under 8:45 pace without seizing up and down hills were almost comical. I actually wished to run uphill since that was the only thing that didn’t lock me up. And I tried everything to subside things. Massage, stretching, extra salt pills, tons of hydration. It was relentless.

That face pretty much describes the "fun" I was having

My game plan quickly switched to holding onto the podium. I did exactly enough to keep moving forward without making the problem worse. But as I left the last aid station and had only about 5 miles left, I saw the runner behind my FLYING down the hill after me. He must’ve sensed my weakness because he attacked with ferociousness. I put myself into survival mode and pushed super hard out of that AS and ignored the pain the best I could. It didn’t last long.

I could feel myself teetering that line and inching towards blowing up. It wasn’t but 3 miles left and I was ready to give up the podium. I didn’t think it was going to be possible to fight him off any longer. Until I came up over a little climb and heard a voice that shot a little energy into my soul. I looked up to see Craig and all his shirtless glory running up the trail towards me.

“This looks familiar,” he yelled. I looked around and realized that 2 years ago today, I met him at this exact spot (literally within 15 yards) to finish out his race. We quickly embraced and the energy of that task 2 years ago sparked the fire to get to the finish. I put all my trust in Craig to get me their and told him I’d do all the work he asked me.

I’m not going to lie… it hurt. A lot. He worked my legs harder than they wanted to. But he rolled me in to seal up the podium and reach a goal of the day. Although I was 10+ minutes slower than last hear, I was happy with the performance. I was able to transcend the pain and turn it into a positive energy. I fought through a rough day and didn’t quite even though I knew I was running well below my capabilities.

When you can't run to the finish, just fly

It wasn’t my best performance but it let me know I’m still running well and I learned a lot. I won’t look at this as a failure, but as an opportunity to learn about my racing and how to improve. Never having fought through cramps like this before, I’m going to have to figure out a game plan for that in future races. My legs moved great and only a few days later I’m feeling like I can start training again. I need to determine if it was the new nutrition plan or different salt that I used that cause the cramps. A few minor tweaks to my training program and I think I’ll be ready to attack my goals for Bryce 100.

Antelope Island is also only a couple minutes from my parents so I'm grateful they come to support

Another special Antelope Island race in books and I couldn’t be more excited with what the future holds. I’m always super thankful for my sponsors that keep me running happy. Altra Footwear, Ultraspire Hydration, Gore Apparel, VFuel (their new products are going to be AMAZING) and Migö Headware are great companies with solid products that keep us adventure specialists moving forward.

Footwear: Altra Footwear the One 2.5 (testing model)

Threads: Gore Magnitude compression shorts and GoreMagnitude singlet

Socks: Injinji quarter midweight Run 2.0

Nutrition: VFuel gels and top secret new product

Hydration: Ultraspire Spry minimal pack and Iso Versahandheld

Headwear: Migö Visor