I can’t think of a more fitting event for my first race as a Colorado resident. Dubbed “America’s Ultimate Challenge,” the race was a 10-minute drive from my place, sent us up some of the most scenic trails I’ve ever had the opportunity to barf on, and allowed me to experience my first 14-er firsthand.
The morning of, I rolled out of bed, downed way too much coffee, and somehow managed to drive myself over to Manitou Springs by 6 am. With a 7 o’clock start time, I had the luxury of hogging a Port-o-Pottie for an unreasonable amount of time, getting lost trying to find my bib, and just generally freaking out for a full hour.
With about 10 minutes to go
and a defeated acceptance of impending doom, I happened to walk past both Zach
Miller and Sage Canaday. For those of you who aren’t embarrassingly-obsessed
with the pro trail running scene, these two are the best of the best – and I
was literally racing against them (ha, yeah right). I miraculously stifled a
bunch of girlish squeals and instead wished both of them luck, heading to the
starting line starry-eyed and maybe drooling a bit? Within minutes though,
there was the bang from the starting gun, and we were off!
(See the tallest point of that mountain? That's where we're running!)
I started pretty far back, a
tad apprehensive about how this whole ‘altitude’ thing would play out, much
less racing after my 6-week hiatus. I focused on staying relaxed as I slowly
passed people on the streets of Manitou Springs, heading up to Barr Trail,
about a mile into the race. It was the trail where the uphill definitely notched
up, and I quickly locked onto the back of a female Scottish pro. I stuck behind
her as we both passed people for the next 2 miles, until, at mile 4, I
leapfrogged her, using a short downhill to my advantage.
There were a bunch of random
hikers on the trail (kinda sucks for them, because they were basically stranded
where they stood until all the runners passed them), and a couple even gave me
a heads up, letting me know that the next mile would be the easiest (least
uphill) in the race. I was quickly noticing that, surprisingly, my strength was
the steep uphill, and this flatter section was the first place where I was
passed. I’d say 5-6 passed me in this next mile (I caught maybe 4 of them later
on), and it was probably mile 6 where found myself running side-by-side with a
runner decked out in orange. Like, orange shoes, shirt, watch, even hair. I
commented this to him, who kind of grunted. Not sure if he heard me, I kind of
repeated it – he didn’t say a thing (HAHA Sam you’re so funny. Idiot).
About a minute later though, he
(post-race we chatted, his name’s Zach) let me in on his strategy: to take the
race as evenly-paced as possible. Feeling like a total jerkface for trying to
get him to talk mid-race, I stuck behind him for the next two miles as we
picked off people. I’d been running the race with my small 10-ounce handheld
water bottle, and up until this point, hadn’t even taken a sip. It’d been warm,
but as we climbed higher and higher, the temps became more and more forgiving.
Zach decided to stop at an aid station, and because I still can’t manage to
stomach anything mid-race, I continued on.
It was probably in between
miles 9-10 that I started throwing in some bouts of walking. Definitely over
10,000 feet of elevation at this point, I realized that it was my breathing
that was slowing me down, not my legs. This run/walk method worked for the next
mile, as I passed a couple more runners, and soon found myself above the tree line.
The dirt path soon became loose scree, not unlike running through sand at some
points, and without the tree cover, you could see for miles. This was the first
time I afforded myself the chance to take in the view, and it was literally
breathtaking. I commented to a runner up ahead “Man, I wish I had my camera” to
which I got a cold, exasperated look (SHUT UP SAM).
I continued the run/walk
strategy from miles 10-11, simply running when I felt good. I kept surprising myself with how good I felt – I continually
told myself to leave nothing left at the finish, and perhaps took a few too
many run bursts on mile 11. This is because, almost exactly as I passed mile
twelve, I hit a (figurative) wall. Not only was my breathing becoming out of
control, but this whole altitude thing started taking its toll, and I was
becoming alarmingly dizzy and uncoordinated.
This last mile was pretty
interminable – I noticed at mile 12 that I was at around 2:30 for total time,
meaning I could potentially break 3 hours, my lofty goal going into this race.
But as runner by runner passed me, something happened to me that’s never
happened in my racing or training before. Both quads totally locked up – they had
me yelping in pain, and I was forced to waddle (‘Did that kid poop his pants?’)
for at least a minute, hardly moving forward at all. Scared and so close to the
finish, I remember reading something online about how just having the taste of
salt is enough to stave off cramping. Sucking on my upper lip and arm like a
masochistic vampire, I regained functioning of my legs, and actually found it
easier to “run” than to walk. I put run in quotes here because at this point,
no one is actually running, just mimicking the motion.
Finally, with the end in
sight, I threw in one last burst, scrambling over scree and boulders for the
most unique finishing chutes I’ve ever seen. Delerious and wobbly, I stumbled
over to flat ground, slowly letting the elation wash over me. Not only had I,
1. Survived, but 2: finished, and 3: finished with a time of 3:00:52, soooo
close to my lofty goal of sub-3 but nearly a half hour faster than my “projected”
time of 3:30. After about 10 minutes of feeling like death, I discovered the
post-race food and proceded to devour an obscene amount of jelly beans and
Goldfish.
(Not a bad view post-race)
Because the race is a point-to-point, we had about an hour to kill before the first vans would arrive to bring us back to ‘ground’ level. I chatted with Zach and his friend Jeff, another Chicago runner, and was even interviewed by the local news! She must’ve seen how loopy and delerious I was, because I remember nothing from it, and 5 minutes after the interview, I was comatose, convenient enough for the hour-long transport back to Manitou Springs.
All in all, the race couldn’t
have gone any better. With my minimal amount of training and recent move to
elevation, I’m quite stoked with my performance, and never did I think I’d say
I was happy with a 13:30/mile pace. I finished 98th overall, 8th
in the 20-24 age group; the 25-29 age group is arguably the toughest, so next
year will definitely necessitate some more training. That Sage guy I wished
luck to at the beginning? He won the whole race in 2:10, most likely thanks to
me.
And, high off the endorfins
of a fun and painful race, I’ve already signed up for another! In two weeks, I’ll
be racing the Breck Crest 13.1, a trail half-marathon over in Breckenridge on
August 31st. If you want to see my short interview (as well as some
good coverage of the rest of the race), I’ve put a link to the video below.
Enjoy!
