Friday, November 23, 2018

Rough Trail 50K Race Recap

Rough Trail 50K 2018 Race Recap
by Chapter Member Stacey M.

I had originally signed up to do Run Woodstock 50k in Dec 2017. I registered for that in December 2017, after having an amazing time at the Run Woodstock half. I thought the next thing would be to add some distance. It’s mostly flat so I knew I could do it with the correct training and working on my mental game.

I had started to meet Jeanette Dunlap twice a week to strength train, while she was training for her 100 miler. I had also started working on my nutrition. All of this helped with my confidence about running a 50k. While I had originally thought, I should just work on distance since I hadn’t run a marathon yet and not add much elevation. I decided that might not be challenging enough, I wanted to add some elevation. I sold my run Woodstock bib and registered for the Rough Trail 50k. Its elevation is 6500 gain/loss. It has seven continuous climbs from mile 18 on…why not, right?! I had already started training for Woodstock as it was in September and Rough was in November. Since I added a few weeks to the training so I took a few weeks of all easy runs so I didn’t get burnt out.

The time came for my training season to restart. With a lot of help from Jeanette I found and figured out a good training schedule to fit my needs of myself and my family. I had decided to do a 24 week schedule with cross training, hills, easy runs and weekend long runs. I hadn’t run past a half marathon road or trail before so I wasn’t for sure what to expect. I also never used much fueling on my runs. I did use liquid fueling but I never researched how often or what to use. So pretty much I just winged all my long runs till now.
During the weekend long runs, I learned with help, what my body needed to stop bonking at mile 11. Every single time. Which became very frustrating and it made me double think my ability to run the 50k. I finally got it all under control and the rest of the training went as smoothly as training plans go. I at least got all the major hiccups out of the way.  

November 9th, race weekend finally got here. All the training leading up to this point was going to be tested. We arrived on Friday to get in the cabin and do our packet pick up. We all decided to go for a short run, a loop of the last roughly 1 mile, of the race. Which is helpful, we got to see the first and final set of steps we’d have to go up and then we’d be on the home stretch. We went back to the cabin, ate and got all our stuff ready for the next day. I didn’t notice my nerves too much, other than when I freaked out earlier, I didn’t have a hat to wear, after we went for the 2 mile run, but Jeanette Ark came to the rescue for my “just out of the shower look” hair.
Before bed I decided to go through the notes that were given to me from friends that Jeanette had given me on Thursday at our final meet up before the race. They were all so sweet and encouraging! I felt all the love from my friends. Anna, had said at one point in her note “you f***ing got this girl!”.  I thought I would repeat to myself during the race. I had Heidi write it on my arm along with another “I am strong” to look at when needed in the race.
I then made sure to go to bed early that night as I wanted as much sleep as I could get. 5 am would come earlier enough.


Race Day!!
We got up got dressed, ate breakfast and the 50kers headed off to Koomer Ridge for the start/finish line. Which was about 20 min ride.
We got to the camp ground and had to sign our waiver so they knew we were there and started. About 6:55, Michael (RD) come on and gave us the prerace announcements. Then he escorted us in his car to the start of the trail. We were on our own to find our way back!

The trail started out nice and muddy, with sections of dry trail every now and then. The RD did email earlier in the week saying “You will get wet. You will get muddy. You will be cold” so I guess it shouldn’t have been a surprise. I tried to run around it as much as I could. I didn’t know how my feet would do as I didn’t get to train on mud or creek crossings. Looking back, I should have just run directly through the damn stuff as it wasn’t the last time we saw it. At about mile 4 my right knee started to hurt and I mentioned it to Lindsey and we both hoped it’d go away after a while.
After about 8 miles, we hit a dirt road. This road seemed to go on and on and on. It was long, It was boring and it was cold. So, I turned on my music and listened to that for a while. I decided to take an assessment of my body and it seemed to be doing great. My knee was still a little irritating but it was fine. I did notice even with my music; I was letting my nerves get to me. I started yelling at myself to shut up. I kept having negative conversations with myself and the race just started. I kept saying “Stacey Ann, your family is on their way here to see you finish. Anna is home stalking me on Garmin, Jeanette won’t want to hear how I DNF after all these months of training, people are cheering me on to finish this race. You won’t be able to handle a DNF especially while everyone’s celebrations in the cabin tonight. I didn’t waste 5 months of my life to not finish this. I am strong, I f***ing got this!” I realized this road wasn’t good for my mental game and I needed off it. It gave me way too much time to think. Then after what felt like forever we hit the trails again then we came up on the rocks. Which was my favorite part, looking back at it. We climbed high onto Auxier Ridge and I saw the tops of trees! It was beautiful, it was gorgeous and I was so happy to see it. I had wondered if the leaves would still be on the trees with as many leaves we had seen on the ground and the storms during the week. I was so excited to see the colors still around.  Lindsey and I caught up to each other again and we could get some pretty picture to remember that area.
We did some more climbing and running down wooden steps and climbing some more to come out back to the Auxier Ridge Aide station, 12ish miles done! The volunteers were so nice and helpful. It was fun to check myself in and out. This is my first race that I’ve had to do that, and all though it was a small silly thing to do, I enjoyed it.



Off to the long dirt road again. I realized my phone was about to die when I went to play my music again. The cold was eating my phone's battery. I was at 6% already and not too far into the race. I texted my husband saying my phone was about to die and that I don’t think the Garmin Live tracking would still work. He had been tracking me as he and our older two kids were coming over to cheer me on through the finish line.  I also knew Anna was home tracking me and I wanted her to be able to keep stalking me. I sent that out and then turned my phone on low battery mode and plugged it into my portable battery thing. I was so glad I decided to bring that. I had a hard time running this dirt road back. I think because I didn’t enjoy it the first time around but held a good pace anyways. This time, I walked/ran a little more than what I wanted. A couple that had ran it last year caught up to me and was talking about the next aid station cut off. We had till 12:30 to get there. I think it was about 10:30 at the time and it was a 5 mile run to that aide station. Forgetting that it was flat then downhill, I started to panic with the couple next to me. They were anxious about making the cut off since they were 4 mins behind one of them last year and had a DNF. That made me get my ass in gear and get away from them. As nice as they were I didn’t want that energy around me. I was confident that if I kept them behind me then I knew I would make the cut off times. 

Back on the trail and my stomach was starting to get hungry. I had been eating but I was wanting my PBJ that I had. I kept running for a while trying to hold it of till later to eat it. I ate one of my paydays, which had become somewhat hard to eat, with this cold. We ran through some more mud and hit a few more water crossings. Some of the water crossings had some rock bridges to cross but most of them you just had to run through. With all the mud that you gathered around our feet it was nice to get them cleaned off.

The next aide station was down a nice long climb before heading to the next 7 brutal climbs. But it wasn’t an aide station, it was a guy taking our pictures crossing over one of the high creeks before starting a hard ass climb. I didn’t realize that we had some 8-9 miles before the next aide station. I studied the map but with nerves, cut off times etc, I didn’t remember any of it. We hit a few climbs and hit a couple wrong turns. We all had noticed that the marking was a little sporadic than we all would have liked. During climbs and turns you had to look around more than you’d like to make sure you went the correct way. By this point I had lost the “chasing cut off” couple and felt better about my time. I was averaging around 17 mm, which put me at finishing about 8 to 8.5 hours, if all kept going smoothly. I had been running with a guy for a while after I asked him to go through my pack to find my PBJ, I was starving by this point and needed some real food. Turns out I forgot to pack it that morning, I was so bummed. It was so nice to talk to another person for a while. It made time go by a little faster. He ran several marathons and decided to try his hand on trails using this race as his first. Which I was in total shock he decided on this one as his first. He seemed to be doing great but mentioned his ankles weren’t used to the terrain. We hung for a while until I realized he was being quiet for a longer period than usually and I heard the noise of polls hitting the ground. When the trail was clear to take my eyes off it, I turned around and asked where the guy was that was behind me. The new guy said “I am the guy behind me”. Turns out he had dropped back a while ago due to his ankle hurting. This new guy, myself and his friend stayed together for a while. They’d get ahead on the climbs then I’d catch up once we were on top. We had been twisting and turning, going up and down wood and metal stairs, some icy some little as hell and hard to navigate on. I only fell on the stairs once and somehow caught myself. During many points of these climbs, I was thankful that I did the stair climber, ran hill repeats and practiced climbing at JMF. Then we came to what turned out to be our last climb before aide station at mile 25. I had remembered a text Jeanette sent the night before. To think of my kids and husband at different points of the race. She had said to think of her at mile 25, 26. Which I thought was odd but didn’t question it too much. So, knowing I was on mile 24ish I started thinking about all her accomplishments on and off the trail. While I was thinking about that we started to pass people coming out and back down the nasty climb.  They all gave us kudos and cheered everyone on. Then, I looked up and over to my left and saw my friend Mitch, who was looking strong, coming back down. The first one of my friends I’ve seen for a long time. He raised his hands and yelled “STACEYYYY” I so needed that. I told him, I was going in for a hug because I REALLY need it, I may have started to get teary eyed a little but yelled at myself to stop. We said goodbye and he told me that there’s a surprise up there for me and we parted ways. I thought, hmm there must be some good hot food up here if Mitch is excited to tell me about it. Then I wondered, if maybe Susan was able to work it out to volunteer. She had mentioned it when the RD posted that a large group backed out to man this station. I had hopped it worked out that she was able to be there. I needed a friendly face. I came to the top of the climb saw the big red truck and bulldozer, thinking man, my little guy would love to see these right now.




I headed over to the tent and I saw Lindsey hugging Susan! Man, did I want one of those hugs too, so I walk over to get in line. Then I looked to the right and I see Jeanette Dunlap, who had said she was at a cross country banquet and wasn’t able to volunteer like she had thought she might. Well now, this wasn’t the cross country banquet. No wonder she told me to think of her at mile 25, 26! The little shit surprised me and come to volunteer at the most crucial of aid station! I saw her and started to cry tears of joy like I have never done before during a race. All the emotions just came flowing out!  We gave each other THE best bear hug ever! It was awesome. I totally needed it. I had been through some highs and was hitting my low before that long climb and the climb just made it worse. I think she could tell by looking at me and how I was acting, she tried to get me to think about other things and take my mind of it. Susan was helping get my bottles filled and my belly fed, while also helping keep my outlook up. I accessed myself before I took off and I felt good. My feet to my surprise felt good, cold but good. The Trail toes I lathered on before the race was doing an excellent job of keeping my feet dryish.  It was time to say good bye for a couple more miles where we’d run out to Skybridge Rd aid station then turn around and head back. As I started out, I became frozen. My hands, my stomach and my feet. My feet were the worst, they were cold and numb. It took a couple miles for my to be able to feel them again. It was muddy but not bad. I could tell I was starting to hit a wall and tried to get out of it. I found a few people I had been running with before and stayed with them for little while. Then I happened to see Amy, Amber and Jennifer and Dave headed back to Chimney Top. I wasn’t that far behind them. I’d say about 20 mins give or take. We gave each other hugs and moved on. I finally made it to Sky Bridge where Lindsey was turning around and headed back down. She asked if I was okay and if I wanted her to wait. I told her to go on and I’d be behind her. I secretly wanted to run with someone I knew but I didn’t want to hold her up. She was doing great and she needed to run her race. I checked in and out of that aid station, got a PB square and a swig of pop and headed back down and up to Chimney Top. I realized earlier in the race that I hadn’t peed yet. Well, as soon as I started to head back down, my bladder was like I was 9 months pregnant again. It hit and there was no stopping it. No matter who was around. I pulled off the trail and went up to a bush and squatted. Not caring who saw what. I finally peed at mile 26ish. I decided I needed a little pick me up, so I got a note my husband wrote me and read it, trying not to fall from the trail and tears, I kept going forward. It made me laugh and cry! It was perfect. Back on the trail I went headed back to Chimney top.  On the way, my stomach started growling pretty good again. I had been eating snack sized paydays and I had a honey stinger waffle at one point. But I didn’t get to finish it because they were frozen. The waffle was like eating a frozen piece of brittle. I was needing some sandwiches badly!

I made it back up to Chimney Top. It took me longer than I would have liked. I made this stop a little faster than the last one but I was worried I wouldn’t make the times. The sweepers were coming from chimney top as I was leaving. So, I got some sandwiches, confirmed the number of miles I had left which was about 4 but I had one last big ass hill to climb. The 7th climb since mile 18. I said good bye to Tippie and Jeanette and was on my way. I was feeling my emotions all over again and pulled out a letter my son wrote me. Oh, my goodness such sweetness! Tears of joy again!

I finally made it back down to the coldest creek crossing of the whole race. A guy had been there with music that we passed going up and now we were passing him again and he directed us up the hill! By this time, I found a couple I had played leap frog with the whole 2nd half of the race. They were sweet and encouraging so I hung with them for a little while. We ended up catching another guy, whom was struggling and asking all kinds of things in a pretty negative way. I tried to answer him without being too rude but I didn’t have enough energy to be positive for myself and him. Luckily the other two helped him and talked him down. We ended up losing him on that climb which, I was grateful for, I needed positive energy around me. It was mile 28ish maybe and we still had a couple miles to go. I couldn’t take any negative thoughts right now, I couldn’t. I was ready to be done. I was ready to see my family.

I stayed with the couple for a while. We walked and ran but mostly walked. We passed a woman who said we only had 1.5 miles to go and I clearly said to her “you better not be lying to me?” She laughed and assured me it wasn’t any longer than that. Well, she was wrong. It was more like 2. I know that doesn’t seem like a big deal, but that plays a good mental mind game on you. It sucked but I kept moving forward. Finally, we got to the sign Koomer Ridger 1.5 miles and I decided I needed to take off and run. I was a little nervous if we continued to walk that I wouldn’t make the cut off. I said good bye and headed out. The guy made sure I wasn’t in their age group before I got too far ahead. He was joking which gave me a good laugh. I made it to our first stairs that we had at the beginning of the race and the same loop that we ran the day before. I knew I was getting close, I kept going and walking during the mud. It was muddy at the beginning but it was even worse with all the 25kers and 50kers going through it twice each. I kept telling myself my husband and two older kids drove over to watch me finish. They’ve been out in the cold for a couple hours waiting for me to show up. I damn well better get my ass in gear and go see them. I took the left turn, knowing I was close to them. I heard music and I kicked it in gear I came across one of the camp grounds and saw the hill that lead to the finish line. I ran up it, as I am I hear go runner from strangers, Go Stacey from Jeanette and Lindsey, then I see a little dude right at the turn then I hear “Go, mama go!” It was Liam! He was waiting there for me, his little red nose and mouth covered in goldfish cheering me on. I put my hand to my mouth with such joy and start to cry. I turn to the right to come into the shoot and there’s my girl on the side running next to John, who are both clapping and both have a gigantic smile from ear to ear. Johns face was so happy and I could tell how excited and proud he was of me. I continued to cry as I cross the finish line! The women put the medal around my neck and asks me if I was okay, because I was crying so hard and I can’t catch my breath. I was hyper ventilating a little. I gave Lindsey, I think it was, a hug, and then I go to kiss my babies! I gave John a gigantic bear hug and cry tears of joy on his shoulder. My kids come over and give me a fast hug until they realize how awful I smelled and how much mud I had on me!

I finished the race. My time was 9 hours 42 mins. The finish line felt better than I ever thought it would. I was so proud of myself and I was so happy to have my husband, two older kids and friends there to help me celebrate! I was done!



1 comment:

  1. Congratulations on your finish! Isn't it amazing all the things that running presents to us in any moment!?! I will be using some of your strategies to keep going! Thanks for sharing your adventure!

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