TNF San Fran Endurance Challenge Race Recap

I wrote this recap for the TNF race website, so I'll just link you there. I got some good insights and interviews with some of the top men's and women's finishers. Enjoy;

http://www2.thenorthface.com/endurancechallenge/highlights/2009/champ_review.html

TNF San Fran Endurance Challenge video

Here's a short and sweet video I put together from some quick pre-race interviews.

Ultracentric 2009

I don't suppose there's a whole lot to say about a race like this, but I'll try to recap it the best that I can. It was a .5 mile pancake flat paved loop and you just run round and round until the 24 hours is up- simple as that. I flew down to this race solo and it was a whirlwind of a trip, but it all went relatively smoothly, so that was great. The Prefontaine 'stache worked wonders, and will stick around for the remainder of the month in celebration of Movember to support men's health.

After getting in to Dallas Friday evening and having dinner with some friends in town there, I had a good night's sleep at the hotel. Then I was up and at it fairly early Saturday and off to the race for a 9am start time. I made many mistakes in my plans for this race, but I guess that's how we learn. After registering for the race and booking my trip and everything I learned that many things I had assumed were not in fact true. Because this had been the national championship race in previous years, I assumed it was again this year (whoops, the nat'l championship got moved to Ohio this year and happened about a month ago). Then a few weeks prior to the race I started hearing many words of warning from friends all over the place who warned me that this was not a good race, poorly run, etc. There are even groups in the Dallas area who were boycotting this race.... little did I know. Oh well, despite this onslaught of new information, I figured I'd be prepared to support myself from my car and how bad could a .5 mile loop possibly be?

So once at the race start, I got a prime parking spot right on the loop and set up the car as my personal aid station with all the food/clothes/hydration I would need for 24 hours. This worked great, although the aid station proper ended up being pretty well stocked throughout and the volunteers were extremely nice and supportive. So the air horn went off at 9am and we were off on the loop. There were a handful of 72 and 48 hour runners already going on the loop, and I recognized Amy Palmiero- Winters running strong and said hi to her- fun to see a familiar face. She is an incredible inspiration too, and seeing her out there trucking along so strong after 24 hours already was awesome. The weather was cool and overcast- perfect. The first loop was over before I knew it, then the first hour was over, and pretty soon the miles and the hours started piling on. In terms of specifics, there isn't much to say. I ran pretty steadily through the day on Saturday, and as night came I still felt pretty good. Somewhere in the night I noticed my lead was about 16 miles and I lost a good deal of motivation to push hard, but I kept trucking along, walking when I needed to and just keeping the loops going. Not having trained on pavement at all, I felt my body getting battered by the hard road, and this was not something I was used to. Another fun aspect of the .5 mile loop was that I was able to run with my phone for some loops when I felt like it, so I got encouraging words from my wife, my brother, and many friends throughout the day and late into the night from some brief phone calls and lots of text messages. The night was cold, but dry and I just kept putting on layers as needed. I brought 3 pairs of shoes along so that I could switch as needed, but ended up staying in my TNF Vozas throughout the entire race- no sock change or shoe change required at all. Sweet ride.

I hoped for a strong second wind when the sun rose around 6:30am, but it just didn't really happen. I kept plugging along, and then with about 1.5 hours to go I picked it back up and ran fairly strong for the remainder. Some friends from the area came out about an hour before the end too, and it was fun to chat with them a bit. I finished just a few minutes before the 24 hour mark and ended up with 115.6565 miles for the win. I had hoped to run significantly farther, but the pavement beat me up more than expected and like I said it was mentally tough to stay motivated without someone nipping at my heels or someone to chase. As soon as the race was over I knew I had to shift gears to "get to my flight" mode. I went straight to the car and closed down my mini aid station, got everything all packed up, put a warm sweatshirt on, threw away all my trash and was ready to roll at about 9:20. There was an incredible brunch spread prepared by the aid station volunteers so I indulged in a delightful plate full of eggs, bacon, sausage, and pancakes. I let the race director know that I had a flight to catch, but the awards dragged on for quite some time unfortunately. All the race participants were extremely friendly, and it was fun to meet some new folks there. After the awards, I was immediately on the road for a stress-filled drive to the airport. Long story short- I got there, returned my car, did a lot of stressful fast walking with a very funny looking pained stride, made my flight, had an uncomfortable 4 hour flight home, drove home, rested for the rest of the day, and slept 12 hours Sunday night. A whirlwind of a trip, but a fun one nonetheless. A few lessons learned- I'll do better research before blindly signing up for races in the future, and I'll be looking for a nice dirt trail course for my next 24 hour excursion. This trail guy just isn't used to so much pavement. Thanks to everyone for the encouragement and support before/after/throughout! I'm excited for some serious calorie replenishment in a few days celebrating Thanksgiving. Happy early Thanksgiving- we all have so many many things to be thankful for!

Headed to the Big D

Well I'm jumping on a plane to Dallas today for a very quick trip. I'm running the Ultracentric 24 Hour race this weekend and it should be interesting. This is a .5 mile paved loop and you just run as many loops as you can for 24 hours. The fun begins Saturday morning at 9am, and ends Sunday at 9am. I've got my bag packed, a brand new pair of TNF Vozas for the outing, and a freshly cut moustache (in celebration of Movember and as my usual Prefontaine inspiration tribute). I'm ready to roll.

If friends come by (I used to live in Dallas), I'll have them Twitter some updates throughout the day, but I'm not promising any live updates. Hopefully a few will happen though- http://twitter.com/seesamrun . The race itself unfortunately doesn't provide any updates as far as I'm aware.

Alrighty, have a great weekend and I'm about to get loopy.

Carkeek 12 Hour 2009

Wonderland Video

Here's the cinematic triumph from our Wonderland Trail adventure. If you'd like more detail, read on to the post below this. Enjoy.

Wondrous Wonderland, Tribute to Dr. DT

I’ve heard glorious tales from the Wonderland Trail since coming to Seattle, and after climbing Rainier last year, circumnavigating the mountain at some point was an inevitable necessity. The Wonderland Trail is an approximately 93 mile trail that circles Rainier and offers indescribably glorious views pretty much throughout, and rewards you with something like 22,000 feet of climbing in the midst of the loop. So we threw together some quick plans, pulled out some maps, and set out on yet another mountain adventure. Brock Gavery, Miles Ohlrich, and I comprised our small, lean team of 3, and after some exciting car troubles before leaving Seattle, we eventually got on the road down to Rainier.

We headed first straight down to Longmire, which we would be hitting the next day at around the 60 mile mark. After a bit of waffling trying to figure out what to do with our minimal drop bags of food resupplies, bivies, etc., we ended up finding a nice tree in the woods and just tied them up, well out of reach of very short baby bears. We said goodbye to the bags and headed back out of the park for the long drive back up and around to Mowich Lake (about 2.5 hours). After getting a nice relaxing and delicious dinner in our bellies at an inn in the woods, we made it up to Mowich Lake right around nightfall. I recognized the roads approaching the area but couldn’t seem to figure out when I’d been out there before, then eventually realized this was right around the start of my first 50 miler some years ago (the Rainier to Ruston race), so that was a fun memory. At Mowich Lake, we threw up our tents and crashed for a very short nap. After a few hours sleep, we were up and at ‘em at 11:30pm. I found a crumpled train ticket in my pocket and remembered the fun day in the park and on the train with my family in D.C. last weekend and smiled remembering my brother’s 3 year old’s supreme joy as we rode the train. We broke camp, Brock brewed up countless batches of Caffe Vita’s deliciously dark Luna

coffee in the French press as we all gathered our gear and made last minute adjustments. Right at about 1am, we were on the trail cruising along nicely in the cool night. The sky was clear and awash with a sea of stars, and the start of our adventure began under an already glorious backdrop despite not being able to see Rainier just yet.

We got in some solid running miles in the dark, but the majority was fairly slow going as we were all still pretty fatigued after such a short nap. The nighttime always proves difficult mentally, and this section held true, but we pressed on. We had only one short section where we lost the trail in a large drainage basin and stumbled around for a while in the rocks before regaining the trail proper and moving along. We moved steadily and seemed to hold on to our goal pace of 3 miles an hour despite occasional stops, getting water, etc. The sun began to creep up over the mountains around us, the headlamps switched off, and our spirits rose as we soaked in the spectacular mountain backdrop surrounding us. Just as the sun popped out in earnest, we fittingly reached Sunrise Camp and stopped for a short eating break. It was a quick cruise from there down to White River, where we put in a little bonus mileage trying to find the trail, but ended up back on course and moving right along.

On the long climb up to Summerland, Brock was leading our small tribe of 3. With our heads down slogging up the climb, one moment I could see Brock trudging onward just ahead of me and suddenly I saw him turn abruptly and run back at me looking none too calm. A beautiful big black bear was paying us a close visit and wishing us a good morning. He was right on the trail munching some leaves, and boy was he stout. Fortunately he seemed more interested in a vegetarian diet for the day. After making lots of noise (which he didn’t seem to mind at all…), he ended up crossing to the other side of the trail and munching on a tasty new tree. We nervously went ahead right on past him at a now “safe” distance of perhaps 4 feet… I was at the back of the pack now and nervously kept glancing back and talking to the bear as we continued the climb to Summerland. The bear was content with his leaves though, and we made it to the top unscathed. We stopped for a short breather and regrouped. Then onward.

The stretch between Summerland and Indian Bar is one of the more spectacular sections of trail. It’s one of the higher sections of the trail, and the terrain is very open and has the feel of high alpine country (and has plenty of incredible Rainier views of course). There was a short climb out of Indian Bar, and then a really long, cruising section all the way down to Maple Creek where we made up some serious time and had a lot of fun. The trail got a bit rougher shortly after Maple Creek and the lengthy climb up to Mirror Lakes was somewhat mentally defeating after such a fast fun section. We eventually emerged at the top and went by Mirror Lakes with an unfortunately completely cloud-shrouded Rainier hidden somewhere behind. After a short piece of road, we began our last chunk of trail for the day down to Longmire. At this point we knew without a doubt we’d make it to the Lodge in time for dinner, which was a great feeling. The restaurant closed at 8pm, and we were well ahead of schedule, so visions of cold beer and hot food began dominating our thoughts. We were all hurting in different ways and in different places, and all ready for a relaxing break. As we got into Longmire, Miles graciously volunteered to go retrieve our food resupply bags from the woods, and Brock and I headed into Longmire. We all awkwardly took mini-showers in the sink and it felt good to clean up. After layering up with all the clothing we had, we headed into the restaurant for some refueling. Fortunately they allowed us in despite our stench and appearance. With all 3 heads bobbing throughout the meal and darting menacingly close to falling straight into our food from exhaustion, we slowly made our way through many plates of salad, pasta, lamb, bread, soup, cold beer, and blackberry cobbler. After reaching Longmire at about 5pm, after dinner we headed back for the woods and quickly bivied where we landed. We had a luxurious 4-5 hours of sleep and were up again at 12:30am. Packing up was quick and easy, though getting going without endless fresh pots of Vita was not so easy, but we were on the trail again about 1am.

We all tried munching some caffeine gum we had picked up at the gas station the day before, but it tasted pretty awful and didn’t seem to help too much. But we trudged on through the night and the miles clicked away slowly but surely. As we climbed out of the South Puyallup River valley, the sun came up again and our spirits improved quite a bit. This morning/night was considerably colder than the night before so we stayed layered up even a few hours into the morning. A few miles before Golden Lakes, we spotted another big black bear right near the trail, but far enough away that he wasn’t an issue- just fun to look at as he lumbered around the mountains. We met a friendly ranger at Golden Lakes and he assured us it was an easy and fast 6 or so miles down to the Mowich River before the 4 or so mile climb back up to Mowich Lake. With that, Brock led us on a breakneck charge down the mountain to the Mowich River and we blazed into there feeling excited about being so close to completing the loop. We had another quick breather there and then embarked on the climb back up to Mowich Lake. It was slow going, but we emerged back at the Mowich Lake Campground not too much later, and we were done. One incredible adventure on the Wonderland Trail, done in about 36 hours with a solid 7 or so hour break in Longmire included.

We couldn’t have asked for more glorious and perfect weather this weekend, and this is a truly pristine and incredible classic Pacific NW adventure trail- a definite must-do for anyone even remotely interested in it. Being in such a vast beautiful outdoor playground makes me feel small, humbled, and grateful for all that we have and the many blessings we take for granted each day. Brock and I had been talking about a Wonderland run for a while, and after the untimely and unfortunate death of ultrarunning legend Dr. Dave Terry last week, this gave us the impetus to head out for a tribute run. Brock ran the Wonderland with DT several years ago, and his encouraging words and motivation kept Brock going then. Although I never had the chance to officially meet DT, I have heard countless great stories about him over the years, and his impact on the sport of ultrarunning will long be remembered. This was an incredible adventure and it was a pleasure to honor Dave Terry in our own small way out on some glorious singletrack where he will be long be remembered. Rest in peace Dr. Dave- you will be missed.

...More pics/video to come.