ATTQOTD: Quite a timely question of the day for me.
After doing my first Dopey this year with my friend, the question of "do you think we could do all this running in just one day?" came up.
So, within a week of being home we both signed up for the Rock the Ridge 50 Mile Challenge with the idea of running a 50 miler in the year I turn 50 being the "logic" behind the decision.
We completed our "run" last weekend so I'll take this moment to give a quick recap................
Training for Dopey had already given us a base to work off and I found what looked like a workable training plan to be as ready as possible in four months. It had us running 3 days midweek ranging from 3-12 miles and both days on the weekend with a max of 31 miles on one Saturday at the end of March. While I had a bit of trouble meeting some of those longer midweek runs as I run before work and simply didn't have the time, we kept to the schedule as best we could with 120 miles in Jan, 140 in Feb, 190 in March and 165 in April. It was a lot of running for our busy lives and having to run multiple weekends that included 16 miles on Saturday and 26-28 on Sunday really put a burden on our wives.
The one wrinkle to our plan was we had two friends get caught up in our excitement and decide midway through to join our team. Unfortunately one of them injured themselves in a frantic effort to pile on the mileage and the other didn't have the time he thought he had to train properly. One topped out at 19 miles and the other 15.......yet both were focused on running regardless....a recipe for disaster.
So, as the race approached I half expected my two friends to drop out but both seemed determined to run.
At the prerace pasta dinner and packet pickup, we stuck out like sore thumbs. Our short and stocky builds among the tall and lanky (and bearded?) competitive ultra runners. It seemed the runners were split in two groups, those looking to run full throttle for 7-8 times or those looking just to somehow survive. We were somewhere in the middle at the moment.
We packed our dropbags that night with multiple changes of clothes, rain gear, tubes of glide and enough food to trek the entire Appalachian trail.
After the RunDisney-like 3:30am wake up call we headed over to NY's Mohonk Presserve. Our hydration packs fully stocked we nervously waited and wondered how the heck we were all going to cover the most mileage we ever ran in day and laughed at how the other two were going to run there first marathon, 50k and 50 miler all in one day.
After a nice rendition of America the Beautiful, the gun went off and the 600 runners were on the move.
The first few miles went off the board easily in a cool foggy morning with the two less trained runners leading the charge. We were all smiles at mile 5 and hit our first real aid station at mile 10 with everyone smiling despite climbing almost 1,000' between mile 2-5. We snacked on some PB&J's and m&ms and quickly headed back up the mountain before the inevitable happened.
At mile 12 just prior to another lung busting ascent, our previously injured friends hamstring forced him to a near walk and then finally at mile 15 a complete walk.
We slowly trudged along knowing the only way out was at the dropbag station at mile 24.6. We ran a little, walked a little, waited for him to catch up for a bit and did our best to keep him in the right mindset and relatively good spirits.
We eventually made it to the dropbags with a surprisingly good cushion before the cutoff time. At this point our injured friend tapped out, give us a hug and headed to shuttle bus.
My under-trained friend decided he wanted to continue so we agreed we would stick together and run as much as he could just as long as we didn't jeopardize not hitting any of the cutoff times.
After a change of clothes, a bit of soup and a potato we continued on. At roughly the 26 mile mark the race headed up to it's highest point gaining another 1,300 feet in 5 miles. That elevation gain really took a toll on us. My feet started to swell and become painful at 33 miles (my longest ever distance) but I wavered from feeling terrible to feeling like I could tick off a few 9 min miles. My Dopey friend and I did intervals most of the time but kept an eye over our shoulder to make sure we didn't completely lose our other teammate. We took time to enjoy the spectacular views waiting for him to catch up.
We finally finished our ridge loop and strolled back to the bag drop where I once again changed clothes, put on a fresh pair of shoes and packed our headlamps as light was beginning to fade.
When my friend finally joined us at the aid station I half expected him to pack it in and jump on the shuttle put he announced he was 'finishing this thing if it was the last thing he did" (there was a bit more profanity).
So we left the last full aid station with the sun beginning to set, some very sore feet and a little over 12 miles to go.
At this point we made the decision to stay together so nobody would have to finish alone and walk the woods by themselves after dark.
We hiked along and watched the rock climbers finishing their day as the sun set and we headed deeper into the preserve. Just as we started losing light, I heard twigs snapping and as we turned a corner I spotted a mother black bear and her three cubs high atop a tree. We quickly took a few blurry bear silhouette photos and moved along energized by this unique experience.
At this point night had fully set upon us and we were ready to be done but not before another uphill grind on what my friend quickly dubbed "that stupid loop" which ground our pace to a crawl.
In the dark, miles seem to take forever and it really became a bit of a quiet death march for 5 or 6 miles until we were able to sense the finish line after coming off the mountain and into the farm lands.
The three of us finally limped across the finish line after 16 hours and 45 minutes. Not nearly the time I had hoped but I was glad my friend gutted it out and I was thrilled to have traveled 50 miles shoulder to shoulder with these two guys.
After enjoying a burger and beer at TGiF, we limped out into the parking lot agreeing "never again". Yet after some of the aches and pains subsided a couple days later the talk quickly changed to shaving a few hours off next years time.
We are not certain we are doing it again as the training is a huge burden on our families, but as we look back on the funny, difficult, beautiful and daunting moments of this challenge the urge to try again is there.
So 50 miles before i turned 50....check
50 miles the year after I turn 50......TBD