Pinhoti race report part 2

As I mentioned in the first post I felt kind of in the hole from the start doing many of the things you shouldn't do from the get go before a race of this size.
A. Sit in a car for eight hours the day before.
B. Sleep about 4 hours.
C. Not be able to hydrate well prior to the event.
D. Run in stuff you haven't trained in.

Oh well, so it goes.

The race started out cool, probably in the mid 40's and I wore a long sleeve t-shirt for probably the first couple of hours feeling comfortable in the shade of the trees and not wanting to get a ton of sun, wind exposure when we were out in the open. Starting literally in the back due to getting all my stuff together I passed a few people early on and tried to take a very leisurely pace and settle into a rhythm.

I caught up and talked with a real nice woman from Colorado (Hi, Anne) for awhile and walked/ran at a pretty mellow pace till I passed her about a mile before the first aid station at mile 6.7.

Unfortunately for some unknown reason there seem to be no results available for the race yet and I didn't keep very close track of my splits so I can only guess at most of my later times. I do know it took me about an hour and forty-five minutes to get to the first aid station and I was thinking it was going to be a long day. Up to this point none of the trails were super challenging, just time consuming with lots of switch backs, several easy creek crossing and lots of debris still down on the trail from previous storms.

The next aid was 6.5 miles away so off we went. Sometime between the start and middle of this section I caught up with three other guys who had done some training together and seemed to be keeping a pretty decent pace. I stayed with them up to the next aid station at 13 miles. The course had been rerouted from aid station 2 to 3 in response to a tornado earlier on in the year and basically the absence of trail. So instead we ran the entire distance of 5 miles on roads till the next checkpoint.
The devastation was pretty drastic and the whole area looked like a clear cut. Not sure whether this was the case after the storm or what but can definitely see where any forward motion on that part of the trail would be extremely challenging.

From aid station 3 to 4 we had about 4.5 miles to cover. Our little group stayed together for the duration of this distance taking turns swapping leads and chatting. Running in a group definitely helped the time go by and in retrospect I should have spent more effort staying in contact with these guys as we were making good time and staying right at the 24 hour mark.

At aid station 4 (22.7 miles) however, I stopped to mess with my bottles, gear food etc. and wound up losing contact with my former group. In retrospect I definitely should have made more of an effort to stay with them because we were making good time and the conversation was helping me out mentally. I didn't see them the rest of the day and wish them well.

Throughout the day it seemed my stomach was not cooperating very well. While I kept up with my eating and drinking as my plan it just seemed like all my fluid intake was just sloshing around inside of me and I had bouts of nausea but never any vomiting. I kept thinking throughout the day the when night came and it cooled off I would feel much better. I did make the decision to carry two water bottles, one in my hip pack and a hand held and looking back I think one would have been fine, especially for a cool weather race like this one.

Also, probably ten miles into the race I began having an injury I had never experienced before. The tendon behind my knee (popliteal tendon) began getting tighter and tighter throughout the day resulting in me not being able to run at all by about fifty miles. I had never experienced this before and attribute it to being tight from travelling and also just not being able to get as much mileage/cross training in as I had been before the race due to work, life and mostly sitting at a desk working on my paper for my senior project.

I struggled all the way down to the race with trying to get in the right frame of mind for racing and probably didn't get there until it was too late but more on that in the what I would have changed section.

By this time I'd made it to Aid station #5 27.6 and the first place where my wife was able to meet me. It was nice to see her as I didn't think she'd make it due to getting confused earlier but just made it in time for me to come through. I don't know the exact times but I had fallen off the 24 hour pace already and was kind of disheartened by how slow I was going. Later, Jody said I was looking pretty pale and dejected. I ate and drank a little, changed socks and insoles and headed off for another long 6,9 mile stretch. These long stretches are not so tough physically, but mentally being isolated and alone it was hard for me to make good time. Again, my stomach was still feeling cruddy and it is so hard to not compare your progress with what you know you can run on flat ground, for me that was usually doubling my time. For this particular stretch I think it probably took well over two hours.

Jody was at aid station 6 (34.5 miles) again when I came in and was a big help to the couple there as they were busy doing their thing and she was able to check off runners coming through. By the time us back of the packers had come through they had run out of water and had only HEED to offer which for the life of me I can't figure out why race directors keep supplying as I have yet to meet any runners who like it. Jody had water for me but I was in pretty good shape to start with.

I was actually looking forward to the next section since A it was shorter and B I knew it would be an emotional and literal high point of the race arriving at Bald Rock and the top of Mt. Cheaha. It would also serve as the transition into night. I was able to actually run a good portion of this section with a group of folks from Wisconsin who had come down and were doing very well. I was expecting a much greater climb but the section was really not too bad. A good portion was run on a ridge so the scenery was fantastic. After running all day in the hollers and switchbacks it was fun to feel like you were getting somewhere. Then all of sudden you hear noise, look up and there are probably a hundred people on the boardwalk at the top of the mountain cheering you on. Apparently Cheaha is a big tourist attraction and there were all sorts of folks up there. I even took the time to pose for a couple of pictures with my camera that died shortly thereafter.

Jody was in the parking lot waiting for me with my tights, long sleeve top, sandwiches etc. I took the time to get a red bull in as well since I knew it would be the beginning of a long night. Having just switched to daylight savings and being in the far eastern part of the central time zone the sun was gone by 5 O'clock. Jody wound up getting some great sunset shots that I'll try to post later.

While getting changed, fueled etc. it was fun to listen to her stories of how others were doing and I envied her opportunity to see all the other runners. Stomach wise I was finally starting to feel better, although my leg was getting tighter.

Heading out from Bald rock (40 miles) I would be on my own again for the rest of my time in the race.

I'll continue part 3 from there tomorrow.