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| Somehow still able to run after 31 miles, with the finish line 50 feet away. |
Lo! Ultra marathon #2 is in the bag, and I even came out of it with a photo that makes me look like a runner! Nice work, Dad. It's probably because the finish line was about 50 feet away and I was desperate to sink into an ice bath and drink a soda.
I'm very satisfied with my time and performance: 31-ish miles in 4hr 44min 36sec, which was good enough to finish as the 4th woman and 21st overall. Went through 5 or so bottles of Gu Brew, 6 or 7 gels, wrung out my shirt 11 times, minimal inner thigh chafing, no alien toenail aggravation, and only one very small blister at the end of my left 4th toe that I didn't notice until the next day. I also finished by 10:45 in the morning; after 9 a.m. was hot enough, and I was glad to be done that much before noon. I couldn't imagine still being on the course once afternoon sun angled in for full frying effect. After the race I immediately consumed half an orange from the bins just across the finish (why wasn't this food available mid-race?!?), a bottle of Pepsi while submerged in belly deep ice water, and quarter of a watermelon once plopped into the shade not far from the Gore-Tex tent ice bath. I wasn't able to speak much until I got half way through the watermelon. Big thanks to my family for bringing that and the Pepsi for me. Odd the things you need after such an endeavor...
Turned out that a few elites showed for the event, with Michael Wardian heading up the 50k race at 3:02:34. Wardian cheered on the rest of us runners for our 6:00 a.m. start, with his own race starting at 6:30 to add the challenge of catching everyone. Second place overall was over 36 minutes later, meaning Wardian passed us everyone and still crossed the finish line 6 minutes before the next guy. He passed me while I was heading east along the Missouri River towards the new 71 Hwy bridge, somewhere around the half marathon point, his 5:52 per mile zoooooom looking effortless as compared to my 8-ish min/mile pace alternating with walking stints for a 9:08 per mile average. Especially because I was starting to feel the effects of running the first hour much faster than planned....
The route included turns at what seemed like every third corner. I saw a handful of KC that was familiar, but mostly I saw tons of areas that are off the beaten path or were simply unknown to me. My memory of KC's hills was correct, though I was surprised at how unrelenting they felt as I progressed farther through the course. The hills just kept going. Every once in a while a cop would remark that the course was relatively flat for the next while. I'd breath a sigh of relief and trod on ahead, only to find a nice downhill that inevitably leads to a corresponding uphill. I stopped listening to non-runner's interpretations of what was to follow, because by mile 20 the non-visible uphills felt enormous. Here I am at mile 28, coinciding with the bottom of Hospital Hill. Granted everything burned at this point, but the 10% grade over the course of a mile was not easy. I started my walk immediately after turning off Grand Street:
At the very end saying "It's all downhill from here, heh heh" was my Dad. I warned my brothers the night before that any comments of "only 27 more miles to go!" are, in fact, not funny despite what it seems to the spectator, and that I'd veer off course long enough to bob them in the heads if they pulled anything like that in the early miles. Dad says he had already walked up and back down the hill to see what it was like so he sympathized, though it's probably better off that I didn't hear him at that point.
In no particular order I remember running up and down various hills in the Plaza, running down a red brick road into Roanoke Park (I haaate running on brick, so was glad when this half mile stretch was done), along Brookside, past the Liberty Memorial, seeing Bartle Hall and the Sprint Center, running through waterfront park towards the 71 Hwy bridge, a very long traverse of the roads in Kessler Park, a lot of Gladstone Boulevard (wherever that is), many many many many neighborhoods that I can't begin to remember, running along the center of downtown roads that had 4 lanes in each direction but no cars (told ya, the cops were awesome!), past Crown Center and Hospital Hill, and then a blur of absent surrounds as I watched the street numbers grow from 38th Street to the finish at 47th Street. Somewhere in that last blur was the KC Art Institute and the contemporary museum, because that's when I knew that the finish was finally around the corner.
Full credit is due to the hundreds of cops and handful of volunteers who directed traffic. They were absolutely wonderful. Never was my passage through an intersection or traverse along a street in need of consideration other than placing one foot in front of the other. I never even needed to pause, as they held traffic when I still had a good 10 seconds of hobbling to go before enter the intersection. Quite different from the street rat traffic game one gets used to in NYC. The difference is that most races will close off streets for so many hours on race day. Since this was a long race but with comparatively small number of entrants, it didn't make sense to close of streets completely with the likely large gaps that would develop between runners. Considering that they (hopefully) did this for all 100+ entrants of the 50k as well as for all the marathoners and marathon relay-ers, they deserve a huge amount of recognition. I thanked as many as I could, and those times I couldn't speak I tried to wave and smile.
What made the greatest impact on the race was the lack of food. I've never heard of an ultra marathon that doesn't at least serve cheap white bread peanut butter sandwiches and bananas. I wonder if paying for the traffic control took loads out of the race budget. Aide stations were spaced every 2 to 3 miles apart, and most were only stocked with water and electrolyte fluids. Other than fluids, every other aid station had a small collection of gels. Usually anything past 2 hours and I need food. The thought of 5 hours without any sustenance made me nervous, all the more reason to walk more hills than planned. I force fed myself gels every 30 to 45 minutes, and by the end they were becoming hard to get down. My digestion came to a relative halt and my stomach felt bloated, but I still managed to come in under my 5 hour goal.
Three days later, Tuesday, I managed a 36 minute jog/run that for now seems to have helped my quadriceps rigormortis. It also occurred to me today that I have now completed two ultra marathons, which makes me feel much more legitimate in terms of kicking off my endurance escapades. Very satisfying in the classic endurance way -- a process of feeling absolutely stoked pre-race, then mid-race hating your supposedly good "judgement" that got you here, and once a half mile from the finish line the exhilaration returns and you can't wait to sign up for the next one. I do look forward to the NYC Marathon in just over two months time, though I also look forward to future races on trail instead of big, wide, paved roads.
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