I toed the line of the Elephant Mountain 50-miler at 5:55 a.m. as ready as one can expect after having already felt the other side of a 50-mile day in the desert in previous experiences. What can I say? I’m just the kind of person that can accept a certain level of discomfort and find her natural frequency.
Clearly this was a headlamp start. Having spent the last few years as an Arizona resident, I know that with the way temperatures work that if I can comfortably wear an unlayered sleeveless top and shorts at the start, it’s going to be hot once the sun comes up.
Starts in the dark are magical. I get amped on the trail of bobbing headlamps weaving through the darkness, runners full of hope for the day, mixed with a little fear and tons of yet-to-be-pivoted plans. I found my usual starting place toward the front but not on the front. I’d rather settle in behind a pace that is a little slower than I want to naturally go because I need to be tamed early on, and I find it helpful to let my fellow runners do that.
It sure gives you a different perspective when you can see the dry desert dust floating through the light of your headlamp. After years studying inhalation toxicology, I can’t help but let my mind consider particulate matter for a moment, but then I just go right back to enjoying the feeling of running in the cool, dark morning along the ridge. A steady, early uphill meant we got some elevation and could see some lights of Cave Creek below. This is the coolest it will be all day, I thought.
If a long race starts in the dark, I tend put the dark part in a compartment to shorten the feel of things. I tell myself that I really start the race when I turn off my headlamp. This works well if you are the type of runner that leans on visualization and mental tricks. You just have to make sure you don’t gas yourself out leading up to dawn. But I don’t really know anyone that smartly goes full throttle in the dark with limited vision, especially when that’s a small fraction of the miles to be run. It’s logically way more important to keep the rubber side down and not edit yourself out by way of tumultuous descent early on, but that’s just my approach.
Once the sun came up, I was weaving my way out to Elephant Mountain. If the course itself were an elephant, this was the trunk. The trunk’s aid stations came at a regular click. It’s pretty rare that I rely on a drop bag, as I had a hard lesson about logistics and reliability of aid stations in my very first distance race, so I usually try to carry anything I’d need for about 30 miles. Seriously, though, it’s more that I don’t know if I’m going to want to wait for the bag to get back to me at the finish.
I grabbed a turkey and cheese wrap “for the road” at the last aid station before the circumnavigation of the mountain, which is where the 50-milers split off from the next longest distance (50k). We would be the only ones headed out and around, and from what was said at the start, we should expect cow pasture, “running flag to flag” and overgrowth. Overgrowth in the desert is not like overgrowth where I grew up on the East Coast, where you can just swing through it and maybe feel the sweat of the last runner. I think I may have left some skin and maybe a little blood behind. You know that thing they say about how everything in the desert wants to kill you? Well…let’s just say that the way I showed up through the next few aid stations left no doubt that what was said about the overgrowth was true. Desert ironwood, graythorn, whitethorn acacia and catclaw acacia are exactly what they sound like. These sticks bite.
At one unfortunate point, a tree snagged the white hat off my head and when I turned around to catch it, I watched it land upside-down in a giant pile of cow dung. I do believe I cursed, but I also promptly saw only a dot of shat on the tip of the brim, plopped it back on my head, and made a mental note not to grab it by the brim in the center.
A short spur led us up to the aid station where I had my first few watermelon slices and used my cup for the first time. I had seen the woman leading on my way out on the spur to the aid as she had just left to continue on the course. I have no problem letting a faster runner take the race at their pace. If they can hold that pace, and it’s faster than mine, they logically deserve to win. Now if they can’t hold that pace and I happen to be running strong, listening to my own body and holding my own steady pace and it’s faster, then maybe I’ll take the win.
We were about 25 miles in when the leader pulled way back on her pace. She had been going strong so I could only assume that it was deliberate and encouraged her to keep up the hard work as I passed through the vegetation (still overgrown). I was feeling good, so I went with it and focused on getting to the next aid, which was a little over 13 miles away.
I always find time to be grateful. It’s most effective if I do so when I’m not feeling so great. Aside from the fact that it scientifically triggers a measurable neurochemical change releasing feel-good molecules like dopamine, serotonin and endorphins/endogenous opioids, it keeps me grounded. I get to run today. I get to thank people (volunteers) for helping me. I get to encourage other runners. These are the unselfish things to pay attention to that will make you a better runner.
Finally arriving at the next aid station was a relief. I had just finished the water in my pack and was helped to refill. I dumped in a pack of electrolyte mix because the sun was beating down hard, and pushed on. I still had plenty of food, so I downed another gel and kept moving. The best decision, though, was to dunk my hat in the ice water, scoop up a few cubes and let it drip down my head. I felt 1,000% like a new woman. Now I was grateful for ice.
The aid stations came more frequently, I knew, but at a slower pace the perceived time was knowingly extended. By this point my time through each aid station was still about a minute with a pointed draw to fill my cup with soda. Enter: caffeine. I also had been saving a snack-sized sleeve of sliced salami, which I learned about racing in France. The salt, protein and fat this late in a race are incredibly satisfying to a nutrient-deprived body. I fished out the first three slices on the go and returned it to the front of my pack. I promptly fished it back out and slammed the rest of the whole darn thing like a ravaged raccoon.
No matter the distance, the last 10 miles of the race are always the most challenging, and this one was no exception. I’ve got plenty of mental tricks up my sleeve, but the accumulated miles of impact and strain will catch up at some point. Amazingly, no matter what the distance of the race, it’s always the last 10 miles for me. I know better than to start looking for the finish, so now I just take each undulating hill as it comes. At one point I did have to sit down halfway up an unforgivingly steep hill that was just too much for the system. I was feeling the heat and exposure, but once the world stopped spinning, I just kept on.
It messed me up more to stop than to just keep putting one foot in front of the other. I could feel that as soon as the race was over, I was going to cramp up. Controlling the negative thoughts got harder. Usually, I take the negative thoughts as a sign I need some sugar to feed the mind, but this late in the race and the way my stomach was starting to deny food, I just needed to push it out.
Finally, I saw the finish. Late afternoon, all the other distances had celebrated and gone, coming over those timing mats is enough to make a grown person cry (if not too dehydrated). I walked around for a bit, unable to stand completely still—or maybe just unwilling to after more than 9 hours moving. I took the win, and accepted the chair and refreshments so selflessly offered. I truly cannot express how grateful I am to have the help of others at the finish. In a body that needs everything with a mind that cannot efficiently express the needs, it is so important. If you think of doing any one repetitive thing for 9 hours (e.g., driving, working, cooking, sleeping) and trying to transition into another gear to be social and act human as soon as you stop, it makes more sense how jarring it is to roll up at the end of an ultra. I wasn’t sleeping, I was running. And I’m so grateful I was.