As half the country begins to breath a sigh of relief from the election anxiety, the world around us continues to reel from the fall Covid spike. Unfortunately, like the spring covid us struck down all the races I would normally do this time of year, Mount Desert Island and Millinocket marathons. Although I was seriously debating about giving up any road marathons all together anyway (all I have to do is read my old blog posts to know why), so I am not overly disappointed by the decision being made for me.
I was going to slip in a 30 mile trail race in place of the marathons, called the Bold Coast Bash . A 10 mile loop run three times that goes along the rocky coast line of Maine with some single track boggy sections tossed in to complete the loop. It sounds like a great race, and one I would thoroughly enjoy, but of course their permits were canceled due to Covid and they could no longer hold the event. So back to the drawing board for plan C.
Plan C would turn out to be another running of the Pemi loop in just under 10 hours with a couple of friends to celebrate my birthday, on my birthday none the less. Our time was a bit slower then what I would’ve typically aimed for but given what I already accomplished this fall then I was just happy to be out in the mountains on a perfect warm fall day. And unlike my first serious attempt back in the mountains after the 100 mile wilderness, a few weeks prior, my calf muscle did not feel like it wanted to explode.
That first major outing was half of what is called the Grafton Notch loop located in the Mahoosuc Mountains of Maine. The traditional full loop close to 40 miles and around 12,000 feet of elevation gain over several mountains. For half the loop in early October my friend Brent and I did 20 miles and around 7000 feet of elevation gain. Overall, it was a great day but a little much for still being in recovery mode. My left calf muscle wasn’t having it and we finished the day in around 6 hours, probably should’ve taken under 5 hours.
Grafton Notch was a beautiful and definitely something I will be adding on the list for next year to do the full loop. After the notch I did back off for a couple weeks, but by the end of October I was back in the mountains running some new to me peaks of Black Mountain and Rumford Whitecap Mountain in Rumford, Maine. Those mountains combined with a second place finish at the the end of the season Trail monster party let me know I was ready for one last big effort and what better plan since no official race was happening was another run at the Pemi.
I joined forces with Brent (again) and one of my other friends Adam joined in. Adam hasn’t been running as much as Brent and myself and the day took its toll on him, but he gutted it out and still put up a sub-10 hour time, by one second! It was awesome to witness and his final push to the end was inspiring, as I know how it feels pushing to your limits with leg cramps and fatigue trying to bring you down.
The end of the Pemi, brought to a conclusion all of my planned big runs for the year (I say this, but even as I am writing this post, I am making plans to do a at home version of the Millinocket marathon with a friend), but my adventures are just beginning. I have decided to change things up a bit for my next big effort (and first official 100 Miler at TMR’s Riverlands 100 in early May), by enlisting a coach into my arsenal. I have hired on Matt Urbanski of TeamRunRun to guide my training from now until Riverlands. Matt comes with a lot of ultra running experience under his belt, an impressive list of accomplishments and a high recommendation from my 100 mile wilderness partner in crime, Brian. I could certainly put together my own free flowing training plan like I always do, that I loosely stick to, but I really want to see how I perform on a more guided path. I haven’t had a coach for over 20 years, since high school cross country. I always did my own thing in marathon training and ultra training. Look where it got me in my marathon training? Just a series of injuries and a slower and slower finish time. I have a lofty goal for Riverlands and I think having Coach Matt on my team will be one of my keys to success.
My first and primary goal is to just finish Riverlands and to have fun while I am doing it, however that may look on the day. With a 32 hour completion time cut if it is doable, and one I could likely train myself on, but I want to make a serious attempt at finishing in under 24 hours. It is a dangerous game to start playing with setting up time goal expectations, particularly on a 100, but once again in my running life I can’t help be drawn to challenging myself. Maybe one day I will be at a place where I don’t care about times, as I have alluded to in some of my other posts, but I am just not there yet. I still want to have fun, and relish the experience, but if I can meet a time goal while doing that then I am certainly going to try.
There is also a bonus of having a coach, as I progress in the coming months and approaching the day then maybe he will reality check me and suggest I adjust my time goal. After all running a 24 hour 100 is going to be vastly different then a 37 hour 100 Mile Wilderness, primarily because there will be a lot of actual running involved. It will be nice to have someone in my court to either support my goal or make an alternate suggestion based on what they are seeing in my training. (yeah, sure Bucky, you listen to other peoples advise so willingly, that it won’t be a challenge whatsoever). Wherever this new training takes me I know it will be doing what I love, and on the trails and mountains that bring me balance and joy in my life. Happy Trails!
Running with Love 