Race Recap - Grayson Highlands 50k

Running is a road to self-awareness and reliance ‑ you can push yourself to extremes and learn the harsh reality of your physical and mental limitations, or coast quietly down a solitary path watching the earth spin beneath your feet. — Doris Brown Heritage

I almost titled this one... "The day I broke up with running."  Haha, just kidding, sort of, not really.  May 5th, 2018 was certainly a day to remember.

Honestly, this really was the race that broke me. Humbling is another word I'd use to describe that day. You'll see why... fairly quickly.

I went into this race knowing I'd not done enough training - my weekday short runs were not consistently long enough (they really need to be 6-10 milers, and I consistently did 4-6 milers)... my weekend long runs were interrupted by life (it happens) but also by a crippling fatigue that began in January of this year. I went to my doctor after 2 months of the severe fatigue, all tests were normal (my Vitamin D was a little low, as well as my B12, so these were replaced)... by the time my fatigue improved, it was late in the training cycle. As I ramped up the mileage despite a lack of a good long-run foundation, my body rebelled during training. My last long run (20 miler) was a straight up disaster between dehydration and nutrition and so many other things.

So going into a race with this kind of elevation and mileage undertrained was my first mistake. My second, honestly, was thinking I still could do it. Don't get me wrong, I am GLAD I didn't DNS ("Did Not Start", in the running world)... half the battle is JUST SHOWING UP to the start line in these things. I knew that I'm NOT a quitter, so if I showed up, I was gonna finish this thing.  And I knew it was going to hurt, and I had already emblazoned my mantra for this race into my mind before the clock started - "Embrace the Suck."

The morning of the race, I fueled up despite my tummy doing flips. GI-wise, I felt ok, but a little uneasy and was nervous about potty-breaks as I knew there were NO porta-potties or restrooms on the course and yall know how your colon works with coffee.  And on race day, I can't go without my caffeine.  So I had about 1/4 cup of coffee from McDonald's on the way to the race and ate my little bagel while the guys ate their fried chicken biscuits and hashbrowns!!!  I seriously do not understand how they can stomach that mess on a huge race day.

To this day, I think the lack of caffeine had a huge role in the snowball effect of the avalanche that was to come. Which is sad, because it shows how addicted I am to caffeine.

There was the threat of rain and thunderstorms for the entire week leading up to the race and even the night before was not looking good at all. I went to bed fully prepared to run in the rain. However, we awoke the morning of to find dry skies that lasted all day!  A few rumbles of thunder here and there, and some rain for about 5 minutes total, and that was it!  It looked like things were looking up for us. The race course had been switched back to the high country at the last minute, to allow for us to see the gorgeous views that Grayson Highlands is known for (it had previously been moved to the lowlands due to the threat of lightening). We were stoked, especially to see the ponies on the course.

We began around 8:15 am, and we started off around the middle of the pack on road towards the trailhead from the visitor center. For these 2 miles, it was literally all downhill, in a good way. haha. My splits for those 2 miles were an astoundingly-fast-for-me 8:30 pace. I knew we'd slow down once we got to the climbs so I told Justin we were "banking" some time for later. Little did I know, I would SO NEED that banked time.

By mile 2.5, I realized the rocky course was going to be a major issue for me. The course was at this point all rocks. I'm talking rocks ranging from the size of my hand to the size of a large man’s foot in general. This makes a size 6 foot very difficult to traverse these type of courses without twisting your ankles. (I counted how many times I twisted my ankles during this race just to keep my mind distracted – sick I know… but it was 16!!) My shoes suddenly felt way too big, as my feet were sliding all around in my trail shoes and I had begun to already - 3 miles in - develop blisters on my feet. Oh boy. I sat down to tighten them significantly and found myself in (dried up, thank God) horse poop. Not the way I wanted my race to start. I hoped that this was not a sign of things to come.

Miles 3-6 or so were not too bad, although involved a TON of climbing, including narrow cliffs beside gorgeous waterfalls. The runners were tight like sardines at this point, but everyone was in great spirits and chatting back and forth. 

I just love the ultra running community - NO EGOS, nothing to prove, NO discussion of pace or of PR's... just a love for running and the outdoors. If you're interested in running an ultra, and pace or PR's is your focus, I'd suggest you stick to road running/non-ultra distances. Not to say the ultra-runners are not a competitive, fast, or insanely beastly group, but they honestly leave their egos at the door and usually are an extremely humble group and it is SO REFRESHING. Anyway, I digress.

Miles 6-10 were, according to my data on Strava, supposedly downhill. I couldn't tell. HAHA. Seriously. By mile 6, I knew I was in trouble. The rocky course had continued, to my dismay. I had truly hoped the rocky course was going to be short-lived, but alas it continued through the entire race almost. In addition to the rocks, mud, and water crossings (I didn't mind getting muddy or wet, except for those too-big-gosh-darn-shoes!!!), and the whole climbing mountains thing, we were at a max altitude of 5432 ft. For many, that's not a lot of altitude, but for someone who lives and trains at sea level for all but about 1 week out of the year, that was also apparently a problem.

At mile 10, the headache came. With a vengeance. It never went away. It was making me nauseous. I found myself thinking, "this is the worst headache I've ever had in my life!" ...and that made me panic. Because as an ICU & ER RN educator years ago, I drilled it into my nurses' heads that the "worst headache of a patient's life" = subarachnoid hemorrhage. Then I began to worry I was having a SAH/stroke. I drank coca-cola at the aid stations, ate food (thinking maybe I needed calories), tried everything including aspirin (I know, I know, if it was a bleed I would bleed out with it, but hey I was desperate). FYI, this headache did not go away until I got back to our cabin that evening. All I can figure is the lack of caffeine, but it could have been a lot of different things, or all of them together (altitude, neck tension, dehydration, etc).

Me "not feeling it" - these were typical trails except the part on my right was runnable here - most of the course, in my opinion, is not runnable as the trail is the rocks you see on the main trail here.

Between the headache and the climbing and the rocks, I was ready to be done by mile 11. Seriously. Not even halfway in. The only thing that helped was seeing the gorgeous views (when I could see them; most of the time my head was down making sure I didn’t fall on the rocks or slip in the mud), the ponies (who acted like our presence was not a surprise at all) and steers, and my husband’s constant attempts to bring my spirits up and make me laugh. My first 50k was difficult with its technical trails and climbing… but for reference, it had about 1500 ft of elevation… this one had 4700+ ft of elevation.

I got to mile 17’s aid station and they were phenomenal. I had worn crew socks instead of higher socks (rookie mistake) and so mud and dirt had gotten inside them and rubbed blisters on my heels. They helped me get them cleaned up and I threw some Squirrels Nut Butter on those bad boys. Then they heard me say I was struggling, so they made me do a shot of pickle juice followed by a Coca-Cola chaser and a grilled cheese sandwich. For the next couple miles, I felt like a new person. I will never forget that hot pickle juice though. Haha!!

However, that feeling didn’t last long and it was all I could do to make it to the last aid station at Mile 21. I thought I’d never get there. And when I did, all I wanted to do was lay down on the picnic bench. I’ve truly never felt more weak and tired than I did in that moment. The aid station volunteers and Justin tried everything to get me moving again, and I’m so glad I didn’t sit down or I probably would have DNF’d.

When we hit the trail for the last 7 miles after that, we shortly ran into the course sweepers (they were probably 2 hours behind us on the trail)… nothing lights a fire under you knowing that you’re about to miss the cut off! We began running – really running – for the first time in a few hours. I ran when I could, power hiked the rest. The last 5 miles (really mile 23-26) were all straight up a mountain & for some reason Justin decided at this moment to leave me and head on up... leaving me to my misery & my solitary thoughts... and all I could do was put my hands on my thighs and keep praying and keep going. Embrace the suck. Do not quit. Keep breathing… in … and out… yes it hurts, but it will be over at some point. Just keep moving.

Coming up that last major climb (there were more after this, but this was the last of the God-awful one)



These gorgeous hosta or some sort of other-worldly plants were blooming all around us the last couple of miles - it felt like we were in a different world!

When we had 2 miles left, we had caught up to these 2 girls that we had been passing back and forth with for the last half of the race. When we finally passed them around mile 27, I turned to Justin and said, “Whatever happens, I want to finish before them.” It was the only thing I felt I could be proud of that day. And it gave me a goal to set, knowing that they were hot on our trails and I could hear them talking behind us. Their voices got softer and softer and I knew my running was putting some space between us. We came up a pass where a volunteer was sitting on a huge boulder above us, cheering us on and letting us know we were literally almost there. Justin told me to turn around and look behind us – it took my breath away. There was the mountain …way off in the distance (I wish we had gotten a picture)… that I had just climbed and came to the other side of. I felt very small in that moment, but not in a bad way. The race humbled me physically and mentally, but this mountain I was looking at showed me that I had done it. I had scaled that huge mama-jama and came out on the other side a different person – stripped down to the raw, the real, the gritty exposed human that races like this are meant to reveal. We may not like what we see, because what it reveals is a vulnerable tiny person in the vastness of God’s amazing brilliant creation. It’s hard to see yourself in this moment – we often think highly of ourselves, especially when we’ve trained hard and when we do well. It’s not easy to see the reflection of true raw vulnerability staring back at you. But that’s the beauty of these ultramarathons. They strip you down to bring it all back into perspective.

Soon after, we crossed the finish line among a small handful of people. Nothing showy or fancy about ultramarathons – very different that the hub-bub of road marathons where there’s a DJ, and an announcer yelling your name, and throngs of people screaming for you. In the muted cheers, we find our friend Daniel who has finished a beastly 2.5 hours ahead of us, and is kind enough to video the finish.

I won’t bore you with the aftermath where I almost passed out in the car, quite literally, on the way back to our cabin. But I will admit this: I broke up with running that day. ‘Who wants to be in what feels like a one-sided relationship?’ I thought. I give and give in training and cross training and foam rolling and yoga and stretching and eating healthy… and all running can give back to me is 8 hours of pure torture and living hell?? Oh you best believe that ‘running’ kept trying to woo me back in over the next week. It wasn’t until I began to process my thoughts for this post that I began to realize that this wasn’t necessarily a one-sided relationship. Running has given me so much in return… yes, physical and even mental anguish (especially that day!). But also mental toughness and fortitude. To push through even when you feel like quitting… when you feel like you might just literally die. To get to the other side of that mountain so you can turn around and say, with God’s help, I did that.

Running is not always so dramatic. It's not always out to teach a life lesson or be so profound. Often times, it is fun and challenging in a feel-good way. Thank goodness. So I laced up this week and allowed myself to recover the best way I know how. With a little easy run. We’ll see where this courtship takes us.

This is what 8 hours on this course looks like. :) Tired, muddy, stripped down to the bare minimum, and kinda faking that smile.