Pineland Farms Trail Challenge 50k

Memorial Day Weekend Part 2: My first Ultramarathon

My husband runs Ultramarathons. When I started my journey towards running back in October I thought that perhaps, in the distant future, I could run half marathons with him. I never in a million years would have imagined that I would be running a 50k race 7 months after I started running.

I had originally planned on running the 25k, but after doing the 20 miler my friends were talking about running the 50k. I didn’t want to have to sit around bored while my hubby ran the 50 miler, so I signed up for the 50k. Adam’s goal was to beat my time on the 50k with the 50 miler. To be fair, I kept talking about walking a lot of the race.

Well my hubby wasn’t at my first Ultramarathon. I’ve been keeping this under wraps on the internet, but he comes home tomorrow and I have a friend staying with me tonight so I feel safe enough, but my husband has been in China for the last two weeks. I’m incredibly jealous despite the amount of hard and tiring work he has done while out there. But I ended up traveling to Maine and running the race all by myself. I ran a 50k without anyone else pushing me to do it. I wanted to be there and I wanted to succeed.

I had even taken most of the week off to protect my questionable quad, which had been bothering me on and off since I injured it in Virginia.

And off to the Race report:

The start of the 50 miler, not the 50k but I'm sure it wasn't that different other than being 2 hours later.

Race: Pineland Farms Trail Challenge 50k
Date: May 30, 2010
Location: New Gloucester, ME
Distance: 50k (on trail)

Let me start this report by explaining that I was dressed in VERY PINK. I would have gone pinker if I could have found pink shoes or ordered pink gaiters before hand. Being dressed in Very pink makes it easy to find race pictures of yourself. At least near the start, because no one takes pictures of those of us finishing near the back of the pack

After the barefoot race on Saturday I chose to wear my Nike Frees in the race. The trails were not technical and I wanted something on the large side for when my feet started to swell. I might have made a different choice if I had understood the fields, but I was blissfully unaware at the time.

Here I am with my pink and with my running buddy for the race, she's in pink too. Originally uploaded by mainerunningphotos

I started the race near the back of the pack. I started chatting with other women and told them that my husband had suggested that for your first 50k, you walk all the hills. I ended up running with one of the women for maybe 30k of the 50k race. It was great to find a friend to talk with, to be encouraged by.

I stuck with a good part of the pack for the first 10k or so. Took a pee break at the second Aid Station then discovered the fields. Fields are not flat and smooth and easy. They are rutted and angle towards the woods and at very hard packed.

Around 15k into the race, my quad started to bother me. And bother me it did. For the rest of the race, every step on my right leg sent pain shooting down the shin and up the quad. I kept pushing though. I started really walking every hill and would run when it was flat or downhill. It actually became a sort of rhythm.

As I crossed through the start finish area the first time (We cut through it twice on the 25k loops), I started chatting with an older gentleman who had been doing marathons or longer 8 weekends in a row. He was trying to cover the 50 states. I think he told me he had 11 states left to do before he really retired. Good for him.

I started looking forward to the 25k mark. The half way mark. This is where the course crosses through the start area again and I think it is the most tempting place to drop. Once I was through the 25k mark, I knew I would continue until my leg couldn’t even walk anymore.

At some point my running buddy started going faster than I was. Or I stopped to chat with my friend Penny at an Aid station or something. So I found myself alone. I found myself very alone. I was so alone that I convinced myself that I was in last place. Mentally, my competitive nature could not handle being in last place. I started thinking about how I was holding up the volunteers, how people wanted to go home. And it slowed me down! The fields were great for that. When I reached a curve in the field, I looked back and saw lots of people behind me. It didn’t really speed me up, but at least it got me moving again.

I joined in with a 50 miler at one point, but eventually she pulled away. I spotted her just ahead of me on a sandy downhill. Maybe I could keep up with her. So I sped up a little. And started rolling head over heels down the hill. Very graceful as always, I had lost my footing. I scraped up my other knee, tweeked my shoulder and ripped up two toenails. I know that shortly I will be down to 7 toenails on my feet. War wounds!

My only complaint about the Aid stations. When I got to an aid station with a bloody knee full of sand, they didn’t have any wipes or antiseptic to put on the wound. Otherwise I was very impressed with the aid stations. The volunteers were friendly and helpful. They gave me food, water, cytomax, CANDY. One of them even had deviled eggs and blue potatoes.

At one point I started doing math. If I worked hard I could reach my goal time, despite the hurt leg. I always set three goals for myself in a race. The first is a minimum goal, in this race it was finish the distance. The second is an achievable if things go well goal. This one oscillated between 7 hours and 8 hours in my head. The third is a reach goal. Something that I could only achieve if things fall into place. For this race I chose 6 hours. So I started focusing on the 7 hour mark. I would need to run, although slowly whenever I could. I would need to keep moving on the hills.

(A quick note about the hills: they are short and rolling, but they are present and keep showing up. After a while of practicing the walk the hills strategy you start wishing that the hills where taller so you could use your walking excuse for longer.)

So focused on a goal, I kept moving. My leg sucked, I was still being passed but I kept focused on trying to break 7 hours. I started focusing on finding landmarks. Like the sign that indicated I had run 45km. I wanted to time my last 5k, but instead stopped the Garmin for 20-25 seconds instead of pressing the lap button. Whoops! The mind does funny things when running for that long on a restless night of sleep (the kid in the tent next to me cried every two hours, poor tyke).

I got to the last Aid station, aptly named Last Mile and I passed my running buddy as she stopped for aid. I kept running, she caught up. I was so excited, we had run so much of this race together and we would be finishing together. Suddenly I heard “Good Luck Miriam, see you at the finish” and she dropped back to the walk. I kept running.

My husband has told me that when he finishes an ultra he sees the finish line and things don’t hurt anymore. He can sprint across the finish line (see the great shot taken of him finishing at MMT100). Well for me that was a lie. I saw from the clock that I could finish in sub 6:50. So I pushed the last hundred or so feet. EVERYTHING hurt, my legs felt like lead, but I pushed through for a 6:49:57 finish!

It’s not a great time by any means, but it’s a finish. And it’s a finish with a lot of pain. Who knows how I would have done with a little more focus, and a happy leg.

My leg was so angry that getting my drop bag from 1/4 mile away took forever. I was afraid to take off my socks to see my toenails.

I ate some BBQ, watched the award ceremony where an acquaintance I think is awesome earned second place. Meet Serena!

This is Serena, she has the same last name as my husband. She's one of those amazingly chipper happy people who can run 50 miles and look like she just took a little walk on the beach afterwards. One of my favorite Ultramarathon personalities in New England.

I drove to pick up Cooper with a sore knee and calves that kept wanting to cramp up (scary when driving). And headed home to shower after a very successful day.

I didn't shower til I got home. I don't know if people were looking at me wierd because of the limp or because of the dirt when I stopped for coffee.

I finished with a time of 6:49:57, 104 out of 131 finishers (official results are here).

I did not finish last but I admire even those who finished last for completing the race. For pushing through whatever challenges they encountered and getting that cowbell.

As for me, I’m now an ultramarathon runner before I’ve ever run a marathon. Other than my pre-existing leg injury that I simply aggravated, the rest of my body feels great. I feel like I ran the race well within my abilities for the training I have completed. And the training has been rewarded by this accomplishment. I finished a 50k while my BMI still places me in the Obese category.

Let me remind you of something important. The journey to fitness is not only about the weight loss, it’s about being able to have adventures, to improve performance and to feel better about yourself. Don’t focus only on the scale.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.