Leadville Trail 100 - What a long strange trip it's been

I somehow got to the point of creating a blog specifically for writing this report. I must think it's important enough to go to all this trouble of registering, checking availability of blog names, etc...but the reality is that I didn't want to clog up everyone's email with some lengthy message that your just gonna delete anyway. With that said, here is my very first blog entry.

Where to start...I guess it would be back over a year ago backpacking in the Weminuche wilderness. Nine of us got off the narrow gauge train at Elk Station out of Durango, went into the mountains, and during the 5 day trip one of our companions passed out with a seizure. It was a terrifying moment, but my great friend, Fred, took charge and volunteered me (no prodding needed) to go on a rescue mission. I don't want to get into the details of what followed (for that's another story), but we ended up hiking, running and 4-wheeling (jeep ride from hell) over 150 miles in 32 hours to get our friend to safety. Two things happened as a result, my other great friend was safely gotten to a hospital, and secondly, I gained a new confidence in what I was able to accomplish, and that's when the seeds of possibly running Leadville entered my consciousness.

What followed was a very busy fall racing schedule that included the M2M Half marathon, Willow City Half, San Antonio Marathon, followed up two weeks later with the Double Decker Marathon. I then limped into the holidays determined to get some rest on my tired legs.

2010 arrives, I'm feeling good, and the only thing on my schedule is pacing at Austin Marathon. Somehow I must have felt that wasn't enough to do, and I don't remember exactly how or when I decided, but I signed up to run the Bandara 50k, thinking, it's only 50k, how hard can it be? Well the race was mid-January, I showed up and had a very miserable finish. I'm not sure the exact effect it had on me, but I knew after that race not to take any Ultra for granted.

So to make a really long story only long, I paced Austin (3:30) and had another great time, then started planning for spring trail running. I ran Hell's Hills 50k the prior year and somehow managed a 3rd place finish, so this year my plan was to shoot for the 50miler. Meanwhile, back at casa Fletcher, Fred declares it's time to make a run for the infamous Rim2Rim2Rim trip in early may. I'm in, without any hesitation, as we've been talking about it going on two years. So now I'm running a 50 miler in April, a 50 miler in May in the Grand Canyon, and I'm thinking, maybe, just maybe, I can make a run for Pbville (if you need to ask you weren't paying attention in high school).

Paul running his first 50 miler at Hell's Hills

Hell's Hills in Smithville,Texas was on April 2nd. I had started doing some longer training runs with Ken & Jason (Rogue Ultra Team) right after the Austin Marathon, and was feeling okay about my chances.The Rogue team had all committed to running pbville, so they were using HHs as a training run, whereas I tapered and treated it as a race. It paid off as I finished 4th OA with a 8:35 time, not bad for my first 50miler.

I think it was one week later that I made the decision, but I needed Cindy's blessing because of the time commitments involved. Cindy has always been supportive of my running and racing and I wanted to make sure she knew what we were getting into before committing. So I sent her the link to the race website, asked her to read every last page and tell me what she thought about me entering. We all know the answer, as she blessed off on it, with the stipulation that we make it a vacation for the family and not drive up, race, drive home.

Paul & Patrick at the North Rim

It's mid-April, I'm signed up for pbville, and it finally sinks in that I need to come up with a realistic plan for racing pbville. So far I've been doing ad-hoc training based on Ken's workouts and what I've done in the past. I finally decide to keep doing what I'm doing until after R2R2R, then make a plan through August. The trip to the GC is for May 1st, and I manage a 30miler two weeks prior followed by a 60 mile taper week. We all head to the GC, and I decide to run moderately hard, with a goal of sub-12hours. Patrick Hall and I have a fantastic run, with a 11:40 time to complete the long route (Down/Up Brite Angel).

First day of summer camp

Once back in Austin, I'm still not sure what the hell I'm doing training-wise, so I make what turns out to be another good decision by migrating my training over to Ken & Jason's group. I like their strategy of running long trail runs on the weekends, with lots of road work (and hills) during the week. They also realize that flexibility is a key component to training and modify the schedules based on the how beat up everyone is feeling. Ken ends up running R2R2R the week after me, so our training is starting to converge anyway. Up next, I get the okay to fly out to Leadville for the LT100 training camp. The camp is two full days of running the hardest parts of the course, with the last day on your own. We ended up running 63 miles in three days, with May Queen to Twin Lakes on day1, Twin Lakes to Winfield to Twin Lakes on day2, followed up by the climb up Mt. Massive on the last day. WoW! It was an incredibily hard 3 days of training that provided two important pieces to my training puzzle. First, it gave me a preview of the course, which at that point I totally underestimated the difficultly I was facing in August, and second, it elevated my fitness to another level, just as Hell's Hills and R2R2R had done prior.

I'm almost to the race so bare with me for a while longer. My remaining training consisted of running some really, really, really hard long runs and some extreme hill training on the infamous 'Ladera Norte'. Austinites don't have the luxury of training at altitude, so our alternative is running hard and fast in the heat. Ken & Jason (along with Meredith Terranova's help) came up with a weekly regiment of hills running at Ladera Norte that more than anything got me ready for Pbville (you can ask me offline for the route). The training culminated in us running a 7 hour session of hills on July 31st starting at 8pm and ending at 3am, followed by the 'Big Breakfast' at Magnolia. That workout stands out more than any other in my mind as telling me, "Your Ready".

Summer & Ally at Maroon Bells

LT100 Mt. Bike Race

I'm ready to race, just add a little taper up in Aspen a week prior to the race. The taper went great, I slept in, got up without an alarm, ran on the beautiful Rio Grande trail that runs from Aspen to Basalt (and beyond), and spent some very enjoyable time with my girls. Most of you already know my wife Cindy, but not all of you know the other half to our household, Ally age 12, and Summer age 16. They both reluctantly agreed (with some arm-twisting) to this adventure knowing they were going to miss the first day of school. For them, this was their summer vacation with the family, so we made the best of it by rafting, shopping, eating out, and one longish hike through the beautiful Maroon Bells wilderness area. The last thing I want to mention about taper was driving through Pbville the week prior and catching the finish of the LT100 Mt. Bike race. It was very exciting seeing the 8hour finishers and getting pumped up by the crowd in anticipation of the following week.

Team Sherpa

So we drive to Leadville the day before the race, check-in takes 15mins, eat breakfast with the team, then head to the hotel to prepare for the morning. I know I said I was almost to the race, but I must say one thing about preparation for this race, DO IT! Racing Leadville isn't like any other race I've done. You can't show up with a box of GUs and expect your race to happen. You need two critical components to pull off a successful race, first, a realistic race plan that only changes if the weather does, and second a crew that is organized and committed to following the plan in the face of being tired, hungry, frustrated, and thoroughly pissed off cause your runner doesn't listen. In both areas, I had it nailed. I wrote up a quite detailed plan of each leg, my splits on each, and very detailed instructions for the crew to follow when I showed up. I outlined what and how much I needed to eat, drink, what gear to change out, and vital signs to watch. Heading up my crew was Cindy of course. She took control of the race plan and became an organizational master. She put people with years of Ultra crewing experience to shame, leaving no detail to chance. With her able assistants, James Allen, Lorena Devlyn (also my pacers), Summer and Ally, my crew knew the when, where and what to do at each and every aid station, now they needed me to execute the plan.

Ken & Paul looking relaxed, John not so much.

Race day, August 21st, the weather is almost perfect, and I'm feeling relaxed. I wake up a little after 1am, shower, put on my race cloths and head to breakfast. I decide to eat more than my usual Cliff bar and banana (do I need to say why?), and add some waffles. I'm feeling a little fuller than I normally do for a marathon trot, but I still have over 2 hours till race time and am hoping that bloated feeling will subside. Cindy and I head over to the 'House' and meet up with Team Rogue Ultra. We all walk down to the starting line and check-in with the race guy. At this point it's starting to really sink in, I'm about to start a 100 mile race. It's a surreal feeling standing there, and it's tempting to back out, calling the whole thing off, but I think back to my training, my preparation, the sacrifices that I've made, that my family and friends made to be there, and a new determination takes hold to give my best and let the chips fall where they land. We line up, we hear Ken Chlouber count down the seconds, then he unloads a double barrel shotgun to send us on our way.

Leg 1) Leadville to May Queen - 0 to 13.5 Miles
We're off, all 700+ racers. My plan is to cover this easiest part of the race in 2:10, transition in 5min and then on to Fish Hatchery. I'm running with Ken, Jason, Kirk, and Muz. I'm wearing my Garmin on Meredith's advice to control my pace and not go out too fast. It's the right decision, as the whole pack is moving at a sub 8:30 pace for the first mile out of town on the asphalt. We turn onto a dirt road and start our first long descent of the day. The pack is thinning as I try and relax, maintain a low heart rate, and keep telling the guys to ease up a little. We cruise onto the trail at mile 5ish for a six mile run around Turquoise Lake in the dark. Somehow I end up in front of the 8-10 person train with the responsibility of following the trail. Our overall pace is over 9min/mile by this time as I keep it under control, trying to nail my split. We lose the trail a couple times, as the markers are sparse, and there are no glow-sticks up on the way outward-bound. Muz and I talk about his time in Turkey, and he tells us about driving out to a remote area to run trails with not a soul around except two climbers. They exchange small talk, and he mentions he's training for a race in Leadville, Colorado. They then reveal that they are both from Leadville on vacation. Huh? I'm thinking what are the odds of that happening, and it's got to be some kind of omen. So on we run, with the pace getting closer, and closer to my goal pace, when suddenly we're at May Queen, with 2:05 elapsed. Ken & Muz & I are all trying for sub-25 hours, so we agree to hit our respective crew stands, then wait for each other and head back out. I go in/out of the aid station tent in a matter of seconds, find Cindy and eat lightly, and have her service my pack (change bladder, fill up GUs, etc). I've eaten 1 GU and 1 pack of gel cubes at this point, and drank a little over 1 liter of Nuun. She gets me in and out right on schedule and at this point we're 5 minutes ahead of the race plan. Ken & I meet up, but we don't see Muz. We look around for 10-15 seconds and head out without him.

Leg 2) May Queen to Fish Hatchery - 13.5 to 23.5 Miles

Power line Descent at LT Camp

Ken & I had done the leg from May Queen to Fish Hatchery during the training camp, so I was familiar with the climb over Sugarloaf pass and then the long descent along "Power Line". The ascent was easy in camp, and today seemed even easier. At 11,071 ft., Sugarloaf isn't anywhere near as high as Hope Pass, but it deserves as much respect as HP, due to it's strategic location towards the end of the course. Today, I hiked up it and tried to stay relaxed, concentrating on my breathing and keeping my heart rate down. At this point I did start noticing my left psoas starting to tighten up, which I attributed to the chill in the air. I was hoping that once it warmed up, my psoas would loosen. I was still looking at my Garmin, but this time I was more worried about being over our goal time as we climbed a little slower than I liked. My legs just weren't hiking as fast as I liked no matter how hard I tried. So I let Ken lead and did my best to keep up. Once we hit the summit, I immediately felt better as my heart rate dropped, and I took a GU before running the 4-5 mile descent into FH. Our descent was slower than camp, as we purposely eased off saving our quads for the rest of the race, but we still managed to pass a multitude of racers. It was light by this time, and the field had broken up into what would be racers of equal abilities, so we started getting a look at "The competition". We passed a familiar face from camp, a 50+ racer named Charlie, who powers like hell uphill with his trekking poles, but then watches us fly by on the downhills, I would be seeing Charlie many times later that day. So we come off the descent onto the asphalt again for the mile or so trot into Fish Hatchery. My psoas is now getting very uncomfortably, and I worried that my form is suffering as a result. I spot Cindy (all alone at this time), hand off my pack, head into the transition aid station where I grab two turkey wraps and some watermelon. By now I'm feeling hungry, and in this race, the more you can eat the better. I down both wraps, all the fruit I was carrying, when asked for potato chips from Cindy. As usually, Cindy methodically made me down the pre-planned number of Endurolyte pills before giving me the junk food. To wash it all down, I drank an 8oz can of real Mt. Dew (not diet). This was another bit of advice I picked up from Meredith that made her trot out at Western States the gold standard for hitting your race plan. The Dew is good and I will never, ever mock Dew drinkers again. I forgot to mention that the timing mat had us coming in 1:59:57 for the leg, meaning we were under our goal by 3 seconds. Like clockwork, Ken & I meet up again and head out. We still haven't seen Muz, so I speculate he must be ahead thinking we dropped him.

Leg 3) Fish Hatchery to Half Moon - 23.5 to 30.5 Miles
The next part of the course is the asphalt road from FH to Treeline. I hated it during camp, and I hated it again during the race. The race plan called for 1 1/2 hours to do the 7miles to Half Moon, which I thought should have been an easy 12:51/mile pace. Little did I know it was closer to 8.5 miles, so our pace was thrown totally out the window. The road was mostly uphill toward what was now called pipeline aid station, where my daughters were meeting up with Cindy. We ran most of the distance, walking only the distinct uphills toward treeline. By now it was 9am or so, and the sun was out and the temperature was rising on the pavement. We hit treeline, turned left onto the dirt road for another mile until hitting 'Pipeline' aid station. My crew had just arrived, and I said hi to everyone, including Summer & Ally, and James & Lorena, but didn't stop for supplies as we thought Half Moon was 3 miles down the road. It turned out it was 4.5miles down the road, but not a big deal otherwise. Half Moon turned out to be quite a nice aide station, and eerily quiet without any crews or spectators around. At this point I decided to use the port-o-let and hoped I hit my GI window. Success! Ah, nothing better than a good "you know what" to make your whole body feel better while running. Ken had similar success, so at this point we proclaimed our cycles were in sync. Timewise we got into HM in 1:33, only 3 minutes over scheduled time, so no worries at this point.


Leg 4) Half Moon to Twin Lakes - 30.5 to 39.5 Miles

Aspens on the Colorado Trail

Ken, Paul, and Cindy descend into Twin Lakes

It's a jeep trail out of Half Moon for 4 miles or so, followed by my favorite part of the whole race, the Colorado Trail. The Colorado Trail is quintessential Colorado single-track. The trail is mostly soft, running through long stretches of Aspen and Pine and lets you eat up the miles without any concerns. It ends with the most perfectly graded descent of the course, one where you can run full strides, no braking, but never losing control. Man, I really love this section of the course. Ken & I ate up the miles passing many racers, and I think this is where people started watching out for the Crazy Austinites on the descents. All good things do indeed end, and we eventually dropped off the trail onto a steep descending dirt road. It was at this point that we caught up to Cindy Henges. She hung on to our pace all the way into TL, but we could tell it wasn't going to be her day today. So with the shortened leg and our quick descent, we came into Twin Lakes 10 minutes under our goal of 1:45. Twin Lakes is "the" major aid station on the course. It's here where you need to get everything in order before heading out for "The Big Climb" up Hope Pass. Being 10 minutes in the black, I made sure to relax and take the time needed to eat, gear up, and finally stretch my aching psoas. Cindy had the perfect stretch routine and sure enough I felt much better heading out. At this point I changed into my new Adidas trail shoes which I figured would help on the technical downhill portions. I also picked up my trekking poles at this point, thinking, sure I used them in camp, why not now. In hindsite, I didn't train with poles, so I shouldn't have raced with poles.


Leg 5) Twin Lakes to Winfield - 39.5 to 50 Miles

Summit of Hope Pass - 12,526 feet

This is the leg that will eat you up and S#%t you out. I did it in camp, so I knew what to except, but doing it on a 22 mile training run isn't the same as during the big show. I planned on being conservative, giving myself 3:30 to get up and over, but somehow that wasn't enough. Ken & I were running 16 minutes in the black, so we felt really good about banking another 15min during this leg. We head out of TL, cross the road and head down into the grass. This is the lowest part of the course (9,200 ft) as we make several low water/mud crossings, followed by the river crossing that edges up to mid-thigh. We easily make it to the base of the Hope Pass climb and immediately start the long, slow climb up to the Hopeless Aid station (11,836 ft).

Road to Winfield

My poles seem to help, but at the same time I feel like the energy required to propel myself with the poles isn't worth the extra effort. We climb (as in slow hike) up to Hopeless and stop to refuel. I had thought before hand that Hopeless was really close to the top, but to my irritation, we still have over 600 feet to climb after leaving. The saving grave is getting to see the surreal setting of 20+ Llamas grazing the hillside with the looming mountains in the background, and a bunch of crazy souls sweating to reach the top. After 3 or so minutes we resume the slow, plodding, slog to the top.

Paul enjoying the pit-stop at Winfield

  I should mention that I've climbed over 20 fourteeners in Colorado, so I do have some experience with this sort of climb, and over of the years I've developed this strange habit of speeding up as I get closer to the summit. Today was no exception on the outward climb. I sped up after Hopeless and ended up summiting a couple minutes ahead of Ken, which allowed me to down a GU, pee, and stretch prior to the descent. Ken then hits the top, and I tell him I'm going to start walking down and will speed up when he catches me. So several minutes later, we're both once again flying down the mountain, passing numerous racers that passed us on the upslope. The upper slopes are a mixture of switchbacks and reasonably graded descents, but when getting closer to the bottom, the trail crosses over to a extreme grade that makes even the crazy Austinites tap the brakes.

Lorena waits to pace

We next get on the dreaded road to Winfield for our 45 minute walk/shuffle to the half-way point. The road to Winfield is a close second to my most hated part of the course, but eventually we reached the halfway point, but in the process used up our entire 16 minute buffer we had accumulated.  At this point I'm not worried about the clock, so I head over to my crew for a relaxing pit-stop (and longest) with my wonderful crew. I would be remiss if I didn't mention the fact that both Ally & Summer had joined the rest of my crew, assisting me during transition. Seeing their smiling faces and cheerful demeanor meant more to me at the aid stations than almost anything. At Winfield I change my socks, drink a vanilla shake in a can, stretch, and try not to think about having to run another 50 miles. The upside is now I get to utilize my world-class pacers.

Leg 6) Winfield to Twin Lakes - 50 to 60.5 Miles
With much trepidation, and only a 1 minute buffer off our race plan (10:59 elapsed), Ken, Adam (pacer/brother), me, and Lorena head out on the homeward bound journey to Leadville. I have Lorena carry my poles on the road leading to the HP climb. The road is a slight downhill all the way to the trail, so we fast shuffle most of it. It's here that we pass Jason, who is in good spirits and then Kirk who is also looking strong. Once on the trail, I grab my poles and start what is probably the steepest climb of the day, the bottom of Hope Pass. I immediately start sweating profusly, and hand off my visor to Lorena. It's at this point that doubts start settling in, not about finishing, but about hitting my pace. But there is no option but to keep putting one foot in front of the other, and ever so slowly the grade gets shallower, and the trees start thinning as we make towards treeline. Once we hit the switchbacks and treeline, I immediately feel better, knowing that the homeward climb is much shorter than the outward climb. Lorena is leading, stopping every few minutes to snap a picture or two, and when we finally see the summit with a trail of runners meandering all the switchbacks, I tell her to make sure to get that shot. Next thing you know, we're there at the top. We stop for a summit pic, some nutrition and fluids, and Ken & I tell the pacers to step aside so we can do our thing. We ease into the downhill and run conservative by our standards, but still manage to cruise into Hopeless aid station 20 seconds ahead of the pacers. At the aid station I eat more fruit and have a volunteer fill my Nathan bladder. Once again I'm amazed at the surroundings and let every sight and sound of the day sink in, from the majestic 14ers, to the glacial lakes, and definitely the Llamas. This is what the race is all about to me and I enjoy a slight smile as I gear up for the rest of the descent. We again lead the pacers out as Ken tells them to catch up on the grassy trail leading into Twin Lakes. We hit bottom, and after 2-4 minutes in the grasses, Adam and Lorena catch up, and we cross the river which has fallen considerably from the outward crossing.

Paul at Twin Lakes - Homeward Bound

We send Adam ahead to alert the crew to our early arrival. It's at this point that we pass Desiree who starts yelling, "Go Paul!". Well this is about the third time today she's done this, so Ken pulls over and tells her, "I need some lovin too! I'm Ken btw". Probably the funniest line of the race, so Des immediate starts yelling for Ken, and all I could do was laugh. Once into Twin Lakes, my girls grab my pack and everyone is amazed how early we've arrived. It's then that I realize we've made the homeward leg back to TL in 3:15, a full 1/2 hour faster the the outward leg. Immediately I think, game on for sub-25, but still head over to my crew station to change socks/shoes (Cascadias), eat, drink, and let everyone know I'm feeling okay. So after a 10 minute pit-stop, we head on out with renewed determination to stay on pace.

Leg 7) Twin Lakes to Half Moon - 60.5 to 69.5 Miles

Ally & Summer waiting for dad.

I've ditched my poles at TL with the intent of not using them again. My original plan was to pick them back up for the Power-Line ascent, but with the hassle, and little noticeable impact on pace, I was resigned to hoof it up Power-Line sans poles. My remembrace of the outward bound descent into TL was that it was step, long, and narrow, but once we got up and over the initial steep drop-off things weren't near as bad. We hiked up the dirt road, then hit the Colorado Trail, which immediately lifted my spirits, then shifted between fast hiking and shuffling for the rest of the way into Half Moon. We had left Twin Lakes at 6:15pm, with out headlamps in our packs fully expected to use them before Half Moon....But another strange thing happened along the way, we totally destroyed our goal pace. The plan was to cover the 9 miles in 2:45, but as we got closer and closer to the aid station it was soon apparent that we were way under. The pacers kept asking if we should get out the headlamps, and Ken & I in unison kept saying, "I think we can make it to Half Moon without them". Sure enough, next thing we know we arrive at Half Moon a full 45 minutes under, and it's still light out! Obviously we're pleased with a full 1:15 ahead of pace, but in the back of my mind I'm thinking, isn't this a full 100 miles, with the dreaded Power-Line still to come. Once again, I'm pleased by the quietness of the aid station. Whereas Twin Lakes was the ACL fest of aid stations, Half Moon was more akin to unplugged at Shady Grove. We all got into the aid tent, I ate more melon and ramon, while Lorena searched for some vasoline to ease the "Chafing" on her neck. So once again, we ease out of another aid station with an air of confidence that all things are possible.

Leg 8) Half Moon to Fish Hatchery - 69.5 to 76.5 Miles
Ken kept telling us throughout training and the race, run aid station to aid station, and while it sounds easy enough, when your 70 miles into this race with 30 to go, the next aid station can feel like a million miles away. That's not what I was thinking when I left HM, but I would soon enough. Don't get me wrong, I was feeling great at this point, all things considered. We were way ahead of pace, still running on dirt, and we had only 4 miles to see our crew at Pipeline. With headlamps now on, we shuffled our way down the trail trying to not over do it. Whenever I felt the pace pick up I would remind everyone to run conversative, we had plenty of time. But eventually the optimism of HM wore off and now we kept saying, it didn't feel this way coming out. We hit Pipeline still quite ahead of pace and sent Lorena ahead to find the crew. Both Adam and Lorena were scheduled to trade out with our next set of pacers, so it was a little sad saying goodbye after they had done such a great job of keeping our spirits up, talking when needed, and generally making the trail more pleasant. Pipeline by this point was a very large pasture filled with row upon row of crews and spectators. After what seemed like 200 yards of parked cars, we finally found Cindy, James, Summer and Ally patiently waiting. This time I used Pipeline as a real aid station, and grabbed a turkey wrap from Summer and let Ally & Cindy do the rest. So with a departing hug from Lorena and my girls, we set out with our new pacers. Ken had Toby as his new pacer, while James took over for Lorena. Funny thing about new pacers, they need to be trained, so Ken & I went over the routine, walk the uphills, shuffle the downs and flats. Once that lesson was over, we settled in to tackle another dreadful part of the course, the road to Fish Hatchery. The new pacers were all fired up and ready to go, but they quickly realized Ken & I weren't. We did manage to shuffle the downhills, but I felt even the flats were taking their toll on us. Once we hit the asphalt it got even worse. It's hard to say if this was a mistake on our part since we are road runners, but in hindsight, I think we should have used this to our advantage and taken it to the competition, but we didn't. We alternated shuffle, walk, shuffle, walk until we could clearly see FH, then I think just to get it over with we shuffled a good 1/2 mile to the station. By now it's very dark and Cindy is crewing by herself (Lorena, Ally, Summer off to bed). James grabs my pack, I head into the aid station, grab more fruit, and ask for some more raman. It's here that I finally get irritated with one of the volunteers. She tells me three different soups and I say "Raman", she then says "Potato", I say "Raman", then she goes to the pot and starts taking what seemed like forever. I get frustrated and I shouldn't have, but I finally say, "I'm in a little bit of a hurry here with the race and all that". So I finally get my raman, and guess what, it's a cup full of mush, damn you soup lady! So I head to my chair, eat, stretch and then ask James to check on Ken. James comes back saying he can't be found, so Cindy checks, same result. By now I'm starting to shiver and tell Cindy I need to leave. She wraps me in a towel and James says they are found and coming. Timewise, we lost 30 minutes on arguably the easiest section of the course, but we're carrying a 45min buffer, so I'm still thinking positive.

Leg 9) Fish Hatchery to May Queen - 76.5 to 86.5 Miles
Whereas I was the one lagging on the road to FH, I see Ken and immediately know something isn't right. Just a second ago on the road he was pulling me along, but now he looks pale and timid. I start off with what was our usual routine of walk the first 1/4 mile out of the aid station, but Ken doesn't seem to be moving. We make it to the first downhill and I start to shuffle calling back to Ken who appears not to respond. This is the point I dreaded from the start of the race. I thought it would be me falling apart and Ken needing to choose, which would have suited me fine, but it didn't work out that way. So after covering close to 80 miles together, I let my survival instincts take over and chose to keep going rather than wait. I'm sure it was the right thing to do, but it still felt wrong then and now. So now it was James & I alone headed up to the Power-line. I kept warning James about how long and steep the climb was going to be, that it was crossing over to an obsession. By now the weather had cooled considerably, and I noticed a strong correlation with the speed of my hiking ability (increase).  I've always performed best during cold weather, and today was no exception. We hit the bottom of PL and we climbed, and climbed, and climbed. By now James had settled in a good 10 yards ahead and began pulling up to the summit. He would call out any path obstructions, changes in grade, and continue to try and motivate me. At times I wanted him to stop, but we were committed with no where else to go, so I plodded on step by step. It was about half way up when a funny thing happened, I got mad. Your 85 miles into the hardest race of your life and someone drops a 5 mile 1,400 foot climb in front of you, sure getting mad is a good thing. I channeled the anger I had at the mountain into an increase in tempo, and soon James & I were starting to pass the many headlamps speckled along the way. We did finally summit (obviously), and I felt better to be on the familiar dirt road on the way to May Queen. By now we're feeling good time-wise, with James trying to fill my head with thoughts of sub-24, but I knew better since I was the one with 85+ miles on my legs. Once we hit the road I told James we would duck back on the trail for another 2 miles and come out at May Queeen. That may be exactly what happened, but those two miles inside the forest kept dragging on, and on, and on. At one point even James thought we were going wrong because we could hear the aid station, but were moving in the opposite direction. The forest finally spit us out and we once again shuffled into May Queen in 2hrs 59minutes, beating my race plan by 1 whole minute. So here I am at the last aid station, Cindy's all alone patiently waiting, and I come barreling in asking for another can of vanilla shake. With close to 3 hours between aid stations, I had a lot of time to contemplate the last pit-stop, and what I decided was I wanted to get in and out as fast as possible. I thought back to advice Jason has given during training, get in and out of the aid stations as quickly as possible, and came to the conclusion he was especially right on the latter stations. With that singular thought in my head I rejected sitting down, asked for my shake and even refused a change of socks. Poor Cindy, she had been lugging my crap to 9 previous aid stations only to see me reject 80% of her offerings, so she did what any tired crew worker would do, she left the vanilla shake can in the car. Me being tired and foggy-headed, couldn't comprehend that what I wanted, wasn't there. Thankfully James took over and set me straight, and wouldn't you know it, Cindy had a can of Starbucks Double-shot! At that moment in the race, that was probably the best tasting drink on the planet, and arguably the best thing to ingest at mile 87 of the race. James and Cindy quickly swapped the pacer number, and we were on our way out of the last aid station of the night.

Leg 10) May Queen to Leadville - 86.5 to 100 Miles
How good it felt to be out of the last aid station. I felt re-invigorated once again not only by the caffeine, but also by the thought that I was a full 40 minutes ahead of pace. Cindy and I quickly established the routine of shuffle down, walk up, and whatever you can on the flats. She was excited as well, but I could tell the long hours of crewing were also taking their toll. We made good progress on the road leading up to Turquoise lake, passing quite a large contingent of sub-25 wannabees. We soon hit the trail that snakes around the lake and immediately I noticed my headlamp giving out. I quickly pulled out my backup blue led light and was able to once again see the path. By now the temperature had dropped even further into the 30s with a crystal clear sky showing every know constellation and a 1-day old full moon shining over our right shoulders onto the lake. If it wasn't for the pressing weight of the clock and my imminent caloric demise, I would have stopped to lay down to admire the view. Cindy was my eyes, pointing out Orion's belt, the Big Dipper, and also the best times to glance at the moonset over the lake. It was about this time that my newly acquainted friend,Charlie from Orchard Park NY came flying by with poles flying in the most impressive shuffle of the night. Charlie looked like a man possessed, and I knew immediately I wouldn't be catching him before the finish. Charlie wasn't the only one out that night, we were caught up in quite a large group that kept swapping places. It seemed that all the runners were going through short bursts of energy, followed by a lull, then another burst. The result was a continuous train of passing, then being passed by the same runners over, and over again. Eventually we reached the boat ramp, which I had heard was a big party for the spectators. They lived up to their reputation, as we passed several groups of highly, and moderately intoxicated persons. One thing they all did say, "You only have 6 more miles to go!". I've done enough road races, let alone trail racers to know that whenever a specator tells you how far to the finish, don't believe them. Even if they were right that night, my perception of the distance was way more than 6 miles.

At this point my recollection of the route was (based on outward bound), get on a dirt road for a couple/few miles, then hit asphalt all the way to the finish. How quickly one forgets as my imagined route to the finish had no basis in reality. By now we had hit the pavement and the wind and cold were most intense. We shuffled for about a quarter to half mile before I finally succumbed to the elements. We stopped, I got my jacket on, Cindy insisted on carrying my pack, and we were about to start back up the road, when we noticed a string of glowsticks leading into another dirt road. I immediately told her it wasn't right...but then why was it lined with glow-sticks. We took the turn, but I was convinced we were going the wrong way. I can only imagine how I sounded from Cindy's perspective, me trying to logically argue that we were going the wrong way on a path lit with glow-sticks with no seemingly other way to have gotten there. The crux of my mental problem was that right before we stopped to change, there were at least 1/2 dozen runners right next to us, and now there wasn't a headlamp in sight. Thankfully we kept pressing on, and eventually tiny dots of light appeared not only ahead, but behind us as well. Now that I was convinced I was headed to the finish line and not back the to lake, we picked up the pace on the last climb up the final dirt road of the course. We traded places several times with a Kiwi runner who told us it was anywhere from 10 to 20 minutes once we hit the road. That meant little to me until I asked how far it was and he told us one full mile. By now I could smell the finish. All thoughts of bonking, cramping, laying down, or slowing down exited my mind. I upped the pace and Cindy now had to shuffle to keep up with my walking pace. I not only felt great, I was at ease. Six months of training, planning, stretching, PT, and worrying had come down to this moment. We could first see the lights of the town, then heard distant cheers, then finally saw the short downward stretch, followed by the 1/4 mile upward finish. That was all I needed, and I bolted (a slow bolt). Cindy was running beside me and I said were running all the way to the finish. It's hard to describe the rush I felt at that point. Not only was I finishing, but I felt great, I was well under my goal time, and Cindy was beside me for the finish. She struggled to keep up with two packs on her back, but managed to pull even about 200 feet out, planted a kiss on my cheek, and then I sprinted to the red carpet and the tape.

I swear I had the biggest smile of any racer that day. First I see James & Ally & Summer, then Lorena, then Cindy joins back up while Marilee puts the finisher medal around my neck. I have to say, I've ran some very satisfying marathons in the past, but none of them compared to the feeling I had at that finish line. I had trained for one of the hardest races in the country, planned almost every detail, showed up, raced and finished, and at that singular moment, everything was in balance.

Paul with 'Big Buckle'

Paul - 8/26/10
Finishing Time: 24:37:15