Wrapped up the year short of my 2022 mileage goal of 2000 with 1871.9 miles.  Will have my work cut out for me to get 2000 in 2023. Doing more power walking than running to try to maintain some semblance of fitness.

I finished 2022 with 2,723 miles.  Solid year.  Short of the 3,000+ Miles each of the last two years but some of that is due to the extra time from the Covid WFM bonus.  No mileage goals for 2023.  I have broken 2,500 miles 8 of the last 9 years so I would like to that gain if possible.

Gatsby see you at states.  I’m still deciding on canyons.  I think I will do the WS camp instead although.

Happy new year everyone. Not as happy for me as I had hoped.

Was a crazy race. Some things went well and many others didn’t. Found myself in a dark hole when I knew things were falling apart. I had to regroup and make a new plan. The alternative was to quit. I don’t know that word. New plan and hope it was. If I could maintain a steady pace I could still win. 

Finished with 130.969 miles. Not the grand number I had hoped for or knew I could run. Finished 1st overall. 24 hour races are hard to get right.

 

I finished the year off with 3412 miles. My biggest year ever. Ran 2- 100 miler, a last man standing, a road marathon and a 24 hour loop race.

amazing year Crash and although it's not the distance you wanted an elite performance nonetheless, congrats!

 

 

I certainly look forward to contributing here and learning what I can.

Hey Kyle, I am assuming you are the same Kyle I follow on Strava. Your last marathon was so impressive with very consistent splits. i often think of 26.2 and being a kind of magic number in terms of a common limit of endurance for most well trained experienced runners and after the things change a lot. for me it's around 22 miles actually. not just 'the wall' but maybe the second or third wall. the one that forces you to change things in order to keep moving. in short a 50 miler is going to be very very different. there are different ways of going about it. one way is to go out fast and hope that when you blow up you will still be able to keep moving, anothe way would be to change how you run it and start out slow. i find the preponderance of advice suggesting the latter but for me the jury is still out. i think when i was younger going out a little fast was acutally better and even though the whole event was a regression run my times were better than when i purposefully went out slow. now i definitely need to be more careful about going out slow. im just talking about 50's here not 100 miles.

 

If you'll have me, I'd like to throw in here some as I'm planning on running my first "big boy" ultras this year - Heartland 50 in early May and Heartland (100) in early October. These are both gravel road races on rolling hills in Kansas, for anyone unfamiliar with them (which I suspect is most to all of you).

 

I grew up on roads like the ones these races are on, and have gravel roads and (small) hills available to me right outside my neighborhood, so terrain familiarity is there. 

Welcome.  I have a few friends that have run the 100 miler in the fall.  What I know about that race is that is very small.  Like 20 finishers every year.  That's good from the idea that you may win your age group or even place in the race (I "think" only like 5 or 6 people broke 24 hours last year).  The bad is you will likely be running for very long stretches of the race alone.

I'm not the type of person that uses pacers (at least I haven't in the past five years) but you may want to consider seeing if you have a friend that could run some of the last 50 miles with you.  My first 100 I ever did, I had two pacers and one person crewing me.  I surrounded myself with people that wouldn't allow me to quit.  Once you finish the first one, it gets much easier.

Across the years 24 hour Phoenix AZ Race report

There is a long and a short answer to how the race went. I don't know if I will write the long one. Since the race didn't go as planned I feel some of the details don't matter. I think the hardest part is that I put in so much work for this race and came away with a flop. I say flop because I know I can run so much farther in 24 hours than I did. Many have told me I did amazing. I think many of you know how I feel when I say I want more and doing ok in my book is not good enough.

The race started off just as planed. The course was a 1.04 mile loop. Mostly dirt with very little elevation change. Every 4 hours we changed directions. It was like a fresh start every time we changed directions. Everything was new. I was running 9:10-9:25 pace for the first 30 milers. It was easy and relaxed. Then I notice the pace started to slip and I had to work to get it back to goal pace. I knew something was off. I backed off the 9:45s for some time and then that pace was hard to keep. My feet and quads started hurting earlier than I think they should have. I had done a lot of long training runs in the Carbon X Hoka. I felt they would help me with the long miles. At mile 72 I switch my shoes to my traditional Bondi's. I have never switched my shoes during an ultra. This time it was the smart move. But the damage was done. The Carbon X were the wrong shoe for this race for me.

About the some time as I changed my shoes I did some math. Most of the time math and ultra running don't mix. I would never bet on that guy to figure out the math in a life or death situation. I still had a clear head at that time and my math was spot on. I knew at the pace I was running and the pace my body would let me run, I wouldn't make my goal. I then found myself is the darkest hole ever. I was hurt, sad, frustrated and angry all at the same time. I though about quitting and I don't know that word. Many say ultras are 20% physical and 80% mental. The brain is a powerful thing. If the mind is not in it you are more likely to fail. I thought about the options I had. I could call it a day or do something about it.

I text my wife and let her know I was in a dark place. To my surprise the text started to flood in. She had posted on FB that I wasn't doing well and to send me text. Well it worked. I started to look for a new reason to finish the race. Could I still win the race? I figured if I could keep a steady pace that I could.

The temperature wasn't that hot but I always felt like I was sweating. It was a bit humid. I used some ice and water to cool off. Ave was 50-65 degrees the whole race. But coming from 20 degrees and snow it felt a bit warm to me.

With 2 hours to go it started to rain. I didn't put on a rain jacket or change my cloths. Just kept running. I finished the race with 130.969 miles and first overall. So far. There was 6 days of running and you could start any of the 6 days. On the last day someone beat me by one lap to win.

I am grateful for my family and friends. I met many new ones that helped me too. I couldn't have pushed on without them. I don't know if I will do another 24 hour loop race. I will leave that decision for another day. There are so many take a ways from this race and lessoned learned.

You are never alone and you can do hard things.

Krash, I think going from cold to run in the heat was the deal breaker. You mentioned ice and water for cooling off. Don't underestimate how much of a factor the heat played.

I know it seems weird to think of 60F as hot, but coming from Wisconsin and doing a race in California one February it was 64F and I almost died lol. Tarawera in a month will possibly be 80F and humid, and it's very cold here, I'm not sure how I'll train for that heat yet.

He is a killer. I normally do a 10 heat training regiment before most races. I didn't for this one. Maybe that's one of the problems. The research shows it's best to start 10 day out and to start easy. If you have access to a sauna, I hear that's the best. I would go out and run in the middle of the day. Wear 2 long sleeve shirts of very dark color. The next step it to add a rain jacket. It taps all the heat in. Then don't drink water for the first 20-30 min after a run. My style is much like SWAP.

Krash, I think going from cold to run in the heat was the deal breaker. You mentioned ice and water for cooling off. Don't underestimate how much of a factor the heat played.

 

I know it seems weird to think of 60F as hot, but coming from Wisconsin and doing a race in California one February it was 64F and I almost died lol. Tarawera in a month will possibly be 80F and humid, and it's very cold here, I'm not sure how I'll train for that heat yet.