san diego 50 2016

Going into the San Diego 50, I had a few main goals in mind: don’t die, don’t get injured, don’t hear any coyotes howling, have fun, and finish…in one piece. I’d like to say I succeeded on ALL of those, but there was one particular goal, I just couldn’t avoid.

Opting for the early start of 5:30AM gives me some cushioning to get across the finish line. Even though I was optimistic about my chances of getting a PR, I knew in the back of my head anything potentially disastrous could happen on race day, and I needed to plan for it. Running ultras are like playing the lottery, there’s always a chance for anything.

One noticeable thing — it wasn’t as cold as last year’s race at the start. Seeing as the temperature was around 46 degrees, I thought this was perfect. I planned for the cold temps and wore my long-sleeved shirt and gloves. My friend Crystal and I made it to the start early enough to check in, turn in our drop bags, get our gear situated and organized, use the restroom a couple of times, and hear the race instructions and details from race director Paul Jesse (Off Road Pursuits).

Taking off in the dark, Crystal quickly moved up to run with a friend of hers and I hung back to warm up the legs a bit and to not blow them out before I even got to the first climbs. The slow gradual buildup to warm up the body before tackling any hills is something I like about this race. There are a lot of mountain races where the second you’re off, the climbs are on.

My pace was steady towards the first aid station just before mile 6. However, about 4 or 5 miles into the race, in the faraway distance, I heard the first sounds of coyotes howling. It’s too early for this is what I mumbled to myself.

When I got to the early stretches of downhills, I wanted to count how many there were so I could try to remember the number of uphills I’d have on the way back. Last year I tried to recall them and I kept it my head there were six sections. Hmmm, turned out there were probably close to around 11. Great. Even if I miscounted, which is fairly easy to do, I’d rather overestimate, and be pleasantly surprised there were less.

Seeing as my hydration pack was full and I had fuel, there wasn’t any need for me to stop at the first aid station, but I did put away my headlamp as it was light out by now. As I kept going, there was a low layer of spooky fog lying around. At this point, I was making some good time. In fact, when I got up to the agriculture crops, it dawned on me the faster runners who started an hour after me, haven’t passed me yet. I was further up the course before I saw anybody from the 6:30AM start. To me, this was an indication maybe, just maybe, I was on a good roll to having a great race!

When I reached the mile 10 aid station, I saw my family who was my crew/support for the day. I decided to discard my long-sleeved shirt, but kept my gloves on as it was still a bit chilly. After leaving, I ran on the bike path, under the freeway, and back onto the dirt, where I caught up with Crystal around mile 11 or so. It was from there on, we were together for the rest of the race, and I’m so happy we were because this wasn’t just Crystal’s first 50 mile race, it was her first ULTRA ever!

Between miles 10 and 15 were filled with some technical, tricky portions and sections with short steep hills. Because I’ve run this race before, I was able to let her know, okay that’s pretty much the only real technical sections. Some people can fly down them, but one wrong step and yeah, you will end your race early.

When we reached the mile 15 aid station, I filled up my bottle with CarboPro. I had planned to use CarboPro throughout the race and I even put 2 bottles of it without the water in my drop bag which would be at miles 20/30. Turns out I didn’t need to use them because it was at every aid station. Nice! It was at this station I ran into race director Paul who was here sending out cheers and support to us runners. Crystal and I spoke with him for a millisecond and in that millisecond I didn’t even take a photo! In fact, I didn’t take many photos this day.

We cruised along nicely between miles 15 and 20 and Crystal even started to play music which helped throughout the race. However, it was around this time she began to experience some blister formation going on. When we reached the mile 20 aid station, I ate a couple pieces of watermelon, handed off my headlamp (which was still in my hydration pack) over to my family, and looked in my drop bag for my lip balm. For the life of me I couldn’t find it, but turns out, it was in my hydration pack all along! Silly me.

Past mile 20 we headed up those lovely switchbacks – up and up and up and then a little down, down, and down. There was a slight incline towards the second water crossing and I told her we have more climbs coming afterwards. “Well that was a nice warmup,” I said. “Are you serious?” Yes, I was. When we finally made it to the second water crossing, we immediately looked for sticks to help balance across the water. Crystal found one quickly and then I grabbed one nearby. As we waiting patiently for one guy to cross towards us, I felt something tickling my arm. It was an ant! Ugh! And then I looked up towards the stick and I saw many ants. UGH!!! I quickly slammed the stick on the dirt to shake them off.

After we crossed, we started the first of a few steep climbs. Some of the longer climbs of the day. Once we made it up the first section and turned left to make our way up the second climb, I heard Crystal say, are you serious???, as she looked up towards what was more climbing to be done. I couldn’t stop laughing.

What we really wanted was to hit mile 25 and turn around. First, we made it to the next aid station and I immediately went for some potato chips and Coca-Cola. Ahhhh, those potato chips tasted so heavenly. You would’ve thought I had never eaten potato chips in my life!!!

“Is this the turnaround?”

“No, you got to run another three-quarters of a mile.”

Womp womp. Someone let the air out of my balloon. We kept going and then turned around, and I got more potato chips and Coca-Cola on our return.

Once I got down the hill and back over the water crossing, this time with no ants on my stick, there were more climbs back up towards the switchbacks. The overcast was gone, the sun was out, and it was getting a little warmer. I wouldn’t say really hot, but warm intertwined with a few cool breezes passing through. However, I’m one who gets affected by warm temperatures very quickly (yes, still working on that). It was here I had a low moment. Crystal started to play some Lynyrd Skynyrd and it took my mind off what I was starting to feel. There was also a Portuguese Water Dog who followed us and he was adorable!

Once we hit the mile 30 aid station, Crystal needed to finally take care of the blister that’s been bothering her for a while now. And after I got fueled up with a few more chips and water, I took off slowly walking up the hills, and waited for Crystal. Knowing what happened at last year’s race, I also made sure I had water in my pack, but miles 30 to 35 ended up being a rough stretch. We power hiked up this portion. It’s an area that is quite exposed and there are climbs up this gravelly patch with the sun and heat radiating up. Now, I’ve run in very hot races and I wouldn’t categorize this as a hot race, but we felt the warmth here.

At this time I kept reiterating how great we were doing. As long as we stayed vertical and kept moving, we would finish.

Just before reaching the mile 35 aid station, Crystal’s cousins found us along the trail, and I know it was something uplifting for her to have. Getting support in trail races can be much more difficult due to the lack of access along the course, but this is something I love about the San Diego 50, and it being spectator-friendly. There are definitely spots to see your runner.

Once we reached the aid station, we were told we had about a 15 minute cushion to get to the next aid station before the cutoff time. What??? To be honest, I wasn’t worried about it. We were told, “as long as you keep moving, you’ll be fine.” I said, “so I can’t stop and take a nap?” “No you probably shouldn’t,” the guy jokingly replied.

Turns out we were heading into the tricky technical portions again and soon after leaving mile 35, I began to feel the nausea wash up over me. This did not feel good. On top of that, Crystal had her blisters starting to come up again. We power hiked up a majority of these miles. And I tried to run every little downhill I could, but my stomach was not feeling too well. Was it too many potato chips? What it too much Coca-Cola? The CarboPro? Too much water? Too little water? The salt? The sun? What was it? Could be any combination of anything. I tend to have a very sensitive stomach with food during running and for the life of me, I couldn’t get myself to take those Hammer gels I brought. I’m not a big fan of them. Not Hammer gels in particular, but ALL gels or gu’s. When I ran Ray Miller 50K, I completed it with one Hammer Gel, CarboPro, a couple pieces of watermelon, and some Coca-Cola. No problems. When I trained, I trained with CarboPro and I’m thinking I need to just stick with it and see what happens. But my gawd those potato chips tasted so heavenly. However, I know if I’m going to increase my distances, I HAVE to figure this one out. I just have to.

Reaching mile 40, I couldn’t have been happier, but I was really struggling. In hindsight, if Crystal hadn’t been there, I might have DNF’d at this point. I would’ve cashed in my (potato) chips, hopped in the car, and called it a day. But I honestly didn’t think about it and pressed on. A DNF wasn’t on my mind even with how awful I felt.

A very nice volunteer assembled me and Crystal a cup of goodies with potato chips and pretzels and I downed Ginger Ale. Before leaving the station, I saw my family/crew/support for the final time before the finish line and they knew I felt awful. Crystal and I both grabbed our long-sleeved shirts and headlamps because it was starting to get chilly, and the sun was going down quickly.

Stumbling upon a porta potty right after we left, I decided to use it and Crystal walked on. After having nothing happen in the porta potty I ran up to where Crystal was and we power hiked our way towards the agriculture crops and this is when the REAL fun started to happen.

{Please note, F bombs up ahead}

As I tried not thinking about the nausea and the intense cramps I was having in the pit of my stomach, and Crystal was fighting off the blister pain, it was then we started to hear the loud noises kick up with one howl and then more joining in this intense chorus of high screeching sounds. I immediately looked over to Crystal and I couldn’t help but blurt out “What the fuck?” “Are you fucking kidding me right now?” UGH! It sounded awful. I told her “C’mon let’s try and hurry up.” And we tried to run as much as possible. Just keep moving was all I remember as she and I would periodically keep looking behind us to see if any were on the trail. I didn’t want to see any.

The section towards the next, and final aid station, took forever to get through. The sun was down, our headlamps were on, and it was dark. At one moment, we were running and I could see Crystal to the side of me quickly hurdle over something. We stopped and looked back to find she nearly had a close encounter with a frog who was sitting idly on the trail. Our lights beamed on it and it didn’t even so much flinch as it stared at us with a “Watch it lady” look on it’s face. Shortly afterwards, I nearly had a VERY close encounter with a spider descending down from a branch. Had I not looked up when I did, it would’ve hit me smack dab in the face and I could’ve possibly had a spider snack. EWWWW!  I jumped to my right side where Crystal was and she thought it was a coyote near me. At that moment I wanted to be done with the race.

We kept running and wondering where the last aid station was. Did they leave? Was it closed? No, we just took forever to get to it. Once we hit the final station, we asked how far till the finish line. “5.7 miles and you have some climbs to get to first, but after all downhill.” There was one gentleman and one woman who was up ahead from us.

And now for the big adventure.

We made it up those climbs and made it to the downhill. Nice! Shortly thereafter, we heard the coyote howls kick up again to our left. “Fuck!” Sorry I couldn’t help it. I hated hearing them. There were so many and I tried to count how many there were. It sounded like a dozen. There was surely a large pack of them and who knows, it could’ve only been three. I kept trying to remember, they don’t want us, they want bunnies. We are not their food. I also know it’s completely dark, and they may not even know we’re not bunnies and will attack if indeed they’re hungry. Are they going to say, oh sorry, you’re humans, we don’t want you? The howls lasted for a couple of minutes and then drifted off. Let’s hurry up and finish. We were ready to be done.

Periodically during these final miles, we’d have a pink ribbon check. Every time we saw a pink ribbon, we’d call it out. Pink ribbon! This indicates we’re headed in the right direction. Now, along this area there isn’t a whole lot of places to even turn down, and getting lost would be a little difficult, seeing as it’s pretty much one single trail.

A few minutes later, we’d hear the coyotes start howling again. I would look to Crystal and say “Are you kidding me? AGAIN???” This time it was to our right and they sounded closer. We called them the “scary bunnies.” At her suggestion, we picked up rocks to carry in case we come face to face with any of them. Around then, I’d see figures running across the trail up ahead of me and they were actual bunnies. Quite cute really. Three of them hopped along the trail and I knew that’s what the coyotes “scary bunnies” wanted. We had ran along this wooden path and there was fresh blood on it. It was only on one section and it wasn’t very large, maybe about a foot long. Was a bunny’s life taken right there? I don’t know, but it’s very possible.

Knowing we were only a couple miles from the finish, I had hoped it was the final time I heard the them, but it wasn’t. It was as if they were right next us in the dark brush we couldn’t see. The howling was so loud and it was the first time I felt genuinely scared. To make matters worse, there were no pink ribbons around. However, I will say, this race is very well marked. Seriously. Until this moment, I never questioned whether I was lost. It’d be extremely difficult to take a wrong turn somewhere, but of course, sometimes people zone out and it happens.

The grass was low and I could see it would be difficult to tie the pink ribbons on it, and I don’t remember seeing any in the morning as we passed through. In fact, there was a concrete wall there I don’t remember seeing even from last year. I started to freak out which I’ve NEVER done in any race. “Crystal, did we make a wrong turn? Where are the pink ribbons??” All the while the screeching howls continued next to us, and they went on forever. Minutes felt like eternity. In the back of my mind, I knew we didn’t make a wrong turn. There was nowhere to take a wrong turn. And there was no way I was about to turn back to find out, so I just kept moving forward and told myself, have faith.

I didn’t start to feel better until the howls stopped again, and I saw the green flashing light directing us to the road and where the dairy farm is. By then, I knew we were close.

Those last miles were certainly very tough to get through. And there was nothing more I wanted, than to be finished. Winding our way towards the finish line, Crystal and I came upon the male and female who were walking and I gave them a “Good job. We’re almost there!” Which was true. We were almost there.

Seeing those red lights at the finish line was the sweetest sight of the day!

Looking back at how this race unfolded for me, there are certainly things I need to work on, but overall I enjoyed this race. I really did! I enjoyed it last year, and even with the challenges I faced later on, I enjoyed it this year. And I enjoyed it even more because I finished it with a friend.

San Diego 50 is well-organized, well-supported, and the volunteers and aid stations were absolutely great…I still think this is a great 50 mile race. At this point, I don’t know if I’ll be back next year, but you never know.

Thank you to race director Paul Jesse, his volunteers, and wonderful aid stations for amazing support and encouragement!

If you’d like to have the “listen on tape” version of this recap, be sure to check out Episode 5 of the Ultra Ordinary Running Podcast:

San Diego 50 Mile Race Recap. “Can I cuss here?”

You can download and subscribe on iTunes or listen through our website at ultraordinary.run

Thanks for reading and Happy Trail Running!