100
I just ran 100 miles. In one day. In 21 hours and 37 minutes.
I am in so much pain. 100 miles is really fucking far.
My journey from Olympic Valley to Auburn, California is something that I still fail to fully comprehend. I’m not sure if it’s because I am still so nutrient depleted, dehydrated and exhausted or if I don’t want to think about it because that means entertaining the idea of running that far again.
I am so tired. My ankle is swollen. There are countless other things I can do with 21 hours and 37 minutes. Why on earth would I want to do that again? There isn’t really a good reason, so I’m pleading the fifth and not thinking about it. That is where I am at for the future. I know it’s not satisfying but I need a break.
Arriving to the starting line in Olympic Village was everything I’d heard about. The professionals were walking around everywhere. Podcasts and livestreams were happening. Group runs were taking off. It was quite the scene. Usually my pre-race activities include reading a book so I made sure to be conscious of giving myself downtime each day to be quiet and just be with myself taking it all in. I felt so lucky to be there. Even sitting here now outside our AirBnB, I feel so present in everything happening.
My crew plan was to have Team A (Ian, Amelia and Riley) meet me at half of the aid stations and Team B (Ann and Bill) to meet me at the other half, both joining at Foresthill. Riley would pace me from Foresthill to Rucky Chucky and Amelia would cross the river and pace me to the finish.
Escarpment to Lyon Ridge
I didn’t think I was running too fast. My effort was exactly what I wanted it to be. I suppose if it was a 100k I would have been fine but 100 miles is not 100k. Camille took it out with the top men. I watched her run up the hill and knew I wasn’t going to try to run with her. I knew my effort and ran that effort. Unbeknown to me, my effort got me up the escarpment in second place. I however was amazed at the beauty of the landscape at the top of the climb. The lighting is perfect, the weather is just right and it is my favorite time of day; sunrise.
Quickly I fell in step with Emily Hawgood and Katie Asmuth, two real professionals and veterans of the race. I knew if I stayed with them I might be ok. We chatted until the first aid station and I took a small tumble not paying attention telling a story. Thankfully I only took two slight spills and they were very minor. Tis only a flesh wound.
Lyon Ridge to Duncan Canyon
The first two aid stations were an easy in and out. I refilled my water and electrolytes and kept moving. My nutrition strategy was a gel every 30 minutes place 16 ounces of Gnarly/electrolyte mix and 16 ounces of water. I figured this would get me through till I saw Team B at mile 24, where I would reassess how things were going. Looking back this is cute, how I thought it would work perfectly and I would get by on gels until Foresthill or further. I barely made it to Ann and Bill before my stomach began to reject most forms of calories.
Duncan Canyon to Robinson Flat
Coming into Dusty Corners was when I got to see my crew Team B Ann and Bill for the first time. It seemed so long since I said goodbye to them at 4AM so I welcomed the chance to emotionally recharge. My stomach was beginning to turn. Gels were not going down well and I noticed I was peeing frequently signaling poor absorption. I told Ann I needed to try something else. I ate some fruit and peanuts and took chews with me on my way out. I was feeling in good spirits and not overheated. I put on a hat and sunglasses and ice down my bra and on my head. To be honest, I didn’t ever feel overheated during the race. I practiced a lot of mental strategies for dealing with uncomfortable heat. This was a both good and bad thing. It would have been great if I had been taking in adequate electrolytes and hydration. However maybe if I did allow myself to feel the heat more intensely I would have made a point to take in more electrolytes earlier and douse myself more thoroughly with ice and water. I had a bit of a low in the next section though I still was moving well and systems were firing. I leapfrogged with Marianne Hogan a bit here (she finished third!) and it was incredible to see her have a few ups and downs and work her way steadily up the field all day.
Robinson Flat to Michigan Bluff
I got to see Team A at Robinson so I was looking forward to that. My strategy was obviously to take the race aid station by aid station rather than think of the complete distance. Again, this strategy had pros and cons. By taking it in small segments, I convinced myself that because I felt so horrible eating, I would simply just wait to eat at each aid station, then feel horrible for a mile or two coming out of aid while the food digested, rinse and repeat. I suppose thinking of it in terms of a longer effort would have encouraged me to eat a bit more between aid stations and not stay long at them. At Robinson I changed shoes and got iced up. This stretch began the section into the canyons, which is a daunting part of the course.
Because food wasn’t sitting very well, I started to look forward to the climb to Devil’s Thumb and then to Michigan Bluff because I thought it would be an easier time to get in some calories. I caught up to Camille Brujas and mule trained it up both climbs with her (she ended up 10th!). The climbs were actually my favorite solo (no pacer) parts of the race. The cliffs are beautiful, and I felt a good rhythm in my stride. Because I had experienced a low or two at this point my focus changed to enjoying the flowy sections or times when I believed I was as good as the women around me.
Michigan Bluff to Foresthill
The six miles between Michigan Bluff and Foresthill should be an easy section. However this was when my stomach got even worse and I knew I would spend a bit of time at Foresthill. I was running fine but getting a soreness in my left shin that was amplified on the downhills. The thing about this course is the beautiful winding trails around the mountains are very dominantly left-sided. I put a lot more force on my left shin going down them than my right and it was at this point where this became more clear. I was approaching the furthest I’d ever run and my body was about to see what it could handle. At this point nutrition wise I was asking for turkey and cheese sandwiches and peanut butter and jelly. Most things felt like too much flavor and the things that were bland seemed so dry. From here until the end of the race the biggest puzzle was getting to aid stations and finding anything that I could put down even if it meant getting sick later.
Foresthill to Rucky Chucky
At Foresthill I took my time. I tried to eat as much as I could and it felt like a lot. I got doused with tons of water, hydrated as much as I could and changed shoes. Thankfully the blisters I was worried about did not raise alarms until mile 80. I picked up Riley and got a small emotional boost from them. This was the part of the course I was looking forward to and I felt bad for Riley because in my opinion I was going very slowly. It never crossed my mind to quit or drop out of the race, but from here on it became about finishing. My stomach was all kinds of awful and though I was running, my shin was becoming a louder issue that concerned me.
From Foresthill the path runs flowy and downhill by the river. It is beautiful, the trail is soft and the perfect time to let it rip. Riley was a perfect pacer. They didn’t talk too much, they kindly encouraged me to get some calories in, and even lied to me saying I was moving along at a fine pace. They even talked for me to another pair of runners who we leap-frogged for a few miles when I was too exhausted to speak. The twenty miles with them flew by and all of a sudden we were descending painfully down to the river where I told Riley I needed to take some time and regroup again.
Rucky Chucky to Green Gate
At the river I promptly plopped down in a chair and mowed down a bunch of cheese dipped in hummus. I have no idea how that combo went down but somehow it stayed there. Ian foolishly asked me to get my ass out of the chair and cross the river because if I rallied I could compete. I totally believe in the power of the mind to do hard things…but I don’t know if this was a situation in which I could have done it. I knew I needed to take care of myself and get to the finish line somehow. The way my shin felt (like a brittle stick) and how my stomach seemed to revolt at the mention of food, I knew I would do my best regardless of top ten or not, but completing the race needed to be foremost in my mind. I spent some time in the chair, ate what I could and got into that cold river.
God damn those rocks are slippery. Thank you volunteers who somehow got my gazelle legs across that stretch because I honestly would have preferred a boat.
Green Gate to Highway 49
Oh Amelia, thank you for walking with me. Thank you for encouraging me to eat. Thank you for suggesting that I start to hobble jog enough times to get me to do it. I cannot imagine what you were thinking watching me stumble and heave and just struggle for twenty miles. My best eating at this point was small bites of anything. I think I tried everything at the aid stations. I wouldn’t give up, but it was not easy and no, my stomach has not returned to me yet.
I think the highlight of this part was getting to an aid station volunteered by Hal Koerner and Scott Jurek. Amelia got excited and said to Hal “Are you Rob Krar?!” and I immediately said “no that’s Hal Koerner,” without missing a beat. At least I was lucid enough to know my celebrities. It was rad seeing those two legends trying to give me things to eat and reminding us not to pull a Jim Wamsley and take a wrong turn on Highway 49.
Highway 49 to No Hands Bridge to Robie Point
The climb to Highway 49 took forever. It is a 3-mile climb that we walked most of. Right after you get done with it, there are these wonderful people and Hoka banners so you think you’re at the aid station. They conveniently tell you that you are still one mile away and they are just there to make sure runners do not get hit by a car. Even Amelia said that was mean. After the Highway 49 aid station, there are about 7 miles to the finish and about 5 miles to Robie Point, where runners get to run the last mile or so with their crew. The sweetest words came out of Amelia’s mouth at this moment. After my dead eyes staring around the aid station, scaring Ann and Bill and doubling over she said “well, it’s only 7 miles so to be honest you will get there without taking anything else.” My stomach felt very happy in that moment.
I wish I could say I was awed or wowed by No Hands Bridge but I think in my state of death march it seemed like a bridge with Christmas lights. It was cool but anti-climactic and different than how I thought it would make me feel. I think I just wanted to see Riley and Ian and the track, not a bridge with Christmas lights. After the bridge began the uphill climb to the finish.
Robie Point to Placer High
Alright this section was mean. I cannot figure out why no one talks about the last two miles of the race and the ANNOYING CLIMB it is! Even Amelia said it was kind of cruel. My shins were crunching at this point and so though now I recognize I might have been able to jog a bit, the incline was just enough to exhaust me thinking about it. When we finally met Ian and Riley at Robie Point I willed myself to jog but simply couldn’t force my legs to even pretend. The uphill was not nice. That is all I will say.
Soon I saw Hoka banners and heard announcers and could smell the finish. The path flattened out and it took every ounce of what I had left to jog the last bit to cross the finish. I laid down on the track, not hydrated enough to cry, overcome with love for the people surrounding me and fiercely vocal about never doing that distance again.
21:37 – 100 miles – 1 day
I made so many mistakes. The effort I thought I wanted at the beginning was not the effort I needed to appropriately run this race. I did not take in enough sodium and electrolytes early enough and that messed me up no matter what I tried to take in later in the race. This made eating anything feel awful and so I avoided it until I hit crew only nibbling on things during aid stations and drinking water which was then not absorbed and peed out. I thought my shins were going to snap after mile 80. I didn’t remember that they were going to hurt no matter the pace I went. I could have hobble-jogged more instead of walk.
There are so many ways to improve. Am I satisfied with this? For sure. Finishing a 100-mile race is something I still don’t believe I did. Does the fact that I performed poorly due to fixable things leave me optimistic about future races? For sure. However I cannot say I know what the future of ultra-races look like right now.
I had so much fun training for this but I miss speed workouts on the track very much. I would like to plan my future training with some of these workouts in there but maybe not every week. I would also like to get to trails every weekend. Though the winter made it tough sometimes, I mostly didn’t run many long runs on trails due to inconvenience. I think I can plan this much better. This makes me excited for the future and whatever it holds because my ultra-puzzle just went from 500 pieces to 1000 pieces. There is much more to unlock and discover and no matter what I choose or how I do, I still love running,
Thank you to Ian, Amelia, Riley, Ann and Bill for sharing this experience with me. You are my family and I love you. I look forward to doing this for you in your next adventure.
Thank you to On Running and Gnarly Nutrition for their incredible support through my training and racing this season.
Finally, to the Trails Collective and my East Coast community, thank you for believing in me, for loving me and for welcoming me into your family. I am nothing without you.
