I went in to Hinson 2015 with a “play it by ear” strategy, meaning I wasn’t really sure what my goal would be until started running and gauged how I felt.  I’ve been so inconsistent with training – not in terms of miles, though that’s some of it too — but in terms of how I feel on each run.  I’d go from an ok run, to a great run, to a blah run, and back and forth.  And one day I’d feel super and energetic, and the next I’d feel fatigued.  I’ve just recently had testing done and am now working through some things which will hopefully change all that, but I was literally one day in to it, so there’s no way that could have started to take effect!

Kelly, Heather, and I drove down Friday afternoon and set up camp.  I opted for our 20 year old pop-up tent, due to how much more space it has than our backpacking tents, but it finally failed.  The 1st night it started raining right as we went to bed, and soon the tent had water covering most of the floor!  We did our best to make it through, but it was a long night!

This was Kelly’s 1st ultra, and she rocked it with 57 miles!  I ran the first two loops with her which was good for me to keep me from going out too fast, but maybe a bit much for her as she was going a bit faster than normal.

Since she was running this year, I don’t have as many photos as normal, just a few posted to facebook:

I’ll keep it short and just say I had a great race.  I was consistent and felt solid almost the whole time — just at 4 and 8 hours in, or so, I felt a bit constricted in the chest and had to take a little albuterol.  I did have 2x200mg of Vit I at the same time, and each time I did that, I had another several solid hours… Of course there were some down times, but overall very good.

Because Pinhoti 100 is six weeks out, it was always my intention to not push too hard.  But I was running so well, that I really thought about pushing for a sub 20 hour 100 miles — something I didn’t really think I’d ever be capable of.  I was also in 2nd place, a couple of laps up on 3rd and 4th.  But I made the call to stop at 15 hours 45 minutes, 82.7 miles in.   Looking at my splits the last few hours, I do think I could have dug deep and done the 100 in 20 hours.  I only needed to average 17 minute miles and my last few lap splits were 13-14 minutes each.  But it may have been a bit too deep with Pinhoti around the corner.   Here it is a couple of days later and I’m feeling pretty good, so I think it was the right call.

Hinson had electronic timing this year, so I have exact splits, and I threw those into a spreadsheet to get a bit more insight…

Gear:

• Altra Superior 2 for the 1st 52 miles, switched to Hoka Stinsons for that last 35-ish
• inj inji toe socks for the 1st 52, then just threw on a pair of old running socks I can’t even think of the name of right now!
• Nike combat gear pro compression
• Prana shorts – these are not a running short but I use them for running, hiking, swimming, etc.
• Started with an icebreaker sleeveless  but dropped it for most of the day, then put on an icebreaker body fit short sleeve for the later hours
• Petzl Tikka RXP; ipod shuffle, ifit belt to hold my race number

Food:

• breakfast was coffee with heavy cream, 1 hard boiled egg, and maybe a slice of bacon
• i had ucaan in a bottle that I drank right before the start and part of the 1st lap, then finished sometime in the next one or two laps
• beyond that it was a hodgepodge of my own food:
  • vfuel gels, peanut butter balls (oats, honey, dark chocolate, raisons), hard boiled eggs, bacon, one more ucann pack; grape juice with water and sea salt; a couple of Epic bison bars
• and food from the aid station:
  • potatoes with salt, 1 very small coke, 3 or 4 small mountain dews (like 2-3 oz each), 1 slice of pizza, ramen noodles and broth, veg broth and white rice
• I had a ton of food in my bin but barely ate it — I probably avg’d 125 calories per hour max

After I finished I crawled into the tent, which was even more wet than the night before, and tried to figure out how to stay dry (impossible!) and get some sleep.  Fit bit says I slept 4 hours, but I heard a lot of runners going by, talking, making noise, etc.; spent a lot of time trying to get out of the water, etc.  I got up around 6:30 and  just like last year, rather than going out for a banana lap, made nice strong coffee and watched all the runners go by.

Congrats to my friends Sho Gray (118) and Kelley Wells (109) on their wins – both great runners with great performances!  Huge thanks to Jerry for putting on the race — it’s truly one of the best organized runs around.  And it was great catching up with lots of people, even if only for a lap or two — Shannon, Joe, Kelley, Sho, Scott, Anthony, Mark, etc.

So all in all very happy with the run, though of course I’ll always wonder — could I have hit 100 in 20 hours?  could I have held on to 2nd?   But I am sticking with my call — it was the right thing to do.  Six weeks is not a long time to recover!