Run!

[face palm]

my treadmill died and its 9 degrees outside

[RH Goatcabin]

Weekly Joe:


Barely Beyond

RUNNING COMMENTARY 973




My first Marathon & Beyond column began with wordplay to justify the use of this space by someone who had stopped running marathons and never really gotten started in ultras. My “beyond” didn’t mean running longer than 26.2 miles. It referred to the after-life of an ex-marathoner and the supporting roles I could still play.

Soon after that first column ran, my support of marathoners became more direct and personal than ever before. I began coaching a marathon training team, and these runners in turn inspired (or shamed) me into a return to marathoning. These recent experiences have filled many a page in M&B.

But I’ve had little to say here about running ultras because my history beyond the marathon is as incomplete as it is ancient. Which isn’t to say I failed miserably at ultrarunning. There are no bad experiences if they teach good lessons. I learned first that I didn’t have the will to see these races through, which added to my admiration for runners who do.

ROCKLIN, CALIFORNIA, November 1970. The best race I ever saw – not on television, film or tape but as an eye-witness – was an ultra. For most sustained drama and strongest personal investment, the greatest race I’ve seen was the national 50-mile championship in Rocklin.

As one of the runners that day I saw little of how this race played out until the very end. We repeatedly looped a five-mile course, and as the leaders lapped me I switched from running to spectating. Dropped out, that is.

I’d like to say that I quit my race to watch the one upfront. In fact, the miles had taken their toll on me before the top two runners roared past, locked in a duel. At the lap-counter’s checkpoint where I stopped, I heard that “Skip Houk and Bob Deines are on American-record pace.”

From then on I took care not to favor one frontrunner over the other with my cheers. Bob Deines had become a good friend and sometime training partner, but I also knew his rival, Skip Houk. Road racing of that era was so underpopulated that almost everyone knew everyone.

Houk had led most of the way. Then Deines entered the last lap 50 yards ahead. Ex-boxer Houk had lost his lead but not his fight. Deines came into view of the finish first. Seconds later someone yelled, “My God, there’s Houk! He’s closing in!” His stocky figure looked all the more so compared to Deines’ skin and bones.

Houk closed faster, shrinking the gap to 10 yards before the distance ran out. He might have won if the race had been a tenth-mile longer. Their times, two seconds apart, both broke the national record by almost 23 minutes. What they did was all the more impressive because of what I couldn’t do on the same course that same day.

SANTA ROSA, CALIFORNIA, January 1971. One of the best races I ever ran was a baby ultra. In my sketchy history beyond marathon distance, this was the only race I ever finished. My career, if you can call it that, as a would-be ultrarunner was as brief as it was dismal.

It took me exactly 19 months and four failed tries in five attempts to realize that I wasn’t cut out to go this far. Or maybe I just never trained enough for it, since my non-race runs beyond marathon distance totaled exactly two – ever.

My first ultra attempt resulted in my longest distance to date – 35 miles. This came on the first day of a stage races that was scheduled to reach 100 miles on the third day. The first round left me too sore and tired to answer the bell for the second. My next try ended even sooner. Stopping at 30 miles of the 50 let me see the Deines-Houk finish detailed above.

My last try at ultrarunning yielded the longest run ever without scheduled walk breaks. This came in the same 50-mile race as the year before, on the same five-mile course. Here I came two laps closer to finishing but still couldn’t push past 40 miles.

Each of these failed attempts to finish left me with a consolation prize. But only one race beyond 26.2 miles was an unqualified success. No surprise that it also was the only one I went into well prepared: first with the 30-mile training run of sorts in the Deines-Houk race of late 1970, then another 30 with Jeff Kroot (my longest-ever true training run) about a month later, and finally a marathon race (more training-in-disguise) a month after that.

Then I entered a 32-mile race from Santa Rosa to Petaluma and back. Today’s ultra runners who climb mountains on trails might call this race of little more than a 50K on flat roads “nothing but a slightly long marathon.” It seemed plenty long to me, thank you, as I passed the marathon checkpoint with almost another 10K to go.

This time I didn’t stop, didn’t slow but actually upped the pace a bit in those extra miles. I would have taken more pride in my finish that day if I’d known it wouldn’t be the first of many in ultras but the one and only.

UPDATE: More than 40 years after Bob Deines’s record 50-mile race, we still stay in touch. He lives and runs in the quiet countryside of northern California. His runs are much shorter now, with his “ultra” now measured in years rather than miles.

[low selfestitle]

Weekly Joe

[low selfestitle]

Tony Krapicka is also a fan of the faggy pants in winter.

Colorodo's big on my list of places I want to run.

[pheelios]

Tony Krapicka is also a fan of the faggy pants in winter.

Colorodo's big on my list of places I want to run.

How have you been low?

[low selfestitle]

How have you been low?

Phee!

How's things, brutha?

Running's been really good the last couple of weeks. I'm back to good health. Still feels strange to finish a run and not have crippling pain in my leg.

[low selfestitle]

No wonder Scott Jurek is such a tireless ultra runner. He's a fucking ROBOT!

[RH Goatcabin]

[face palm]

thanks for your support fucktards

[Stew Nod]

my treadmill died and its 9 degrees outside

Did you run?

[Mrs Selfestitle]

I just called my running everyday brother in law (not Low's brother my sister's man) sponsor because I had a dozen reasons I couldn't run today. Have to shit, running shoes at work, was stuck in traffic for 4 hours in a snow storm, haven't eaten since breakfast, it is cold, no one will thank me for it, people annoy be, it is dark and last time I ran out on a Friday night these creepy dudes at the park made me turn back, I haven't seen my kids in two days so I should cuddle up, the snow isn't thick enough for yaks but there is enough to make it slippy ( Slippy mention ), the dog is sleeping in front of the front door and cause I don't want to. All he said was, "Get your run in."


Well I am taking a shit first damn it

[Mrs Selfestitle]

1

[Stew Nod]

Right on Mrs Low.....love it...ya did something

[BudBudha]

thanks for your support fucktards

I just called my running everyday brother in law (not Low's brother my sister's man) sponsor because I had a dozen reasons I couldn't run today. Have to shit, running shoes at work, was stuck in traffic for 4 hours in a snow storm, haven't eaten since breakfast, it is cold, no one will thank me for it, people annoy be, it is dark and last time I ran out on a Friday night these creepy dudes at the park made me turn back, I haven't seen my kids in two days so I should cuddle up, the snow isn't thick enough for yaks but there is enough to make it slippy ( Slippy mention ), the dog is sleeping in front of the front door and cause I don't want to. All he said was, "Get your run in."


Well I am taking a shit first damn it

I've hiked in microspikes but have never run in yaks. What depth do you need to use them?

[low selfestitle]

1 mile

[Stew Nod]

[IMG][/IMG]

[Stew Nod]

Be on the lookout for that guy in central jersey...he's retawwded!

[Stew Nod]

srs though that mask makes a world of diff with the cold air

[Bye You!]

srs though that mask makes a world of diff with the cold air

and you get enough air through it?

it's so cold lately. i used to run in ridiculous cold, years ago. i'm too much of a pussy now.

[low selfestitle]

[IMG][/IMG]

Ninjer!