QUANTICO, Virginia, March 23 2013

Ambitious goal – 1:30:00
Fallback goal – Didn’t really have one

Not much to say about this race. It was the “golden ticket” race for this year’s Marine Corps Marathon – all finishers get guaranteed early entry. Given that the MCM sold out in under three hours last year, this was a pretty big perk. Of course, the 2,500 slots available in this race sold out in like 90 minutes, so it’s hard to say if this path to MCM registration was really any easier.

I was interested in the 17.75k for its own sake; I am not planning to run the MCM this year. I had a great time the previous time it was held, in the Fall of 2011. There were only some 600-odd entrants, and they had this diminutive female DI on the course just lighting us up: “You suck, you’re slow, move your butt!” We saw her near the beginning of the race and again at the end. I had almost given up on catching the string of three or four runners I’d been trying to reel in for the last mile or so, but then she was up in my face: “You suck, you can catch that guy, he’s slow, move, move, move!” I was like “…OK…”, and wound up dusting the entire string. The 2011 edition also featured an inspirational finish at the Museum of the Marine Corps.

This year was a let-down. No feisty female DIs; more paved roads and less trail; finish line just at some random place in Prince William Forest Park.

We arrived a little late and I got stuck in the back of the starting corral. The very first section of the course was in a shopping center parking lot and so was fairly wide. As soon as I crossed the starting mat I zigged left and started sprinting, trying to get around as many dawdlers as possible before the course narrowed after turning onto Dumfries road. I must have passed a few hundred people during that short sprint, and I didn’t have to do too much picking through slower runners. I was pretty much out in the open after half a mile or so.

I did have trouble recovering from that initial sprint, though. I was only 6 days removed from a PR effort at the Tobacco Road Marathon, and my legs were still a little tight. I had hoped to maybe stay a little under 8:00/mile, but most of the 11 mile splits were at least a little over that. The course was unremarkable – a few hills, mostly paved road, about a mile of gravel road, and the last half mile or so on double-track trail.

I wound up 200th out of 2,175 finishers, 1:29:42.

Miles this race – 11.03
Miles raced in 2013 – 53.43

There is only salt. Bitter, sweet, sour – these are only fairy tales told to children. Umami – to the extent that I ever knew what it was – is a distant and fading memory. I exist in a world of salt; there can be nothing else.

***

I am already composing the excuse section of my race report: “I was on track to break four hours until calf cramps started hobbling me at around mile 20. I really could have done it this time, dangit.” I am approaching the water stop at mile 24. I have 2.2 miles to go, 3:37 or so on the clock. This can be done; this is achievable. Except for these cramps. You can run through a blister, you can run through knee pain and shredded quads, but a knotted-up calf will sideline you for sure. Then I remember – I have one salt tablet left. Will it hold off the cramps long enough for me to gut out these last couple miles? No time to think about it, no time to wait for it to dissolve. A quick check of the distance to the aid station and I chew viciously through the outer capsule and feel the contents instantly coat my tongue…

***

The volunteers don’t seem to mind that I grab a second cup of water. The first one is practically brine by the time it washes the residue from the S Cap down. The second one is sweet relief. A few twinges echo up from my calves, but then they quiet down. From here I only need ten minute miles to get in comfortably under four. My left knee is a screaming knot of fire; my quads are shot; my feet have been blistering for the past twelve miles. It’s twenty minutes of hell to the finish line, but as the signs say, the achievement is forever.

***

I’m on the way back from the second turnaround at about mile 18.5. I know a long, gradual uphill is coming because I enjoyed it as a downhill on the way out. I’m still taking a short break to walk at each mile marker, no more than 0.05 miles. I see the 4:00:00 pace leader coming the other way maybe five minutes after turning around, and I wonder when he’ll catch me.

I pass mile 20 at about 2:54, leaving me 1:06 to run a 10k. Easy, nothing to it. I walk a twentieth of a mile as I take my last gel and swallow a salt tab. But soon after I break back into a run my calves start threatening to cramp. You know the feeling – the muscle goes right up to the edge of turning over, you do a little hop-jump-step, and it backs off a little. You run a little slower but continue on, you and the cramp eyeing each other warily. I know that ten minute miles will get me home, but I don’t think I can pull it off. At least I’ll beat my 4:16 PR.

I hit the expected uphill, and find myself running with unexpected strength. I know the turn back onto the road is coming at around mile 23.7. I skip the walk break at mile 22, chat briefly with a young runner regarding our chances of finishing under four, drop him, resolve to make it to the road without stopping, skip the walk break at mile 23, make it to the road, walk a short distance, check my watch, start to feel cautiously hopeful about my chances of beating my long-time goal, pull up limping as my traitorous calves start to fold in on themselves…

***

There is no more stopping. A mile and a half to go, and some seventeen minutes to do it in. The body has the strength, if the mind has the will. I reach the last water stop, at the mile 25 marker. The volunteer is shouting “Just one more mile to go!”, and I can’t keep myself from correcting her: “You mean one point two!” She gives me some water anyway, and I am grateful. Fourteen minutes to go.

***

The girl I’ve been leapfrogging all day passes me for the last time when I take a brief break to walk at mile 16. An Indian guy has also stopped to walk a bit, and I complain to him about the girl’s stubborn insistence on not staying dropped. I mention that I’m always strong in the first half and fade in the second, and he allows that he has the same problem. I don’t think I’ll make four. I have some chance at a PR, but I’m OK with just finishing. The Indian guy keeps walking as I start up running again, trying to catch that girl before the 17 mile marker.

***

The legs are tired, but I know they will see me through. The “one mile to go” lady also said it was all downhill from there, but that was a lie too. Almost immediately I’m heading uphill again, but at this point it doesn’t matter. I almost bailed on this race because my knee has been hosed for the past two months. I decided to unbail and sacrifice the knee, and now I can make it all worthwhile by gutting out this last mile. Twelve minutes to go.

***

Just before the end of the first out-and-back there is a road crossing with a sign: “drop area”. If you are unable to continue you can drop here and get a ride to the finish. When I was trying to decide whether to unbail on this race I knew that I could at least quit at the end of the first out-and-back section and walk the last 2.5 miles back along the road. I had even planned how I’d be careful to give up my bib before crossing the finish line, so as not to accidentally record a finish time instead of my rightful DNF (surely there are protocols in place to avoid that, but still, I planned it). I just smirk at this drop area, however, and continue on. I am hurting, but not yet licked.

***

I don’t look at my watch. Just don’t stop and you’ll get it. I don’t try to guess how many tenths are left. I reach the end of the uphill section and open my stride a little bit as the road slopes down…

***

At around mile eight, just short of the first turnaround, I look down the front of my shirt to check that my anti-chafing band-aids are in place. One of them looks to be riding a little low so I try to adjust it, and of course it falls half off. A girl I briefly spoke with earlier suddenly bolts down a side trail into the woods. Is she taking a pee break? I can see the port-a-potties up ahead at the turn-around. Whatever. She’ll catch me at the turnaround and then we’ll spend the next several miles leapfrogging each other. At the end of the out-and-back there is a simple cardboard box with an arrow painted around it. A volunteer is admonishing all runners to “go all the way around the box.” I do so, then stop short of the water table. I shake some grit out of my shoe, replace the band-aid over my left [redacted], finally grab the water a volunteer has been trying to hand me, and start back running. I had thought with the extended stop this mile would be the first one where I failed to stay under a 9:09 pace (the average pace needed to break four hours), but remarkably when my watch beeps at me it reads 09:05. I continue on, encouraged.

***

Half a mile to go. Don’t trip over your goofy clown shoes. Amazingly, I pass a few straggling half-marathoners. There is no pain any more. I hear the first faint cheers coming from the finish area.

***

According to plan, I stop to walk as I take my first gel at mile 5. A guy runs past me, also taking a gel. He holds up his packet and companionably calls to me, “Mile Five!” I tuck the empty packet into my waist pack and catch up to the guy. He has a classic North Carolina accent, and it makes me nostalgic. He throws his empty gel packet on the trail while berating himself for doing so, apparently sincerely. I struggle briefly with the urge to gang up with him – equally sincerely – on himself, then master it. We chat for a while. He asks me my time goal and I tell him that I’d like to do four, except for my knee, and I’m just trying to finish. “You’re under four pace now,” he says, and I agree. He goes on, but I catch him just before the turnaround, where he informs me that he is intent on catching the 3:45:00 pace leader, who is in sight just up ahead.

***

A short gentle uphill leading to the turn back into the park. The cheers are louder now. I catch up with an Asian man at the turn, and I encourage him to push and make it in under four. He looks at me with either incomprehension or disdain. I don’t care, goodbye, I’m going on. The road turns down. I pass mile 26, five minutes left on the clock. The course is twisty here; I can’t see the arch.

***

We start. The marathoners and the half-marathoners start together, and it’s crowded. As always, there are walkers and slower runners inconsiderately starting up near the front of the race, and I have to pick through them for the first mile or two. The two races will split after about two and a half miles, and then I will have more breathing room. I had told myself that I would take it slow, don’t do anything stupid like try to break four hours, just take it slow, preserve the knee, and finish. My legs had other plans, though, and I find myself running in the low-to-mid eights. We turn right onto the trail and it is beautiful.

***

I still can’t see the arch. It can’t be more than a tenth of a mile to go. I round a turn, and then another. I see the clock. Is that 3:59:xx or 3:58:xx? It doesn’t matter, I’m safe on the chip time. I start to sprint it in (for low enough values of sprint). It turns out to have been 3:58; the clock reads 3:59:06 as I cross. I remember to stop my watch, as I almost never do, and I see that I had plenty of cushion – 3:57:04. Pretty sure I was sub-nine for the last mile. I accept my finisher’s medal from a young volunteer. It’s massive. It has the image of a train on it.

I take a water bottle and go off in search of pizza. I liberate a slice of cheese and find a quiet place to sit and eat it. I am overcome.

***

“Hey Boss?”
“Yes?”
“You know that North Carolina marathon coming up? The one I said I was bailing on?”
“Mm-hmm?”
“I’m thinking I might unbail on it…”

Reston, Virginia, March 3 2013

Ambitious goal – 1:15:00
Fallback goal – Beat The Cat and/or set a PR

I’ve been hobbled by a knee injury the past couple months and haven’t really been training. Could be tendonitis, could be something else. It’s been improving very gradually, and I was planning to use this race as a benchmark to gauge whether the knee might hold up for the Tobacco Road Marathon in a couple weeks. It mostly felt pretty good during the race, only really bothering me around miles 3 to 4. But immediately after stopping it started screaming at me, and didn’t let up for more than 48 hours. It’s just now getting manageable. I’ve got an appointment with the orthopedist on Thursday.

On the plus side, I felt strong throughout the whole race. I think I kept my mile splits pretty consistent after adjusting for wind and elevation. I normally drag the last couple miles of a race of this distance, but they seemed to fly by this time.

Finish time: 1:18:43, a new PR.

Miles this race – 10
Miles raced in 2013 – 16.2

LEESBURG, Virginia, January 1 2013

Ambitious goal – 50:00
Fallback goal – Not to PW

The weather was tolerable. I only felt cold while waiting for The Boss and her friends to finish. The race does not publish a course map, but the course had been advertised to us by those who’d run it previously as “hilly”. It lived up to this billing.

Given the expected nature of the course and the fact that my training had been lax to non-existent over the past month, I decided that 50 minutes was a reasonable goal. As usual starting out, I lost seconds trying to get around lumbering morons who had situated themselves in the front of the pack before the gun and then proceeded to spread out across the course and slowly jog along. The first few hundred yards was downhill through a grassy, open field, so it didn’t take too long to clear around the jam and settle into a reasonable pace.

I felt pretty good for the first three miles. The hills didn’t seem that bad. According to my watch I was at about 23:50 at the halfway point – a cushion of about 1:10. Things changed rapidly after that, though. The real hills started making their appearance near the end of the fourth mile. They were not super-steep, but they were steep enough, and long. My pace dropped to the high eights, and even the high nines on one particularly tough rise. Each time I’d start wheezing up a hill I’d resolve to abandon the sub-50:00 goal. “Fifty and change is good enough; at least there’s no real danger of a PW [54:07+].” Then of course I’d get my wind back pounding the downslope and resolve to run it in hard.

With about half a mile to go I was at around 45:30. Just a 9:00 pace needed to break 50. I admit I eased up a little at this point – no possibility of a PR, almost certain to beat my stated goal, why kill yourself? I did try to sprint in the last hundred yards or so, though, and finished in 49:30.

It’s always a good race when you surpass your goals, even if the goals are a little unambitious. There were two additional bonuses this time around:

–The Boss beat her PR by some 20 seconds. Given that her PR was set on a dead flat course, this was a big achievement.

–Just after I finished and grabbed a water bottle I turned around to see who was coming in behind me. A young, tall, slender woman, all kitted out in running gear, crossed the line and wobbled over to the side of the finishing area. She started to double over and raise her hand to her mouth.

Me: “Wait for it, wait for it. . .”
YTSWAKoiRG: “Blagrhghrghrh!”
Me: “Yes!”

I may be old, fat and bald but I finished ahead of you. And you puked.

Miles this race – 6.2
Miles raced in 2013 – 6.2

I thought I might not get chicked.

I’ve never avoided getting chicked in a race with official results. I’ve been close – twice I’ve come in ahead of the second place female, but behind the first. I was thinking I had a pretty good shot for most of the race today.

In the end, not only did I get chicked, I also got wienered. Sucks to be me.

The Boss and I did this race last year. The Survivor was there with us, but did not race. There were only 69 finishers in the 2011 version, so I got a good view of all of them as we lined up to start. Off to my right was a kid wearing a hot dog suit, and I took it in mind that I was not going to lose to a frankfurter. And in the end, I kept that promise (Hard to make out the seconds, but a close inspection of the clock shows that I finished first):

Me

The Wiener

Kids get faster, though, and all I’m getting is older, fatter and balder. He wound up cutting some five minutes off his time this time around, and finished comfortably ahead of me.

This time around we set out fast. My watch recorded a maximum pace of 5:11 per mile, but nobody held this too long. Within the first half mile I had settled in with a small group in the low to mid sevens. A couple of young ladies passed me early on, but I went back by them pretty quickly.

The race seemed shorter than it did last year. I’m pretty sure it was the same course, but I think I’m a little fitter this year, so the second half didn’t seem to stretch out so long. All along the course I could hear the girls I’d passed chatting with each other, and I tried to judge my lead by their volume. There are three big hills on the course, including one just before the finish line. On the first two of these my pace plummeted down to the mid eights, and I heard the girls creeping up on me as they nimbly flew up the slopes. I was able to wheeze back out to what sounded like a decent lead on the downs, though.

In the last couple miles I was passed by only one male runner, and I managed in turn to reel a few in. With about three quarters of a mile to go the volume of the voices behind me started creeping insidiously up and I got chicked at about the 4.5 mile mark. I’d already decided that if they passed me there was no point in trying to hang – I knew I’d just fall back on that final hill.

My goal had been to finish under 38 minutes, and as I came up to the finish line I saw that the clock had not yet ticked over to 37:00. A final dash under the arch and I finished in 36:52. A new 5 mile PR for me, but there was one final indignity – I finally managed to finish second in my age group, but the awards only went one deep.

Nothing for it but to get faster, I reckon

ApolloRay: Now, when you beat me, you beat me by one [half]… ONE [HALF]… second. Now do you know what something like that does to a man of my intelligence?

RockySteve: I thought you said you got over it.

ApolloRay: I lied.

The race by numbers:

1000 – Exact number of finishers that I beat
663 – Total elevation gain in feet
507 – Number of men I beat
150 – Miles the starting line was from my house
51 – Number of times I got chicked
26 – Number of men 45 – 49 I beat
13.65 – Minutes shaved off my PR
7.77 – Miles I ran on the out-and-back course before I saw the sweep car coming the other way
5 – Hours I spent driving to/from the race site in excess of the hours I spent running
3.xx – Miles I ran on the out-and-back course before I saw the leaders coming the other way
2 – Cheese pizza slices eaten after the race
1.5 – Uphill miles leading up to the finish
1 – Number of kitted-out little kids who blew past me in the last mile

Metro Run & Walk have recently started a series of casual, low-key events with unusual distances and unofficial timing. Today was the “sweatfest 6k” – three laps around the old Lorton prison. One runner really got in the spirit of the race:

The good thing about these races, from the point of view of a duffer like me, is that the more serious runners tend to skip them. No prize money, no official finish times (although they do have a race clock running at the finish), no big deal. So I can generally get up closer to the front than I do in a bigger race.

“Ready, set, go!” Mark called, and we lit out down the road. I was the first runner off the line, and I stayed out front for a hundred yards or so. I was hearing a chorus of heavy breathing behind me, but only one guy passed me, a skinny, youngish dude whom I’d chatted with briefly in the registration line.

I was bracing to get passed again, as usually happens to me repeatedly over the first mile or so. But we rounded a curve and came to a large downhill followed by a foreboding up. I know that I am decent on climbs, so I bombed down the slope, leaned into the up, and cranked up it in high gear.

When I was about halfway through the loop with no change in position I started composing my race report to The Boss (who had chosen to sleep in rather than race): “I was in second place through the first loop, but then people started passing me.” I had the leader in sight for most of that first lap, but he found another gear near the end of it, and I didn’t see him again until the finish.

The second time up that first big hill was the worst – the first time my legs were still fresh, and the third time I was done with it, but on the second ascent there was still one more dispiriting iteration looming. On the other hand, I still had not lost my 2nd place position, so I powered up it as best I could.

“Boss, I was doing well,” I mentally revised my race report, as I pointedly refrained from looking back behind me. “I was in second place through two laps, but then people started passing me.”

I lapped quite a few walkers on the end of their first lap as I was finishing my second. I came back to the start and gratefully accepted a cup of water from the volunteer there.

Then it was back to the big hill. I saw a small knot of kids walking up it and caught them near the top. “That hill was bad enough the first time,” I said, “three times is just torture.” They expressed emphatic agreement.

I kept thinking I heard breathing or footsteps behind me, but I still didn’t want to look back. Around halfway through this loop I started to lap some of the faster walkers and slower runners on their second time through. The dude in the convict outfit said something encouraging as I huffed by him. “I’m about done in, dude!” was all I could manage as a reply, but I was starting to think I might make it.

I wheezed up the last climb, passed a couple people rounding the last corner, and powered down a short hill to the finish. The clock read 31:xx, I don’t remember exactly. Not a blistering pace, but fast enough on this day. I shook the winner’s hand, “Good race, man.” He’d actually improved his pace in the later loops and beaten me by some four minutes.

I shook the hands of more finishers as they came in. “I kept seeing you up around the next bend, but I just couldn’t catch you, man!” I was glad to finally get to experience some of the camaraderie among the top finishers. I hung around and enjoyed cheering some of the other runners in.

After partaking of the decent post-race spread I made my way back through the uncrowded parking lot to my car. “I was,” I texted The Boss, “the 2nd finisher.”

“I changed my mind,” The Boss said as she staggered into the living room, “I think I might want to do that again next year.”

———————————————
TWENTY HOURS EARLIER….

“Omygod. No way am I ever doing that again. I’m done with running, maybe forever. Oh my God. Ow.”

“Meh, I always say the same thing after a long, punishing race. You might change your mind – after a while you’ll forget the pain and just remember how you felt at the finish line. Give it twenty hours or so…”

———————————————
ONE AND A HALF HOURS EARLIER….

———————————————
EIGHT AND A HALF HOURS EARLIER….

“You’re leaving before breakfast?” the desk clerk at the Carnegie Inn asked incredulously. Apparently we were missing out on something special. “We have a race to get to,” The Boss called over my shoulder, and I added “Afraid so”.

The start of the Rothrock Challenge was waiting for us some 12 miles down the road, and we had no time to fool around with brûléed oatmeal and asiago cheese omelets. I tossed the clerk the key, swiped the receipt out of her hand, and set out for the parking lot.

We arrived with plenty of time to spare, although the extra time wound up being consumed by trips back to the car for sunblock, bug spray, a change of shirt, and various other forgotten items. The lines for the portajohns were not bad, but The Boss still wound up getting stranded in one when the starting whistle blew. The race had chip timing, but only at the finish line, so she did lose a few seconds.

I knew my training was off. I had even briefly considered skipping the race altogether; my right hip had been bothering me since an ill-advised two-half-marathon weekend two weeks prior, and I had already lost months of quality running after breaking a wrist in early February. In the end I decided that 30k was short enough to get through on grit alone, even considering the difficulty of the course

I had decided that five hours was a reasonable ambitious goal given my current level of fitness. I was hoping to take about an hour between each of the four aid stations, giving me an hour to stagger through the final ~2.5 miles. In an all-too-familiar pattern for me at distance events, this plan held together for more than half the race but fell apart in the end.

I set out at a pretty good clip (sub-8:00) along the initial section of road to the trail head. I knew there was a steep, mile-long hill at the start of the trail and I preferred to be the obstacle rather than the obstructed. This turned out to be about right – I was passed by a few ambitious runners, but mostly held my place. When we got to the summit there was a nice stretch of flat single-track, which was an absolute joy to run: the weather was near-perfect, and the trail was sublimely beautiful. It had rained hard the previous night and there were a few areas of mud and standing water, which I fastidiously ran around.

Of course, it wasn’t too long before I realized the futility of trying to keep my feet dry. There were bogs and mud pits throughout the middle 15k of the course that were unavoidable, and I was soon sloshing through them with abandon.

I hit the first aid station around mile 4 in just under an hour. Even with trudging up that mile of hill I was still under 15:00/M pace and feeling good. The second section was challenging as well, with lots of rocks starting to infest the trail, more climbing, plenty of mud, and some technical downhills. Still, I was through the second aid station and past mile 8 in under 2:00:00.

The third segment is more of a blur. I know I was still making OK time but I was starting to tire. Just before the third aid station there was a difficult climb down some rocks. It was dangerous enough that someone had installed ropes in several places for racers to cling to as they picked their way down. In one of these places I lost my footing and had to use the rope to right myself. This startled the lady below me, who was visibly (and audibly) nervous about the descent, and she scolded me for what she perceived as my carelessness.

At the bottom there was a large log, flattened along its top, bridging a sizable stream, followed quickly by AS3. I was just over 3 hours in at this point, and I figured the rocky descent had cost me at least 2 or 3 minutes. I was right on schedule.

But not for long. A few hundred yards past the aid station the path took a sharp left turn. This is where things started to get surreal. There was a young lady, not a racer, seated there at the turn. She had laid out a large pattern of small pink flowers around herself, with part of the pattern forming an arrow pointing the correct direction down the course. I paused briefly to admire the scene and then continued on to the rock scramble.

This was a hard slog. My legs were feeling the lack of training, and the climb was not easy. I found myself worrying about The Boss – how would she manage the rock slide and this crazy scramble? Should I head back to AS3 and wait for her so I could help her up the climb? I was about a third of the way up when I heard a series of shrill yelps and a separate set of harsh barks from far below and well off to my right. Had a dog been injured? Perhaps in a fight with another dog, or by falling off some rocky height? Should I go back down and check? I wasn’t confident I could even locate the source of the sounds. I decided to continue on.

A short time later I saw a dog with a scarf around its neck trotting up the rocks. It caught up to me, sniffed around for a bit, and continued up the scramble. I wasted a few moments in futile envy of its nimble, easy climbing. I don’t know if it was one of the dogs I’d heard.

When I got to the top of the rock climb I knew I was pretty much done. I didn’t have legs to run any more, and my feet were getting kind of blistery and sore. The Hoka Mafates I’d recently acquired had absorbed a lot of the impact, though. I think if the course had been drier my feet would have come through almost unharmed, and they felt fine the day after. My legs were a different story, however. From that point until AS4 I mostly walked in a zombie-like shuffle, although there were several nice, flat sections where I was able to run a couple hundred paces at a time before reverting to a reeling shamble.

After AS4 there was one final climb and then a long downhill stretch. I ran practically none of this. Then there was a long meandering flattish section over which I mostly walked, but occasionally busted out some air. I kept thinking the road was just ahead, but the course kept veering off just before exiting to pavement. Finally, I reached the road and broke into a hopeful, ragged jog. I saw a couple sitting on rock wall by the roadside with a dog, and I thought I heard the man explaining to someone in an aid vehicle that he had found the dog after it had been hit by a car. The dog looked not to be injured too bad, and I hoped it was the one I’d heard yelping earlier.

From the point where I left the trail it was no more than a half mile or so to the finish, but I regret to say I didn’t manage to run all of it. In my memory we’d run uphill all the way from the start to the trail head, but now I was heading up another big hill. If I’d known how close I was to the end I’d’ve probably been able to run it all, but I was demoralized by the unexpected and baffling upslope, and I wound up walking maybe a couple hundred yards or so.

When I recognized the turn to the finish I was able to break into a decent jog, and I crossed the finish line in 5:41:15.8, tossing salutes to the knots of charitably cheering spectators. The last 6.x miles had taken me very nearly as long as the first 12.

Now it remained only to scarf as many calories as possible and wait for The Boss. I did manage to totter back to the car and grab my phone in order to capture her finish. The post-race spread consisted of pizza and Subway and barbecue and baked beans and potato salad and cole slaw and chocolatey, peanut-buttery “recovery bars” and sodas and water and powerade, and I consumed near ’bout one of everything.

I was still somewhat worried about The Boss. She was even more undertrained than I was. Had she managed the rock slide and climb? Had she fallen and brained herself on some stony outcropping? Had she lost a shoe in a bog? Had her legs given out on the final uphill? I was tense and concerned, but I knew she’d conquered a similar course last year in worse weather.

I don’t mind admitting that my eyes were less than completely dry as I saw her coming down to the finish. I normally have to scold her for walking with the end in sight, but she ran it all the way in this time. She swapped her chip for a finisher’s medal, and a hearty embrace ensued. Her time was measured at 7:21:39.9, only some 5 minutes slower than her time at the 5k shorter Hyner View Trail Challenge last year, and ahead of 20 finishers (and, I assume, some number of DNFs).

They had run out of plates and most of the food. The Boss managed to get a paltry amount of barbecue on a bun, and a cup full of side dishes. It turns out that a generous runner had provided her with some kind of electrolyte concentrate when she’d had cramping issues in the latter part of the course. She introduced him and I shook his hand. We waited to see the finish of a woman we’d chatted with before the race. We weren’t sure when she’d be coming in, and we almost decided to leave, but finally The Boss sighted her rounding the turn to the finish and we cheered her in. We limped back to the car, changed our clothes and shoes, luxuriated in the glow of our achievement for a few moments…

…and The Boss and I set out through the Pennsylvania hills towards home.