Experience and Bullshit

In life, experience and bullshit can carry one through many situations that you're otherwise unprepared for. The question this weekend is, can it carry me through a 50 mile race? I'm pretty good at wingin' it, in general. This weekend I may be testing that presumption a little bit. And this time, oddly enough, it wasn't supposed to be this way. My base training was great. Then I got sick.

After spending most of March with some weird illness, my only chance was to quickly build up enough reserve so that my body can handle the pounding of 50 miles. With less than 50 miles of TOTAL training over the previous 6 weeks, here's the plan I've attempted.

April 7 - Ran about 3 miles of flat in support of Sandee's challenge. I'd hoped to do more but illness was lingering.

April 8 - Ran Little Pine mtn, about 12-14 miles of mainly technical trail, with about 4,000' of gain. Felt okay and, on the summit, it was the first time I'd felt "normal" in over a month.



April 9 - went climbing

1oth - easy ride

12th - Ran 4 hours w/ Sandee. Heaps of elevation gain, very technical trail. Fitness is okay given the circumstance but my lower back is hurting from too much too soon on Little Pine.

13th - Ran and easy trail for about 6 miles. Lower back still bad

14th - went climbing

15th - pretty tired, worried a tad about another relapse, went climbing.

16th - tired, so just walked a bit and stretched and iced.

17th - last chance to run. Did 7 miles of easy technical trail and felt pretty good. Back soreness has subsided. No real injuries. Certain that I can handle 25 miles but 50, at any sort of pace beyond survival, seems highly unlikely.

Today off to give my project one last try (climbing) then heading east. The "race" this weekend will be on slickrock, 50 miles, with nearly 10,000' of elevation gain. Normally, this is the type of terrain I'd love, but with two months of soft snow running, a month off, and the above "base" I'd say I'm hoping for a miracle.

pics: Phoebe on the summit of Little Pine, the trail in spring conditions, Phoebe cooling off.