It's About the Voyage

Two weeks after struggling through an easy run at the 1/2 Voyageur, I laced up the ol' trail shoes again for the full Voyageur -- a 50 mile trail run from Carlton, MN to Duluth and back. The course, for those who have never run it, has a little of everything, including technical single-track, wide well-groomed trails, mudpits, creek crossings, steep descents dotted with rickety bridges, plenty of rocks and roots, and some paved road and bike path. It is a true test of trail running prowess. I don't think it's an accident that Scott Jurek, 7-time Western States 100 champ, holds the record.

A couple weeks of drier weather, plus the trampling of a few hundred feet, did wonders for the course...until it started raining mid-race. I had a very enjoyable run and am glad I decided to run. Andy Holak and crew did a great job in putting everything together. I can't say enough about how humbling it is to have volunteers out there literally all day. On the same note, my wife Taj came out for her first ultra crewing experience, and helped me out so much along the way. Towards the end I started to just to look forward to seeing her again at the next aid station.  Charlie and Sierra, two of our dogs, accompanied her and did a fine job licking the salt off me.

The race itself...

I ran with Brian P. for the first few miles. We chatted and caught up to John Storkamp after a few miles. Dusty Olson and Chris Gardner were out of sight from the get-go. Brian fell back after a bit, wisely listening to his body. Storkamp and I were close until the powerlines (after 10 miles), where he snuck away from me a little bit. I was running by myself, feeling good, eating a gel every 30 minutes in very dutiful fashion. This was a major accomplishment for me. After my first 50k last year, I was laughed at for commenting that I had taken two gels during the race, but that the second one didn't go down well, so it was actually more like one and a half. The seasoned ultra guys I was with thought that was pretty funny.

The only hiccup on the way out was that my left foot was starting to hurt. It was not bad, but still that is a little scary 15 miles into a 50 mile run. So at 18 miles or so, I stopped in the aid station to change my shoes. I put on the New Balance 759 that I had gotten from Kurt K. at New Balance via TC Running Company. They're light and flexible, and for the next 14 miles (to the turnaround and back) they were ideal. There's a lot of road and gravel road-type surfaces on that stretch, so they worked great.

At the turn-around, I realized I was actually very near the lead of the race. I had sort of been running along in my own world, not having seen another competitor in many miles. I was a few minutes behind Gardner, and very close to both Dusty and Storkamp. Neither of them looked very good at that point. After passing the halfway point in 3:23, I also realized that I was on a pretty nice pace. So I got motivated and quickly passed Storkamp and Dusty, and decided I'd try to catch Gardner before the powerlines. I cut the lead from 5 minutes down to a little over a minute, which was encouraging. Still, I knew that the less technical section was my strong suit, while the technical stuff would favor him.

My energy was great and it was still relatively cool...actually it was raining. It dawned on me that the trails were going to be tougher going and a bit slippery on the way back, but I didn't think much of it. I could have changed my shoes again, but the idea of running another 18 miles on shoes that were aggravating my plantar fasciitis seemed pretty stupid.

Just after the opportunity to switch shoes came and went, I hit a section of trail that left me sliding down the trail in the wrong direction...repeatedly! I finally figured out that I needed to go off to the side of the trail, grab grass, branches and anything else, and literally crawl up the hills, which I did on numerous occasions, before even reaching the powerlines. On the powerlines, I had actually become fairly adept at the crawl, so I didn't suffer too bad. However, this technique led to my arms being the most sore part of my body in the days after the race.

As I struggled forward (and sometimes backward), I kept hearing the voice of Paul Sherwen, one of the Tour de France commentators. He was saying things like, "Well, Phil, the impetus has really gone out of him now...He's just hoping to drag himself home now..."

It did give me some solace to see the tracks of Gardner along the trail...he had obviously done his share of sliding around and falling down as well. He still managed to finish in 6:55, one of the few sub-7:00 times ever, and the first in a very long time. I don't care what shoes I was wearing -- no one was going to catch him on that day. I came through in 2nd in 7:13, with Dusty behind me in 7:26, and then Brian running a very steady 7:52. Congrats to Valeria of TC Running Co. for her fourth place finish. I'm going to guess she holds the Voyageur record for an Argentina native.

Coming up...

I got a call on Tuesday informing me that a spot had opened up on the USA Mountain Running team, for the World Mountain Running Championships in Kamnick, Slovenia. Fortunately, I recovered quickly from the 50 miler (even my arms are feeling okay now!), and have turned my attentions toward training for this race. It's a real honor to be selected for international competition, so I'm very excited to have the opportunity. More on this race in the posts ahead...