San Diego 100

It was the San Diego 100 mile endurance run. Runs like these are designed to test even the best of runners. On mostly dirt, single track trails through the desert and mountains, climbing and descending time after time, it is a battle between you and the elements, but mostly it is a battle with yourself. Designed to take well prepared athletes between 24 and 32 hours, even the world’s fastest ultra runners will take around 17 hours to complete the grueling course, twice as long as the fastest Kona IronMan races. If you enter into a race like this, it is because you are interested in pushing more than just your physical limits. You are out testing your mental endurance, and exploring the depths of your running spirit.

Prior to the race, I felt well rested and uninjured, but my runner’s knee had only just subsided by about 2 days. It was great excitement to arrive at the race start the day before and meet the other runners. No race I’ve done ever had this kind of small, close knit community. I have never been so nervous as I was the day and night before the start of the race, knowing that it would be the hardest and longest and that I wouldn’t sleep again until the following day. It was very hard to sleep, and it was so hot and dry on that mountain, I went to bed with a headache that wouldn’t stop and I feared would still be there when the gun fired. It wasn’t until around midnight that I finally got up and went to the refrigerator to crack open a coconut water which did the trick. As I lay in bed, I entertained myself by rubbing various blanket fabrics together on my bed. You could see the static electricity discharge as I did so, a phenomenon I’d only noticed once before. My blankets lit up like a bioluminescent creature.

The race itself was the hardest event I’ve attempted, and the only one I never finished. It was hot and dry and at altitudes above 4k feet. The trail was unforgiving and littered with loose rocks. I got stuck behind a congo line of people on single track at the beginning and didn’t want to pass anyone for waste of energy, but plenty of people wanted to pass me, so I would have to step aside. I was worried about pushing too fast a pace early on. It was already warm and the day would get hot, near 100 degrees fahrenheit. I met a guy named Chase and we ran the congo line together for a bit. He told me a story about the Gold Rush hotel he was staying in, which had a journal in his room detailing all the hauntings that had taken place there. I suffered a nose bleed and got blood on my hand. I was already feeling my knee, and wondering if I could manage it for 100 miles. I recited Scott Jurek’s mantra in my mind. Can I take another step? Yes, then I can keep going.

I ran and walked through the first two aid stations. A guy at the second asked me how much water and salt I had been taking and he said I should double what I was doing. I ran with Bill (who finished i around 25 hours) and another guy, I can’t remember his name, until we caught up with Ashley. I stayed with Ashley until the third aid station then went ahead toward the fourth, at about mile 24. This is when it began to get hot, and The Jester passed me. I passed a couple runners but began to get passed more than I passed. I met up with Nathan (who also finished) who was really struggling in the heat. He wasn’t carrying much water. I tried to offer him some tips I have learned about surviving heat, like holding water in your mouth, taking off your (wet) hat and waving it in the air to cool it, etc. I was helped tremedously by a water beed bandana I borrowed from Ashley, when stayed around my neck, and a collapsible bpa free plastic cup the race had given us, which I was filling with water from my camelbak and dumping on my head from time to time as I walked. We passed a couple creek crossings which offered Nathan the chance to cool off and we ran toward the Noble Canyon aid station. This is where I saw Anders Dahl and learned of the 5 mile loop and upcoming popsicle treat. I took 5 minutes or so at the aid station and wandered off without a word up the hill following (I thought) Nathan who I had been running with. It was a paved road section and Nathan was flying up it, and I wasn’t surprised since he had told me about the multiple road 100 mile runs he had done. I guess he liked roads. I hated them. I tried to run on the dirt on the side. Somewhere along this 2 mile climb I began to wonder if I had gone the right way, and if that really was Nathan up ahead. But it was so hot, I tried not to think. Just trudge onward and stay cool as much as possible.

I arrived at the top and got my popsicle and surveyed the people and noted that Nathan was not among them. These guys all looked really fast. That’s cause they are 5 miles ahead of me, I thought. I said nothing. I knew I had missed the loop. There were no race officials at this aid station so I would have to get to the next one to learn my fate. I inspected my feet, found no blisters, and continued onward, now pretty depressed about the mistake I had made. I finally wanted to talk to someone about it, so I ran up to a kid after he passed me. I saw him drop a bag of salt pills and I brought them up. He confirmed about the loop and suggested I try to finish the race anyway. Someone called from behind and he went runing back. I did’t hear what they said, but I continued going. I don’t know why I never got suspicious that no one passed me, that there were no course markings or footprints in the ground. I continued on up a hill for at least 15 minutes and arrived at a fork in the road with no indication which way to go and knew then that I was off course. I turned back and ran down the hill, very pissed off at myself. I was hugging the cliff side and happened upon a rattle snake. I startled it and it startled me and I doubled my pace to fly away from it. I think I was about 6 feet from it when I noticed it.

The Pioneer Mail aid station had a huge number of spectators so I picked up my pace, smiled and made it look easy as I came in. They applauded and noted how fresh I looked. I have the ability to make myself look like I just started running deep into the race, even when I’m feeling terrible, but only as long as people are looking. They asked me my name and number when I arrived and said they needed to have a talk with me. A man gave me the bad news about disqualification but said I could do whatever I wanted. Stop, or keep going. I believe they assumed I would stop. I rested for 10 minutes and told them I would continue on.

I was so far behind schedule that I arrived at Sunrise aid station about 30 minutes after nightfall in pitch dark, meaning I was fumbling over trail without a light for that long. The race co-director was there waiting for me when I arrived at the aid station. I was surprised to have them tell me I wouldn’t be allowed to continue, after the previous aid station said I could continue under the stipulation that a finish wouldn’t be considered official. I was mentally prepared to go one more aid station, but it was a relief as well as a disappointment to have them make the decision for me that I must stop.

I was pulled for inadvertently cutting part of the course, but I would not have made it even if I had stayed on course. I was injured. Even without that, I don’t think I was prepared for the difficulty of this distance, so I am glad I got a taste of how this distance will break your resolve, so I am familiar and know what to expect next time. The mind will be searching for any way out. There is a side that wants to stop and another that wants to finish, and really you have to be willing to suffer if you want to finish the whole distance. I only hope that I will be able to run at least 51 of the 100 miles. At this event, I think I ran no more than 20 of the 49 miles, and that’s just depressing. It was that hard. I couldn’t have increased that ratio even without the runner’s knee. It was too hot, dry, hilly and rocky and my pace was dismal. More training, and a cooler day would permit a faster pace.

The woman who cut my wristband was none other than the same Jennifer Henderson who had passed me in another race I had gone awry at: my first Palm Springs half ironman. I had run and talked with her at the end of the run before she passed me right before the finish line. She was a bad water finisher who blew me away that day. Here she was putting me out of my misery at my first 100 miler. Small world.

In the aftermath of the SD100, physically I suffered from runner’s knee and my big toenail threatened to fall off. I stayed healthy and slept without pain the following night. I only had 49 miles, but it was the longest continuous bout of movement I’ve ever done, 14 hours. I wish I could figure out how to put in lots of training miles but I have suffered relentlessly from various injuries throughout my running life. My runner’s knee persists at the moment I am writing this, and I haven’t run at all since the race. I’ve iced and massaged and rested but it stays with me and forces me to avoid running and cycling.

The mind will be searching for any way out. There is a side that wants to stop and another that wants to go on. The question is which side will win. I will be back to the 100 mile distance, and my quest for the proverbial maltese falcon will continue.

So much has happened since last I blogged! Other than a three day backpacking trip in the Sespe, and several Saturdays I spent at the Mt. Wilson Observatory training to be a docent (which it turns out I am too busy this year to go through with) April was pretty much exclusively a month of mellow mountain trail running, but then travel and racing stepped into high gear.

First of all, it has been awesome not having to report to a job! But it has also been frustrating dealing with traffic while theoretically people should be at work, and not having the company of my friends who have jobs, but I have made friends with some people who have weekdays free like me, and spent some time with my dad who is retired. I don't miss working, and I am gaining some valuable insights into how I want to live when I eventually do return to work.

The docent training I underwent is worthy of mention. The Mt Wilson Observatory is one of the premiere observatory sights in the world, and is the place where Edwin Hubble conducted his work on the expanding universe. I attended 4 all day training sessions to learn all about the history of the observatories and the people who worked there. I met Don Nicholson, who is the 90 something year old son of an astronomer who is famous for co-discovering the Hale Nicholson Law of the sun, and was himself a resident of the mountain throughout much of its history, which makes him perhaps the greatest living historian on the mountain. I met Dave Jurasevich who gave Huell Howser the tour on that episode of California's Gold, and a big group of volunteers who thrilled me with their enthusiasm and knowledge on subjects of astronomy and the machinery therein used. This is one of the best kept secrets of Los Angeles and I recommend you make the long drive up there on a weekend afternoon, eat at the cafe, and go on a tour of this amazing place.

I did an ultra ragnar that left me with a tight IT band on my left leg. This persisted for several weeks and jeopardized my 100 mile training. I did one long run in spite of it, a double ascent of Mt. Wilson with Ashley. That was hard! It was a hot day, 29 miles and 12,000 feet of climbing. My IT band didn't seem to bother me very much on that, but in the aftermath it was as bad as ever, so much so that I would barely be able to run 1 mile in a few days.

The thick of things  began with a trip to Wildflower where I was racing the long course triathlon for the third time, and managing meals for the contingent of California Triathlon folk camping out for the race. On the drive up, I stopped over at UCSB for a short run on my old college stomping grounds. I went out in my running sandals, but barely made it a mile when it pretty much became unbearable to run. I walked back on the sand along the beach. This was disconcerting since I had a half ironman triathlon in 4 days. So I arrived a few days early and secured a camping site, but realized quickly that it would be better to try and camp with San Diego Tri Club, like we did the previous year. I stopped by to confirm that this would be ok, and Julie Moss was there to greet me. She is the woman who crawled across the finish line of the IronMan in Hawaii in the 1980s. At first I didn't recognize her, even though I had seen her the year before, she was so nice and personable, asking all sorts of questions and wanting to hang out.

The next day, I did a practice bike ride. My seat tilted forward and my shift lever came loose. I broke the shift lever trying to re-seat it  by rotating it without remembering that the wire ran underneath the bar tape on the outside of the bar (which is sad because I put it there) and pulled the electric cable loose. I had to take the bike into town to fix the seat, but there was no replacement available for the shifter lever. I would have to race without it. While I was driving out, I saw a sight I took as an omen: a large bald eagle swooped down and grabbed what I think was a dead rabbit, road kill, from the road in front of me. It flew to the side, chased by 2 hawks, and flew alongside my car for about 10 seconds. Low and behold, I left my front wheel in the parking lot of the bike shop and didn't realize it until the next day, the day before race day. I am a lucky one that the store had it and it was ok, and I had to make the 2 hour round trip into town to get it back.

Race day was disappointing for me. I had my usual stomach problems in the water and felt weak on the bike. It was hot, and I didn't have much motivation during the run. I think I walked half of it, and finished with my slowest ever half ironman time. I made friends with a Canadian engineering student at mile 11 and ran the last 2 miles with him. He had crashed on the bike during the race the previous year, which required an airlift to the hospital. It was cool to finish the race running with him. Kind of knocked me into a different perspective on my own situation.

Since I was already farther north, it was high time to visit my friend Brenden, living near Humboldt. I made the drive north, calling home on the way to be reminded of the fact that I had borrowed my mother's cast iron skillet for the camping, and that I had left it at the camp site. This thing was like a hundred years old and belonged to my great grandmother. Ugh. I was 3 hours away when I remembered, and we believed it would have been picked up by then, so I continued the drive, past San Francisco, enjoying a great breakfast along the bay in Sausalito. The terrain turned from dry vineyard to lush green and I entered the Red Woods. Brenden lived in the middle of nowhere town of Petrolia which was very pretty, I thought rather like parts of France. I had a great week of relaxing up there, fishing and surfing, and eating healthy food.

I wasn't about to miss the bachelor trip to Nicaragua he had coming up the following week, even if it might mean getting too few training miles in before the San Diego 100. We all met up the following week at the airport in LA. Brenden, his dad, mutual friend Pat and the bride to be's father were all in on the trip. I met Phil, the bride's father, who was himself a Hawaii resident and former crew member for various Badwater ultramarathoners including his wife Kari, as well as the famous Marshal Ulrich.

Arriving in Managua, I was delighted to be in a warm, humid tropical climate. We were greeted and brought to our hotel. We rented a Toyota Helix the next morning and made the 3 hour or so drive to Playa Santana, a secure, modern resort destination, where we were staying in some mansion of a house. The best thing about the trip? Climbing palm trees for coconuts and hacking them up with a machete to drink and eat. All the coconuts you could ask for, free!

We took a surfing safari to Astillero beach, which the local surf shop recommended for the surf, but cautioned us was a little unsafe. It sounded like as long as we paid to park in this secured lot we would be ok. The plan was to do surf photography and always have at least one guy on the shore to man the fort. The whole day of surfing went down without a hitch, other than one man who Patrick saw carrying a machete. Down there, machetes are very common so he didn't think much of it. We were walking back to the truck, Brenden 30 feet ahead of me and Patrick 30 feet behind me. We were all carrying our boards and probably looking tired. I had my camera bag in my left arm. I saw two teenage local kids walking the opposite direction. They looked friendly, so I smiled a hello. The one in front eyes my bag and yanks it. I was stunned for a couple of seconds then gave chase, but he pointed back with a gun so I gave up. Patrick and Brenden were chasing in spite of the gun so I decided to resume the chase too. The kid took a hard slip and fall on the rocks and I thought Patrick had him, but he got up and made it onto the sand. At this point I was chasing him in my huaraches but Pat and Brended were barefoot and the sand was hot. I was closing in on the kid but he looked back, saw me and made a retreat into the thick of cacti and brush along the beach. I reluctantly followed but they had already disappeared. I really didn't know which way they had gone, and I still didn't know that the gun had been a fake, and I suspected they might have other weapons so I quickly gave up looking. We were understandably upset that we had failed, and I realized I lost a $3,500 camera.

It is ironic, but being the one who lost his camera, I was the least interested in this group of 5 in continuing to look for those kids. I had already given up, but these guys wanted to drive around and look for the kids. We started driving around in parts of the sticks that it really did not look like we wanted to be, and we even happened upon the house of the guy Patrick had seen carrying the machete on the beach, and we had our suspicions. Now, the kid who robbed me of my camera had dropped his plastic gun and his backpack which we kept as evidence. So we showed it to the machete guy at his house and tried to explain what had happened, but this went nowhere. The next idea was to find the police station and try to get a police report.

We found the police station with the help of some townsfolk and I made may case against the kids as best I could with the help of the guys. It wasn't easy, as the police knew no English and we sucked at our Spanish. We got most of the main points across and understood that the police wanted us (me) to go with them in their truck to the sight of the crime. So we waited about an hour for their truck to get there, then I got in and our truck followed. Brenden rode in the back seat of the truck with me, and two of the officers got in the bed with their AK47s. We broke speed records on the dirt roads back to the beach while the police truck utilized its sirens and blared techno music.

We arrived near the crime site and I was walking ahead of the police, another group of surfers saw and guessed correctly that I had been the victim of theft and had brought the police back. One of their guys knew English and Spanish fluently and explained to me that he had his car keys stolen a few days earlier. Evidently, he had bought them back for $40 at one of the restaurants nearby. This gave me hope and I asked if he thought I could buy my camera back and he thought I could. I never got the specific information from him which restaurant he went to. We tried several of them two days later, but I don't know if it was because of my poor Spanish, not finding the right person(s) or because I was a gringo, but it never went anywhere. We only found blank faces and suggestions we talk to the police.

I want to bring home the point the our experience in Nicaragua was very positive on the whole. This incident, and a little traffic violation we had to pay, were the only remotely negative things that happened on the trip, and I want to point out that it could have been much worse. The people were friendly on the whole. The food was cheap and delicious. The country was beautiful. I saw how a third world country is for the first time, and I am glad to know that there are still places in the world like this where we can safely travel. It's both refreshing and a little bit depressing, but eye opening.

Now I am anxiously awaiting and preparing for my big event, the San Diego 100 mile endurance run. This is the culmination of everything I have learned about running and human spirit. I anticipate being rattled to the core, and pushing myself to the brink of exhaustion, the point of wanting to give up, farther than I have ever been, and I hope to find some reason to endure beyond those moments of despair and finish 100 miles with a smile on my face and tears of joy in my eyes.

Night Walk

I began a walk at the foot of the San Gabriel mountains Tuesday evening before sunset that I intended to take me high into the mountains, not to return until after the sun rose again. This was an exercise in staying up for 24 hours and moving alone in the dark over dirt trails, as I will have to do to run 100 miles in June. I chose this night for the full moon and pleasant temperatures we have had. My willingness to go through with this was irresolute even before I began. I was already feeling sore from workouts over the previous days, and thought I may have been doing too much not yet a month out from the ironman, so I was far from fresh, but I told myself that was the better to simulate how I'll feel on the 100 mile day.

I parked at the top of lake and walked up to Mount Lowe by the time the moon crested the horizon. I dreaded the thought that I wouldn't stop my walk until that moon set in the west. It made beautiful light on the mountains though and I walked usually with my headlamp turned off. Sometimes tree cover or technical terrain made me turn it on. I saw a tarantula that didn't like my light. At one point, passing through a tunnel in the mountainside, I turned on my lamp only to be horrified in seeing dozens of millipedes that were walking on the ground. I turned the lamp back off.

It was earily quiet in the mountains, the wind still. Not even crickets. From the top, near the observatory, I watched as the blanket of clouds formed over the city and blocked in the lights. I walked along singletrack and when there were forks I explored some of the paths I've never tried before. I constantly fought the desire to return to my car and drive to a warm bed, and even thoughts of lying down on the ground to sleep. My mind was coming up with excuses, like the typhoid vaccination med I needed to take in the morning for my Africa trip, to return and make sure I had that empty stomach I was supposed to take it on. This is exactly why I was doing this walk; to explore all the things your mind will do to get you to stop. In the end, I did give in and it would have been over a lot sooner if not for the fact that I had walked a long way from the car and had to get back. I had caved in by about 1:30 am, but didn't get to me car until 5:30. I thought I would be back by 4:30 but I was farther out than I knew. Still, I was at least an hour short of sunrise. I'm glad I stopped because I faught to stay awake driving home, and I did need to take that last typhoid vaccine pill. I have a mind to try this again in April, next full moon, or I might just go for the 24 hour walk.

Sunset, planning to go til sunrise

Moonrise

Tarantula

Au revoir DreamWorks

It seems like it was only yesterday that I began working with the folks at DreamWorks Animation in Glendale, Ca. I remember how proud I was to be working as a full time employee at a position I had sought after throughout college and alway imagined so difficult to attain, what with the awesome nature of the work, and every fan boy computer scientist and art student I assumed would be competing with me for the job. It was with much apprehension that I approached the job hunt after graduating college with nothing yet lined up. I had a degree, a temporary gig coding open source RenderMan for Google/Aqsis, a resume that listed work experience from student computer support technician at UCSB to editorial intern at Pixar, and a heart full of desire to work on awesome animated films, with the people I had come to revere through reading Siggraph papers and watching DVD special features. To me the environments at places like Pixar and DreamWorks looked like utopias where creative, friendly, and brilliant people collaborated, using art, science, mathematics and engineering to create movies.

It was at Siggraph 2007, two months after I graduated college, that I got my big break after hunting down DreamWorks' human resources desk and handing them my resume. I really did not expect a call from them. Pixar was my big hope, but I was happy to aim my sights at lesser known and therefore (I assumed, it seems, incorrectly) easier to get into shops like Laika. But in fact it was DreamWorks that called me up the next day and wanted an interview right there at Siggraph. That interview was surprisingly pleasant.

The train ride back to Ventura after that trip was something I will never forget. There I was on the train in a seat with an empty one next to me, feeling very content after my awesome week at Siggraph, where I had made new friends, partied on the aircraft carrier courtesy of Autodesk, attended lots of interesting talks, and interviewed with DreamWorks. I thought the week was over but a man who worked at DreamWorks asked if he could take the seat next to me. He told me his name and I recognized it, because I owned a copy of his book, Image Synthesis using RenderMan, by Satty Raghavachary. He told me about working at Dreamworks and at this point I felt it was destined that I would work there too. I was so excited!

I look back on over five years and am really happy to see that I worked on such a wide variety of things, and with such an incredible group of people. I worked with people who made the movies that I grew up on, like The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid and even The Jungle Book. I worked on state of the art camera capture tools, learned the tools they made Shrek with (and even Kung Fu Panda on mostly the same tools, incredibly antiquaited though they were for the time), I wrote probably hundreds of python scripts, became an industry expert in Maya, designed APIs, learned stereo movie making from the best people in the business, and saw how these films get made from almost beginning to end and worked in almost every department in the pipeline along the way. I really feel like I've seen a lot, and I haven't seen everything but for now I have seen enough and I know that the world out there is so big and I have a yearning to see that too.

I am forever grateful to those who demanded the most of me and never doubted that I could deliver even though sometimes I doubted myself. I may or may not return, but I feel content that I have inspired some of you to run, others to do triathlon, and I was in turn inspired in watching you rise to your endeavors. I will remember most the hallway conversations and lunch table discussions where we shared our weekend stories, complained about the process, and dreamed of bigger and better things.


IronMan New Zealand

Me at Craters of the Moon, a thermal area near lake Taupo, a few days before the race

I arrived in Auckland, New Zealand with my dad and we visitied my friend Tim Mitchell, an Auckland resident who I met in 2011 on my tour of the Alps in the Tour de France. Tim is a Kona IronMan athlete and completed IMNZ multiple times. On race morning Tim sent me a text which I read just before entering the water.

"Ironman is all about how you deal with the bad-patches - cause know there will be bad-patches mate ...
And whether that's a technical problem on the bike, accidentally dropping your specially prepared peanut-butter dates, or just your body saying "I've had enough", be prepared for them (ideally just the latter) ...
Also know everyone out there is dealing with them too. Cause Ironman is a race that you race against yourself (just like your 100-miler which blows me away) ... so again, your biggest challenge will be how you deal with the bad."

I don't know if Tim jinxed me with this little warning, but it stayed in my mind while dealing with the physical pains and discomforts of the race, and especially so when I suffered mechanical problems on the bike. It kept me calm and determined to fix the problems and keep on going.

So the race began before sunrise with a deep water start, all of is bobbing in the water waiting for the gun. I positioned myself middle-to-back. I had been in this water many times in the days before the race and found it to be the most pleasant swimming environment ever, with comfortable temperature, 25-foot visibility and water so clean you could drink it. The surface was smooth and we were off.

The bike was my least favorite part of the race. The chip-seal road surface is bumpy and uncomfortable. I was suffering my usual stomach issues and trying to get all my food down. That was my big goal for this race: to eat enough. Shortly after the half way point, I dismounted to take on new water at an aid station, and began eating from my special needs bag. I kept the bag out and continued riding, and emptied the bag. I remember thinking I was past the drop zone for trash, so I should stuff the empty bag in my shirt, and boy do I wish I had. I decided to discard it anyway, and the darn thing landed in my rear cogset. Its then plastic membrane formed a web over all of the cogs and got underneath the chain. I first tried picking it off but knew it would be easier to remove the wheel from the bike to be free of the chain. I did that and removed the bag, replaced the wheel. Riding again, up hill, I could heard bad sounds. I stopped again and looked. My rear break was stuck fully open, brushing against the crank. I had pulled the break cable free of its anchor point in the break, and the steel threading had unwound at the end, making it impossible to reset. It was not an option to ride on; the grinding would slow me way down and tear up my bike. I rode to an intersection manned by a volunteer and asked if she could get me a mechanic but she didn't have a comm unit. I knew I would have to work this out on my own, so with my bike upside down and my drink leaking from my aero bottle, I went to work taking the rear brake off. I managed to get it all off and stuffed it into my spare tube bag and mounted the bike again. Now I realized I couldn't shift. My thoughts turned to true dispair. I must have broken the electronics somehow. I could ride without a rear brake but no shifting? I'm done. Luckily this was an easy one. I had merely engaged the shift adjustment mode on my computer, I saw that the LED was lighted up so I pressed the button and had shifting again. Ok. 55 miles to go and then a marathon.

I think I spent about 30 minutes all told stopped, fixing these various problems. This break kind of changed the way I was approaching the race. I was now riding with the back of the pack. Before, I had been riding with some grinders, and having them pass me was affecting my pysche and making me ride harder than I wanted. Now I could ride at an easier clip and pass others, and that's what I did. I stopped two more times to use the restroom, eat and take on liquids. I finished the ride after 7 hours, right behind a 70 year old man.

The marathon was the highlight of my day. Well fed, and not too drained from the bike, I hit good form immediately, running out of the starting chute, a woman asked me, how come your legs are working? "I don't know, I said." I could see I was well behind. After each 8.3 mile loop of the marathon, you get a new colored scrunchie on your wrist. Lots of people already had two. It wasn't going to be the kind of day I wanted for the overall ironman time, but maybe I could have a better marathon than I had hoped. Going in, I estimated I could do the marathon in 4:20-4:30. Spectators brightened my day with their cheering and comments about my great looking form. I love them. I walked every aid station and ate and drank, alternating water and electrolyte drink. I would stuff ice into my hat, shirt, and mouth. This really helped a lot. I wish I had done it at my first IM. I started passing people. I passed hundreds of people. Most of the athletes at this stage were walk/running. Lots of walkers. The runners were finishing their IM when I started the marathon, or just shortly after. I remember hearing "So and So, you are an IronMan!" as I left transition to start the run. Those would have been the pros I guess, at around 9 hours into the day (15 minutes longer for them since they start early). I had the time of my life on that run. I walked the hills, mostly as a strategy to conserve energy, not because I felt I had to. I probably didn't run as hard as I could have, since I am still new to this and wanted to conserve and make sure I had enough in me to run at the end. And I did. I ran the whole least 1.5 miles and came in about 10 minutes faster than my first IM, and with a marathon time of 4:11, which was 9 minutes faster than my best hope, and 49 minutes faster than my first IM. I had so much fun, I immediately wanted to do another IM. There were no IronMan blues for me this time, not at the finish, and not in any of the subsequent days. Just pure addiction.

This was the first time I returned late at night to watch the end of the race. It was a very lively and inspiring place to be near midnight as hundreds of people cheered the last hundred or so athletes to finish the race. The most memorable was the last, a woman who must have given up 300 meters from the finish, I heard someone say she was getting on the foot bridge as if to go home, perhaps assuming she was not going to make the cutoff which was only about 90 seconds away. I could imagine her wanting to avoid the dismay of the clock stricking midnight right before she crossed the finish line. Mike Reilly took off to usher her in anyway. Somehow we learned her name, so the whole crowd began to chant it and we grew louder and more excited as she come through and finished with about 11 seconds to spare.

My dad and I before the swim start

Catalina 50 mile ultramarathon 2013

After reading Barefoot Ted's account of his 2012 running of the Avalon 50 mile run on no more than 25 miles of training per week, I was very interested to see how I would feel since I also trained with fewer miles than would be considered typical for a 50 mile training plan, averaging about the same mileage per week as Ted and having no more than 40 miles in my peak week.

The Catalina 50 mile run begins at 5:00 am. Tony Rudd and Sarah Davis and I ferried over the day before and shared a nice little house on one of the main streets. This race has some of the simplest logistics of any race ever. We wake up at about 4:00, eat and get hyped before strolling the 2 minute walk to the start line, where we meet and greet for about 3 minutes and the gun goes off. It's 350 people running up a mountain in the dark with their headlamps on, and the stars watching from above. I'm pretty much in the middle with a trail of lights zigzagging along the switchbacks below and above me. It's cold, so I'm going a little faster than I want, just to keep warm. After reaching the top, we descend. A guy nose dives right in front of me and I stop to ask if he is ok, so does the guy behind me. A snappy yes is all I wait for to keep booking it down the hill. Nearly 2 hours in, the sun begins to rise. My hands are frozen bricks and I can't use them for anything. It's a gorgeous and warming sun rise. We reach the airport which was the turnaround for the marathon I did here 2 years before. This time we turn left and head for the opposite side of the island. This is barely the beginning of the day.

I will confess without any regret that I ran this run in shoes. The cold weather and the mean, 3 mile paved road descent at the end would have made this a painful run to have done in sandals. I am very pleased to have finished this 50 mile run, less fatigued than after most of my road marathons. A fact I attribute to increased endurance, but some of it is just becaue trails are much less taxing to run than roads.

By this point we were pretty spread out and I started seeing runners who had started their run early, at midnight and 2 am. Soon I saw the lead runners including the winner, Fabrice, who was a picture of concentration, as he ran every bit of the course, including the steepest of hills. It started to get real when I found myself alone above a gorgeous pristine beach and smelled the deliciously salty breeze as I walked up another hill around mile 37. Up until this point I had run my race almost entirely on the physical level. Now it started getting mental with the usual doubts and reasoning against running in favor of walking.

I arrived at the mile 40 aid station where they were playing blue grass music, serving lobster, buffalo burgers, wine, red bull and beer. I grabbed a can of kerns and some potato smothered in salt and continued on my merry way.

Walking up one steep hill around mile 42 I saw Sarah Davis was running back to meet Tony. She gave me grief for walking instead of running and I gave her a hug and walked on.

Around mile 44 I started to experience the same kind of goal defeat I had experienced at my ironman. It was a little different, because instead of realizing I couldn't reach my goal I realized I was well ahead of schedule and could easily walk almost half the remaining distance and still meet my goal, and I have to admit at least some amount of disappointment in myself for not pushing on and seeing just how well I could do. Instead I kind of took the middle ground and continued to walk/run toward the final descent. This kind of moment is the readon I do endurance sports. You really learn what you're made of. Then something interesting happened. Half a dozen or so runners began to slowly pass me and I realized the difference between us was that while I could run faster than them when I did run, I would quickly get tired and began walking again, and they would pass me again. They were all just running along very slowly but never slowing to a walk. I tried it myself but it just wasn't my style. I would pick up the pace and get tired again. I guess you have to train for this.

Around mile 45 it began to get emotional. I began simultaneously regarding what a ridiculous thing it was that I was doing, and yet how pleased I was with myself for doing it. I soon stared with disdain at the long steep paved black road that winded down into town. I began to laugh at myself as well as the 350 other nut jobs who were doing this along with me. A voice inside my head said "IT DEOESNT MATTER" and I regarded the double meaning: it didn't matter how my body felt, and it didn't matter how fast I finished or whether or not I even finished at all. It just is what it is, and so I ran on.

So next week I'll be doing trail work at Mt. Laguna to get my entries in the lottery for a chance to run the San Diego 100 miler in June. I'll also be back to run Catalina again, because I never saw a buffalo.

After taking my post race soak at the beach, I saw Ashley finish and soon Trace came out to usher us into Coyote Joe's bar for drinks with the guys who had come in 1st and 3rd. I didn't realize for the first 30 minutes that I was sitting next to the winner, who looked fresh as though he hadn't run at all, but had nearly broken the course record by finishing in 6:09. He was from France and had a ton of experience. I learned tons by listening to him talk about how he trains. It reaffirmed by belief that ultra running has not and perhaps cannot be so well understood as Marathon running. He only runs what he feels likee, never more, never less. No strict schedules or workout plans, and no speed work.

Of food, I consumed: 1 perfect foods almond/honey bar, 1/2 acai/flax bar, 2 rolls onigiri, ~1/2 potato with salt, 3 pretzels, 1 piece sliced banana, 10 grapes, 1 can Kerns nectar, 5 medjool dates, 1/2 sprouted corn tortilla with hummus, 2 orange wedges, about 12 ounces of electrolyte drink,  1/3 bottle of chia/agave/water blend, 7 salt tabs, and about 70 ounces of plain water. I believe I consumed ~2k calories total. The cold weather made digestion very easy. I never used the bathroom.

Smile 33 aid station: already farther than I've ever gone

Flick House and housemates Sarah and Tony

Dinner night before the run

Into the Wild

On February 15, 2013 I am leaving my dream job. It's been a decision I've mulled over for at least a couple of years now and I could see that it was never going to be an easy choice but I am finally convinved it is the right choice for me. I don't have another job ligned up and I don't even know what I really want to do for a job, but almost like a chapter out of The Alchemist, I can feel the universe moving me in this direction, as if to fulfill my personal legend.

The excitement is already building. My exit date is just on the heels of my second IronMan race, New Zealand. I'll be flying out only a few days after, and will return with no job to go back to, but a mission to have fun, play hard, spend a whole lot of time outdoors, and complete a 100 mile run. I hope to run out of money, get lost and find myself again.

The excitement I once had for my day job has long since faded away. For a long time now, I've drove, biked or ran to work on so many days when I would gaze off toward Mt Wilson and wish I were heading there instead. I've spent too many days in a dark building with my attention on a screen, slaving away towards a purpose that is not my own, making people richer than I even richer and not seeing the worth in it. I once imagined settling down here, falling in love and starting a family, but that hasn't happened and I'm done waiting around for it. I am off to make it a life worth living while I can still do it my way.

Years from now I'll look back and see that this was one of the best choices I ever made. I know it's one of the hardest. It's scarry because I am leaving behind a (false) sense of security and a network of friends and the familiar atmosphere. I am comfortable here and it is not to escape problems that I am leaving. I have to believe that something out there holds greater promise for me even though I don't know what it is. I feel a great sense of freedom, having the power to make this choice. And I know that I am going to discover something about myself I never would have if I hadn't chosen to do this.

2013 has the following in store for me, just to start. IronMan New Zealand and vacation in New Zealand and Fiji, touring up the U.S. West coast to visit friends and train along the way, Wildflower long course for the third time, a 100 mile run, hiking the John Muir trail, travel to Tanzania, climb Mt Kilimanjaro and visit Egypt, another 100 mile run. Ever wanted to live out your bucket list? What the hell are you waiting for?

The mountain are calling, and I must go. -John Muir

IronMan, Ultra and Beyond

It's been almost 3 months since my first ironman and I've progressed through the whole gamut of post race psychology, from thrill, to regret over not going faster, to depression, to not caring to ever do that again, to being very interested in doing that again.

My earliest memory of IronMan was as an 11 year old kid, driving with my family through the lavafields while on summer vacation on the big island of Hawaii. My parents talked about how the bike course went through where we were driving. I remember thinking how utterly terrible it sounded to swim miles through the rough ocean, bike over 100 miles through the heat, and run a marathon. What kind of tough, mean person would do such a thing. To me it was akin to walking on the moon, something mortal men never do in their entire lives. I had not even a hint in my mind that I would ever attempt it.

Alas, 14 years go by. A classic triathlon gave way to a half marathon, gave way to olympic triathlon, marathon, half ironman then what's next. The body gets stronger and the mind more curious about what it might be like to go farther.

So it came to this. It was a nerve racking time, preparing over the course of 6 months, over-training and getting sick and injured and getting discouraged. The mental game is relentless. Right down to the wire. Even the journey, driving the 1200 miles from soCal to CDA, trying to get there in time for the 4:00 pm packet pickup cutoff time on Friday, after only leaving on Thursday morning. I didn't plan that so well.

Heading out to my first ironman was the most exciting thing since waking up on Christmas mornings when I was younger than 10. I very much looked forward to spending all the daylight hours moving across the surface of the earth.
I was too restless to sleep much the night before the race and around 3:00 am it was raining and thundering, with only 4 hours until race start! Memories surfaced of how awful the LA marathon was during the storm in 2011. An ironman would be a bigger mess still. By the time I left the house it was no longer raining, and by the time I was on my bike, the roads were dry. That's how the weather is in the Pacific Northwest.


The memories are vivid all the way from driving to the starting line in the morning wth my parents, listening to The Killers' "All These Things" on my ipod, powering through the swim feeling way better than expected, pushing through the bike ride - never been so happy to get off the bike and run, to wanting oh so much just to walk or lay down in the shade for a spell (and I did lay down in someone's shady lawn once until the lady who lived there asked her husband to ask me if I wanted the hose), but  pushing on for the goal of the finish time and from the spirit of the race, the other racers and the crowd to push cheering me on. Go Spartacus! The sandal runner.

The most depressing moment was when another racer passed me while I was walking and asked me how badly did I want it? And I realized that in spite of wanting so much to finish under a certain time, at that moment I didn't really want it all that much. I was beat in that sense, but really my spirits were high and I was certain I would finish. There was never any doubt of that. It was just a matter of walking vs. running. So I walked quite a bit. I alternated between barefoot and huaraches. My throat became parched from the breathing and the electrolyte drink. My leg muscles began to fail. I was undernurished. Learning.

I was passed at my run mile 6 point by Jason Lomheim who told me he didn't want to see me walking except at aid stations. Well, he was at his mile 20. Gerardo Barrios asked me if I wanted some shoes, Cynthie Cuno said hi and Ray Barios gave me a hug. I passed by Jon Nathan who was my carrot on the bike, but he kept coming back and passed my 20 feet from the finish line. It was a great day.
Coming in just under 13 hours, I was kind of surprised at how quickly I had finished. Though my original goal was 12:30, my diminished spirits during the run, and the fact that I was walking so much made me expect a 13:15 - 13:30 finish time. It kind of made me wonder if I had pushed a little more, maybe I would have met my 12:30 goal. On the other hand, I don't regret not pushing because I had fun doing this, and pushing it would have only shaved at the very most an hour from my run time, and made me suffer. I wanted to savor taking it kind of easy, because I knew I had not trained properly for this distance, and I knew I have another IronMan race in New Zealand next year, and for that one, and all that come after it, I will not walk.

Part of me felt depressed after the completion of my first ironman. It's like a mixture of feelings about having worked so hard and focused so much and not having that anymore. It's missing how great it felt to be a rock star on race day. It's not being able to do my workouts because I have to recover. It's people doubting, and especially my own self doubting that I can ever qualify for Kona. It's like an identity crisis. Part of me wants to stop trying. But that's what this is really about, isn't it? This is the struggle of the ironman. This is where the real pain is endured. And I love it. Never give up.

Still, it's utterly bewildering how much faster I need to be to qualify for Kona.

I do believe that completing an ironman triathlon is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself. It is gratifying for me to look back on the photos and know that I did this, and to remember thinking how scarry it was when I first made that commitment, and that I stuck to it over the long haul and made it all the way to the finish line, in good time, and in good form. Then you can watch videos of ironman races and be able to relate to what you are watching. You know what is involved because you went through every mile.

As challenging as the ironman is, it somehow is not enough. I am convinced that a 24 hour run, or a double-ironman is the real test of not only the body, but the mind. I look forward to experiencing this for myself. The most satisfying thing in all of this has been that the more I do the more I want to do. I biked through the Pyrenees in France just 3 weks after my ironman. 7 days, 350 miles, and 45,000 feet of steep climbing on the bike at a pace faster than I had ever done before. I came back and did  a 16 mile run through 100 degree heat, a 5 mile ocean swim, and a 31 mile run in 5:19 running in a combination of sandals and barefoot 1 weeks later, again with tons of climbing, my first ultra. I'm more in tune with myself and more confident. This sport is my yellow brick road, and I'm off to see the wizard.