Race Report: Green Jewel 50k

Below is my race report for the 2012 Green Jewel 50k.

We ran that far.

I'm not sure how I got talked into NOT following my training plan from Coach Bob for this weekend. My schedule called for a 16 mile negative split run on Sunday. I think it's that I PR'd at the GJ50k in 2009 and I wanted to see if I could run this as a fun training run and beat my time of 4:56. In 2009, it was a 50k PR of 1hr 24mins as I was very new to ultra running. I was fortunate enough to be offered some "rock star" crew treatment from Mike Nicholson (2011 3rd place) whose brother Greg, was running his first 50k. After waiting for the salamander migration to clear at CVNP, we pulled in the lot and I ran into a number of familiar faces (Kathie Teuschner, Pam Rickard, Brian Morris, and others) before taking off and heading to the start.

I love the atmosphere before an ultra. No one was complaining that the race was not going to start on time, everyone was smiling, excited for what we were about to do, taking photos, sharing stories, adjusting bib numbers, and well-wishing other runners. I finally got to meet Lee Shane in person (rather than facebook), accepted an Elmo (gluten & vegan) cupcake from the Basich's, shed a layer, took a quick wizz and off we went!

Pam Crushing PR

I ran a few miles with Pam who stands 9 feet tall in her Hokas and floats through puddles, whereas I was skimming the ground in Altra zero drop shoes :). Pam & I are fellow Runwell Ambassadors and have been under the same coaching & nutrition expertise from Bob Seebohar (www.Fuel4mance.com).We were both very excited to see how the metabolic efficiency training was going to play out for us. 

Keith Finishing Strong

A few miles in, Pam dropped back (but only by a few seconds) and I met up with Keith Lascelles; we began chatting about running, nutrition, the day's goal, and whatever other stories that came to mind. Our goals were similar, to run about a 4:30-4:45 depending on how the day went. This is one of the best parts of the running community I think. There are races that you end up running solo for hours and races where you play leap-frog with people, and ones like this where I was fortunate enough to run with Keith for pretty much the entire race. We kept saying "we need to slow it down, if we take the pace back, it will pay dividends later, etc..." neither of us would do it, we just kind of went with it. Mile 16 flew by and I thought  maybe I can negative split this thing, so I started a slight pace increase. 

Can you guess where the cramps started!

Lesson learned. 

On Friday, I posed a comment in the Outrun group "taper schmaper" after a hard week of speed workouts and a brutal 9 mile race pace run on trails on Thursday, 90mins of intense core (TRX, Insanity, and other core work) on Friday. Seemed a good idea at the time, besides it was just a fun run, right??. At mile 19 something under my right rib cage had such a sharp pain that it made me walk. my pace went from ~8min/mile to 9:30 to an 11:00 pace, not cool. I first thought was that it was my food....nope, dummy, it was my overzealous workout the day before. I met and passed Debbie Scheil, who shortly thereafter patted me on the shoulder to get going so she could chase....she continued on strong (to PR!) and not long after I see Keith. We played leap-frog for a while before the abdominal muscle cramp was manageable to run constant. We hit the marathon mark at 3:45 and the rest was just a solid easy effort to the finish. Everytime I picked up the pace, I was reminded to back off by my ab muscle. Lesson learned. With about 2 miles to go, Keith picked it up and ran a really strong finish...gaining about 4 mins on me by the end (4:31). I came in shortly after with a 4:35.

Green Jewel 50k Finish

Happy enough with the effort, but disappointed in myself for not taking heed to taper even a little. That's all a wash though since the experience was such a great one. I ran into Lee Shane, Crystal Basich, & Keith super exited to hear how they did (so impressed). They asked how Pam was and I guessed about 30mins back. I went to change into warm clothes and as I walked back, I saw Pam finishing an astonishing 4:44!

Pam's first question to me: "what did you eat?".....", "2 packets of Chocolate UCAN. that's it."...nod of agreement, this works. Proof is in the pudding (as long as it's a 1:1 carb/protein ratio!).

Final Thoughts

It's been 4 days since the race and I have still not taken a day off. Got in 8 miles Sunday, 8 Monday, and a really hard 6 miles Tuesday. I finally cross trained Wednesday and am back on track for my Leadville 100 training. Next on tap is more training, the O24 and then Mohican 50mi.

Big Thanks

Please remember that none of these races are possible without a LOT of hard work from the Race Directors (Joe Jurczyk & Vince Rucci) Courtney Russell for taking all the finisher photos and all the volunteers who give time and effort to support runners in these events. There is nothing better than seeing familiar faces at aid stations and getting help from people who have such great ultra & running experience and really do know how to help. Again, how can you not be impressed with the ultra running community? We rock.