Having done all the
“work” for the race, the week before was dedicated to resting and packing. With
the boys starting school in Aurora, my mom flew in from Florida and to help me
relax and me pack up and organize my stuff up in Silverthorne. And, boy was it
nice to have her there. Go mom!
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| This is actually a picture of my mom and I relaxing at her place before a different race, but you get the idea. She's my people. And this wasn't her first rodeo. |
Note to anyone who hasn’t run a 100-miler: Holy crap! Is there a lot of planning that goes into this. I had outfit changes, nutrition needs – any single one of them I could think of, stuff for the crew at each aid station (they would be waiting for me for HOURS with no amenities), etc. Oy vey! Is that a job in itself.
When my friend,
Jennifer (also doing the race), arrived on Monday from Ohio to stay with us for
a night, she was so ecstatic. Anxious, but more than excited to conquer the
course. I was envious of her excitement but couldn’t bring myself to share in
it. After the fact, I deduced later that my lack of excitement was due to the fact that I was
afraid of creating so much excitement for myself, that if I didn’t make it, the
pre-excitement would've amplify my heartbreak.
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| Me with my Leadville Camp Besties - Donna and Jennifer - before race. |
Now, I have been to plenty-a-race meetings in the past and this one was like no other. Yes, it gave you your standard information – why you could be dq’d, course changes, specific rules, etc. But when the creators of the race Ken and Marilee (but mostly Ken) got up to speak, WOAH! Was that some inspirational stuff he was spewing. There was plenty about the history and challenges of Leadville, the meaning of the race to the town, the ability to conquer the course, that quitting wasn’t an option (or at least one you would want to live with) and what it would take to finish the race. I took it all in and that’s when I really started to get excited within. As much as my nerves and anxiety were playing on me, the need to dig deep and finish this course became even greater!
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| Ken and Marilee imparting wisdom and emotion on us all! |
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| A WHOLE gym filled with Leadville crazies. It was amazing! |
Next morning came sooner than anticipated. Alarm went off at 3:00 am. I was lucky and booked a cabin 3 blocks from the start, so for me it was roll out of bed, eat a little, go to the bathroom and get rolling with the family and Todd.
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| Everyone up and ready to go! Even Lucy. (Todd taking picture.) |
The start line was
energetic as all get out. I really didn’t expect that for a 4 am start. Heck! I
find 6 am starts to be less than enthusiastic, so having all this energy at 4
am was INCREDIBLE!
I got some pictures,
got some hugs (I realized this summer that hugs are my SUPER JUICE) and then lined
up in the corral. By myself. I knew if I was going to make this race, I needed
to listen to my body, worry about myself and not think about running/staying with
anyone. So, alone it would be.
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| Getting ready to line up |
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| Reminding myself what I would need to do that day |
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| Last minute advice and encouragement from my hubby and rock. |
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| Me with one of my many trail sisters I met along this journey - Mary. |
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| Go time at the start line! |
5.5 miles is the first small climb and then it was a single track around Turquoise Lake. This part was amazingly beautiful to see the lake peak out from the darkness as the sun rose. It reminded me once again about the uniqueness and beauty of this race. Even when you aren’t climbing mountains, you can’t escape the views!
Soon enough I was
exiting the trail, running through the campground and into the aid station. I
bypassed the aid station and went straight to Ross and Todd who crewed me by
replacing my bladder of Tailwind and some nutrition and telling me to drink more.
I also got to see my friend, Andy, who had set up right next to Ross and Todd,
as he waited for his wife to come through – that was super good to see familiar
faces!
Coming out of May
Queen (the first aid station), you hit the Colorado Trail and start climbing. I
knew this part of the route pretty well and made my way up, up, up the trail to
Hagerman Pass. Then it was more up, up, up to Sugarloaf Road. During this time,
I just watched my heart rate and ran when it was low enough and walked when it
wasn’t (which was more often than naught). I made some friends along the way,
but I won’t bore you with the conversations.
At the top, I was more
than excited to go DOWN! I started running down. I was feeling great! I whipped
out my walkie talkie and radioed into Todd and Ross and told them where I was.
They were like, “Great! …but you’ve got a long way to go.” They then asked
about wants and needs and I told them to adjust my Tailwind ratio (it worked in
training, but for some reason it was too potent today, so I wanted to adjust)
and, basically, that I needed to eat some fruit and drink some coke, so please
have that ready. I realized that I had been so happy/excited to see them at the first aid station, I basically FORGOT to eat. Oy! Can't let that happen again!
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| 13 miles in and all smiles! Ready to start climbing! |
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| Here I am climbing up Hagerman Pass and even running! (I must've been doing that for the camera) |
Made it down the powerline descent (3.5 miles of DOWN) and met a new/old friend. How fitting, she had remembered me from another race. As we were descending, she told me how I had taught her how to run downhill at another race earlier in the summer. Evidently, she made a comment about her poor descending and I had imparted what I knew from downhill running to her. I guess it worked! She said her knees no longer hurt as she ran downhill and we were doing it together with ease, so something was good about that union. And here we were running the 100 together!
Two miles after the long descent, at mile 23.5, you roll into Outward Bound aid station. Here I got to see ALL of my family (minus my dad who was not feeling well) and Todd. They had everything I asked for, including my new Tailwind concoction, and off I went.
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| Can a girl get much sweatier? It was getting HOT!!! |
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| Crew at Outward Bound (minus Todd who was taking picture) |
This upcoming part is (I
think) the most boring part of the course. First, you have to run on road for a
little bit. Then, it is uphill, with limited views, but it really isn’t THAT
long. I knew mentally this would be a hard part of my race, so I just focused
on my running and keeping my heart rate consistent.
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| Me...smiling even through the most unscenic part. |
About 3 miles from the
aid station is another place where a lot of people crew their runner. I
preferred to have my crew only at the aid stations, BUT it was refreshing to
see people here. It is here that I saw my friend Jay’s crew and my friend
Donna’s crew – who told me she was just ahead. I plugged along another 4 miles
to the next aid station and coming out (while I was coming in) was my friend,
Donna. YAY!
After the aid station, I caught up with Donna and we chatted for a bit and then I carried on, running in front of her for a bit. It was so awesome to see her and know we were on our way to completing this journey together!
I am not sure of the
mileage, but there is a point where you stop climbing and start descending into
Twin Lakes. When I hit this point, it was game on again! I think my schtick for
this race was just to not kill myself on the climbs, so I could really enjoy
and run most of the descents. So, as soon as I was descending I was happy
again. I passed the Mt. Elbert water station, and was glad I didn’t need water
(since there was a line). I was also happy to see my friends Kelly and Eric
there. Yay friends! We’re doing this! I thought.
I whipped out my
walkie and had some talks with both Todd (who was crewing at TL) and my kids
(who were “helping” Todd and my mom crew at TL). If you ever do this race, I HIGHLY
suggest carrying radios. They help with what you need when you are coming into
an aid station (so it’s prepared). This time, I asked for them to soak my
Koolie in a bath of ice water, so I’d have it for over Hope Pass. It was
getting HOT!
Got into Twin Lakes
on/ahead of schedule and really just felt great. I was excited to be attacking
Hope Pass (the next section – arguably the hardest) feeling so good. In
general, I try to get to halfway in a race feeling “good,” whatever “good” may
be… and in this case it felt – good!
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| Mom and the boys attending to all my needs!!! |
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| Pre river crossing on the way to the pass! |
About ½ way up the
pass, a guy started more-or-less pacing behind me and we started chatting. He
was actually heading up to volunteer at the aid station and he was delightful
to talk to. Cindy had warned me to conserve energy and not get sucked into too
many or too long of conversations, but I really just liked talking to him and
it made the time go by faster, so I didn’t see the harm. (In retrospect, I say
that I picked up an unofficial pacer then.) On the way up, there was also some
rain. Not a lot, but enough to have me stop and put on my raincoat. Thankfully,
this storm was short and passed.
About ¾ miles from the summit of the pass, there is an aid station. This station is AMAZING if, for no other reason, a team of volunteers guides up 20 llamas and 4 mules with 3,000 lbs of supplies for the station and then spends time filtering water from the nearby creek, so that us runners have all that we need on race day. A-FRICKIN-MAZING! Here's an article about it, if you want to read more.
It was here that I had
my first visit to the medical tent. Nothing horrible, just what I considered a
little chafing on my waist, so I asked for some Vaseline. They looked, told me it was worse than I thought, applied Vaseline,
and then told me to continue to keep checking in with med tents to reapply and
it, potentially, had to be wrapped. Yikes!
After an ample amount
of aid at the station, it was onto the summit of Hope (yay!) and then DOWN!
Now, the other side of Hope (the Winfield side) is NO JOKE when it comes to
steepness, it is scary to run down and HARD to go up (notice I said “go", not
“run”). I was glad that I had been there a couple times and had the chance to
practice it. On the way down, I channeled what I knew and just went at it
running down. I caught many people on the descent and was clipping along at a
good place for the majority of it. I finally found a couple guys that were also
clipping along and settled in behind them. It was a lot easier to pass people
going down when you were a group of 3.
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| View from top of Hope coming down on Winfield side |
Once you finish the
steepness (2.5 miles of it), you turn and run another 4 miles to Winfield
(rolling up, then down the last mile to Winfield). When I rounded the corner to
the ghost town, I saw some signs and KNEW they were for me! Yes, I am the LUCKY
GIRL who got to have fans who actually OWNED A CABIN IN WINFIELD (there are
very few cabins and they are all historical landmarks). I saw Ethan and Cade
and their cousin and aunt, got sweaty hugs and continued on into “town” which
is really just the aid station at this point.
There were tons of
people and I got lots of cheers running in. I was amazed that I STILL felt
great! I was so happy to be there and just ecstatic that (other than chafing),
my body wasn’t breaking down, I was still digesting food like a rock star – things
were just falling into place!
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| Their cabin/cheer central for me! |
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| Me with the Brook boys (Cade and Ethan) and their AWESOME SIGN!!! |
I checked in with the aid station, the medical tent (more jelly, no wrapping), and found Ross, Kelly and Christi (my friend with family at the cabin). We quickly got my stuff ready, deciding on what warm weather stuff I might need over the pass with the sun going down and so forth, what food I needed, and I was happy!
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| Kelly and Ross waiting for me at Winfield -- who wouldn't be excited to get to that?!?!?! |
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| Christi documenting me at the med tent (getting vaseline on my chafing). When asked why, she stated "to keep it real". :) |
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| Hope Pass. I had just climbed over that. Now, at mile 50, I got to turn around and do it again!!! |
Now, here came an unexpected hard part of the race for me. Coming out
of Winfield and heading up the pass, there was certain point (maybe 2 miles
out) where we knew that everyone we were passing coming down was not going to
be able to make it to Winfield in time for the cutoff… and their race would be
done. This was really stinking hard to deal with, especially when we saw a few
of our friends. This course is hard, takes no prisoners, and, this year, had
even lengthened the course without lengthening the overall cutoff time.
Onto the climb. This
puppy is steep and we just plugged away. We talked for most of it (minus the
steepest parts where Kelly tried to humor me so I wouldn’t have to talk) and
just kept going. Not a lot of talking around us, but that was ok. Up, up, up,
we went and was happy to see the top when we got there. Yay! Kelly was on top
of mileage and timing and let me know that we actually summited FASTER than we
had the day she and I ran it about 2 weeks earlier on fresh legs – no way!
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| View looking back as we climbed |
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| And up we go. You can't see it, but there was a family of mountain goats up there. |
Over the top, down to
the aid station. Visited med tent (again) and they said it looked much better,
didn’t need wrapping. Got some LOTS of ramen (it was past my dinnertime). I was told to "thank the volunteers at the top," so I asked if I could hug a llama... and they were happy to let us! We asked for one that wouldn’t spit at us and
they gave us this dude.
Then it was down,
down, down. The Twin Lakes side was not as steep as the Winfield side and I ran
what I could. With the sun setting and my legs getting more tired, it was
harder to run some of the rockier spots, so I did what I could and was happy
with that. (I think I wanted to run ALL of it, and it ended up being more like
70% of it, I think.) Once we were out of the forest, it was another 2 miles to
the aid station, including through the river, and we entered Twin Lakes Aid
Station in darkness.
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| Llama love. |
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| Ain't no drama with this llama! |
Side note: Kelly took
her pacer duties very seriously and even prepared a joke for me for our run. It
went something like this: There were two tomatoes running the Leadville 100 and
one of the tomatoes fell behind as they were coming into the Twin Lakes Aid
Station… so the second one says, “KETCHUP!!!” Never dull moment with Kelly. ;)
Now, Twin Lakes, at 8-9ish
at night on Leadville Night is a paaarty! We ran in. I saw Cindy (my coach) and
just let her know I was good. (It was good to see her!) I had planned a full
outfit change here, which just was… well, comic relief. We had a tent that Ross
and my mom had set up the night before, they added a few sides so that I could
have some privacy. Changing when you are tired, sweaty, a ton of people around,
well… it was just kind of funny. And probably took a lot longer than necessary,
but what can you say? I’m a newbie.
This aid station I
wasn’t in-and-out, but that was ok. I got to see my parents, kids, coach, crew
and friends. It was awesome. It was there that I picked up Todd as my pacer and
off we went.
Now, it is true that
Hope Pass is the pinnacle and getting up and over it is a HUGE deal. So much so
that a lot of people focus their energy on that task and don’t have anything
(or much) left after they get down from the second crossing of Hope. I was
aware of this and had “planned” to conserve energy, so I was glad that I had energy
(as planned) when the day came. Yay!
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| Lotsa crew and love at Twin Lakes!!! |
*** THIS is the part where it got dark and the pictures stopped coming, so I apologize for the lack of photos from here on out. I understand if you want to skip to the end... :)
Coming out of Twin
Lakes there is a 3+ mile climb… and I was glad I saved some in the tank for
that! Todd (like my other pacers) was the best pacer ever!!! He had actually come out and run this (and a few other sections) of the course with me. He was great and dealt with me and my paranoia about being
lost… “Yes, Randi, we are on the right trail,” to which I then further
questioned, to which he then pointed out the trail marker (or just repeated that we weren't lost). God bless his patience with me!
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| Todd and I running a section of Leadville on a different day (obviously in the light). |
We went off climbing
up the big climb and then when we got to some runnable spots, I was SO HAPPY to
still be able to run some. Being that I’d never really run over 55 miles, I
wasn’t fully sure how my body would do and if it could keep going (at least a little)
at a running pace… but it did!
We went along, run, run, run, walk, walk, walk. I needed to be ahead and all was good. We got to Half Pipe Aid station where no crew was allowed. It was kind of surreal to come upon this lighted tent with yummy and warm goodness inside. We went in and had some ramen. The medic saw us come in and checked in with Todd (to see how I was) and then checked in with me (to make sure I was as “good” as Todd said I was). I found it hilarious that, after I answered his question with one word, he told me that I had “good conversation skills.” I looked at him shocked and he told me that I had answered correctly and made eye-contact with him – I guess I aced the test. He then said I should have a seat and warm up. I said I just wanted to keep running, which he said was even better.
So, off we went, 5
more miles till Outward Bound Aid station – I couldn’t wait! This next 5 miles, the terrain is not too hard,
mostly flat double-track and/or jeep road, so I was glad for the lack of
technicality in the dark. As we got closer to the aid station, it got loads
COLDER. (I think that was the coldest I was all race.) I was finding it hard to
motivate myself to do too much running in this section, but as we got closer, I
started saying “run to that such-and-such” and picking up the pace a little at
a time. This helped me get warmer, so I also realized if I wasn’t going to
freeze, I needed to keep myself moving as rapidly as possible for the rest of
the way.
We rolled into Outward
Bound (going inward – ha!), Krista and Ross were there. Yay! I was feeling
good. I put on some tights and we adjusted for the dropping temperatures. And I
was like, “KRISTA! We’re over 75% through!” and was so excited for that fact. I
really was trying not to think about mileage in a mile-by-bile way and had just
broken the sections between aid stations in my head, so getting to this aid
station, in particular, I was EXCITED!
From OB, I knew it was
a climb up and over Sugarloaf Pass. Weird enough for me, I was ok with that. I
had done this before, I knew it would be slow, but mentally I knew where I was
going so it was “ok” for me.
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| Picture of me and Krista. I guess I am always excited to see her! |
Krista was phenomenal!
We set off, we had lots to talk about. We went up the Powerline climb – which
she had mountain biked a gazillion times – so she knew EXACTLY where to tell me
to go (to the point where she was like, “move over to the left side here,
because it is less steep on this side of the trail.” Amazeballs.).
At the top, we got
some coke and started to head down. I will say that this part I had ‘expected’
to be able to run down. Like I said, downhill were my “thing” and that was
where I was excited about doing and making up some of the time I had lost on
climbing. BUT, after 80ish miles on the legs, going down on the rocky terrain
wasn’t as fast as I planned. I tried to run when I could, but it was really
that I didn’t trust my jello legs and/or footing/ankles to get me down the rock
pass without buckling. So, whilst I was still happy, I was a little slower than
planned.
Soon enough, however,
we were rolling into Mayqueen Aid Station – YAY! I was glad to see everyone
(Steph, Ross, Todd) and get some more food. I can’t tell you how delicious
ramen tasted at every station I stopped at. The sun was starting to come up and
Todd informed me that I needed to pick it up if I could.
I left there a little
terrified that I wasn’t going fast enough. I thought, “oh, I run this section
in like 13-14 minute miles” which I do REGULARLY, but at mile 88, I was
struggling to do 18-minute miles. (This was the first time ALL RACE I had
looked at my pacing.) That was a bit of a wake up. So, I plugged on doing what
I could.
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| Me and Steph (with Ross and Eric), looking MUCH better than I did that morning. |
Steph was awesome and
we had plenty to talk about. SHE informed me I was just fine at my pace to
finish, it was only if I wanted a faster time would I need to pick it up –
whew! I mean, I am normally bad at math, and after 25 hours of running I’m
REALLY bad at it, so having her realize that Todd didn’t mean I had to pick it
up to finish (only if I wanted a goal time) was super helpful!
We made our way
through and around Turquoise Lake as the sun rose. It was just BEAUTIFUL! Again,
my legs were having trouble with the rocky terrain, but I made it along as fast
as I could.
There were spectators
more so along this route because (1) it is closer to town and (2) it is through
a camping area, so people can view a lot of it. At one intersection, I asked
someone “how far till the dam?” and he said, “I don’t know, but I DO know that
you can see your belt buckle from here!” – which was awesome.
We made it to the dam
and down the mini-pipeline to where Todd and Ross were waiting for us. My last
pacer – yay! And my husband. Double-yay!
From here till the end
was 5.5 miles. Todd told me if I did 20-minute miles, I would finish in a
little over 29 hours. At some point, I decided I wanted to finish in UNDER 29
hours (if I could). So, I just plugged away. I was happy at this point that the
technical terrain was over. From here till the end was mostly graded dirt road.
Walk, walk, walk, run, (more of a slog), slog, slog.
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| The only picture I have of us this section! |
As the miles ticked
down, I just got more and more excited to be at the end. One of the coolest
things about the Leadville finish is that from one mile out, you are able to
run in with friends and family… mine met me and Ross at about ½ mile out and
ran to the end with me. They joined me and many of my friends and family were
able to help me finish what, in essence, we ALL had started almost a year ago.
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| Heading in to the finish line with everyone in tow! |
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| Finishing time-ish. |
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| Getting my medal with Ken and Marilee |
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| Congratulatory hugs!!! |
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| I can't thank these people enough!!!! |
My family, especially Ross and the boys, were with me every step of the way, either literally or as a support system from afar.
My friends all stepped up, whether it was in emotional support and/or physical support (running buddies).
Cindy, my coach, who paved the way for me. Who listened (for months!) to my woes and was always full of advice. She laid out a solid plan that went with my crazy life schedule AND got me to the start line healthy and with all the tools for me to have an AMAZING race.
And I can't believe the number of crazies I met along the way (some doing the race, some not) that I will keep with me forever - either in memories or as life-long friends and/or running partners.
People say this race changes you forever and they are right. What you do with it is up to you. I am glad I had a great journey surrounded my amazing people.
Here's a little of the aftermath:
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| First time sitting in 29+ hours. |
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| We did it!!! |
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| Got home to this!!! |
