I am writing this to remind myself to read this post next year when I think that the
Cle Elum 50k trail run is a good idea.
My day started with my alarm at 4:10 AM. Because I got home late, I ate dinner late and my digestive system was a bit off...nuff said. Left the house a little before 5 AM and drove East in the dark through rain almost the entire time. By the time I arrived, I was 20 minutes too late for the early 7 AM start but I figured that I would have no problem making the 9 hour cut off. After all, my first 50k took me a little over 6 hours, and the last one I did was just under 5 hours. Even though I had not really trained for it, I was planning to just planning to do it as a run, not a race.
We were warned at the beginning that there was a lot of elevation and I knew that 8,000 feet was going to be tough, but I forgot how tough... damn. The first three miles were uphill a fire road and I took it easy jogging the entire time. Then we started to climb. And climb. And climb until we hit the first rest stop at 7ish miles. Then the 25k people turned around because their race was an out and back and the 50k participants continued.
I felt really good at that point, the weather was perfect for me and it was lightly misting. I decided to wear a light wool tank top under a light wool long sleeve shirt and was comfortable taking the long sleeve shirt on and off as the temperature changed. I was even fine with the dirt bikes (the loud motorized kind) for a while but I eventually tired of how many there were, and how much dust, mixed with gas fumes. Unfortunately, the trails were not wide enough to share so whenever I heard them coming, I had to pull over and cling to a tree so they could pass. By the end, when my attitude was completely in the toilet, I did allow myself one little nasty fantasy of seeing one clothes-lined...
Aside from the dirt bikes, my other issue was running in the ditch that the repeated dirt bike traffic left on the trails. I am already a beginner on technical trails, but running in a rut was exceptionally difficult for me. I tried to straddle, hop from side to side but never really found a sweet spot. My ankles took a real beating... I also notice that the only people I saw on foot were race participants. Everyone else was on a dirt bike.
I missed a turn about about 19 miles in and ended up adding an extra 20-25 minutes to my time. I was in a foul mood by the time I hit the next rest station and really did not appreciate the responses of some of the volunteers there who, I am sure were just trying to keep themselves from going crazy with boredom by seeing who could throw the most sarcastic response to the runners' questions. But most of the volunteers were awesome and the rest stops were well stocked!
At the last rest stop, I had determined from the mileage that there was only 5.8 miles to go and I would make the time easily until I was told that there were actually 7 miles -- the organizer had gotten a bit carried away. I finally finished 3rd from last and was 22 minutes past the cut-off time. This is the first time I have ever not made a cut-off time and I was really bummed.
Got some nutrition at the finish line and took a to-go sandwich for the road. I had plenty of time to still get home in the daylight until I hit construction and 10 miles of stop and go traffic. Being stuck in construction traffic is bad, but being stuck in construction traffic post race crusty with especially foul body odor is truly eye-watering terrible.
I finally got home after 9:00 to Ruth's delicious chicken enchiladas and the appropriate amount of sympathy for my long day.
50k (plus*) Run @ 09:22:00* Note from Organizer...
"thanks again for coming out and running the new and improved cle elum 50k and 25k! we had a perfect finisher percentage something i've never heard of for non-road race of these kinds of distances. and speaking of distances if you didn't hear about it while hanging out and eating the yummy food from canyon river bakers catering company the courses were longer than advertised-- runners with gps watches got around 18 miles for the 25 and between 33.5 and 36 miles for the 50k (sometime before next year's race i'll go and measure the courses with a professional quality gps). despite the long distances, nasty weather and tough tough course it sure seemed like everyone had a good day--maybe not a fun day and i was told by quite a few people they hated me but at the finishline i saw lots of smiles. "
