Salida Trail Marathon Race Report

One of the coolest things about trail racing is that your average Joe Shmoe middle-of-the-packer like me gets to toe the line with the sport's best. Case in point: I was standing at the starting line of the Salida Run Through Time Trail Marathon and took a casual glance around. Hmm, that's Geoff Roes, 2009 and 2010 Ultrarunner of the Year. And that's Nick Clark, winner of the 2010 Bandera 100k, Jemez 50 mile, and Wasatch 100 mile races (among others). And that's Timmy Parr, two-time defending champ and 2009 Leadville 100 winner. And that's Ryan Burch, winner of the 2010 Leadville Trail Marathon, 2009 Jemez 50 mile, and 2009 Run Rabbit Run 50 mile. I could go on, but I think you get the point: what other sport can offer this? I can't think of one off the top of my head.

I put this event onto my calendar as a training race a couple months before the Jemez 50 miler. I wanted to get some feedback on my fitness coming out of winter so that I could make any needed adjustments to my final Jemez build-up. The course had 4500' of climbing and descent, with the middle 10 miles at about 9000 feet elevation and the start/finish about 7000 feet elevation. So it was well suited as a Jemez training run. I expected to finish somewhere between four and four and a half hours, but truth be told I wasn't too concerned about my time. I just wanted to put in a good effort and test my downhill chops.

Marathon course map, courtesy of CCRC. The
left/upper portion of the loop is the outbound le

I opted to stay Friday night at the Simple Lodge and Hostel which is a great little place right downtown and within a couple blocks of several restaurants (e.g. Amica's, where I ate dinner in lieu of the pasta dinner) as well as the race start and finish areas. After a relaxing morning and breakfast I wandered over to the Steamplant Event Center for check-in. I definitely appreciated the later (9am) race start.

The start was a little bit hectic given that a marathon and half-marathon ran together for about the first mile and a half. The marathoners then turned right onto a short pavement section before the surface turned to dirt. The first 8 miles was basically a 2000 ft climb. For the first half hour or so I was completely discombobulated. I had no rhythm or focus, my breathing was erratic, my head was filled with negative thoughts, and I refused to accept the fact that my body should be working and my muscles should be burning. This seems to be an occasional pattern for me early on in races but fortunately I was able to recognize the situation. [An interesting historical note: several years ago I was a sub-elite level road cyclist - Cat 2 for those of you familiar with the USCF system - and I realized on the drive home from Salida that I sometimes did the exact same thing in bike races.] I fired up some hip hop on my iPod and after a few minutes of listening to my West Coast playaz and deliberately slowing the pace a bit I was rolling again. I came into the 7-mile aid station feeling strong. I grabbed a couple gels on the move and kept motoring along.

Hand drawn elevation profile courtesy of CCRC.

Once we crested the climb there was a short flat-ish section before we started going down again. On this relatively mild downhill I saw a runner coming back the other way. My first thought was, there's no way that could be the lead runner; he must have had to go back for some reason. The turnaround for the out-and-back section wasn't until mile 13.6, and here I was maybe at mile 9. Then I saw another runner, and another, and so on and so on. Eventually I figured out that the turnaround had to be at the 10.4 mile aid station, not 13.6 as I had originally thought. The final grunt up to the turnaround was quite a bit steeper than the opening climb, rising perhaps 400 feet or so in half a mile. And it was more technical - not single track, but definitely some gnarly jeep road. I broke into a power hike on the steeper sections and was breathing pretty heavily by the time I reached the top. The views were just phenomenal and I wished I had had a camera with me. But no such luck, so I just grabbed a couple gels and headed out. The trip back down was a blast and I was able to run it pretty well. In retrospect I think I might have run this climb and descent a little bit too hard, since my legs were feeling the effort as I climbed back up the previous descent. I was able to recover a bit through this section and came through the 13.6 mile aid station feeling pretty good. I jokingly asked for a beer and they pointed me to a case of PBR. Ah, no, I think a cup of Gatorade, a slice of orange, and couple gels will do.

I felt pretty good over the next couple miles, but at about mile 15 I stopped to pee and it came out looking like two-month-old bongwater (gotta love college). Clearly I had not been drinking enough. I slammed a couple gels to get some electrolytes and started drinking steadily to try and reverse the damage. I was able to push the pace strongly for about another half hour or so, including some steeper descents that I again ran quite well, but eventually I had to slow down because I could feel the cramps starting to flare up. The next mile or two was definitely a low point for me. I felt like crap, couldn't run very fast, and the 20-mile aid station just never seemed to come. And then all of a sudden I came around a turn and there it was.

Psychologically that really gave me a boost, because I knew I only had about 10k left to go, with nearly all of it downhill, and about 55 minutes left for me to break four hours. It also was about at this point that the course turned onto single track (finally!). The next mile and a half or so was fantastic: downhill with a couple short rollers, and just technical enough to keep things interesting. My legs were tired, but I was having so much fun I was easily able to keep running hard (more on that aspect later). I really thought I was going to be able to finish the race strongly, but then it came: The Demoralizer. Right about mile 22 was the steepest climb of the race. It was not very long, maybe a third of a mile, but seemed to go straight up and it was all I could do just to keep walking up it, never mind running it. After that climb I was not the same and I just wanted to be done. I also knew I had gone so slow up that hill that any shot I had at breaking four hours was gone. Despite being demoralized I kept pressing on, taking some solace in the fact that I was going downhill. There was a bit of a rise up to the aid station at mile 23.5, but this was a gentle grade and I was able to run nearly all of it.

From there I had a little under half an hour to run 2.7 miles and hit 4:15... which seems easy but when you're ready to be done nothing comes easy. The course wound around the back of "S Mountain" before descending on what seemed like eternally long switchbacks down the front side. The switchbacks went on for so long I was actually starting to get pissed off. And then when I finally thought I was at the bottom, nope the course keeps going along the base for another few hundred yards. WTF? Finally I emptied out onto the gravel and then it was half a mile of flat running to the finish. I crossed the line in 4:15 and change. I think I ended up in 29th place out of ~ 130 starters. That was actually better than I thought I'd do given the competition, the course, and the unexpected heat.

My gear for the day:

• La Sportiva Wildcat shoes
• drymax Lite Trail Run socks
• Salomon shorts
• North Face technical shirt
• Soleus 10k watch
• Native Eyewear Bolt sunglasses
• REI fitness cap
• Hydrapak Flume hydration pack 

Everything performed great except my shorts. I love these shorts but I'm starting to notice that when I wear them for more than about three hours, the seam of the liner starts to chafe my inner thigh. When I was undressing for my post-race shower I didn't notice it until the water hit it.... which really hurt. The hydration pack was definitely overkill given the six aid stations but I wanted to test it in a race situation before Jemez, since I expect to use it there. One question that came up in my mind however is how to monitor fluid intake with a hydration pack. With a handheld bottle you can just look at the bottle and see how much you've drank. It's also right there in your hand as a reminder. But with a pack, short of taking it off and inspecting the bladder, I'm not sure how to keep track. Maybe it's just something you get from experience, but if anyone has any suggestions please advise. My nutrition was fine all day. I ate two or three gels per hour, mostly from aid stations. Plus the occasional orange slice and cup of Gatorade.

One thing I took away from this race was how valuable back-to-back long/hard training runs are. Without a doubt, having spent some time running on tired legs in training is what helped me get through those last miles. I'm definitely going to try and do more of them over the next 10 weeks, along with really hitting the steep climbs and descents.

My aid station splits. Numbers are mileage, split time (h:m:s), split pace (min/mi), elapsed time (h:m:s), and elapsed pace (min/mi). You can see how much I slowed between stations 5 and 6.

1.   3.5:  0:30:45,    8:47,   0:30:45,   8:47
2.   7.0:  0:35:37,  10:10,   1:06:22,   9:29
3. 10.4:  0:29:32,    8:41,   1:35:55,   9:13
4. 13.6:  0:28:34,    8:56,   2:04:30,   9:09
5. 20.0:  1:01:16,    9:34,   3:05:47,   9:17
6. 23.5:  0:43:07,  12:19,   3:48:54,   9:44
7. 26.2:  0:26:43,    9:54,   4:15:37,   9:45

It's easy to look at the numbers and play "what if" but in the end running 9:45 min/mile on a course with 4500 feet of climbing and over a third of the mileage at 9000 feet elevation is a result I'm happy with. This was a great race and I may very well try to make it an annual event.

Some props I want to give out before signing off. First and foremost to my awesome wife for letting me get away for a day and a half, and my MIL for helping with the kids while I was gone. Second to the Simple Lodge. They were very accommodating and even let me come back after the race and shower even though I had already checked out. And third to the race organizers. Somehow they have managed to put together a race that is casual and low-key in every regard, yet attracts some of the best mountain running talent in the country. That's a formula I'm sure many other race organizers would love to have.

ETA: race results