Blogged right past my anniversary

My first blog post ever was March 15, 2004. That was about two weeks before my first (and only) marathon. At that time my long term goal was a 100 mile race in September or October, 2005. So far I'm on target.

PS Blogger is grumpy today and I lost a post and triple posted others. I hope I can get this one posted without any major snafus.

Oops! Race Report Re-Posted

Blogger accidentally posted one of my posts twice. While deleting the duplicate, I accidentally deleted my race report post. Here it is again. I lost all your nice comments! Thanks for posting them.

Three Days of Syllamo Official Results

The official results have been posted here. One of my days was adjusted downward; two were adjusted upward. Here is the final tally:

20k - 3:24:30 (16:27 pace; 33rd out of 37 men; 47th out of 57 overall)
60k - 9:27:22 (15:13 pace; 24th out of 32 men; 32nd out of 44 overall)
40k - 6:33:34 (15:50 pace; 19th out of 28 men; 26th out of 41 overall)

120k/74.4 miles - 19:25:20 (14th out of 20 men; 20th out of 30 overall)

This is almost always where I finish: top of the bottom third. But I'm happy with my finish and the great fun I had. I can't wait for next year.

FYI, the fastest men's time was 12:02:20; the fastest women's time was 13:38:20.

Recovery Status

I'm still here recovering from Syllamo. I'm feeling better but tired. As you'll see when you read my race report, I didn't sleep well during the trip (20 and 30 degree nights camping) and didn't sleep well my first night home, so I'm still getting caught up on my sleep. My aches and pains are mostly gone except for some pretty severe pain in my right knee. It doesn't hurt when I walk on it; it only hurts when I've been sitting and I have to get up, or if I try to cross my legs. I'm going to give it a few more days before I worry.

Also, I've got some pretty bad fever blisters/cold sores! :( This happened to me after my very first half marathon. I guess I pushed myself so hard and got so tired that my body is depleted and the cold sores emerge. They are really uncomfortable, not to mention embarrassing.

I'm working on my race report--I'm still waiting on my photo CD from Walgreens (I hate photo finishing at Walgreens, I don't know why I keep going back there) and once I have my digital photos and some time I'll finish the report and get it posted.

I still haven't caught up on all the RBF posts out there (121 posts to read) so I don't what's going on out there in blogville. Hopefully I'll get caught up soon.

In the meantime, here is my tentative race schedule:

Heroes for Children 5k--April 23, 2005 (they actually have a judged racewalk division with prizes, and the race sponsors children suffering from leukemia)
Prickly Pear 50k--May 7, 2005
Heartland 100 Mile--October 8, 2005
Rockledge Rumble 50k--November 12, 2005
SunMart 50 Mile--December ?, 2005
Bandera 100k--January 7, 2006
Rocky Raccoon 100 Mile--February 4, 2006
Three Days of Syllamo--March ?, 2006
Gobi March--April ?, 2006

Perhaps too ambitious. We'll see....

Also, I've noticed that my blog template doesn't look too good with Internet Explorer (I use Firefox so I hadn't noticed it until recently). I'll try to fix the problems, but I also want to highly recommend Firefox for it's functionality, stability and anti-monopoly qualities. Check it out.

I'm alive

I just got home about an hour ago after driving back from Syllamo. I had no cellular connection there (in fact, we had to drive for over an hour before my phone got a signal) so I couldn't post from the race.

Results:
20k: 3:25 (16:30 pace)
60k: 9:27 (15:13 pace)
40k: 6:31 (15:44 pace)

74.4 miles
19 hours, 23 minutes

It was great! I took lots of pictures so I'll post a detailed report with pics very soon. My friends Frances and Marla also finished all three races and felt good!

Thanks to everyone for the warm wishes!

Only two days left--Last Post before Syllamo

Tomorrow morning I'll be on the road to Arkansas for Three Days of Syllamo. My friends from SunMart are picking me up at a truck stop in Rockwall, Texas, and we're all riding out together. We'll be camping at the race HQ.

The weather has been changing from day-to-day. Yesterday the forecast was for possible rain on Friday and then clear on Saturday/Sunday. Now the weather calls for storms on Friday, clear on Saturday and rain on Sunday. The temperatures are supposed to be lows of high 30s/low 40s, with highs of 50-60. Perfect racing weather. There's nothing we can do about the weather so we'll just have to take it as it comes.

I've got my bags already packed, so tonight I'll just do a final gear check. I've got a few disposable cameras to carry in my pack plus I'm taking the digital camera for pictures on the road and at the camp.

Thanks to everyone for their encouragement and support. Someone suggested I make audio posts from the race. I've set up my blog for audio posts but I'm not sure if I'll do it. If I have cellular reception I will post short reports via Yahoo! mail on my cell phone. I'll be back on Monday with more info. and will post pictures and details as soon as possible.

See ya'!

Another ultrawalking blog!

Ultrawalker Dave Littlehales has joined the blogosphere. Always great to have more walkers, especially more ultrawalkers. Welcome, Dave!

Syllamo Update: 9 days till Race Day

The Syllamo Race Director sent an e-mail last night with final instructions on the race. Everything is falling into place: I've prepared my gear checklist, camping arrangements have been made, I've started martialing my supplies, etc. There are 44 racers doing all three races (29 males and 15 females). In addition, there are sixteen 20k racers; eleven 60k racers; and six 40k racers.

In the race instructions the RD told us a little about the course profile. Looks like we'll be doing some climbing:

20k: 3,000' (Click here for profile)
60k: 8,000' (Click here for profile)
40k: 4,000' (Click here for profile)

It's not brutal, but it will be a good challenge. By way of comparison, here are some of my recent training walks:

Mission Peak: 3,016' (6.85 miles)
North Shore: 2,193' (17.2 miles)

Here are the elevation gains for some of the more prominent 100 mile races:
Rocky Raccoon: 5,375'
Heartland: 6,000'
Kettle Moraine: 7,685'
Rio Del Lago: 9,000'
Arkansas Traveller: 12,086'
Leadville: 15,600'
Western States: 18,000'
Angeles Crest: 21,610'
Hardrock: 33,385'

(Thanks to the great site Run100s for the elevation information)

So mile for mile the second day of Syllamo (8,000' over 60k/37.3 miles) will have more climb (214' per mile) than all of the above races except Hardrock and Angeles Crest. Of course, 37 miles of climbing is a lot different than 100 miles of climbing.

The challenge in this race is to go fast but not too fast. "Leave something in the tank" is what I keep saying to myself. If I burn everything up on the first two days then day three will be a death march. Luckily the cutoffs are very generous:

20k: 5 hrs. (24:08 per mile)
60k: 12 hrs. (19:18 per mile)
40k: 9 hrs. (21:44 per mile)

If I can't make those cutoffs then either the course is brutal or I'm injured.

So there's not much left to do but wait, recheck my list, wait, plan my nutrition, wait, wait, wait.............

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Updated 3/11/2005 with links to course profiles (see above). Whoo doggy, some steep hills!

Test

I'm blogging from my phone. If this works I'll post short reports from Syllamo.

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