2018 was an interesting year with a focus on the Boston Marathon. The goal was to go to Boston and run a sub 3 marathon on the oldest marathon course in the world and be done with road marathons (except for the occasional hometown Blue Ridge Marathon).
The year started out with an oldie but goodie, the 2/13/18 - Holiday Lake 50k. This was my 9th running of this race and it has been a great, early in the year event to get in roughly four and a half hours of constant running. If you can do that in the middle of February it sets
a good foundation for any ultra distance race. I placed the best I have over the years with a 14th and 1st Master in 4:35.29.
Following Holiday Lake, the goal was to fine tune the endurance fitness into some speed and turnover work needed to hit the 6:52/mile average needed for the 4/16/18 - Boston Marathon. Anyone who followed this race knows how bad the conditions were. I remember standing around with James Decker in the athletes village under a giant tent. As we stood, shivering, watching the rain,we were seeing the rain freeze on the tent and fall off as ice. An ice pile was forming on the ground around the border of the tent. Even with that, I still thought I had a sub 3 chance until mile 8. That's when I saw the pace falter and knew it was time to roll with it and enjoy what I could. The final number was a 3:06.20
Now that, that was over it was on to training for the Vermont 100. This seemed like the right year to do Vermont. It is one of the original four, grand slam 100s, and it is 68ish miles of gravel road. So it seemed like rolling marathon fitness into a "runable" 100 was a logical plan. The next stop on the 100 training train was Gina's pick and my 3rd San Juan Solstice 50m on 6/23/18. This high elevation race has put a hurting on me in the past but this year I was going for a sub 12:30. This would provide some much needed time on feet to prepare for the 100 that was a month away.
I ran on perceived exertion on this one and saw myself running in places I haven't in the past and knew I had a chance at a big PR. I hit the 42 mile aid station and knew it was going to happen. I came close to a sub 12 hour finish but ended in 12:03.14.
We continued to put in some serious miles after the San Juan Solstice while on vacation and this put me in a good position to taper into the 7/21/18 - Vermont 100. I had been focusing on a goal of finishing in less than 20 hours. That would also be midnight and the thought of finishing that early was great motivation. I also Strava stalked another ultra runner that I tend to run near, in other races, and saw they had run in the 18:30s. So best case scenario was an 18:30 and a goal of no more than 20 hours. This race was a real test. There was plenty of climbing with 17,000ft of gain over the course but much of it was runable. Keeping the legs running after 50+ miles is tougher than in races where you have to hike due to large sudden inclines. I hit the 50 mile mark right on schedule at 9 hours. The 2nd 50 miles were a little longer. I pittled away some time at water stops that I shouldn't have. But I was very happy with my 19:16, 22nd place and big sub 24 hour buckle.
I went into a post Vermont funk. Running didn't feel good and it wasn't any fun for about 2 months. Not sure what it was. Could have been overtraining or a need for a break. I tried to keep my running schedule consistent and get extra rest in hopes that things would "snap" back in to gear as quickly as possible.
I kept toying with the idea of training for the Hellgate 100k but I knew a couple nagging injuries should be tended to before I committed to anything like that. What helped get me out of the funk was Alice Stump asking if I would pace her to a MMTR finish. This kept the wheels turning and kept me distracted on a task. On 11/4/18 we had a great day to be in the woods. A wet and muddy time for the first half and then as the course climbed up into the mountain we had a perfect cool breezy Fall day. Alice kept moving and that constant forward progress got us to the finish in 11:49ish with an 11 minute cushion. Whew, that was quite a physical and mental day in the woods. Glad we were able to reach our goal.
With the end of the year winding down and us having a trip to New Zealand planned I decided to keep things conservative for the remainder of the year, trying to get my right foot, Achilles and left quad healed up so that we could put in some serious time on the trails of New Zealand.
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