Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Bumps, Bruises, and Mt. Begbie

I can hardly believe it is already the end of August! Where has the summer gone! After ben's race I accepted a part time job with Valhalla Pure here In revelstoke. This really ate up the spare time that Ben and I had to go on adventures. Needless to say that job only lasted 2 weeks. The breaking point was last weekend when I was going to be working all weekend and had already worked 3/5 nights that week. It was a beautiful weekend, and Ben and I were determined to take advantage of the 20 hours total that I had off all week(from 3pm Sat till 11am Sunday). At 3pm we packed up bags and headed up to camp on Mt. Begbie. It was a 6 km slough up a steep 22% grade trail with all our camping gear on our backs. There aren't any views along the way, but once you get above the treeline the view was rewarding! We could see the ski hill, the town, the setting sun, and it was a clear evening so that stars were unbelieveable that night. There is a couple of tent pads up there but they were all taken so we hiked up a little further and found a spot right below the glacier. It was unbelieveable. We had some wine, made some "dinner" (which is freeze dried astronaut food which you just add water too... yet tastes soo good after hiking)and built a fire. We hung out played cribbage and soaked in the views determined to stay awake for the stars. We camped that night without the fly on our tent and stared at them all night. Well ben literally stared at them all night because he didn't sleep at all since a spark hit his thermarest sleeping pad and created a hole.. I on the other hand slept peacefully under the stars.

We got up bright at early at 6 am because I knew I had to work. Dreading work. We started hiking down the mountain and wound up on top of a rock ledge. I was in front and kept walking trying to find a safe place to get down. Finally i found a place i thought I could do it, took a couple of steps until i felt my feet slip and fell about 10 feet. I am so lucky it was only 10 feet because I was pretty much helpless falling. My knees were pretty cut up, so ben came over with the trusty first aid kit and bandaged me up. All in all i was lucky and didn't think there was any major issues... that was until I started trying to walk down the steep mountain. My right knee that wasn't all that scraped up was really really sore, and very step made it worse. But I had no choice we had to get off that dumb mountain. It took us 3 hours. 3 hours of torture with every second step. Did I mention that we forgot the painkillers at home? whoops. Half way down I stopped trying to be tough and gave ben my backpack to carry down which made it a little easier but boy that was one of the hardest things I've done. Needless to say I didn't work that day, and proceeded to work one more shift before quitting. Working 8-5 is enough, I dont need to be working 60 hours a week. Especially since I want to do so much other things too.

This past weekend Ben and I had plans to climb Mt. cartier here in revelstoke. But it was soo smokey so we just went to the gym, had a mini triathlon, did a little hiking that was not strenous, and just hung out. I was supposed to work all weekend again so we just enjoyed having that time off together.

This coming weekend we're headed to Penticton. We decided to volunteer at Ironman Canada which will be really exciting! I'm planning on signing up for next year and we decided that since we were going so I could sign up we might as well volunteer and get involved in the whole thing! The weather is supposed to be nice and we've decided to bring our bikes.. maybe bike a portion of the route for ironman! should be a good weekend!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

After the 2010 Canadian Death Race





Wow, what an adventure........i thought that i would share my experience for anyone who might want to do this race. Although it is not a typical ultramarathon, it has definitely become a popular race over the last ten years, and i was lucky enough to take part in the 10th anniversary. The death race is always over the august long weekend, and includes a Relay Race (5 legs), a Kids Race, and the Solo Race which i did. Its a pretty cool weekend, with thousands of people flocking to a tiny town in northern alberta, Grande Cache, which is west of Hinton, north of Jasper. We drove up on Thursday night, and camped at the local campground.













As for training, I basically started in early January. Im not a fan of running in the super cold calgary outdoors, so i chose to hit up the treadmills, usually on a serious incline, and did lots of stairclimbing with weights. Jen was training for her Osooyoos race, so she was busy with swimming, biking, and treadmilling, so we kept pretty busy. I was determined NOT to underestimate this race because of the elevation changes (17 000), so I planned on doing some serious hiking when the weather allowed me to (Canmore area/Kananaskis).........im truly lucky to be from the calgary area becasue there is some awesome hills to assault in that area, and those are super important for trail running an ultra! I peaked about 4 weeks before the race, which is a couple weeks longer than for a marathon but i was so out of routine with moving, and getting a new job, and all that stuff so i was concerned about not having gone hard enough, but the last 6 months had been full throttle and fortunately injury free.





The Race: the CDR is divided into 5 legs, each of which has its unique challenges and features, and this year, about 1200 people started the Relay Event, and just over 400 started the Solo Event. In the end, only 150 finished solo, and i was lucky enough to finish 24th overall. It was a good day to race, because it was relatively dry and the heat didn't get into the 90's so even though alot of people got serious dehyrdartion issues, it could have been alot worse. The day before the race, i started reading the brochure about the course itself, and became pretty uncomfortable and nervous. i questioned whether or not i had done enough, and worked specifically for this terrain. i probably got about 4 hours of solid sleep the night before. But race day came, and the gun went of at 8 AM. (they start the race later than most to give runners the 'opportunity to run at night'. Heres a breakdown from the lonnnng day:




Leg 1: Downtown Jaunt (21 km)
Starts downtown Grande Cache and quickly heads into the forest. my plan was to Pace, Pace, Pace and keep it slow and steady (around 10 minute mile) and was near the back of the back for the first section of paved road. I watched in disbelief as people went out WAY TOOO fast, sweating, out of breath, and i was so thankful that i didnt get caught up in the competition, and as i got onto the double track quad trail began slowly passing people, but still super relaxed and not even breaking a sweat. There is a few inclines on this leg, but nothing crazy. the main thing was to watch your footing, and try to keep calm and not get over excited. this stage of the race took just under two hours, and the the relay station at the end was erupting with crazy fans and supporters yelling "GO DEATH RACER!".....it was awesome to come cruising through the transition seeing champ waving frantically with my little station set up, and changing my shoes, gatorade and refuelling me for the hardest leg of the race..........


Leg 2: Flood Mtn, Grande Mtn (27 km)
This is definately the hardest leg of this race for a few reasons. There is some seriously steep uphills, and some insanely steep downhills, like 1000 ft sketchy, quad burning types). the only easy part is the 1 km back onto the highway and into town. this is where people started throwing up, and the test of whether or not you trained for this thing became apparent. It starts from the TA into to the forest and up, and up and up. you climb steadily for about 2 hours, and i casually passed a whole bunch of people keeping my heart rate and footing in check. you get to a point where you think you might have climbed the first mountain untill a race official says, "welcome to the climb", and you get hit with another 500 ft of straight up bush wacking up near the summit of Flood. your there for about 2 minutes, before running back down, down, down, down untill you get to do it again on another mtn!!.........one of the toughest sections of the whole race is called the Slugfest, which involves about 1000 ft decline on a super sketchy, super loose, bouldery, ravine where apparantaley a few people broke their ankles, and put their knees out. there is no real strategy for getting down, some were butt sliding, others were zig zagging through the woods, trying to make it from tree to tree, but definetaley a slog. From the top of the second mtn, you run down a steep power line, and get back to the highway. from there its about 1 km back into town and the TA is right at the start line. Again, I see jen with all my goodies (running vest, gatorade, goodies, and new shoes.....she was the best race crew, everyone neeeeds one of these! part support, part motivator, part psychologist, part physical therapist, part doctor.........) by the end of this stage, i was still mentally/emotionally intact, but my legs were getting dehyrdated and started to seize up a little.





Leg 3 Old Miners Road (23 km)
This leg has a net elevation loss of about 1000 ft, and its a pretty gradual decline down a rocky, sketchy old school logging road/creek bed. The nice thing is that its in the shade, and it was about 1 pm so super hot outside. By this stage in the race, people were spread out fairly well, so i only saw a handful of people. i was so jealous to see relay runners sprinting by me with fresh legs, but the REALLY COOL thing about this race is that there are NO EGOS whatsoever, and when most relay runners look over at your number and realize your doing it solo, they are so supportive asking if you need anything and encouraging you to keep going. As far as obstacles, this is the leg where there is normally a major river crossing with a current that is nee deep water. Fortunately, it was dry and there was only a whole bunch of mud/boggy lowlands to deal with so nothing like sopping, soaking wet feet!. That was a relief! I was approaching the half way point, and my legs started to really, really cramp up. I was surprised because i had been drinking tonnes of fluids (gatorade) and eating good gels and stuff, but i should have been replacing my salt much better. by the time i got to the transition, i was way ahead of the cut off time of 7:15, coming in at about 4:30 and getting to rest for 15 minutes before the insanely long 27 km Hamel Assault



Leg 4 Hamel Assault (27 km)
Jen had brought me a cold can of coke and man was that ever good!!! i put on my compression pants, and my legs really started seizing up. after some great words of encouragement from jen, this random dude on crutches, and some local supporters, i sacked up and headed out along the highway enroute to Hamel Peak which is a super steady but steep mountain with switchbacks, logging roads and alpine singletrack. I became so sluggish, i was wobbling down the highway and about to enter the trailhead for the mountain. i kept telling myself that it was game over. my legs were so cramped, and i could barely keep a normal gait. almost as soon as i started climbing (10 steps up, then keeled over wondering what the HE@# i was doing here, this elite runner came down the trail puking and telling me he was done.) I wanted to follow him, but i couldnt face my champ and all the supporters cheering me on and telling me i could do it, so i kept on slogging........the 2 hours it took me to get up that first section was in forest, switchbacks mainly and it opens up to a checkpoint on a logging road. this guy told me it was still 5 km to the top of Hamel, and i shook my head and kept going. By the time i got to the base of the real climb, i was pinned up against the wall in agony, and this relay runner gave me 2 bottles of a super concentrated sodium chloride mixutre to help my spasming legs from agonizing me. what an awesome guy, he helped me huge. another guy gave me some salt tablets, and my legs began to feel a little bit better. I got to the top of Hamel, and from there you decend 850 meters for a prayer flag, and then run back to the peak to place it and say a prayer. It was another 10 k to the aid station and a gradually declining double track. I got the aid station, where you have to again go back 2.5 km to a checkpoint, and then back to the aid station to check in. From there its all down hill! (9 km logging road down to the transition area). This was kind of freaky, because the sun had set but it was still kind of light out. I had to turn the head lamp on and by the time i got to the transition area on the highway, i could hear the massive crowd cheering, and saw my champ smiling, waving, and hooking me up with another cold coke, a breakfast drink and the best thing ever....A bag of regular Lay's........SOOOOO FREAKING GOOD

Leg 5 (Hells Gate 27 km)



At this point it was 11:00 pm, and i knew i was going to make it!!! I was on the last leg, and i was only thinking about getting to the jet boat 12kms away. thick jungle like forest, running with your headlamp by yourself is kind of sketchy, but the course was very well marked. it was typical of the death race, nothing easy, big climbs, sketchy footing and scary because i only saw a handful of people, but after a while i could hear the jet boats and you squeeze through this huge rock and run down to the loading area. This guy dressed as the grim reaper with a huge axe asks you for your fare (a silver coin that you carry with you throughout the race) to get across Hells Canyon and then you load on the boat. they rip across the river and you think, "man, im going to finish this thing". i got off the boat, and didnt realize that the canyon was over 1000 ft below the town, so guess what? an insanely steep 2 km climb up what seemed like a friggin wall. i was so determined to get it over with that i passed people and began a pretty steady pace untill i got out of the forest. from there its 3 kms up a gravel road and onto the pavement for the last km. i could hear the announcer and it was very emotional for me. I turned the last corner and began sprinting through the chute and around the corner. I ran through the finish and threw my arms up in total and utter exhiliration! Champy was there to hug me, and i was sooooo happy to do it! thanks to everyone who beleived in me!