I ran my first (and so far, only) 50K a little over eight years ago, in October 2014. It was the inaugural run of the Dead Horse Ultra, and I finished solidly at the top of the bottom of the very small pack, in just under 6 hours. I also herniated a disc - possibly because
I'd run the Durango Double (a trail half marathon on Saturday and a road half marathon on Sunday) the weekend before - and was injured enough that I ended up sitting out the Boston Marathon the following April. Still, I wanted a rematch, both with the distance and these particular jeep and mtb trails.
It was not to be. I had a long and slow come-back from injury, complicated by menopause and the onset of osteopenia (the precursor to osteoporosis) setting me back with a stress fracture, and I haven't even run a marathon since, let alone an ultra. But last month my internet-friend K, who lives in Boulder, told me that she'd been inspired by the beautiful desert photos of my race report to sign up for the Dead Horse 15K; I hemmed and hawed and considered that 1) I had just recovered from covid-19 and 2) I have done approximately zero trail running since mid-summer; but on the other hand a) 15K is about 9.3 miles, which is a typical long run distance for me, and b) it would be a chance to meet K - and the alphabet won. So about ten days ago I signed up for the race and reserved a hotel room, and on Friday afternoon I drove out to Moab. I had a nice and relaxing dinner at the fancy-schmancy Desert Bistro (the salad was beautiful, the wine was delicious, the main dish was a bit too salty for my taste, alas), went to bed early, and slept reasonably well, waking before my 6:30am alarm.
In the intervening years since I'd run the 50k, the Dead Horse had been taken over by another race management company, moved about a month later, sprouted additional distances, and become much, much bigger. The second running, 2 years later, changed the 25k to a 30k and added a 50-miler; this 2022 running included the 15k for the first time, which attracted 175 runners - more than three times the total number of runners in both distances combined in 2014! I drove up to the starting area on Saturday morning - the thermometer in my truck said it was 25F - and parked in the overflow area. This meant I couldn't wear extra clothes and then stash them quickly in my vehicle, so it was a cold wait for the start: I'd worn capris, a short-sleeve tee in jersey-like fabric, thin arm warmers, thin gloves, a thin buff around my neck and a fleece headband around my ears. (Spoiler alert: this was the right way to dress for the race, if not for the standing-around.) I met up with K and the other friends she'd talked into doing this race (K is a very enthusiastic promoter of things she likes) and we chatted until I realized it was just a few minutes to the race start, at which point I quickly got in the starting chute, positioning myself about the halfway point of the group. (The race does a self-seeded wave start, with three waves starting 5 minutes apart, and K and her friends planned to run in a later wave.)
And we were off! I ran around the parking area and up to the slowly-rising dirt road at what I hoped was approximately half-marathon effort level, trying not to push too hard at this early stage, trying not to feel bad about people passing me at this early stage. It wasn't too hard to remind myself to keep things under control - all I had to do was look over to where the road became 4WD-rough and turned steeply uphill. My first mile clocked in at a 9:10 pace, but pretty soon I was alternately walking and jogging up the ~450' hill, and mile 2 was a much more sedate 12:10.
After cresting the summit, the road swooped back down in short segments, a little down, a little up, a little more down, and so on, and I turned up the speed, though I had to watch my balance and footing on the rough terrain. When mile 3 checked in at 8:25 pace, I noticed that I'd run the first 3 miles in (barely) under 30 minutes, a 10-minute pace average, and set the arbitrary goal for myself of attempting to average under 10-minute pace for the whole race. Though it depends on terrain, my trail runs are typically between 11:30-12:00 pace, so I figured that I could improve that by a couple of minutes per mile with a race effort.
And so I kept up my pace and effort as I headed downhill, passing a few of the people who had passed me earlier, and even catching up with the slowest 30k runners and walkers who had started 20 minutes before me. Mile 4 was at 8:30 pace. When the road started to flatten out, getting less rough but sandier, I started seeing the leaders coming back from the turnaround at mile 4.8. I was carrying my handheld, so I didn't stop at the turnaround aid station, just rounded the marker and headed back the way I'd come.
The turnaround was only 10 feet higher than the start, which meant I had to climb back up the huge hill I'd just run down! But just as it had gently swooped down, it swooped up more gently than the initial climb, and I was able to run mile 5 at 8:50, mile 6 at 9:22, and mile 7 and 8 both at around 10:40 pace. I was still on pace for a sub-10-minute average...and now I was going downhill! Mile 8 was actually about half up and half down, but the roughness of the road kept me from really letting loose once gravity was helping rather than hurting; the road got smoother in mile 9, though, and I clocked 8:15 pace, and then 7:55 on the last bit, just under half a mile of almost imperceptible downhill by my Garmin, down to the parking lot, and through the finish chute at 1:29:39, a 9:28 pace which blew away my arbitrary goal (but made my new goal of sub-1:30 which I decided on at the moment I saw the finish clock from 25 yards or so away).
I immediately went to get some water - I'd finished what was my handheld during the last climb - and then just breathed for a while, as it had been an all-out effort at the end. I went to watch the finishers for a while, but started getting cold; I wanted to watch K and her friends finish, though, so I didn't dare hike back to my car to get my warm jacket in case I missed them. I lucked out, though, because one of the guys waiting at the finish line was holding an extra down jacket for his friend who was running the 50k, and I begged him to let me wear it until either his friend finished, or mine did! So I got to see K's friend Jenn finish, and then she and I cheered K across the finish line, and then I handed back the jacket and took the very very long and cold walk back to my truck. (I'd parked in the "wrong" overflow, just across the highway from the start, but the traffic which was minimal before 8 am was now heavy, and the traffic controllers sent me down the bike path to the underpass which led to the "correct" overflow...then I had to walk back along a service road, into the wind, to my parking area. Maybe a total of 3/4 mile - I was shivering, teeth chattering, by the time I got to my truck! Fortunately solar radiation had made it nice and toasty inside.)
I drove back to my hotel room and took a very long, very hot shower, then drove into downtown and met K, K's boyfriend, and Jenn for lunch, where I ate a burger the size of my head and about half of the huge helping of fries, washed it down with a draft beer (draft beer in Utah is limited to 5% ABV) and plenty of water, and made it home by 5pm, before dark. My butt hurt a lot (glutes are what drive you up the hill, and then I sat on them for three hours!) but otherwise I felt fine, and today I really didn't have any DOMS.
Final numbers: I won my age group! Which feels like a particular accomplishment since this race uses 10-year age groups and next year I age out into the next. I was first out of 14 in F50-59, 14/105 women, and 37/176 human beings.
And now I'm thinking about another 50k sometime...
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