C.C. Pyle's Amazing Foot Race by Geoff Williams

This last week I finished reading a story about a true ultramarathon: "C.C. Pyle's First Annual International Transcontinental Foot Race, From Los Angeles to New York" nicknamed by sportswriters of the time: "The Bunion Derby". The book chronicles several of the runners of the race, from their motivation for partaking in such an outlandish event with only meager preparation or knowledge of what they where about to try to accomplish, to pain, blisters, sprains, strains gained from running across the entire continent to a successful finish in New York, or where ever they might have dropped from the race.

The runners traversed 3421.5 miles over a span of 84 days, never once taking a full day of rest. In case you're curious, that's averaging about 40.7 miles per day, for almost 3 months! Try that one on for size Ultramarathon Man. Considering the foot wear they wore was nothing like the comfort cushioned cloud riders we use now, the determination these men had to finish surpasses any modern day ultra. 55 runners out of 199 finished. The winner was Andy Payne, a Cherokee from Foyil, Oklahoma. He covered the distance in 588 hours 40 minutes and 13 seconds. That works out to an average pace of 10:19 minutes per mile. He was flyin'. Here's a picture of the champ (taken from the Andy Payne Memorial Races website):



Read this book if you like reading about running, crazy endurance events or if you're a masochist looking for a new pastime.

Running moment of the week: I guess this has been a normal week in running, just putting in the miles, I cannot think of any special moment. Mostly runs in town, one hill workout on some country roads and a trail run today out at the lake. Maia and I did go on two seven mile runs this week and she ran really well, after a little encouragement. Together we averaged 7:45 minutes per mile. After which she barely moved for the rest of the morning.

2/18 - 2/24
total miles: 59.8
time: 7:48

YTD miles: 441.7

Running in the rain

On Saturday morning Gina and I woke up later than usual after staying up late (i.e. past 11 pm) watching movies with Gina's sister the night before. It was tough enough getting out of bed and the fact that it was raining outside wasn't helping at all. I was planning on running around 12 - 13 miles and I'll be damned if a little bit of rain was going to stop me. We all got dressed and put on rain gear. Well, everyone except for Maia who doesn't seem to mind if her fur gets wet. Five minutes before we were going to leave the rain changed from "get you wet rain" to "soak you to bone with icy cold rain". And because when it rains, it pours, some thunder and lightning got thrown into the mix. But no little winter thunder/ice storm is going to keep me from getting my miles in. However, being one to listen to reason, I did agree to only go for 8 miles.

9:30 AM: The roads were beginning to get covered in standing water creating giant puddles along the curb. You always need to pay extra special attention to passing motorist in this weather since they will take their "I'm a bad ass cause I can drive over any curb in the city"-SUV and plow right through a puddle sending a tidal wave over the sidewalk. However, by the time I was outside for 2 minutes, it would not have mattered a bit cause I was already soaked through. I ran past the park where the open drainage canal was nearing flood stage and turned north into the wind. The rain was starting to freeze on parked cars on the side of the road. The jacket I was wearing caused the rain water hitting my chest to pool and flow straight down to my shorts (that's right folks, I was wearing shorts). My gloves were soaked through and my penis was getting colder by the step. I didn't make it much further before I turned around and headed home. About half way home I ran into Gina, Vanessa (Gina's sister) and Maia, they left the house about five minutes after I did. They saw me running home and it didn't take too much convincing to get them to turn around too. We all headed home, dried off and ate an amazing breakfast of waffles, scrambled eggs and buffalo sausage.

Just as quickly as the rain picked up intensity, it lost it too. About 30 minutes after we got home with our tails between our legs the rain mellowed out to a steady drip. I cursed myself for my cowardice and planned on going out later in the day. This time with two pairs of underwear.

1:50 PM: It looked as if the majority of the storms had passed and that all that remained was the rain. I headed out to run the same 11.7 mile route around town that I ran on Monday and the moment I closed the front door the rain picked up again. "It's just a little rain," I thought and left anyway. This time it turned out to be harmless and ten minutes later it calmed down again. The roads were still wet, though not a bad as earlier. My jacket was doing a good job keeping my core warm and even though I was again wearing shorts, which were soaked, with two pairs of underwear on my important regions stayed warm. Some of the roads on this route don't have a sidewalk and are too busy to run on, especially when the shoulder is under water. This caused some tromping through the mud on the side of the roads. A few slippery spots, but don't worry folks, this humble blogger jogger is quick on his toes (just don't look at some previous posts) and managed to keep his tookas out of the mud. The weather was a non-factor until about 10-15 minutes left to go when I heard some thunder again. Then again. And again. It was getting closer and I pushed hard to try and make it home in time before the next storm arrived.

Running moment of the week: Making it to the port-a-potty in time on Monday's run. Enough said.

2/11 - 2/17
total miles: 58.1
time: 7:37

YTD miles: 381.9

Mock 3 Days

This weekend I ran a practice multi-day run. The actual milage was: Saturday 19.5, Sunday 28.4 and Monday 11.7 for a total of 59.6 miles. Here's a breakdown of each day:

Saturday: First of the mock "3 Days" and it was a great start to the training. I ran 19.5 miles out on the trails at Lake Thunderbird. It was a beautiful morning that started off pretty cold, but it quickly warmed up as the sun came out of the clouds and was 50 degrees by the time I was done. Luckily I left my winter hat in the car and took my visor instead. I could have left my big black gloves in the car too and taken my glove liners. I didn't have enough Gu and took cookies. See the "Running moment of the week" for the result of that action. I remembered to keep my pace slower than normal and felt pretty strong when I finished.

Sunday: For the second day of the mock "3 Days" I went out to Lake Stanely-Draper and ran two laps around the lake for 28.4 miles. The wind coming off the lake was brutal! Remembering how warm I was the day before, I went with the glove liners today instead of the big black gloves, big mistake! The first lap I basically kept blowing on my fingers to keep some dexterity in them. The temperatures dropped from the start and went down to 30 before the sun came out and started to warm things up again. First lap time: 1:57, second lap time: 2:10. I think with the cold temperatures I started a bit too quick to try and stay warm.

Monday: Last day of the mock "3 Days" and I ran a route around town. I felt pretty strong throughout, after a slow warm up. I would have had a faster time but I had to walk a lot on Jenkins from Timberdell down to 9 since I really needed to have a bathroom break.

Running moment of the week: I got mad skills and you know it. On Saturday's run, I didn't have enough Gu packets so I brought some Keebler Elves' double stuff cookies on my run at Lake Thunderbird. I put them into some cheap Target ziplock bags that are hard enough to open when you're not wearing gloves, holding a water bottle in your armpit and trail running. Go figure that a root found a hold on my toe and I went down face first. Awesome.

2/4 - 2/10
total miles: 80.4
time: 11:07

YTD miles: 323.8

Oklahoma Narrows

It was a gorgeous weekend here in Oklahoma and with my dad visiting, Gina and I decided we should all go down to the Wichita Mountain Wildlife Refugee. The temperature on Sunday reached into the mid 70s while we were hiking, it was hard to believe that we woke up to the low teens on Friday and a half an inch of snow. Without a cloud in the sky and the Superbowl to keep the crowds away, we had a great time.

We began by hiking the Dog Hollow trail, an eight mile loop through the prairie grasses and over a couple streams. Maia has such a great time hiking, I wish there was more trails around here to take her on. She sniffs the ground so intently and every so often stops just to make sure that the pack is all together. The rocky trails don't seem to bother her and she loves to hop over the boulders and wade through the creeks.

After stopping for lunch at the car, we went on to hike in one of the amazing spots of the park, the Narrows. There is no maintained trail through the Narrows, but there is a well established trail leading through the canyon. The first time we get to some water there is a little spot where Maia loves to swim and play fetch. She turns into a crazy driven dog and tries so hard to get the stick without getting in over her head. She stands on the edge of a rock and paws at the water trying to get the stick to move closer. It's absolutely adorable.

We kept walking further into the canyon, hopping along the boulders and through the creek bed. It is incredible. When I moved to Oklahoma I had no idea that we would find such a special place.

Again, I missed the goal milage I set out for myself a few weeks ago, even the lower modified goal I wrote last week. I think this week I'll probably miss the goal again. It looks like I'll miss it again by around 5 miles. I'm feeling strong and healthy during my runs and I'm really excited about running my first multi-day race. My January total miles is on track for the 2500 mile goal for 2008. I've added a "ticker" on the right keeping track of this goal.

Running moment of the week: Saturday morning I went for a 20+ miler out at Lake Thunderbird. About 8 miles in my toes caught a root and after a few stumbling steps where I thought I might regain my footing, I fell face first into the dirt. Boo-Ya! It was the first time I had fallen in a long time, too bad no one was there to see it. I'm sure the deer got a good chuckle in.

1/28 - 2/3
total miles: 56.8
time: 7:51

January miles: 213.7
YTD total miles: 243.4