Climbs and Crossings

 Race morning, when I had no clue it was going to be a crap day.  Something went wrong. Something went really wrong because I had no legs to run on. I kept waiting for them to warm up, loosen up, wake up...but they felt heavy and fatigued. My quads burned on the rolling singletrack, and it wasn't long before I was walking runnable trail. My mantra became "there are still so many miles in front of me" which is maybe the first time that's ever been a comforting thought in a race. It meant I had plenty of time to work through this. It would pass. My legs would show up, just be patient.  About mile 10 I gave up on waiting for my legs to show up. If this was the hand I'd been dealt then it was time to face it and readjust. Forget a PR. I ran into Warm Springs at mile 11.6 and heard someone say my name.  Hey, it's Alvin! This guy is always smiling. I wished him a good race and hung out a few minutes longer to eat and regroup. Leaving the aid station ...

This is a big deal. Without fail, there is somebody at every ultra I've run that I hear say, Oh, I'm not really trying for anything today, I'm just using this as a training run for my self supported run across Canada next month. I'll probably just cartwheel the whole thing.   I heard this type of exchange on the bus on the way to the start. "It's only a 50 miler, so the heat shouldn't even be an issue." It's a good thing it was dark... The "it's only a 50 miler" comment snapped me out of the anxious mind chatter and got me refocused. The few weeks leading up to the race, any time it came up, GeNene would say to me, "This is a big deal." Then I started saying it, and understanding what it really meant. This is something that I used to talk about doing "someday". It seemed really far off. I believed I could do it, but it would happen to some distant future version of me. "This is a big deal" m...