MISERY

Today's run was 25 miles and I decided I needed to make it more "race specific" so I included a run up to Camp Misery, a popular entrance into the Jewel Basin hiking area. One of the partners in my office went backcountry skiing at Jewel Basin this week and told me that people snowmobile up the unplowed forest service road with their skis -- and that I could probably run on the tracks. Supposedly the road is 7 miles up, though my Garmin says it's 6.4 miles up.

I parked the car at the bottom of the forest service road, at 3100 feet, and headed up. The first mile is pretty flat and sort of plowed. People live on that stretch. It was basically ice. Though now that I have IceBugs ice is perfectly good running surface for me. Then the road turns to snow, which was pretty well compacted by snowmobiles. It quickly became un-runnable for me so I tried to "walk with purpose." I'm still really slow at climbing. I need to work on this. As I got higher the snow became less packed down, deeper and more difficult to traverse. This slowed me even more.

This picture (above) was taken at around mile 5. That's Flathead Lake in the distance.

The views were beautiful. Although it was grey it was breathtaking. The pictures really don't do justice to the views.

So here is the "road" as I neared the top. As you can see, it's not ideal. But not terrible. But as I was running I was thinking, "I really DRIVE on this?" Scary. Anyhow, on my way up, a snowmobile passed and a woman was skiing behind as if she was water skiing. Behind her were two cute dogs racing up the mountain. It was really funny. I chatted with them a little bit when I reached the point where they decided to stop and ski. The dogs, though having run about 5 miles straight up behind a snowmobile, showed NO sign of tiring. The woman said they would be tired by the end of the day.

I started to feel a little dramatic and tired as I neared the top. My Garmin showed 6.3 and I was mustering up the positive thoughts to make it the last .7. My feet were pretty much sinking through the snow, but not with every step, which made it a little difficult to avoid falling. Then, rather suddenly, I could see the cabin that marks the end of the road. Here (below) is the restroom. Good thing I wasn't planning to use it.

Here is the cabin. Very snowy. According to my Garmin, this point was about 5700 feet, which means I climbed about 2600 feet. To be honest, I was disappointed that it wasn't more. It sure felt like more. And, I will have to climb much more than that in a much shorter distance at Western States. There might even be snow, which negates the fleeting though I had that "at least it will be dry trail." I suppose that's what the whole training thing is for -- to get me ready.

I cruised down back to my car where I did a shoe change, a bottle switcheroo and stocked up on Accel Gel. I then headed out to do the other half of my run -- on road. Now, if I was hardcore, I would have done two "Miserys" to get my 25 miles. I'm pretty sure these guys would have done 3, even though they're training for a marathon rather than 100. Maybe next week I will try doing two, or a double Misery (I'm having too much fun with this). Maybe Leanne or Tom will do the second with me. Misery loves company :p In any case, the road portion of my run was pretty easy. That said, while the uphill/downhill made me tired, the road does make me feel more pounded.

Near the very end I came across this sign, which I've seen before but never thought much about. I totally have no idea what it's talking about -- the big empty tree-less field?

Finally, here's a self-indulgent picture of myself happily finished in front of the lying liar sign that marked the beginning of my day's adventure. It's funny how totally impossible the last mile of any run seems, regardless of distance. And the joy I feel in being done. Even though I really truly do love running. I love the post-run pizza :-)