HUNDRED IN THE HOOD

INTRODUCTION

After a DNF (did not finish) at Western States, I needed a finish to get the 100 mile thing out of my system once and for all. I wanted redemption. At the same time, I didn’t want to properly train so I wasn’t sure whether I’d finish. So, I didn’t really tell people that I was planning to do another 100. It’s not fun to have to tell everyone about failing and explain why and all that. I decided for sure that I would run the “Hundred in the Hood” only the week before – I thought about bagging it and crewing for Leslie and Quinn at Bear 100 in Utah (both women did awesome by the way – absolutely amazing runners!). But, I had a great offer on the table from Chris O’Connor to come pace me and Callie offered to come along and crew as well. I figured I’d give it a go.

The Hundred in the Hood is comprised of two out-and-backs on the Pacific Crest Trail. It turns out that the course was about 103 miles (according to RD Olga), but more on that later.

The two concerns I had about the race were that I had a little ITB trouble recently and that I’d only been running 20-30 miles per week, pretty much all long runs once a week. Neither of these, thankfully, ended up being deal breakers.

MISC. PRE-RACE STUFF

Callie and took Amtrak to Portland, which was great. The train leaves Whitefish at 9:30 p.m. or thereabouts and gets into Portland around 10:00 a.m. or thereabouts. We had regular reserved seats on the way out, which were pretty comfortable and allowed decent sleeping. On the way back we were in the sleeper car, which is first-class travel for sure. I definitely want to incorporate the Empire Builder into more vacations.

We stayed in Government Camp at the Huckleberry Inn, which was fine other than their firm refusal to let us check out late on Sunday. For dinner we went up to the Timberline Lodge, which is where The Shining was filmed. That place is pretty neat – and they had excellent hot chocolate.

I was trying to jump but that didn't work so well. This picture reminds me of my friend Joanna's four year old, who assumes this pose often it seems. It's sort of a monster pose.

Now these guys can jump.

The packet pick-up was seamless and quick. We met up with Joe Lee and his runner Mike, who was running his first 100.

Callie, Mike, Joe, Chris

RACE

A. Miles 0-28

The race started bright and early at 5 a.m. I ran a bit with a guy who does endurance unicycling. I asked Chris if he knew him, and figured he would be easily identifiable since I didn’t think endurance unicycling was common. Turns out there are more than one, so we never settled the question of who I was talking to. The first couple of hours were pretty dark, and I hadn’t thought of needing a headlamp in the morning. Luckily Chris had an extra.

The beginning miles of the race are relatively easy with rolling terrain and some spectacular views of Mt. Hood. This section was an out-and-back, which allowed me to see the people going in the other direction. It was fun to see Jennifer Hemmen, who was running her first 100 miler. She’s funny. This section of trail was pretty uneventful, other than getting stung on the thumb by a bee (I think?) which caused my thumb to swell up big and fat. I did a sock change and foot cleaning at mile 18, which was part of my foot care strategy. I cleaned my feet, re-lubed and changed socks every 20 miles or so, and didn’t get one single blister!!!!!! Can you believe it?

I felt really good and was maintaining an average pace of about 13:30 minute miles without feeling at all like I was working. Just a comfortable jog.

B. Miles 28-35

At some point around mile 28 the second out-and-back begins. The course became more varied, with more climbing and descending. This was welcome since my “runs” lately have been mountain hike/runs and I don’t really have running legs these days. Things were going along smoothly and my pace was still well under 14s on average and I started entertaining ideas of a relatively fast finish. . .

C. Miles 35-55

Around mile 35 (or 40, I’m not sure as my Garmin missed some miles it seems) I washed my feet in a stream and changed my socks. When I got up. . .OUCH. Just as I was thinking about how fast I might be, and also as I was getting a little depressed thinking about how long I would be running, my ITB started screaming at me. I stopped to stretch it a couple times and popped some Advil but was hobbling mightily. I then had a meltdown. How could I be so stupid as to try 100 miler when I knew I might have an injury that could stop me in my tracks? How was I going to get a hold of Chris when there was no cell service? Everyone would think I was just a quitter with lots of excuses after the Western States DNF. I mean, after awhile you might wonder whether I was really just full of lame excuses. I practically hyperventilated I was so worked up. I finally gave up on stretching and just tried to hobble along. Once I stopped freaking out and kept moving for awhile the pain went away and I could run. I reminded myself that you can’t ever take anything for granted in these things and that a finish is all I really wanted. And that I wanted it. And that was that.

I made it to mile 55 where I picked up my pacer (Chris) in about 13 hours, which I thought was pretty decent for me. At that point I was hopeful that I could finish somewhere between 27-28 hours without having to push too hard.


D. Miles 55-75

This section is the most technical of the entire course, with a long descent up very rocky trail and what appeared to be some cliffs off the side of the trail. It was beautiful though and at one point we were treated to a sunset behind Mount Hood.


Live trailside entertainment. He had a hat our for runners to toss payment in. . . hopefully he has enough Gus to last him awhile.
Aid station fare, including whiskey

I think it was during this section that I ran into a log and somehow managed to stab myself in the left shin AND the back of my right thigh at the same time. I was bleeding kind of a lot and the blood on my thigh was pooling behind my knee. It really grossed Chris out for a little bit. Eventually all the trail dirt mixed in with the dried blood and it sort of disappeared. That was my main injury, followed by a fall on a bridge that could have resulted in a dunk in the drink (but only resulted in a scraped up knee), another minor fall and the bee sting. All told, a success.

E. Miles 75+

I can’t say for sure when, but the wheels fell off at some point. It was really cold and I became really sleepy. For the first time I experienced the most desperate desire to sleep ever. At Headlands I grew really tired and cried and stuff but don’t remember this desperate sleepy feeling. My eyes were rolling back in my head while I trudged along. I would have stopped for a short nap if it weren’t so cold. The only way to stay warm was to keep moving. Finally I begged some No-Doz off Chris, which didn’t even work! I must drink a lot of coffee. After a second No-Doz and having Chris run ahead rather than behind me, I woke up a little.

The low point of the race was some time later, when someone (I think Nic, who ran with us for awhile) informed me that the race was longer than 100 miles. I guess this was on a chart that I had even printed out, but somehow I missed the fact that the race was longer than 100 miles. Someone told me that it was going to be 102.5, and I thought I was going to have a meltdown. I couldn’t talk, and felt like some great injustice was being perpetrated against me. I didn’t cry, but probably stewed about this for a couple hours. The fact that each mile seemed to take hours made me feel like the extra 2.5 miles would mean another entire day of running. I eventually got over it, but not until long after I proclaimed outloud that I was over it.

The last few hours were pretty agonizing. Nothing was particularly wrong with me, other than the fact that my feet were really achy. I was tired, but not sick or anything. Yet, I was moving very slowly and felt sort of like a cranky kid dragging her feet and pouting. I felt guilty that at the final aid station I couldn’t muster cheery conversation and even pretend to be happy. I think I was able to muster a despondent look, though on the inside I was crying to learn that I still had 6 more miles to go. I repeated in my mind over and over “this is so *&(*$&#ing heinous, this is so &*#&*$&ing heinous” until I was finally convinced it would end, which wasn’t until around the last half mile.

I barely jogged across the finish line in 29:10, but was treated with Olga-cheer and a special present from her because she said she likes me. That was really nice. Olga is awesome, even aside from the fact that she gave me a cool present.

Olga, looking great, above.

Post-Race and thoughts

There was an excellent spread of food at the finish, and even beer. Remarkably, I didn’t want a beer. Scary, eh? We hung around for a little bit and chatted with Joe and Olga and Lisa Heurta, whom Callie paced for 25 miles. Lisa finished under 24 hours I believe. Awesome. We went back to Government Camp, dropped off Chris and headed back to Portland where I had the best shower of my life at a 24-Hour Fitness in downtown Portland. We boarded the train and headed home. A fantastic weekend.

My main thoughts are that my foot-care strategy worked great (clean feet, clean socks and Hydropel) and that I really don’t want you all to let me run another 100. Also, Chris is an awesome pacer and I am eternally grateful for his help and support. I had fun and am so so so so very glad I did this race, but don’t want you to let me do another. OK? Promise? Thanks.