East Texas Ultra Runners 50K 25K

Tyler, Texas

Saturday, 10, 2007

 By Deborah Sexton

 This is such a great race and I love this course. It has a wonderful
combination of ups and downs, a little bit of terrain, but mostly wonderful
sandy, pine-needle covered trails. You really get in some long runnable
stretches on this course which after Bandera is a nice change.

If I could change one thing about this race, it would be the weather. It’s
just too cold for me. Last year, it was so windy, everyone grabbed their
hamburger and ate it in the car. This year it was about 29 degrees at the
start and I don’t think it ever got past 45 degrees. Now most people think
these are perfect temperatures, but I hate the cold. 

 Driving down with Tom Crull and Jay Freeman was one of the highlights of the
trip. You can always count on great conversation in the way of stupid jokes
from Tom, past race experiences, and general gossip, news, and catching up.
We left Tom’s house around 4:30 a.m. and chatted all the way to the race. I
had a great time just driving with Tom and Jay.

 Ok here’s a Tom Crull joke:

A skeleton came up to a bar tender. The bar tender said: What can I get you?
The skeleton said: A Bud Light and a mop. 

 Tom told that joke about three times during the run as well and I still
don’t get it but maybe it’s because I’m blonde. 

 Once we got to the race start, I cracked the door and the frigid air hit my
face. It was going to take all I had to get out of the car. I asked Jay to
pick up my packet so I could delay the moment as long as possible. But
finally with about four minutes left to race start, I took a deep breath and
jumped out of the car. 

 I looked for Brad Garrison and Goutham K, who I thought I might be able to
keep up with. I was supposed to run with Tom but he has a bad habit of
leaving me in the dust, despite his insistence that he wasn’t feeling well
and was going to go “slow.” 

 There were a few hardy souls in shorts and I was wishing I had put on a
second pair of pants. I saw Letha, who had done the Rocky Raccoon 50 miler
last week, doing the 25K this week. Mark Dick made a rare running appearance
without his unicycle to do the 25K. He was by far the most colorful runner.
And Ryan Loedling was there, after doing the Rocky Raccoon 100 miler last
week to do the 50K this week. He ran a 16:15 at Rocky and came in fifth. I
think he ended up third at Tyler. Man that is so amazing to me. He passed me
on my second loop to finish.  

 The caravan I ended up with initially was Tom Crull, two ladies I met for
the first time-Sharon and Terri Griffith, Brad, Goutham, and Sue Yates and
her out-of-town friend Tim. They both also did the Ultracentric together
this past Nov. 

 We stayed together pretty much through the first aid station and then
started to break up a bit. It’s a long steep climb out of that first one so
I didn’t linger and I am slower on hills than Tom. Brad and Goutham didn’t
even stop they keep going up the hill. We got to the turnoff and I realized
Brad and Goutham had keep going up the hill and missed the turnoff so we all
started shouting their names to come back they were going the wrong way.
Thank goodness they heard us and turned around. 

 We got to the second aid station on the course, which had the famous Red
Spicer (Palo Duro RD) at it. It is always so great to see him and he helped
us refill. Tom pulled off to do something but since I was already struggling
to keep up with him, I didn’t wait and Brad and I left together. Goutham was
on fire and he breezed past us and I never saw him again. This was his first
50K and it looks like he finished it in fine style although I do not know
his time. 

 Brad and I finished the first loop together and I grabbed a couple more
packs of Clip 2 and set out again. I didn’t see Brad anywhere so I guessed
he hadn’t waited. I ran about a half mile and didn’t see him so I turned
around and saw his white shirt coming. So I waited. We finished the second
loop together. Toward the end, he started losing steam. He had been very
sick the week before so he declared that he was done. I begged and pleaded
for him to finish it out but he had had enough. Just as we were heading in,
we spotted Tom Crull and Terri Griffith coming in also.

So I run in, grab some more Clip 2 and wait to see who’s going back out. Tom
is done. I don’t see Terri anywhere so I set back out for my last loop which
will probably be myself. Boo Hoo, I hate to run alone. But after about five
minutes, I see Terri coming around the bend. So I wait for her and we had a
wonderful last loop together. This was her first 50K and she held a very
strong pace for the whole loop. I would have loved to slow down more but she
kept moving and I was not going to lose my warm body to talk to.

She is an adventure racer so I learned a lot about that (she bought three
boats and two mountain bikes last year) and I realized that I’m not rich
enough to be an adventure racer. About a mile from the finish, her husband
Ed came out to meet us with her two dogs. And we ran it in. We beat the
cutoff by about 1 minute 30 seconds with a time of 7 hours 58 minutes 30
seconds. I was disappointed that was the best I could do but happy to finish
and get out of wet clothes. 

 Melissa, an aid station worker, made me a hamburger and Tom and Jay (who
were so ready to leave) urged me into the car and we drove home.

 As I said, this is such a nice course. It’s a good beginner 25K or 50K. It’s
not “easy” but less technical than even Rockledge as a course. You do a lot
of winding and circling around in the woods and many of the hilly climbs are
long switchbacks. So it’s a good workout without really climbing hard.

Race director Paul Stone does a great job of logistics with well-stocked aid
stations, wonderful volunteers, and a nice award at the finish. I also
really like the T-shirt for this race. It’s usually an earth-tone color with
a woodsy graphic and the name of race.

Thanks Paul for hosting us another year.