My Umstead Race Report by Kimberly A. Love-Ottobre

It was a great day for running, fairly cold (and especially for NC’ians)
somewhere in the 40’s-perfect for Buckeyes who had barely had any warm
temps!

I ran the first two laps too fast. I ran into Helen Malmberg, at the start,
who was at Mohican last year, and is the Race Director of the Haliburton
Ultra. She introduced me to Ruta Mazelis, who turns out to live in just
about a neighboring county in Ohio, was the RD of the Dan Rossi Memorial
Ultra, and knows some of the same runners I do. She is running the 50 miler,
so she and I chat for the first five miles of the race. She tells me to go
on around that time, and I run on ahead. The course is really nice. There
are hills here, although I did make the mistake and say ‘what hills’ when
Steve asked me about them later in the race. (ANY incline is a hill after
twenty-some hours.) These hills are a little more gradual but long, kind of
relaxing and casual in the early hours of the race to power hike up.
“Patience is a virtue.” I was impatient that second and third loop. I wanted
to run. I wanted to log those miles in. I held back as well as I could. It’s
hard when you’re a newby. But I knew I had many miles to go (somewhere I
knew that, in the back of my head, I didn’t think about it so much).
I knew the fourth loop would be tough. It was predicted to be a high of 72
that day, and I had was not acclimated to that at all. It turned out that
Raleigh Airport posted an official high of 79 degrees that day. I ran that
faster that I should have with the heat. I was eating and drinking, but it
seemed like I really wasn’t sweating too much. Or peeing much, considering I
thought I was getting water in me. (I was taking Suceed caps every hour for
electrolytes.) I was, however, getting sun burnt!!! I had liberally coated
myself with sunblock at the start of the race, but I could feel myself
turning pink like my shirt. The aid station had some lotion for me to use.
(Later I did find I had tucked my sunblock bottle into my own drop bag.)
Toward the end of the 4th loop I was “thinking too much”. And everyone knows
most ultrarunners don’t think too clearly after a few miles down the road. I
knew I would be finishing the first 50 miles in over 12 hours. For some
reason I thought I only had 24 hours for the race. What? There was no way I
could do another 50 in less than 12 hours. Panic set in. Then I forgot what
I was thinking about, probably got amused by some wisteria at the side of
the road.. Minutes later I remembered it was a 30 hour race. Okay! I was
really looking forward to meeting up with my pacer Steve Leopard.
Thank goodness for cell phones and reception in the park. Steve and I made
contact as I started my fifth lap, he linked up with me after 2 miles. His
brother in law, Troy, also joined us for the lap, which was very cool,
because the constant talking helped. I have learned that it is good for a
pacer to talk, it stimulates the runner. Steve and Troy talked to me, and
also chatted with each other. Troy has just moved to NC from Ohio, and Steve
was telling Troy all about the park.

Once it turned dark, I didn’t ask what time it was at all, although I knew
it was around 11pm when Troy left so he could get out of the park. Of
course, I then completely forgot to take my Succeed caps all night, because
I was taking them every hour.

Steve was great. He talked to me, we chatted about races, running, drugs (I’
m a pharmacist) health care; he made sure I was eating enough and drinking.
When we had to stop at the Red Cross Station (twice) to bandage up my feet
he went out to my drop bags and got whatever I needed out of them.
I would say the fifth lap was the hardest mainly because I just hadn’t been
up 24 hours since college days (long long ago). I would feel bad, then I
would feel good. Then I would feel bad, then I would feel ‘not so bad’ then
it might even swing back to feeling good again. It was true then, about what
I had read about ultras: there will be bad patches. Be patient, they will go
away, to maybe become good patches. I kept having this vacillating up/down
mentality going on.

Steve had to stop pacing me after this lap, because he was having knee
issues, which he knew beforehand (and I knew too.) It has to be tough being
a fast runner and then tone it completely down to a shuffle/walk.

I picked up my iPod for Lap 7. I also picked up Ann, as my last pacer! She
caught up to me as I headed out. Ann was part of the volunteer pacer group
that Umstead had set up, runners out there volunteering their time to
shepherd us poor runners in. Ann actually had been a shepherd in her past
career, and still had sheep on her property, along with her ten dogs. It was
great to have Ann with me, she did a good job of talking to me, keeping me
going, making sure I was drinking and eating.

I was wobbling on this lap, although I did have the mentality of ‘7th lap.
7th lap’ going. I had read “it is darkest before the dawn”. This is when
armies attack, when you are the most vulnerable, the least with it. I had
also read that you will feel better when the sun comes up. And you know
what? It was true.

Ann and I hit the HQ around 730am. I finally looked at my watch at this
time. I had not glanced at the time since dusk. I asked what the cutoff time
was at the next aid station. I was told the cutoff was here, at 8am, they
wouldn’t let anyone start the last lap if they weren’t in before 8am. So I
made it, all I had to do was the last lap!

Yeah, right. Ann said she would like to go out with me again, and I was all
for that. We walked the first six miles. I was so afraid of blowing up, I
didn’t want to lose it for the last six miles. Now I understand how people
drop out after 80 or 90 miles of a race. My leg buckled once or twice and I
just kept moving. Blisters were growing on my feet, yet out of the aid
station, I really didn’t see what I could do about it-just go forward.
Another volunteer pacer joined us around mile six, Rob I believe is his
name. He did not end up with any runners, but was going to run ahead and see
if anyone needed help. At the time I was DFL which was just fine with me.
You know what they call the last person across the finish line? A finisher.
I asked him to see if there was any coffee left at the aid station, because
I had drank all my Adrenalin energy drinks and had been caffeinating myself
since about 4am on.

We got to the aid station and they yelled at us to keep going they would
bring our drinks to us. I got a little scared here, because this was the
first time I thought about not making the time limit. Ann and I shuffled
forward, and Ann checked her watch, and asked me if it was important to just
get the 100 miles, or finish in the official time. I told her I wanted to
complete the race within the time cutoff. This was when she said something
about “we’ve got two hours to go 3.5 miles so we’ve got to move.” So every
downhill, she suggested we shuffle down it. I would say yes to about her
every suggestion about the shuffle. The blisters were growing. I knew the
course so well by this point I knew every little downhill. We kept going
forward and forward. We hit the last good downhill, and actually saw other
runners ahead of us! Huh!!
I knew after this downhill, we crossed a bridge, had another uphill, and
then it was one mile to the turnoff to the campground. We caught more
runners here, and passed 4 or 5 runners on the hill. Ann kept me shuffling
forward.
The mile between mile 11 and 12 has to be mismarked. It was at least 4 miles
long. I kept looking for the turnoff to the campground.
OHMYGOD there it was. Finally. I knew I could do it. We were well within the
cutoff. We hobbled over the rocky road for the last ½ mile. The runner in
front of me stopped to pee in the woods. I was amused. I was not stopping
for anything at this point.
I heard my husband yelling at me from the top of the hill and I gave him a
“Whoohoo”.
He said to run and as I hobbled up the hill I said I was running. About ten
feet from the finish line, I sprinted it -I was done!!! 100
miles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks to Blake and all the volunteers this was a well organized race. Steve
Leopard was a great pacer throughout the night.
Ann got me to the finish line. I actually did the last loop in 3.46, and
passed 8 runners in the last 2.5 miles.

I need help from the NC runners-I have lost Ann’s email info, and I don’t
even know her last name! Could someone email me off list with her name and
possibly her email address, or give her mine? I really want to thank her
(again.) She was in the volunteer pacing group.