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Dealing with Injury

For the serious runner, an injury that causes you to halt the activity that you love, can be a pretty frustrating experience.  But if you push the limits often, injuries are bound to happen, and right now I’m dealing with it.  Across The Years 48-hour run has left me with a sore knee/leg that really taking its time to heal.   I drive down the road and see happy, healthy runners going by, looking at them in envy.  But I tell myself, “rest is good, be patient.”  Nevertheless, I have nagging irrational thoughts that my competitive running days may be over. 

Across the Years 48-hour race

To close out 2011, I again ran in Across the Years (ATY), a fixed-time race held in Glendale, Arizona.  For a fixed-time race, the objective is to run as many miles as you can within a given period of time.  The clock is always ticking.  You can take rests along the way, but the clock never stops.  At ATY, there are three different races, running concurrently, 24-hours, 48-hours, and 72-hours.   This year I again decided to enter the 48-hour race.   Last year I also ran for 48-hours and came away with a surprising 187 miles, good enough for the overall win.

This year I set my sights on running 200 miles in 48-hours.  I really thought it was within the reach of my abilities, and if I could achieve that, I would likely win the race again.  But I had experienced a rather disappointing year in my races.  Sure, I had finished nine 100-mile races without a DNF this year, but my times were all slower this year and I began to wonder if my age (53) was really finally slowing me down once and for all.   My speed during my last 100-mile race was disappointing and it seemed that being able to run 100 miles in less than 20 hours was a thing of the past for me. 

Race Directors – Stewards of the sport

I’m a new race director in the sport of ultrarunning.   I never envisioned that I would be a race director and never really sought after doing it, but as I wanted to share the experience of ultrarunning with others, I eventually took the plunge and started to direct a race.  However, I did not just jump into it, I did it after serving several years in an “internship” helping and watching a race director who I think is one of the best in our sport.  Still, I feel like a rookie race director and I’m still learning.  

The sport of ultrarunning is unique in that it has no governing body looking over it.  Some may believe the USA Track and Field organization (USATF) does, but in reality this body doesn’t even understand the sport and in recent years seems to get in the way more than help.  They try to anoint national championships that are largely just ignored by the mainstream competitors of the sport.

So without a true governing body, race directors can have an enormous impact on the sport.  In recent years, there has been an explosive growth in the number of ultramarathons and thus an explosion of the number of race directors who are impacting the sport.  Thankfully, the vast majority of these race directors are ultrarunners or have experienced ultrarunners on their committees and are being careful to provide what is expected and maintain a level of uniformity.

The Bear 100 Endurance Run

The Bear 100 was the first 100-miler I attempted back in 2004.  It was a small event that year with 51 starters.  At mile 87 after 30 hours of running/hiking, I found myself in last place with very little energy left.  I asked my pacing friend to flag down an ATV or motorcycle to help get us to the finish.  At the finish line, I watched other runners finish their 100-miles.  I shook my head and told my family that this race was way over my abilities, that I could never finish it.  But in 2010, I was back again to challenge “The Bear” for the 7th time, seeking my 6th finish.

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