Sunday, July 23, 2017

TRT 100 DNF

TRT 100
Jul 15th, 2017

Bipul and myself drove on friday morning for TRT race checkin and race briefing. We had a good drive leading to race , made up for the pre-race just in time and after meeting fellow runners, Sandy Baker, CJ, Karl Jensen, we headed to pre-race dinner.

1st 50M loop went  little too fast, I ended up doing in about 13:20, which was much faster than my planned pace, I felt the fatigue at turn around my friend Gautam was planning to pace for next 30 miles until Diamond peak. I made a mistake of not refueling well at 50M AS, and hurried up with night gear and slow hike towards Hobart, not sure what happened but pretty soon I hit the wall and Hobart section seemed much longer than expected, I took a nap break at Hobart, and continued onto to Tunnel, by this time my sleep exhaustion was getting worse and on top of it I wasn't fueling enough, Gautam encouraged me to keep moving but I was mentally lost, made my mind to drop at Tunnel. I came across another friend Chuck who was pacing one of his buddies, he helped me with some coffee beans.

As we reached Tunnel in about 6 hrs for 12 miles, I was out of it, AS captains tried to discourage me from dropping but I had checked out of the race and dropped out, looking back I lost the battle with my demons. Gautam and myself got ride to Diamond peak where we waited for Bipul (mi 80m), before heading to his house to refresh and turn back at finish. I was thrilled to see Bipul finish strong in about 33hrs.

DNF at TRT put a big dent in my Fat Dog plans, that totally questioned my ability to finish much  tougher race, I had to introspect on my TRT DNF and try to fix the issue.  my theory was I wasn't consuming enough calories during the evening hours and it along with fatigue intensified my sleep deprivation  and once it  gets worse I loose ability to track my calories as well. It becomes a circular loop and only way out of that is to stay on top of calories.

I decided to try other options apart from gels, after some research I decided on Tailwind nutrition which had rave reviews, I took up their challenge package and tried on couple of runs before Fat Dog. This supplement provided vital in my completion in a race like Fat Dog with remote Aid stations and minimal support at some of the AS as well.

Monday, May 15, 2017

9th Quicksilver 100k 2017

my favorite local race with lots of elevation gain and fantastic views, I never get tired of getting back to this race, very well organized by QRC and John Brooks.

Due to trail work around bald mountain sections trail was diverted to kennedy trail which added about 1000ft extra, made the finish much sweeter.

I started struggling pretty early on in this race, maybe due to too much ensure consumption and tummy took a toll with many unplanned breaks. Eventually after avoiding ensure for rest of the race, my tummy settled around mile 40 and I had a pretty decent 20 miles of running  chatting with Pavan and many other fellow runners.

Eventually finished in 14:45hrs and was thrilled to see my folks at finish.

Looking forward to 10th running in 2018.

Friday, May 12, 2017

Upcoming Quicksilver 100k 2017




Quicksilver 100k course map



                                                Elevation profile of 100k course


On the verge of starting another year of running at Quicksilver county park. Two races 100k and 50k superbly organized by my friends at Quicksilver Running Club. This will be my 11th year at this race either as runner or volunteer.

There are some course changes due to closure of baldy mountain sections, as a result we will be getting more fun by running down kennedy trail (8 mile section with 1000ft extra), thus covering a good portion of 34 miles in Sierra Azul open space preserve.

Needless to say I am really looking forward to this day, its my favorite race weekend and first thing I like to do when the registration opens during Dec 2nd week.  Life has been mostly good this year so far, I have been able to get a fair bit of hill training and some good downhill running as well as, so more or less I feel ready for this race. One of my goals for the year is try to run a more even paced race, 2nd half has been much slower in past, I want to correct that by running 1st half about 20 mins slower, and run about 7 hrs each if possible, sub 14 would be a bonus.

This year many friends are back to this yearly tradition, Nattu, Karen, Satpal, Julian, Chihping etc. Anil Chandran is taking on his first 100k this weekend. Bipul is back to training for Tahoe 100 doing a series of 50ks over next few weeks,  Hart is running another 50k at Quicksilver. Wishing them all a great day ahead.

Overall goal, enjoy the course and camaraderie of fellow runners and hear their stories so far and rest of the year.