TURNING UP THE HEAT!!!

What a Father’s Day weekend. Of course the highlight was me spending time with my kids. Luke had 2 baseball games…his team won the Sunday’s 2:30 game…heat index at about 100 F…and I was sweating like a whore in church.

On the training front, I have NO heat acclimation yet. I have been doing most of my runs in the very early morning or very late at night….and with the mild spring…I am feeling it when I run with some higher temps. When we took off at 8:45PM on Saturday evening, it was 95 F. I do know that at this point last year, I was much better in the heat.

Saturday had scheduled a 2 a-day run as I met some runners early morning 6:30 AM to run a 5 mile run on the Erwin Park Trail…running hard. At 8:45 PM, I met Lynn Ballard, Mark Blendon, for the evening run. Rochelle Frazuer showed up later at about 10:30PM. Lynn wanted to show us the new trails he helped build at the Frito Lay property. All I can say is that the 3.5 mile loop is incredible with some climbs, some rocks, some roots…a good challenge. Lynn thought it would be good to take off at a quick pace to familiarize the trail at least once in the day light. We whipped through a couple of loops rather quickly and things felt decent, but I could tell that the heat was getting to me. At about mile 8, the stomach was nauseous and I had to drop Lynn’s pace if I was going to run a full 20 miles. Miles 8 through 16, I lingered behind, Lynn and company, but never too far behind…always able to regroup with the company a few minutes later at our self supported aid station in the parking lot. I remember having a “come to Jesus” meeting with myself at about midnight on the trial in regards of not getting in the driver’s seat and driving home at the next aid station stop. I do have to admit that part of my sick self enjoys the solitude of suffering on the trail. No one to talk to except the constant conversation with that little voice in my mind that keeps telling me that normal people don’t do this to themselves. In the words of Mark, “In Ultras, you have to keep running when it quits being fun.” In miles 14 to 16 the stomach improved a bit but it had quit being fun. The group had decided to knock out 4 miles on the crushed stone walking trail that circumnavigates the Frito Lay Property (at my suggestion.) The night breeze actually made it feel cool at this point…of course it’s all relative. I learned about Rochelle finishing the last 5 miles of a 200 mile race in flip flops…at this point I was able to actual smile at that.

At 2:00AM I had wrapped up 20 miles and was going to call it a night. Lynn, Mark and Rochelle were going on…remember Lynn and Mark will be toeing the line at the Hardrock 100. Some people would consider the night I had a horrible training run. I think of it differently….only as an opportunity to press on when it would be really easy to quit and go to bed. I plan on to doing some runs in the heat these next few weeks to acclimate myself. Until then Run On…even when it ain’t fun!

POST NOTE: Lynn's son, Keith joined us for a few miles. Unfortunately, because I was lagging, I didn't get to talk much with him. I expect we'll see more of him out there with his dad.