Western States Predictions

Of course all this blabber about an obscure race in Bulgaria (which just happens to be the most special ultramarathon for me) is completely silly, given what’s coming up tomorrow. So here are my admittedly bold/slightly insane predictions.

Having officially entered my high 30s, I am rooting for the semi-veterans this year. In the men’s race, I predict that Roes and Jornet will have just a bit too much fun at the front and will either drop or get caught and passed late by Mackey and Clark, with Mackey winning by less than five minutes (sorry Nick, I really do like your blog a lot as I do Geoff’s). In the women’s race, I think Semick and Greenwood will turn out to have run too hard at Comrades, so I put my money on Arbogast (being a something of a Corvallis expatriate, I might be slightly biased with this one). Oh, and speaking of Oregon bias, I am leaving the biggest upset for the end. I predict Craig Thornley will finally put a dent into the 8+ hour gap AJW has on him in their infamous 10-year bet. Realistically though, I doubt I will be winning the irunfar contest.

Out of Excuses

All right, so I am all settled in now in what seems to be a mini-Mecca of running. I have great runners to train and compete with. I have more spare time than I remember having since I was in college because my family is away on vacation and work is not too hectic yet. So what excuses do I have left?  Not many, really.  I have been gradually ramping up my mileage for the last 4-5 months, while staying completely injury-free. More importantly, with all the hills and fell races around here (which I am starting to get used to), the quality of my training is better than it has ever been. I think I might be ready for a race.

Well, this is good timing because my "A race" for this year is coming up in exactly eight days. I had not tapered properly for a race since last fall, consciously deciding to treat all of my spring races as high-intensity training runs. Now I am curious to see the effect of my gradual three-week taper before the forthcoming Vitosha 100k. Unlike last summer, I have managed to fully embrace the generally unpleasant running withdrawal and even enjoy it. I was ready for a break after the intense training in the last month, the most prominent examples of which were the double headers of the Snowdon and Cader Idris.  

Another difference compared to the period leading up to the WV Trilogy last year, however, is that I don’t seem to have the same “bring-it-on” attitude. The Vitosha 100k has humbled me in different ways, but with the same severity, in every one of the three times I have run it since 1997. I even recorded my first and only DNF on my last attempt in 2005, when I decided that running ultramarathons with an inadequate training base was not fun anymore. So I am feeling a strange mix of trepidation and excitement that I might finally have a chance of running a good race on this course.

With the inter-continental move and new job, there has been lot of uncertainty weather I would even get to run this year’s race. I wrote it off and then worked it back into my schedule at least three times over the last months. But I think this was a good thing because I didn't want to get too fixated on any one specific race (which incidentally seems to work pretty well for this guy).

One thing I really look forward to is running with Daniel Tsokev again. We were both rather unprepared and struggled together through the 2000 race to finish in a tie. After running together for 11 hours and helping each other through multiple low points, racing to the finish line just didn’t seem right. But this year will be different. We are both fit and ready to go. And it is going to be a real race this time, with at least several other Bulgarian runners having made a lot of progress over the last few years. This should be fun!

Uprooting

Now that I have settled in Aberystwyth (Wales), my emotions and more abstract thoughts (I mean thoughts beyond what goes in which box) are catching up to me, and I realize that the latest in my long string of relocations has been by far the most difficult. There are several reasons for that. First and foremost, I left behind my closest friend, who also happens to be a person that I can connect to professionally in a way that I have not experienced with anyone else. This is rare, and I don’t really expect to find it again. Our families have also fused to the point that I am not really quite sure how to tackle the thought that we can no longer just get together for Sunday afternoon ice cream, semi-planned dinner, or just a play date. There better be a biofuels breakthrough soon because the current prices of plane tickets will not cut it. Second, just before moving, I had discovered the joy of training with other people, and I really liked the group I was running with late on Wednesday nights and, occasionally, early Saturday mornings. I was also really enjoying the Tuesday night hill reps with Phil Turk and the great conversations we had, whenever we could manage anything more eloquent than grunting up the hill. Finally, there were several races in the Eastern US that I really wanted to run because I was curious what they would feel like (Hellgate, Massanutten), because I had messed them up big time on previous attempts (Highlands Sky), or because I wanted to have a little more of (WV Trilogy). But several things have helped tremendously with getting over most of that and regaining my positive outlook.

Aberystwyth

This is a really nice little town on the Irish Sea, and it has a lot to offer to runners, especially those who prefer trails and hills. Here are a few pictures to illustrate that:

 

Ceredigion Coast Path: 60+ miles of this with plenty of hills.

And then there is this for when I decide that I miss the forests of West Virginia or I am tired of the wind.

 

Running Club

I recently joined the local running club and was completely blown away by its depth. In Morgantown, we were doing great on nights when there were five of us on a social run. Here, I am yet to go on a run and know more than half of the people! There is plenty of good conversation, and if one feels like going for a hard speed session, there are several competent coaches, as well as running ability sufficient to challenge anyone.

Fell Running

Man of many talents Joel Wolpert was quick to surmise that I would get into fell racing after I move to Wales. Well, he was spot on about that. Less than a week after the Brecon Beacons 40-miler, and with my quads still burning from the ~10,000 ft of elevation gain, I heard about the Cader Idris race, which was going to take place on the following day. My first reaction was “no way,” but I think it took people from the Aberystwyth Athletic Club less than 30 seconds to persuade me to do it. What is there not to like in a race that covers 3000 ft of elevation gain (and as much loss) over ten miles of rugged, rocky trails? These races are fairly competitive too. I gave it a fair effort on the ascent and felt like I was taking some chances on the downhill, but that was still only good enough for placing 20^th overall, after an epic battle with the winner of the 50+ age group! Fell races are awesome. Steep terrain, sickening pace, great atmosphere – the espresso of mountain running! I am not sure I am ready to write ultramarathons off yet, but I will certainly be running a lot more shorter races than I used to.

The Mountains of Wales

My exploration of the mountains of Wales took me to the Snowdon last Saturday. The experience is probably best summarized by a little episode I had on the way there. In Beddgelert, a small village in Snowdonia, I picked up a couple of hitchhikers, who had just got off the mountain and were too tired to walk back to their cars. “Are you camping before heading up the mountain?” They asked me after I told them I was planning to head up (it was 5:30 pm). “Nope,” I replied, wondering what they would think if I told them that my plan was to actually run up and down the Snowdon twice. As it turned out, their hypothetical judgment would have not been completely baseless – this was much harder than I expected. But I did make it back just before it got dark (which is after 10 pm around here), exhausted but happier than I remember being in a very long time. With all this running in the mountains, I feel like I am rediscovering a part of myself that I thought had died when I stopped climbing and caving. It is nice to see it is still around. And I am curious to see where else it will take me.