Ron Herzog 50k

This is a fun but hard race.

Four of us met up and rode to the start arriving an hour early. It was a little warmer but wetter than last year. I started out slow running the flats and downs and doing a walk run on the ups, walking a lot more the running. About 200 yards before we leave the dirt road and finally get to run on trail, Shawn went to water the bushes. So I decided to just walk until she caught up. Once I got to the trail I turned and still couldn’t see her. I decided to head in and take it easy until she caught up. About a mile and half later I noticed my foot pod was gone. I knew it was only about 100 yards back because I remembered my foot got caught on a branch and almost pulled me down. So I turn around and started running back. I passed a guy that asked if I was looking for the girl I had been running with. “Nope, I’m looking for my foot pod.” I thought to myself, self that was strange. Then I come to another guy that asked me the same thing and then told me she was looking for me and that she got some “wrong” information. I guess he must have been the person that gave her that “wrong” info. Then I found the pod and kept going back. I didn’t want someone lost looking for me thinking I was lost. Finally after over 20 minutes of going backwards Shawn comings running up the trail, “there you are” we both say.

So we’re off in the right direction. I figure I lost about 30 minutes to this detour. Running the traps is the most fun part of this race for me. I expected the Tank Traps to be real messy because of all the rain but they were about the same as last year. A tank trap is a steep narrow washout in the road wide and deep enough so a tank couldn’t get across. Well we ran them pretty fast but not as fast as last year. I’m still not getting enough rest in between races. We passed the five people that I passed going backwards. After about 3 miles we hit snow but nothing like the 8” last year. Dang that was fun last year! Last years snow covered a few bogs that were pretty wet this year.

We finally got to the halfway aid station at about 3:35. I figured with the delay and extra 1 ½ miles that wasn’t all that bad. The rest is pretty much downhill so I can make up some time. Well I just could not get my legs to turn over fast enough. I had dropped or lost my bag of tricks, so I had no Salt or Tums or Advil, all of which I needed. The lack of salt was the worse. It made it so my sports drink was going right through me. I had to stop at least every mile to pee. It seemed like it took for ever to get back to the finish. My time was 6:42:49. If I take the extra 30 minutes off that’s faster than last year, but not much. Not enough!
Next year maybe I’ll be rested. Next up Seattle. It’s payback for last year.