Bander 2010

This is one race report I am not excited to write. As an athlete, people look at what I say and do and make so many assumptions about who I am based on these things. Knowing that people who don't know me (and maybe some who do) are deciding who they think I am as a person based on a few actions or words is a big stress for me. I'm just not one of those people who can easily shrug off things like that. Also, I know I am a very blessed person. What I have in my life is nothing to complain about in the grand scheme of things. But as a human being I do get weighed down by thing I wish I could just let go of and truly be none the wearier in spite of. This weekend I learned that I can let things go and not stress about them but they are still taking there toll. I will do my best to write my thoughts about this race below, but words are limiting.

Thursday morning, January 7th, Dan and I got up a little before 4am Colorado time ready to drive down to Texas. We had loaded all or things into our rental car the night before. Why rent a car when we currently have no income you ask? Well, I guess I need to back up farther and start in mid December when Daniel lost his job. I've been trying to not think much about this, as it is a pointless stress for me. Dan is looking hard for (and likely has now found) a new job. We cut or budget down as tight as we could (glad I Christmas shopped in January!) and were ready to do what had to be done to make ends meet as responsibly as possible. So stressing about it is of no use. Also in December our renters from Austin fell 2 months behind in rent...meaning our savings account was being drained on a mortgage that was housing another family, and we had/have no income. We spent a good amount of time earlier in this week trying to access a savings account we set up for emergencies and currently can't get to. Sometime in the next few days we will have all the information needed to get into this account. Meaning we have money to last through a few more weeks of bills, only we can't get to it. Kinda frustrating to see a nice bit of money in our account, need the money to keep from paying interest rates, late fees or over draft fees, and not be able to get to the money. But I know it could be worse and am grateful that it is only what it is.

Wednesday, January 6th, I got a package in the mail from Running Warehouse. "Oh boy," I'm thinking, "my shoes for Bandera." Only when I opened the box, I had the man's Peak XC in a size 9, not the woman's. Immediately I called Running Warehouse, who assured me they would have the woman's size 9 Peak XC shoes to my parents house (were I would be the day before the race) with their free-on-every-order 2end day UPS shipping. I was still in a bit of a pickle. I knew the balance in our checking accounts...we couldn't buy me another pair of shoes and pay for gas to Texas too...yes the man's shoes would be 100% refunded, but not until it was received by Running Warehouse...my current running shoes were dead because I had been putting off buying another pair until I had to...what to do? Daniel decided he would pay for our gas to Texas with his silver dollars so I could order the shoes. Feeling guilty, I ordered the shoes and put the man's shoes in the mail.

On the way home from dropping the giant looking shoes off at UPS, we had a car accident. No one was hurt, but both cars were in need of repair. We called the insurance company, told them what had happened, that we were planing to leave for Texas in less then 12hrs, lived over a half hour away from the car place, blah blah blah, and they agreed to stay open late so we could turn our car in this night and get a rental. Another $500 spent that we don't have right now.

Back to Thursday morning. The trip down was pretty uneventful. We listened to "Into Thin Air". An amazing and very moving story of the events on Mt. Everest in 1996. At about 9:30pm Texas time, we pulled into Marabel Slab were my dad treated Dan and I to ice cream. My favorite!

The next day we ran a few errands in San Antonio and visited with family. At about 4pm we headed to Bandera for packet pick up. The plan was for my parents to finish packing the RV they rented and meet us at Hill Country State Natural Area maybe around 8:30pm. Only my Mom told me they were still waiting on my shoes. At 5pm, my mother called UPS to see if they could give her an ETA on the shoes. They told her the truck had already tried to deliver the shoes, but there was no house at the listed address...I had put the wrong house address on the shipping info.! Then my mother called Running Warehouse. Running Warehouse called UPS. Running Warehouse then called my mom and told her she could pick the shoes up from UPS, but not until 8-9pm. My parents drove to the other side of SA at 8pm, picked my shoes up when the came in at 8:40 and thought they were now headed to Bandera. But the highway was closed. All told, they arrived at the park about 11:30pm Friday night. Dan and I had been trying to rest in the car, waiting for them to arrive with our bed.
Side note: I was so peeved at myself! Why did I put the wrong number????? Gurrrr. But I was very grateful for how willing my parents were to do what they could to help me out. THANK YOU MOM AND DAD!

Friday night was very cold. I had on my warm fuzzy socks, sweatpants, long sleeve shirt, sweatshirt and warmest hat. I slept with the blankets pulled up over my head to try to get warm. At about 3:30am my father, in his freezing state, checked the thermostat in the RV. Somehow the heater was off. He turned it on. Normally I'd leave all these little silly things that went wrong out, but this time I am listing them all because individually they are small. Piled up they took their toll on my brain.

I got up at 5:30am Saturday. The outside temp was around 11degrees. For the start of the race, I put on my Team Traverse jersey, arm warmers, thin zipper jacket, Toaster gloves, running skirt, ear warmer and topped my outfit of by putting a beanie over my pigtails. Injinji sock's as always and my new black Peak XC shoes w/ gaiters. I stood in the starting area in a blue penguin flannel robe until the start countdown began.

At 7:30 we were off. The start of the race was awkward for me. I knew from my current training that I could smoke this course. I also knew that mentally I wasn't up to racing. I had done my best to suck it up and put on my game face. I set little goals and didn't speak about what I "could" do to keep from putting useless pressure on myself. I wanted to be encouraging to the other girls who I knew could smoke this course as well. I LOVE fast women...not in a weirdo way, but in a team mate, lets show the world what a lady can do too way. That is part of why I suck at racing. I don't really care if I "win". I'm there to do what I can. Winning is fun, but I am also super happy for other ladies when they run well and beat my in the process. I need to learn how to handle this. How to race and not feel like a mean person for it. Anyhow, I was just there to run my race. I went out comfortably and met 2 of the ladies I had suspected would run well at Bandera.

I went through the first aid station in 54mins and aid station 2 at 1:44. The first 2 sections have some nice climbs and the 3erd section is flat and fast. I changed my warmest gloves for some lighter ones and dropped my jacket at this station, #2. A couple miles in, my hands were freezing. I pulled my arm warmers down over my gloves and wrapped my ear warmer around my left hand. While running along the fence line a little later, I decided to change the ear warmer over to my right hand, as my left hand was warm and my right hand cold. After wrapping up my right hand I looked up to see a split in the trail. The split was unmarked. Odd, because Tejas Trail courses are always well marked. Being there was an obvious main trail, I kept running straight. about 8mins later I hit a dead end at a fence. Ah! I was thinking. What did I do??? I turned around and saw that a young guy had followed me. "I though I say my twin brother running the other way back there." He said. We turned around to retrace our path. Only there were more splits from this side and all of the splits lead nowhere. Being frazzled, I forced myself to stop and think. Just follow the fence back. Duh. The young guy then asked for some water, saying he was feeling dehydrated. I pulled my mostly full bottle of Gatorade out of my pack and traded him for an empty hand held. I few minutes later we were back at the unmarked split. When I ran back a bit farther, I saw the turn. Taking no time to examine the missed turn, I took the right path towards the next aid station. All told, I had spent 20mins running around lost. As soon as I was back on course, I knew I was finished. My brain just couldn't get around this one. Sure it is a trail race. People get lost and keep going all the time. Yes I can keep going. But for me the time lost was just crushing. I was already so mad at myself for the dumb things I had done to get to this race and then I got myself lost. That was a crusher for me. I decided I'd just run on as planed to the 50k. But mental I was finished.

When I got to the 50k (in 5:19..boo to getting lost!), I was physically feeling better then I ever had at the half way point in this race. My legs had no cramps and I wasn't feeling the need to walk the climbs yet. But I was just so long gone mentally. Joe and Dan, along with what felt like 30 other people, tried to nicely convince me to run on. "You're not far behind the others," and "You are gaining on there splits" they said. But I wasn't there to race them. I was racing me and I got lost, and lost. Feeling very torn and peeved with myself, I left for loop 2. Running up the climbs felt great on this loop , but my mind was still not going to push my though a hard 100k. When I got to aid station 1 on loop 2, my family agreed that it was ok for me to not force myself through this. I just didn't have the mental strength for it. I was greatly relived. Being I was still doing well physically, I decided to shower, change into dry and warmer running cloths, eat a bit, and then go back to aid station 1 and find someone to pace for the rest of the 100k. I figured that just because my race was over didn't mean I had to actually drop the race. Maybe I could help another runner run well by running with them through a harder part of their race. I have run at Bandera by myself in the dark, and it can be grueling if you are physically hurting.

The first few runners through said they were OK and didn't need a pacer. But one guy said something along the lines of "You don't want to go with me. I know I will finish, but it will be a very slow process." Being he hadn't said "no" to my offer, I told him I would join him, if that was alright. I didn't care a bit about the pace.

As we walked fast towards the next aid station, we talked. The more we talked, the better I was feeling about being out there. I was running with Mark Raymond , who I had never met but he knew all the runners from Austin that I knew. Mark had finished the Bandera 100k every year that there has been a Bandera race (year 8 this year) and planed on keeping his streak going. This past year had been harder then normal for him because of a move to New York that brought more job stress and left little time for training, so finishing would be harder and slower. But he was a positive thinker and never voiced wanting to quit. And I will tell you, walking that course in the dark with the temperature in the teens is freaking hard! When we got to Chapas (aid station 2), my hands were so numb I couldn't feel them. One of the volunteers suggested I lay my hands on a crock pot to warm them. After she assured me that I wouldn't damage my hands from the heat (being I couldn't feel them), I happily complied. After drinking hot chocolate and soup, I went and stood by a space heater with Mark. Before too long I was shaking horribly and I could feel my hip flexors grinding along my hip bones from shaking and tightening. I knew that if we didn't leave soon, my body was going to really fight leaving at all. I think Mark knew that too, because he said "lets go" soon after. As we walked out, Mark told me that if I didn't warm up soon to go ahead and run into to cross-roads (the next aid station) to keep from getting hypothermia. But no fear. I stopped shaking before 10mins were up.

I told Mark about what happened earlier in the race for me during this section, and we both watched the course closely to see were I went off course. The place was easy to spot. After running along the fence line for awhile, there is a left turn to head toward the fields. The turn was marked with streamers on the left and had a "wrong way" sigh on the left about 4feet past the turn. Talk about bad timing for me! I must have decided to switch my ear-warmer from my left hand to my right hand seconds before this turn came into sight. And being the wrong way sigh was on the same side of the trail as the turn and the opposite side of the trail as I was looking, I never saw the markings. Bad luck for me.

Mark was great company for the next 10 or so hours. I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know him. And the night was spectacular despite the freezing temperature. We stopped and turned off our lights (well, I covered mine as my fingers were unable to push buttons) on the top of The Sister's (a high point in Bandera) and looked at the stars. Breath taking. Normally when I run out there, I don't get the chance to look around much. Looking and running on rocks can be hazardous. Taking the time to stop and enjoy the beauty of this place was refreshing, and what I needed mentally.

19hrs and 24minutes after the start of this race, we finished. I can't say I'm glad this race turned out this way for me. But I can say that this experience was good for me over all. I probably should have decided to volunteer this race weeks ago when life circumstances had me feeling over whelmed and the idea of racing seemed like another stress. But I wanted to just suck it up and run. After all I love running and put in good training for Bandera. But I am not there mentally yet. I will get there. I will learn how to be a racer along with a runner and how to balance life stresses with my running. This weekend taught me a lot. I have a long ways to go.