July 19, 2024

Western States 100: “Red Shorts Guy” Chris Culpepper and The Active Joe Sponsored Runner Karen Ellis Share Their Contrasting Race Experiences

Western States 100: “Red Shorts Guy” Chris Culpepper and The Active Joe Sponsored Runner Karen Ellis Share Their Contrasting Race Experiences
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Season 2

This is a BUMPER episode packed with not 1, but 2 stories from the recent Western States 100 event!!  It’s a 2-FOR-1 !! Grab a coffee, sit down and get comfortable - it’s gonna be a while.  Join us as we welcome WS Golden Hour’s Golden Boy a.k.a. “Red Shorts Guy” & “The Leaner” Chris Culpepper, who finally got his chance to run this prestigious race after a seven-year wait and a name draw by the legendary Gordy Ainsleigh AND a return to the show for The Active Joe sponsored WS runner and all-round badass Karen Ellis - both supported by and members of the outstanding Cypress Wolfpack running group. This episode promises not just 2 thrilling and very different race stories, but also invaluable race/course insights and practical tips for every aspiring ultra-runner out there, particularly if you plan on or are hoping to complete Western States at any point in the future.

Hear all about the grueling preparations that Karen and Chris underwent to tackle the Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run. From navigating the pre-race jitters to overcoming physical and mental challenges on race day, they share their strategies and experiences in detail. Karen opens up about the importance of coaching and preparatory races, while Chris talks about his journey from a DNF at Rocky Raccoon to finally crossing the Western States finish line. Their stories highlight the importance of heat acclimation, technical running skills, and the critical role of crew support.

The emotional rollercoaster of ultra-running is laid bare as Karen and Chris recount the highs and lows of their journey. From battling back pain and muscle exhaustion to the overwhelming support from their crews and the bitter sting of disapointment, their stories are a testament to the spirit of perseverance. Discover the camaraderie shared at aid stations, the transformative power of motivational songs, and the unforgettable moments that made their Western States experience truly special. Whether you're a seasoned runner or just starting out, this episode offers a deep well of inspiration and practical advice.

Western States Endurance Run:
https://www.wser.org/

The Active Joe - Dinosaur Valley Endurance Run:
https://ultrasignup.com/register.aspx?did=111283

The Active Joe - WSER Sponsorship Opportunity:
https://www.theactivejoe.com/westernstates

Choose to Endure:
Website:
https://www.choosetoendure.com/

YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/@ChoosetoEndure

Instagram:
https://instagram.com/choose_to_endure?utm_source=qr

Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61552757049526

Chapters

00:01 - Ultra Running

08:49 - Western States Training and Pre-Race Vibes

18:58 - Race Day Experiences

34:07 - Race Against Time

48:30 - Lessons Learned From Ultra Running

51:29 - Technical Challenges and Aid Station Mishaps

55:52 - Devil's Thumb to Forest Hill

01:09:07 - Back Pain on the Western States

01:15:05 - Struggle to Finish Western States

01:27:30 - Reflecting on the Western States Experience

01:32:42 - Western States 100 Back of Pack

01:41:14 - Maximizing Podcast Outreach and Engagement

Transcript
WEBVTT

00:00:01.100 --> 00:00:02.184
Hello and welcome.

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If this is your first time with us, thank you for stopping by.

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You are listening to Choose to Endure, the show dedicated to the back of the pack runners, where we share stories, interviews, gear and training tips specific to the tail end heroes of the Ultra Universe.

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If you haven't had a moment to do so yet, please consider heading over to your favorite podcast app Hit, follow, rate the show and, if you're on Apple, maybe even leave us a short review as well.

00:00:30.492 --> 00:00:32.726
My name is Richard Gleave.

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I have been running ultras since 2017, and I've taken on and finished numerous distances.

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At this point, all the way up through 220 miles.

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At this point, all the way up through 220 miles and I'm unashamedly a member of the back of the pack, just like many of you guys Now here in the studio today, I am very honored to welcome the excellent Mr Chris Culpepper for the first time and also give a warm welcome back to Miss Karen Ellis, who, of course, joined us in Season 1, Episode 9, where she shared her story of how she was selected as the sponsored entry Western States runner for the excellent the Active Joe Race Company.

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Now Karen and Chris are both members of the Cypress Wolfpack Trail Running Group here in the Houston area and are no strangers to ultra running.

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Just a quick glance at their ultra signup history shows Karen finishing multiple ultra distance races, including Dinosaur Valley 100 and Bandera 100K earlier this year.

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K earlier this year, while Chris has also previously completed several hundreds in the Texas area, including multiple Rocky Raccoons, as well as the Javelina 100 back in 2017.

00:01:53.814 --> 00:02:10.526
But they are here today to talk with us about their very recent visit to a certain Olympic Valley and the 2024 Western States Endurance Race 100 mile, which they both took part in just a few weeks ago.

00:02:10.526 --> 00:02:24.794
We're hopefully going to learn a little bit about how they got into the race, how the race went for each of them, what they learned, what their experience was like as back of the packers at such a huge international elite level event.

00:02:24.794 --> 00:02:25.937
So stick with us.

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We're going to be right back after this.

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Discover raw, inspiring stories from runners who've been right where you are.

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This is the.

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Choose to Endure Ultra.

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Running.

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Podcast with your host.

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He's English, not Australian Richard Gleave.

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Karen and Chris, welcome to the show.

00:02:50.627 --> 00:02:53.475
Fantastic to have you both on.

00:02:53.475 --> 00:02:59.748
It's been a short while since the run, but I hope you guys are rested up and healing well at this point.

00:02:59.748 --> 00:03:00.911
How are you feeling?

00:03:01.492 --> 00:03:02.454
Well, I'm feeling okay.

00:03:03.721 --> 00:03:04.824
Yep, I'm feeling okay.

00:03:04.824 --> 00:03:06.188
Yeah, we're back to running.

00:03:06.188 --> 00:03:09.669
This week my coaches already got me back to running, so I'm feeling okay.

00:03:10.341 --> 00:03:13.909
Well, that's quite quick to get back to running, so good for you, Karen.

00:03:13.909 --> 00:03:14.491
How are you doing?

00:03:15.382 --> 00:03:16.306
I'm doing pretty good.

00:03:16.306 --> 00:03:27.735
I was back to running probably four days after the race, but we'll get into why I might not have needed as much recovery later.

00:03:27.735 --> 00:03:32.306
So I recovered pretty quick after that.

00:03:32.306 --> 00:03:36.775
So back to trying to build up and see what's next.

00:03:37.161 --> 00:03:38.204
Now Western States.

00:03:38.204 --> 00:03:40.870
Such a hard race to get into, as most people would know.

00:03:40.870 --> 00:03:47.733
Karen, we heard previously on the show about how you were selected as the Active Joe sponsor entry for the race.

00:03:47.733 --> 00:03:50.209
But, chris, how did your entry come about?

00:03:50.209 --> 00:03:52.628
How did you get into Western States?

00:03:53.461 --> 00:03:57.471
Well, I was fortunate enough to get picked this last year.

00:03:57.471 --> 00:04:01.262
You know, in the lottery I had 64 tickets and you know, basically been waiting seven years if you include the COVID year.

00:04:01.262 --> 00:04:04.504
So I got picked and you know, basically been waiting seven years if you include the COVID year.

00:04:04.504 --> 00:04:10.528
So I got picked and the person who picked my name just happened to be Gordy Angely.

00:04:10.990 --> 00:04:15.552
Oh wow, it was the first name he picked out of the lottery.

00:04:15.552 --> 00:04:18.194
It was my name and it was just a crazy moment.

00:04:18.194 --> 00:04:27.064
I was like sitting there on the computer watching the live feed and I was like, hey, my name just came up and, of course, Karen and there was a bunch of other folks on there.

00:04:27.064 --> 00:04:32.646
I was like, wow, you know we're all texting each other over Facebook messenger and just it was, it was crazy.

00:04:32.646 --> 00:04:40.884
So, yeah, it was a, it was an awesome moment and yeah, to get Gordy to pick my name of all people, it was just really awesome.

00:04:41.646 --> 00:04:42.728
Yeah, that's really cool.

00:04:42.728 --> 00:04:47.952
I mean, what was going through your head at that point, like, oh my gosh, this is going to be real now.

00:04:48.233 --> 00:04:50.817
Yeah, I know, I just couldn't believe it.

00:04:50.817 --> 00:05:00.437
I couldn't believe I'm really running Western States, I really finally got picked, and I don't know, I guess I was just in shock and I just couldn't believe it.

00:05:00.437 --> 00:05:05.132
I mean, honestly, I just could not believe I was actually going to be waiting that long.

00:05:05.132 --> 00:05:10.512
And you know, every year you go to the lottery and you're usually disappointed.

00:05:10.512 --> 00:05:11.725
You're always disappointed.

00:05:11.725 --> 00:05:24.161
You know you sit there through the entire process of the lottery and through the wait list and you know, yeah, your name never gets pulled and you're like, okay, well, I guess we'll wait till next year, yeah, so to get pulled.

00:05:24.161 --> 00:05:24.822
And it actually was.

00:05:24.822 --> 00:05:26.483
Well, I guess we'll wait till next year, yeah, so to get pulled.

00:05:26.483 --> 00:05:28.064
And actually it was pretty early, I think.

00:05:28.064 --> 00:05:32.189
In the actual pull I think I was like I don't know, like 1.30 or something like that.

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It was pretty early.

00:05:32.910 --> 00:05:37.074
Anyway, they pulled Gordy up there pretty early, since he's the guy.

00:05:37.074 --> 00:05:38.615
You know, he's the guy that started it all.

00:05:41.579 --> 00:05:45.350
I mean that's so cool and it's like pretty much everybody's dream at this point is to get selected.

00:05:45.350 --> 00:05:49.151
One of those three was like 375, I think, entries.

00:05:49.240 --> 00:05:50.805
Yeah, 375 is what ran this year.

00:05:50.805 --> 00:05:52.170
Yeah, I don't know how many.

00:05:52.170 --> 00:05:54.107
Yeah, I forgot how many.

00:05:54.107 --> 00:05:58.271
Karen, do you remember how many actual outside of the top 10?

00:05:58.480 --> 00:05:59.663
How many tickets they pulled.

00:05:59.923 --> 00:06:00.505
You know others?

00:06:00.505 --> 00:06:04.221
Yeah, I think I forgot how many runners there are.

00:06:04.221 --> 00:06:04.940
Just some.

00:06:04.940 --> 00:06:05.661
You know others.

00:06:05.661 --> 00:06:11.644
Yeah, I think I forgot how many runners there are, just regular lottery people, it was around 100 or so, less than like the total number.

00:06:12.245 --> 00:06:14.807
Then there was like 75 for the wait list.

00:06:15.627 --> 00:06:18.769
Yeah, it was probably like 270-something.

00:06:18.769 --> 00:06:20.269
That's not a lot.

00:06:20.310 --> 00:06:20.910
Yeah, that sounds right.

00:06:20.910 --> 00:06:30.334
Yeah, Not a lot, when you've got like what, 9,000, 10,000 people trying to get in, so that's fantastic, and did that give you any extra motivation?

00:06:30.375 --> 00:06:31.196
seeing that, were you like?

00:06:31.196 --> 00:06:36.077
Look, now that I'm in, I know I got to finish this now, regardless right, yeah, I did.

00:06:36.240 --> 00:06:37.742
I was like, oh boy, I've got to.

00:06:37.742 --> 00:06:39.925
You know what am I going to do here?

00:06:39.925 --> 00:06:45.733
You know, I've never had really great luck with uh, with mountain, you know, ultras.

00:06:45.733 --> 00:06:51.800
I've tried one addition I had to try to.

00:06:51.800 --> 00:06:56.653
I tried to do a, a mountain ultra a couple of years ago up in Wyoming and I actually, uh, dnf, didn't make the cutoff at the 50 mile mark.

00:06:56.653 --> 00:06:58.406
It was a real tough, tough one.

00:06:58.406 --> 00:07:12.519
So you know, yeah, it was just that that uh experience told me that that, yeah, I needed to take this pretty seriously and I wanted to finish this one because it was special.

00:07:12.519 --> 00:07:16.550
It's the only time I'll probably in my lifetime maybe, be able to run this one.

00:07:16.550 --> 00:07:21.372
So you know, it's something you've definitely got to concentrate on and get it right.

00:07:22.523 --> 00:07:23.869
So yeah, indeed.

00:07:23.869 --> 00:07:27.870
So now you guys are both in the race at this point.

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How did you each go about thinking about preparation for this massive race?

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Were there any specific routines or training methods or races in the buildup to Western States that you guys found particularly effective looking back or, I guess, ineffective as well in sort of getting you ready and prepping you for what you were going to find out there?

00:07:53.423 --> 00:07:58.800
I think what started off first is I think I got a message from Chris was like are you getting a coach?

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I think that started off the prep.

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And then it was like starting to think about that, because at first I was like, oh, can I justify the cost, can I not?

00:08:10.315 --> 00:08:20.329
And then, when Chris said he was going to get a coach, I was like, well, he's done a lot more than I've done, so I guess we should look for a coach.

00:08:20.329 --> 00:08:28.781
So we did start looking for coaches and we actually ended up with a married couple from sundog running.

00:08:28.781 --> 00:08:35.933
I had Emily Torrance and he had Ian Torrance, um, but oh, how cool yeah.

00:08:36.114 --> 00:08:41.451
So, and that was through a friend, friend of ours, uh, she, she's coached by Emily already.

00:08:41.451 --> 00:08:44.284
Um, so I went with that recommendation.

00:08:44.284 --> 00:08:49.464
But I did already have like Bandera lined up to do cause.

00:08:49.464 --> 00:08:55.523
Originally that was going to be my big race for the year, so I was just by that point.

00:08:55.523 --> 00:09:01.947
I was just going to get through that and then start with the coach on on training after that race.

00:09:01.947 --> 00:09:11.410
So I kind of wanted to rely heavily on the coach on her suggestions, because she had trained a Houston runner previously for Western States.

00:09:12.072 --> 00:09:12.273
Right.

00:09:12.561 --> 00:09:15.107
And I had a few ideas for training races.

00:09:15.107 --> 00:09:21.706
One of them was Spider Mountain and I did that one and I did think that one was quite helpful.

00:09:21.706 --> 00:09:29.705
It's about the closest you could get for something with a lot of incline and decline here in Texas.

00:09:29.705 --> 00:09:31.067
It's a timed race.

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You can do six hour, nine hour, 12 hour and it's basically about a four mile loop where you do two ascents and two descents in the loop and then just keep repeating as many as you can in the time allowed.

00:09:46.635 --> 00:09:49.842
So that one was super helpful.

00:09:50.484 --> 00:09:53.229
Other than that, I had another 50K.

00:09:53.229 --> 00:09:56.134
We both did Hell's Hills 50K.

00:09:56.134 --> 00:09:58.442
That was before Spider Mountain.

00:09:58.442 --> 00:10:08.674
Chris had a different race that he did and then, um, one thing I really wish I could have done, that I'll say on.

00:10:08.674 --> 00:10:22.729
One of the things that I would do differently is I really would have tried to uh, get to the training camp or to train on the course or some other mountain um before the race.

00:10:22.729 --> 00:10:30.726
And ch Chris did get to do that and he can talk about how that may have helped him be more successful.

00:10:31.389 --> 00:10:36.744
Yeah, chris, in addition to I think you guys did both did Hell's Hills, yeah, what was your buildup like?

00:10:37.326 --> 00:10:39.191
Yeah, so I started the year off.

00:10:39.191 --> 00:10:50.610
I was attempted to do Rocky Raccoon but I did actually DN, actually DNF that one, uh uh, uh, around mile 80 or 60, I should say I think it was.

00:10:50.610 --> 00:10:52.836
Anyway, I it was this the year.

00:10:52.836 --> 00:10:53.177
You know.

00:10:53.177 --> 00:10:57.330
You probably heard about the wetness they had this year and I just got out there.

00:10:57.370 --> 00:11:00.344
Yeah, I got out there and I said, yeah, I just didn't want to go out there and get injured.

00:11:00.344 --> 00:11:10.400
I was about to get into a training for Western States and didn't want to go out there and do anything that would injure myself and I'd be spending like six weeks or eight weeks trying to recover from that.

00:11:10.400 --> 00:11:13.967
So I just cut it short and I didn't.

00:11:13.967 --> 00:11:21.671
I had originally signed up to also do a Bandera before that, but I had dropped that race.

00:11:21.671 --> 00:11:27.389
Talking to my coach, he was like yeah, it seems like you're doing way too much volume in this period.

00:11:27.389 --> 00:11:31.130
So we kind of decided to drop the Bandera.

00:11:31.130 --> 00:11:40.948
Instead, I just did the Houston Marathon and finished that and actually had a really great Houston Marathon, the best time I'd had in a marathon.

00:11:40.948 --> 00:11:43.528
So I can't complain for Houston anyway.

00:11:43.528 --> 00:11:45.385
So it was a in marathon, so I can't complain for for Houston anyway.

00:11:45.385 --> 00:12:00.446
So it was, it was a good, a good marathon and um, and then for, you know, after that we just kind of got into training and like, like, uh, like Karen said you know, we did uh, hills Hills, 50 K and then um, and then I did Pandora box of rocks, uh, did the 50 miler.

00:12:00.446 --> 00:12:12.240
That helped a lot, especially with, uh, some of the heat acclimation and uh, some of the technical running that you need, you know, for going out to western states and some of the technical sections there's.

00:12:12.240 --> 00:12:13.703
You know there's a lot of rocks.

00:12:13.703 --> 00:12:17.131
You're kicking out there in pandora, so that's a.

00:12:17.131 --> 00:12:18.503
That's a good race to go to.

00:12:18.503 --> 00:12:22.211
Not a lot of elevation, you know, you'd like to have more elevation.

00:12:22.272 --> 00:12:26.991
I think karen picked a really good race to go to Spider Mountain and do that.

00:12:26.991 --> 00:12:33.033
And then for the training run I didn't sign up for the training camp.

00:12:33.033 --> 00:12:37.299
I was late signing up for that and all the spots filled for the weekend.

00:12:37.299 --> 00:12:53.258
They have a training camp on Memorial Day weekend, out in California for the Western States, out in California for the Western States, and so instead I went ahead and assigned, basically talked to my coach and we did a training kind of our do-your-own-thing kind of training around the weekend before that.

00:12:53.258 --> 00:13:07.133
So we went out there, me and Isaac Fox, which is another guy that's in the Cypress Wolfpack, and my wife went out there and ran sections of the course and it was a really good experience.

00:13:07.133 --> 00:13:17.679
I mean, I definitely, if you're going to do Western States, I mean that's just a, you need to go out there and get the training run in, especially going through the canyons.

00:13:17.980 --> 00:13:37.570
He had me actually go do an out and back through the canyons and that's the El Dorado Canyon, the Devil's Thumb section, which is kind of like the section everybody, really always curses, yeah, and so you know, um, so I did an outback in that and that was, you know, when I got to that in the race, you know I was like, oh yeah, I've done this.

00:13:37.919 --> 00:13:41.285
It really wasn't psychologically, didn't really bother me, you know.

00:13:41.285 --> 00:13:57.193
So it was a great, great idea to go out there and kind of just you know, go through that section twice and, of course, doing the you know, the run from Michigan Bluff to Ruckie Chucky, basically river crossing.

00:13:57.193 --> 00:14:07.884
During the training run you get to see that whole section to see how runnable it is, and then, of course, the section from green gate all the way to placer or plucker high school I guess that's how you say it.

00:14:07.884 --> 00:14:09.889
That's also very runnable.

00:14:09.889 --> 00:14:18.086
You get to see that and and get a good experience and understand that's where you're really going to make up a lot of the time and your race is is, uh, those sections.

00:14:18.086 --> 00:14:20.089
So, yeah, the training run is, is.

00:14:20.089 --> 00:14:25.208
Yeah, I would definitely say, if you're going to do western states, try to do that training run.

00:14:25.208 --> 00:14:28.149
It's definitely necessary to get out there and do it.

00:14:28.940 --> 00:14:33.731
So you guys have got your training in and you've arrived in Olympic Valley.

00:14:33.731 --> 00:14:42.788
I'm curious maybe there are others out there too but sort of the whole pre-race vibe For those of us who've never been and, honestly, may not ever get the chance to go.

00:14:42.788 --> 00:14:49.607
I would love to hear from you both what was the vibe like around that Olympic Valley pre-race?

00:14:49.607 --> 00:14:55.046
Did you guys get to spend much time there and if so, what were you doing in advance of the race?

00:14:55.506 --> 00:15:01.785
So I stayed right there in Olympic Valley, I stayed at the Olympic Valley Inn or whatever.

00:15:01.785 --> 00:15:06.760
So it's just a short walk from the actual little area, race hub area.

00:15:06.760 --> 00:15:28.687
So, like even the Thursday night I went and I ate dinner by myself that night because we had a long drive up to Olympic Valley, we got stuck in a lot of traffic and I felt like I was just in this pizza place and I was like that person right there could be a famous pro trail runner, and I'm not really sure, but they kind of look like they could be.

00:15:28.687 --> 00:15:33.344
Um, so I'm just like sitting there by myself trying to see who I might see.

00:15:34.066 --> 00:15:41.725
And, um, I I was walking at the hotel and in the lobby was, uh, was casey, casey litdick?

00:15:41.725 --> 00:15:43.808
Um, yeah, so she was, was there.

00:15:43.808 --> 00:15:55.724
And then, of course, then Friday it's just, it's just all pre-race buzz and you know, I'm waiting in line to get my bib and Harvey Lewis is two people in front of me.

00:15:55.724 --> 00:16:04.753
And then you know, walking around, all of a sudden I'm like there's Sally and I'm like waiting to, to to meet her Cause that was my one of my big things.

00:16:04.793 --> 00:16:06.023
I was like, oh, I want to see Sally.

00:16:06.023 --> 00:16:14.389
So when I saw her, I I kind of stood around and waited for a picture and we, we both ended up getting a picture with her and getting to meet her.

00:16:14.389 --> 00:16:32.053
So, yeah, the vibe is real, it's it's it's it's kind of electric there and it could get to be a little much, especially for the day before the race and definitely the pre-race meeting that you probably see on millions of YouTube videos about it.

00:16:32.053 --> 00:16:40.369
That thing's long and it's in the sun and it's hot out there, so that's not the most ideal thing to sit through.

00:16:40.369 --> 00:16:49.067
Before race day we were hiding behind a bush against a wall where you can't even see the stage but you're just listening.

00:16:49.067 --> 00:16:55.828
And at one point we're watching it on YouTube while we're out there because we couldn't hear anything.

00:16:55.828 --> 00:16:58.596
But then they got louder.

00:16:58.596 --> 00:17:02.082
But so, yeah, it's, it's pretty electric there.

00:17:02.683 --> 00:17:04.586
Yeah, it was awesome.

00:17:04.586 --> 00:17:09.073
You go over there, you get to the start-finish line, you see the escarpment.

00:17:09.073 --> 00:17:19.355
You're going to run up the next day and they've got the big wooden replica of the buckle there and the clock and everything.

00:17:19.355 --> 00:17:21.548
Yeah, you just know it's real.

00:17:21.548 --> 00:17:22.905
You're like, wow, okay, I'm here.

00:17:22.905 --> 00:17:26.809
So I go, wow, I'm really at Western States.

00:17:26.809 --> 00:17:29.104
Yeah, it was just awesome.

00:17:29.104 --> 00:17:32.871
Yeah, and like she said, Karen said we met Sally McRae.

00:17:32.871 --> 00:17:37.030
She's just really approachable and really a nice super person.

00:17:37.030 --> 00:17:39.500
I don't think I saw anybody else.

00:17:39.500 --> 00:17:41.548
I kind of just kind of laid low a bit.

00:18:05.799 --> 00:18:10.765
I was trying to stay off my feet as best I could and just kind of sit around and you know Sally McRae's and Harvey Lewis and all those folks you're like, oh Christ, yeah, this is real now.

00:18:11.800 --> 00:18:14.528
I don't know I, I for me, I don't think it.

00:18:14.528 --> 00:18:23.326
I was just like, oh, I was still trying to really just digest the yeah, I'm still running Western States, honestly, and you know.

00:18:23.326 --> 00:18:26.814
So I was still pretty relaxed about the whole situation.

00:18:26.814 --> 00:18:28.082
I mean, to me it was.

00:18:28.082 --> 00:18:33.153
I'm usually pretty chill when I get into the day before a race.

00:18:33.153 --> 00:18:36.125
I don't get too wound up about it, I'm just kind of laid back.

00:18:36.125 --> 00:18:48.630
But yeah, I guess the thought of you know it's still 100 miles, you still have that, that fear, you know, and you know it's a hundred miles, it's no joke, you know you, you, you can't take it lightly.

00:18:48.630 --> 00:18:57.102
But uh, but yeah, it's, it's Western States and you've got to, uh, you know you got to put your best foot forward, you know, in the race.

00:18:58.104 --> 00:19:13.403
Well, let's talk about the race itself, cause I think I am, and I know many others are, fascinated to hear how the race went for each of you, and I think they're likely quite different, but both very interesting stories that you guys have to share.

00:19:13.403 --> 00:19:22.286
So maybe, Karen, do you want to kick us off and let us know how the race played out for you and ultimately, what happened.

00:19:22.846 --> 00:19:32.209
So me and chris's story stayed together for about 10 miles, um 10 ish or so, but um yeah.

00:19:32.209 --> 00:19:49.134
So we plan to kind of try to start together and see if we could, uh, keep each other honest at the beginning and not, um, go too hard or anything coaches had differently said don't, don't like push too hard on the escarpment, you know, just get, get through there and get past there.

00:19:49.961 --> 00:19:52.289
So we did that whole section together.

00:19:52.289 --> 00:19:57.972
We got up to the top and Isaac and Kim were up at the top.

00:19:57.972 --> 00:20:01.750
They were two of the crew that decided to take there.

00:20:01.750 --> 00:20:09.509
There's like a 4am group that goes up the escarpment to cheer people on at the start of the race once people get up there.

00:20:09.509 --> 00:20:12.962
So they did that, which is fun to see somebody cool.

00:20:13.163 --> 00:20:24.757
Um, when you finish climbing all that and um, for the most part the escarpment's not, I mean, it's it's hard, it's an, it's an hour climb you're, but most of it's on a like a road, pretty much.

00:20:24.757 --> 00:20:25.218
It's almost.

00:20:25.218 --> 00:20:40.671
It's almost like a gravel road and till you get to a few sections closer to the top where where you're kind of like, if there was snow over this, this would be kind of challenging, um, because you know there's little steps and it's a little more technical, just right there at the very tippy top.

00:20:40.671 --> 00:20:47.885
But the view is beautiful up there and it was really nice to get to do it without the snow because you could see so much.

00:20:47.885 --> 00:20:58.821
And then you get up and over it and it starts winding down and then you're kind of going through the high country, the, which was really pretty, it was really nice up there.

00:20:58.821 --> 00:21:13.587
It's like the smells are different than what we have in texas and you you kind of went through some runnable stuff and then every once in a while you get through something kind of muddy and boggy from the snow melt and where it's draining down the trail.

00:21:13.587 --> 00:21:22.890
Sometimes the trail was like a little stream almost from the snow melt, so it was unavoidable to get to not get your feet wet there.

00:21:22.890 --> 00:21:31.441
So you were sometimes in some mud and some wetness and then you get into some runnable stuff and every once in a while a little climb or something like that.

00:21:32.262 --> 00:21:44.374
And we pretty much got into the first aid station together and feeling pretty good, no problems there, and that things, I think, started to change for me shortly thereafter.

00:21:44.374 --> 00:21:54.914
We got through there and it started to seem like every time I hit a little climb Chris would suddenly be, almost would be gone and I'd be like huffing and puffing.

00:21:54.914 --> 00:22:00.729
So he kept turning back and kind of waiting and I started to just say just just keep going.

00:22:00.729 --> 00:22:31.596
So he kind of eventually started to separate for me and I didn't see him anymore, because you'd get these short little climbs in the high country, like you see where Cougar Rock is and things like that and for whatever reason, I just started to struggle on the climbs and I can only attribute it to altitude and I actually had a lot of family stress the month before this race.

00:22:31.636 --> 00:23:03.000
That I wasn't expecting and I think took a lot out of me because I did so many long treadmill climbs where I just hiked at 15% or whatever to try to prepare for this, sometimes with a 20-pound weight vest and for whatever reason, on the day and this was after doing the escarpment I just felt like I couldn't keep my breath on any of these climbs and I was just taking them too slow.

00:23:03.000 --> 00:23:09.226
But we'd get to something runnable and I'd feel better and I didn't have any problems there.

00:23:09.226 --> 00:23:27.409
But by the time I got to the second aid station, 15 miles or so in, I felt like I looked at the sign where it has the different cutoff times and I looked at that and I was like oh getting kind of back there and even that early, yeah, it comes.

00:23:27.528 --> 00:23:38.663
Well, and if you look at some of the data for it, a lot of people can ride that cutoff very early and it's OK because they kind of start to pick up later.

00:23:38.663 --> 00:23:47.643
So like you can watch some videos and you'll see people riding the cutoff close to the 30 hour mark and the cutoff actually goes to like 31 hours at the beginning, you know for most of the race.

00:23:47.643 --> 00:23:51.011
And then they pick it up later and are fine.

00:23:51.011 --> 00:23:55.191
So like I was still kind of like oh well, you're going to be fine, you're going to be fine.

00:23:55.191 --> 00:24:09.935
And I headed out of that aid station and you know it was with some people and I kept trying to just lock into a person and I'm just going to follow this person and kind of lock into their feet and run what they do.

00:24:10.637 --> 00:24:14.146
And there was even a section where we didn't see flags for a little while.

00:24:14.146 --> 00:24:17.820
And this one, this one guy, was like have you seen a flag?

00:24:17.820 --> 00:24:20.026
And I was like, yeah, no.

00:24:20.026 --> 00:24:24.061
And then I was like they're better and better be on the right trail.

00:24:24.061 --> 00:24:28.428
And then I asked the a girl in front of me and she hadn't seen one either.

00:24:28.428 --> 00:24:33.834
But she pulled up her a gaia or whatever and she's like well, it says we're on the right trail.

00:24:34.537 --> 00:24:50.682
And we went a little bit farther and finally saw one, and all we could think of is they were just like the little irrigation flags that are on the little wire, with a flag that they've probably been trampled into the ground by now because so many people have come through, so we probably just missed a couple.

00:24:50.682 --> 00:24:58.082
But so we were back on, knowing that we were on the trail and I mean I felt like things weren't going badly.

00:24:58.082 --> 00:25:04.509
I felt like I was keeping up and doing a run, walk and going along.

00:25:04.509 --> 00:25:11.282
There wasn't anything huge yet until you get to Duncan Canyon.

00:25:11.282 --> 00:25:25.632
So I got to the Duncan Canyon aid station and we actually, since our crew was so large, we had enough crew to split up to do pretty much all the crewable aid stations.

00:25:25.632 --> 00:25:30.990
Most people don't get that much crew out there, so there was crew there.

00:25:30.990 --> 00:25:38.909
I'm trying to remember what mileage that aid station was, but it was somewhere around 24, 25 or so.

00:25:39.730 --> 00:25:40.673
Right yeah, the Duncan.

00:25:40.692 --> 00:25:41.334
Canyon one, that's right.

00:25:41.334 --> 00:25:49.574
And when I got there, when I was getting closer to getting there, I started to feel like maybe I might be getting too close to cutoffs.

00:25:49.574 --> 00:26:03.792
There was a couple of other people and they were kind of starting to try to pick it up and I was running pretty hard here and all of a sudden I trip on a rock and just go boom down in the dirt in a bush.

00:26:03.792 --> 00:26:05.965
I'm just covered in dust.

00:26:05.965 --> 00:26:07.740
There's a lot of dust on this course.

00:26:07.740 --> 00:26:12.087
It's very dusty trail whenever it's dirt.

00:26:12.087 --> 00:26:18.409
And I get up, these two guys help me up and then just start running again.

00:26:18.409 --> 00:26:20.718
Luckily, nothing was injured or anything.

00:26:20.718 --> 00:26:22.682
I had a tiny little scratch on my knee.

00:26:22.682 --> 00:26:29.467
I felt like maybe I hit my lip a little bit, but it's nothing, was like sore or anything.

00:26:29.467 --> 00:26:32.280
But I'm just like okay, we just got to keep going, just got to get.

00:26:32.280 --> 00:26:37.712
We can only be like a mile or so from the aid station, so like just go.

00:26:37.712 --> 00:26:43.148
So I'm just running as much as I can to get to the aid station.

00:26:43.148 --> 00:26:44.351
See crew there.

00:26:44.351 --> 00:26:50.087
And when I get there it's just like I need to wipe down, like I'm covered in dirt.

00:26:50.087 --> 00:26:51.069
Um.

00:26:51.069 --> 00:26:56.826
So the crew like got a wet towel and wiped face and stuff like that.

00:26:57.106 --> 00:27:27.292
And, um, they had kind of like some of my heat gear there, like ice hat, and so I was trying to put that on and I had arm sleeves on from the beginning and uh, one of the crew, uh Thomas, he had seen all the pros come in and get stuffed with ice and um, so he started stuffing ice in my arm sleeves and I really wasn't that hot out there because we've been living in Houston and it's just boiling here and like he put the ice in there and I was like I need it out now.

00:27:27.292 --> 00:27:31.289
It's like painful, like I'm just like pushing the ice out of my sleeves.

00:27:31.289 --> 00:27:34.246
I was like I don't need the ice, like it's too much.

00:27:34.246 --> 00:27:42.211
But I left with an ice bandana and an ice hat and then realized that the ice bandana was like too uncomfortable to run with.

00:27:42.211 --> 00:27:44.188
It was like bouncing all over the place.

00:27:45.740 --> 00:28:11.490
So I ended up dumping most of the ice other than what was in my hat and started heading down to uh, duncan Creek, which is a couple of miles downhill from that aid station, and there was actually seemed like a few creeks you had to go through in that kind of little Canyon section, but they don't really list this as a canyon when they describe the course, but they talk about the other canyons later.

00:28:11.490 --> 00:28:15.744
But this one it's a canyon and there's a big climb.

00:28:15.744 --> 00:28:23.526
It's a couple mile climb and I don't think anyone really described it well enough to me.

00:28:23.526 --> 00:28:27.661
But I wasn't quite expecting it to hit that hard, that quickly.

00:28:29.203 --> 00:28:37.545
So climbing out of that Canyon I was like great, I've got three more and they're supposed to be worse, um than this.

00:28:37.545 --> 00:28:50.586
So I get out of there and as I'm coming into Robinson flat, I'm just running and there's two guys the two guys that had picked me up when I'd fallen either before.

00:28:50.586 --> 00:28:55.284
One of them's like sitting on a rock at one point and he looks like he's given up.

00:28:55.284 --> 00:29:10.227
I know I'm getting close to the cutoff for the 30 mile ish point there at Robinson flat and I see this other, the other guy that was with this guy he's walking down the trail at us and I'm like, and he's like you're almost there.

00:29:10.267 --> 00:29:12.807
And I'm like but why are you stopped?

00:29:12.807 --> 00:29:19.583
But I think they had just already decided to DNF, I think already.

00:29:19.583 --> 00:29:29.165
Um, because I I get into, I'm running into the aid station and they're like you've got 13 minutes and I'm like great, that is not good.

00:29:29.165 --> 00:29:44.640
So I kind of just I saw my crew there and I just went into pit crew mode because I had originally planned to change shoes there because of all the wetness and so I just kind of let it all happen, like changing shoes, socks.

00:29:44.640 --> 00:29:49.431
I was switching packs there because I didn't want to carry my bladder anymore.

00:29:49.431 --> 00:30:04.205
I was switching to bottles and a handheld and on second, on, thinking back, I probably should have just like maybe switched my pack and just kept going and not done the shoes and like just tried to get through there as quickly as possible.

00:30:04.205 --> 00:30:10.694
But regardless, I got through there, got back on the course, grabbed a snack on the way out.

00:30:17.300 --> 00:30:27.067
And the next section was actually probably my favorite section and I kind of wish I had just hammered it the entire time and ran as hard as I could have, because after Robinson flat, from Robinson flat to dusty corners, it's all great running.

00:30:27.579 --> 00:30:45.005
It's a lot of dirt, gravel road and then, like some easy, smooth trails, very runnable section and by the time you know you get one little aid station Miller's defeat in between there, um.

00:30:45.005 --> 00:30:54.791
But by the time I got to dusty or what is it yeah, dusty corners I was still 13 minutes from cutoff.

00:30:54.791 --> 00:30:59.625
But when you count my shoe change and everything like that, I basically just caught up from that.

00:30:59.625 --> 00:31:02.092
But I had passed tons of people.

00:31:02.092 --> 00:31:09.028
Like every time I saw somebody I was like, okay, focus on this person, we're going to get past them and keep going.

00:31:09.028 --> 00:31:15.205
But I got into that aid station there and saw a crew again and they told me I had 13 minutes.

00:31:15.205 --> 00:31:24.132
I actually was really frustrated by that because I was like I felt like I'd been working so hard and that I had barely caught any time.

00:31:24.132 --> 00:31:30.028
But I got through there and it was still some runnable um trail for a little while.

00:31:30.088 --> 00:31:41.141
It just kind of winded on a little smaller uh trail for a while and by the time I got to last chance, I had 20 minutes on the cutoff so that felt better.

00:31:41.141 --> 00:31:45.148
Um, I was like, okay, I did a lot.

00:31:45.148 --> 00:31:46.673
I, you know, got somewhere.

00:31:46.792 --> 00:31:49.709
But yeah, that seems like you're gaining some time.

00:31:50.200 --> 00:31:51.242
I'm at last chance.

00:31:51.242 --> 00:31:54.691
The next things are the hardest parts of the course.

00:31:54.691 --> 00:32:35.136
You know, now I've got the canyons to go through and the first one's supposed to be the hardest and what I felt was the hardest thing that I didn't get I didn't really realize in my training was a lot of the downhills are still quite rocky and you hear people talk about Western states and how runnable it is and everything, and there are certainly parts that are very runnable, but some of this canyon stuff still has quite a lot of rock and I'm not a great rocky, technical downhill runner.

00:32:35.136 --> 00:32:36.640
I get a little nervous.

00:32:36.640 --> 00:32:43.181
I kind of don't want to break my face and you know I feel like I'm going to trip and fall or I'm going to slip.

00:32:43.181 --> 00:32:52.115
And when you're on a mountain and there's kind of like a slope right next to you, you get even more nervous about it especially because, you haven't done it at all.

00:32:53.160 --> 00:33:08.290
So I didn't get to make up time on the downhill part because I was just doing real careful steps and being careful with that and of course that also hurts your quads a little bit more because you're breaking and you should shouldn't be trying to break your stride a lot.

00:33:08.290 --> 00:33:17.351
But then that climb up to um devil's thumb that is so long and I haven't.

00:33:17.351 --> 00:33:31.291
I obviously did not get to do it, um, cause I didn't get to go to the camp and part of me, uh, wondered, if you know, for a little bit after the race I wondered if it would have been better to have done it or not done it.

00:33:31.291 --> 00:33:43.383
And I think right now I'm onto, I should have done the camp, but at the time it's just long switchbacks and you can see it in all those YouTube videos online.

00:33:43.383 --> 00:33:46.664
But you can't quite appreciate the grade.

00:33:47.625 --> 00:34:06.615
And then when you watch it in a training camp video where people are doing it fresh and they're kind of running it and stuff like that, you think, oh well, this can't be that bad and I'm a good hiker, I can hike pretty fast and I usually catch people when I'm hiking.

00:34:06.615 --> 00:34:09.478
And it wasn't like that for me there.

00:34:09.478 --> 00:34:13.762
I was not breathing well on the ups.

00:34:13.762 --> 00:34:23.369
I was going quite slowly, somewhere between 25 to 30-minute miles at times, stopping here and there for a little breathing break.

00:34:23.369 --> 00:34:29.951
And then it's hard to eat when you're going uphill, it's hard to fuel and drink properly if you can't breathe.

00:34:29.951 --> 00:34:37.552
So you know, a two mile climb is suddenly an hour and you're already on cutoffs.

00:34:37.974 --> 00:34:38.193
Yeah.

00:34:49.079 --> 00:34:49.822
I get up to Devil's Thumb.

00:34:49.822 --> 00:34:52.648
I think I was back to somewhere close to like the five minute to cut off or something, maybe.

00:34:52.648 --> 00:34:53.510
Maybe I was still a 10 minute there.

00:34:53.510 --> 00:34:55.260
I think it was five minutes at the next one.

00:34:55.260 --> 00:35:03.007
But you know, you get up there and at least there's some popsicles and stuff like that and you're like, okay, I made it up this one, but I still got.

00:35:03.007 --> 00:35:05.152
There's still two canyons to go.

00:35:05.152 --> 00:35:13.981
So like I kind of talked to the aid station there and I was like, okay, so how's the next downhill?

00:35:13.981 --> 00:35:17.190
And they're like, oh, you'll like the downhill to El Dorado Canyon.

00:35:17.190 --> 00:35:20.744
It's much better, it's much smoother, it's not steep.

00:35:20.744 --> 00:35:26.414
And I was like, great, maybe I'll gain some time and do a little better on this one.

00:35:26.414 --> 00:35:31.916
So I head off for this one and it was a much better run in this canyon.

00:35:31.936 --> 00:35:35.967
You get some actual section where you don't even feel like you're in a canyon.

00:35:35.967 --> 00:35:36.389
You're not.

00:35:36.389 --> 00:35:37.782
You don't feel like you're going down.

00:35:37.782 --> 00:35:39.987
I'm like, when am I going to be going down?

00:35:39.987 --> 00:35:44.047
I feel like I'm just running past the Deadwood Cemetery.

00:35:44.047 --> 00:35:44.579
I took a picture there.

00:35:44.579 --> 00:35:44.903
I got a little like I tried to pump myself up.

00:35:44.903 --> 00:35:45.623
I feel like I'm just running past the Deadwood Cemetery.

00:35:45.623 --> 00:35:45.954
I took a picture there.

00:35:45.954 --> 00:35:48.237
I got a little like I tried to pump myself up.

00:35:48.237 --> 00:35:50.768
I was like I'm not dead yet, I'm going to make it.

00:35:50.768 --> 00:35:53.188
I can, I can, I can do this.

00:35:53.188 --> 00:35:56.690
And I was trying to just feel better about it.

00:35:56.690 --> 00:35:59.686
I was like, ok, we can do this and still in the game.

00:36:00.059 --> 00:36:03.628
Then still in the game, I was like I'm not until I'm done.

00:36:03.628 --> 00:36:08.684
I then still in the game, I was like I'm not until I'm done, I'm done, I'm, I'm still out here.

00:36:08.684 --> 00:36:20.931
Yeah, um, but luckily I prepared for the the crew to give me the backup headlamp at the previous uh aid station because I wasn't going to make it to michigan bluff before um, before dark.

00:36:20.931 --> 00:36:22.081
I mean, I was going to.

00:36:22.081 --> 00:36:26.152
It was going to be dark before I got there, so I had a headlamp.

00:36:26.152 --> 00:36:37.538
And so a little bit, just before I reached the bottom of el dorado canyon or el dorado creek, I put it on because it was starting to get dim, but just so it was ready to go.

00:36:37.597 --> 00:36:40.766
And when I got down there, they're like you got five minutes on cut off.

00:36:40.766 --> 00:36:42.871
And I'm like, okay.

00:36:42.871 --> 00:36:44.987
And they're like and they're like you got an hour climb.

00:36:44.987 --> 00:36:50.047
So they basically tell you the climb is going to take you at least an hour.

00:36:50.047 --> 00:37:06.811
So I started heading up that and about this time I started to feel some soreness in my feet, like a blister maybe forming, and I decided to take a stop to put some lube on it, because I was like, well, I can't handle a blister right now.

00:37:06.811 --> 00:37:08.423
If I think about it now.

00:37:08.423 --> 00:37:14.987
I should have just kept going, but it didn't take that long because the mosquitoes instantly attacked me as soon as I tried to deal with my foot.

00:37:14.987 --> 00:37:20.150
They were awful, I hate mosquitoes Worst thing ever.

00:37:20.739 --> 00:37:26.043
But just kept continuing to climb up this canyon to try to get to Michigan Bluff.

00:37:26.043 --> 00:38:04.333
At one point, some guys telling me we're halfway through the climb or that we have a half hour left, and you just kind of lose awareness of how much time's going the final cutoff time of days and had it with me because I really couldn't remember what they were and I wasn't going to try to look for them on my phone and I was like I, if I had had the time that I needed to be there by, I think it could have helped me a little bit, because at some point climbing up to Michigan bluff I was starting to think there's no way I made it.

00:38:04.333 --> 00:38:08.182
Like I, I'm surely done by now.

00:38:08.182 --> 00:38:13.657
Like it's dark, I can't see the top, I can't see anything other than my light.

00:38:13.657 --> 00:38:15.661
I still have people around me.

00:38:15.661 --> 00:38:24.893
It's not like I'm the only one there, like there were other people back there with me, I don't you know, trying to make it to michigan bluff.

00:38:25.835 --> 00:38:42.661
And I finally come around one little turn where I think I see a sign and I'm like, I feel like maybe I'm almost at the top and this, this guy comes running towards me and I'm like oh, and he's like okay, okay, we've, we're gonna get you through this aid station.

00:38:42.661 --> 00:38:46.809
You've got two minutes to get from here to the exit of the aid station.

00:38:46.809 --> 00:38:51.322
We've got your, your crew, waiting, you got your bottles, we're gonna get you what you need.

00:38:51.322 --> 00:38:52.385
You just have to keep running.

00:38:52.385 --> 00:38:53.309
And you got to run now.

00:38:53.309 --> 00:39:08.849
And I'm like okay, um, like trying to gasp and get my breath because I just finished climbing, and then we just take running and as I I'm running into the aid station, someone in there screams is that Karen?

00:39:08.849 --> 00:39:15.615
And I'm like, yes, and it's Libby's there from Active Joe.

00:39:15.635 --> 00:39:40.742
Oh yeah, leanna, who is my backup emergency pacer, because you're not supposed to need a pacer atacer at michigan bluff, but you can get one if you're there after 8 pm, and it was well past8 pm okay um, yeah, and laura was there with stuff, but it was just like I'm running and liana's carrying my waist light and the stuff she needs and like things she think I might need.

00:39:40.782 --> 00:39:47.632
like she's got a can of orange soda with me with her and the crew person is carrying a baggie of fruit.

00:39:47.632 --> 00:39:51.204
As we're running through the aid station, I'm just like where's the end?

00:39:51.204 --> 00:39:51.907
Where's the end?

00:39:52.108 --> 00:39:52.307
Wow.

00:39:52.539 --> 00:39:54.346
And you just had to get past this guy.

00:39:54.666 --> 00:39:55.769
Get out yeah.

00:39:56.199 --> 00:40:04.077
And get past the guy and then, just at that point, try to breathe a little bit and start trying to collect yourself.

00:40:04.077 --> 00:40:07.514
For the last part well, what ended up being my last part?

00:40:08.036 --> 00:40:09.039
I think that's that's.

00:40:09.039 --> 00:40:15.295
That's one of those interesting lessons of experience that I certainly have learned.

00:40:15.295 --> 00:40:16.456
Uh, because I watched it.

00:40:16.456 --> 00:40:39.762
I watched this happen at moab a little bit, too where people would get in with minimal time left and literally walk out the other side with a bunch of stuff just so that they could be out of the aid station and then sit down on the road and figure out what it is, what the heck they need to do in order to keep going, you know, rather than sit and do it at the aid station and miss the opportunity to get out.

00:40:39.802 --> 00:40:41.690
Yeah, yeah, so good call, I think.

00:40:41.885 --> 00:40:42.614
Well, and they, they work to try the aid station.

00:40:42.614 --> 00:40:43.606
People really work to try to get people.

00:40:43.606 --> 00:40:44.052
Yeah, yeah, so good call, I think.

00:40:44.052 --> 00:40:45.282
Well, and they, they work to try the aid station.

00:40:45.282 --> 00:40:48.213
People really work to try to get people through there.

00:40:48.213 --> 00:41:01.713
Like that was that guy's purpose to go find people that were almost to cut off and get them through yeah, that's cool because otherwise, if you were just gonna walk into that aid, I would have missed it, like if you wouldn't have known.

00:41:01.733 --> 00:41:08.135
Yeah, Like I wouldn't have known that I had to run Because I didn't hear any of the horns, because it had.

00:41:08.135 --> 00:41:21.215
You know, they blow a horn, I think, at 10 minutes, and then after that they just tell people at five minutes that are around that you know got five minutes left and then when the final horns go off, you're done.

00:41:21.215 --> 00:41:29.012
So I wouldn't have known, because I didn't hear any of the other horns, because I must have been too far to hear those.

00:41:29.012 --> 00:41:35.556
So without those crew people pushing to get those last people through, I wouldn't have gotten through.

00:41:35.556 --> 00:41:46.639
And I think I found out later that I was I'm pretty sure I was the last person to get through Michigan Bluff that came out of El Dorado Canyon.

00:41:46.639 --> 00:41:48.610
Like I was the last person to make that cut off.

00:41:48.610 --> 00:41:51.396
But so then I was that's cool.

00:41:52.519 --> 00:41:54.070
Yeah, I mean, that's the thing, right.

00:41:54.070 --> 00:42:05.070
I mean when I was down there in El Dorado Canyon, one of the aid station workers was like trying to tell me the time and she's like go make a great story, Like give it all.

00:42:05.070 --> 00:42:06.309
You got there you go like they're.

00:42:06.329 --> 00:42:12.092
You know they're trying to get you going and get you through because I mean I had no stomach problems.

00:42:12.092 --> 00:42:16.746
I had like no real problems other than not being able to breathe on the climbs.

00:42:16.746 --> 00:42:21.807
I felt great unless I was climbing or going down rocky hills.

00:42:21.807 --> 00:42:49.228
So it just it felt really perplexing to me because I'm not usually riding the back of the pack, I'm not usually struggling for cutoffs, but and I didn't feel like my body was totally destroyed, like I just couldn't breathe well enough on the climbs to go faster, and it it just hard to um figure that one out Like I.

00:42:49.228 --> 00:43:14.951
It's not like I didn't try, I was trying really hard, um, but but yeah, so I got to, got through um Michigan bluff, picked up the pacer, you know, got my bigger light on and we kind of headed out of there and I'd like to say I should have pushed more there because it was a little bit of runnable stuff before you got into the last canyon.

00:43:15.853 --> 00:43:39.264
But I was also tired from sprinting through that aid station and I'm really not sure that I could have made up the time I needed to be able to handle the canyon appropriately and this is supposed to be the smallest canyon, volcano canyon not as big of a deal as the others, but the downhill was still very rocky.

00:43:39.264 --> 00:43:42.250
It wasn't as runnable to me.

00:43:42.250 --> 00:43:50.429
Yeah, I was like picking my feet down and and then there's still a climb out of there.

00:43:50.429 --> 00:44:11.137
And when you do get out of the trail there you hit bath road which ends up still going uphill a bit, quite a bit, and you still got like I feel like you had like a mile and a half to get to Forest Hill from when you left the trail and I mean started to try to get some good running in there.

00:44:11.137 --> 00:44:18.085
But by the time I got to Forest Hill Road, you know, you hear the only thing you hear is cars speeding down the road.

00:44:18.085 --> 00:44:26.246
Like people who drove down that road were ridiculous at that time of night, but like I didn't hear any like aid station sounds.

00:44:26.327 --> 00:44:43.315
You didn't hear any cowbells, you don't hear any sounds and I'm like I think it's over I don't think I need it and then I, you know, I was kind of running in and I see thomas, who would have been my pacer, standing there and I kind of go what's's the time?

00:44:43.315 --> 00:44:47.987
And he's like it's over and I'm just like, well, let's just walk in now.

00:44:47.987 --> 00:44:59.786
So I don't know exactly how many minutes I missed the cutoff, especially because he met me out there and then we just kind of did a little sorrowful walk in from there.

00:44:59.786 --> 00:45:06.688
But somewhere around 10 to 15 minutes, or if I'd been pushing could have been a little less than that.

00:45:06.688 --> 00:45:17.452
But yeah, it's hard to miss it by just a little bit and then start picking apart every little thing you could have done to gain that.

00:45:17.452 --> 00:45:19.878
And it's real hard to walk in.

00:45:19.878 --> 00:45:28.005
Especially for me the biggest thing was I was there for the Act of Joe as their sponsored runner.

00:45:28.005 --> 00:45:34.686
So you feel like you're representing someone in a company and you don't want to let them down.

00:45:34.686 --> 00:45:47.849
You don't want to let your crew down, that has all come out to support you, that has volunteered to spend some money to come out there, and they want to, you know, share in the experience with you.

00:45:48.791 --> 00:46:08.264
And you realize you don't, you haven't made it and you're coming into that final aid station where you didn't make it and you know some of them was there waiting for you and, um, you know they're not disappointed at you, but it's hard to not feel that way.

00:46:08.364 --> 00:46:18.349
When you're coming in, you're like because you feel disappointed in yourself because, um, you know this is such a big thing, you know, to get into western states.

00:46:18.349 --> 00:46:34.398
It's supposed to be like the one time you get this chance and, um, hopefully I'm young enough still that I could get in again and like I can wait another definitely eight, nine years or whatever to get back.

00:46:34.398 --> 00:47:02.014
But when you go into race thinking this is probably your one and done, this is your big shot, and then you don't make it through and it's not just something you can sign up again for next year it it hits pretty hard and, yeah, I just walked into that aid station and at first you try to hold it together and then you just sit down and, yeah, put your head in a towel and just start to feel really sad.

00:47:03.838 --> 00:47:32.911
Really sad, but I mean, I think one of the really great things about ultras is that no race success is guaranteed Correct, and so any time you do a race there is a learning curve, especially if it's the first time you've done the race and not being able to get out on the course and not being able to test yourself at altitude and you still got, I think, probably 60-ish miles I would imagine it was 100K, it was 62 miles.

00:47:32.971 --> 00:47:33.251
Yeah.

00:47:33.251 --> 00:47:39.552
So I mean you've still got 100K of the course down, even with all the challenges you were having.

00:47:39.552 --> 00:48:09.293
So you know, I think time is such a great thing, and I went through something relatively similar, I think a year, two years ago I went over to England and ran the Lakeland 100, which is a huge race, arguably the biggest race in the UK and I timed out at 34 miles in a race that I had spent thousands of dollars to go to and time away from family and put a whole bunch of effort into training, and I got 30 miles before I had time now.

00:48:09.293 --> 00:48:14.916
Now, there were reasons for that and actually, funnily enough, one of them was the technical aspect of the trail.

00:48:14.916 --> 00:48:19.876
It was incredibly technical and, just like you, the downhills really chewed me up.

00:48:19.876 --> 00:48:24.994
I was so slow on the downhills where other people familiar with the trails and had done this, they're bombing down those things.

00:48:24.994 --> 00:48:29.509
I was scared to death going down super technical downhills.

00:48:29.509 --> 00:48:30.429
I was so slow.

00:48:30.630 --> 00:48:50.545
But, um, so I, I I can empathize, certainly, having sat in you know, the, I think, the fourth or fifth aid station of that race and just timed out, and and just timed out, and for something that was so big for me, I was gutted, I was absolutely gutted at that point, and a long way from home.

00:48:50.545 --> 00:48:52.311
So I definitely empathize.

00:48:52.311 --> 00:48:57.855
But I will say I think where I was going with that time brings a whole lot of perspective.

00:48:57.855 --> 00:49:06.273
And once you sit back and you evaluate the whole thing and the lessons you've learned, you may or may not realize as of yet the experience that you've had.

00:49:06.273 --> 00:49:11.851
I, I think, is always going to be there and, I think, will stand you in in good stead moving forward.

00:49:11.851 --> 00:49:20.376
So it just, unfortunately, it just takes a little time for the sting to subside a bit and then you can sort of look at it a bit more objectively.

00:49:20.456 --> 00:49:42.731
And, um, and that's where I'm at with that race right now, and I had no right to be doing that race, I hadn't trained on any of that terrain and there was torrential rain and sideways, wind and tiny little tracks going across the mountain, which which were, uh, dirt trails which became like an inch thick with mud and slick, and I again you were talking about, hey, I don't want to slide off the side of a mountain here.

00:49:42.731 --> 00:49:43.893
That was really what it was.

00:49:43.893 --> 00:49:49.255
I mean, I was concerned for that and so my time went super slow and I timed out.

00:49:49.255 --> 00:49:52.976
But again, perspective, I think, is awesome.

00:49:52.976 --> 00:50:08.994
So I hope in time you can come to look back objectively on the race and take all the good stuff and all the things you did learn and all this knowledge you now have of 60 odd miles of western states and, as Chris said, the last bits are super runnable.

00:50:09.324 --> 00:50:10.791
So we don't got all the hard stuff.

00:50:12.025 --> 00:50:12.947
Yeah, you did all the.

00:50:12.947 --> 00:50:14.811
You did all the really meaty stuff.

00:50:14.851 --> 00:50:17.137
That's right, you got through the hard stuff you did.

00:50:17.804 --> 00:50:27.512
So, yeah, I think still a fantastic effort and I'm sure nobody, nobody out there is seeing you any different than you know, a heroic push to, to where you got.

00:50:27.893 --> 00:50:28.494
Definitely not.

00:50:28.733 --> 00:50:29.094
Indeed.

00:50:29.094 --> 00:50:34.739
So, chris, while Karen was going through all of these challenges, how was your race unfolding?

00:50:34.739 --> 00:50:39.583
After you guys had split up what 10 or so miles in, how were you doing?

00:50:45.105 --> 00:50:46.289
I had kind of the opposite of what Karen had.

00:50:46.289 --> 00:50:48.416
I was fine on the climbs but I was having problems on the downhills.

00:50:48.416 --> 00:50:51.867
I was like my heart rate was like really spiking and I couldn't really understand it.

00:50:51.867 --> 00:50:55.902
But I think it was again like Karen, I think it was the altitude.

00:50:55.902 --> 00:50:57.447
I don't understand why it didn't affect me.

00:50:57.447 --> 00:51:00.195
On the uphills, I mean, I was my heart rate was like a hundred.

00:51:00.195 --> 00:51:07.972
I mean, on the uphills I was just like climbing these hills and my heart rate was going nowhere.

00:51:07.992 --> 00:51:12.284
But as soon as I hit some downhills and started running, you know pretty well I mean, my heart rate would get to like 180 or 185.

00:51:12.284 --> 00:51:13.670
I was like what the heck's going on here?

00:51:13.670 --> 00:51:19.456
It doesn't usually get that high and I was just feeling a little bit off and feeling a little strange.

00:51:19.456 --> 00:51:21.351
But I just kept going.

00:51:21.351 --> 00:51:25.166
You know, just kept going.

00:51:25.166 --> 00:51:25.668
You know it was.

00:51:25.668 --> 00:51:28.981
I kept going and, and you know, made it to pick it up where we're carrying it, going into duncan canyon aid station.

00:51:28.981 --> 00:51:43.048
I had a similar experience with the caring had is there's some really nice downhills going into that aid station and you know my legs got a little floppy and I clipped a rock and ate some girl myself not very far from the aid station, I could actually hear them.

00:51:43.148 --> 00:51:44.431
I mean I could hear the aid station.

00:51:44.431 --> 00:51:46.556
As long as they don't see you, do that, you're all right.

00:51:46.556 --> 00:51:48.119
I think like, yeah, like get up.

00:51:48.164 --> 00:52:04.239
Well, no, no, nothing happened yeah, they got up and yeah, they're like, hey, you're kind of dirty man, like, yeah, I kind of fell back there, so but yeah, yeah, they, you know, got in there and they, they fixed me up and you know, I asked where karen was at, where she you know if anybody had any idea where Karen was at, and the crew was great.

00:52:04.239 --> 00:52:11.518
They just, you know, got me fixed up and I had actually I had a handheld that when I fell I broke my handheld.

00:52:12.306 --> 00:52:28.934
The little nozzle was not holding water, so when I would like move my hand around, the water would start to slosh out, and so, fortunately, charlie had brought one of his handhelds and swapped it out with me, and so I used his handheld for the rest of the race.

00:52:28.934 --> 00:52:37.237
So, thank God, he had his handheld in his backpack, so that kind of saved me on my handheld and being able to have some water in my hand.

00:52:37.237 --> 00:52:41.396
But, yeah, they loaded me up with ice and similar situation with carrying it.

00:52:41.396 --> 00:53:00.655
You got all that ice on you, you got an ice hat and you know you're trying to run with that on you and it's it's kind of flopping all over the place, you know, and you're trying to get used to it and you know that's something you don't really, you don't really train for, because the ice does you know, it has weight to your.

00:53:00.695 --> 00:53:08.050
You know it's not just, yes, bulk and weight, and so it's a really different feeling running with that, although I ran with ice before.

00:53:08.050 --> 00:53:27.768
It's not that big of a deal, but it seemed like there was more this time, I guess, with the ice hat and the bandana, and then I did put ice in my sleeves, it didn't bother me as much, but yeah, that was great.

00:53:27.768 --> 00:53:32.565
Getting in and out of there in summer experience, getting down to Duncan Creek and doing that climb, that was just the most of all the bad parts of the race.

00:53:32.565 --> 00:53:38.438
So I would say that was probably the most miserable section that I really didn't care for.

00:53:38.438 --> 00:53:40.914
It was just technical.

00:53:40.914 --> 00:53:43.432
There were some technical sections and it was starting to get warm.

00:53:43.432 --> 00:53:49.556
You know, the heat was probably close to midday by that time, so the heat was starting to come on.

00:53:49.556 --> 00:53:53.333
Then I got behind a Congo line of runners that were like zombies.

00:53:53.333 --> 00:54:01.077
You're trying to get around these people, but they're just not really paying attention or anything.

00:54:01.077 --> 00:54:03.231
I guess I should have spoke up really loud.

00:54:03.231 --> 00:54:05.192
Hey, I'm on the left, could you let me buy, or whatever.

00:54:05.192 --> 00:54:07.465
But but they, you know, you, I don't know.

00:54:07.465 --> 00:54:09.617
I'm usually when I hear people come up behind me.

00:54:09.617 --> 00:54:11.726
I'll just usually step aside and let people buy, you know.

00:54:11.726 --> 00:54:18.311
But but it seemed like it was just a long slog up to uh, uh, you know to the next aid station, you know.

00:54:18.311 --> 00:54:35.911
And getting up to Robison Flat, you know, meeting the next crew that was there, we changed out my shoes and it got me fueled up and the next section is really about 15 miles of really downhill right there from Robeson Flat to Devil's Thumb.

00:54:35.911 --> 00:54:38.554
You know, that's really like 15 miles of downhill.

00:54:38.554 --> 00:54:44.577
There's a little bit of uphill in there, but it's really just like slowly downhill there that you're really running.

00:54:44.577 --> 00:54:46.989
So it's a good section to pick up some time.

00:54:46.989 --> 00:54:51.592
I thought it was doing okay, similar to what Karen's experience is.

00:54:51.592 --> 00:54:53.706
You get there, you're like, wow, I thought it was doing a little better than that.

00:54:53.706 --> 00:55:01.306
But you get there and you're like, you know, I'm still maybe on 28-hour pace and I thought it was doing a little better than that.

00:55:01.306 --> 00:55:03.632
You know, getting to some of the aid stations.

00:55:04.092 --> 00:55:10.885
Once I got into last chance and I was going to go down into devil's thumb, the canyon there.

00:55:10.885 --> 00:55:20.092
So I got in the last chance and kind of sat there for a little bit and just chilled for a bit and just to kind of gather myself because I knew what was coming up.

00:55:20.092 --> 00:55:21.956
It is very technical.

00:55:21.956 --> 00:55:27.045
Once you take off from last chance and you're taking that downhill going into the canyon there it's very.

00:55:27.045 --> 00:55:31.257
That's the most technical section I would say in the canyons is right there.

00:55:31.257 --> 00:55:39.418
There's some videos on YouTube, even some of the people that are practicing for the cup the Tevis Cup that they do out there.

00:55:39.418 --> 00:55:44.166
They're doing their horses, they're running their horses through there, the Tevis Cup.

00:55:44.166 --> 00:55:44.847
You know that they do out there.

00:55:44.847 --> 00:55:52.016
You know they're doing their horses, they're running their horses through there and you can even tell they're not crazy about even bringing their horses through there Because there are some really technical, nasty like rocks and places right in there that you have to get through.

00:55:52.396 --> 00:56:05.268
When I got through that section also, it was starting to, the sun was starting to set and so I was getting most of the sun on me.

00:56:05.268 --> 00:56:06.873
At that time the sun was just kind of like right on my body and heating me up.

00:56:06.873 --> 00:56:09.581
But you know, finally got down to the swinging bridge, made my way up to Devil's Thumb.

00:56:09.581 --> 00:56:15.173
You know, like I said, I had done these canyons before, so it wasn't, it didn't feel that bad.

00:56:15.173 --> 00:56:18.586
I knew what was coming and I just kept moving along.

00:56:18.586 --> 00:56:22.289
Saw a lot of people struggling going up.

00:56:22.289 --> 00:56:24.972
Those you know, felt for, felt really bad for them.

00:56:24.972 --> 00:56:29.677
You know, because you know, I know it's really tough If you haven't seen these before.

00:56:29.677 --> 00:56:33.400
Finally got into Devil's Thumb Popsicles.

00:56:33.541 --> 00:56:33.940
Yeah.

00:56:33.960 --> 00:56:34.661
They were the bomb.

00:56:34.661 --> 00:56:42.860
I mean honestly, got there and got a couple of Popsicles and, you know, fueled up and tried not to stick around too long.

00:56:42.860 --> 00:56:48.251
They do their best, the aid stations at Western States.

00:56:48.251 --> 00:56:54.074
I'll just say that they are top-notch, the best aid stations I've ever seen.

00:56:54.074 --> 00:56:59.050
These guys they'll sit there and they'll wait on you hand and foot when you walk into the aid station.

00:56:59.050 --> 00:57:01.717
They're holding on to your gear while you're eating.

00:57:01.717 --> 00:57:05.134
If you sit down, they'll stand next to you with your gear.

00:57:05.134 --> 00:57:09.516
You know, basically, you know just holding your gear and saying, hey, do you need anything else?

00:57:09.516 --> 00:57:12.213
And you know, if you're finished with something, they'll pick up your trash.

00:57:12.213 --> 00:57:13.315
You talk, we'll hold on to that.

00:57:13.315 --> 00:57:20.208
You know they're just wanting to get you out of the aid station as quickly as possible and so it's just, you know, just top notch.

00:57:20.668 --> 00:57:23.570
And were you ever close to cutoffs like Karen was?

00:57:23.570 --> 00:57:27.693
Did you ever find yourself like that close, charging in and charging out?

00:57:28.554 --> 00:57:30.894
No, I was about an hour ahead of cutoffs.

00:57:30.894 --> 00:57:33.396
I think in most cases I know.

00:57:33.396 --> 00:57:38.360
When I got to Duncan Canyon aid station that was an hour cutoff.

00:57:38.460 --> 00:57:43.663
I was an hour ahead of the cutoff then and I thought Karen was probably about 25 minutes behind me.

00:57:43.663 --> 00:57:47.771
I assumed she might have been about 25 minutes behind me, I was.

00:57:47.771 --> 00:57:54.715
I did have a little bit of concern, you know, after um at Michigan bluff, you know because I was getting there so late.

00:57:54.715 --> 00:58:04.277
But uh, I think I got there around, let's say, around eight, 30 or so and, uh, my, uh, my crew was already there.

00:58:04.277 --> 00:58:24.057
They were waiting for me and, um, fortunately, isaac uh had already decided that he was going to pace me, already had his pacer bib on which he was thinking ahead, and also they had brought all of my drop bag stuff, I mean all the bags that I had pretty much and I had through most of the race.

00:58:24.105 --> 00:58:32.512
I was wearing, you know, a regular, you know hydration vest with the big, you know one liter or whatever bladder, which was just by this time was just like.

00:58:32.512 --> 00:58:33.768
I just wanted to get rid of that thing.

00:58:33.768 --> 00:58:35.134
It was really way too heavy.

00:58:35.134 --> 00:58:45.106
It already cooled down and I just said, hey, you know, I just want to go with a weight, a waste of hydration in a bottle and a handheld just to lighten the load.

00:58:45.106 --> 00:58:46.795
And they were smart enough to bring all that stuff.

00:58:46.795 --> 00:58:55.717
So you know I had softened them to bring all that and have it ready for me and we just we changed that out and took off towards, you know, forest Hill.

00:58:55.717 --> 00:59:00.715
And I can't complain, those guys just wow, they were terrific.

00:59:01.865 --> 00:59:03.713
But we took off to Forest Hill.

00:59:03.713 --> 00:59:07.855
It's a, you know, like Karen said, it's a pretty runnable section.

00:59:07.855 --> 00:59:20.836
There is a very nasty kind of downhill that's called the elevator shaft that you get to and it's just a winding downhill, kind of a switchback, and it's kind of technical.

00:59:20.836 --> 00:59:34.172
And Isaac and I were just running down this thing, you know, as fast as we could fortunately my quads weren't totally shot yet, I was actually surprised so we were able to get down that and in pretty good shape.

00:59:34.172 --> 00:59:44.617
And then I got down to volcano creek and and I was trying to go up the hill and I took a wrong step and fell into the creek.

00:59:44.878 --> 00:59:45.278
Oh gosh.

00:59:45.485 --> 00:59:46.929
And fortunately it's not a deep creek.

00:59:46.929 --> 00:59:48.213
But you know it was okay.

00:59:48.213 --> 00:59:51.853
I didn't injure myself and the water felt pretty good.

00:59:52.266 --> 00:59:53.972
Probably quite refreshing, I would imagine, yeah.

00:59:54.586 --> 00:59:55.931
It felt real well, it was awesome.

00:59:55.931 --> 01:00:09.737
But yeah, we went ahead and it was a pretty good climb out of Volcano Creek to Bath Road and that's a like I think it's like probably a mile and a half or something, a path road.

01:00:09.737 --> 01:00:11.130
I didn't realize it was that long.

01:00:11.130 --> 01:00:12.012
I did the training run.

01:00:12.012 --> 01:00:15.311
It seemed like it wasn't that long, but it was definitely longer.

01:00:15.311 --> 01:00:19.695
That night and we made it over to Forest Hill aid station.

01:00:20.744 --> 01:00:25.554
Charlie had brought me some great food that he had, you know some other stuff that wasn't part of the aid station food.

01:00:25.554 --> 01:00:31.273
You know some, uh, some chicken salad sandwiches and I think it was a philly cheese steak or something.

01:00:31.273 --> 01:00:41.246
And you know, I kind of wolfed down a little bit of that and we got all our stuff together and and headed out and charlie, uh, is, is, is quite a character.

01:00:41.246 --> 01:00:43.811
He's one of the characters in our team that you know.

01:00:43.811 --> 01:00:46.657
Know he's, he's Mr Kind of gung ho in a way.

01:00:46.657 --> 01:00:51.530
Sometimes he, he actually, you know he's kind of like you know, let's go, man.

01:00:51.530 --> 01:00:57.427
You know we're going right now and it's like okay, charlie, just remember I've been running like 62 miles, don't kill me, man.

01:00:57.427 --> 01:00:58.748
So you know when.

01:00:58.748 --> 01:00:59.951
So let's go.

01:00:59.990 --> 01:01:04.594
So we're running down Cal Street and there's this long downhill where you go down.

01:01:04.594 --> 01:01:08.478
And I'm explaining to Charlie and I was like, yeah, I ran this route.

01:01:08.478 --> 01:01:19.990
You go down here and you're going to take a left and you're going to take another right and then you're going to take another right and then we're going to be doing a bunch of switchbacks for a while until we get on the main trail to Rucka Chucky.

01:01:19.990 --> 01:01:29.092
We started running and Charlie was trying to make sure I didn't trip over any rocks and step in any holes and we were going at a pretty good pace.

01:01:29.092 --> 01:01:35.077
Actually, my team kind of has a running joke for me.

01:01:35.077 --> 01:01:38.173
I'm the most clumsy of the team.

01:01:38.173 --> 01:01:43.969
I probably fell more times on the trail than anybody in the entire team put together.

01:01:43.969 --> 01:01:44.449
So they make fun of me.

01:01:44.449 --> 01:01:47.632
I probably fell more times on the trail than anybody in the entire team put together.

01:01:47.632 --> 01:01:53.338
So you know they make fun of me and I'm pretty good at falling a lot Because I have very large feet.

01:01:53.338 --> 01:01:54.918
I wear like a size 14.

01:01:54.918 --> 01:01:56.300
Oh my gosh.

01:01:56.521 --> 01:01:57.742
No wonder you trip on stuff.

01:02:02.045 --> 01:02:03.992
Yeah, and my gait, I think, doesn't help much, so I'm kind of a weird gate.

01:02:03.992 --> 01:02:09.137
So Charlie was just trying to make sure I didn't trip and fall while he was pacing me.

01:02:09.137 --> 01:02:19.951
But we made it down to the switchbacks and across and then started on the main Cal Street trail and we started passing people.

01:02:19.951 --> 01:02:20.954
We were just passing.

01:02:20.954 --> 01:02:22.311
I think we ended up passing.

01:02:22.311 --> 01:02:26.858
I think Charlie said at one time he thought we passed like 40 sets of runners.

01:02:26.858 --> 01:02:28.764
We were just wow that's pretty good.

01:02:28.965 --> 01:02:36.208
Running and running and running, and and I did, I did take, you know, speaking of following, I did take another spill.

01:02:36.208 --> 01:02:37.894
I think I tripped on a rock.

01:02:37.894 --> 01:02:44.715
That was kind of like outside the trail, the trails there, uh, that cow street section is is very, very, very smooth.

01:02:44.715 --> 01:02:47.248
It's like if you wanted to run on a trail.

01:02:47.248 --> 01:02:48.271
That is the trail.

01:02:48.271 --> 01:02:51.126
I mean, it is just nothing to really trip over.

01:02:51.126 --> 01:03:02.255
Not, you know, of course, unless it's me, I'm going to find something to trip over, but, uh, but, but it's really very, very smooth for the most part, uh, and it's just so runnable.

01:03:02.255 --> 01:03:05.306
I mean, it's just not really too steep in some sections.

01:03:05.306 --> 01:03:13.809
Now there are some rollers you have to go up on, but otherwise it's, it's really just very, very runnable, just super runnable.

01:03:14.271 --> 01:03:16.235
So we, we made up a lot of time.

01:03:16.235 --> 01:03:21.634
I did start to get a hotspot in in one of my toes.

01:03:21.634 --> 01:03:22.737
I was getting a blister.

01:03:22.737 --> 01:03:48.150
A blister, I knew, I had a blister on my, on my second toe of my foot, on my right foot, and, um, we got to the next to last aid station, far what's called the ford's bar aid station, and, um, I was able to, you know, take my sock off and look at my toe and I basically had sheared off, like most of the meat all the way up to the nail, so so it was pretty nasty.

01:03:48.170 --> 01:03:59.485
I was like, okay, but we they stuck a bandaid on it and and, uh, we made it over to Rucky Chucky and uh, they'd expected us about an hour later, so we had made up an additional hour.

01:03:59.485 --> 01:04:00.405
It was just hours.

01:04:00.405 --> 01:04:01.186
It was a good section.

01:04:01.186 --> 01:04:03.427
It's a really very, very, very runnable section.

01:04:03.427 --> 01:04:08.851
And then you know, I'm in Rikichuki and it's time to get wet.

01:04:08.971 --> 01:04:10.891
So you know, that's.

01:04:10.891 --> 01:04:13.913
You know, sat there for a bit and got some food.

01:04:13.913 --> 01:04:17.675
I look over there and there's Gordy.

01:04:17.675 --> 01:04:24.739
He's over there giving massages to all the aid station workers, you know, and of course I I got to go and talk to Gordy and he shake his hand.

01:04:24.739 --> 01:04:25.778
He pulled my name, you know.

01:04:25.778 --> 01:04:27.860
And you know, cool, cool moment.

01:04:28.081 --> 01:04:28.940
It's a cool moment.

01:04:29.340 --> 01:04:29.621
Yeah.

01:04:29.621 --> 01:04:40.847
So went over there and uh and say, gordy, hey, you pull, pull my, uh, pull my name.

01:04:40.847 --> 01:04:42.070
And uh, charlie also, uh, another funny story, uh.

01:04:42.070 --> 01:04:55.275
So, um, back a few years ago Gordy came out to Rocky Raccoon and Charlie Pace, uh, he paced Gordy, him, and a friend of his paced Gordy out there at, uh, at Rocky Raccoon and, and so they had some some crazy stories to tell.

01:04:55.275 --> 01:05:00.585
I won't go into any details, but but it was fun and he was like hey, gordy, you know you remember me.

01:05:00.585 --> 01:05:03.487
And Gordy's like I'm not real sure.

01:05:03.487 --> 01:05:06.027
He says yeah, remember our past year at Rocky Raccoon.

01:05:06.027 --> 01:05:07.967
He says, oh, yeah, now I remember you.

01:05:07.967 --> 01:05:09.929
So it was pretty cool.

01:05:09.929 --> 01:05:15.150
So Charlie got to reunite with Gordy also and kind of catch up on what was going on.

01:05:15.150 --> 01:05:32.356
Typically at Rocky Chucky you can have what typically happens is you can either have your pacer that's with you already, go across the river and then go to the other side and then you go all the way up to Green Gate.

01:05:32.356 --> 01:05:36.018
Well, they had had some kind of fire earlier in the day.

01:05:36.237 --> 01:05:36.717
That's right.

01:05:37.177 --> 01:05:47.501
Yep, they had a fire earlier in the day and so they supposedly or they had cut off, although I think they had actually reinstated Yucca Park, because we saw a bunch of people coming down when we got to the other side.

01:05:47.501 --> 01:05:53.684
But Isaac did go across the river because he was going to be my next pacer at Green Gate.

01:05:53.684 --> 01:06:03.288
You know that was the original plan and but going across the river was, was awesome, the water felt great.

01:06:03.288 --> 01:06:08.177
They let you either have a life preserver or not a life.

01:06:08.177 --> 01:06:09.588
I didn't go with the life preserver.

01:06:09.588 --> 01:06:18.853
I said, hey, you know it wasn't that deep, it wasn't that bad, uh, but uh, took a good deep, you know, dip in there, got my head all the way under the water.

01:06:18.853 --> 01:06:20.867
You know, just just to try to.

01:06:20.867 --> 01:06:21.969
You know, make sure that.

01:06:21.969 --> 01:06:27.139
Uh, you know, I got the whole experience and my whole body got the whole experience.

01:06:27.139 --> 01:06:35.378
And it was funny At one of the earlier aid stations before Rookie Chucky, we were listening to an aid station captain.

01:06:35.485 --> 01:06:36.771
He was talking to another runner.

01:06:36.771 --> 01:06:47.795
I was sitting there next to this guy and this guy was like you know he was talking, man, I've, you know he was like I haven't, I've been puking and you know, and just, you know, my stomach it's really bad.

01:06:47.795 --> 01:06:49.208
And he's talking to the aid station cabin.

01:06:49.208 --> 01:06:53.269
He says, uh, you know, I don't know if I can make it to Dan, it's just just, this is bad, you know.

01:06:53.269 --> 01:06:54.775
And he says, well, I'll tell you what he says.

01:06:54.775 --> 01:07:06.550
Rookie Chucky's coming in, I can get over there and you get in the water.

01:07:06.550 --> 01:07:11.246
Just dunk your entire self in that water really well, and you'll come out like you know, a new man, you'd be baptized and all your problems will go away.

01:07:11.246 --> 01:07:12.809
I was like, yeah, right, dude.

01:07:12.809 --> 01:07:17.045
But you know, hey, whatever, whatever, mind games work right.

01:07:17.065 --> 01:07:19.251
Yeah, whatever you need to get you down the road.

01:07:19.271 --> 01:07:34.469
Yeah, it was get you down the road, but, uh, we went up to, uh got, we went up to, uh got to got out of the guy out of the water and uh, yeah, that's when you realize all the chafing that, uh, that's happened during the race because everything gets washed off in the water.

01:07:34.469 --> 01:07:42.536
So, so, fortunately, they had some, some chafing stuff at the other side to help help, uh, repatch you up, you know, as you start to run again.

01:07:42.536 --> 01:07:44.311
Because that was a good place to put it.

01:07:44.545 --> 01:07:46.331
Clearly experience driven that one.

01:07:47.092 --> 01:07:52.916
Yeah, yeah, they definitely had the experience with the squirrels and nut butter over there.

01:07:52.916 --> 01:08:04.367
And we just started making our way up to the Green Gate aid station, which is about, I think, 1.8 miles from the river that section.

01:08:04.367 --> 01:08:06.235
I was, I guess, getting out of the water.

01:08:06.235 --> 01:08:22.577
I was kind of starting to feel a little tired, and it was probably what 3 in the morning, I think, at that point, and so I think the sleepy bug was starting to hit me a little bit and so I kind of just walked that whole section, which I should not have.

01:08:22.577 --> 01:08:26.849
I should have probably tried to run it a bit more Once we got up to the top.

01:08:26.929 --> 01:08:30.877
You know Isaac, you know told me he says, man, we need to get moving.

01:08:30.877 --> 01:08:37.730
You know you're back into the 29-hour you know kind of you know area now and so you need to get moving.

01:08:37.730 --> 01:08:51.146
And you know, that kind of motivated me to start running again and we just started clicking off miles, you know, as best we could.

01:08:51.146 --> 01:08:51.628
Uh, it was, you know we.

01:08:51.628 --> 01:08:52.833
We seem to be running with the same set of runners.

01:08:52.833 --> 01:08:54.300
We would pass them and they would pass us, and you know it was.

01:08:54.300 --> 01:09:06.407
It was kind of a nice little game of, you know, running each other down and doing that uh for for the next uh, whatever for the next whatever 14 miles or whatever it was, I guess that was.

01:09:07.268 --> 01:09:21.841
You know, I got into Auburn Lakes Trail it was like the third to last and Isaac was saying you know, hey, we need to get through this aid station quickly, let's not sit down here and do anything.

01:09:21.841 --> 01:09:28.011
And so I had a Coke and I had some pancakes, you know, and I scarfed those down.

01:09:28.011 --> 01:09:29.979
We didn't stay very long but I noticed my back was starting to tighten up.

01:09:29.979 --> 01:09:35.677
You know, I was like that doesn't feel very good, but maybe it'll be okay, I don't have much more.

01:09:35.677 --> 01:09:38.847
You know, it's only 15 miles left or whatever.

01:09:38.847 --> 01:09:41.671
And so I just got to make it 15 more miles and we're good to go.

01:09:41.671 --> 01:10:16.252
And then we just took off and ran that next section you know, that's another, I think five miles or so to the next aid station, which is the Quarry Road aid station, and that aid station has got some really, really steep, steep sections right at the end coming into that aid station, and we were with, actually, some other runners also who were behind me, and they, you know I was like, hey, you guys want to come around me, you know, because I'm running kind of slow here and they were like no, you're doing good, man, just keep going, they don't want to even come around me.

01:10:16.252 --> 01:10:20.470
There I was like, yeah, it must be, really your quads must be screaming.

01:10:20.470 --> 01:10:30.527
Yeah, I know mine are, so you know they were really screaming at that time and I think that's kind of like, I think, where my back started to really started to have problems right there.

01:10:30.987 --> 01:10:38.439
And we got into quarry rate aquari road aid station and, uh, it was a great aid station.

01:10:38.439 --> 01:10:42.233
They had some really great, uh, nice cookies there.

01:10:42.233 --> 01:10:43.676
What was it?

01:10:43.676 --> 01:10:45.538
Ginger snap cookies, homemade.

01:10:45.538 --> 01:10:51.051
I ate a bunch of those, really awesome, did stick around too long.

01:10:51.164 --> 01:10:53.713
They were trying to tell us, you know, hey, this is the climb up here.

01:10:53.713 --> 01:10:56.734
You've got another, you know, two-mile climb.

01:10:56.734 --> 01:11:16.578
So you know, and then you're going to get over that and then you'll be to cross the 49 highway there and over to the aid station, to Pointed Rocks, and we start climbing up this hill and pretty soon I'm just like over, like a sea.

01:11:16.578 --> 01:11:25.840
My back is just, you know, I'm basically just kind of like climbing and my face is I'm just using my hands to kind of keep myself up upright.

01:11:25.840 --> 01:11:29.059
You know, on the climb I'm climbing actually pretty well.

01:11:29.059 --> 01:11:30.083
I was actually keeping up.

01:11:30.083 --> 01:11:36.347
We were actually keeping up with a couple of other runners that were ahead of us, a couple of ladies that were running right ahead of us.

01:11:36.347 --> 01:11:41.286
So we were keeping up with them, but I just couldn't stand up straight.

01:11:41.286 --> 01:11:46.597
And Isaac, I asked Isaac, I said, man, I mean, am I really leaning bad?

01:11:46.597 --> 01:11:49.309
And he's like, yeah, so you've been.

01:11:49.309 --> 01:11:51.680
You said you've been leaning to the left a little bit.

01:11:51.680 --> 01:11:52.645
I was a little concerned.

01:11:52.645 --> 01:11:56.475
And then you started leaning to the right and now you're kind of just leaning forward.

01:11:56.475 --> 01:12:10.662
So you know, when I said, well, maybe you can see if you can, like, you know, you know kind of stretch me out, you know, and he picked me up, you know, had his kind of bear hug me from behind and try to see if he could straighten me up or whatever, and that helped a little bit.

01:12:11.143 --> 01:12:16.228
We started off, you know, trying to go up this, this hill again and finally, finally made it out.

01:12:16.228 --> 01:12:22.755
But I was, I was just you could tell it was going to be, it was going to be bad, it was.

01:12:22.755 --> 01:12:23.315
I got it.

01:12:23.315 --> 01:12:28.462
I got across highway 49 and they're like they were saying, hey, you guys got seven more miles to go.

01:12:28.462 --> 01:12:32.011
You know, we get across the highway there and I'm like, yeah, seven more miles.

01:12:32.011 --> 01:12:37.438
Well so, and uh, and I had told Isaac, uh, my next pacer was Rick.

01:12:37.438 --> 01:12:38.166
I told him.

01:12:38.166 --> 01:12:52.832
I said, hey, tell Rick to make sure he brings the massage gun to the next aid station because I want to see if he can massage my butt, actually, because I'm thinking maybe I could help in my back and see if I could resurrect my back.

01:12:52.832 --> 01:12:56.033
He texted Rick and told him to do that.

01:12:57.365 --> 01:13:04.953
We got across Highway 49, and there's a small uphill right there after you get past Highway 49 that you have to go through.

01:13:04.953 --> 01:13:09.654
It's a little bit technical and it was kind of a conga line right there.

01:13:09.654 --> 01:13:24.047
There was a bunch of runners trying to make it up there, people were trying to get past other people and it was a little bit difficult and I was just leaned over like a C trying to go up this hill and I felt silly.

01:13:24.047 --> 01:13:26.676
And I felt silly and I was like, yeah, this is, this is just.

01:13:26.676 --> 01:13:28.591
I can't believe this is happening right now.

01:13:28.591 --> 01:13:30.671
I can't believe I'm I'm having to deal with this.

01:13:30.671 --> 01:13:38.617
Finally got into pointed rocks aid station and I went over and laid down and Rick pulls out the massage gun and starts massaging my back.

01:13:38.617 --> 01:13:51.273
And here comes a photographer, I guess for Western States, and the guy is just like right there in front of me and he's just sitting there taking pictures and taking pictures, and he's like you know, I always like a good lean story.

01:13:51.273 --> 01:13:52.155
This is really great.

01:13:52.985 --> 01:13:53.951
This is going to be good.

01:13:53.951 --> 01:14:02.909
Yeah, I always like a good lean story and the guy was just sitting there like five, six minutes, you know, because I think we were in the aid station about 10 minutes.

01:14:03.470 --> 01:14:03.551
And.

01:14:03.631 --> 01:14:06.494
I was like, okay, these guys are probably setting me up for something.

01:14:06.494 --> 01:14:08.918
I don't know what's going on here, but I think they're setting me up for something.

01:14:08.918 --> 01:14:25.657
I tried to eat a bunch of bananas and just trying to wolf down some bananas to maybe some kind of potassium deficiency issue, because that sometimes helps with the leans, you know, but it really was just a muscle, you know, just exhaustion issue.

01:14:25.657 --> 01:14:32.819
I mean I guess all the downhills and uphills, maybe I was leaning too far forward or whatever was going on.

01:14:33.581 --> 01:14:39.092
Is that something you've run into before or was that totally new experience as part of the race there?

01:14:39.820 --> 01:14:43.832
I've never ran into where I've leaned over like a C, like forward.

01:14:43.832 --> 01:14:48.140
I have had issues with the lean, where I've leaned to the left a little bit in the races.

01:14:49.082 --> 01:14:53.632
I've had that and actually had talked to my coach about it.

01:14:53.632 --> 01:14:59.761
I wish I had talked to him earlier in my training about it.

01:14:59.761 --> 01:15:04.394
I wish I had talked to him earlier when in my training he probably could have found some stuff to probably help train me better on this and maybe prevent this.

01:15:04.394 --> 01:15:09.987
And I had actually tried to do something to prevent the left leaning.

01:15:09.987 --> 01:15:17.469
What I did is I decided to use my handheld on my right hand, so it would like have me move to the right.

01:15:17.469 --> 01:15:19.092
Yeah, add some weight.

01:15:19.092 --> 01:15:21.664
Yeah, add some weight to that side of my body.

01:15:21.664 --> 01:15:32.542
And I also had put like some, some tape, you know, like some rock tape, on my back, hoping that, you know, if I started to lean to the left, I would feel it and try to correct myself.

01:15:32.542 --> 01:15:37.064
You know, uh and uh, but that didn't really turned out to be.

01:15:37.064 --> 01:15:39.845
I started leaning forward, so it totally defeated everything.

01:15:39.886 --> 01:15:55.956
So I'm like, okay, well, yeah, so, so Rick and I, you know, we we got to left pointed rocks and, um, it was, uh, I think I was good for maybe, I don't know, maybe three quarters of a mile, and then it just slowly started.

01:15:55.956 --> 01:16:12.743
My back just just started doing again, I was just over in a sea again and uh, there is a little bit of downhills and some a little I wouldn't say technical, super technical sections, but there are some, you know, you've got to be able to step down and not fall on your face kind of sections.

01:16:12.743 --> 01:16:25.466
And we were just trying to make our way through that and, uh, rick was great, he, he just helped me, you know, kind of keep straight and and he also straightened out, straightened out my back, probably like 10 times.

01:16:25.466 --> 01:16:31.573
I just like you know we just kept doing that and hoping that would get me to go down the trail a little bit easier.

01:16:32.657 --> 01:16:35.125
And uh, did you have any poles that you could kind of push?

01:16:35.125 --> 01:16:36.148
No, they won't allow poles.

01:16:36.148 --> 01:16:38.233
There's no poles, oh, no poles.

01:16:38.479 --> 01:16:40.226
No poles are allowed on Western States.

01:16:40.226 --> 01:16:47.384
Well, unless you're like a, unless you're you know, like I think there was a blind runner that was out there they were allowed poles.

01:16:47.384 --> 01:16:48.127
Yeah, of course.

01:16:48.127 --> 01:16:50.707
But yeah, that would have been nice.

01:16:50.707 --> 01:16:52.623
I probably wouldn't have been lean if I had the poles.

01:16:54.306 --> 01:16:59.637
But, hey you wouldn't have been recognizable as the guy with the lean.

01:16:59.637 --> 01:17:11.606
Otherwise, no kidding, you're coming out of this with some excellent kudos, very recognizable as you enter the track there Red shorts guy leaning over.

01:17:11.606 --> 01:17:14.087
Yeah, exactly.

01:17:15.341 --> 01:17:29.534
But we finally made it down to no Hands Bridge and took some pictures down there and you know I was using the railings on no Hands Bridge to kind of stand up straight, you know, and try to go down there and down to the end of the bridge.

01:17:29.534 --> 01:17:35.788
And the photographers were waiting down there also and they said, yeah, we knew you were coming, we heard you were coming.

01:17:35.788 --> 01:17:37.588
So they were there.

01:17:37.588 --> 01:17:38.230
They were like, yeah, we knew they already called and we knew you were coming.

01:17:38.230 --> 01:17:38.487
We heard you were coming, man.

01:17:38.487 --> 01:17:38.557
So they were there.

01:17:39.201 --> 01:17:49.487
They were like, yeah, we knew they already called and told us you were coming man I was like, oh boy, oh boy, I hope I don't bomb this one, that would be terrible if I don't finish.

01:17:49.487 --> 01:17:57.310
But I just kept thinking to myself I mean, I can only go like maybe 30 or 40 steps.

01:17:57.310 --> 01:18:01.865
And then I just was breathing really, really hard and it had already gotten hot too again.

01:18:01.865 --> 01:18:02.648
You know cause it was.

01:18:02.648 --> 01:18:07.645
You know it was 10 o'clock or 10, whatever it was, and I had already ran out of water.

01:18:07.645 --> 01:18:12.882
You know, my handheld was empty and um so uh, and Rick kept.

01:18:12.882 --> 01:18:18.967
He kept comforting me and saying hey, we just got a little bit more, we just got a little bit more, we just got a little bit more, we're almost there, or whatever.

01:18:18.967 --> 01:18:19.649
Just keep going.

01:18:19.649 --> 01:18:21.010
I'm like man, we're almost there.

01:18:21.010 --> 01:18:22.430
I just want to get to the stupid cutoff.

01:18:22.430 --> 01:18:23.551
Where's the turn at?

01:18:23.551 --> 01:18:27.676
I'm thinking in my head you know where's the turn off to Roby Point?

01:18:27.676 --> 01:18:29.317
You know it's got to be.

01:18:29.317 --> 01:18:34.086
I know there's like a little uphill here.

01:18:35.628 --> 01:18:47.381
Anyway, I got to, got to that little uphill and and I was just exhausted, I was like man, I just and I told Rick, you know, I said, you know, hey, you know, I think I'm just gonna.

01:18:47.381 --> 01:18:49.847
I want to lay down here for for a few minutes.

01:18:49.847 --> 01:18:51.701
You know, I don't, I don't think I'm going to finish.

01:18:51.701 --> 01:18:55.426
I think we had 45 minutes left at that time to finish.

01:18:55.426 --> 01:18:57.149
And I told him, I said I don't.

01:18:57.149 --> 01:18:58.811
I said I don't think I can make it.

01:18:58.811 --> 01:18:59.993
I just don't think I can make it.

01:18:59.993 --> 01:19:01.234
I just keep running out of breath.

01:19:01.234 --> 01:19:07.224
I can only take 30 or 40 steps and I'm just running out of breath.

01:19:07.224 --> 01:19:08.386
And so I laid down there.

01:19:08.386 --> 01:19:12.972
There was an Asian couple that came by and they were trying to help me out.

01:19:12.972 --> 01:19:24.434
They even put their backpacks underneath my head and were trying to comfort me and and uh, and rick, uh, I guess must have taken a picture and sent it to the entire team.

01:19:24.554 --> 01:19:25.863
We saw that facebook message.

01:19:25.882 --> 01:19:29.815
We saw that yeah, again, I guess that kind of pissing.

01:19:29.815 --> 01:19:31.020
Why did they pissing people off?

01:19:31.020 --> 01:19:49.787
But I think that got some people ticked off and so, anyway, I hear the phone ring and Rick's like, oh, okay, yeah, so Charlie Fisher, I told you Charlie's a character and he's like, yeah, you need to get the F up man and move your ass, or something like that.

01:19:49.787 --> 01:19:50.828
You're not quitting.

01:19:50.828 --> 01:19:52.670
Okay, get up and move.

01:19:52.670 --> 01:20:10.898
And so I got up and moved and finally made it to the little far road up to Robie Point and I could hear my wife screaming, you know, and I could hear Charlie screaming at me and I was just slowly making it up to Robie Point.

01:20:10.898 --> 01:20:15.943
Fantastic, yeah, it was, just it was.

01:20:15.943 --> 01:20:28.734
And then when we got up to Robie Point, they pulled out the massage gun again, tried to massage my back again, and at that time I think I had I think it was like 35 minutes or 30 minutes or something like that.

01:20:29.161 --> 01:20:30.265
Yeah, to finish.

01:20:30.265 --> 01:20:38.765
And everybody was getting impatient, of course, and Charlie's like man, we got to go, just get the hell up and let's go.

01:20:38.765 --> 01:20:43.309
All right, let's go, man, we got to go.

01:20:43.309 --> 01:20:46.640
Man, we got to go, get off the ground, let's go, let's go now.

01:20:46.640 --> 01:20:51.010
And so we started going and it was a struggle.

01:20:51.010 --> 01:21:04.189
I had to just keep going and I'd stop every so often and straighten out my back and I wanted to definitely stay as legal as I possibly could, because you're not supposed to have any interference with any of your crew.

01:21:04.189 --> 01:21:05.704
They're not supposed to help you.

01:21:05.704 --> 01:21:07.166
I don't want to get disqualified.

01:21:07.166 --> 01:21:19.050
So I was really concerned that anybody was mewling for me or trying to help me out, although I think they were much more lenient, I think towards the end, I think they would have done anything to help a runner get past.

01:21:19.050 --> 01:21:20.323
You know, get, get a finish.

01:21:20.323 --> 01:21:21.346
I mean, it's like you're, you're not.

01:21:21.346 --> 01:21:25.601
You know you're not Jim Wainsley, you know you're not helping him across the finish line.

01:21:26.144 --> 01:21:27.368
So, it wasn't that big of a deal.

01:21:27.368 --> 01:21:54.742
So there's a pretty good uphill coming out of Robie point and then there's another uphill before you take a left and go across the bridge, and then it's just downhill to the, to the uh, to the high school, and so, uh, I made it down there and, uh, these guys were just cheering me on and just helping me out, keeping me straight there, cause I kept like walking to the right, you know, keep a straight line.

01:21:54.742 --> 01:21:57.984
And they were like, hey, go this way, man, quit, quit.

01:21:57.984 --> 01:22:00.887
You know, going to the right, you keep walking to the right.

01:22:00.887 --> 01:22:09.114
I'm like, I'm trying to stay straight and I was just walking crooked and made it down to the high school.

01:22:09.175 --> 01:22:11.556
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've done that, but only after beer.

01:22:11.556 --> 01:22:16.925
Usually there's a beer or two involved, maybe during a race.

01:22:16.944 --> 01:22:27.229
I mean, I know I was there cause I waited at the bottom at the track instead of going up to Robey point, since I was a little sore, and so they came down and then I saw them all.

01:22:27.229 --> 01:22:32.826
So I met them there and I think I was on the right side and I was just kind of like, had my arms out.

01:22:32.826 --> 01:22:37.386
I was like just stay, stay here, stay here, not touching you, but don't come over here.

01:22:37.386 --> 01:22:39.351
Yeah, yeah.

01:22:39.701 --> 01:22:41.046
Stay in this zone over there.

01:22:41.046 --> 01:22:48.774
I mean, what was that like coming around coming onto the high school track with the whole crew there and everybody else?

01:22:48.774 --> 01:22:54.132
I mean I can only imagine watching on the live stream.

01:22:54.132 --> 01:22:54.822
It was pretty.

01:22:54.822 --> 01:22:57.510
You know, it's a pretty wild experience.

01:22:57.510 --> 01:23:03.722
I mean, what was that like for you and Karen and and Karen you, as well as as part of the, as part of the team what is that like in person?

01:23:03.722 --> 01:23:03.984
Is it?

01:23:03.984 --> 01:23:08.052
Is it as amazing as it looks on online?

01:23:08.500 --> 01:23:09.440
It was just crazy.

01:23:09.440 --> 01:23:11.203
It was crazy Amazing.

01:23:11.203 --> 01:23:13.546
The crowd was just cheering for me.

01:23:13.546 --> 01:23:14.627
I mean, wow, it was just.

01:23:14.627 --> 01:23:16.451
Yeah, I couldn't believe.

01:23:16.451 --> 01:23:20.576
I mean they were just and I was just shaking my head, you know, going.

01:23:20.576 --> 01:23:24.030
I don't really want to have this kind of attention, but I just want to finish.

01:23:24.030 --> 01:23:27.509
But you know, hey, you know, I just it was just awesome.

01:23:27.509 --> 01:23:35.792
I mean I just people were screaming and yelling and just trying to get me around and, um, I think uh, karen you said AJW.

01:23:39.779 --> 01:23:41.625
He was like telling me hey, you got plenty of time, right as Chris enters the track.

01:23:41.706 --> 01:23:48.369
I've got a picture of AJW in this bright tropical shirt and he's following Chris in and he's just right alongside him.

01:23:48.369 --> 01:23:57.378
You got plenty of time, you're good, you got this, and I don't think Chris had any clue who it was and didn't have a clue, didn't?

01:23:57.399 --> 01:23:57.859
have a clue.

01:23:59.203 --> 01:24:02.171
I mean, yeah, everything that you think it is.

01:24:02.171 --> 01:24:09.221
If you, the experience of the track is exactly what you want and you almost want the golden hour, it's just so amazing.

01:24:09.221 --> 01:24:18.789
So like I didn't get my journey the way I wanted it, but I did get to do my lap on the track with with chris and the crew, so so I, that was epic.

01:24:18.789 --> 01:24:36.025
Um, you, we were, we were walking around the track and you know people just come running for across the field to like run with you and to cheer you on, and and there was times where we're going around the track and and you know, someone would just start a chant Chris, chris, chris.

01:24:36.025 --> 01:24:50.369
And you know everybody and you don't hear any of that on the live stream, but that's what happens and it's it's happens for like every runner coming in, the people just like go after that and especially with the, the lean.

01:24:50.390 --> 01:25:06.353
You know everybody remembered that story from last year with Ash Bartholomew coming through and a lean and not making it so um, even though he had chris had like 10 minutes, you know it gave people the vibes of being worried, like I know.

01:25:06.393 --> 01:25:16.421
I went back and watched the live stream and like yeah when they from when they first showed him to, you know, it took a break before they showed him for a little while and people are like where's red shorts guy?

01:25:16.421 --> 01:25:17.606
Like we want to know, like where's red shorts guy?

01:25:17.606 --> 01:25:18.596
You know, um, it was it for a little while and people were like where's red shorts guy?

01:25:18.596 --> 01:25:20.264
Like we want to know like where's red shorts guy?

01:25:20.305 --> 01:25:28.890
you know um, it was, it was a big deal and and it was the same feeling like, since I was waiting at the track, like when chris said that you know, we took a picture.

01:25:28.890 --> 01:25:36.484
Um, rick took a picture of him laying there on the ground, like I'm there on the messenger, I was like he needs 30 minutes to get down here.

01:25:36.484 --> 01:25:38.407
I was like, like, get him up, you know.

01:25:38.407 --> 01:25:41.952
Like you know, we're like we need to go, we need to get him down here now.

01:25:41.952 --> 01:25:45.664
Um, so, you know, and I, you know I was messaging to people.

01:25:46.326 --> 01:25:49.860
There was a group chat for people back home, you know, people like where's Chris?

01:25:49.860 --> 01:25:50.301
Where's Chris?

01:25:50.301 --> 01:25:54.006
I was like, well, he's supposed to be at mile 97, but been there for a really long time.

01:25:54.006 --> 01:25:57.492
So like everybody's trying to figure out where chris is.

01:25:57.492 --> 01:26:14.845
Um, so, you know, it's, it's, it's nerve-wracking and in that last hour, everybody is coming in, like as I sat down there at the track and it's just like 80 people finishing in that hour and they just keep coming in with their crews and and it's I.

01:26:14.845 --> 01:26:19.154
It's everything you see on that golden hour when you watch the live stream.

01:26:19.154 --> 01:26:21.770
It's just emotional.

01:26:21.770 --> 01:26:30.613
You see every type of runner, you see people that look like they just got up and decided to run and they're happy and they're finishing in the last hour and they look great.

01:26:30.613 --> 01:26:38.252
And then you see people that look half dead, and then you see people leaning, and then you see people, you see it all you see the older people.

01:26:38.168 --> 01:26:38.769
You see people, that, and then you see people.

01:26:38.769 --> 01:26:38.837
You see it all.

01:26:38.837 --> 01:26:38.944
You see the older people.

01:26:38.944 --> 01:26:40.729
You see people that look really young and fit.

01:26:40.729 --> 01:26:49.051
It's just all different body types and they're all just trying to get their buckle and finish in that last hour.

01:26:49.792 --> 01:26:50.613
Absolutely love it.

01:26:50.613 --> 01:26:52.407
And were you aware of any of this going on, Chris?

01:26:52.407 --> 01:26:55.149
Like how aware were you at this point of all of that?

01:26:55.640 --> 01:26:57.328
I wasn't aware of any of that, honestly.

01:26:57.328 --> 01:27:00.103
I mean I wasn't aware of any of that honestly.

01:27:00.103 --> 01:27:00.845
I mean I wasn't aware of any of them.

01:27:00.845 --> 01:27:02.310
What was going on with the stuff about the messenger stuff?

01:27:02.310 --> 01:27:04.483
I didn't know any of that until after the fact.

01:27:04.483 --> 01:27:08.992
And you know some people had had actually captured some of the live feed.

01:27:08.992 --> 01:27:16.542
Uh, you know comments of people you know that were watching at home and you know they were like uh, chris, go, you know somebody, get that guy a chair or whatever.

01:27:16.583 --> 01:27:18.065
You know there was like comments like that.

01:27:18.086 --> 01:27:22.332
I was like so it was pretty, it was pretty, pretty crazy.

01:27:22.332 --> 01:27:23.274
It's like wow.

01:27:23.274 --> 01:27:33.509
So, yeah, you don't realize that, you're just, I'm just thinking.

01:27:33.509 --> 01:27:38.402
You know, I just want to get around to the, to the finish line, and it seems like that finish line is a mile away when you get on the track, you looking at, oh, it's way on the other side.

01:27:38.402 --> 01:27:41.807
I got to get way over there and but you know, yeah, I did have plenty of time, but it seemed like to me it was.

01:27:41.807 --> 01:27:46.475
You know, I didn't, I wasn't sure, I still wasn't sure in my mind that I was going to finish.

01:27:46.475 --> 01:28:01.715
You know, although it was, I would still have that doubt, you know that, that I might not finish even with that amount of time that I had left yeah, I think you actually finished with what eight or nine minutes to spare about nine minutes so no, you got loads of time loads of time.

01:28:01.755 --> 01:28:07.266
Comparatively, yeah, comparatively eight or nine minutes over, uh, 30 hours.

01:28:07.266 --> 01:28:22.625
I mean at some time and I've, I've finished close I finished a race called the peak district 100 two years ago with 13 minutes to spare over 34 hours, and it just at some point I I was thinking about like, okay, if I'd have just sat at an aid station for just a shade longer, I might not have made that.

01:28:22.625 --> 01:28:29.300
So I don't know if you've kind of thought a long way out, if I didn't get up or if I took an extra five-minute nap or whatever.

01:28:29.300 --> 01:28:29.881
At some point.

01:28:29.881 --> 01:28:35.421
Get in with nine minutes to spare is pretty close, but still a great job.

01:28:36.100 --> 01:28:44.827
Yeah, what a fantastic experience to have with all those folks, all the crew, everybody around your last lap, around the high school.

01:28:44.827 --> 01:28:46.108
They're absolutely insane.

01:28:46.868 --> 01:28:48.329
Yeah, very cool yeah.

01:28:49.189 --> 01:28:51.332
Well, well done to the both of you.

01:28:51.332 --> 01:28:54.194
I've got a quick fire round real fast.

01:28:54.194 --> 01:28:56.335
We'll go, karen, with you first.

01:28:56.335 --> 01:29:05.640
I'm calling this kind of good bad and the unexpected right.

01:29:05.640 --> 01:29:08.405
So, and maybe you've answered some of these already, but best part of the Western States 100 experience for you.

01:29:08.426 --> 01:29:10.390
I mean probably some of the pre-race stuff.

01:29:10.390 --> 01:29:11.592
That was tons of fun.

01:29:11.592 --> 01:29:13.764
Meeting Sally McRae was super cool.

01:29:13.764 --> 01:29:19.939
I will also say that the golden hour was kind of cool to see super cool.

01:29:19.939 --> 01:29:21.802
I will also say that the golden hour was kind of cool to see, even though it wasn't well.

01:29:21.802 --> 01:29:31.944
I was participating but not in the way I intended, um, but that those are pretty epic moments for for me perfect, chris.

01:29:32.385 --> 01:29:38.295
What, uh, what best parts of your 100, western States 100 experience?

01:29:38.859 --> 01:29:48.774
Just the support from my crew and coming out there and just being a part of it and giving their all and just, you know, supporting me.

01:29:48.774 --> 01:29:50.403
I mean they just.

01:29:50.403 --> 01:29:55.654
I mean to me it's almost bigger than the finish itself.

01:29:55.654 --> 01:29:59.170
Honestly, these guys are just selfless.

01:29:59.170 --> 01:30:02.970
I mean, honestly, it was terrific having them out there and supporting me.

01:30:02.970 --> 01:30:04.305
Couldn't ask for anything more.

01:30:05.300 --> 01:30:06.344
All right, we'll go to the other side.

01:30:06.344 --> 01:30:07.027
Worst part.

01:30:07.027 --> 01:30:11.451
Worst part of the experience, Chris, for you, since you were up already.

01:30:12.140 --> 01:30:15.168
Well I would say, other than getting the lanes.

01:30:15.168 --> 01:30:21.327
I guess at the end I would say Duncan Canyon really was bad, but that's really.

01:30:21.327 --> 01:30:23.104
I'd probably say that was the worst part.

01:30:23.707 --> 01:30:27.810
Okay, karen, I'm gonna throw it over to you.

01:30:27.810 --> 01:30:30.509
I mean where do you land on this?

01:30:32.020 --> 01:30:34.484
Getting the bracelet cut off at Forest Hill.

01:30:34.484 --> 01:30:41.625
When it's real you walk up and it's shut down and you basically just have to get them to cut it off.

01:30:42.587 --> 01:31:03.171
Yeah yeah, awful feeling, I would imagine um unexpected challenges or surprises during the race, karen, anything for you, something you weren't expecting when you went in and it was like, oh, either positive, negative, unexpected, uh, probably just underestimating um the technical uh sections.

01:31:04.033 --> 01:31:13.631
Um, yeah, in training I felt like I, every time I trained on some rocky stuff I was like, well, I don't need that much of this and I probably just should have done way more of it.

01:31:13.631 --> 01:31:21.592
Like there's some power lines that I trained at in san antonio and austin and when was out there I was thinking they were not perfect training because they were too rocky.

01:31:21.592 --> 01:31:27.032
Now, if I could have done that, you know, several weekends, that would have been great.

01:31:28.119 --> 01:31:28.721
Very good, chris.

01:31:28.721 --> 01:31:29.323
How about you?

01:31:29.323 --> 01:31:35.322
Something unexpected, a challenge or a surprise, or not?

01:31:35.322 --> 01:31:37.824
I mean, maybe you did well and planned.

01:31:37.845 --> 01:31:53.583
Yeah, I don't think I had anything that I can think of that's, you know, other than, yeah, the surprise of being leaning, you know, at the end, I think the lean qualifies as an unexpected challenge and surprise yeah, unexpected.

01:31:53.644 --> 01:31:54.247
and surprise.

01:31:54.461 --> 01:31:55.605
Yes, that's definitely part of it.

01:31:56.159 --> 01:31:57.780
I'm actually just looking at the lean.

01:31:57.780 --> 01:31:58.622
Yeah, yes, that's definitely part of it.

01:31:58.622 --> 01:31:59.443
I'm actually just looking at the lean.

01:31:59.443 --> 01:32:00.923
And, folks, if you haven't seen this, go go look at the.

01:32:00.923 --> 01:32:05.926
You can follow Chris around the track on on any of the live stream stuff from from Western States.

01:32:05.926 --> 01:32:07.328
But just take a look at that lean.

01:32:07.328 --> 01:32:09.369
I am amazed.

01:32:09.369 --> 01:32:15.715
I don't know how long you had it that bad, but I'm amazed that you got through that final section.

01:32:15.854 --> 01:32:30.886
If, if, if that lean was what you'd had for some time, I mean that is a pretty serious lean and I was using my strangely enough, I had my light belt, you know, and I was using it kind of to push myself up.

01:32:30.886 --> 01:32:34.204
That was kind of my crutch, kind of tighten it straight.

01:32:34.204 --> 01:32:39.488
Yeah, that was what I was using to kind of keep myself, you know, from falling over on my face.

01:32:39.488 --> 01:32:42.014
I guess you could say Wow, yeah.

01:32:42.500 --> 01:32:51.555
Well, one other thing I wanted to ask you guys too is just really your perspective as back of the pack runners at such an elite international race as it is now.

01:32:51.555 --> 01:32:59.523
You know, how did you guys feel about your experience participating in that as sort of the quote unquote, everyday, everyday runners?

01:32:59.523 --> 01:33:04.881
Were there any unique challenges, I guess, or advantages maybe, to being at the back of the pack?

01:33:04.881 --> 01:33:07.811
And did the race organization you know was it?

01:33:07.811 --> 01:33:10.340
Was it catered to us as well as the elite folks?

01:33:10.340 --> 01:33:15.346
Did you feel like you were included in the overall feeling of the race?

01:33:16.028 --> 01:33:17.310
I thought it was geared to everybody.

01:33:17.310 --> 01:33:34.668
Honestly, I'll tell you my experience at the buckle ceremony when I got my buckle you know they have you get your buckle, the race director hands it to you and then you walk over there and then they've got the I guess they're the committee members or whatever and they all shake your hand.

01:33:34.668 --> 01:33:42.847
It's like a high school graduation, you know, and I got to shake all the committee people's hands and I actually saw Magda there.

01:33:43.108 --> 01:33:43.548
Oh yeah.

01:33:43.649 --> 01:33:47.011
Belay was there and she commented.

01:33:47.011 --> 01:33:48.694
She said I saw your finish.

01:33:48.753 --> 01:33:51.056
I'm telling you, man, that lean gets you every time.

01:33:52.960 --> 01:33:54.162
It's going to get you all of it.

01:33:54.162 --> 01:33:59.850
So, yeah, I mean, it was just, you know they're there to make it, make it, you know, a day for everybody.

01:33:59.850 --> 01:34:04.742
You know, like, like I say, and this might be the only chance you get to do this race You've got to.

01:34:04.742 --> 01:34:13.510
You know they want to make sure everybody does their best and has the best chance of finishing and I think that they, they just it's a great, great race.

01:34:14.712 --> 01:34:14.872
Yeah.

01:34:14.872 --> 01:34:23.836
Well, hopefully not the only time for Karen at least to get out there, and I think Karen's going to be back out there.

01:34:23.836 --> 01:34:33.409
I'm going to look on the positive side and say you've plenty of time to get more tickets and get back into that race and think of all the awesome experience you now have in order to complete it and just dominate next time you're in.

01:34:33.409 --> 01:34:35.240
I think you'll be well set.

01:34:36.163 --> 01:34:38.529
Several buckle, yeah, sub 24.

01:34:39.110 --> 01:34:40.132
That's right For sure.

01:34:40.132 --> 01:34:52.015
Now, one of the things we do like to do here is encourage guests to choose a song to add to the free Spotify Choose to Enjoy playlist something typically family friendly.

01:34:52.015 --> 01:34:55.690
Maybe it lifts you up, motivates you or just keeps you moving while you're out on the trail.

01:34:55.690 --> 01:35:00.363
Motivates you or just keeps you moving while you're out on the trail.

01:35:00.363 --> 01:35:03.751
Now I'd like to see if you guys chose a song and why it resonated with each of you.

01:35:03.751 --> 01:35:07.965
Karen, I think I know which one you picked, but do you want to tell folks out there?

01:35:08.445 --> 01:35:22.746
So, yeah, if you heard my podcast last time, I picked a movie themed song and I'm going the same this time, and I actually did have it on my earphones when I was at the race, so it's not like I didn't listen to it out there.

01:35:23.948 --> 01:35:48.908
I'm gonna go with let it go from frozen, because I still do need to let this go, and, um, yeah, you know and move on and uh, but I've used that song before when I've had a bad day or something, and you know it's a good one to sing in the shower or in the car when you're feeling a little low and you know just want to get through it, that is one for sure.

01:35:48.988 --> 01:35:49.550
Crank that.

01:35:49.550 --> 01:35:53.310
I mean not that I do this, obviously, but crank it up and just let it ride Right.

01:35:53.310 --> 01:35:58.661
I mean, why not?

01:35:58.661 --> 01:35:59.545
Yes, just put it out there, I love it.

01:35:59.545 --> 01:36:00.551
Yeah, very cool and very appropriate.

01:36:00.551 --> 01:36:02.260
Chris, I think we have a fairly appropriate one for you as well.

01:36:02.260 --> 01:36:04.003
Do you want to tell folks which?

01:36:04.466 --> 01:36:04.546
one.

01:36:04.546 --> 01:36:06.853
It was yes, yes, lean on me.

01:36:06.853 --> 01:36:09.902
Lean on me, bill with us Lean on me for sure.

01:36:12.426 --> 01:36:13.630
Absolutely yeah.

01:36:16.240 --> 01:36:16.801
It's appropriate.

01:36:16.801 --> 01:36:23.573
I had the crew to lean on and I guess I did a lot of leaning myself out there in the last seven miles or whatever.

01:36:24.054 --> 01:36:28.011
Absolutely, and it seems like both of you guys talked very highly of the crew.

01:36:28.011 --> 01:36:37.929
I mean, it seems like they had a huge impact on your race experience for the time you were out there, so maybe we should give them a shout out too.

01:36:38.199 --> 01:36:52.706
Yeah, so most definitely, and this crew kind of formed before Chris even really got in, like, basically, when I got my thing, I kind of like just kind of put it out there, I was like I can't pay for anyone to go, but who wants to go?

01:36:52.706 --> 01:36:56.282
And you know, we had these people who were like we want to go.

01:36:56.282 --> 01:37:02.525
So that's why we were already like on a chat group ready watching for Chris to get pulled.

01:37:02.525 --> 01:37:05.787
But yeah, so this is an awesome crew.

01:37:05.787 --> 01:37:07.849
The Wolfpack is an awesome crew.

01:37:07.849 --> 01:37:12.572
Wherever you go, we have great aid stations and everything like that and everybody's super supportive.

01:37:12.572 --> 01:37:20.195
But you know we had Charlie Fisher, isaac Fox, leanna Kelly, laura and Dan Guerrero.

01:37:20.195 --> 01:37:22.877
Oh gosh, where am I going with people?

01:37:22.877 --> 01:37:25.707
Rick Posada who else?

01:37:25.827 --> 01:37:28.863
And my wife, yes, your wife Kim.

01:37:28.863 --> 01:37:30.193
You should probably thank her.

01:37:31.061 --> 01:37:33.487
Yeah, thank her, kim Culpepper.

01:37:33.487 --> 01:37:34.399
That's probably a good idea, kim Culpepper.

01:37:35.380 --> 01:37:36.301
That's probably a good idea.

01:37:36.301 --> 01:37:48.471
And then Libby Jones from the Active Joe basically joined up with us for this because she was there for social media for me, but you know, she kind of became part of the group for the whole weekend.

01:37:48.471 --> 01:37:52.069
So we got to have a lot of fun for the whole time.

01:37:52.069 --> 01:37:57.574
But everybody oh, I didn't say Thomas, perkins and Amanda, how could I forget?

01:37:57.520 --> 01:37:57.640
them.

01:37:57.640 --> 01:37:58.524
Yes, yes, I can't say Thomas Perkins and Amanda.

01:37:58.470 --> 01:37:58.659
How could I?

01:37:58.604 --> 01:37:58.989
forget them.

01:37:58.989 --> 01:38:11.273
Yes, yes, I can't forget them, but you know it's a great group and they helped both of us and we had some people that were pacing Chris and some people pacing me, and the crew helped everybody.

01:38:11.273 --> 01:38:13.908
So can't do it without them.

01:38:14.300 --> 01:38:22.914
Yeah, absolutely, crew is totally essential and it seems like they had a really big effect on your races.

01:38:22.975 --> 01:38:29.867
Yeah, Now I feel like I need to check the name list and make sure I didn't have a brain fart, but I think I got everybody.

01:38:30.199 --> 01:38:34.471
Well, I'll let you check that for a moment as we go ahead and wrap up the chat.

01:38:34.471 --> 01:38:45.971
I do want to extend my heartfelt thanks to both Chris and Karen for sharing their incredible experiences and insights from the Western States 100 this year.

01:38:45.971 --> 01:39:01.703
Karen, you're you're candid and honest account of the race, including the challenges that led you not to be able to finish, and Chris, your detailed narrative of the race and ultimately getting across that finish line, both of them pretty, pretty awesomely inspiring.

01:39:01.703 --> 01:39:19.814
You guys have definitely highlighted the determination and perseverance that I think really defines us as back of the pack runners, and your stories have not only illustrated the highs and lows of Western states, but also offered a ton of invaluable lessons for listeners out there.

01:39:19.814 --> 01:39:35.404
If you want to learn more about the race and how to qualify, you can go to WSERorg and Karen I think the sponsorship opportunity is now open again, is it not for the Active Joe?

01:39:35.425 --> 01:39:35.585
Yeah, yes.

01:39:35.585 --> 01:39:41.135
So if you're looking for another way in, definitely go check out the Active Joe's website.

01:39:41.135 --> 01:39:50.609
She has a link for the Western States sponsorship and there's an application process on there, and you can also listen to that last podcast to get more details.

01:39:50.609 --> 01:39:52.653
But might as well get an extra shot.

01:39:52.653 --> 01:39:57.731
You never know if you might be her choice for the next year.

01:39:57.752 --> 01:40:03.220
You never know if you might be her choice for the next year Exactly.

01:40:03.220 --> 01:40:10.987
And folks, karen did go into some really good detail about how you might position yourself better to get your shot when you put the name in the hat and, while you're out there, maybe sign up for a race with the Active Joe.

01:40:10.987 --> 01:40:12.131
You just never know.

01:40:12.640 --> 01:40:26.926
Yeah, dinosaur Valley is now a qualifier in the 100K distance and you can actually earn that in the 100 miler as well because the unique way their course is set up, but it's really one of the most generous cutoffs for 100k qualifier.

01:40:26.926 --> 01:40:37.371
Well, I'm not going to say the course is like easy, easy, easy, but the time allowed makes it doable for a lot of people.

01:40:37.371 --> 01:40:47.194
So if you wanted to compare it to like Bandera, bandera has a 17 hour cutoff, dinosaur Valley has a 22 hour cutoff and Bandera is probably harder.

01:40:48.779 --> 01:40:50.447
So that was a tough course.

01:40:50.887 --> 01:40:52.935
Yeah, Look up the Dinosaur Valley race.

01:40:52.935 --> 01:40:57.988
It's still challenging but overall, with that time you should be able to get through it.

01:40:58.390 --> 01:40:59.912
Fantastic, fantastic, yes, bandera.

01:40:59.912 --> 01:41:13.715
My toenails haven't recovered from kicking rocks at Bandera yet, but I will be up at Dinosaur Valley Endurance doing the 100 up there, 100 miler up there, and hopefully getting my own ticket in the process later this year.

01:41:13.715 --> 01:41:23.911
I'm going to include all of those links as many as I can on the show notes, so scroll down or do whatever you do to go find those when you need to.

01:41:23.911 --> 01:41:36.055
While you're out on the internet checking all that out, don't forget to subscribe to this show as well, get notified each time a new episode comes out and, of course, follow, share and review.

01:41:36.055 --> 01:41:38.283
That would be very much appreciated.

01:41:43.439 --> 01:41:54.472
Doing any of those things really helps promote the podcast, which in turn gets the word out and increases the chances of other runners finding the information that awesome guests like Chris and Karen have given up their time to come and share with us.

01:41:54.472 --> 01:42:07.404
You can find us on Instagram and Facebook over at TuesdayEndurecom, so be sure to head over to any of those spots, check us out, send a message, say hello or suggest a topic if you have a moment.

01:42:07.404 --> 01:42:17.523
I definitely like getting all those interactions, but until then, run long, run strong and go run some races to get your own Western States lottery tickets.

01:42:17.523 --> 01:42:20.430
While you're doing that, keep choosing to enjoy.

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