2009 Green Rock 40-mile "Fun Run" with St. Louis Ultrarunner's Group (S.L.U.G.'s)

The 6am start met the runners with pitch black darkness in the rural area of the Fox Creek Trail Head. Headlamps or other lighting were necessary for the first 45 minutes or so. While the day's high temperature was projected to be 40, the temperature at 6am was well below freezing - I'm guessing around 20 degrees - BRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!

I was appropriately dressed, but my thin running gloves don't work well unless you're moving, so the first mile or two really hurt my fingers due to the cold. Once I was "warmed up" it was perfect.

I covered the first 5 miles with fellow SLUG's Greg Murdick & Tommy Doias. Not only are Greg & Tommy nice guys and fun to run with, they are EXCELLENT runners. In their first respective 100 mile attempts about 4 weeks ago at Ozark Trail 100 both Tommy and Greg finished! More than you can say for me at OT100! Tommy cracked the top 10 with a stellar 25:39 and Greg ran a highly respectable 30:58. The finish rate that day was only 44% - amazing job Tommy & Greg!

About 5 miles in Greg & Tommy took a walk break to chat with Jerry Frost, a SLUG legend. I was feeling good, so I decided to keep on running and "flew solo" until I reached Rockwoods for the 1st turnaround at the 10-mile mark.

SLUG President, Lee Hess, with the help of a couple of other SLUG's had a full on aid-station brewing! They had a camp stove and were whipping up pancakes & soup - YUM. I didn't stay too long because my friends Wendie, Jen & Adam had come to Rockwoods to meet me and run the 10 miles back to Fox Creek Trail Head so they could get some miles & fun in on the day. The course is pretty difficult and Jen & Adam took a modest pace, so Wendie and I went out ahead. I broke a pretty big lead over Wendie because I was feeling pretty good and wanted to keep my time down so I could meet up with Lauren later for plans we had in the afternoon. NOT good to be late for that.

I made another turn at Fox Creek road to start my 2nd out-and-back. About a mile before I hit the turnaround - there was my good buddy Travis Liles coming in the opposite direction! I convinced Travis to double back so he could run the entire length of my 3rd leg back to Rockwoods. What a guy! Of course, he made me pay for it half way through the leg: on a flatter section half way across the 10-mile leg Travis started throwing down 7 minute miles. He's a madman! I was 25 miles in at that point and that put a pretty good whoopin' on me. On top of his voracious pace, he was able to TALK the whole time, like it was easy! OUCH, is all I can say. It was all I could to hang on for dear life.

As we got within about 2 or 3 miles of my last turn around for mile 30, I was pretty sure I WASN'T going to run the last leg. I felt destroyed, sore, tired - you know, the usual ultra "fun". But, my last turn around brought a great surprise - LAUREN SHOWED UP TO CHEER ME ON!!! Thanks honey that was a MUCH needed boost. Plus, crafty veteran & SLUG President Lee Hess SHAMED me in to continuing. When I mentioned I didn't think I could cover the last 10, he said "You can't do that in front of your WIFE". You're right, Lee, YOU'RE RIGHT!

So I sucked it up and carried on, knowing full well Travis was going to throw down on this 10 miles and there wasn't a snow ball's chance in hell I was going to be able to keep up with him because he as pushing hard since he was running 22 miles instead of forty. I ran as much as I could, but there are some hills on Green Rock I just can't run - not even when I'm fresh, much less possible after 30+ miles. Travis took off like a shot and was long gone within a mile.

I have to say, it was a TOUGH 10 miles, but I just kept plugging along running as much as I could and walking when I had to. I never stopped, so that was a positive. As you approach the last couple of miles heading back towards Fox Creek you can begin to hear Interstate 44 traffic - YES! I was going to make it! I ran nearly 100% of the last 2 miles at a pretty hard clip, save for a couple of hills I had to march up. When I finally rolled in to Fox Creek I had completed the run in 8hrs 42mins. Sounds slow, but as I said: this one is a MONSTER - so I was totally happy with it.

Travis really had thrown down a serious 10 mile split to finish his run, well under 2 hours which is smokin' on Green Rock. Tommy Doias came in only 5 or 10 minutes behind me and was looking good.

I can't thank Lee Hess & fellow SLUG's who supported us today enough. The aid (which usually isn't included in a "fun run") was tremendous. Lee met us at every single turn around and even dropped extra water for refills half way across the course. What a guy!

Thanks Adam, Wendie & Jen for coming out to support me. It made a big difference. I 'guess' I should thank Travis too, but he did kick my ass on the 1st leg we ran together, ANIMAL. But that probably saved me a couple of minutes or more, so although it hurt, it was worth it - thanks buddy!

Thanks especially to Lauren, my best & most favorite crew member. She always supports me in this crazy stuff, which I couldn’t appreciate more than I do    :D

Fun run indeed and I'm looking forward to more adventures with the SLUG's.

 

P.S. I was on the phone with Lee on my way home from the run and he thinks I might have set a new SLUG's record for GR 40! He is going to check to history to be sure. It would be my first record ever! Since it's not a race, but a fun run, it's not really a "record" I guess, but I'll take it just the same.