Run with the Beavers

This past weekend was the Run with the Beavers 10-mile trail race put on by rival/good guy Bob Jackman. The race was going to be a major test of both my endurance and ankle, so I set the mood dial to cautious optimism. I had two goals for the race: (1) Run even splits on the two-lap course, and (2) Place second (behind Greg Hammett, who would be untouchable, as usual). The first goal would require some patience on the first lap, but I thought I could pull it off. The second goal would be tougher, with both Muddy and Jonny in great shape and others no doubt gunning for strong races here as well. I was also looking forward to what I expected would be a close team competition. Jonny drops his allegiance to WTAC for this race every year, joining his brother and Boj to create the formidable and creatively named "Hammboj." WTAC would thus be running shorthanded but still with a strong, trail-hardy squad. To build camaraderie, Seth and Muddy crammed into my clown car for the ride up. We sang along to mix tapes, did each other's hair, and talked about all of the cute girls in school. We emerged an hour later full of team spirit and ready to go.

Note: By now, you have probably read several other race reports, so I'll get right to the action as I saw it.

The race course starts up a hill on a dirt road before jumping into the first single-track section. It's cruel to start a race on a hill, but that's the kind of person Bob Jackman is. As we took off, I found a spot next to Muddy, and we cruised up the hill side by side, entering the woods behind six other guys. I noticed that Greg already had a sizable lead and that no one had gone with him. The rest of us would be competing for second. The single track section is rocky in places and difficult to navigate when running close behind others. The guy directly in front of me had a couple of near ankle sprains. I found myself judging his trail running skills, but that seemed bad for my karma, so I scooted by after a mile and caught up with the next guy in line. Apparently, my judginess was too offensive to the trail gods, and as punishment they made me step awkwardly on a rock and twist my bad ankle (despite the industrial strength brace I was wearing). I involuntarily let out a primeval scream of pain and frustration. Without the brace, this would have been the end of my race, and probably the end of all running for the rest of the summer. With the brace, it hurt a ton, but it wasn't a knock-out blow. I limped along, letting Muddy go by on a treacherous downhill while I waited for my foot to numb itself into submission. It finally started to feel better after another mile, but just as I allowed myself to relax, I did it again! Can I please get a new foot? This one is defective. I made a promise to myself that if I had another ankle roll, I would call it quits and preserve myself. I couldn't risk ruining the rest of the year just for this one race. I was only a quarter of the way through and so much had already happened. What misadventures still awaited me?

After the 2.5-mile water stop, things started to shake up. Muddy and I moved by a guy or two, eventually landing on Jonny's shoulder. Jonny had been leading our group for the entire race to this point, but Steve Brightman edged ahead of him up the dirt road before entering the next single track section. In order meet my "even split" goal, my race plan had been to stay behind Muddy and Jonny for the entire first half, no matter how strong I was feeling or what other moves had been made. This meant letting Brightman go and hoping he'd eventually come back. I muttered to Jonny something about being patient and that there was a lot of racing left, but the advice was as much for myself as it was for him. Jonny, Muddy, and I ran together through the next single track and up the steep hill. This was great, as Jonny acted as our personal tour guide, warning about each section of the hill as it approached, while Muddy kept an eye out for loose beavers. As we neared the end of the first lap, I gobbled up the GU that Muddy had so generously given me before the race. This was the first time I'd ever taken one during a race, and it was actually pretty difficult to do. Apparently, GU + dry mouth = Gorilla Glue. Good to know in case I ever break a piece of pottery while on a run. As a mouth breather, however, I was fighting a losing battle trying to get air through the product of the complex chemical reaction described above. The water stop at the halfway point couldn't have come soon enough. I took a swig of water that broke up most of the GU glob in my mouth. I'd have to wait until 7.5 miles to get the rest.

That is not a smile. It the face of someone trying to flex every single muscle fiber in his body.  I think I held that footstrike for 20 seconds just to make sure Scott got one with the quad engaged (a.k.a. a "Jackman").
(Photo: Scott Mason)

We started the second half as a group, and while I was feeling content to hang where I was, I also didn't want to wait too long to make a move since I wasn't sure I'd be able to hold off Jonny and Muddy on the technical section before the end of the race. I decided to ease ahead before we entered the single track and then put in a small surge to catch up to Brightman. Again, I had to make a decision whether to sit behind him and risk letting the other guys catch up or to blow by and hope he could act as a buffer. I waited a few minutes but took the first opportunity to go once the trail opened up. It was really enjoyable to have the woods to myself for awhile. I focused on keeping my feet light on the trail and putting as much distance as possible between me and Brightman.

At the 7.5-mile mark, I grabbed another water and got some encouragement(?) from the volunteers. "Nice job. You're in second place...but really far behind the other guy." Thanks.

I tried to open up my stride on the dirt road to get some more breathing room on whoever was behind me. I figured it was still Brightman, but I then I heard voices. That sounds creepy in retrospect. What I'm saying is that people were behind me, and they were talking, which likely meant it was Jonny and Muddy. Shoot, they were moving up.

I got a little surge of adrenaline and took to the next single track section with a renewed vigor. My legs were tired but I wanted to put this race away now rather than letting it come down to a kick. All was going according to plan until just before the big hill when pop, pop went my calves. Calf cramps! Calf cramps? Calf cramps! I have never in my life had a calf cramp while running, let alone two of them, and I had no idea what to do. I thought I remembered seeing someone once stretch their calves out after getting a cramp, so I quickly pulled over to a big tree and stretched them against the trunk. It felt better, so I gingerly accelerated up the hill...when it happened again! This time, I used the incline of the hill to stretch them out as I tried to run up it. But every time I pushed off my toes, they'd cramp again. I tried running crow-footed, then pigeon-toed, then every other kind of bird gait I could think of. Nothing worked. I started to panic. A disastrous scenario played out in my mind in which I was forced to walk the entire final mile while the whole field passed me. How embarrassing that would be. I shook the thought from my head. I looked back but didn't see anyone yet. OK, this thing's not over yet, but I had to find a way to run without my calves cramping. Since the toe-off seemed to be source of the problem, I just had to avoid doing that. I started to run by pushing off the balls of my feet and keeping my toes out of the anatomical equation. This seemed to work. I got over the steepest section of the hill and found I was able to run normally again. But as soon as I hit the next rise, the cramps returned. I stretched once more against a tree, while two runners on their first lap looked on in confusion. I asked one of them if he'd carry me the rest of the way. He laughed. I was serious. I went back to the ball-of-foot method, and this got me through the remainder of the hills. The downhills weren't a problem, and I recklessly tried to get back some of the time I'd lost, ankle sprains be damned. The trail finally spat me out at the entrance to the finishing field, which has a deceptive little rise to it. With that rise came the darn cramps again. I awkwardly circled the field, a big grimace on my face, and stumbled through the finish line, never so glad to be done with a race. I turned around to see Muddy and Jonny very close behind. Another hill, and I might have been toast.

Thus ended one of the most eventful races of my life. I have no idea what caused the cramps. I was well hydrated and electrolyted, so I'm at a bit of a loss as to the cause. One obvious reason could be that the fitness just wasn't quite there, and my body was rejecting what I was putting it through. A more interesting but less likely theory is that the long socks I wore in the race (which had an upper edge that wrapped mid-way up my calf) put an unusual pressure on the area, which somehow triggered the cramps. Or was it something else entirely? Trail demons, perhaps?

Well, aside from the cramps and ankle sprains, I felt quite good out there, running very close to even splits (33:50, 34:15), but I still left the race very disappointed with the final mile. On the flip side, it was awesome to see Seth come in with a strong finish and then count off the minutes before Boj finished to see if WTAC would pull out the victory. We did and were rewarded handsomely.

All in all, it was a fun experience, and I look forward to a less dramatic version of this race next year. Many thanks to Bob Jackman and crew for putting on a fabulous event.