Just the usual ride

I think every mountain biker has their "usual:" that one route they've ridden considerably more times than any other route. It may actually be their very favorite trail; more likely, it's the best option closest to home. But either way, it's a place to memorize the tiniest details — the ruts and curves, the line through the rock garden, where to let off the brakes and really let 'er rip. And it's a place to be consistently surprised by the bigger picture — a mountain range of clouds hovering over the ocean or red sunlight cast across the hillside. Most riders' regular routes have boring yet endearing names like "Tin Cup" and "The Goose." Mine is called Steven's Creek Loop.

I've ridden it so many times and taken so many pictures of the same vistas. And of course they always look the same because this is coastal California and I'm fairly certain I haven't witnessed a significant change in the landscape in the 11 months I've lived here. But truthfully, I know these hills do change because I'm here often enough to notice the subtle differences. In March the skies were gray and wet; in April and May the hills were brilliantly green. June's heat added hints of gray to the greens. July gave way to the golden age of August, when the sky was so incandescently blue that it almost burned. In October some of the trees shed their withered leaves; those that stayed turned an undaunted shade of Army green. Now the winter grass is brown and brittle. But in the low evening light, the delicate colors come to life.

I set out almost defiantly this afternoon because Wednesday is becoming a good day to go for a mountain bike ride. But truthfully, I wasn't too stoked on riding today because my arm hurt — not the injured kind of hurt, just a bruised and battered hurt. So there was no risk of damage, just irritation. I pulled on my big elbow pad even though I dislike it because it's so stiff that it essentially immobilizes my arm. Right now, a minimal range of motion is a good thing. Still, every bump in the trail felt like a bratty child repeatedly slapping a sensitive bruise just to get a rise out of me. I reached the top of the steep hill where I crashed last August and thought, "I really don't want to descend any more dirt." So I turned away from the usual and mixed it up with an out-and-back. I was happy to be pedaling uphill again.

One of my favorite things about my usual is the fact it's so quiet here. Even after dozens of rides, I still marvel at the fact I can pedal away from my apartment at the edge of a crowded valley and ascend so quickly into the idyllic tranquillity of these hills. The silence here can be almost absolute when I'm not moving; and when I am moving, I can listen to all the sounds mountain bikers love — the purr of my freewheel, crackling gravel, and a gentle percussion of wind. I usually see more deer and osprey than people, and in the winter I often don't see any people. It's come to a point of solitude and familiarity where I often talk to the deer as I pass, like chatting with neighbors. Every once in a while I bump into the more reclusive residents, the bobcats and coyotes.

"Hey, Coyote, how's it going?" The coyotes rarely even bother to feign interest. This one was especially shy. I got off my bike to subtly stalk him and see if I could capture a better photo. Alas, coyotes are more wily than I am, and he knew exactly what I was trying to do after I snuck around a tangle of bushes for a clearer view. He raised his ears and I could imagine him rolling his eyes at me as he stood up and bounded away.

And maybe I followed him up the hillside, because sometimes it's just fun to follow the trail of a coyote.

The sun began to set as I began the long but mostly smooth descent toward home. I noticed a thin film of frost had formed on the road, which was actually kind of exciting because it meant the temperature had dropped below freezing — and this was something new. Of course, it also meant I was woefully underdressed for the next six miles, screaming down pavement at thirty miles per hour.

Happily, I brought my good bike light this time.

Which was perfect for really hammering the frigid but exhilarating descent into the crowded but beautifully lit valley. A giddy grin froze on my face as my fingers and toes went numb. It's just the usual ride, and yet I love it, every time. 

Creative running

My minor maladies often come in bunches, usually convincing me that they're somehow related. Just about the time the swelling on my elbow finally diminished, I came down with a wretched case of likely food poisoning. I spent a long evening and night clutching the toilet and wondering if I had some kind of horrific wound infection from the superficial cuts on my scar. It is humorous what my mind can conjure up when I'm coping with a downturn in my health. By the fourth purging session, I felt extremely dizzy. I laid down on the cold floor and obsessed about flesh-eating bacteria and probable paralysis in my right arm. Honestly, I can be such a hypochondriac. Luckily I know this and keep these delusions to myself until my health starts trending upward again.

Still, arm pain and food poisoning sufficiently punctured my motivation and led to a rather deflated weekend and start of the week. I had big plans to finally hammer out a kind of "deadline schedule" for my 2012 project goals (I am discovering that my journalism background has essentially trained me to only work well under deadline pressure.) But nausea prevented consumption of breakfast and coffee, which led to more dizziness (and sleepiness) and out-of-focus staring at a blank document on my laptop screen. I finally decided my day was shot and I might as well just try to stuff down some simple carbohydrates and go for a run.

This is also the time when "training nerves" start to get under my skin. It's just a little more than four weeks until the Susitna 100. Conventional wisdom tells me that the next two weeks are crucial for hammering out the kinks in my fitness, putting in a couple more endurance-boosting long days outside, and pounding a few more miles on my soft feet. Once it's time to taper I actually feel relieved, because there's really nothing more I can do so I might as well return to my regular happy routine. But for the third and fourth weeks before a big event, I tend to experience low levels of panic that I'm completely unprepared and I need to get my butt in gear.

I didn't want to let an arm boo-boo and a tummy ache completely derail the whole week, but I knew overdoing anything wasn't going to help matters either. I settled for ninety minutes at an easy pace, and of course felt lousy the entire time. It is humorous that I try so hard, when deep down I know that these little training efforts aren't really what will give me the boost I need to finish the Susitna 100. I know that any success I might experience is going to be a triumph of my imagination rather than fitness. I already have the physical ability to drag a heavy sled a hundred miles over soft snow while wearing snowshoes. I nearly did exactly that just three weeks ago, and it wasn't really that hard. Of course doing even the same thing in one long effort is a completely different matter. (It always amuses me when people try to impress the difficulty of a 100-mile trail run by exclaiming, "It's like running four marathons!" Because, really, if it were as easy as running four marathons, there would be a lot more people running fourteen-hour hundies.) Still, it doesn't have to be impossible, either. If I imagine piecing together three thirty-mile days in Alaska, the Susitna 100 suddenly seems imminently more doable. And if I continue to imagine it as doable, it is.

One of my favorite aspects about winter ultras is the fact that even if I wanted to, there's no way I could train for them with any sort of scientific precision. There are too many variables, too many unknowns. My default setting is essentially "unprepared" no matter how well my training went before the race. I have to activate my imagination, think my way through problems, and adapt to unexpected and continuous changes in myself and the environment. It is, in its own way, a creative endeavor, just like writing. Creative running.

Still, physical fitness is the most useful tool in this creative process. And it is crunch time. I guess the best I can do is all I can do. I hope this bunch of minor maladies doesn't come in threes.

Reliable klutz

Beat and Liehann, trying not to look cold because it was about 40 degrees, drizzling and windy at the ridge.

After a mountain bike crash last August left a quarter-sized crater in my elbow, I started demoing different elbow pads. After all, it took a full painful month of wet-dry bandaging to extract all (or at least most) of the gravel from that thing, and I really didn't want to have to go through that again. I briefly tried a roller blade pad — stiff and inflexible — and moved onto mountain bike armor — hot and uncomfortable. Just before a 25-hour bike race in November, I discovered lightweight pads for basketball players — basically a thin piece of foam on a sleeve. It seemed better than nothing, so I wore them a few times, but it didn't take long before I went back to arms au naturel.

Just as the pain of dragging a sled a hundred miles through frozen Alaska fades all to quickly from memory, I had conveniently forgotten all the ways in which I was kinda miserable for most of the month of August. Laying in bed with my arm propped above my head, unable to sleep ... jogging slowly with my hand in a sling ... not biking at all. All of these memories are still fairly fresh. They should be reminders of why I should wear body armor and maybe just not go outside at all, but memory is a funny thing. It manages to gloss over weeks of teeth-clenching soreness and yet acutely remembers a single moment of getting back on a bike after six weeks off, and how incredibly liberating that felt. Padded arm sleeves, on the other hand, do not feel similarly liberating.

Good thing my friend Martina remembers that I'm a klutz. Before we set out for our planned 18-mile run on Saturday, she pointed to my scar, which was covered with a blood blister I incurred after I smacked my elbow on a bathroom drawer a week ago. "Are you still wearing elbow pads?" she asked. "Uh, yeah," I said, and pulled them on for the first time since November.

It was a hot day for January, nearly 70 degrees, and that's before we hit the oven of Rogue Valley. I rolled the sleeves over the pads but didn't take them off, although I really wanted to, and this is perhaps the first thing that went through my mind at mile 9.5, when, while running uphill along a narrow piece of singletrack cut into a steep slope, I caught my foot on a rock and started going down. My face was headed toward a veritable abyss and all I could think was "good thing I'm wearing elbow pads." Instinct directed me to grasp for the trail before I tumbled down the mountain. My right elbow smashed directly into the rock, scraping along the rough surface as my body slid a couple of inches horizontally down the sideslope.

I pulled myself up quickly and continued running, too filled with klutz's remorse to even stop and assess my pain, which was relatively immense. Martina caught up to me about the time the adrenaline wore off. I couldn't really muster more than a staggering shuffle anymore, so I had to admit I had clumsily tripped and landed directly on my bad elbow. It hurt a lot more than I thought it should. I noticed blood dripping beneath my sleeve. I pulled the pad off and sure enough, my scar looked like rotten hamburger — a mess of torn gray tissue and blood. The joint itself was cut and swollen, and turning a pale shade of purple. "Well," I said with a resigned sort of gratitude, "it could be worse. There's no gravel in there. At least I won't have to go to the hospital for a scrubbing this time."

The wound continued to throb with pain as we tried to catch up to Beat and Harry, who were a ways ahead of us. Beat finally came back down to see what was wrong, and agreed to continue downhill and get our car at home while Martina and I climbed to Black Mountain and walked a shorter route to the road. I was angry with myself. All of those easily forgotten bad memories about August trickled back into my consciousness, and I wondered how much I had set myself back. Would I not be able to ride a bike for a while? Would I have to run with my arm in a sling? Would it hurt too much to run at all? What exactly happens when you rip up scar tissue? Does it ever heal?

For most of Saturday, I was genuinely worried that I had singlehandedly undone five months of careful healing in one clumsy blow. Luckily, it does seem to just be a simple arm bashing rather than a deep wound. The swelling went down and I was feeling better this morning, so I decided to pop a few Advil and join Beat and his friend Liehann for the first paved miles of a long mountain bike ride we had been planning. Even with the full-squish bike on pavement, every tiny jolt caused enough pain that I rode most of the miles slowly with my right arm dangling. I have enough diagnosed nerve damage from the original injury that I'm not exactly sure how the healing will progress this time around. I admit not even the slightest hint of a scab has formed. The new wound isn't deep but it is still bleeding. Still, I remain optimistic that it's just a small setback, hardly worth mentioning, really. Except for this blog post ... because it's kind of a funny story, don't you think?

Afternoon spin class

Back in late 2004, I had twenty-five extra pounds I wanted to lose and not a lot of enthusiasm for my bicycles (I know, I know. Life was very different for me back then.) I was also an extremely dedicated non-runner. A co-worker listened to my woes and invited me to join her for lunchtime spin class at the Apple Fitness in Idaho Falls. "Her class is hella-hard," she said of the noon class's instructor (this is circa-2004 when people still said 'hella.') "But for seventy minutes a session it will get you in the best shape of your life, I promise."

The instructor was drill sergeant. Her classes were filled with creepy death-metal-electronica fusion music alongside the Gwen Stefani. She screamed in our faces and turned up the resistance knobs repeatedly without asking us if this was okay, and then nodded in stern approval as our knees made horrible crunching noises and our faces locked in a twisted grimace. It was so not my style. But my co-worker was right. Afternoon spin class set me on a road to physical fitness that I haven't turned back from since.

I haven't belonged to a proper gym in years, but that doesn't stop me from occasionally returning to afternoon spin class. These days, I pull out the road bike, tune into motivating pop music like The Naked and Famous, and set on a steady beat toward Monte Bello Road. After a 3.5-mile warm-up, I charge full-bore into the climb as my heart rate shoots to 180. I have five miles to ascend to 2,500 feet. I hit the steep pitches hard, relax on the short descents, and try to tap a little spin class magic by setting my iPod on repeat (I just stand still but it keeps on coming, and I just stop moving but it keeps on coming, it keeps on coming so I start running) The goal is to get to the top before minute 55. My all-time best is 50:21. Someday I'll cut it below 50. I just keep on chipping away at it, still reaching for that ever-elusive best shape of my life.

But the best part about afternoon spin class: The 2,500-foot cool-down. It's a long way down. 

2012 goals

Recently, Beat posted his adventure goals for 2012. It got me thinking about what I want to do in 2012. Below is a list of the events I'm thinking about for the coming year. Most of these are tentative, and I'm sure others that I haven't even thought of yet will become reality. But for now, these are the dreams that get me out the door most every day. My adventure dreams. This post is merely "part one." I'll post about other goals for 2012 soon.

Susitna 100
Foot race, February 18-20
This year will be my fourth showing at the illustrious Susitna 100. I finished the 100-mile "Race Across Frozen Alaska" twice on bikes (a full-suspension Gary Fisher Sugar in 2006 and an old Raleigh with Snowcat rims in 2007. It is possible to ride snow trails without a fat bike. Not well.) Even though I had much better bikes by 2011, I still decided to leave them at home and try my chances on foot. I surprised everybody and myself by finishing, and now I want to go back and try it again. Why do I want to drag a heavy sled 100 miles across the Susitna Valley, yet again? For me, these long winter slogs are very much a mental landscape sort of challenge; one might even call it intense meditation for lack of a better term. Almost regardless of the outcome, I always emerge from my Alaska sabbaticals with a renewed sense of clarity. But I do want to improve on my 2011 finish of 41 hours and 16 minutes, and my main strategy is to avoid the two-hour breaks at Luce's and Flathorn lodges.

White Mountains 100
Snow bike race, March 25
The White Mountains 100 is easily my favorite race, ever. This 100-mile race in the mountains north of Fairbanks, Alaska, takes all of my favorite things about snowbiking: Rolling terrain, winter "singletrack," sweeping vistas, a huge climb up a mountain pass, a white-knuckle descent, cozy checkpoints, tasty hot food, awesome volunteers, potential aurora gazing ... and just enough extreme cold, terrifying overflow, and of course the 800-foot-climb-in-less-than-a-mile-Wickersham-%*$!-Wall to keep it real. I finished in 22:23 in 2010 and 17:55 in 2011. Since I won't be particularly well-trained for snow biking, and since snow conditions always dictate how these things go down anyway, my main strategy for 2012 is to minimize the weight I'm carrying in extra gear, and probably also try to cut down my checkpoint times. However, the overwhelming goal in this race is to have fun.

Stagecoach 400
Self-supported bikepacking race, April 27
I haven't taken on a multi-day mountain biking challenge since I finished the Tour Divide in 2009. Although I've enjoyed my foray into ultrarunning, I admit I miss the independence, freedom and flow that I feel on my bike. So I was excited to learn that Mary Collier, who also previously finished the Tour Divide (in 2008; she is one of the stars of the movie "Ride the Divide") and her husband, Brendan, put together a 400-mile dirt route across Southern California. The loop incorporates historic routes such as the Juan Bautista DeAnza trail and the Great Southern Overland Stage Route of 1849. Since I am now a resident of California, and since the Stagecoach 400 Web site features stunning photographs, I felt compelled to enter. My main concern for participating in this event is the likelihood of extreme heat, given that it swings around the Salton Sea, which is often hotter than Phoenix. But I figure after returning from Fairbanks, some dedicated sauna training will hopefully get me in shape for what will likely be a grand and difficult tour of the state I now call home.

The Zion 50
Foot race, May 11
This race fits in the "maybe" category, and hinges on actually feeling ready for such a thing so soon after the Stagecoach 400, and also on whether Beat decides he wants to run the Zion 100. But the course looks fantastic, through one of my favorite regions, just outside Zion National Park. This would be my first attempt at the 50-mile distance, and I'm guessing a pretty tough one for me. The elevation gain in the 50-mile course is only 3,500 feet, which puts it solidly into the "runnable" category, and the cutoff times reflect that. But it would be a beautiful challenge, and it would give me an excuse to visit my family in Utah.

The Colorado Trail
Bikepacking, July
This one also falls squarely into the "maybe" pile, and actually just popped into my head as a possibility the other day. Beat is planning to spend some time in Colorado in mid-July to acclimate for the Hardrock 100, which begins on July 13. I thought if I went to Colorado with him, and acclimated, I could potentially give the Colorado Trail a shot starting the following week (mid-July.) My plan would be a self-supported fast-tour of the bike route set in place by the Colorado Trail Race, which covers 470 miles and 65,000 feet of climbing. This wouldn't necessarily be an ITT, as I don't really believe I have a shot at Eszter Horanyi's incredible time. But my plan would be to abide by all the self-support rules, carry a Spot, and basically just give myself good excuses to keep the pace cranking when things are going well, and take a breather when they're not. I like the challenge of a determined pace, even if I'm ultimately just out for a scenic bike tour. I've long promised myself I wouldn't try to ride the Colorado Trail, which is known as much for its rugged singletrack as I am known for being a poor technical rider. But I figure if I ever want to see the Colorado Trail, I'll either have to walk all of it or some of it. I might as well ride my bike where I can, and try to enjoy the hike-a-biking as though I were simply hiking. I do enjoy occasionally taking my bikes for long walks. Since this ride would be in conjunction with Hardrock, I imagine I'd start in Durango, which is opposite of the race this year. The Colorado Trail Race begins in Denver on July 30.

Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc
Foot race, August 31
This is a HUGE maybe, given — among the many reasons why I should not attempt this even if I do get in — that there's a lottery with a little worse than two-to-one odds (to be held later this month.) But the truth is, I threw my name in the hat for what is widely considered one of the most competitive and most difficult ~100-mile foot races in the world. The 166-kilometer run around Mont Blanc crosses into three countries (France, Italy and Switzerland) on steep Alps trails with nearly 31,000 feet of climbing. Entering this thing when I have never even successfully completed a much easier trail 100-miler probably comes across as an extreme case of hubris, and it is. I blame curiosity. I was only even on the Web site to check out the much crazier race that Beat signed up for, the La Petite Trotte à Léon (290 kilometers with 22,000 meters of "positive height gain.") The adjacent site for the UTMB offered registration for qualified participants, and I thought, "there's no way I qualify." To qualify, a participant needs five points in two races. I discovered that my finishes in the Susitna 100 (4 points), Racing the Planet Nepal (3 points) and Ohlone Wilderness 50K (1 point) were more than enough to get me through the first cut. Out of sheer bemusement about the idea that a snow slog, a stage race with a heavy pack, and a 50K could qualify me for one of the toughest mountain races in the world, I signed up.

Let me just continue that I do think, with a little luck, I could finish. I would approach it from a speed-hiking standpoint and would aim to move consistently at a conservative but determined pace to stay ahead of the 46-hour cutoff. And believe me, I've done enough hiking in the Alps to understand how incredibly hard this will be. Hopefully all the hike-a-biking I do in Colorado will whip me into shape for the task, but if not, no biggie. Honestly, if I don't get into UTMB, I won't cry about it. I'll just hike the Mont Blanc loop over a much more luxurious four or five days while Beat is racing the PTL.

The Bear 100
Foot race, September 28-29
If I don't get into the UTMB, I'd still like to aim for a 100-mile trail race in 2012. The Bear 100 is ideal for me. It's tough and "climby" enough to be a good fit for a hiker like me, covers a scenic point-to-point route in my home state of Utah, and has the awesome nostalgia factor of being the race where Beat and I had our first "date." I've already run the last fifty miles of the course, so I think the hundred-miler is doable for me, although I would have to practice my running plenty over the summer in order to finish under the cut-off. Plus, my friend Danni is planning on running this race. It should be a lot of fun.

25 Hours of Frog Hollow
Mountain bike race, November 3-4
This is just a fun mountain bike party in the desert near Hurricane, Utah. It's too far in the future to really know whether I could fit it into my schedule, but I like to tentatively plan on being there all the same. I'd love to return as a solo racer and avenge my early-morning meltdown of 2011. However, I'd be thrilled if I could place as high as second, because this race becomes more popular every year. I wouldn't be surprised if a pro or two showed up in 2012. It's still a fantastic way to spend a day with some great people. 

Indulgence

I should know myself better than this by now. I have two very nice bike lights that take all of thirty seconds to mount on the handlebars. However, I often leave these lights at home, on purpose, as though neglecting to bring lights will force me to return at a decent hour. So I leave the bike lights behind, but I do bring a small headlamp and red blinkies, because, you know, safety first.

I was little bit lost in my project today, and failed to noticed the quickly passing hours until it was already 3:04 p.m. Oh, I need to go. Slap on a long-sleeved T-shirt and tights. My running pack from last weekend's trail race and its leftover water, hat, jacket and mittens should suffice for supplies. The responsible side of me just wants to stay at home and keep writing; don't break the flow. But louder voices lodge a compelling protest.  You promised we were going mountain biking today. You've been home in warm, sunny California for a week. No more excuses.

Okay, okay. What  kind of ride do I even have time for now that it's what, 3:17 p.m.? Sun sets at 5:10. Useable daylight lasts until 5:30. That should at least give me time to tag Black Mountain. I pedal away from my apartment building, mind still crowded with chapter outlines and dialogue. Not that any of that stuff is really all that important, but I admit I sometimes wonder exactly why I feel so compelled to ride my bike. Daily exercise has been such a part of my routine for so many years, through so many major life changes, that I have a difficult time imagining my self identity without it. Exercise serves as both my anchor and my escape, but sometimes I wonder if it's too much of a priority. What is it exactly that drives me to cut the line to my creative juices and redirect all of my energy to simple pedaling? What does mountain biking accomplish for me that words can not?

I pedal up the steep road as guilt about stifled creativity and slow work progress gives way to the blissful mindlessness of hard effort. It's easy to ignore the more oppressive thoughts in my head when so much oxygen is directed to my muscles — one of the side effects of exercise that I cherish. With guilt and worry out of the way, I launch into the trail with renewed enthusiasm, the kind that never grows stale no matter how many times I venture outside for a simple ride. After cresting the mountain top, I briefly remember I was supposed to do something here, but can't remember what that something might be. Warm January air and rich afternoon light prompts me onward to a smooth ribbon of singletrack. The blast of chilled air and swirls of dust put a smile on my face, which is as good a reason as any to tuck in and coast all the way to the canyon.

It's there — twelve miles, 2,700 feet of climbing, and 600 feet of descending later — that I remember what it was I set out to do on this ride: Get home by dark. Wisps of pink light stretching across the sky tell me this is not a likely scenario. But I engage the high gear anyway, and get all the workout I need in twenty red-lining minutes. With my grimace factor on high, the air temperature turns from chilled to raw, and there's only enough oxygen flowing to my brain to register gasps and moans. But the rewards are unmistakable. I reach the top of Black Mountain just in time to watch the vermillion sun slip beneath a sheet of haze over the Pacific. Steeped in pink light and endorphin euphoria, I steal a few minutes of fading daylight to catch my breath.

I pull on all the warm layers in my pack, sip some leftover race water, and switch on my headlamp and blinkies now for good measure, because I'm going to need them soon. I'm not going to make it home before dark, and by the time I shower and eat dinner I'm probably going to be too tired to get any more work done today. And yet, the ride is completely worth it. I should know myself better than this by now. 

Recovery run: Crystal Springs 50K

At the start of the Crystal Springs 50K

I felt weak and a little off-kilter, not unlike the way I felt a month ago after I returned from Nepal. I went for a couple short bike rides, and on Thursday decided it was time to return to running. Since nothing I did in the deep snow and intense cold of Alaska can really be counted as running, it had actually be a while. I ran my standard eight-mile loop. It felt weird. I returned home with my usual attitude that forms after a hiatus of any length — "running is too hard." But it was too late; Beat had already signed us up for the Crystal Springs 50K.

Upon arriving at the start in Woodside, I learned I was currently the female course record holder for the Coastal Trail Runs race. I did not know this, nor did I feel pressured to defend my title (Crystal Springs was a smaller affair in 2010 and 2011, but this year there were 60 people starting the 50K, at least a dozen of whom were women.) But as the "defending champion" I did feel some responsibility to at least show up and give this running race my best running effort. But not too much running, because running is too hard.

The antithesis to my frosty face photos from Alaska — this is what winter running looks like in coastal California. 

I hit a few snags early on in the race. I learned why leg warmers aren't more popular with runners after I had to stop several times to pull up my leg warmers after they'd fallen down, then finally just took them off. There were also a couple trips into the woods when something from that morning didn't agree with me — I convinced myself that something was running. But eventually I hit my stride and found myself surprisingly able to hold a solid pace without excessive effort. I'd already decided I was just going to run Crystal Springs "easy" because right now, maintaining my endurance motor is about the only thing I can do to improve my chances in the Susitna 100. Speed will accomplish exactly nothing toward that particular goal.

Everything motored along swimmingly until I passed the last checkpoint, 4.6 miles from the finish. I looked at my watch and realized if I could somehow log sub-nine-minute miles for the rest of the race, I might just reach something that has been a longer-term goal of mine — to finish a trail 50K in less than six hours. The remainder of the course was predominantly downhill, but in my world, that's a bad thing. I think you have to be a similarly flailing and awkward runner as I am to really understand what I mean. Even on flat pavement, seven miles per hour is about my speed threshold before I begin to feel uncomfortable, like my feet are stumbling over themselves and painful things are about to happen, and sometimes they do. Even if they're physically achievable, fast speeds frighten me enough that I'm psychologically incapable of letting off the brakes.

I crested a small hill with my GPS registering a 13-minute-mile, which just wasn't going to cut it. Just then, a song came on my iPod that reminded me of my trek in Alaska, and momentarily moved my thoughts from the vibrant sunlight filtering through the redwood forest, back to the frigid air and frozen swamps of the Susitna Valley — "The Cave" by Mumford and Sons:

It's empty in the valley of your heart
The sun, it rises slowly as you walk
Away from all the fears
And all the faults you've left behind


For a moment I could feel all of it — a hundred miles of snowshoe trekking, a reluctant sled tugging at my hips, lips cracked with windburn, swollen fingertips, a painful patch of dry skin that formed on my nose after I dozed off with my face sticking out of my bivy bag, the cold headaches, the fatigue after my long flight home, the lead weights in my legs during my difficult training run, the 27 miles of consistent running I had already logged that day. And then, in the next moment, I let it all go. And I ran. 

But I will hold on hope
And I won't let you choke
On the noose around your neck

I locked in to the frenetic banjo harmony and matched my own cadence, feeling a rush of wind and adrenaline as I accelerated down the narrow, winding trail. A towering redwood canopy filtered the sunlight into a hypnotic strobe, dry leaves erupted at my feet, and I could almost taste the moist aroma of soil and green moss. Even the endless hairpin turns couldn't disrupt the exhilarating sensation of simply running without fear. Who cares if I fall?

And I'll find strength in pain
And I will change my ways
I'll know my name as it's called again

I passed several runners — a guy, another guy, a woman, two guys. One of them called out to me, "Nice pace!" "Thanks!" I shouted back. The trail disappeared beneath my feet like a conveyor belt. I felt like I could run faster, but I had a hunch I was running fast enough. That was good enough for me.

I crossed the finish line at 5:51, a personal record by 20 minutes. (Garmin stats here) I didn't win. Not even in my age group. The woman who did win shattered my course record and beat me by an hour. But it felt like a big victory, all the same.