Welcome And The Big Lesson

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Hello and welcome to Running with Problems. My name is John Eisen. I'm Miranda Williamson. Running with Problems is a podcast about the problems runners face during a life in running. Today on the podcast, we have Miranda Williamson herself.

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Yay. Talking about my Ute 100 experience.

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Miranda ran her second 100 miler, and we go deep into all of the details. It was a really fun experience to be at. I was there as crew chief, and Miranda just spoilers, she crushed it again.

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I don't know about all that. There were some difficulties and challenges to overcome along the way, as you'll hear about.

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Definitely a much more interesting story than your first hundred.

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I think really triumphing in your first hundred is a cool story. But this story is a little different and a spoiler alert. But um I do want to say that I've had some time to reflect and consider what that experience meant to me and what I learned from that experience since we recorded this podcast. And I think I ultimately got out of it what I wanted, which what I wanted was to reveal something new to me that I didn't know.

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To go deep into who you are as a person.

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Yes.

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And it's amazing how ginormous extreme physical efforts can do that.

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It really is. And I wanted to learn something new about myself. That's why I wanted to do this again. Um, is I felt like what I learned from the High Lonesome 100 was that I really liked the person I was in extremely difficult conditions, like when the outer layer was peeled away, when Miranda the podcast host, when Miranda the um professional at work, when Miranda the good friend was all peeled away. I really liked the version of myself that was under there. But other than that, that was the only thing I really learned. And you showed me something different.

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What'd you learn?

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I learned that I have a really difficult time accepting failure. And that uniquely makes me good at these types of things, and also it can be something that's maybe a little dangerous.

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If you sign if you push through to I mean, this year we've talked about to two people who ran the iditarod had opposite outcomes.

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Yeah.

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And now that turned out to be a relatively dangerous situation. Absolutely. And uh you imagine if you know what what drives somebody to complete those sorts of things, maybe it's something similar to what you experience.

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Right.

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Almost uh fear of failure.

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Right. Like what does this it it even goes deeper than fear? Like, who what does that mean about who I am? Like, am I like a completely different person than I thought I was if I don't finish this? And that was what came up in my mind during you.

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Yeah. How does your identity reflect your choice?

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Interesting.

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Very interesting.

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We will let you decide the kind of person Miranda is listening to her recap of the Ute 100. I certainly loved being there and seeing your incredible determination.

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No, thank you.

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But before we get into that, let's have a quick check-in.

Check-In And Training Updates

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How are you doing?

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I ran track this morning.

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So recovery's going well.

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Recovery's going well. I'm eating a lot.

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And she made peach cobbler.

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And I almost ate half of it.

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It was delicious.

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Um, and I've been eating before that, I was eating like ice cream every day. We had like ice cream in the fridge, and I was eating it every day at like lunchtime.

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Gosh, I miss ultra running. Like this is like one of the best parts about ultra runnies you just eat ice cream every day.

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I feel like I lost like eight to ten pounds from that race, and all my clothes were like hanging on me like I was some sort of skinny before the race. And then after, even more.

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Yeah.

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So um, yeah, I've been eating a lot of good food. I did go to a sauna cold plunge dance party.

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Those are three words that really shouldn't be in the same sentence.

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But that yet they are. And it was really nice to show off my abs at a dance party where I'm dancing in my bikini because I don't normally show my abs because I have a nice layer of um uh, you know, cushion around them.

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But oh, I wouldn't be so harsh on yourself.

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I'm not harsh. It's there. It's beautiful as part of me, but it was nice to dance in my bikini while I'm looking uh heroin chic, as is in vogue right now.

SPEAKER_01 5:42

Oh gosh. I was about to say you did it the healthy way, but then again, as you know, is ultra running healthy? We'll tackle that question next time.

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Another running with problems. How are you doing?

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Doing all right. Uh I'm I'm doing a little bit of training. It's not definitely not anything near what I used to do. And I still I'm still dealing with pot symptoms. Some days they're real bad. Most days they're just like moderate, and I just deal with it. And occasionally, uh, like the day I ran with you at your hundred, I had no symptoms. So I'm hopeful of a day where the days with no symptoms grow. And the days with light symptoms uh grow. Um, but yeah, I'm kind of training in a bit. I'm gonna try and do a high lonesome loop with you and uh some of your girlfriends. And I think that'll be fun. High Lonesome Loop is not the High Lonesome 100. Uh, those are two separate things.

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I gotta ask that today.

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I mean, a lot of people, a lot of people uh misnomer them. Um the High Lonesome Loop is a 15-mile loop out of the Hesi trailhead out near Netherland. It's about 45 minutes from our house here in Boulder. It's pretty close. It's one of these classic loops in the Indian Peaks Wilderness. You basically start at around like 9,000 feet. Yeah, and then you run these beautiful trails uh that slowly climb up to the Continental Divide.

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12,000 feet.

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And then you run along the Continental Divide for three miles and you get to look out west and look out east and see the I mean the Continental Divide is named such because at that point the rivers flow different directions to either side. So if you look east, the rivers flow east. If you look west, the rivers flow west. It's it's a beautiful location if you've never been to the continental.

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There are like uh natural formed mountain lakes out there, wildflowers, you're up at altitude for quite some time. It's just very stunning.

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And you get done and you still have time for lunch down in Netherland. Uh so training to go do that on the advice of my Dr. Roger. Dr. Roger, thanks, Dr. Roger. Um, he's been listening to a few episodes. So uh maybe, maybe we'll get Dr. Roger and Teddy on the podcast. They are uh an athlete-focused direct care group.

SPEAKER_03 8:17

Ooh, this would be a very interesting topic. We could source a lot of questions for this.

SPEAKER_01 8:22

They have their own podcast. Gosh, I should probably know it off the top of my head what the name of their podcast is, but I don't. I think it's uh their group is called High Point Direct Care. Um, so I think you can find their podcast on the website.

SPEAKER_03 8:34

Oh my gosh, we got to do a collab of the future.

SPEAKER_01 8:38

Uh, I mean, we got to get on a lot of recordings. We've been a bit lax these last six weeks with all the running we've been doing. Well, you've been doing. I haven't been participating. But uh we'll get back into it, guys. No worries. So I think that's everything on the check-in.

Shoutouts And A Dog Trigger Warning

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I do want to give a trigger warning before we go in. Oh, shout out and then trigger warning.

SPEAKER_01 9:02

Yeah, shout out to John Kelly. Yes, friend of the podcast. Can we say that? Yes, we'll just say that. Uh he is out doing a surprise AT FKT. Uh, he's going, he's out on the Appalachian Trail this year. He started from Catain. He didn't tell us about it, he didn't tell anybody about it. Total secret.

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He did not tell the socials.

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Total secret right up until the day he left on uh from Qatahdan South. So he's been, if you guys want to follow him, he's all his socials. I believe he's random forest runner on all his socials.

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Yeah.

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It's really cool. He's got a he's raising money for a charity in North Carolina for youth uh scholarships to various little things in uh to help the his community in Boone, North Carolina.

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So I'll link to the charity in the show notes.

SPEAKER_01 9:53

Yeah. So I'm pretty excited to to watch him try to cross the AT in less than 40, was it 41 days?

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He seems like he's in really good spirits thus thus far.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

I love his attitude with this one. He's he endeavored to be happier. Right. And if you if you look at John, like a lot of his best Barkley runs, he claimed to be happy the whole time. Um his some of his best times at uh Tour de Jean were the ones where he was happiest. So I think I love this attitude from him to focus on enjoying himself. You know, last time he got bogged down, he talked about it when he was on with us. Like he got bogged down in the in like having a negative mindset.

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Yep.

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And that really weighs against you and is difficult. He still made it so far. Like he was within less than a week from finishing before his leg gave up on him. But uh he actually found he got a diagnosis for what was wrong with his leg after like I think I think he figured it out after he was on with us.

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Right.

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That like, because he was still dealing with his leg being weird, but he actually a doctor like went in and found that there was like some sort of impingement on the nerve there, and they removed it, and he's been running well ever since.

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So amazing.

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I'm rooting for him.

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Me too. And we have to say congrats to Camille Heron. She ran Vermont 100 um and crushed it, and she hasn't run 100 in uh uh quite some time, and so yeah, it's been quite a while for her.

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She's been out taking a break.

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Yeah, so congrats. Welcome back to the game. Glad to have you back.

SPEAKER_01 11:44

Yeah. Great to see.

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Great to see.

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And shout out to another former podcast guest, Katie Grossman.

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We saw her, as we mentioned in this podcast, and she finished her 50 miler, and this is marking her return to ultra running. She is looking for her next big adventure.

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Yeah, I mean, she last finished hard rock in 2017. That was her last ultra finish. And to come out and do this really tough 50 miler. I mean, that you raise is no joke.

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It was bananas tough.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

So it was really nice to see her. I hung out with Dom for a little bit. It was great too. We didn't actually see her finish, but I know she did. And um, yeah, congratulations to you, Katie. It's awesome to have you back.

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And for all those listeners who um listen to Katie's podcast, I hope this like reframes um how you think of that story.

SPEAKER_01 12:41

In what way?

SPEAKER_03 12:42

Uh, some folks were saying that they were fearful of childbirth because of Katie's story and just like how it affected her. And I really um I think that's that's not the message I'd love people to take away from that story.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

I mean, you could listen to this whole podcast and never want to go running at once. I think the point is, is that you're the point of the fucking podcast is that there are going to be problems along the way. And we're here to talk about some of those problems, but not just that they happen and you shouldn't go outside because the problems are there. We talk about them because we're running with those problems. Everybody is running with problems. If you look around every time somebody passes you or you pass somebody, those people have problems and they're different than yours. And understanding that we all have problems, we're all dealing with it, and some of those are worse and some of those are easier. I think that's the point is not to be afraid of experiencing problems, but knowing that everybody experiencing them is experiencing them, and therefore there's equality in that.

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And it could be literally any impetus that causes the problem. You and Christine, a viral infection. We have Dave Mackey, a a fall from a rock. We have people who've trained too much for these experiences, and that set them back. And childbirth is just one of those experiences among many.

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You don't know what's gonna be causing your problems, but you know that you have the strength and the perseverance to run with them. Maybe we should record an outro like that. Maybe I should just clip that, and that could be our outro. That would be a good idea. I love it. That's pretty good. All right, guys.

SPEAKER_03 14:34

Let me give a trigger warning before we get into the episode. We have a trigger warning for um some uh dog stuff. I like this trigger warning because I don't like to hear anything bad about dogs, anything bad horrible happening to dogs. I don't want to watch any movie where a dog dies.

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Just except for John Wick.

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Except for John Wick. Yeah. But that's only because he goes on a murder.

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Everyone.

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Literally everyone who caused his dog's death. So um there's just some the dog lives just to, you know.

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Yeah, you're making that sound kind of bad.

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But it it's I wouldn't want to listen to it. It sounds bad. So start if we start mentioning um Summit's issues and you just want to skip ahead, just go ahead and hit that skip button. That's the trigger warning.

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Okay. Well, without uh further ado, the incredible story of determination, perseverance, and GI distress in the heat of Moab at Miranda's Ute 100 by Revenant Running. Enjoy Miranda Williamson, welcome to Running with

Why Choose Ute 100

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Problems.

SPEAKER_03 15:55

Thanks for having me. And you're here because I just ran the Ute 100 in Moab. In the LaSalle, outside of Moab, yes.

SPEAKER_01 16:08

Well, how should we structure this discussion? Where do we want to start?

SPEAKER_03 16:11

I think we should start from the beginning, like we do with all of our guests. The lead up.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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So when were you conceived? When did you uh sign up for this race?

SPEAKER_03 16:28

So I saw for this race. Oh gosh, this was a while back. It was after Hilo. I was inspired by my experience, and I wanted to see what more I had in me. And I didn't really want to deal with a lottery situation, so I kind of looked around like what race could I potentially do that I could just like sign up for and get into.

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And you were looking for something harder than Hilo.

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I was looking for something that would challenge me in different and more ways than Hilo. I wanted to touch that edge of quit and see who I was in those those moments. And I just didn't get that experience in Hilo.

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I just an amazing race.

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I had a great race. I never wanted to quit. I always knew the finish was inevitable from the moment I started. So I wanted something like a different type of challenge. And what's the next level after you run a really hard hundred and you're like, oh, that wasn't challenging enough.

SPEAKER_01 17:31

And did you know what kind of challenge you would be?

SPEAKER_03 17:36

I knew some things. Yeah. I knew it had more climbing than Hilo, which Hilo has a lot. So let's like not that's a lot to have more than Hilo.

SPEAKER_01 17:48

Yes.

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Um and I knew that it had the element of being in the desert, so the heat was going to be a factor.

SPEAKER_01 17:55

It is in the LaSalle Mountains outside Moab. Uh the mountain range consists of three sort of mini mountain ranges along, I don't know, what, 10 miles long? It's not even that long, the whole mountain range. But it is really looms large over Moab.

SPEAKER_03 18:17

It does. It's like one of those mountain ranges similar to like I think of the um Eastern Sierras and Bishop and um where Mount Whitney sits, that they just kind of shoot out of the desert.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

Right. Like Bishop's in the desert, and then straight up to uh forested and then beyond to um alpine terrain. The same thing happens in the La Salle where Moab's in the desert, and you have these beautiful canyon walls that Moab's famous for, and then you get up into these pine forests and then beyond into the alpine terrain. But it's pretty warm out there.

SPEAKER_03 19:01

It's pretty warm out there.

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Did you think heat was gonna be a problem?

SPEAKER_03 19:04

I knew it was going to be a challenge. I didn't know because I had no way of predicting what the weather of the day was going to be. I had no idea it was going to be as much of a challenge as it was. But I I knew it was going to be part of it. Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:20

Okay. So we signed up. We wanted you wanted something hard. You wanted something to push you to your edge. Yep. And then there was the training.

SPEAKER_03 19:30

And then let's let's talk about the other element of this, which is um, and then we'll get into the training, which is um the other thing that's challenging for me is I get a lot of external motivation in life and just in general.

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Yeah.

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And this was going to require a lot of internal motivation just because the eight stations are very far apart and much more sparse. And there's less are way less runners.

SPEAKER_01 19:55

Yeah. I mean, I think this year it started less than one quarter, less than a quarter of who started at Hilo. Right. With you.

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Yeah.

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Yeah. Much smaller.

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Much smaller. Yeah. So there were like, I think 69 starters. 79 registered, 60 or 73 registered, uh, 69 starters. Nice. Yeah. So yes, the training. For the most part, my training went well.

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You were very strong.

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Very strong.

SPEAKER_01 20:27

Yeah, you were so strong. You're stronger than all your training partners right now.

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Yeah, and maybe stronger than I've ever been. Uh, which is amazing, incredible to be um approaching 44 and be the strongest I've ever been.

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I'm so attracted to you.

SPEAKER_03 20:44

Oh, thanks, love. But I I had some setbacks.

Training Wins Plus Perimenopause Hurdles

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Um early on in in the training, I was dealing a little bit with perimenopause.

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How have you dealt with that?

SPEAKER_03 20:58

I started, I I opted to start HRT, hormone replacement therapy. Um, which consists of, for me, three separate hormones on a very low dose, which has been very helpful. We'll do a whole episode about that, don't worry.

SPEAKER_01 21:14

I mean, I think as a man on a podcast, I'm obliged to say that I don't believe in perimenopause.

SPEAKER_03 21:21

Let me tell you, it's real.

SPEAKER_01 21:25

I am just kidding, the listeners that don't understand my dry humor. Yeah. Uh it's been pretty interesting to see you go through this because it it seems like slight changes to your hormone balance have had repercussions larger than I would have expected. Um, it's my first time uh dealing with perimenopause personally.

SPEAKER_03 21:49

Well, everyone experiences it differently. Every woman does. Some women just have like very small symptoms that come on slowly. Other uh Women don't have any symptoms and just slowly transition into menopause.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

And would you say it's hard to even identify that this is what's happening to you?

SPEAKER_03 22:10

No, not for me.

SPEAKER_01 22:12

You were like, I know what this is.

SPEAKER_03 22:14

Yeah. It was for me, it was very, very sudden.

SPEAKER_01 22:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:19

Yeah. It was sudden and extreme in all the ways. And one of the symptoms I was experiencing was I couldn't recover from workouts.

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And you're used to a pretty good recovery.

SPEAKER_03 22:34

I'm used to a good recovery. And I'm also used to my body responding.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

I mean, you eat really well.

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I eat well. I work out.

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You take supplements, you uh you don't talk about it much, but you you take care of yourself.

unknown 22:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:49

I do the things that, you know, an athlete wants to do to take care of their body, and my body was not responding to any of them.

SPEAKER_01 22:57

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 22:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:00

So that was. So the story HRT was it was um, without giving too many spoilers to the HRT or sorry, to the perimenopause episode we're gonna record, was HRT helpful in your training?

SPEAKER_03 23:14

Almost immediately. Almost immediately, my body started responding to um my training. Uh, one thing that was really impacted um was my sleep as well. Um, that was a little that was the slowest to respond to HRT, but it's starting to respond about now, which has been great to be able to sleep through the night again and not have hot flashes in the middle of the night. Although John has enjoyed that I now um like a cooler night.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

Yeah, I pre-perimenopause, Miranda enjoyed the heat in all things, including in the house uh at bedtime. And that is uh you know something we we've been disagreeing about for the length of our relationship. But now that she's in perimenopause, like we can just make the whole bedroom super cold, and I love it. I'm really happy. I'm excited for it to actually be cold outside. We can turn on the house fan and blow cool air through. Oh, I'm so stoked. I cannot wait. I love sleeping in a with chill air. I think I think I think lots of covers and chill air is like my favorite. I know there's all these new solutions. Uh, Dr. Rogers has been telling me to investigate getting like a cooling pad for our mattress uh to cool the mattress. So there's a lot of research now that like being cool like from the mattress up as opposed to like from the air down is actually like the most effective way to manage temperature during sleep. But I haven't done that yet.

SPEAKER_03 24:52

Well, we might get there.

unknown 24:54

Well, we might get there.

SPEAKER_03 24:56

But yes, so that was kicking off training. So that was a bit of a rough patch, kicking off training. But once I got that sorted out, training went well until the week before high low.

SPEAKER_01 25:08

Yeah, and it was going really well. I mean, let's just before let's not skip over, like talk about some of your big runs. Oh, yeah. Like yeah, you know, you enjoyed the summer. It was good.

SPEAKER_03 25:18

I crushed the summer. I did this big uh La Plata Hope Pass loop that you shared with me. It was a beautiful run that climbed up to 14,000 feet, La Plata, which is a beast of a 14er, and then climbed down the back side, descended down the backside, and then climbed up Hope Pass, which is in the famous Leadville marathon. Leadville 100 100, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:44

Although who knows about this year? Have you seen the course yet?

SPEAKER_03 25:46

I have not seen the course yet.

SPEAKER_01 25:47

They're supposed to get a fire-changed course.

SPEAKER_03 25:50

Yeah, they did.

SPEAKER_01 25:50

It's out.

SPEAKER_03 25:51

I think the runners have it.

SPEAKER_01 25:53

Okay. Yeah. All right, I'll have to look it up. I'm pretty excited. Yeah, I haven't seen it yet.

SPEAKER_03 25:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:59

All right. So, yeah, you did La Plata Hope, you did Pawnee Buchanan.

SPEAKER_03 26:05

Um, Pawnee Buchanan, fastest time ever. I did it in under nine hours with my girlfriend Hannah, which was that's a stout time for that. It's very fast. It's like Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:19

I think my fastest is 8 30.

unknown 26:21

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:22

It's only 10 minutes slower than your poor old husband here.

SPEAKER_03 26:25

I did.

SPEAKER_01 26:26

You can't possibly run that time now.

SPEAKER_03 26:28

I did a run that my peak run was this um this horseshoe run, which included the four pass the four passes in the four pass loop in Aspen.

SPEAKER_01 26:39

The six-pass horseshoe?

SPEAKER_03 26:41

Yes, and it added two additional mountain pass mountain passes. And that one I did in broke my previous time by two hours.

SPEAKER_01 26:52

Yeah, but that came at a cost because of all the smoke.

unknown 26:55

Right.

SPEAKER_01 26:56

And that was the first time we experienced nosebleeds in uh as a result of being.

SPEAKER_03 27:04

And that was also smoky in Moab. Anyways, we'll get to that. We're giving spoilers.

SPEAKER_01 27:08

We're not giving any spoilers. You had nosebleeds running the six pass.

SPEAKER_03 27:12

I did uh my first nosebleed running the six fast.

SPEAKER_01 27:15

Foreshadowing. Okay. And it's it's a great technique for describing something to listeners that they might uh enjoy hearing about later that will like connect to the earlier part of the story.

SPEAKER_03 27:26

Okay, so foreshadowing coming. Um I got a nosebleed on that run. It was very smoky because of the fires.

SPEAKER_01 27:34

Yeah. The the fires have been raging across the state and in Utah, as well as smoke coming in from other states, especially Washington and Canada, are just totally on fire right now. But in late June, early July, it was the Aspen Acres fire, the Gold Mountain fire. There was a fire in Fish Lake National Forest, I don't know what the name of it, and then there was the fire in Leadville, the Willow Fire fire, um, all raging across the state. And name one, that was the one putting smoke in Aspen that day, right? Like it depended on didn't really matter how the winds blew, because there were fires to the north, south, east, and west.

SPEAKER_03 28:15

So yeah. So, anyways, I got pretty sick after that run.

SPEAKER_01 28:22

Yeah. So you you came back from six pass and hilo was the next weekend, and you got sick. How sick, like what kind of sick? What are we talking about? Like smokeness sick?

SPEAKER_03 28:33

I th I thought at first it was just smokeness because it was a sore throat and runny nose, and I was like, oh, the smoke affected me. And then I was sick with like a full-on cold. Sick, sick, cold.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

And do you think it was a virus?

SPEAKER_03 28:50

Yeah, I think so. It turned went to my it moved to my lungs and so it was a cough. I think it was like COVID. I was fully down for five days. I didn't know.

SPEAKER_01 28:58

Did you just stay home and wait it out like a cool person?

SPEAKER_03 29:01

I did that home waited out thing. And I tried to run just minimally. I think I had a 27-mile week or something that week where I was sick.

SPEAKER_01 29:11

Everyone who's ever had COVID just looked at you with disgust when you just said that.

SPEAKER_03 29:16

But keep in mind, like I was really strong. So that is like for me was like super chill.

SPEAKER_01 29:24

From my perspective, barely anything. Your strength has been quite apparent. Like just how much recovery you were experiencing, run to run, as well as your ability to crush like every single run with a good effort. Like it just didn't feel like fatigue was hitting you very much this summer until you got sick.

SPEAKER_03 29:44

Until I got sick. And I'd say my body looks different too. Like you can see muscles in my arms, you can see like just the def a little bit of definition.

SPEAKER_02 29:54

Yeah.

unknown 29:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:56

So um that sickness put me out. And then we had Hilo coming up.

SPEAKER_01 30:03

And Hilo, you ran 18 miles overnight after recovering from being sick.

SPEAKER_03 30:09

Yeah, so I was hacking up a lot of the colours.

SPEAKER_01 30:11

Run maybe a bit um rough here.

SPEAKER_03 30:13

Yeah, it was a it was a death march to Monarch.

SPEAKER_01 30:17

Hashtag death march running co, not a sponsor. Could be.

SPEAKER_03 30:22

Um yes. So I did the overnight section, um, which was actually totally fine. I was completely fine on that section, and I started to feel better after that. I felt like I accomplished the thing I wanted to accomplish, supporting McKenzie, and I started to like finally my lungs started to clear up after that.

SPEAKER_01 30:47

So did you feel so you started feeling confident that you were gonna go to the race, and then Summit happened.

SPEAKER_03 30:53

And then I had my biggest run with Hannah, Pawnee Buchanan, which we crossed like I crushed like

Sick Week And The Dog Emergency

SPEAKER_03 31:00

and then I planned to go running the next day on Sunday, but my dog woke up throwing up.

SPEAKER_01 31:07

Yeah, and we've described this in the intro a few weeks ago.

SPEAKER_03 31:12

Um I don't think we described it in in the detail in which it had happened.

SPEAKER_01 31:17

It was heinous.

SPEAKER_03 31:19

It was really bad. The poor dog. So he wouldn't eat breakfast, which was very unlike him.

SPEAKER_01 31:34

This is after throwing up, waking up in the middle of the night, uh like a whole bunch of stuff that's also unlike him.

SPEAKER_03 31:40

Yes. So we took him to the emergency vet, they sent us home with some probiotics.

SPEAKER_01 31:48

And they anti-nause and antidiarrheals.

SPEAKER_03 31:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 31:52

And then immediately after getting home, we got blood coming out his ass.

SPEAKER_03 31:57

Really badly.

SPEAKER_01 31:59

Yeah. Like shooting blood out when he's trying to poop, and no, no poop, just blood. And that was extremely scary for us.

SPEAKER_03 32:09

So we're like back to the emergency vet.

SPEAKER_01 32:11

We go. We put him right back in the car, drove back. They admitted him into the hospital, put him on an IV. Yeah, gave him an antibiotic that would kill his gut health, but also kill whatever might be two ultrasounds. Multiple ultrasounds on his gut, nothing found. So he stays there overnight.

SPEAKER_03 32:33

Lots of blood work.

unknown 32:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:36

The whole thing. He stays there overnight.

SPEAKER_03 32:38

I'm not running, by the way. I'm with the dog.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

Yeah. Um, I come in in the morning and I sit with him and try to work. And we're just in a kennel, like a tiny little kennel that's like built for a dog, and I'm just like me and this 85-pound dog. Well, he's not 85 pounds anymore, he's 77 because he dealt with this um difficulty.

SPEAKER_03 33:03

His um dog uh therapist wanted him to go on a diet.

SPEAKER_01 33:08

Well, physical therapist. He doesn't have a psychological therapist.

SPEAKER_03 33:12

No, we're not those people. Although we are, right? You know, we are getting our dog a physical therapist.

SPEAKER_01 33:19

We are those people, let's be honest.

SPEAKER_03 33:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:25

And then you take a shot, and like if they release him on that Monday, and it's just still unclear what like we don't know what was actually wrong with him.

SPEAKER_03 33:35

Right. All we know is that yeah, nothing comes up on his blood work.

SPEAKER_01 33:40

He's getting a little better with a w on IV when he's rehydrated. And over the next week, we're just basically going day to day. So at this point, you don't even know if you're running the race because we're less than a week out from this hundred.

SPEAKER_03 33:53

Right. And I'm planning that if so, we have the weekend, and I'm planning to make a decision on Monday if I'm gonna run this race for the next weekend.

SPEAKER_01 34:05

Oh, I guess it's less than two weeks out from the hundred, right? So it was like that happened less than two weeks out. Right. So we go that whole week, he's getting a little bit better. We're seeing him improve a little bit, but it's still up in the air. When did you make the decision to actually run Ute 100?

SPEAKER_03 34:23

Monday is when I The day Monday before the race. Right. Is when I was like, okay, he's better. He's like, he's well enough for me to feel comfortable leaving him with his dog sitter. And though, like his dog sitter is amazing. She's a great, she has dogs, she knows what to do. I have nothing against her.

SPEAKER_01 34:40

Shout out to Layla.

SPEAKER_03 34:41

It's just that, like, I've made a commitment to this dog, and I want to be there if something goes wrong.

SPEAKER_01 34:50

Does that commitment supersede the commitment to this hundred-mile race?

SPEAKER_03 34:54

Correct. There's a there'll be other hundreds.

SPEAKER_00 34:58

There's no other summit.

SPEAKER_03 34:59

There's no other summit. So I was struggling with my decision to run this race or not. And ultimately we decided he's well enough. Layla's great. She's gonna sit him. Let's do this. So that's when we're go time.

SPEAKER_01 35:22

So Monday, Monday before a race on Saturday.

SPEAKER_03 35:24

Before we leave on Thursday.

SPEAKER_01 35:26

So you gotta get two girls down to go. They're coming out to crew or pace. And and I was your crew chief.

SPEAKER_03 35:32

Correct.

SPEAKER_01 35:34

Um, yeah, I'll just say as crew chief, I made sure I knew all of the locations of the aid stations. I watched the pre-race video because Miranda wouldn't, uh, to learn all of the things that she needed to know about the race. I made sure I knew all the rules that were going to be enforced during the race. Um, and I worked and I made sure because I use an electric car that I had appropriate range to get to all the aid stations uh and do all those off-road sections. And I checked out a few fun roads that I could maybe drive. Moab is known for its really nice off-roading sections. So I was uh excited to use the rib to go down and do that. Um just doing all this prep for like just getting to these places, making sure I know when to get there. I use this app called Ultra Pacer, also not a sponsor. Hashtag could be. Uh they are a really cool app for estimating pace in ultra marathons. So you can load in a course, they'll use existing data about the terrain, but you can also adjust it yourself. And that and you can have custom basically like how much do you fall off as the race goes on? How much do you faster do you run downhill versus uh flat? How much slower do you run uphill versus flat? At what uh how much do you respond to like heat? Do you do you respond better than average or worse than average? And they take all these factors into account and they can estimate basically if you want to get a 32-hour pace, they'll show you what that pace looks like over the course of a race, accounting for fatigue, heat, uh downhill, uphill, terrain difficulties. And so it takes into account all that. It's really, really cool app. Um, and so I went in and I took your estimate of 34 hours for doing this race, which is kind of what you estimated for high low. And you're like, well, I did high low a little faster. Maybe this one will be slightly slower. So at 34. Because it's harder. And I honestly think 34 is a good estimate for you, knowing how the race turned out. And I was able to put in that. I also put in like a few slower and and faster times so that I had at least um sentinels, like something to compare against. So that's something.

SPEAKER_03 38:04

So there's no timing just for the listeners. Oh, yeah, there's no tracking. No tracking, no timing, no way for my crew to have any information about me out there other than what they've gleaned from the previous aid station.

SPEAKER_01 38:16

Oh, we used a little find my sharing.

SPEAKER_03 38:19

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 38:20

Uh, to get that done. But I'm just saying, like as a crew chief, like here's what I did to like prepare um, in addition to making sure I knew everything that was in your bag.

SPEAKER_03 38:29

And then I'll say to our listeners as well, I relied on John a lot to do that. I mean, she does every day, really. Would, but but he wasn't my crew captain for Hilo. And I had two girls pacing and crewing me who had never done it before. So I took in all the knowledge and prepared them, but this was not the case for this race.

SPEAKER_01 38:53

I you got you got to rely on me.

SPEAKER_03 38:55

I got to rely on John, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:56

Do you think you relied on me more than I rely on you for one of some of my big things? Like let's just say you taught 115 last year.

SPEAKER_03 39:04

Yeah, I did. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 39:08

Is that because I take on logistical things naturally? I enjoy that part of the challenge, and you you let me take on the logistical part of this race. Is that the difference?

SPEAKER_03 39:18

That's a big difference. Yeah. And then I think just the lead up, I I had planned ti allotted time to do more. To do more, but the time was taken with a very, very sick dog. And so it was yeah. I mean, I had to.

SPEAKER_01 39:34

And you felt like you didn't.

SPEAKER_03 39:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:36

Did you feel prepared for this race?

SPEAKER_03 39:38

Like Yeah, like physically, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:40

Like Mentally?

SPEAKER_03 39:42

Possibly.

SPEAKER_00 39:44

Maybe.

SPEAKER_03 39:44

Maybe. But like just for our listeners, like not a little bit of a dog sick, I then had to cook all of his food.

SPEAKER_01 39:52

Yeah, I remember the m the night before we left, you spent an hour in the kitchen cooking food for the dog.

unknown 39:59

Right.

SPEAKER_01 40:00

And I know my mom, love you, mom, would say, Oh, I also cook dog food for my dog, but my mother's dog is eight pounds, and our dog is eighty pounds. So that means you cook ten times as much food.

SPEAKER_03 40:14

Right. And this was like time I had not planned on on allotting to that. Um, yeah. So I relied on you a lot.

SPEAKER_01 40:26

So we took off Thursday.

Crew Planning In A Remote Race

SPEAKER_01 40:28

We drove out a day early. We got out to Moab. We got in our cabin.

SPEAKER_03 40:33

That was lovely. Our cabin was adorable.

SPEAKER_01 40:35

What are you thinking the day before we we head up to pack a pickup?

SPEAKER_03 40:40

Well, I'm thinking, why is it so hot?

SPEAKER_01 40:43

It was like 103 the day we arrived. And on race day, the high in Moab was 106.

SPEAKER_03 40:51

And it's 15 degrees cooler in the mountains, but when it's No, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 40:55

It's only 10.

SPEAKER_03 40:56

When it's 106, 15 degrees doesn't make a lot of difference.

SPEAKER_01 41:03

It was easily over 90 degrees at 10,000 feet that day.

SPEAKER_03 41:06

I mean, it was. It was really, really hot. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:10

Yeah. Well, the girls got out there. Any anything else more to say about pre-race or should we get into the race?

SPEAKER_03 41:17

Um, the sleep leading up.

SPEAKER_01 41:19

Uh, there was the night before sleep.

SPEAKER_03 41:21

Right. So I hadn't I had had terrible sleep the whole week. Every time my dog's stomach grumbled, I was like freaking out. And then the night before the race, yeah, like our room had gotten really hot, and the AC unit was really loud, and it was just really bad sleep the night before. Like almost non-existent, no sleep.

SPEAKER_01 41:44

Yeah, you said you were up like basically two hours in. Right. And that was it.

SPEAKER_03 41:48

That was it. So I got a couple hours of sleep. That was it.

SPEAKER_01 41:52

And that ends up coming back to bite you. That's what we call foreshadowing. Let's get into it. Race morning. Uh it's dark. It's dark. We, you know, you seem to be- We have to get up at 3 a.m. You seem to be in good spirits.

SPEAKER_03 42:09

Yeah, I'm ready to go.

SPEAKER_01 42:10

Girls are giggling like crazy. You had Mac and Corey there for pacing.

SPEAKER_03 42:16

Mac and Corianne, two of my girls I run with every weekend. Those girls are amazing.

SPEAKER_01 42:23

So we we went up to the start line, about a 30-minute drive from our Airbnb. And then and it wasn't even an Airbnb. We just used that as like a term for a place you stay that isn't a hotel, right?

SPEAKER_03 42:35

Yeah, it was a vacation rental cabin.

SPEAKER_01 42:37

Yeah. I just call it an Airbnb.

SPEAKER_03 42:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 42:40

Okay. So we head up to the start. Um start line is unremarkable.

SPEAKER_03 42:48

Right. And off we go. And into the desert.

SPEAKER_01 42:52

And uh, yeah, then you go down. I guess the so let's talk about the first section here. You're gonna head uphill on a road for about like a mile and a half, and then you hop on some trail connecting Jimmy Keen, Coco Pelle, and the Porcupine Rim Trails. And then you get on like Porcupine Rim Road. Uh or San, sorry, not Porcupine Rim Road, San Flats Road. And you run downhill on this beautiful road.

SPEAKER_03 43:19

It's a very beautiful, it's like broken cement, if that makes sense. And the views are gorgeous of the desert. There's a cliff on one side, on one side going up, and then a cliff going down on the other. Just beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 43:33

You saw us at mile six, nothing really much to do. Uh, we took your headlamp, that's about it. And then you kept heading down the road. And at the bottom of the road, you're supposed to turn onto the porcupine rim trail and climb back up, uh, back to the same aid station and then beyond. Uh and how'd that go?

SPEAKER_03 43:55

I got a little lost at that time section. What happened? I wasn't looking at my watch. And my watch wasn't set on beep because I was wearing. You were using my I hate the beep.

SPEAKER_01 44:06

I prefer to just sort of like know where I'm going. And I think sometimes the beep just is really annoying. Especially after I ran when I ran Utah 115, the GPX file was just not aligned to the actual course. So there were times where I was running the real course and the GVX was just fucking beeping the whole time. So I really haven't had it on beep since then.

SPEAKER_03 44:28

Right. And so I thought it would beep at me if I went off trail and I was running with a lady who was like, I've run this three times. And I was like, great. And then there were like four other people with me. So it was it wasn't like I was alone. I was kind of like running with people, and we ended up going half a mile past the trail turnoff and then turning around and realizing we were off and going back.

SPEAKER_01 44:49

But that's how did you feel about that?

SPEAKER_03 44:51

I felt pretty I don't, I really don't like getting lost. I really despise that experience.

SPEAKER_01 44:58

Is it do you have some sort of like a emotional reaction to getting lost?

SPEAKER_03 45:05

I think I do. I don't think I've explored it enough to know why, but I definitely do because I was like really crushing Ring the Springs, and then when I doubled a loop that I shouldn't have, I might morale dropped so much that I really didn't do as well as I probably could have that final season.

SPEAKER_01 45:25

You still won that race.

SPEAKER_03 45:26

I still won, but still.

SPEAKER_01 45:30

That sticks in your craw.

SPEAKER_03 45:32

Yes. So I really don't like that. It was not a good, good experience, but I I did shake it eventually. It's like, oh, what's one extra mile in this grand scheme of things?

Race Eve Heat And No Sleep

SPEAKER_01 45:42

You weren't, I don't know if you shook it by the time I saw you next. So you climbed back up, you turned around on the road, you took the right turn off, you got back on the porcupine rim trail. It's overlooking, it's on the Porcupine Rim, which is near Moab, and it overlooks Castle Valley, which is this incredible western view. Like if you think of these spires coming out of mesas across a gorgeous desert with reds and oranges uh across the valley. Castle Valley is this iconic visual of the American West. And you got to run along that. I got to run along.

SPEAKER_03 46:26

It was so beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 46:27

At sunrise.

SPEAKER_03 46:28

That trail was gorgeous. 10 out of 10 would recommend.

SPEAKER_01 46:33

I got a pretty good uh photo of it on. We'll share my photos of Miranda's race.

SPEAKER_03 46:38

Oh, yeah, on the Insta.

SPEAKER_01 46:40

Along with the show notes.

SPEAKER_03 46:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:43

Um, and you guys can check out a view of Porcupine Rim there.

SPEAKER_03 46:47

We'll share a few on Instagram too. We'll do a post.

SPEAKER_01 46:50

So, mile 15, you've climbed along Porcupine Rim, you're coming in. It's a little later than we expected you to come in, and you admitted to losing a mile there. Well, how were your spirits at that point?

SPEAKER_03 47:05

I think they were good. Yeah, they were good. Yeah, I was focused, I was ready. It's starting to warm up. You all uh put ice bandana on me.

SPEAKER_01 47:13

Yeah, I I think heat management was gonna be super important. We brought two ice bandanas. We had a I bought while you were down uh after that porcupine roommate station. I we went down to Moab and I bought like uh 32 pounds of ice and put it in the cooler. I was like, we are not running out of ice, not today. Um, we also saw Katie Grossman and I got to finally chat with Dom Grossman. Hi, Dom, if you're listening.

SPEAKER_03 47:46

Yeah, I ran with her a little bit in the very beginning. She was running the 50.

SPEAKER_01 47:50

Yes, Katie was running her 50 mile. Now, she's been on the podcast. If you guys haven't heard her story, highly recommend. Incredible story of perseverance through numerous medical issues.

SPEAKER_03 48:01

And she's out running ultras again.

SPEAKER_01 48:04

She completed this race, and it is the first completion of an ultra marathon since her 2017 Hard Rock 100.

SPEAKER_02 48:13

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 48:14

That is nine years of uh just working through her problems, right?

SPEAKER_03 48:22

She said this was one of her hardest finishes, too.

SPEAKER_01 48:25

She could be a mascot for running with problems. She really is. So we're really proud of you, Katie. Really proud. And uh that I just saw her a couple times there. Um and I chatted with Dom. But that was the last point that we saw then because after this moment, you went up to do your 27-mile section with no crew aid. And by the time I saw you next, you're on the 100-mile-only course, and the 50 milers have turned around and started coming back. So let's talk about this section, okay, what it involves. It's pretty beastly.

SPEAKER_03 49:05

It's all climbing.

SPEAKER_01 49:06

It's going from mile 15 to mile 42.

SPEAKER_03 49:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:10

And the it is not all climbing, but you are climbing straight from mile 15 all the way to mile 30. Correct. So you you've already been climbing for five miles because you turned at like mile 10. And because you had an extra mile there, you're kind of climbing for an extra one. And you are you have to go 15 more miles until the next downhill, basically.

SPEAKER_03 49:35

Right.

SPEAKER_01 49:35

And the peak of this is man's peak. It's over 12,000 feet. It cannot be cooler than 70 degrees at the top of there. And the whole way up is beating sunshine. Yeah. How much how much shade did you have on this section?

SPEAKER_03 49:52

Almost zero. Yeah. There was a tiny bit right before you came out of tree line.

SPEAKER_01 49:58

All right. So let's tackle this section by section. So you climbed on the porcupine rim trail up to you and to up to where you crossed the highway, and then you hopped on the trail to hazardous aid station or the the hazard trail, the hazard county trail, I believe is what it's called.

SPEAKER_03 50:15

And that aid station had run out of water before me, but had gotten water by me coming in. Um, this was pre-mile 20. This is like mile 19, something like that. And I come into that aid station, I'm able to get water, but they were out of ice.

SPEAKER_00 50:34

So you couldn't refill your ice tending?

SPEAKER_03 50:36

I didn't really have any food or any much of anything.

SPEAKER_01 50:39

They didn't really have much.

SPEAKER_03 50:40

They had like soda and chips. So I was like, okay, not much to do here.

SPEAKER_01 50:46

How are you how are you feeling at this point?

SPEAKER_03 50:48

I'm feeling fine. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:50

Fine. You just need more water and yeah.

SPEAKER_03 50:54

Load up, head out.

SPEAKER_01 50:56

Did you have about electrolytes?

SPEAKER_03 50:58

Um, I had plenty of electrolytes. I had two bottles of electrolytes. I was carrying uh two liters of water and drinking electrolytes in two bottles. So off I go, and I really felt good until like mile 20. I started to feel a little bit nauseous. I'm like, oh, we're at mile 20. But I look at my watch and I'm like, I did I only I'm like, I did this 20 miles well. Like I got to the mile 20 pretty good. Like at five hours, I was like, this is great. This is excellent, better than excellent. This is right where I want to be. This is what I want to be doing.

SPEAKER_01 51:35

Yeah, I mean, minus the one the fact that you ran an extra mile. Totally fine. Everything's good.

SPEAKER_03 51:40

Totally fine. Yeah. The climb though, then begins.

SPEAKER_02 51:46

It is a big fucking climb. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 51:49

Big fucking climb in direct sunlight in like 90 degree heat.

SPEAKER_01 51:57

At 10,000 feet.

SPEAKER_03 51:58

At 10,000 feet. So I am like, you know, I did this six-pass loop I'm telling you all about. Like, even at my final pass, I was a strong climber. Strong. This the way I had to climb this mountain was like step, step, step, rest on my poles. Step, step, step, rest on my poles. Step, step, step, rest that's how I was climbing this mountain.

SPEAKER_01 52:26

The total climb from mile 10 to mile 30 is over 8,000 feet. It's a lot. It's and it just is like And what was the terrain like up there?

SPEAKER_03 52:44

It's rocky, rugged.

SPEAKER_01 52:47

Was it a trail? Beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 52:49

It was a trail. It was a full trail, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 52:51

Okay, all the way to the top?

SPEAKER_03 52:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 52:54

I mean, there wasn't loose scree.

SPEAKER_03 52:57

Uh there were some some ish, but not bad.

SPEAKER_01 53:00

Not bad, okay.

SPEAKER_03 53:01

It was not not super bad.

SPEAKER_01 53:03

But it was steep enough that you were just you were taking breaks.

SPEAKER_03 53:07

Yeah. I mean, not it wasn't even the steepness.

SPEAKER_01 53:10

And you as a strong runner, like I know that you don't you don't take breaks on mountains very much.

SPEAKER_03 53:15

No, it I don't think I think it was the steepness combined with the altitude combined with the heat.

SPEAKER_01 53:21

Everything was hitting you.

SPEAKER_03 53:22

I don't think it was any one thing because if it was just a couple of those things or one of those things, I would have been fine just climbing it like a freaking champion. Um, a couple locals passed me and told me, like, oh yeah, I know this terrain. You're you're like this far to the top. And I'm like, oh my god, these locals, they know how to do it. They're very crushing. Um, so that was a little rough. I got to the top, which was there are a couple false summits. It was, it was an experience. I was so happy to get to the top. I like laid down at the top. I'd passed some guy that was like dying worse than me, and he came up on me, and I was like, I just gotta enjoy this top. I'm like laying down up there.

SPEAKER_01 54:04

This reminds me of when I ran Never Summer and climbing up North Diamond. It's like absurdly steep. And getting to the top is like it just feels like such a relief.

SPEAKER_03 54:15

Such a relief. And then the descent is just like straight down the mountain. Just straight down. And now that's where we hit some like hard rock type descents.

SPEAKER_00 54:26

Oh yeah?

SPEAKER_03 54:27

Just descend down the mountain. And I did, I took that like a champ. I passed like four people because I can just fly down those descents.

SPEAKER_01 54:38

Nice. You started to feel better?

SPEAKER_03 54:40

Yeah, I was feeling great. I was feeling good at that. I still have like low-level nausea in my body, but like I'm dealing with it. I'm navigating. I'm not worried about it. I'm eating, I'm drinking, everything's staying down. I'm drinking a lot. I'm running out of water, which is bananas to me because I had filled up at that hazardous aid station.

SPEAKER_01 55:03

Well, you only brought what?

SPEAKER_03 55:05

Two liters.

SPEAKER_01 55:06

Only two liters, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:07

And I'm running about to run out.

SPEAKER_01 55:09

Yeah, but how long was that how long were you out of aid that section?

SPEAKER_03 55:12

It was a long section.

SPEAKER_01 55:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:15

So I do run out, but I'm only like a mile from the aid station. I get there and I spend a little time there.

SPEAKER_01 55:23

I think you spend like 30 minutes there.

SPEAKER_03 55:26

Really?

SPEAKER_01 55:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:27

Well.

SPEAKER_01 55:28

What you just like recovering?

SPEAKER_03 55:30

Yep, just recovering, drinking, drinking ginger ale,

Early Miles And A Costly Detour

SPEAKER_03 55:35

trying to eat something, refilling my bag. Also, no one was supporting at that eight station, like no one was helping me, so I had to refill all my water bottles myself and just do everything myself.

SPEAKER_00 55:46

Oh, I'm so sorry.

SPEAKER_03 55:48

There was someone who came in a little bit after me. I'd passed him. He had passed me in the beginning, and then I'd passed him on the descent, and then he came in and he was like shivering.

unknown 55:58

Oof.

SPEAKER_03 55:59

Sh full-on shivering. I'm like, ooh, that's not good, buddy. I later found out he had rhabdo hospitalized with rhabdo.

SPEAKER_01 56:09

Gosh.

SPEAKER_03 56:10

I know.

SPEAKER_00 56:11

It was real out there.

SPEAKER_03 56:13

It was that's how real it was.

SPEAKER_01 56:15

It was real.

SPEAKER_03 56:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 56:16

So his friend continued on, which I'll later run into him, but so eventually you left that aid and you were rewarded with like a nice downhill road that was somewhat shaded.

SPEAKER_03 56:27

Yes, it was a nice time to recover. And I ran into two guys, which really helped boost my spirits. Um, Braden and Colin.

SPEAKER_00 56:38

Hi, Braden.

SPEAKER_03 56:39

Hi, Colin. Hi, Braden. It's great to run into you guys. We shared some miles together, chatted a lot, and Braden had um anti-nausea pills.

SPEAKER_00 56:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 56:51

And so he gave me one of those.

SPEAKER_01 56:54

And that that really brought you to life?

SPEAKER_03 56:56

That was incredible. Incredible. So I eventually left those guys and ran in to meet you all.

SPEAKER_01 57:05

Yeah, we saw you at Dark Canyon 8. That's my 42. I had been hanging out with uh Mac and Corey for a while. And we uh yeah, we were really excited to see you. I uh for a while I couldn't see your tracker wasn't moving, but then when you got on Man's Peak, it finally moved, and I was like, oh thank God. Uh yeah, I I was just super stoked to see you. I mean, the whole time I'm I'm basically an anxious mess, like waiting for you. I I just fucking love you and want you to do so well. But we had the whole crew car ready for you right next to the aid station. Uh you came in. It was uh it was good to see you. Mac and Corey received you. Uh we got you uh new ice bandana. I cleaned your feet because you know, you've been out for over 12 hours, so or I guess just under 12 hours. And so it was or no, it was over. It was over 12 hours, yeah. And so it's just really important to clean your feet.

SPEAKER_02 58:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 58:07

And then um, yeah, we got you some food. You were eating okay, you were fine then. I guess that anti-nause worked well. And then I I went off and uh paced you, and that was a really fun little five miles. It was due to my continued pot symptoms. I did not want to sign up for anything more than a short downhill section, but we did find a good little five downhill five miles I could pace with you. And I actually had no pot symptoms, so go figure out.

SPEAKER_03 58:33

Yeah, that was fun. That was a whole fun section. I thought that I was um going to be revived. Little did I know what was to come.

SPEAKER_01 58:41

Well, yeah, I mean, I feel like at the end of it, you were quite revived. You you had a you had a latte, you were eating, you were drinking, you were in good spirits, you were running well. So I handed you off at the Winter Creek water stop to Corey, and you guys were gonna climb up South Mountain. Uh, Mac was gonna go get some sleep, and we were going into the night. So how did the climb up South Mountain, which is really just like a long road climb, right? How did that go?

SPEAKER_03 59:12

Well, I began with a bloody nose.

SPEAKER_01 59:14

Oh my god, the bloody noses.

SPEAKER_03 59:16

The bloody noses begun began here.

SPEAKER_01 59:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 59:20

So I got a bloody nose. I wasn't too worried about it. I didn't really let it get to me or anything.

SPEAKER_01 59:25

I was just like, oh, because you're not like I get blocked so so there's two kinds of people in the world, right? There's the people who get bloody noses and those that have never had one ever, right? You're the one night Miranda's raising her hand to m signify that she is one of these people who have never had a bloody nose. So she did so you don't really know how to deal with them.

SPEAKER_03 59:46

No, I've had like a handful my entire life. I've never been a child who got bloody noses.

SPEAKER_01 59:52

I've never like I as a child, I got one a week. As an adult, I get one a month. Okay. This is this is my life.

SPEAKER_03 59:59

And I've like not even one a year. Like not, I'm not even in that bucket.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:04

So uh how do you handle a blood no blood just streaming out of your nose?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:10

I mean, I l I didn't, you had to teach me.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:13

Yeah, but but I wasn't there at this point. I taught you miles later. I didn't teach I taught you how to handle it at like what was that at like mile 75 when I finally was like, what are you doing holding it wrong?

unknown 1:00:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:28

So I'm just like, well, this is No, I taught you after the race. Yeah, you taught me after the race. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:36

The whole race, you don't know how to you don't know how to hold the bloody.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:38

So I'm like putting the t like I have uh wet wipes that I used for like, you know, you know, emergencies, bathroom emergencies, and I'm like holding one up to my nose.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:47

We went through two and a half packets of wet wipes on bloody noses throughout this race. Just so you it's clear. There was so much blood coming out of Miranda's nose.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:59

I had this this first bloody nose. I have this bloody nose. I'm holding a wet wipe, and I'm like, let's keep going, Corey and I keep going. We're going. And then I'm like, oh no, something's wrong. I feel super nauseous. And then I start throwing up.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:14

This is after you see me. Yeah. So I went, I drove up um two-thirds up the road. I was looking for this one junction intersection where all the runners have to make a hard right turn. Um, and I just figured it would be tricky. The race director said that, like, basically he wants crew to help out with the race. You know, like if the aid stations need something, crew should interact and help out with it. That they're not, they don't really enforce they they don't mind you crewing outside aid stations. Like it's very um, it's very much a rate just an event being put on, and there's not a lot of like strict rule enforcement.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:52

And so I felt especially with so few runners, they don't have to be so strict, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:57

Yeah, I mean, and it is so hard, it's very grassroots, it's a really cool event. Um I got to hang out with the race director later, really enjoyed the time I got to do that. So I drove up to this junction and I basically set up camp. I pulled my car over. I found where the trail went. I actually didn't find where the trail went initially. This runner came through and they ran up this obvious road. And I was like, Yeah, you made the right turn because you're supposed to turn right onto this road. And little did I know, you're actually supposed to you're supposed to turn right onto that road and then immediately turn left onto this completely invisible trail that at night is very difficult to see and is only marked by blue flags with no reflectors. It was, and so uh I with the first runner who came through, we fan we figured it out, and then I helped all the other runners through. So I basically became like a little I've just played music and I sat there and I did some astrophotography and I helped runners find the right trail and I waited for you to come through. Um, and yeah, so I was just I didn't didn't really I offered people cold brew, but nobody wanted it. So it was kind of fun to just like prop up an impromptu aid station, just bit like, hey, uh I'm here to help you guys.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:15

Love it. Uh you came you I came through there.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:19

It was about five and a half miles.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:20

That's when I got my first bloody nose.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:22

And so you got your bloody nose there, and then in between there and the aid station, which is only three miles and not too much more climbing.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:30

Yeah. That's when I started throwing up.

unknown 1:03:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:33

Um, so I'm throwing up with the bloody nose, and I'm like, okay, Cory, I want to do this a little faster, but like let's slow down a bit. Let's see if my stomach writes itself. I'm like holding on to my nose, throwing up a little bit. So, anyways, we continue on.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:50

Were you able to keep gels down after the throw up?

SPEAKER_03 1:03:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:54

Okay, that's good.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:55

Yep, but I was still nauseous, still felt like shit, but kept it down. Finally, the nosebleed stopped. I'm like, okay, God. Nauseous, nosebleed stopped. All right.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:06

And then you guys get into South Mountain Aid, which is a bit of an oasis. There's a lot of cars there, a lot of people there, but the aid station itself is relatively, you know, the whole race is small.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:17

And I and I feel things are going in the wrong direction. I'd have been very hopeful that things were gonna like be better at night with the heat gone.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:28

Because with the heat gone, I mean it was I mean, it was a balmy 65 degrees at 9,000 feet.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:34

Yeah. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:36

I mean, I'm say that facetiously because it should be cooler.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:39

Right. But it was I so I was like hopeful things would be like I'd be able to move really well.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:47

Yeah, because if you if you did feel good, you would have moved pretty pretty well through the night.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:53

Because like let's like like I felt worked at mile 30. Let me just like put that out there. I felt worked at mile the 50k mark more than I should in a hundred miler. But that

The Massive Climb To Man’s Peak

SPEAKER_03 1:05:06

was mostly because of the heat and the 8,000 foot climb. My body felt okay. Like my legs felt like they could move, but my stomach was revolting still. So I was like, maybe if I lay down for a little bit. So I lay down for 20 minutes.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:24

We put you in the car and laid you down for 20 minutes. I didn't want you lay I mean, this is early, this is what like you you had a midnight cutoff at this aid station.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:36

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:36

Now I later learned that that cutoff is basically never enforced.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:40

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:40

But I wanted to keep you on track.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:43

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:43

And you did not have that much time to spare on that cutoff.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:46

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:47

You came in at like eleven twenty.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:49

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:50

So, but you were feeling pretty bad. So I was like, let's get you down for twenty minutes. You slept that whole twenty minutes, as far as I can tell.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:58

I did not sleep. It was like A very like in and out.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:02

Okay. So not good rest. No. But at least rest.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:06

Fitful. Fitful, I would say.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:07

Fitful. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:08

But I was hoping like at least I rested. Let's go.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:13

Okay. So I woke you up or didn't wake you up, I let you know that your 20 minutes were up. Uh you got up, you ate a few things, and then you hit it out.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:22

Yeah. I think we were feeding me broth and saltine at that point.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:25

The next section is a loop around South Mountain. Now, South Mountain is the southernmost loop in the La Salle. I mean, stop me if you guessed that already. Uh it is a pretty interesting mountain area with multiple subpeaks, and the loop around involved two kind of like 1,500-foot descents and 1500-foot climbs. It was 11 miles. It was going to be the longest section you had without aid. I think I estimated that you that on 34-hour pace you would do this in four and a half hours. Um, you ended up doing it in five fifteen.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:04

Yeah, that sounds about right. I started to die even more in the section. So I started hallucinating, which was a bit wild for me. I've never hallucinated before.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:18

Congratulations. Is it fun? It's very fun. I like it.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:21

I don't know. Um it started people want to know. It was a progression. So I started seeing like uh like shadows out of the corner of my eye started looking like marmots or um cockroaches or like creatures.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:38

Um were you thinking about creatures?

SPEAKER_03 1:07:41

Apparently, it's all I saw was animals.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:44

My theory on most hallucinations, like before you get like really crazy bad, uh, is it just you just see what you are thinking about. So if you want to find aid, you see people. If you are afraid of animals, you see animals.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:01

I'm not afraid of them. Maybe that's why I saw like benign creatures.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:06

Ah.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:06

Like I didn't see mountain lions or bears or anything.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:10

Which is hilarious because the locals were pretty afraid of a mountain lion that lives on that loop. But I neglected to tell you about that for fear that you might be afraid of it.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:19

I've run into mountain lions face to face before. I'm not really afraid of that. But then um they got what I mean by they got worse is um they were coming to more and more frequency, and they got more detailed. At one point, like I fully stopped in the middle of the trail, and I'm like, oh my god, what is that? And I saw like a warthog in the bushes.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:47

A boar.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:48

Yes. In the bushes, like full on, fully formed. There it was. And Corey's like stopped, and she's like, took her a minute, and then she's like, that's a log. And the slowly the shape of the warthog slowly morphed into the log that it actually was. But I was like, oh my god, I think I'm going crazy. I think I'm going insane. Like it was like my mind is betraying me. That was the feeling.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:19

Do you remember on TNOA when after we like uh we got to that like pass aid station and we dropped down the four miles, and then we were just on this fucking shh crazy four by four road that I was moving so slow on.

unknown 1:09:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:34

At one point I was like, there's a Jeep straight up the hill, and there's a guy working on it. I don't know if I told you, yeah. But I I think I told you about it after I realized it. But I literally saw a Jeep parked at a 45 degree angle and a dude like working on the tire. And when I got closer, I realized that whole thing was a log.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:58

Man, those logs, they get you every time. Fucking logs. So I'm hallucinating. Then my body starts to like reject things. It was rejecting things out the front end, and then it starts to reject things out the front back end.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:11

So I'm like uh let's just say uh nausea and diarrhea.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:16

Yes.

unknown 1:10:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:17

So and I'm also stumbling, kind of like weaving on the trail. At one point I fall off the trail.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:23

It's just I hope to the mountainside, because most of this trail is like half mountainside, half valley side. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:30

No, I fall off to the side you don't want to be falling off.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:33

Oh no.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:34

I pop back up, I'm okay, I'm stumbling along, and I then the thoughts of like quitting come in my mind.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:44

Wow. What was the what do you think? What happened right before those thoughts?

SPEAKER_03 1:10:48

Well, all those things I just mentioned. Just like it's just the progression. All the hallucinating, all the stumbling, all the rejecting fluids out of end of my body.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:02

Why did you consider quitting? Like, what's the what's the thought process?

SPEAKER_03 1:11:06

The thought process is was like, well, I can't keep going like this. That was the thought process.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:13

Like the way you're going is not sustainable.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:16

This is not sustainable. This is what I'm doing right now, this slow, like zombie pace through the woods is not something I can continue for the remainder of this race. Because for me, this was fairly early still in the race.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:33

I mean, to be fair, you I don't know exactly where you were experiencing this, but this was between Miles, I guess it's like 51 and six no, no, no, 56 and 67.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:50

Which I think is fairly early in a hundred still.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:52

Yeah, I mean, you're before the anything before sixty-seven, sixty-eight is like pretty early. Like it's that middle third that is 100 miles are if you're listening to this and you've never run a hundred miler and you are wondering why do people run this fucking bullshit? 100 miles are this unique distance that are they are so long that when you are so dead tired after running 50 plus miles, you look ahead and you still have 50 miles to go. But they are not so long as these 200, 200 plus milers that you can just say on most hundred 200 plus milers, you can just hike for five days and and make it through. That's a I've never run a 200 miler. I tried to run one this year, it didn't really work out. Um, but generally speaking, people talk about 200 milers as if they're easier than hundreds, and hundreds basically they they fit this inflection point where you have to work pretty hard the whole time, but you get you bring yourself down to a really low point and realize there is still halfway to go, right? It's super unique in that way, and you realize that you you looked ahead and you were like, I have almost 40 miles to go, and I am a zombie right now. Feel awful.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:30

How much um negotiating did you do with yourself?

SPEAKER_03 1:13:38

A lot. Um I wondered what it would mean for like my relationship with myself if I didn't finish this race, if I quit, if I gave up, because I did you think about what you'd say on this podcast? I did not. Sorry, listeners. I didn't think of you all. Um, I thought about like what does this mean for my identity? I've never quit anything before. Like, what does it mean about who I am as a person? Like, what is it what does this mean if I give up now? But I was also like, I can't keep going like this. Like, this is not sustainable.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:22

Did you have a voice in your head telling you to stop?

SPEAKER_03 1:14:27

Yeah, I certainly did. Yeah, the su I the suffering needed to end. And the suffering was the what I was like saying to myself is this isn't the suffering I signed up for.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:38

Like you volunteered for one kind of suffering and you got something else?

SPEAKER_03 1:14:43

Yeah. That which is ridiculous, but that's what I was thinking at the time. Is that like I didn't think I was gonna be like puking and nauseous and my stomach was completely turned and ruined, and my legs were fine. That was like the most challenging part is like that. That like what what suffering am I willing to deal with?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:14

What place did you get to by the time you got back to South Mountain Aid?

SPEAKER_03 1:15:20

The by the time I got back to you was just I I think

Aid Station Reality And Heat Management

SPEAKER_03 1:15:26

I'm not able to think clearly because of the the sleep deprivation. And I just need to fix that.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:36

I have a theory about sleep dep that, you know, I mean, no one's gonna argue with me about this theory. Uh, that it adds up over a few days, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:15:44

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:45

The worst sleep dep I ever experienced was on a hundred where I didn't sleep well for the week up leading up.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:52

And do you think that I mean, I think that's what happened.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:55

I think a hundred percent that's what happened. I mean, I had the worst, most stressful time in my life thinking I was gonna lose my dog, which is the love of my life leading up to this race.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:08

I will not take that offensively.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:14

So yeah, I totally think that played into it.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:19

Um did you think about summit out there?

SPEAKER_03 1:16:21

I didn't a lot, no.

unknown 1:16:23

No.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:24

No, it's probably bet for the best.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:26

I think so. And um, yeah, so I was like, I just need to fix the problem in front of me, and the problem in front of me right now is sleep deprivation.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:37

So I saw you coming up the hill. I had I had gotten a few hours of sleep um in the car, and I was getting up. I knew you guys should be there at like 4:30. You were not there. You got there about 45 minutes later, saw you guys coming up the hill, received you. You weren't really coherent that well.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:01

I wasn't.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:02

No. I can imagine. Asked you how you felt. You said nauseous, diarrhea. Um, you said, I'm not in a good way. I think I got a text from Corey. I forget what it said, I can look it up, but uh, something about like she's gonna need to like get better.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:28

And so I knew you were basically destined for a nap. I was like, this is gonna be a nap time. We're gonna get you in. I quickly assessed in two to three minutes that you needed to not go to the aid station. You need to just immediately get into the car. So we got you in the car, and I told you that, you know, you came in around 5:15. Uh, you there was a noon cutoff. Now I knew they weren't really enforcing cutoffs, but there's a noon cutoff later in the race. And um, Ultra Pacer was predicting you to get to that aid at 10 a.m. So I knew you basically had two hours against that sort of flimsy but somewhat real cutoff, right? And so I I told you you had plenty of time and you could sleep for an hour. I and it seemed like you really needed from from the text I got from Corey and the way you came in, I immediately determined, like, hey, you really need some help here.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:27

You need to be, you need to be cured. Yeah, and so I did not want to do another 20-minute nap. I wanted to give you the freedom to sleep. And so I was like, you have an you have an hour, go sleep. We got you on this new mattress, by the way. So we got this new mattress from Hest. It's a it's a Hest foamy, is what it's called. It's all uh memory foam, no air, and it's like a glamping mattress. It doesn't roll up that tight, but uh really, really comfortable.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:55

Yeah, yeah, it was amazing. I mean, and then I really slept. Let's just like I slept on that mattress, and I not like that fitful 20-minute nap situation I had before. I was out fully into deep sleep, no dreaming, nothing. Out.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:14

Corey, who had been running with you or hiking with you all night, she slept in the front seat. I sat in the driver's seat. I just waited. Waited for you to get up.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:28

And then you woke me up an hour later.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:30

At 6 15, I woke you up. I think I said, it's time to think about getting up or not getting up. Or like uh, or I guess it's like it's time to get going or quit. It's like you either need to get up or decide you're not getting up.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:48

Because I I've seen people, you know, once you get into bed, it's hard to not, it's hard to get out of bed. You uh you you you woke up briefly, you sort of winced at the idea of having to get up, closed your eyes for two seconds more, and then you sat up. And it took you another 25 minutes to get out of that aid station, but you walked out of that aid station with after eating and and you you got all your clothes back on, you got out of that bed, and you kept going. What were you thinking then? Like, what's your mindset like waking up? Like, were you still determined to get to that finish line? Or was there still a battle going on?

SPEAKER_03 1:20:32

There was still definitely a battle. The battle between wanting to continue to sleep and have the pain be over, and then the like conversation. Well, like Is it is that is my stomach fixed? Am I fixed? Like, did that nap do what I wanted it to do?

SPEAKER_01 1:20:51

Because you only said you were gonna quit if you couldn't fix your stomach.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:54

Yeah. And as I drank, as I like started drinking and eating, you all got me some broth and I started drinking a coffee, I started to realize like, oh, I'm not nauseous anymore. And then that was what like kind of started to like encourage me. And then once I left that aid station, it was like, okay, I'm gonna finish this thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:20

That was when you knew.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:21

That's when I knew.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:22

Miles 61 point 67.1 or whatever.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:26

But up until then it had been a big question mark. But then once I left that aid station, I was like with Corey, and I started feeling better and we started moving well. That was great.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:38

And on the course design, leaving that aid station, you you start to return towards the finish start line. The start-finish line. Yeah. I always feel that's a really meaningful change. Every time I'm on a run, any run, could be two miles, could be 200 miles. As soon as you turn towards the finish line, it feels like you're making real progress.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:01

And I just felt better, like better as mentally more focused.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:08

How is that section technically? I heard some uh there was this uh there's this mother. She had she came in, her her two kids, so it was her uh son and her daughter-in-law, were running together. There were a lot of people who ran this race together.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:23

Smart, smart since it was so remote and lowly.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:27

Yeah. They were ahead of you at mile 42, they were behind you by the time South Mountain

Meeting Trail Friends And Getting Nausea Help

SPEAKER_01 1:22:33

won. And so they came in after you left at South Mountain 2. Or maybe it was like while you were sleeping, they came in. I can't remember. And and this mother is she is so fucking gung gung-ho about ultras. Like, this is not a mother who's like, oh my god, my I can't believe my daughter's doing this. It was like, you better get your ass in, get off your feet. We need to get you taken care of. Oh my god, we gotta go, and then I'm gonna pace you. It was great. She was great. So yeah, she uh she took uh was interested in hanging out with her. She actually paced that section. I remember talking to her later. She said that the next section that you were on now uh was pretty heinous technically. How did you feel about it?

SPEAKER_03 1:23:18

I don't even remember that being a technical challenge at all. Not even in the least.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:28

Well, I don't know really know where she's from, so who knows?

SPEAKER_03 1:23:32

Yeah, yeah. No. I was great. It was a good section. I had a good time.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:37

So you had about eight miles to get to mile 75. I drove down one side of the mountain all the way around, picked up McKinsey, woke her up, drove her up to the mile 75 spot so we could receive you. You came in, you had blood coming out of your nose.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:55

Oh, I got another bloody nose on that section. Uh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:59

Luckily, McKinsey had a tampon.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:02

She put up my nose.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:03

There's a great photo of you with a tampon up your nose.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:07

We'll we'll post it to the I think it should be Insta.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:10

I think when you post the Instagram for this art for this post, it should be the photo with you with a tampon up your nose.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:16

Oh my god. It's pretty epic. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:18

It's a pretty good photo.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:20

I mean, I I had blood on my face for the rest of my like I'm not sure who the photographer was. I had blood on my face for the rest of this race. There's another video of me eating bacon with just like blood all over my face, eating a piece. I'm like eating, which is amazing. Then my stomach came back. I was able to like just eat normally, which was life-changing.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:47

Yeah. GI distress is probably one of the most detrimental things to ultra running.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:52

Yeah, that nausea was rough. But yeah, made a return. I got once I got McKinsey, that was amazing.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:59

So mile 75, you switch pacers.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:02

And you are off into the the heat of the day again.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:06

Off into the heat of the day again. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:08

So mile 75, you're heading out to get to Geyser, that's along a road.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:14

Right. That was like a four-mile, five mile climb, something like that.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:17

Five miles, 1700 feet.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:19

And that was non-eventful. We did that. We passed some people who were really suffering on that.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:25

I mean, it was exposed again, hot.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:28

Yeah. And because of my nap, I then started like passing the back of the pack. That was kind of my I was I was solidly back of the pack.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:36

Yeah, you were you were close to the cutoffs for sure.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:39

Yeah, I was back of the pack, and then I'm because I'm feeling better, I'm starting to like pass the back of the back of the pack.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:46

And then out of geyser, you have a nice long descent on some what looked to be pretty good trail.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:53

It was great, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:54

And then you ran it, you got to Uwa Lake and you found me there.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:58

Yeah, you and Corey were there.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:00

And there's this really good photo of you like screaming in excitement of uh seeing us. It's it's good. You guys should check out my uh photo um album of Miranda's race. I took a lot of great photos with both my Fujifilm GFX 100S2 with a 20 to 35 millimeter F4 lens, as well as my Fujifilm XT50. Um, I had a few shots with a 27 millimeter um f uh 2.6, and then I also have a bunch of shots on the uh 50 to 140 f uh 2.6.

SPEAKER_03 1:26:41

And at this point, I'm not worried about time anymore. All time goals have gone out the window, and I am only worried about keeping it.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:52

Well, you you already knew you were gonna finish, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:26:55

Yeah, I knew I was gonna finish.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:56

You just had to get it done.

SPEAKER_03 1:26:57

Just had to get it done. And we have 13 miles to finish. I see you guys, I get cooled down.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:01

We got you a new ice bandana.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:03

You got me a new pair of shoes.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:05

New pair of shoes, and then you just had 13 miles to go.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:09

Oh my god, listeners, that last 13 miles is not to be trifled with.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:15

I don't think so, no.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:18

This race is brutal to the very end.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:23

Relentless.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:24

Relentless, savage, as Hannah would say. Savage to the very end, my god. We still had three gnarly climbs left.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:37

Yeah, you had to climb to hazardous. We climbed hazardous, and then you had to climb to gold knobs just straight up.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:43

And then gold knob is this like out and back. That is like very mean to do an out and back with no like there's no, it's just on our system that you did it. I did it. Listeners, I did it. And okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:00

And then finally, after Gold Knob, you're like descending off this last mountain of the race.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:05

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:06

But there's one little uh fuck you climb.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:08

Fuck you climb. But I am gonna say about this race is I think the way that the race director wrote this course is to cover every beautiful scenic section of these mountains. That gold knob was so beautiful. And then this final climb,

Nightfall Nosebleeds And First Vomit

SPEAKER_03 1:28:29

I'm so mad this final climb is like through the bushes, like bushes are whapping me in the face. It's super rocky and it's so steep. And I'm just like dying climbing this. And then you run along this beautiful ridge that's has a steep drop-off, and the valley beyond is so stunning. I'm like, okay, I forgive you. This is beautiful, so beautiful. So I just I really John had said something to me, like, just try to enjoy it. And I really was able to finally, in that that final section with McKenzie as my pacer, really enjoy it. Like I settled into the fact that I was gonna finish. Time no longer mattered. I was gonna be back of the pack. It really didn't matter. I was still gonna finish this thing. And I just really enjoyed those sections. My feet hurt, my body hurt, my stomach was great. Like things were great. And I just was able to settle in and enjoy the views.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:37

It took 95 miles, but you finally did enjoy it.

SPEAKER_03 1:29:42

I did. And then the final descent was very mean. It was very mean. It was on this rocky, jeep road with all these giant boulder rocks. I thought I was gonna get a fun descent of the finish line, but no, it was it was cruel. It was cruel on 100 mile legs with 95 miles on them to descend that five miles to the finish line. But I made it and I did it. 3743. A very hard-earned, long finish for that brutal, brutal hundred miler.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:32

Congratulations.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:33

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:35

What are your thoughts on it now, a week out post-race? Like, what are your thoughts on yourself and your capability, your limits?

SPEAKER_02 1:30:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:48

I think it was pretty incredible. Um you experienced more GI distress than I've ever experienced. Um, you, despite how much you described grappling with wanting to quit, you handled it really well from my perspective. A lot of people, I'll just say most people in this sport, because most of us are traumatized, we catastrophize, we have a large negative voice inside our heads. And when things get real bad like that, when when things get, when you say, this isn't the suffering I signed up for, right? When things don't go to plan, that negative voice becomes louder and harder to not listen to. Uh and I've seen it time and time again in myself as well as in other people that it is hard for most new hundred milers to come to terms with that voice. And to see you address your problems head on and say, if I can't solve these, I don't think I can continue. And when they were solved, you were like, okay, I guess I'm continuing. And I think that that um I don't know, that directness uh about how you addressed your problems is just incredibly uh remarkable. I feel like you you run hundreds the same way. I run hundreds, but it took me like eight years to get there, to get here. And you do you're you're in your second year running hundreds. And I think that's just um I just I just don't really understand you.

SPEAKER_03 1:32:43

I really appreciate that. I I guess I um I'm having a hard time appreciating that about me. So I really appreciate you and Corey um sharing that and me being able to see that through both of your eyes. Because I am still like hard on myself for those weak moments because I'm so unused to touching those weak moments. Even though That was the goal. That was the goal, even though that was You said you wanted to find I wanted to find it because I've never touched it before. I wanted to find it and I found it and I kind of like I reject it.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:30

Like I You really dislike quitting.

SPEAKER_03 1:33:32

I really dislike that like part of myself, and I I found it. I wanted to find it, and I found it, and I just don't like it. Like I didn't like it. I did not like being that person who wanted to quit something I really wanted to do. Really interesting, though. But all of that's interesting.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:55

It's just I mean, that's what hundreds allow you to do. And and to a new side of yourself. Whoa. I mean, it's not a new side. It's a little bit more like taking off all the covers that we put over ourselves.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:11

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:12

Like there's a core part of ourselves that we cover up every day. All the time. And hundreds strip those covers bare and allow you to inspect yourself.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:23

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:23

And you've found that you are uncomfortable with failure. And I to the point that it drives you to continue.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:32

Yeah. Uh-huh. Uncomfortable with it.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:36

Maybe, maybe, maybe you'll continue to explore that. Explore that one.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:41

Yeah, I don't have a full analysis of it at this time, but all I know is in high low, um, I never touched that side. And I and all the as all the layers were removed, I just I really liked the version of myself that was under there.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:00

And I mean, I like it.

SPEAKER_03 1:35:03

I loved it. I liked it. And wow, to think that like, okay, when all these filters are removed, I really like the version of myself that exists under here. And this race was not that experience. All the layers started to be removed. And I saw, I saw what it would look like to quit. And I didn't like it at all. At all.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:38

Well, that is very interesting.

SPEAKER_03 1:35:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:41

I'm proud of you. 3743. You 100.

SPEAKER_03 1:35:46

3743.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:48

High in Moab that day is 106.

SPEAKER_03 1:35:51

The two guys I shared miles with, they both ended up dropping.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:57

The mother who was encouraging her son and her daughter-in-law. Her son ended up in the hospital, and her daughter-in-law ended up finishing.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:07

I love that. I love that so much.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:12

This is a real race.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:13

It was a 42% drop rate in this race.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:17

It's a it's run by low-key good people. Uh, Jordan Ricks. Uh I got to hang out with him a bunch of the finish line. He, you know, he's a race director. He's in it for the right reasons. He's trying to keep a good community of people together

South Mountain Loop: Hallucinations And Quit Talk

SPEAKER_01 1:36:40

and host a race in a place he loves.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:42

It was beautiful. So I definitely recommend it, but not for the faint of heart.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:51

Would you like to get Jordan on the podcast?

SPEAKER_03 1:36:53

Yeah, let's get Jordan on the podcast.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:55

We'll get Jordan on the podcast.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:58

Any other final thoughts before we close?

SPEAKER_03 1:37:01

Final thoughts.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:03

Shoutouts to Katie, obviously.

SPEAKER_03 1:37:05

Shoutouts to Katie. Great to see you out there, Katie. Congratulations on your finish of the 50 miler. Super excited to see your return to running and racing. You're a badass. Keep going. Um final thoughts. I'm gonna just um I give a piece of advice.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:26

Oh, yeah. That's right. We do that. We do the piece of advice thing. I it's been a while since we recorded.

SPEAKER_03 1:37:32

Yeah. Piece of advice.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:34

It's been a busy summer.

SPEAKER_03 1:37:38

Uh even if you think your race is over and you think it's time to quit, I'll bet you there's more to give. There's probably more in there.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:56

Reminds me of the Barkley for me.

SPEAKER_03 1:37:59

Right?

SPEAKER_00 1:38:00

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:38:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:04

Because it wasn't like um, well, people always complain about how I turn your stories into my stories. So I'm not gonna do that. I'm gonna not do that. When you think there's no more to give, I bet there's a little more to give. This story from Miranda.

SPEAKER_03 1:38:22

Signing off.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:24

Thank y'all listeners for listening to this. It's been a long episode. Um, we're gonna get back to a little bit more regular episodes after this. Uh, summer's been pretty busy, but things are looking cleaner from here on. So we just appreciate y'all. Um, we love making this podcast for you and uh hope you enjoy it. Go out there and uh tell us your stories. We want to hear about it. We love seeing listeners out in the wild and um let us know what you're running and where we should be. Uh I submitted an article to Ultra Running magazine. We'll see if it gets published. Um, but yeah, it it's just been amazing to you know, we're over three years into this podcast. Miranda's changed as a runner.

SPEAKER_03 1:39:16

You've watched me change.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:18

I've changed as a runner.

SPEAKER_03 1:39:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:22

We've changed as podcastos.

SPEAKER_03 1:39:24

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:25

Changed as people. And um it's been an interesting ride. Um I'm happy to be here with y'all.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:37

See you next time.