Saturday June 24, 2017, 27 miles (43 km) - Total so far: 136 miles (219 km)
I think Catra's boyfriend Phil might be the kindest man in the world. We both showed up at the portaloos at the same time this morning and only one of them had TP so he let me go first. He was still waiting when I got out, so he clearly was in need as well. It's these moments of human kindness...
Tara's FB post about her blisters.
The usual breakfast routine, charging phones (via a converter attached to a truck), eating, filling water bags, getting blisters taped etc. One of the staff, John, shouted "first wave in five minutes!" when we were still about 30 minutes from start time. Panicked heads swerved and he said, "OK... I'll just do it now..." and gave a friendly hand wave. Hahaha. It was actually extremely funny at the time. Candice wished me well, which I so so appreciated. She and her girls would be at one of the aid stations, and there were going to get popsicles for hot thirsty runners.
Today Reid finally went ahead and started the second wave on time instead of waiting for me. I don't know why I can't do this; honestly every night I laid out my stuff and tried to plan in advance. I left about four minutes after the rest. Remember that figure. Four minutes.
selfie w/Jean-Michel: Lawrence and Florence of Arabia
First person I pass is Tara and her blisters… she looks so uncomfortable but she just forges ahead. I ask her if she gets sick of people talking about how amazing and inspiring she is. She says "just keep going..." and I honestly don't know if that's her personal mantra or a request. [She got pulled at 20 miles because she wasn't going to make the cut-off, but she finished every other stage and is pretty fucking amazing and inspiring.]
Next I see Jean-Michel, who like me has started every day slow and gradually passed many runners.
... and then I see Bill and we stay together long enough to grab some pics...
Bill, by Sue
Sue, by Bill
At some point I start to think about turning this whole experience into a writing opportunity. I don't know what's involved in getting to be an "ambassador" for various running products, but I know several people who do this. I don't mean sponsorships like the pros get, but the kind of thing where some company occasionally sends you free shoes or nutrition (or these cute Nuu-muu dresses please! everyone keeps asking about them) in exchange for blogging and instagramming and hash tagging. Basically you're their unpaid advertisers and I don't think you have to be an especially elite athlete to do this. I generally scoff when people say "you should write a book about your adventures" because I'm hardly the only person who does this; on the other hand I've definitely read some poorly written books and boring articles so maybe it's not totally crazy. The woman who wrote the original "Mozart in the Jungle" said more than once that I should have my own reality show.
Anyway I still have several unfinished bike blogs at the crazyguyonabike site, so who knows if I'll ever follow through on this.
The final day's marathon comprised a relatively short uphill (relative to what we did on the expedition stage, that is) following by a gradual descent to Moab. The one exception to this general downhill was a 4.5 mile out-and-back on the Porcupine Rim Trail. Candice, her girls, and the popsicles were working the aid station which was at the beginning/end of this spur. I quickly refilled, chose my popsicle flavor, and moved on. Not far into the trail I saw Amanda returning and calculated that I was already an hour behind her. I KNEW she could run! Shortly after I saw Bill who concurred that she was moving like a gazelle and kicking my ass. Things were finally as they should be today -- everyone was kicking my ass. I passed very few runners on this final day.
I don't think I was running any worse than on the other days; I think everyone else finally felt like themselves again and I no longer had the advantage of heat tolerance / long climbs / big mileage. (Yes, 26 miles, much of it on pavement, was one of the easier days.) I also saw Brian, the consistent winner of every stage, on his way out from Porcupine Rim, hauling what looked to be a twenty pound stone on his shoulders. The deal was that at the turn around point we were to find a bowl of rocks and grab the one with our number on it, or any other one for that matter. (They threw in extras in case anybody messed up and took the wrong one.) We had to carry them back to the aid station to prove we'd gone the distance. To taunt Brian, they'd put his name on an enormous stone, which he wasn't actually supposed to take but he thought it would be funny.
From his FB page: Brian back home with his souvenir stone. It actually weighed 34.4 pounds but he only carried it the 2.25 miles back to the popsicle aid station. Wimp.
the bowl of rocks. They also made a special one for Tara's blisters. My little #18 is on the right
This guy posed for me on my way out of Porcupine Rim Trail
Today was the first day I had any sort of intestinal discomfort -- nothing out of the ordinary, just a bit of "runner's trots." This is another thing that has improved beyond my wildest dreams over the past year and a half of running. I once pooped on a sidewalk like a dog in an expensive DC neighborhood, but my body seems to have adjusted. (All you grossed out non-runners out there, believe me, this is a thing which gets discussed a lot.) Anyway the dress really helped with taking care of this, but I didn't bring enough paper towels. Guess what I resorted to! A rock! Not the one with number 18 on it though. That's a memento that now sits on my reed desk. Luckily all the aid stations were equipped with hand sanitizer since dirty filthy runners were all coming in and touching the same water containers.
Let me also say a bit about dirty filthy runners. None of us had a shower or laundry the entire week, it was over 100 degrees, we were sleeping in tents and running lots of miles. At no point did I detect any body odor on anybody. I'm just putting this out there because so many people use the lack of work showers as a reason not to bike commute. There's a lot you can do with running water and a wash cloth, plus a change of wrinkle-proof clothes. I doubt I'm going to convince anyone but it's on my mind.
Down off my soap box and back to Utah...
I carried much less water today than the other days and did run out a couple miles before the finish. There was no danger in this as by this point we were close enough to Moab that there were lots of vehicles on the road, some of which resembled the Mars rover, ready for off-road adventure. Since I was no longer passing runners and we were in a more touristy area on pavement, the last few miles felt bittersweet -- like the adventure was already over and I was back into civilization. I didn't want it to end, but I was also getting really thirsty. I don't recommend running out of water in the desert.
Getting close to Moab
The finish line was in the parking lot for the Slickrock park where Bill and I attempted to mountain bike 13 years ago. We hadn't been able to get through the "practice loop" let alone attempt the real Slickrock Trail. This truly is an adventure wonderland.
Bill at the finish
Sue at the finish. This little white dots are champagne. That's Hans on the left. I saw on FB he's got a marathon coming up -- in San Francisco where it'll be cooler.
a better version of the route profile, from an interpretive marker at the Slickrock parking lot.
Here's the final scorecard..... note that the difference between me and number two finisher, Jeff Knakal, was ONE MINUTE! That'll teach me to be ready on time. (Probably not and of course there were a thousand other places where I could have saved that minute ... but I still found it funny.) The part I really found interesting was the times for the final stage. I love that Shane (guy who puked next to me on day one and was pulled on day two with heat exhaustion) pulled out a 4:21, and that my girl Amanda was next with 5:00. I imagine Brian's 34 pound souvenir slowed him down a bit. Several other people I'd been effortlessly passing all week were an hour or more faster than I was. This makes much more sense.
That evening we had a group dinner where the awards were presented and people were invited to get up and share their feelings about the week. I was so overwhelmed by the experience I didn't know where to start, so that's what this blog is for. We had booked an extra day in Moab and had a good sleep, an enormous breakfast -- again revisiting a place from a previous trip, this time the Eklecticafe, HIGHLY recommended -- packed the bike, and drove through Arches National Park. Bill said he could come back again and again to Arches and never tire of it. That's good, because we've already re-upped for next year's Desert RATS. (Reid offered a huge discount if we signed up within the week.) We'll make a longer trip of it next year to have more time in my favorite place in the world.
My other favorite place in the world, in the Car2Go after picking up Bella from the dog sitter.
My new bling and 2/3 of our cats