2014 3 Days at the Fair - Afterthoughts

This is Part 4 of a 'three-part' report. :)

Here are Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.

In this final post I want to do three things:

1. Fill in some 'color' I feel is lacking in my personal narrative to the point of painting an inaccurate picture of the true character of the race.
2. Talk about what recovery from a 72-hour was like for me - something a multi-day noob reading this report might be interested in reading about.
3. Summarize the important things I think I learned doing this race.

If none of these topics appeals to you, you should probably not read on!

2014 3 Days at the Fair 72-hours - Day 3

This is Part 3 of a three-part report. Here are Part 1 and Part 2.

Day 3

We set up my stuff at a new location - the covered pavilion of a Rotary or Kiwanis club building right on the corner of the final turn. It was a nice spot, again with picnic tables to spread my things out on - and situated just before timing.

I spent the first hour or more getting ready to get back on course - most of that time carefully taping my feet. I chose to go with the kinesio tape. I taped the balls of both feet. That was the finicky part of the job because I had to trim the tape carefully to cover the foot pad without getting up into the creases of my toes where it might rub and cause a problem. I also taped one big toe, and applied several strips of tape across the bottom of each foot wherever the skin felt really tender.

I think I worked on another iced coffee eye-opener while I did this.

After taping was done I very carefully put on clean, dry socks, and then stepped into the flip-flops. Finally I was ready to give this a try and I walked stiffly and gingerly away, taking the long way around the aid station building as Rick had instructed the previous night, to re-enter the course just behind the timing gate and begin mile 98.

2014 3 Days at the Fair 72-hours - Day 2

This is Part 2 of a three-part report. Here are Part 1 and Part 3.

Karen and I headed from my site to race HQ.
As usual, this is the only picture of Karen from the race. :(
(Photo credit - Tom Butler)

Day 2

Many people say that the worst day of a six-day race is the third day. I've sometimes speculated this was the reason that records are not kept for 72-hour races. Why would elite multi-day runners want to go through the worst day and not go on? Then I started talking to three-day runners and they, almost to a person, say that Day 2 is in fact the hardest day of a 72-hour race - and they are right.

Day 2 is when you are first really pushing past sleep deprivation. Most people have gone through one 24-hour period with minimal sleep. Not so many have done it while pushing their bodies to ultra endurance distance. Even fewer have tried to push that into a second day. It seems that there is a 'wall' of sorts to sleep deprivation that has to be pushed through, and this wall comes on Day 2.

This particular Day 2 also brought the rains.

2014 3 Days at the Fair 72-hours - Day 1

This is Part 1 of a three-part report. Here are Part 2 and Part 3.

At the start of 3 Days at the Fair.
Oh how fresh and confident looking!

Bing! My eyes popped open and suddenly I was fully awake. I was sweaty and I smelled bad, but my legs didn't hurt as much as they did when I laid down two hours earlier.

I was in a little two-person tent pitched on the grass just off a road on the Sussex County Fairgrounds in Augusta, NJ - site of the New Jersey State Fair but, on this weekend, the venue for a running race called "3 Days at the Fair." The 'bing' marked the end of a pattern I would repeat several times during the next two days or so. I would retire to the tent, dead on my feet, barely able to move - spend twenty minutes or so shifting around trying to find a position that didn't hurt too much to go to sleep and then (once I'd found it) zonk! Out like a light, spending about an hour in a deep haze of unresolvable dreams, occasionally mingled with the voices of other runners passing by outside. After an hour, the sleep of the dead would give way to that lighter phase where you pass back and forth between half-wakefulness and full sleep, always fighting the wakeful part until... bing!

I yawned and drew my legs up, stretching them and then checking my feet for tender spots. Everything felt surprisingly good given that I had already run and walked 50 miles in the preceding 17 hours. It was still dark outside, so I had at least four hours to add to my mileage total for the first 24 hours. The race clock never stops! It was time to get going again - and I really needed to use the bathroom anyway.

2014 Jack Bristol Lake Waramaug 50K

Morning over Lake Waramaug, CT.
27 April 2014

When I was putting together my race schedule for this year everything centered on Vol State and what might help me get there and succeed. The first, obvious choice for the centerpiece of training was the 72-hour at 3 Days at the Fair, starting May 15th. There I would get my first experience with multi-day racing (I've always believed in just-in-time training/preparation in ultrarunning - it works for me... sort of).

Next I started looking around for a good 'normal' race to serve as peak training for 3DATF. The Jack Bristol Lake Waramaug 50K sort of 'bubbled up' on UltraSignup and seemed just right. Almost three weeks before 3DATF, a road course - and a legendary race in its own right as a bonus. The 100K at Waramaug is the oldest continuously-held 100K race in America; this year was its 40th running.

Seemed like a chance to make my tenth ultra something special! As always happens, the race I choose merely for a 'training run' soon has goals and excitement of its own.