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| Pennsylvania's state flower - and the source of Laurel Ridge's name. |
Seven years.
I've not been writing "Enjoying the Journey"
posts that long, but I've been on the journey that long. It was seven years ago
(maybe even this month) that I devoured "Born to Run" while on
vacation at my parents' home near Johnstown, PA. I was enthralled by the idea
of running unheard-of distances on rugged trails in beautiful places! I'd been
working on my health and fitness for a couple of years and I was looking for
something to serve as a challenge and a source of goals and motivation, and I
knew immediately that I had found it.
"Why I'd bet I could even hike the whole Lost TurkeyTrail in a day right now," I thought to myself - and then I convinced my
Mom and my two children to join me that very weekend as I tried it. They all
bailed out at nine miles, but I continued on alone for another nine before I'd
had enough. That left about eight more miles of that trail unfinished.
It seemed like this trail running thing might be a little
harder than I expected. Good!
Lost Turkey was just a 'baby trail' near Mom and Dad's.
As I looked to the west from the little knob their house sits on I could see
the unbroken wall of Laurel Ridge running as far south as the eye could see. Up
on top of that mountain, I knew, was the Laurel Highlands Hiking Trail (LHHT) - and I
knew there was an ultramarathon running its full 70-mile length every year in
June. If I was going to run an unheard-of distance on a rugged trail in a
beautiful place where else would I want to do it but on the LHHT - on the
mountain ridge in the shadow of which I had been raised?
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| This view is of the Conemaugh Gap, taken from Daisy Town, PA. I grew up just a few miles behind the photographer. The imposing line of Laurel Ridge (left of the Gap) extends, nearly unbroken, southward for seventy miles. (Photo credit - "buzzpittsburgh" - http://www.panoramio.com/user/6184872?with_photo_id=58296125) |
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| This satellite image is about 20 miles south of the one above. The left/upper end of the white line is about on the LHHT on top of the ridge. The right/lower end is on what used to be my maternal grandparents' farmhouse. |
If I had known then the degree to which I overestimated
my renewed 'fitness' I would simply have abandoned the idea.
I'd watched how a few friends prepared to run a marathon
or two each year and figured all I had to do was commit to training harder and
longer than they did. I could do that! Whenever I set my mind to something I'm
serious! From the time I firmly committed to the goal I had twenty months to
train for the 2011 running of the race, and I figured that would be ample.
Well, my first ultra didn't happen in 2010 as I had hoped
it would though. I limped through the year nursing persistent PF and working my
way through a variety of other injuries. When that 2011 running of the Laurel
Highlands happened I was on a forced layoff from running due to a developing
tibial stress fracture. Not that it mattered much. I had well understood by
then that I was nowhere near ready for a 70-mile trail run yet. Still, I
refused to let my 50th year go by without finishing my first ultra. In August I
returned to the Lost Turkey Trail and finished that 'run' solo-self-supported.
Counting that one 27-ish mile effort I had a total of less than 800 miles on my
legs that year when I ran/walked/death-marched my way through the Oil Creek 50K
in October and I officially became an ultrarunner!
I needed a new plan for Laurel though. Finishing 50K on
so little training only served to ram home the understanding that seventy miles
was unfathomable. The new plan would be another twenty months of training. I
would run the Laurel Highlands 50K in 2012 so that I could learn the first
thirty-one miles of the course in preparation for finally taking on the big one
in 2013. I finished that 50K, and it was a real eye-opener and a reminder of
the scale of that mountain by comparison to anything I had yet run. Then a
trail 50M with 10,000' of elevation gain later in 2012 took me nearly sixteen
hours to finish and left me broken again through the end of the year. I would
be a fool to tackle a longer race with even more elevation change in June when
I wasn't even sure I could successfully start training again in January. I was
still just not ready.
Things did finally begin to change for me in 2013 though.
I switched to roads. It hadn't been a plan or anything. I just really wanted to
run a Laz race and the only one remotely within my capability was the StrollingJim. Restarting training in January went okay, and for the very first time I
trained methodically and ran a springtime race in a way that felt competent to
me. That October I finished the CanLake 50M (another road race) in well under
eleven hours - again, feeling (mostly) competent. My trusty annual 50K trailrace in Rochester that November? Again, competent - and my 50K times were on a
consistent improvement trend.
All of this was good because I had succumbed to the siren
song of Vol State.
What?! You've got to be joking, right? You've just gotten
your ultra legs under you - finally - and you're going to run 314 miles across
Tennessee in July? Well... Juli had said I could when my weekly mileage was up
around 40-ish... and it was... and Vol State had captured my imagination at
least as much as Laurel Highlands ever had. Oh, and my daughter wanted to run
it too...
The Journey has twists and turns that cannot be foreseen.
That is part of what makes it so much fun.
In April, 2014 I ran 50K in under six hours (finally) at
Lake Waramaug. Then I discovered the true love of my ultrarunning life -
multidays - at 3DATF a month later and I learned things in 72 hours there that
were invaluable to know two months after that on the roads of Tennessee. Life
changed forever on those roads. Then three months after that I brought my time
at the CanLake 50M down under ten hours.
Finally, I was ready. I would run the Laurel Highlands in 2015. It would be the culmination of everything.
If you've read me before you know what happened. Mr.
Big-Stuff-Vol-State-Finisher thought a little too much of himself! Mr. B.S.
figured a 70-mile trail race would be practically a 'gimme' at that point.
"Sure, I can run the 72-hour at 3DATF and then hit Laurel four weeks
later. I'll just need to run a few trails in the spring to get my 'trail legs'
back under me and it'll be fine." Well it wasn't fine, and Mr. B.S.
couldn't make the first cutoff at nineteen friggin' miles! D.N.F.
So now it's been seven years. Seven years since a
clueless non-runner looked at a mountaintop and said, "I want to run
that." It's been a long journey, an unexpected journey, an incredible
journey. I cannot say that I've loved every minute along the way, but I value
them all looking back on them from here.
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| Ohiopyle Falls - right near the start of the Laurel Highlands Ultra |
Juli will be there, and nothing could be better or more
appropriate to close the circle, to 'tie a bow' on this part of the journey!
Juli was one of the first on the ultra list to send me a note of encouragement
all those years ago. Juli told me I could do the Vol State. Juli helped this
generally introverted loner to understand that the journey is really about the
people that you meet along the way - and Juli is one of the best of those. That
I can toe that line-of-lines for me alongside a friend and competitor like Juli
and share as many miles on the trail with her as the vagaries of ultrarunning
permit is the greatest of gifts. If she beats me I imagine I will see her
smiling face waiting for me when I make it in. If I beat her she will see mine.
There will be hugs. I like those.
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