Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day 50K: Feb. 29th, 2020

Nice views from Dogmeat

This race in the South Bay mountains takes mental and physical toughness to a whole new level, the term sadistic comes to mind as an accurate description.  Ram convinced Shaun and myself that it was a good idea to sign up.  The entry fee for the race is $0 and it's completely self supported.  In order to reach the start line for the race you have to do a two mile hike with 1,000 feet of climbing.  To add to that challenge you have to carry all your personal "aid station" supplies with you on this hike.  We were expecting full sun exposure today with temps in the 70s so I knew that I would need some cold beverages and water for what we were about to undertake.  I froze some water and gatorade which I would put in a cooler with some food to take to the race start area.  That was a heavy cooler to carry up there but I knew it would be worth it in the grand scheme of things and it definitely proved to be!  I met Shaun and Ram in the parking area and we carried all our stuff up that hike to the start line.  There was no official race start time, in fact, everyone knew the objective of the day and would have GPS watches to track our time etc.. so you could get out there at anytime of your choosing.  Looking back on it now I think I would of preferred to get out there super early and do part of the race in the dark cooler weather.

Such an appropriate message!

So, your probably wondering what the actual course of this race consists of.  Well, there is a climb in this area called Dogmeat, it's basically a 1.5 mile trip up with 1,000 feet of elevation gain.  The race starts at the base of Dogmeat and the concept is simple: go up the climb and come back down and keep doing that pattern 10 times!  The downhill was not easy either, it is an uneven fire road which is very steep at times, your body really takes a pounding when you run down this thing.  I knew this sounded horrible before I even signed up so I have no idea why I ended up trying it.  I guess the fact that it would test me mentally and physically was appealing and peer pressure also had something to do with it.  I met Shaun and Ram at the parking area around 6:00 am.  We hiked up to the base of Dogmeat with all our stuff and got started right away.  To my surprise there were already a few people up there who had started before we did.  The first trip I did without trekking poles and after that I knew I was in for a long day.  The second trip I started using my trekking poles as I needed the help on the steep parts of the climb and they also assisted on some of the steep downhill sections.  Shaun and Ram seemed to be climbing a lot stronger than I was.  The downhills were beating up my quads very badly and all the pressure from the pounding went straight there as I was nursing a sore knee.   

The pacifier is hilarious

I wanted to slow down and told them to go ahead and I would just do the day at my own comfortable pace.  They pretty much denied me of that request but they did slow down for me which I was thankful for.  Shaun was nursing an injured hamstring so he was about the pace as me after a few trips up and down.  On the 5th trip up, the sun was out in full force and it became quite hot which added to the discomfort of this thing we were embarking on.  I was really happy that I had frozen some gatorade and it really hit the spot after each trip down Dogmeat.  Some a-hole was drinking the water that Shaun carried all the way up Dogmeat and didn't even ask if it was ok.  Most people in the ultra community are top notch.  I don't think this guy was an ultra runner.  In fact, I think he only did like 2 out and backs.  It put us in a bad frame of mind but we didn't have enough energy to get worked up over it.  

The last steep part of Dogmeat

This was just a brutal race from start to finish.  There was one big tree on the climb about 3/4 of the way up and it provided just a tiny bit of shade however it was a great place to take a little break each time up Dogmeat.  We started calling it the Tree of Life!  There were maybe 30 other people out there doing either the full 50K or just doing a few trips up and down and it was fun to see these people over and over.  We would just look at eachother and smile because we all knew how brutal this really was.  I think the 8th time up about broke me and I didn't really have any desire to do two more trips.  Once that was done the 9th trip was motivating because we knew only one more after that.  The last trip was very satisfying as we knew that we were almost done.  On the way back down the 10th time Ram slowed down right at the end to wait for Shaun and I ran past him to finish, not because I wanted to finish ahead of them rather I just wanted to be done with this nonsense!  I still get teased about that to this day, I just had to be first and I saved my energy burst until right at the end etc..

So glad that nonsense is over!

We did the 10 out and backs on Dogmeat...30 miles and 10,000+ feet of climbing in under 8 hours which I thought was extremely good considering how tough it was.  After crossing the finish line I was so damn grateful to be done.  All we had to do was hike two miles back to our cars while carrying a bunch of crap..haha.  This race absolutely destroyed my quads.  I was signed up for the Marin Ultra Challenge (MUC) 50 miler which was only two weeks out and I had zero idea of how I could even do that race.  Within this time COVID-19 had started spreading more rapidly in the U.S. and they decided to cancel the MUC 50 just a few days before the race so the pandemic made my decision for me.  In fact, pretty much all the races in California ended up getting cancelled after this point in time so I was happy to get two races completed in 2020 before COVID mania swept the world.  I don't know if I will ever do this race again as it seems like a good thing to do once and then never again. However, I am easily swayed by peer pressure so if any of my friends wanted to do it then I would unfortunately follow along like an idiot!