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  • Day404 the big one / Rocky Raccoon 100

    I really don’t know how I pulled off this one to run and finish the Rocky Raccoon 100. But yay, I did finish.

    It was the coolest race I did. Long but top of the line race support and community. People of Texas put up an amazing race.

    1. The race is noobish friendly. I picked it for this reason since I had two previous failed attempts in running the 100 and I wanted to finish this time.

    a. what made it new comers friendly? The course is looped, 5 twenty mile loops, so it is a “relatively” short course, the course though has the ability to lengthen itself with each passing lap. There are three on course Aid Stations, and four if counting the start/finish. They allowed plenty places for a drop bag (each aid station is a drop bag point).

    b. plenty of Aid Stations. AS is what can make or break a run. We have one about every 4-5 miles. They were superb full service aid stations. Aid stations for an ultra usually mean full supply of everything you can ask. What saved my race was a cup of coffee during the early morning and as well a hot salty cup of I don’t even know what it is, but I think it was ramen extract package mix in a cup of hot water. I drank that down thinking it was hot coco, that got me running at 3 AM in the morning. And I ran when many others were walking.

    c. Drop bag. At rocky raccoon you can leave a drop bag at any aid station. So you can bring along your favorite food/drink or stuff you need at almost anywhere on the course. Or drop off stuff in the middle of a run was really helpful! My strategy was to run light! I saw some crazy people carry a huge hydration bag on their run and they could hardly move, but I decided to ditch my hydration pack and only carry a hand bottle. I ditched my bag and jacket at an aid station during the last lap, that made a difference in finishing or not finishing the race.

    Dropped off that extra five pounds. I don’t know why people were still lugging around theirs on their final lap. Maybe for toilet paper — gosh the lady in front of me just pulled off her pants and pee – I turned away pretending not to see, meh. Good thing though she wasn’t carry her pack. I didn’t ask if she needed some toilet paper. Afterward she let me pass on in front. I think it was her lady friend (a pacer) needed her turn. I think her friend was a bit squirmish to drop her pants. When you gotta go, you gotta go. (I had a similar experience at the wee hours when the girls kept following doggedly behind me and I couldn’t shake them off – I waited until they passed, of course.)

    d. crowd support. You never expect to have a crowd support at an ultra, at least not in a traditional sense like at a marathon since normally the course is so spread out. But this race course is small enough (like at most is 5 miles out from anywhere), there is campground in couple places. We have the huge park to ourselves – they reserved it for us this year. I tried to get a camping spot, but unfortunately unable to… due to my procastination – early bird gets the worm as they say. Anyway, you see people from time to time.

    The interesting thing about this race is they allow people to set up tents, not the camping tents but those picnic three side tents along the starting/finish line on either side. So at every lap you run through this village of people/tent city and they cheered you. Runners brought their kids and family along and they set in their chairs waving and cheering even when you are half dead. I love it. Things were a bit subdue at 3 AM but there were still people there. One or two had their camping tent there though they were not allowed according to the park rules.

    e. plenty of time to finish. We were giving 30 hours, plus an extra 2 for those who wanted an earlier start time. I started at 7 in the morning so I had 31 hours total. It was just about enough time for me. I finished at 28.5 hrs. I almost thought I wouldn’t make it to the finish line. Silly me – strange ideas flew through my head during a night of sleeplessness.

    f. terrain and elevation. I think it has a total around 2000 ft. That seemed to be a lot for a marathon, but with ultra, it was almost flat. All of the hills were runnable. The terrain was rough in couple places – this race is known for ‘rocky’ but it was mostly due to roots and not rocks. I tripped over them a few times, but none of them were a fatal race terminating event. My friend unfortunately had to end hers at mile 40 and this was her 3rd attempt.

    A 100 mile race is hard no matter how friendly and easy they made it to be. It was mostly on trail and few miles were on a dirt road (the gate portion). My experience from this race was sleep deprivation is terrible.

    I was walking with my eyes opened but I could hardly counted as being awake. A few times I almost walked into a bush. I saw weird stuffs – like a bush suddenly turned into a deer and I startled myself and then it turned back into a bush. A few times I thought someone was standing in a shadow watching me. Maybe it was hallucination or maybe it was real.

    I wish I had flew in a day earlier to able to sleep better before the race day. I arrived on Friday afternoon. Getting a rental, and race day supplies, and hotel, by the time I settled in it was pretty late. I was too excited to sleep until around past 2 am. I had set my alarm for 3, thinking I would head out at 4, since it is an hour drive to the race site, and I wanted to be there by 5. I had only a moment of eye close before the alarm went off. I snoozed it, then my second alarm went off. By golly it was 4 am now. I was lucky to get an extra hour in. I woke up and was fine. There was a bit of that hazy-head but I sat around a bit for the body to warm up, then I felt good enough for a shower. I ate some and was ready to head out. I arrived at 6 and the parking lot was full by then. But lucky someone pulled out and I got a spot. There were still many arriving after me. They would have to park at a remote lot that is like 3 miles away. I’m thankful I didn’t need to do so. I tell you, it still took me an hour to walk to my car after I finish the race because I was basically limping – one step and rest for five minutes and another step and rest before I made it to the car. I can’t imagine what I would do, if I had to go another 3 miles to my car.

    The morning went well. Personally I prefer to have started with the 6 o’ clock crowd, but things just worked out for a 7 o’ clock start. I didn’t have to use a head lamp. Less weight, and less stumbling in the dark. Sunrise was just around 7, so the trail was visible.

    My first lap was strong. I tried not to go out too fast but it was hard to control myself. I found couple great people to follow. I called the guy a bionic man because he ran like a robot at a steady mechanical pace. The three other guys behind me were just party people. They were loud and talked the whole way. Luckily I parted way with them a little after. I was with them for maybe 10 miles. The course was more gentle than I imagined (I did study the elevation profile). The terrible infamous rocky roots were not that bad. I ran on more challenging trail than this. The trails were wide and most of them were double trail. Yes it is a fast course as the organizer previously informed us.

    My original intention was to bypass all the aid stations since I had my dropbag at the starting line, which is my private aid station. I figured I would be looping every few hours to allow me to get water/food/and change of clothes.

    Not sure when that plan started to fall apart, whether it was the second or by the third lap, the official aid stations were pretty tempting not to bypass.

    LAP 1 – I finished the first lap around 11 am. A decent time. Each subsequent laps took much longer.

    LAP 2 – My goal for my second lap was to arrive back before sunset since I didn’t have the head lamp on me. I made it my goal of not carrying my hydration pack, which mean none of the basic stuffs were on me. Why carry one when everything you need is five or six miles away.

    The ideal pace would be 6 hrs per lap with 30 hours for the whole 100 mile. I hope to arrive back at the starting point before 6 when it gets dark. I arrived around 4-4:30. I was two hours ahead by then.

    LAP 3 – Going out for the third lap, now the sun has set. I hoped to finish it by 11. They warned us that it would be cold and we should carry a jacket. I don’t remember much after that but I did make it back before midnight. I think it was around 10 pm. Word about this is once the sun had set, the whole environment changed. You could no longer see where you are running even with a flashlight. The place was no longer recognizable. Weird isn’t it, but you get night blindness from the headlamp. The best ones for me were the dimly lit one, then you can see some shadow of trees and bushes to serve as a guide to the trail and can see a almost like in the morning. For me though, the night run became mostly stumbling in the dark. Oh you see all kinds of lighting devices people have. The most popular kind was a waist belt with a row of light. Very interesting. They lighted the whole path. I also saw a guy with christmas light wrapped on him.

    What I think people were carrying so much silly stuffs were because this race had the 100km crowded. They are noobies compare to us. Of course they walked. The pro already finished theirs in the afternoon, so you only had the weird crowd at between 10 – 2 am at night trying to finish their 100km.

    Lap 4. When did I start lap 4? This was probably the longest lap. I think I went out around 10 pm and hoping for 4am/5am start for my final lap. I took some food before starting. Was it a can of chicken noodle? I started feeling nausate at the time, which is normal, since the body started to shut down the digestive system on a long run — at least from what I read.

    I don’t remember much of my fourth lap except yes it was cold. The whole night is cold. 40F. I knew it beforehand but I had no idea where I packed my gloves. Couldn’t find them. Luckily I had those runner jackets that have the extra long sleeves, where you can poke your thumb through on the side.

    This was also the most lonely lap because by then the 100km people had left. Also the pros for the 100 miler are finishing or would be finishing. They were on their last lap and you still had two more to go. It was just depressing.

    The last two laps were mostly just stumbling through. My body mostly refused to run. Did I say it was cold! I like put on everything I had on and still I was cold. I came in for my final lap an hour before sunrise. Was it at 4:30 am? It didn’t get warmer with the sun rising, I can tell you that.

    Aid station was great though. They worked energetically through the night. A fellow runner I was with during the deep of the night stopped at the dam (they nicknamed the place damnation) and she told me to turn off my lamp. I was WTF, who you telling me what to do. I was like at the point of exhaustion. F* the sky. Then she kept on insisting, pointing to the sky. I was moved to tears, because it was the most spectacular night sky I saw. She remained just maybe a mile or two before running off. The moon was there too. It did give me a burst of energy to run for the next 10 miles and she also told me to ask for coffee at the Aid Station. I also didn’t know ramen and mash potato was a thing. She said it easier to slurp that way and it packs plenty of calories. This sweet angel probably saved my race because it was very tempting to quit during these late hours of the night. I didn’t bring along a pacer, but her suddenly appear and stay till I got my groove back somehow served as my needed pacer.

    Lap 5. I finished the 100 miler around 11:35 the next day. It was 28.5 hours since I started. Even though when I started the last lap, it was guaranteed I would finish, like hell I had 8.5 hours to do it, no way I wouldn’t. Still there were doubts near hysteria – I was repeating in my head I can’t make it in time. Not sure why, but that was my mentality… I felt like I needed 10 hours. I was walking and unable to run. I was jealous of those who still could run. Majority though was walking and walking very slowly. Every bench I saw I wanted to sit and close my eyes, even if it was just for a few minutes would be heavenly, except it was too cold to be sitting. I know if I did, there is no way for me to get back up.

    It was quite a scene there when you see a bunch of us as slow as we can get and still competing for a slight advantage because you would think everyone walks at the same pace, and I scratched my head why some could walk so fast effortlessly while at my pace I was unable to catch them. I did see a guy, he did finish, maybe an hour after me, but he was bending side way the whole time while leaning on his trekking pole. I was thinking how he could continue. He did it one step at a time. We were in various state of misery.

    Any joy from the whole ordeal? Yes nothing happier than when we coming through the finishing chute. Cowbells clanking, music blasting, I attempted to run the last few steps awfully, but that was most satisfied moment. A silly fellow runner attempted to challenge me to sprint to the finish. I had nothing left in the tank. She won. It might be the same lady who asked me to look at the stars a few hours before.

    I picked my buckle and did a few remaining things like locating my dropbag. I could hardly walk but I did limp to my car. Rolled down the window, wolfed down a few things I still had — F* the squirrels or raccoons for stealling all my remaining croissants that I forgot to put away. At first I was mad, thinking my fellow runners ate my food but then I saw the tell tell bite mark on the container lid. Humans don’t eat plastic. I was so straving but I was unable to keep awake much longer and soon felt into a deep sleep.

    I did not know how I made it back to the hotel. When I woke up after everyone was gone. I slept maybe 3 hours in the parking lot. Somehow later, I managed that hour long drive back to Houston. I was in the dreamlike state during the whole ride, but that will be another story for another time. I should have stayed at the park for few more hours of sleep. However, I wanted that nice shower the hotel offers. I was going to go out and eat, but couldn’t will myself. Also the fear from my ride back to Houston hadn’t left me. I went to bed early and slept until the morning. I cooked myself a big meal at an god early hour at the hotel, then ate my own body weight, but still I was hungry afterward.

    There is probably some feel good lesson to close this. The whole run has been pretty peaceful. I can probably point to the earlier experiences preparing me for this. I was not a complete noob to say the least. The last four years have prepared me. I know how hard it was to stay on my feet for 24+ hours. I had been through the tougher runs in Atlanta where the sun was burning hot – even at night and we had to climb a mountain at the end of the 60 mile. I had endured thirst and hungry and blisters on my foot and various runner related problems. This race in comparison is easy. You can say, if one set ones mind on it, you can accomplish anything. Hmm. Or good preparation is 90% of the work. Or if you don’t succeed, try again. For me, indeed third time the charm. Nope, those are good lessons, but I think what make this trip worth it, is just to be able to run and have the same shared experience with other runners. I feel happy about it. A runner gave me a pat on the shoulder and said nice work! That was enough, and I felt accepted into this rank — I’m now an ultra runner.

  • Day403 update

    I’m still here. Just have been goofing off on twitch. I wish I can tell you all the weird stuffs I found there. I mostly watch music streams though, but a lot of IRL chats (in real life) are quite entertaining. I watched like 8 hours of a guy biking in Japan (Robcdee). If you want to waste time go on stream. It is not just for gamers. anyway…

    Just want to let my readers/followers (twitch uses followers) know that in about 30 hours I will be going to Texas. I am excited and pumped.

    Yes it is for a race/run. A 100 miler. The race will last around 30-32 hours. If I run it under 30 hours I can have my name entered in a drawing for the Western States, which is like the crown race for Ultras.

    I have semi packed my suitcase. It is a bummer because I hate packing. I want to bring everything and half of my stuffs do not fit. I will have to repack it tomorrow night. Now I just chill and go to bed.

    I booked my hotel and car rental today. Yes the trip is on unless for any last minute change, which I don’t expect any. I handed off the stuff needed to do at work. Anything should be taken care of. As I know this trip is a go.

    One last thing is food. I will figure that part out once I land. Orignally I wanted to shop here and bring what I need there so I don’t have to go to the supermarket to reduce the risk of exposure of the coronavirus. It cant’t be help.

    Also I will be staying Houston instead at the race location, figuring first it is cheaper and second, everything is more readily available in Houston. The airport is nearer and some good restaurants too.

    The race site though is an hour away, so I will probably get up at 3 in the morning. Race is at 7 but check in is at 5. Then it is 30 hours.

    I hope there will be phone signal so I can update the world my progress during the race. If it is not available, then people just have to wait until next week when I am back.

  • Day402 dream

    I dreamed last night with many loud noises. I was not in a thunderstorm but it sounded like I was. There were a lot of loud rumbling. Very loud sounds. I was on the verge of waking up but I was not yet there. I wanted to make sense of the sounds hoping to see some pattern in them and wanted to sleep more.

    I did see a lot of blinding flashes but they were not lightning. There were no shape or pattern, just white flashes filled my vision. It was not all dark, but I couldn’t see anything. After a while, everything was quiet and very dark and I woke up.

    Does it correlate to what I was doing during the day? I listened to a lot of music channels on twitch last couple weeks and it might have been sensory overloaded.

    Trip: Yup weird dream. Unrelated, but it affected me deeply that the trip to Texas might have be scraped and it might be what prompted the dream. I need a covid test within 3 days before boarding the plane. I would need another test before flying back. I will get tested, but it is another added uncertainty in my travel plan – like what if I got stuck in Texas for couple weeks? What would I do? I don’t mind not being able to fly out but not able to come back is another thing. Anyone in the Houston area able to take me in for couple weeks if I get stuck?

    Or plan B drive 22+ hours down there and back? Anyone up for a long drive? Plan C is don’t go.

    correction: testing is only required for international travelers, so I will be fine for going to Houston. It is still recommended to be tested before boarding the plane though for everyone safety

  • Day401 goofing off

    I found something that is better than yt. It’s tw!!

    why tw? Because you could instantly interact with the performers as they perform.

    Been spending 24 hr on it. Not sure why watching people singing and goofing off on camera for hours is so addicting.

    Some good ones though (those who called themselves professionally/classically trained) are not getting the view they should be getting but the goofey ones got tons of views

    I guess if people like good music they would go to a performance, but for some lightheart entertainment the web would do

    I found myself some streamers to follow. The coronavirus pandemic has pushed the gig economy to the web. Too bad there is no livestreaming runners on tw.

    Oh I did some running this week, so it was not all goofing off with watching vods.

    Why gamers change the term vid to vod? cooler I think. probably a vod means unedited. I know it stands for video on demand.

  • Day400 last review of 2020? (and into 21.1)

    I have been waiting for this day forever. Readers as you might notice the pattern that I have slow down my posting. It was a bit intentional on my part. I have been soft inting.

    I have mentioned many posts ago maybe around November that I was tilting… It became a hard tilt. I messed up big time. (gamer term). It might be even gg. (game over)

    I didn’t have much interest in running since. I usually only blog when I run — that just what I do. I find lot of energy and passion when I run, but when I don’t run my creativity is just not there. I stopped running that much for the last three or four weeks, so fewer blogs were posted. It was a hard tilt I am telling you. (gamer term)

    So here it is Day 400: A summary/highlight of the past 50+ days.

    You can check Day 350 for comparison. (love the search function and finally my day numbering is able to pull up the entry fast instead of scrolling to it).

    See my Day 396 for the review of the year. I will try to avoid doing the same thing. Same for the Top 10 pop-offs. If you have been following, there is not much new here.

    There were a lot going on as well as also not much going on. So ya hard to explain. I don’t write much about my down time. Winter is my down time because I am too lazy to run in the cold.

    Let focus on what I was hyped first. The biggest run I did was the Seneca/Stone Mill run. This has been mentioned in a few posts already. Looking back, it was not that scary at all. Fifty-miles is still a lot with Stone Mill being my second attempt at 50 but it came out to be a piece of cake. I was freaking out before the race, feeling I was under-prepared and was stressing about the hills and all. I only specifically trained for it the two/three weeks leading up. However, I ended the race feeling pretty strong. There were a bit of “weak” or low points during the event, but my strength came back every time. I saw people left and right were peeling away after the first 20 miler…but I kept getting a second wind and a third to out sustained them. The race was safely in the bag. Hey, I was not first or second or anywhere near the front pack, but I felt I won the race. It was just an awesome experience. Yo man, I wish I could run like that all the time.

    The next race after was the Devil Dog. I was hyped to be able to get an entry. It is one of highly sought after in our area. DC area does not have ultras. This one is it besides Seneca. This year they limited the number of participants. But I got myself an entry. It was just a 50k, but I might say, this was harder than Stone Mill. I enjoyed the challenge. There was grit and all the grind to get the race to the finish. I highly recommend this for those who love slugging it out. This was the race. Their real distance is a 100 miler, so some day I got to attempt the real thing, but the 50k gave me a feel for it the Devil Dog it was.

    Gettysburg was a fun one. A marathon. I think was the only fall marathon I did. It was short, fun, picturesque. I went up to Pennsylvania one early chilly morning to do it. Duh, the famous Gettysburg. I did not have much memory of the event. It was small, peaceful, and a successful run. I love running marathons. This was one of them. I have done so many, so this one was one of the low-keys (not that it was not good, but I had so many super good ones, and a normal marathon seems to be normal-boring and does not stand out). It might be the last ever because the race organizer told us they won’t be able to get the permit for us to run in the national park any more (I think also neighbors didn’t like us running on their roads too). That is the rule for most/all national parks, i.e, no organized sport event. So I kind of feel fortunate to be able to have done it. Last time of running through the hallow ground. They said they will try to still have the race next year but without going through the park. I still would recommend people to do it.

    I also had many spectacular personal runs besides races. Signal Knob was one. I ran on Bull Run Trail. And Waterfall Mountain. Spent many weekends on the Senecca Trail. You guys just have to go back to read them. I am kind of lazy in linking them or to tell you why they were great. I think they were memorable because they had to do with slugging it out. A run might seem super hard at first, but in the end, I did it. Overcame!

    I did some group runs with the Virginia Happy Trail people (VDM1/VDM2). Rock N the Knob was good too. Well that was a race. It had the social vibe. As well as hard. I love hard runs.

    All these might not make any sense now to me since there was a big gap in time. I tried to think of I had learned, maybe something profound in this period, such as did I grow in my running?

    Runners struggle too. I try to think what motivate us to get out on a cold and nasty day to run? And usually by ourselves for a long extended time. Sometimes when everything click it does not need that much motivation at all. But there were times even when the weather is pleasant, I can’t seem to push myself out of the door.

    I call that the big tilt of 2020. I seem to gloss over what went wrong. One was after getting a speeding ticket, I didn’t want to drive out to the country side any more. I felt I was being (unfairly) picked on and there was just a fear it would happen again. This fall I had switched from running on the road to running on trails, and when the trail was not available, there was very little incentive for me to run. I have been staying in the last 3-4 weeks.

    A Second problem I had was with time management. If you want to do something you had to do it quick and early or else other things would be unendingly get in the way.

    And if you want to do something, you have to do one thing a day and only one thing. This should be my philosophy.

    However, I started sliding when I tell myself there is still much time left in the day. Yet time flies! I felt cheated each time I look at the watch and it shows like 5 minutes to the hour. Reason is my mind divides the hour into 100 units instead of 60. However, 50 minutes is not halfway, however, my brain thinks 50 is halfway. Before I knew it, hours go by and daylight becomes night and when it is dark outside I don’t feel like running. We only have about 8 hours of daylight. My mind always think we have 24 hours or at least 12. Noo, only usually got 8. And useable hours is usually only 2 or 3 hours “personal time”. So unless I run, those hours can easily disappear, Even on weekends! No especially on the weekend. Don’t you feel weekends are always so packed?

    Hence, only should try to do one thing and one thing only. And Start early! TL;TR

    Also, usually by the time it gets dark, I also get hungry. By the time I cook, and eat and clean up, it would be time for bed. Every day I went through that same cycle and was unable to get myself out the door for a run. A big tilt! Yes, if I have a schedule,…, and follow…, then I wouldn’t waste time. Still I think motivation has something to do with it. A bog word but very hard to pin down. Where is my motivation?

    I have been seeking that passion to re-ignite the flame in me. So that once I run, I don’t ever want to stop. I know I have it, but hard to bring it to the table sometimes.

    Outake? My Raccoon 100 is coming up in a few weeks. Yes I need to get hype up and so do my prep.

    Hope this post isn’t too long. Next post (Day 450) will be about the raccoon race and where I’ll go from there. Maybe more on motivation stuff. Until then PIZZAA (peace-z-out)

    p.s. see, it is Saturday here my time, but instead of writing what I’ll be doing today as I usually would, I was reflecting…see more tilting on the way

  • Day399 Flex

    those who served, vienna Fairfax

    Not trying to make any statement…just something I saw on my run

    Why is the flag flown at half staff? anyone? Is it because of last week? “insurrection?”

    Short blog today… my sister said my blog is always too long.

    Learned a new web thing today. TL;DR

    I thought it was a typo people put on their blog. I used to code in html right, and I thought sometimes the code accidentally got leak to the page.

    Oh, it means don’t read any further (Too long don’t/didn’t read)

    Got a new pair of shoes…hope to try them this weekend. to break them in

    Brooks…Cascadia – Black with orange strips

    Meta: yes another filler post

  • Day398

    This won’t be a full blog, just some thoughts.

    I was looking into microblogging but not the popular ones.

    I joined discord last year, when I wanted to listen a live stream of a translator of a web novel I was following. It is a cool piece of software.

    I thought it was an open souce. I am a big friend of linux and stuff where anybody can come and code. Sadly it is not. It is the next big thing though. If the company goes public, I might invest in it. Keep an eye on this.

    Anyway, discord is an amazing concept. It is a bridge between a traditional social media and the “new” easier, voice chat.

    I was looking something like that but is open source. I didn’t find anything close.

    I used to use identica before it changed to pump. It is still available but that seems to be dying.

    I was not a big friend of diaspora. I installed that before but couldn’t keep that running. Also that project seems to be at a deadend.

    Friendica looks ugly and I never really fall in love with it.

    I just found mastodon. This seems to be viable.

    I am not too into irc, so discord is not my thing. Microblogging, I am warming up to the idea. Mastodon seems to be my thing… I just need a server to run it.

    Somewhat relating. I used to use ikiwiki to blog. Oh how time has changed.

    why this post? A filler 🙂 I need to get to Day400

    update: I gave into the big corps. I started twitter at the end of year

  • Day397 Top 10

    I am a bit vain this year to do a top 10 of 2020 of my runs.

    2020 compares to 2019, let’s see. 2019 had tons of going on. I ran my first 50 miler plus going to Chile afterward for Patagonia and did many other stuffs. Thought can’t top that, can I?

    But 2020 was not a dud. Still I am kind of scratching my head trying to think of what did I do in 2020. What happened there. So here go boys and girls, the top 10 of 2020 Antin’s running report.

    10. I had Carlsbad Marathon (plus attending a wedding). Yes what was I thinking? It was a 007 operation

    9. Seneca Greenway 50K. This was pretty dope. We were on the edge of having that canceled due to Corona. We got through by the skin of our teeth. We ran it before masking was required. Yike!

    8. GVRAT. The rat race. Awesome in its own way. I ran 1000 miles. Never done anything like this. I ran across Tennessee virtually.

    7. GSER. I went to Atlanta-Georgia twice during the peak of the second wave of the pandemic to do this virtual run and both times DNF-ed (failed to finish). We could label it as GSER1 and GSER2. Unbelieverably hard and risky. There were BLM protests and all (I saw more police than protesters though). It was one of the epicenters of what 2020 is about (as you know still ongoing with the elections). I had the boots on the ground! I can say I was part of history. Hey, we take that — both the good and the bad.

    6. CRAW. A virtual race across the world and is still ongoing. We ran over 5,000 miles. The fun never stops. 31,000 miles is the end, so 26,000 miles to go. We will definitely be crawling. Are we an airplane though?

    5. Camp Anderson. Another virtual event but WTF, everyone showed up in-person and we cumbaya at the camp… true, glad it was just 10-15 of us and not 150-200. It was still a WTH moment. I had a good 6-hr endurance run. Never was a run so hard. Great people though

    4. Gettysburg Marathon. Thought all in-person races were canceled? I was able to “sneak” across the state line to do this one early morning (I didn’t tell my family). At the time they were not strict about needing a rapid corona test. Love this race though

    3. Rock N the Knob. RTK. half marathon. Awesome trail race. Nuff said. Hardest of hard freaking race…”I need a sherpa”…who came up with a trail and a trail name like this? I will go back for a second. Yup, already registered it for 2021

    2. Stone Mill 50. SM50 stressed me out like no other race. We started in the dark and finished in the dark. Way finding wasn’t hard, but I was worried the whole time of getting lost since “those” trails were not on any maps and the RD kind of handwaved that they were there. We did it that I got to say

    1. Devil Dog the Lite version. 50K. Hmm. It was the last race I did. In December. Pog! Just a 50k but it has a “heritage” and I felt like I ran the 100. This means I need to do the real 100 miler version some day to earn it – a true devil dog

    (Meta: I’m too lazy to post the links to the journal post of the runs I did …maybe some day I will go back to add them. By the way, just go to my run history page, it has the same thing)

  • Day396 looking back

    It is a new year and some years I really looked forward to doing New Year Resolutions but the last couple years I have been lazy/avoiding them.

    Maybe because it is facing the reality that they are so hard to do! There are easy stuffs but then there are impossible dreams I want and well they end up being impossible.

    2019 was the year I acually sat down and wrote out a bit of resolutions and I have on and off referred back to them last year. I might have grown out of them this year.

    Not in any particular order. About eating well…I finally stopped eating out much. I used to ate out 2/3 times of all my meal (yes even breakfast sometimes). Now it is usually only once meal a week. I could do better. Not about eating out, but about my choices. I am still eating a lot of processed food. I need to get on fresh fruits/vegetable diet. 2019 was the year I had high cholesterol count in my body. It is probably still high. (I avoided having a physical last year, but can I deny the reality this year?) This is proven to lead to an early death from cardio-pulmonary disease unless I do something about it. I am considered the high risk population with family history of this disease. I refused to go on medication at the time. I said I had to look into it, such as rhe risk of medication side effects (liver damage) versus risk of the disease. The brief medical survey I did, then to favor medication path. Well two years now, I think I need to make a decision soon.

    I was led to thinking about this after coming across statistics on mortality. Life expectancy is 78 for people in the US. Men are a few years lower and women are a few years higher.

    Retirement age is between 65-67. Some are retiring a few years earlier. I am still have quite to go before retirement. However, time flows fast. I was just thinking a few years ago I started running. How many more years can I do it. I have been filling up my schedule for next couple years with races. Of course I hope to run all fifty states in the US. I have done 7 so far.

    I am rushing to reach my life goal before I am weaken. Sure there are people who are still physically strong into their 50s and 60s. I hope I will still be strong but I am a person who don’t count my chickens before they hatch. I am trying to do as much as I can while I still have the strength.

    One of my resolutions in 2019 was to buy a bike. At this moment in life, I can finally could afford one. Money has been tight for the last two years. Spending money on a “good” bike was out of the question. I was at the lowest fund at beginning of 2020 and now I have more than I ever had. Sure I could afford a bike or two. Getting a new bike is no longer the priority. With more money saved, means more new goals.

    I wanted to go on a trip this year, like some where far, like Sydney. This is not new per se but now it it moved from impossible to possible. I was there in Sydney maybe 10 years ago. Amazing how time has flied. I wanted to go back this time to run a marathon. Sydney is not the only place. I wrote about Ireland/Vietnam/Hong Kong too are my list of choices. Doing all is impossible but to do one is very likely. Not this year though (my race schedule is nearly full). Winter Olympic in China is not too far away on the horizon (not to run but to see). I might go there. I haven’t finalized the plan yet. These are just ideas.

    On my bucket list is to do the Rim-to-rim-to-rim (R2R2R) of the Grand Canyon. I visited this place back in 2018 and 2019. This morning I looked at it again and finally it is feasible. In 2019 it was a dream at the time. The trail across and back is only 50 miles. I can do it in a day, not a problem after I ran multiple 50 milers. I plan to see if I can get two or three other people in doing this with me either next year or the year after. Yes, I am no longer fearful of running a 50 miler.

    Friends. I made couple friends along the way in 2019 and 2020. I am not a popular person. I mostly kept to myself. But 2020 has been great. Friendship happened in accident. In school and work too right, you do social mixers and all, but mostly friendship or people met are usually on a superficial level. It is quite hard to met good friends. I don’t even know how to think about this…people without other agendas. I love my running friends. Given I am a runner, hence running friends, but that is not always true. Runners too have their own what-evers. I mentioned a few races I did – how in our areas people are usually quiet, possibly from their position in the government, that they are not too forthcoming in mixing with people or as friendly. I considered blessed to have couple of good friends made in 2020.

    Lastly, camping/outdoor trips. I didn’t fare much. I did in 2019 and 2020 went to camping at least once by myself. 2020 was not a legit camping trip because I slept inside my truck (Wild Oak trip) – was too tired to hike to site to camp after a 50+ miles run. I consider this goal unmet. I did planned couple trips by myself – the WTF trip and the Bull Run Occoquan trip. I enjoyed it. They were challenging. I wrote about it in couple entries back.

    For 2021 I haven’t set any resolution yet. It is likely a redo of 2020. Most of my runs are redos, that is, instead of virtual runs I hope to run in-person races. But if I think of any resolution, I will write them down, so 2021 won’t be a lost year. Boys we are going to run it back! Yes one resolution is definitely camping – say go to West Virginia and camp. Worlds End trip is a high possibility too.

    There will be another looking back entry once I reach Day 400, whether it will be in a few days or in a week, we will see.