On June 1st, I ran the FANS 24-Hour Race in Bloomington,
MN. The race had a new venue this
year. Since 2014, the race has been at
Fort Snelling State Park in the Minnesota River valley. This year, severe flooding in the river
valley forced the park to close, and it wasn’t expected to re-open until July. Finding a new site for the race was
difficult, because the Minneapolis parks won’t issue permits for a 24-hour
event. Five weeks before the race, the
organizers announced that the race would be held at Normandale Lake in
Bloomington.
I made a late decision to do the race this year, not signing
up until May. I haven’t been training
for ultramarathons, but my marathon training has been progressing well. I initially assumed I would do the 6-hour
race. When you’re in good shape to run
marathons, it isn’t much of a stretch to run for six hours. You just have to slow down and take a few
walking breaks.
I’ve done FANS several times, both as a runner and as a
walker. In 11 previous attempts, I had
logged more than 900 miles. I’m already
in their 500 mile club, and I was within striking distance of joining the 1,000
mile club.
My primary motivation for running FANS was to get closer to
1,000 miles. At first, I thought I could
do thirty-some miles, if I did the 6-hour race.
Then it occurred to me that I might be able to get to 1,000 miles this
year, if I did the 12-hour race.
After looking up my previous totals, I realized I needed
66.5 miles to get to 1,000. There have
been years when I could do that in 12 hours, but I’m not currently in shape for
that. I just haven’t been putting in
enough miles. I could probably run 66.5
miles, but it would take me 13 or 14 hours.
Then it occurred to me I could enter the 24-hour race, but
only run long enough to get to 66.5 miles.
In a fixed-time race, you can stop any time you want. Ideally, I could finish 66.5 miles in time to
get some sleep. I didn’t want to run all
night.
Our course was a 1.82 mile asphalt path around Normandale
Lake. Other than two short wooden
bridges, it was all paved.
Most of the course was fairly flat, but there were a few
sections with rolling hills.
The main aid station was next to the bandshell, where there
was also a building with bathrooms.
There was also a smaller aid station on the opposite side of
the lake, near Nine Mile Creek.
There was a small area on the west side of the lake where we
could set up tents. There wasn’t as much
space for tents at this park as there is at Snelling Lake, so we were requested
to keep our campsites as small as possible.
In the past, I’ve always had a tent, but my tent has a rather large
footprint, so this year I decided to forego it.
I was comfortable doing that, only because I was reasonably confident it
wouldn’t rain.
The race started Saturday morning at 8:00. I’m used to arriving two hours early to set
up the tent and unload my gear. This
year, I didn’t arrive until 6:45. That
gave me plenty of time to walk to the main aid station to check in. Everyone has to get weighed before the race
starts.
It was 60 degrees at the start, with an afternoon high in
the mid 70s. That would be hot for a
marathon, but for 24-hour race, it’s not bad.
When you’re pacing yourself to run all day, you run at a slower pace and
take walking breaks. That makes it much
easier for your body to dissipate excess heat. I was relieved that we didn’t have any rain in
the forecast. It’s been a wet spring, so
most of the lakes and rivers have had flooding.
Earlier in the week, the paths we were running on were flooded in a few
spots, because of heavy rain on Memorial Day.
Thankfully, we had enough warm dry days for the water level to recede.
Our first lap was a slightly shortened lap of 1.68
miles. All subsequent laps were 1.82
miles. To run at least 66.5 miles, I
needed to complete 37 laps. To keep the
mental arithmetic easy, I gave myself 20 minutes per lap. At that pace, I would reach my goal in 12
hours and 20 minutes, which would have me finishing before it got dark. I didn’t know if that pace would be
sustainable, but it seemed reasonable to start at that pace, and make
adjustments as necessary.
I kept myself on a consistent pace using variable-length
walking breaks. After running one lap, I
walked until my watch read 20 minutes.
Then I resumed running until the end of the second lap and walked until
my watch read 40 minutes. I always
started my walking breaks at the end of a lap, and always ended them on a
multiple of 20 minutes. The beauty of
this strategy is that is automatically adjusts for things like bathroom breaks.
There was a cold breeze, so I started the race wearing a
light jacket. After a couple laps to get
warmed up, I was able to take it off. I
drank a small cup of water or Gatorade at each aid station. Every couple of laps, I also had a small
amount of solid food. At various times,
I ate pretzels, candy, PBJs, and naan bread.
The naan was warm and buttery. It
was a nice change of pace from the usual aid station food.
During the morning hours, my pace felt really easy. That’s how it should feel when you’re running
all day. My walking breaks were
typically about six minutes. Then I’d
run the rest of the lap.
Every four hours, we had to weigh in, so the medical staff
could tell if we were hydrating properly.
At noon, my weight was up a pound, suggesting that I was drinking too
much. For the next four laps, I only
drank at the main aid station. After
that, I went back to drinking at both of them.
There were signs at various places indicating where we would
reach significant milestones. During my
15th lap, I reached the marathon mark.
When I finished that lap, I was officially a finisher of at least a
marathon, making this my 50th marathon or ultra in Minnesota. As I started my next lap, I looked at it from
a different perspective. I was now
running farther than I’ve run since August.
For the rest of the race, I was running distances for which I haven’t
trained.
To stay motivated, I needed to focus on intermediate
goals. The next goal was to reach the
50K mark, which came during my 18th lap.
After 19 laps, I was more than halfway to my goal. I just needed to run 18 more laps, but they
were getting tougher.
In the afternoon hours, it got warmer, and the sun came
out. Running in the warmer temperatures
was more tiring. I was still doing 20
minute laps, but it didn’t feel as easy as before. I wasn’t sure if I could sustain it for the
whole race. Eventually, as my running
became less efficient, I couldn’t afford to do as much walking. Soon, my walking breaks were only four
minutes.
After eight hours, I weighed in again. My weight was down a pound compared to my
previous weigh-in. I was sweating more
in the afternoon sun.
The time it took to weigh in left me less time for my
walking break. I could only walk for two
minutes. On the next lap, I also only
had a two minute break. I finally had to
abandon my pacing strategy. I couldn’t
sustain 20 minute laps for four more hours.
After that, I walked the first quarter mile of each lap and ran the rest
of the way. That gave me about four
minutes of walking per lap. That was
difficult, but I was able to sustain it.
My pace slowed to about 23 minutes per lap. If I could keep that up, I’d reach my goal by
around 9:00 PM. I could still finish
before it got dark, but just barely.
The Gatorade was clear, so it looked just like water. I had to pay attention to where it was on the
table to know which was which. On one
lap, I saw some cups where the clear Gatorade was usually placed, but the
liquid was bright yellow. Did they
switch to yellow Gatorade? As I drank a
cup, I quickly realized it was pickle juice.
It didn’t taste good, but it probably gave me plenty of salt.
In my 28th lap, I reached the 50 mile mark. When I finished that lap, the lap counters
rang a cowbell. They do that whenever
someone reaches a big milestone.
Now I just had nine laps to go. Whether you’re counting down remain laps or
remaining miles, it usually seems easier when you’re down to single
digits. This time, it didn’t. With each lap, I had fewer to go, but each
lap seemed more difficult than the previous one. I was struggling. I wasn’t trained to run this far, and it was
really starting to show.
I had to get creative and think of intermediate goals. In my 30th lap, I reached a distance equal to
the length of the Comrades Marathon. I
got there in 9:58. The cut-off time for
Comrades is 12 hours, so I was well within that. It’s worth noting, however, that this race
didn’t have all the big hills that Comrades has.
My next goal was to finish 32 laps, which gave me 58.1
miles. That that point, I had run my age
in miles.
I started seeing some hot food at the main aid station. On one lap, I ate some spaghetti. On the next lap, I had a small slice of
pizza.
I was starting to feel thirsty all the time, so I suspected
I was getting dehydrated. At the next
weigh-in, my weight was actually up.
That surprised me, but at least I didn’t have to worry about drinking
enough.
The next big milestone came early in my 35th lap, when I
reached the 100K mark. When I eventually
finished that lap, I got my second cowbell of the race. Now I just had two laps to go.
They had a leaderboard that showed the top men and women in
each race. At 8:30 PM, I was in 4th
place in the 24-hour race, but that was misleading. I was pacing myself to do 67 miles as fast as
I could and then stop. Others were
pacing themselves to keep running all night.
As usual, there were a few walkers who were attempting to
walk 100 miles to earn a Centurion Walker badge. In my second-to-last lap, I did some extra
walking, so I could briefly walk with two of the Centurion candidates.
John Greene and I often crew for each other. John was doing the 24-hour walk, but like me,
he didn’t have an ambitious goal. John
is also working on getting into the FANS 1,000 Mile Club. He couldn’t get there this year, but if he
walked enough miles this year, he could get there next year. John was walking about four laps at a time
and then taking breaks. In my last lap,
I walked the whole thing, so I could walk with John. It was slower than my other laps, but I knew
I had enough time to finish before it got dark.
Near the end of the lap, I took off running to ensure I
would finish within 13 hours. That lap
gave me 67.2 miles, giving me more than 1,000 lifetime miles at FANS. For that, I got to hear the cowbell for the
third time. Unofficially, I finished in
12:59:25. Officially, my time for the
race would be 24 hours.
After having another slice of pizza, I went home, so I could
shower and try to get some sleep. The
shower was interesting. As my sweat
evaporated, it left a layer of salt. As
I started to rinse that off, my skin initially felt slippery. It took a few minutes to thoroughly rinse
away the salt water. When I rinsed my
face, I could taste salt water getting into my mouth.
When I got into bed, I felt a bit nauseous from all the food
and beverage in my stomach. Sitting or
standing, I felt fine, but it didn’t feel good to lie down. That feeling eventually passed, but I
couldn’t get to sleep. It was as if I
had been drinking coffee all day. I had
a few small glasses of coke during the race, but this was something else. After exerting myself so hard for so many
hours, my body chemistry was off. Who
knows what kind of stress hormones I was producing.
I took me until 4:00 AM to get to sleep. Then my alarm woke me up at 5:00. I wanted to go back to watch the end of the
race. I was moving kind of slow, so it
took me a long time to get ready. I
finally got back to Normandale Lake around 6:45.
When I got there, John was still on the course. He had just finished his 37th lap. He did one more to make sure he beat my
total. We can be competitive at times.
After the race, there was a breakfast and awards ceremony
under the bandshell. First they have
awards to the top finishers in each race.
Then they give special shirts to anyone who finished 100K in the 12-hour
race or 100 miles in the 24-hour race.
After that, they honor anyone who reached a lifetime milestone. I got a jacket as a new member of the 1,000
mile club.
Race Statistics
Distance: 67.2 miles
Official Time: 24:00:00
Actual Time on Course:
12:59:25
Average Pace: 11:36
Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:
374
Minnesota Marathons/Ultras: 50
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