Race Report: 2025 Marrakech Marathon

On January 26, I ran Marrakech Marathon.  I’ve been interested in traveling to Marrakech, but I didn’t know enough about Morocco to be comfortable planning a solo trip.  Then I found out that Marathon Tours & Travel (MT&T) goes there.

I first saw this race on the MT&T race calendar for 2024, but I already had plans for that weekend.  I made it a priority to go there this year.

Thursday, January 23

I arrived in Paris on an overnight flight from Minneapolis.  I had a four-hour layover in Paris, but there were two other runners from Minnesota who were on the same two flights.  We spent the next three hours together in the Air France lounge before boarding our flight to Marrakech.

We arrived in Marrakech in the late afternoon.  As it turns out, there were dozens of runners in my tour group who arrived on the same flight from Paris.  Once everyone had their luggage and got through immigration and customs, we left together to go to our hotel.  MT&T arranged for our transportation.

Our group stayed at the Kenzi Farah Rose Garden, which is a five-star hotel near the old town.  After everyone had time to check in, we went for a three-mile shakeout run.  This was our first chance to see the neighborhood around our hotel.

We had a welcome reception in the evening at the hotel bar.  After the reception, I had dinner with my friend Gwen at an Italian restaurant at the hotel.  By the time we paid our bill, I was struggling to stay awake.

I had no trouble getting to sleep, but I couldn’t sleep through the night.  I woke up at midnight and it took me a few hours to get back to sleep.

Friday, January 24

We had a buffet breakfast at the hotel.  Besides our group, there were other large groups staying at the same hotel.  I made a point of getting to breakfast before it got too crowded.

The air was really dry.  I didn’t drink enough water the day I arrived, so I drank as much as possible with breakfast to get rehydrated.  That became a daily routine.

After breakfast, we had a half-day guided tour of the city.  They transported us by bus to the Koutoubia Mosque.  We started our tour with the mosque and its gardens.

From there, our tour was on foot.  There were 90 of us, so we split into four small groups. We walked through one of the main gates in the medina, which is the old town.  Then we visited the Saadian Tombs.

We walked by several small shops to get to the Bahia Palace, which includes numerous rooms and gardens.  We spent a fair amount of time there, but I only took one picture.  This room is part of the prime minister’s private chamber.

The rest of our tour took us through a large marketplace.  We navigated through a maze of narrow alleyways with dozens of small shops.

We made a stop at a local pharmaceutical shop, where we got to taste the Moroccan mint tea.  We also had an opportunity to buy various cosmetics.

As we made our way back through the market, we stopped at the main square, and we had some time to explore on our own.

We were going to be bused back to the hotel, but it was only about a mile away, so some of us just walked back rather than wait for the buses to arrive.

MT&T had already gone to the expo to pick up everyone’s race packets.  After getting back to the hotel, we could get our race packets in the hotel lobby.

A few of us had a late lunch on the terrace next to the hotel pool.  Then I went to the fitness room to do weight training before relaxing until dinner.

Our dinner was a Moroccan meal at Chez Ali, which is an entertainment venue on the outskirts of the city.  We were scheduled to leave at 7:00 PM, but nothing ever happens on time in Morocco.  We left about 20 minutes late.  With traffic, we didn’t arrive at Chez Ali until 8:00.

Our dinner was a four-course meal.  We had a choice of entrée.  Mine was a tagine dish with lamb, prunes, and almonds.  Between courses, various groups came into our tent to entertain us.

Dinner was going to be followed by a Moroccan folklore show, which included a parade, acrobats, and traditional songs and dances.

We didn’t finish dinner until 10:15.  I didn’t know long the show would be, but I didn’t expect to get back to the hotel any earlier than midnight.

I didn’t sleep at all Wednesday night, and I only slept half the night on Thursday, so getting back so late wasn’t ideal.

Somebody else asked one of the MT&T guides if it was possible to go back to the hotel early.  That was only possible if enough other people were interested.  We came in a motor coach and three large vans.  They would need to have enough people going home early to fill at least one of the vans.

One of the MT&T guys went from table to table to see how many people wanted to skip the show and go home early.  Of the 90 people on our tour, 31 were interested in going back right away.  I was one of them.  I’m sure it was a good show, but I desperately needed to get some sleep.

We got back to the hotel at 11:00.  It took me about an hour to get to sleep.  I slept better than the previous night, but I still didn’t get a full night’s sleep.

Saturday, January 25

I set an alarm for 8:30, just so I wouldn’t miss breakfast.  Noise from one of the other rooms woke me up much earlier, and I couldn’t get back to sleep.

I had a late breakfast.  One of the other runners in our group said the show was spectacular, but she didn’t get to sleep until 3 AM.  I’m sure I would’ve enjoyed the show, but I don’t regret going back early.

We didn’t have any planned activities until the afternoon, so I spent the rest of the morning with Gwen, walking through the same marketplace that was part of our tour on Friday.  Gwen was able to buy some Moroccan coffee, mint tea, and a tagine.

Our tour in the afternoon took us to three gardens.  The first was Parc Lalla Hasna.  We had seen this park on our first tour, and some of had walked through it on our way back from the marketplace.

Our second stop was Menara Gardens.  This park has thousands of olive trees and a central reservoir which provides water for irrigation,

We spent the majority of the afternoon at Le Jardin Secret (the secret garden).  The entrance to these gardens is a doorway in a narrow alleyway in the medina.  You could easily miss it if you didn’t know it was there.  This was by far the most interesting of all the gardens.

Our last stop was a place where we could ride camels.  We split into three groups, and each group formed a caravan of about 15 camels.

We got back just in time for our pre-race dinner.  It was a buffet that included pasta and also other entrees.

That night, I got to bed earlier.  For the first time during this trip, I slept well.

Sunday, January 26

Sunday was race day.  The marathon didn’t start until 8:30, so I was able to have a light breakfast at the hotel before walking to the start.

The starting line was a 10-minute walk from our hotel.  We met in the lobby at 8:00 to walk to the start together.  We crossed the first street, and about half of the group went around some barriers, so they could keep going straight.  Then the police moved the barriers, so nobody else could get through.

I found a way through on the other side of the street, but I don’t know if the rest of the group was able to follow me.  They could get to the start area another way, but we weren’t all able to go as a group.

On the way to the start area, I caught up with Gwen.  After we entered the start corral, we were reunited with Julie.  Julie wasn’t part of our tour group, but Gwen and I met her on our flights.

The temperature was in the upper 40s at the start, and I expected it to remain chilly for the first half of the race.  The sun had just risen, and it wouldn’t warm up much until the sun got higher in the sky.

In the second half of the race, I expected it to warm up rapidly, getting to 60 degrees by the time I finished.  I wore tights, because I would rather risk being hot in the second half than be cold for the first half of the race.

I wasn’t sure how fast I would run.  My only other race this year was a 48-hour race.  My previous three races were all marathons, but none of those races was conducive to running fast.  As a result, I haven’t tried for a fast time since early November.

For the last two months, I’ve been training in cold weather, so I’ve been wearing bulky clothes that slow me down.  I normally train at an easy pace, but all my recent training has been slower than normal.  That had me feeling unsure of my readiness for  running a fast race.

I had to start the race before I could evaluate what pace I could sustain.  At a minimum, I wanted to start the race on pace to break four hours.  Ideally, I wanted to start fast enough to break 3:50, which would be a Boston qualifier.  To do that, I would need to average about 8:45 per mile.

This is a large enough race that the start was congested, but it didn’t take long before I could run at my own pace.  I kept accelerating for the first kilometer.  By then, I started to feel like I might be going too fast.  I didn’t know for sure until my watch gave me my split for the first mile.  I ran that mile in 8:21.

I knew that pace wouldn’t be sustainable, so I eased up a little in the second mile.  That mile was 8:36.  That was still too fast, so I eased up some more.  By now, it seemed like 8:45 would be a sustainable pace, but I worried that anything faster might not be.

There were a lot of turns in the early miles.  At about two miles, we made a large U-turn and came back on the opposite side of a divided parkway.

As soon as we made that turn, I felt a breeze.  It---- was probably at our backs when we were on the other side of the road.  I hadn’t noticed any wind since arriving in Marrakech.  Having a breeze during the race meant I was less likely to feel overdressed in the second half of the race.

In the third mile, my pace slowed to 8:42.  That was pretty close to the pace I wanted to average.  Ideally, I would have settled into that pace now for the rest of the race.  That was easier said than done.  Because of my fast start, I was surrounded by people who had also started faster.

They had aid stations every five kilometers.  On the course map, the aid station locations were denoted by an image of a water bottle.  I couldn’t find any information indicating whether they would have other food or beverages.

At the 5K aid station, I just saw bottles of water.  I grabbed a bottle, took the cap off and drank about two thirds of it.  That was as much as I could drink at one time.  After drinking what I could, I tossed the bottle onto the sidewalk, so other runners wouldn’t be in danger of tripping on it.

In the next two miles, I started running too fast again.  I’d tell my self to slow down, but then I’d go back to running at the same pace as the people around me.  It wasn’t until the sixth mile that I had a mile that was slower than 8:45.

As I was approached 10K, I saw people who seemed to be assembling tables.  As I got closer, I realized they were tearing down the tables.  Those were the fluid tables for the elite athletes, and they were no longer needed at this point.  I was still surprised how quickly they were taken down.

At the 10K water station, I only drank half of my bottle.  That was as much as I could drink without slowing down to walk.

After slowing down to 8:53 in mile six, I picked up my effort.  I didn’t want my pace to get any slower than 8:45.  I evidently overcompensated, because I sped up to 8:11.  I settled down a little bit after that, but I kept running faster than I needed to.  I’m still surprised that I was able to run that fast without realizing it.

By now, we had left the older part of the city and were getting into the more modern parts of the city.  I recognized a mural that we had driven by on Friday, so I stopped briefly to take a picture.

When I finished that mile, I saw that I was slower than my target time of 8:45, but only by a few seconds.  If I hadn’t stopped to take a picture, my pace would’ve been just right.

At 15K, I took off my gloves.  My hands weren’t getting hot, but they no longer felt cold, and I knew it would start warming up soon.

In mile 10, I was back to running too fast.  I sped up to 8:21 in that mile.  I wasn’t trying to run that fast, but I kept falling into the trap of running with the pack, and the people around me were going that fast.

There’s a rule of thumb that if you don’t feel fresh after 10 miles, you’re going too fast.  I didn’t feel fresh.  I definitely felt like I was working to run at this pace.  On the other hand, I didn’t feel like the pace was taking a toll on me.  I felt about the same after 10 miles as I did in the first few miles.

In the 11th mile, we went through a roundabout that had an elaborate fountain in the center.  I was tempted to take a picture, but I didn’t want to lose time again.  As it turns out, I sped up to 8:18 in that mile.  If I had realized I was running that fast, I would’ve stopped to take the picture.  It would’ve help me to settle down.

A couple miles after taking off my gloves, my hands starting to feel cold.  I didn’t worry about it too much, because it would warm up about 10 degrees by the time I finished, and the sun would get higher in the sky.  The fact that I had cold hands this late in the race was encouraging.   I didn’t worry as much about being too hot later.

The first three aid stations only had water.  The aid station at 20K was the first pone where I saw food.  I saw bananas and other food, but I didn’t want to slow down long enough to eat anything.  I was in a good rhythm, and I didn’t want to do anything to disrupt that.

I run best when I can stay in a consistent rhythm.  This race has one of the flattest courses I’ve seen, and the whole route had nice smooth pavement.  I was surprised how comfortable I felt at the pace I was running, but this was an ideal course for me.

Halfway through the race, I was on pace in finish in about 3:44, but I expected to slow down in the section half.  My only goal at this point was to break 3:50.  That gave me some room to slow down in the second half, but I kept running with about the same effort.

After running miles 12 and 13 in 8:25, I ran the next two in 8:33 and 8:40.  I was still going faster than my target pace, but it was starting to take more effort with each mile, and I wondered if I would keep slowing down.

When I’m running on an unfamiliar course, I’ll sometimes think about where I would be if I was at the equivalent point on a course that’s familiar to me.  As I approached 25K, I though about where I would be at 25K of the Boston Marathon course.  That race is pretty easy for the first 16 miles, but you have to hold back or you’ll struggle when you reach the hills between 16 and 21.

In Boston, my goal is to reach the 16-mile mark feeling like I’ve been hold back.  I was only at 25K, and I was clearly working hard.  If I felt the same way at 25K on the Boston course, I’d be heading for a train wreck.  That was a wake-up call.

I regretted not having anything to eat at 20K, because I didn’t know if other aid stations would have food.  When I saw food at the 25K aid station, I decided I should eat something.  I didn’t see any bananas, but I grabbed a date and a handful of golden raisins.

Eating the date, I had to be careful to chew around the pit.  I was carrying a water bottle, but I didn’t start drinking until I was done eating the raisins.

Running with a water bottle while chewing raisins caused me to get out of breath.  It was starting to warm up now, so I should’ve had more to drink, but it was all I could do to drink half the bottle.

It took me a few minutes to catch my breath.  Then I gradually started to catch up with the runners who were near me before the aid station.

About half a mile later, we ran down a ramp to go under two bridges.  Then we had to come back up a ramp.  It was the only hill on the course, but at this point I needed to be careful not to work too hard.  Going up the ramp, I tried to maintain a consistent effort and not worry about my pace.  I ran that mile in 8:45 despite slowing down for the ramp.  I was satisfied with that.

Just after coming up the ramp, I saw runners merging in from the right.  There was a half marathon that started at 9:45.  They had a different course, but it overlapped with the marathon route in a few places.

The half marathon runners outnumbered the marathon runners by about ten to one.  I’m not sure how far they had run by this point, but it seemed like they had not spread out much.  The road was now filled with a wall of runners.

I quickly discovered that these runners weren’t going as fast as I was trying to run.  To stay on pace, I needed to work hard to get around the slower runners.

It was no longer possible to run the tangents.  Instead, I was weaving back and forth, always looking for a gap I could run through.  When I broke through one wall of runners, I would accelerate.  Then I’d have to figure out where to break through the next wall of runners.  I was like a running back who has to follow his blocks, only I didn’t have any blockers.

When I finished the next mile, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I actually sped up in that mile.  It took a lot of extra energy though.

I was still fighting my way through this horde of slower runners when I reached the 30K mark.  The aid station was total chaos.  I had to come to a stop before I could get through the other runners to get to one of the water tables.  Runners were grabbing bottles faster than the volunteers could unpack them.  I eventually got a water bottle, but it cost me some time.

That mile was slower than my target pace, but there was a good reason for it.  The next mile was equally slow, but now it was because I was getting tired.

At 20 miles, I finally reached a point where marathon runners went straight, but the half marathon runners turned right.  It was a relief to be out of the crowd.  Now I could follow other runners and know we were all doing the same race.  I could once again use the other runners to gauge my pace.

We did a short out-and-back.  Then we turned onto the same street where the half marathon had turned previously.

There were barriers in the middle of the street, but they were spaced about 100 feet apart.  I think they were supposed to be connected with caution tape, but the tape was missing.

It was obvious to me that the marathon runners were supposed to stay on the left side of the street, and the half marathon runners were supposed to stay on the right.  There was nothing to prevent runners from crossing over, and most of the runners moved over to the left side of the street.  That was frustrating.

This street was wide enough that I could easily get around the slower runners.  Unfortunately, I didn’t know which runners were doing the marathon.  I couldn’t gauge my pace according to the other runners without knowing if they were doing the marathon.

Occasionally, I would pass a runner who I remembered passing before.  I had run an out-and-back that they didn’t have to run, so they all got ahead of me again.

I was struggling to keep up my pace, but I no longer needed to average 8:45.  After 22 miles, I calculated that I could slow down to roughly 9:30, and I would still finish in 3:50.  That’s all I cared about.

The two races diverged again.  We turned to the left, and the runners doing the half marathon turned to the right.  In theory, I could once again stay on pace just by following the runners in front of me.  In practice, the wheels were coming off.  The pace I had been running for most of the race was too fast, and it was catching up to me.  The extra effort I put into weaving around slower runners didn’t help.  My legs now felt like lead.

I reached the 35K sign, but the aid station was farther down the street.  Before I got there, my watch gave me my time for mile 22.  I slowed to 8:58.  That was my slowest mile so far, but I viewed anything faster than 9:30 as extra time in the bank.  With 4.2 miles to go, I just needed to average 9:37.

The aid station had bananas.  They were cut in half, but I needed to remove the peel.  As I pulled back the peel, the banana squirted out.  It popped up in the air.  I couldn’t catch it, but I kept it from hitting the ground by deflecting it onto the table.  I don’t know how clean the table was, but it was a lot cleaner than the street.  I still ate the banana.  Then I slowed to a walk while drinking some water.

When I looked at the course map before the race, I saw aid stations every 5K, up to 35K.  I didn’t see an aid station at 40K.  As far as I knew, this was the last aid station, so I drank as much as I could stomach.  Then I forced myself to run again.

When I finished the next mile, I saw that I had slowed to 9:35.  That made me panic.  I couldn’t afford to slow down much more.  I momentarily forgot that I had lost a lot of time at the aid station.

I could no longer count on the runners ahead of me to keep a consistent pace.  Most were slowing down.  Some were walking.  I spotted a runner who looked like he was still going strong, and I challenged myself to keep up with him.  Then I passed him.  Then I looked for another runner to chase.

In October I bought a new running watch.  My old watch displayed my current pace, but it never seemed to be accurate, so I didn’t trust it.  I didn’t know how fast I was going, so I looked at my watch.  I saw my current pace, but the readout was tiny.  My watch said my current pace was 8:45.  If that was accurate, it was encouraging.  That gave me the motivation I needed to keep up my effort.

For the next mile, I moved up through the field.  Then we merged with the half marathon again.  I continued to focus on the same two runners I had been following.  One was a guy wearing a red shirt.  The other was a woman with a pink shirt and a camelback.  I ignored everyone else, knowing that most of the other runners were doing the half marathon.

When I finished mile 24, I saw that I had sped up to 8:43.  To break 3:50, I needed to run the last 2.2 miles in 23 minutes.  I could afford to slack off, but I didn’t want to get lazy.  I did my best to keep chasing those same two runners.

In the second-to last mile, I went through a roundabout and saw cars going through it.                   Often, in races with traffic control, the police will let a few cars though when there’s a large gap between runners.  Here, it seemed like too many cars were going through.  I continued to run through the roundabout, even though cars were entering from another direction.

It wasn’t until later in the day that I learned from other runners that the roads were opened to traffic long before the race was over.  I only encountered cars at the last roundabout, but the slowest runners were sharing the road with cars for the last two hours of the race.  These weren’t quiet residential streets.  The course was on streets that are normally busy.

When I reached the 40K sign, I didn’t see an aid station.  Then I turned a corner, and my watch recorded my split for mile 25.  I slowed to 8:54 in that mile, but that was still much faster than the pace I needed.

A little farther up the road, I saw water tables on the left.  The guy in the red shirt stopped to grab a bottle, so I figured I could too.  He resumed running while I was still drinking.  After that, I couldn’t keep up with him.  All I could do is to try to keep him in sight.

I had already been out of breath for the last two miles.  I’ve never felt like this in the late miles of as marathon.  I might be fatigued or have sore legs, but it’s not normal to be out of breath in a race as long as a marathon.  I felt like I was running a 10K race.

I wanted to give my maximum effort, but I could no longer force myself to do it.  I did my best to limit the damage, and I only slowed to 9:11 in that mile.

The last turn was in front of the Menara Mall.  We had driven by there on at least one of our tours, so I had a good idea where I was.

After turning the corner, I saw the first of several balloon arches.  I remember seeing at least two other arches at the beginning of the race after crossing the starting line.  Now, I was about to go back through them.  I was expecting the finish line to be under the third arch.

As I ran under the first arch, I looked ahead for the digital clock at the finish line.  I could see now that there were more arches than I remembered.  It now looked like I had to run to the fourth arch.  Then I saw another … then another.  There were six or seven other balloon arches before the finish line.

I knew I was going to break 3:50, but I had to run farther than I expected.  With two arches to go, I finally summoned up the strength to put on a strong finish.  I crossed the line in 3:48:24.

Immediately after finishing, I started to feel light-headed.  Fortunately, that feeling passed quickly.  I continued to move forward, but I couldn’t get far before I encountered a wall of runners who weren’t moving.  They were packed in like sardines from one side of the street to the other.  The start/finish area was fenced off, so there was no place to go but forward.

I never felt too hot during the race, but with hundreds of runners packed in around me, I quickly got hot and sweaty.  I was uncomfortable, but there was nothing I could do about it.

For the longest time, nobody in front of me was moving forward.  Gwen had told me before the race that she was going to stay and watch for me after she finished.  I sent her a text to let her know I had finished.  Then I got a text from Gwen saying she was still in the crowd of runners in front of me, even though she had finished much earlier.

Eventually, the crowd started moving forward, but only at a snail’s pace.  It wasn’t until I was almost to the last balloon arch in the start/finish area that I saw the problem.  There were only a few narrow openings for us to squeeze through.  In between, there were tables with volunteers handing out food bags.  It was like six lanes of traffic having to merge down to two lanes.  It was a bottleneck.

I eventually got through and got my food bag and finisher medal.  By the time I got out to the street, 36 minutes had elapsed since I finished the race.

The food bag contained a bottle of water, a banana, two oranges, and a package with dates and raisins.  I ate the banana and drank half of the water while walking back to the hotel.  I ate the rest of the food when I got back to my room.

After showering and changing into clean clothes, I relaxed in my room until I started to get hungry again.  Then I went down to the pool bar to have a late lunch.

While I was eating, I saw other runners I knew, and we shared our race experiences.  I learned that the race ran out of medals, so many of the runners who finished later didn’t get one.  That’s also when I learned that the streets were opened up to traffic.

My own race experience was mostly positive until I crossed the finish line.  The post-race experience was bad for me and worse for others.

I spent the rest of the afternoon with other runners in the pool area.  Then I went to a post-race celebration with all the runners in our tour group.

Many of the runners weren’t showing up in the race results.  When I looked up my bib number, it didn’t initially show any result.  MT&T made a list of all the runners who either didn’t get a medal or didn’t get listed in the results.  I’m confident they’ll make sure everyone gets a medal and an official result.

I was one of the last runners to leave the party.  By then everyone else had already made dinner plans.  Despite having a late lunch, I still needed to have something to eat before going to bed.  I eventually had dinner by myself at an Italian restaurant at the hotel.

I’m happy to say that I slept well for the second straight night.

Monday, January 27

MT&T had an option for a four-day extension to see more of Morocco, but I didn’t want this to be too long of a trip.  Instead, I flew home.

I didn’t have a lot of options for flights.  I could wake up in the middle of the night for an early morning flight, or I could take a late afternoon flight and have an overnight connection in Paris.  I chose the afternoon flight.  That allowed me to get a full night’s sleep and have one last breakfast with the other runners.

Many of the runners either left early or had booked other excursions.  At breakfast, I saw two runners I knew, and I met two others.  We had done many of the same races, so we talked for almost three hours.

After breakfast, I had just enough time to do a workout and finish packing before I needed to check out.  I checked out before noon, but I didn’t need to leave for the airport until 1:30, so I continued visiting with other runners who were in the lobby.

One of the topics that came up was the problems with results.  I looked up my result again.  They now showed a time for my bib number which matched the time on my watch.  There wasn’t any name associated with my bib number.

That was a common problem.  In the participant list, there were numerous bib numbers that weren’t associates with any name.  Mine was one of them.  My best guess is that it was a data entry error associated with runners who were registered by a tour group.  I talked to a runner who registered himself, and his result was fine.  If that’s the only problem, I’m sure MT&T can get it straightened out.

I got to the airport about two and a half hours before my flight to Paris.  Check in, security, and passport control were all quick, so I had time to relax and eat an early dinner in an airport lounge.

In Paris, I spent the night at an airport hotel.  I was leaving the terminal, so I had to go through passport control for entering the Schengen zone.  After that, getting to my hotel was fairly easy.  I took an automated train from Terminal 2 to Terminal 3.  From the terminal 3 stop, I only had to walk a quarter mile to get to my hotel.  I got there around 9:00.

When I got to my room, it was a little too warm.  I set the thermostat and went down to the lounge to have a beer while I waited got the room to cool down.  When I got back to my room, I was disappointed to find that it had only cooled down by one degree.  I was so tired that I crashed hard anyway.

Tuesday, January 28

My flight wasn’t until 10:30, so I had time to eat breakfast before going back to the airport.  I’ve made connections at CDG before, but this was the first time I’ve departed from this airport.  It’s a large airport, and it can be confusing, but I found it to be a breeze.  There were airport employees in various places scanning boarding passes and directing people to the right gate area or the best security line.

Flying home from Europe is always a long travel day, but it helps that I got a good night’s sleep, and I only have one flight today.

UPDATE: I checked the results again on Tuesday, and my result now shows up correctly.  I also checked the results of some of the other runners, and their results are there too.

Race statistics:

Distance:  42.2 kilometers

Time:  3:48:24

Average Pace:  8:43 per mile (5:25 per kilometer)

First Half:  1:52:07

Second Half:  1:56:17

Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:  537

Boston Qualifiers:  174

Countries:  52

2024-25 Across the Years 48-Hour Race

On January 1-3, I ran the Across the Years 48-Hour Race.  This is a fixed-time race where you run as far as you can in 48 hours.  They have other fixed-time options, including 6 hours, 12 hours, 24 hours, 72 hours, and 6 days.  They also have fixed-distance options, including marathon, 100 miles, and 200 miles.  Finally, they have a last person standing race.

The 6-day race started on December 28 and ended on January 3.  For most of the other races, you could choose which day you wanted to start.  I could’ve chosen to start the 48-hour race as early as December 28, or as late as January 1.

I considered starting on December 28, but changed my mind and started on January 1 instead.  Finishing on January 3 made it possible for me to attend the awards banquet, which was held two hours after the end of the 6-day race.  If I finished earlier, I probably would’ve flown home before the awards banquet.

I’ve done Across the Years three times before, but I always seem to run only about half as long as I expect.  The first time I ran the 48-hour race, I started to develop an ankle injury.  I stopped after 28½ hours, because I didn’t want to make it worse.

On my second attempt at the 48-hour race, I went into the race with a hamstring injury.  I tried to run the race with the injury, but it didn’t go well.  I stopped as soon as I got to 100 miles.

Two years later, I did the 24-hour race.  Four weeks before the race, I fell and broke a rib during a trail race.  I recovered sufficiently to be able to run, but coughing was still painful.  The course was mostly dirt, and it was dusty.  Breathing the dust was starting to make me cough.  Because of the pain, I stopped after 50 miles.

This year, my training was going well, and I came into the race with high hopes.  A lot of diffe4rent things can go wrong during the race, but I thought I was at least making it to the starting line healthy.

They had a new race venue this year.  These races used to be held at Camelback Ranch in Glendale, but that facility wasn’t available this year.  The new venue was the Peoria Sports Complex in Peoria, AZ, which is on the west side of Phoenix.  The Peoria Sports Complex is a baseball facility used for spring training by the Seattle Mariners and the San Diego Padres.

The course was a loop through the facility.  The first part of the loop went around the perimeter of a stadium.  This part was concrete and included two ramps.  The second ramp came up to a bridge going over an entrance on one side of the stadium.

After that, there were sections of dirt and gravel, as we wound our way around several baseball diamonds.  The tent area was at the beginning of the longest dirt section.

The last part of the loop was along a concrete sidewalk and through a parking lot where people could park RVs.

I flew to Phoenix on December 30.  My flight was delayed, so by the time I checked into my hotel, it was almost dinner time.  My hotel was less than a mile from the race venue, and there were lots of nearby restaurants.

Arriving a day early allowed me to drive to the Peoria Sports Complex on the 31st and check in early, even though I didn’t start my race until the next day.

When I registered for the race, I had the option of renting a tent.  Having a tent gave me a place to store my gear and change clothes.  I was going to experience a wide range of temperatures, so I anticipated adding or removing layers a few times during the race.

When you rent a tent, you don’t have to set it up yourself.  All the tents are set up in advance by race volunteers.  I just had to choose an unclaimed tent and attach a sticker with my name to show that this was my tent.

The tent included a cot, and I also rented a sleeping bag.  I didn’t know if I could make it through the whole race without sleep.  I was hoping to keep moving for the whole 48 hours, but I needed to have a backup plan.  Having a tent with a cot gave me a place to take a short nap during the race, if necessary.  I didn’t think driving back to my hotel would be an option.  If I was too sleepy to keep running, I would also be too sleepy to drive.  Besides, going back to the hotel would take extra time, even though it was close.

After I picked up my race bib, I looked around to find a tent that wasn’t claimed yet.  After picking out a tent, I loaded my gear into it.  I wouldn’t leave anything of value in the tent, but I was comfortable leaving spare clothes and shoes there.  I also took the time to organize things a bit, so I could find things quickly when I needed them during the race.

While I was there, I saw several runners I know.  I had a chance to visit with some friends who were there for the 72-hour race.  Then I went back to the hotel to do some strength training exercises before lunch.

In the afternoon, I went back to the race venue, and I walked a couple laps with some friends who were doing the marathon.  That gave me a good preview of the course.

Setting up in the morning gave me an idea what the temperature would be like in the morning, but I still didn’t have an appreciation for how much colder it would feel during the night.  Walking the course in the afternoon gave me an appreciation for how much warmer it would get in the afternoon.  I was going to experience temperatures ranging from 40 to low 70s.

For dinner, I went to an Italian restaurant that I knew had good pizza.  What I didn’t know was that they had a limited menu for New Year’s Eve, and pizza wasn’t on the menu.  I didn’t find that out until I got there.  Since I was already there, I still ate dinner there.  Instead of pizza, I had to settle for pasta.

Most people stay up to celebrate on New Year’s Eve.  For me, it was the night before the race, so it was important to get as much sleep as possible.  I went to bed shortly after dinner.

I slept until about 3:15.  Then I woke up, and I couldn’t get back to sleep.  My mind was racing.  I rested in bed until 5:30, but then I got up and started getting ready.  It would’ve been nice to get a few more hours of sleep.  That’s not a good way to start the day when you’re hoping to get through a 48-hour race without sleep.

The race started at 9:00 AM.  Most of my gear was already in my tent, so I didn’t need to get there too early.  That gave me time to have breakfast at my hotel before driving to the race venue.  When I got there, I dropped off my warm-up layers at my tent.  It was cold, so I waited in my car until it was time to go to the starting line.

Because of the chilly morning temperatures, I started the race in tights.  I didn’t know if I could wear them through the afternoon hours or if I would get too hot.  I had to wait and see.

I assumed the dirt portions of this course would be similar to the course at Camelback Ranch.  My experience on that course was that the fine dust would gradually work its way through the fabric of my shoes.  Gaiters help, but they only slow the inevitable.  Once that dust works it way into your shoes, it’s almost impossible to get them clean.  I assumed any shoes and socks I wore during this race would be ruined.

With that in mind, I only brought shoes that already had enough wear that I would’ve been retiring them soon anyway.  I brought four pairs of shoes and socks, with the intention of changing shoes every 12 hours.

If I learned anything from my experience at the FANS 24-hour race last June, it’s that I had to have a plan for how to pace myself.  Winging it doesn’t work.  I went back to a tried-and-true method.  I had a target time for each lap, and I used variable-length walking breaks to ensure I wouldn’t go too fast.

My plan was to run each lap in 20 minutes.  If I finished a lap ahead of schedule, I would walk until the next multiple of 20 minutes before I started to run again.  I chose a target time of 20 minutes for two reasons.

First, 20 minutes divides evenly into 60 minutes.  My target time always ended with 20, 40, or 00.  That made it easy to remember.  In this long of a race, it’s important to keep things simple.

The second advantage of running 20-minute laps is that it put me on pace to run slightly more than 100 miles in the first 24 hours.  That’s a pace that I assumed would be manageable for the first 24 hours, but would get progressively more difficult in the next 24 hours.  I didn’t know long I could keep up that pace, but it seemed like a reasonable pace to start.

I came into this race with two straight rest days, so there was a danger that I would have too much pent-up energy.  Having a pacing strategy was the only thing to keep me from going out too fast.

As far as goals go, my primary goal was to make it to the end of the race without quitting.  I had never done that in a 48-hour race, so this was going to be a learning experience.  I wanted to find out what the second day feels like.  I also wanted to know whether I could get through the entire race without sleep.  If I couldn’t, I wanted to find out whether I could get to sleep quickly and how soon I could get back onto the course.

I wasn’t focused on any one mileage goal.  First, I needed to go farther than I’ve gone before.  I assumed that would be easy, since that was a distance that I had run in a 24-hour race.  Beyond that, there were a few numbers I was hoping to hit, but I really didn’t know which ones were realistic and which ones weren’t.  It all depended on how long I could continue running three laps per hour.

There was a tent with food and beverages in the start/finish area.  As long as I stuck to my pacing plan, I would go by the aid station every 20 minutes.

My first big concern came early in the race.  In recent weeks, I’ve sometimes noticed soreness on the inside of my left foot when I wake up in the morning.  I had been assuming it was from sleeping in a position that had the side of my foot pressing against the edge of the mattress.  I sometimes noticed that when I first woke up but the soreness would go away within an hour of waking up.  On race occasions, I would feel that same soreness during a run, but I didn’t think it was a big concern.

This was one of those mornings when I woke up with a sore foot.  It hurt more than it has in the past.  When I started running, I felt the same soreness.  It was a minor concern, but you don’t want to start a long race with something already hurting.

At some races, you weight in regularly, and you can tell if you’re hydrating properly by paying attentions to fluctuations in your weight.  They don’t do that here.  Instead, I needed to pay attention to how I felt and how frequently I was making bathroom stops.  That proved to be more difficult than I thought.  More on that later.

Another challenge was taking in enough calories.  I won’t go through my calculations in detail, but I estimated I would be burning 400-425 calories per hour for as long as I was doing 20-minute laps.  I could meet some of my caloric needs by the slow metabolism of stored fat, but also needed to take in as many calories as my digestive system could handle.  I expected to get some of my calories from drinking Gatorade at the aid station.  The rest had to come from solid food.

One of the foods at the aid station was peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, cut in half.  I’ve found that PBJs are something I can eat all day without having digestive issues.  They provide easy-to-digest carbs, while also having some protein and fat.  If I ate half of a PBJ every hour, that would provide about 200 calories.  Between that and the Gatorade, I would probably take in enough calories to get by.

The food tent had different foods at different times, and I sometimes ate different foods just to get some variety.

You may be wondering why I wasn’t eating gels.  A gel packet has about 100 calories, so eating one gel per hour isn’t enough without also eating some real food.  When I’ve tried gels in other races, and I’ve found that I can only them for about 10 hours before starting to feel bloated.  PBJs work better for me.

That’s one of the things about a race like this.  Everybody’s digestive system is different.  You have to experiment and find out what foods your digestive system can handle.

It was chilly at the start, but it warmed up quickly.  I started the race wearing a Tyvek jacket and gloves, but I took then off during my third lap.  My tent was right next to the course, and I went by it about halfway through each lap.  That made it easy to stop briefly at the tent to add or remove a layer of clothes.

In the early laps, my walking breaks got longer with each lap.  By the fourth lap, I was already starting each lap with 10 minutes of walking.

By the end of my fourth lap, my legs were already getting sweaty.  It had warmed up enough that I needed to change into shorts.  On my next lap, I stopped at the tent to change.  To do that, I needed to take off my shoes.  That took extra time, which came out of my next walking break.

By my seventh lap, my walking breaks were back up to 10 minutes.  By my eighth lap, I was walking all the way to the midpoint of the lap before I needed to switch to running.

Just past the start/finish line, they had a screen that showed your name, lap time, number of laps, and total distance.  Each time I finished a lap, I looked at the screen to see my name come up.  After my 10th lap, I never saw my name come up on the screen.

I had my phone with me for the whole race.  I usually kept it in airplane mode to conserve power.  I took it out of airplane mode, so I could look at the live tracking.  I saw my time for the midpoint of my 10th lap, but not for the end of that lap.

There was a chip mat in the middle of the lap.  The next time I crossed it, I checked the online tracking again.  It showed that I had reached the midpoint of my 11th lap, but it still didn’t show a time for the end of my 10th lap.  When I lap 11, I stopped at the timing tent.  They showed me with 11 laps completed.  That was official, even though one of my lap times was missing from the live tracking.

I talked to a few other runners who had similar issues with the timing.  After that I always looked for my name when I finished a lap.

The dirt portions of the course were dusty.  Whenever someone ran by me, they raised a cloud of dust.  After four hours, the dust started making me cough.

When the races were held at Camelback Ranch, they used to change directions every four hours.  Here, they didn’t do that.  It’s a somewhat complicated loop, which includes about a dozen turns.  Always going in the same direction made it easier to get used to it.  After a while, I could do it on autopilot.  I was happy to always go in the same direction.  Changing directions might have been confusing later in the race, when I was tired.

After about 15 laps, I started to notice chafing under my arms.  I know other runners who put Vaseline or Body glide in that area.  I’ve never needed to do that, because I don’t usually chafe in that area.

This is an arid region.  The air is dry enough that your sweat evaporates quicky, leaving behind traces of salts.  My T-shirt was dry but the salt residue created extra friction.  This was something else that I could tune out, but I was concerned about the number of minor issues I was already having in the first five hours of a 48-hour race.

The PBJs were something I could take with me and eat on my walking break, but I wasn’t carrying any fluids with me.  I could eat a PBJ slowly and swallow it down, but it wasn’t long before I wanted to eat something different for a change.  As I finished my 16th lap, I saw that the aid station had grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup.  I took a grilled cheese sandwich in one hand and a cup of tomato soup in the other hand as I started my next lap.

A few laps later, as I finished a lap, I saw a volunteer holding a tray with several paper cups.  They were smoothies.  I usually drank Gatorade, but on that lap, I had a smoothie instead.  I also had a smoothie after my next lap.

As my walking breaks grew longer, I found myself getting into a nice rhythm.  Without really trying, I was starting to walk faster.  That, in turn, led to me to go even farther on my walking breaks.  My walking breaks grew to be 13 minutes, then 14 minutes.

As my walking breaks grew longer, I got excited about it.  Now I was putting more effort into walking at a brisk pace.  Soon, my walking breaks grew to almost 15 minutes.

The second half of the loop included a long section that was dirt.  Some of the dirt sections also included a few rocks.  I really hated to have to resume running while I was still on this long dirt section.  There were two reasons why I preferred to walk the dirt sections.  First, walking didn’t raise as much dust as running.  Second, I was less apt to trip on a rock if I was walking.

I kept putting more effort into my walking until I was able to walk all the way through the last of the dirt sections.  Then I only had to run on the last section of the loop, which was all pavement.

I was eating PBJs every three or four laps.  After lap 24, I was due to have another PBJ, but as I walked though the food tent, I saw small pieces of pumpkin pie.  On that lap, I had the pie instead.

At 4 PM, it started cooling off.  For most of the afternoon, it had been about 70 degrees.  I didn’t think the heat was wearing on me, but I felt more comfortable as it cooled down.

By late afternoon, my walking breaks peaked at about 15 and a half minutes.  Unfortunately, I had not trained to do this much walking at a brisk pace.  It started to get tiring.  You don’t want to start feeling tired this early in 48-hour race.  Putting so much energy into my walking was my first big mistake of the race.  It was also the first sign that my race plan was going to go off the rails.

About nine hours into the race, I saw my first sunset of the race.  After that, it cooled off more rapidly.  I don’t think the temperature had actually dropped that much, but it immediately feels about ten degrees cooler when you no longer have the added warmth of direct sunlight.

The next time I came by my tent, I put on gloves.  I also replaced my running hat with a warm winter hat that has an LED light.  The course was well lit at night, but the LED made it easy to find things when I needed to go into my tent.  The tent area was the only part of the course that wasn’t lit up at night.

At first, I thought the hat might be too warm.  I quickly realized it wasn’t.  I really needed the warm hat to keep me warm as it kept cooling off.

I eventually realized that I needed to do more running and less walking.  I wanted to walk all of the dirt sections of the course, but I was also walking some paved sections that came early in the loop.  I started running those sections, as well as the longer paved section at the end of the loop.  I continued to walk the only two uphill sections.  One was a ramp at the beginning of the loop.  The other was the ramp coming up to a bridge.

Now that I was running more, I could throttle back the pace of my walking until it was just a casual walking pace.  I should have started doing that much earlier.

With the revised run/walk mix, I still had to pay attention to when I needed to end my last walking break and run the rest of the loop.  I was still finishing my laps in about 20 minutes.

By 7:30 PM, it had cooled off enough that my legs started to feel cold.  I needed to change from shorts into tights, but I waited.  I was planning to do my first shoe change at 9 PM.  I needed to take off my shoes to change into tights, so it made sense to do both changes at the same time.  In retrospect, I should’ve just changed shoes earlier.  This was my second big mistake.

Through my first 35 laps, I was consistently finishing my laps anywhere from 12 to 15 minutes ahead of my target time.  At the end of my 36th lap, I was only eight minutes ahead of my target time.  I realized at this point that I could no longer stay on the same pace with my current run/walk mix.

I was tiring.  I wasn’t sure what to do next.  One option was to abandon 20-minute laps but keep running and walking the same part of the course, knowing it wouldn’t be as fast as before.  I worried that even doing that might continue to wear me down.

It was time to change into a new pair of shoes and socks, so I stopped at my tent.  I was originally going to change into tights, but I decided to change into sweatpants instead.  I might not need something that warm yet, but the temperature would keep dropping all through the night.  I would need sweatpants eventually, so why wait?

Changing shoes was a glacially slow process.  First, I had to unclip each of my gaiters from the shoelaces.  Then I could untie the shoes.  Taking off each shoe was difficult.  Even with the gaiters, there was so much dirt on my shoes that they were stiff.  I had to loosen the laces to get them off.

I wear orthotics in my shoes, so I had to remove the insoles to take out the orthotics.  Then I needed to put the orthotics under the insoles of the clean pair of shoes that I was changing into.

Next, I removed my gaiters and my socks.  Then I put on clean socks.  Now, I could finally change from shorts into sweatpants.

Putting on the clean pair of shoes also took time.  It was tough to get them onto my sore feet.  I needed to loosen up the shoelaces, so I could pull the tongue back as much as possible.  I forgot that I had brought a shoe horn.  Using that would’ve helped.

The last thing I needed to do was attach my gaiters to the laces of the new shoes.  I had trouble with that.  Maybe it’s just because I was tired, but I really struggled with getting the clip to go over the shoelace.

That whole process took somewhere between 20 and 25 minutes.  My legs were cold even before I started.  Sitting that long in the cold evening air made them even colder.  When I stood up, I could barely walk.  My legs were too cold and stiff.

The long break was hard to avoid, but it didn’t help that my legs had already been cold for a long time.  My legs don’t respond well to being too cold for too long.  This was the same issue that caused my race to come to a sudden end at FANS.

It took some effort just to walk in a straight line.  At first, I was staggering.  With more effort, I managed to walk forward at a normal (i.e. casual) pace.  It took even more effort to walk at what felt like a brisk pace.  Running was no longer possible.  For the rest of the night, all I could do was walk.

There was some good news.  After changing shoes, my feet felt great.  I had noticed soreness in my left foot since the beginning of the race, and I felt other minor irritations in both feet as dirt worked its way into my shoes.  Now, I no longer had any discomfort in either foot.

After another lap, I stopped at the tent again.  My hands were too cold with just the polypro gloves.  I added a pair of Gore-Tex shell mittens.  At first, my hands were still too cold, but they gradually warmed up.

The course was much quieter now.  There were fewer runners on the loop.  Runners doing the shorter races (marathon, 6-hour, 12-hour) were already done.  Runners doing the longest races (200 mile, 72-hour, 6-day) tended to sleep at night.  Even many of the runners doing the 24-hour or 48-hour races took breaks during the night.  The only runners still out there all night were the ones who were the most competitive.

I wanted to know what my pace was now that I was only walking.  At a minimum, I wanted to maintain a pace of three miles per hour.  That meant completing laps in 28 minutes.

The lap with the long clothing change was obviously slow.  The next two laps were about 26 minutes each.  I was still going faster than three miles per hour, but not by a wide margin.

After another lap, I stopped at my tent again.  I was still cold, so I took to time to take off my jacket and T-shirt, so I could put on a long-sleeve polypro shirt underneath.  Now I was wearing three layers on top.  That was as many layers as I brought.  I never imagined that I would need more than that.

During the night, the temperature was in the 40s.  That may not sound cold, but it feels much colder during the night.  Also, 40 degrees in the dry desert air is not the same as 40 degrees with humidity.  If you’re not moving, it can feel bone-chilling cold.  At this point, I wasn’t moving very fast.

I didn’t want to be reduced to only walking.  There was one part of the course where it was easy to run.  That was on the ramp coming down from the bridge.  I started running down that ramp on every lap, even though it only saved a few seconds.  Mostly, I wanted to preserve my ability to run.  I’ve learned the hard way that if you walk for too long, it can be difficult to start running again.

For a few laps, I tried to keep running after the course leveled out again.  With effort, I could do it for about 30 seconds, but it was really tiring.  After trying that for a few laps, I went back to just running down the ramp and walking everywhere else.

During the day, I was consistently making bathroom stops after every third lap.  In the evening, my bathroom stops got more frequent.  At one point, I had to stop to pee on consecutive laps.  I assumed I was overhydrating, yet I felt thirsty after every lap.  My body was giving my mixed signals.

After talking to a more experienced runners, I concluded that it was the dry air that was making me feel thirsty.  I cut back to just drinking a sip or two after each lap.  I was keeping my mouth from drying out, but I wasn’t drinking much.

That was my third major mistake, although I wouldn’t realize it until much later.  I was peeing more often just because it was nighttime.  Sometimes kidney function gets weird during the night.  During the night, I gradually got dehydrated, because I thought I was overhydrating.

As the night progressed, my pee breaks became less frequent.  Eventually, I was back to only making bathroom stops every few laps, yet I continued to limit my fluid intake to only a sip or two after each lap.  I should’ve gradually started drinking more.  I still didn’t realize that I was letting myself get dehydrated.

In a long enough race, where you’re eating solid foods, it’s inevitable that you’ll need to poop at some point.  Fortunately, there were real bathroom in the stadium, and they were right along the course.  Near the end of my 43rd lap, I stopped to poop.  While I was in the stall, I looked down at my shoes.  I had only been wearing these shoes for about three hours, but they were already getting caked with dirt.

When I finished my business and tried to wipe myself, I didn’t realize my jacket was in the way.  I got a poop stain on the bottom of my jacket.

I had to take the time to wash that part of my jacket in the sink.  That took time.  Then I needed to dry my jacket with a hand dryer.  That also took time.  The time I lost on that lap was time I could never make up.  I just wasn’t walking fast enough to make up for any significant downtime.

It was then that I realized that I could no longer sustain a three miles per hour pace, when I took occasional stops into account.  That realization was demoralizing.

After that I gave up on trying to walk at a three miles per hour pace.  It was taking too much energy.  I walked at a pace that didn’t take too much energy, and I accepted that I was going to be slow.

With all the layers I was wearing, I was still getting cold.  I wasn’t moving faster enough.  I wasn’t generating enough heat to stay warm.  Dehydration probably also played a factor, but I didn’t realize that yet.

I talked to a runner from Chicago who had brought her warmest winter coat to cope with the nighttime cold.  She couldn’t believe I didn’t.  I had warmer clothes, but I didn’t bring them.  I didn’t think I would need all the layers I was already wearing, much less anything warmer.  That was my fourth major mistake.

It was only 2 AM.  The temperature wouldn’t bottom out until 7 AM.  I didn’t know how I could get through the next five hours.

They had a warming tent near the finish line.  After my 46th lap, I sat down in the warming tent and tried to figure out what to do next.

Before the race, several people asked me what my goal was.  I was hesitant to commit to a mileage goal, even though I had a few numbers in mind.  Instead, I always told people that my primary goal was to make it to the end of the race without quitting.  My resolve to do that was being put to the test now.  Everything was going wrong, and I really wanted to quit.

I decided to go back to hotel for the night, but keep open the option of continuing in the morning.  I was clinging to hope that I might be rejuvenated if I could get warmed up and get a couple hours of sleep.

I talked to one of the race officials to find out how best to proceed.  I needed to stop at my tent to get a clean pair of shoes to wear in the morning.  The tent area was in the middle of the loop.  The official I talked to suggested that my best course of action was to start another lap.  By following the race route to my tent, my walking was all productive.  I picked up a pair of shoes at my tent, and I continued walking along the route until I reached the point on the course that was closest to my car.  When I got to the parking lot, I went straight to my car and drove back to my hotel.  I waited until the next morning to complete that lap.

When I got back to the hotel, I wrestled off my dirt-encrusted shoes.  Then I got undressed and climbed into bed.  It was 3 AM now.

As soon as I got into bed, I started to shiver uncontrollably.  That lasted for 10 or 15 minutes.

I normally keep my hotel room pretty cold at night.  I wasn’t expecting to come back to the hotel until after the race, so I didn’t set the thermostat as cold as I usually do.  It was about 67 degrees in the room, but I was covered with thick warm blankets.  There’s no way I should feel this cold.

That’s when I realized something was wrong.  I was dehydrated, and it was impairing my body’s ability to regulate my body temperature.

Under the warm blankets, I eventually warmed up, but it took a while.  Then my attention switched to another problem.  My left foot started to hurt again.  I couldn’t find any position that didn’t make that foot hurt.

I had previously written off that sore spot as something caused by spot pressure if the side of my foot pressed against the edge of the mattress while I was sleeping.  Now, I had to consider the possibility that I had a more serious injury.

The pain made it difficult to fall asleep.  I was lying in bed for what seemed like two hours. Then I finally rolled over to look at the clock.  It was 4:20.  I still had time to try to get to sleep.

I laid in bed for what seemed like another hour.  Then I looked at the clock.  It was 7:30.  I could see light filtering into the room from outside.  I never felt like I fell asleep, but I couldn’t account for how much time had passed.  I must have drifted into a light stage of sleep.

I got up, but before getting dressed, I took a quick bath and did some stretches.  The time I took to do that proved to be a good investment.  I also took the time to have a quick breakfast at the hotel before driving back to the race venue.

I started the day in the same clothes that I was wearing the night before, but I changed into a new pair of shoes and socks.

It was only now that I realized that trying to take a nap in my tent would never have been practical.  Before climbing into a sleeping bag, I would need to take off my dirty shoes.  Before the race, I didn’t have any appreciation for how long that would take.

I parked my car in the same spot where I was parked the day before.  I re-entered the course in the same spot where I had left the course.  Then I walked the remainder of the lap that I had started seven hours earlier.  When I crossed the chip mat, I looked at the screen and saw that the timing system had recorded my 47th lap.

As I started my next lap, I was still walking, but after crossing the bridge, I ran down the ramp.

After running down the ramp, I decided to see if I could keep running.  To my surprise, I could.  It wasn’t as tiring now.  In fact, I was able to run all the paved sections for the rest of the lap.  Between the rest, the hot bath, and the stretching, I had rejuvenated my legs.

I was overdressed now, so I stopped at my tent to shed my jacket and the Gore-Tex mittens.  I also swapped my warm hat for a regular running hat.

It was warming up quickly.  On my next lap, I took off my gloves, and I removed the polypro shirt that was under my T-shirt.

One lap later, I changed into shorts.  That involved taking off my shoes, but they weren’t too dirty yet.  I was able to continue in the same pair of shoes.

I wasn’t running all that fast, but running half of each lap allowed me to make respectable time.  My lap times weren’t as fast as the first day, but they were only a couple minutes slower.

I started the morning with only about 64 miles.  I needed 36 more miles just to get to 100.  At the pace I was going, I could plausibly get there before nightfall.  I was now focused on that goal.

Before the race, getting to 100 miles wasn’t even on my list of goals.  I took it for granted.  I was hoping to get there in the first 24 hours.  Now, I had to work for it.

At the aid station, they now had breakfast burritos.  I had something similar for breakfast at the hotel, but now that I had completed a few laps, I was ready to start eating at the aid station.  A bacon and egg burrito doesn’t digest as quickly as a PBJ, but its something you can easily carry with you and eat while you’re walking.

As the day progressed, I was able to keep up the same run/walk pattern.  I remained focused on getting to 100 miles before nightfall.  In the afternoon, however, I started to notice the heat.  It was a few degrees warmer than the day before, and I noticed the sun more.

They food tent featured different foods at different times.  The next treat that appealed to me was a hot dog, but I couldn’t eat a hot dog without having a beverage to go with it.  Instead of taking it with me and eating on the run, I had to eat it before leaving the aid station.

There was a particularly long section of pavement at the end of each lap.  As it got warmer, it was too tiring to run the whole thing, so I started adding a walking break in the middle of that section.

My lap times were a minute or two slower now.  As I did the math, I realized I wouldn’t get to 100 miles until about 20 minutes after it got dark.  That wasn’t a big deal.  I remained focused on that goal.  I knew exactly how many laps I still needed, and I counted them down.

I was drinking much more than I was the previous afternoon.  The first day, I rarely drank more than half a cup of Gatorade.  Now, I was sometimes drinking a full cup of Gatorade and also drinking some water.

As I was on my 63rd lap, I was particularly thirsty.  I wondered if they were going to have smoothies at the aid station again.  As I finished that lap, I saw two race volunteers holding out trays with paper cups on them.  Smoothies!  I had two of them.

The last special treat I had at the aid station was a plate of pierogies.  The volunteer in the food tent warned me that they were still hot.  I had to stay in the food tent while I ate them, so I could follow each bite with a sip of water.

At about 4:30 PM, it started to cool down.  I needed four more laps to get to 100 miles.  Before I got there, I saw my second sunset of the race.

With one lap to go to reach 100 miles, my legs started to feel sore as I started running.  I’m surprised it took that long.  I had held up well all morning and afternoon, but now it was getting difficult again.  That would be my last running of the evening.

It was cooling off rapidly.  I didn’t want my legs to get too cold, so I stopped at the tent to pull on a pair of Gore-Tex wind pants.  I could put those on without having to take off my shoes.  I also added gloves and a jacket.

Before the race, I wanted to know if I could get through two nights without sleep.  Since I had already gone back to the hotel during the first night, there wasn’t much point in trying to plow through the second night.  I knew I didn’t have adequate clothes to make it through the night.  Going back to the hotel was inevitable.  It was just a matter of when.

At first, I was going to start walking laps after I reached 100 miles.  I wasn’t going to go back to the hotel until I got too cold.  Continuing into the night, however, carried some risk.  Now that it was dark, there was a real danger that I could start getting sleepy at any time.  I wanted to drive back to the hotel while I could still do so safely.

After reaching 100 miles, I started one more lap, but I wasn’t going to finish it until the next morning.  I stopped at my tent to get my last clean pair of shoes.  I also put on my warm hat, so I would have it when I returned in the morning.

I walked most of that lap, but I went to my car before finishing the lap.  Then I drove back to the hotel.

I saw another runner in the hotel lobby.  She was cheerful, and she had obviously changed into clean clothes.  I asked her which race she did and when she finished.

She had done the 100 mile race, and she finished the day before.  That explained how she could be cheerful.  By comparison, I was a train wreck, although I was happy to have reached 100 miles.

We started talking about the race.  We had some similar experiences.  In particular, she had also come back from the race during the night and started shivering after getting into bed.  We talked until I started getting sleepy.  Then I went up to my room and climbed into bed.

I was sleepy, but I had a hard time getting to sleep.  At first, I was hot.  My metabolism was probably still revved up from the race.  I had to push the blankets away.  Also, my foot hurt.  During the race, I felt it, but I could tune it out.  Now the pain kept me awake.

I was still awake at midnight, but I slept well for the rest of the night.  I wanted to get back to the race by dawn, so I set my alarm for 5:30.  The alarm woke me up.

I wanted to be back on the course before 7:00, but I had time to take a quick bath and do some stretches.  My left Achilles tendon was tight, but stretching helped.  I had noticed it was getting tight the day before.  I was only going to be running until 9 AM, so I wasn’t too worried about it at this point.

I changed into my last clean pair of shoes and headed back to the race.  I got there around 6:30 and finished the lap I had started the night before.

I was once again able to run the paved sections and walk the dirt sections.  My pace was about the same as the day before.

My first full lap after getting back on the course was in the dark.  Then I saw the sun rise.

I had time to run at least four more laps.  As long as I did enough running, I could probably do five.  With only a couple hours to go, I didn’t need to stop at the food tent to eat.  I barely even needed to drink.  The only stop I made was to shed some clothes as it warmed up.

After running four more laps, I still had plenty of time for a fifth.  I could’ve walked that whole lap, but I still ran half of it.  I finished my final lap after 47 hours, 49 minutes, and 10 seconds.  That lap brought me to 109.9 miles.

I wanted to take a picture of the screen showing my final lap, but it never came up.  My final lap wasn’t recorded by the timing system.  I immediately went over to the timing tent to let them know, and they recorded that lap manually.  The time recorded for that lap was a few minutes later than I actually finished it, but that doesn’t really matter.  What matters is your official distance.  Everyone’s official time is 48 hours.

Every runner gets a mug.  I have four of these now.

If you finish a multiple of 100 miles, you also get a belt buckle.  This is my third 100-mile buckle from this race.

On my way back to the car, I stopped at the food tent to get a breakfast burrito.

After stopping at the car to drop off my mug and belt buckle, I walked to the tent area.  I needed to pack up all my gear and bring everything back to the car.

They had an awards banquet at 11:00.  I had everything back in my car by 9:20, so I had time to go back to the hotel, unpack, wash up, and change into clean clothes before going to the awards banquet.

The awards ceremony was held in the stadium, where there was seating.  They had food and beverages, but we were all there to hear about the runners who had epic results.

They started with the top finishers in the various shorter races.  Most of those runners had already gone home, so they weren’t there to receive their awards in person.  The last awards were for the top three men and women in the 6-day race.  Those runners were all present, and the mileage they each ran (or walked) was impressive.

In four tries at ATY, I’ve yet to have a good race.  There are a lot of things I like about this race, but there are also two things I hate.  I’m not a fan of the dirt sections of the course, and I have trouble with the nighttime temperatures.  Will I be back?  Probably.  Would I do a few things differently?  Definitely.

One good thing that came out of this race is that I had my first experience with sleeping during a race and then coming back to do more running in the morning.  If I ever do a longer multi-dace race, I’ll have a better idea of what to expect.

My biggest concern coming out of this race is the pain in my left foot.  Is it a bruise?  Is it tendonitis?  Is it a stress fracture?  Is it plantar fasciitis?

That last possibility is something that didn’t occur to me until the day after the race.  For the first time, I had discomfort in my foot just from putting weight on it.  When I’ve had plantar fasciitis in the past, the onset of pain was much more severe.  This has come on much more gradually.  Whatever it is, I needed to figure it out, so it doesn’t become a long-term concern.

Race statistics:

Distance:  109.9 miles

Official Time:  48 hours

Actual Time Before Stopping:  47:49:10

Average Pace:  26:06 per mile

Lifetime Marathons/Ultras:  536

Lifetime 100s:  16

Lifetime ATY Miles:  382.85