If Not… (Labor Pains 12 Hour – 2019)

“If you can fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, and – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!” – Rudyard Kipling, as quoted by John L. Parker.

If it only takes a minute of running to earn it all, and you can go out for twelve hours without fall, then you should be master of the universe, and, maybe more – you’d be The Man, my man. At least that’s my extrapolation from R Kip. The Labor Pains 12-Hour Endurance Trail Run offers just such an opportunity for those four hundred plus foolish enough to give it a go. I’ll save you the suspense – I am unable to claim the title of Master of the Universe (He-Man is safe for now).

The quote above from Kipling introduces us to Quentin Cassidy, the most famous fictional runner since Pheidippides, in the early part of Once A Runner. Taken alone, the quote does not make a lot of sense; how is a minute filled with a distance run? At best it’s a sprint. Even all out, the best are not covering more than a third of a mile in that time (and that’s flying), but no one except an inchworm should consider that any kind of impressive distance feat.

Eating a quick lunch last week at Jimmy John’s, I found the “If” poem on the wall of inspirational signs, and I was reminded that Rudyard had fourteen (14) previous stanzas preceding the paltry, iffy minuteman conclusion. There’s more to it to earn your stripes. For instance, “If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew to serve your turn long after they are gone, and so hold on when there is nothing in you except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold On!’…” This couplet conveys a heck of a lot more effort than the last one. Google “Rudyard Kipling If” if you want the whole thing and don’t feel like searching the walls at a Jimmy John’s, but Google alone won’t help as much if you’re hungry and in a hurry for a sandwich.

But back to the race that took place on September 1st in Reading, PA. Starting at 7:45 a.m., 411 official runners (per the unofficial results) embarked on the trail loop of five miles to be repeated as many times as possible, or at least as many times as preferred, over the course of the day. I’d participated twice previously in 2013 and 2014, both times stopping well short of 12 hours, (after 40 miles in ’13, and only 31* in ’14), but I never put together a post-race report of the efforts. This meant that in five years’ time, I had forgotten just how rocky, rooty, and hilly the trails were, fooling myself into thinking that it was easier than it is. Being five years older and in worse shape doesn’t help either.

[*While the course is measured in 5 mile increments, they offer turnaround markers for people looking to run an even marathon or 50k on the day – after your 5th or 6th loop, you head back out to the turnaround for the marathon or 50k respectively, returning against traffic to check out for a milestone achievement that is not wholly divisible by 5.]

I had run consistently for three straight months leading into Sunday’s event, averaging close to 7 miles a day with a long run of 13. Less than three hours into the run, and I’d done more in one go than I’d run since last November. There are probably better ways to prepare for an event like this, but you’re here and not on John Dragon’s blog (he’s the badass with the badass name who ran 75 miles on the day and bested the course record). Dragon may lay claim to He-Man-like status after his race, while I may lay lame in bed instead, but at least by writing an overly long race report I can give myself ammunition to know what I’m getting into next time I decide that it wasn’t that hard. Besides, just ask the few remaining people of King’s Landing – there’s no shame in getting destroyed by a dragon.

The Reading Liederkranz plays home base to the event, with plenty of parking (always a plus!), but never enough portapots (always a problem). Their central pavilion is the checkpoint for checking in to receive your bib and swag (tech tee shirt, bumper sticker, coffee mug, with a special post-race follow-up gift to follow in the mail afterwards – one year this was a fleece vest, another a light windbreaker; this year it’s a techy thin long-sleeve hoody). The pavilion is where you report at the end of each lap. There you can refill your water bottle and pick up other drinks and snacks. Around this area are picnic tables where you can drop your backpack full of race gear which you probably won’t need but have to have just in case. Around this are a bunch of tents and canopies from people who are much more prepared or who travel with entourages, as opposed to solo participants such as myself. It has a very Ragnarian trail base camp feel to it.

At the start, I observed that there seemed to be a lot more women than men running, which surprised me. I thought this would be the case for half marathons, but for anything longer, I still expected the fairer sex to be under-represented,  like in our government. My sexism or misogyny aside, I was not complaining, as I’ve grown accustomed to being chicked, and I preferred the sight of the super-hottie girl standing next to me at the start to the big guy running in a Speedo. (Tallying the results, looks like 210 women to 201 men, so maybe not as lopsided as I thought). Said hottie would drop me during the first lap, only to disappear never to be seen again the rest of the day. In a loop event where you see everyone over and over again, this was particularly impressive. She must have been geosynchronously running and breaking consistently polarly opposite me all day thereafter just to avoid my ogling eyes. Meanwhile, Mr. Speedo decided to recur in my nightmares throughout much of the race. Karma is real, and she’s a real bitch sometimes.

Lap 1, we started down the road, across the street, up a long driveway, and into the woods, out of the woods, around an empty sediment pond, past a picnic area and the mile 1 marker. I reached this point in a little over 8 minutes, which was way too fast (for me) to sustain for another 712 minutes, so I slowed down as we ascended a bigger hill back into the woods again. Around two miles in we dropped down a fire road, crossed a street, up and down more minor rolling hills, up to the midpoint aid station where I declined their limited offerings and continued on. Maybe a mile later the course throws its nasty rock section at you in what they officially describe as “900 foot of bad footing” following a nice uphill. After the crappy ankle-rollers we come down some scary steps to another fire road, back into the woods for a generally downhill stretch before they spit you back out onto the roads, across a glen, then you run alongside the road beside the empty pond, cut back down a grassy path, then up a legitimate hike – “a short but painful hill of about 75 yards up the back of the Liederkranz”, where runners make sure their numbers are recorded before restocking and heading out for Lap 2…

First lap was around 44 minutes, which again was too fast to sustain, but banking time always works. The morning temperature was in the low 60s and cool before the start, and I was already dripping with sweat after a single lap. While I vividly remembered the 900 foot stretch and the 75 yard hike from previous runnings, I’d forgotten how many rocks were strewn throughout the course. I feared I was likely to turn an ankle or fall at some point on this terrain. [Yes, that’s unsubtle foreshadowing.]

Betwixt laps 1 and 2 I decided to grab my water bottle. The spacing of aid at ~2.5 miles apart allows you to run unfettered, but a bottle in hand is worth two in the bushes or something. Anyway, the second lap was similar to the first except that at some point I had a bug fly into my right eye, I ran a little slower (still too fast though), and the general crowd spread out so that there were some nice moments of tranquility in the woods, listening to the birds and the bugs (mostly crickets and cicadas, I believe). If you’re going to be out for a long, solo run in the woods, quietude is nice.

Like all good things, it doesn’t last. By lap 3 we were lapping some of the back of the packers on the course in front of us, and the trails started to resemble a Ragnar trail as well (where you have no idea what loop the other people are on, but you’re constantly seeing people come and go around you). The course easily accommodates the four hundred people spread out along the route, but if you’re antisocial like me, you won’t find solitude for long stretches (not a complaint – just an observation)*. At the start of lap 3 I grabbed a waffle wafer whatever snack from my backpack and prepared to ingest some calories. Instead, I dropped half of it on the ground. So that sucked.

*[Okay, here’s a complaint:  Expecting peace and quiet in a run with over 400 people spread over 5 miles is ridiculous; but I do expect those 400 people to respect the rest of us who don’t want to hear their music.  Earbuds, buds!  Two guys had the temerity to tout their questionable musical tastes via smart phones in their packs.  While Gordon Lightfoot seemed somehow not inappropriate in these settings (light feet and trail running are kind of linked via Born to Run, right?), thrash metal surely should stay at 10k’s or less as far as I’m concerned.  Yes, I am getting curmudgeonly in my master years.]     

At least I didn’t have another bug fly into my eye. That waited until lap 4, when a flying fucker found my left orb. I was dreading lap 6, since it seemed that every even lap was turning into a temporarily blinding annoyance. Every other lap of this was still better than every lap I guess, if you’re looking for the glass (or waffle or vision) half-full perspective.

Lap 5 was like laps 1 through 4, though there’s a short stretch before mile 1 where the course was turning muddy. You could make your way through it without sinking too deep or having a shoe sucked off. It was during this circuit that I first caught a rock or root or invisible tripwire or something and stumbled, catching myself on a tree with my water bottle. The bottle took the brunt of the impact like a whoopie cushion, draining half its contents (though without the flatulent sound), and I course-corrected, counting myself lucky to have not hit the ground. I finished the loop in around 4:09 overall, which meant that my pre-race hope to finally break 8 hours for 50 miles was not going to happen (0 for 8 in that department).

Lap 6 lacked eye-seeking insects, which was nice, but another one of those tripping objects found me somewhere along the way. This time my water bottle did not save me from the tree. The bottle flew off my hand, the hard pretzels I was nibbling flew from my other hand, and my right forearm connected solidly with a tree (not sure if it was the same tree from the previous lap or not). Another runner helped retrieve my tossed tool of hydration; the pretzels, like my earlier other half of waffle, were lost to the natural environment. My forearm showed some gnarly barky tree rash, but I was okay to keep going. The rest of the lap was less eventful. My marathon split was 4:25.

I regrouped a bit before heading out for loop 7, taking advantage of the cold outdoor shower to clean up some and soak my head, taking off my shoes and retying them so that they might not conspire with rocks to trip me up again, etc. This lap was less fun for some reason. After 30 miles, my back started to tighten up. My feet were feeling the pounding (even though most of the course is trail). I passed 50k in 5:21 and mentally computed that I was not going to reach 100k in the time remaining based on the slowing down I was doing. Instead, calling it a day at 50 miles started to seem like a better idea.

Halfway through the next loop, my spirits lifted when I chugged a half cup of Yuengling at the aid station (they offer this alternative nourishment in the afternoon). I asked how much beer it would take to stop the ache of my feet, and they told me as many as I needed. They also offered shots of fireball. The one beer was enough at the time, and I continued on my merrier way. Weirdly, shortly after consumption, a stream of runners proceeded to pass me like I was standing still, yet I didn’t seem to mind. One of them was Mr. Speedo, which kind of killed my buzz, but I was not in a position to do anything about it.

At the inter-lap interlude I espied Speedo-dude hanging at the aid station (still no sign of the starting gun girl), repeated the ritual, and continued. Speedo passed me a few miles later. I overheard a couple other guys commenting at the time: “If that doesn’t motivate you to run…” Deadpan answer “That doesn’t motivate me.” Another beer at the midpoint, fortunately not followed by a parade of passers this time.

40 miles was covered in under 8 hours, so I was averaging better than a lap per hour, but between the breaks and running I was taking over an hour per lap lately, again confirming that I did not have time to reach a new distance milestone on the day (my record remains 64 miles from where I dropped in my lone attempt at a hundo). Besides, the prospect of being done in two more laps was sounding more and more appealing the more those last laps were appearing to be nearing.

Lap 9’s aches and pains were the knees and kidneys. The knees weren’t surprising, but the kidneys were different. I briefly wondered if Yuengling was not the best sports drink for an ultramarathon before chugging another cup. Still, I felt generally pretty good. I’ve run several ultras where it felt like I was being continually kicked in the gut. Others where my legs spasmed (quads seizing up or calves cramping). The minor aches of this one were a joy by comparison. I was still running up most of the hills while most around me were walking up them. Lap 9 wrapped around 8:26 elapsed (if memory serves). I stretched and cold-showered before heading out for the last loop, mentally computing that I needed to run sub-90 minutes to beat 10 hours.

Knowing that you are almost done makes such a difference. Against the people planning for another three hours, my earlier ending enabled me to move by with a spring in my step. This time at the midpoint, I made it a double, downing two cups of Yuengling, forgetting to fill my water bottle or to grab any salty snacks. I was too excited to end this thing!

At 9:34 I crossed the line for the last time, checking myself out of the event with 2:26 of unused clock still on the board. May the German gods of Liederkranz forgive the waste, even if Kipling would not. 50 miles was a good day.

If you can manage the marker of a 50th mile

And still pass people with a smile,

If you can stumble and fall

Yet get back up, bloody and all,

If you beat your previous run

Even if less than you’d like to have done,

If successful or even if not,

You gave it a good shot.