Wy'East Howl 100k Race

A long race with a short-ish report and a few pictures.
My first 100k (63 mile) race.

I planned my year where my big "A" race event was in the middle of my race calendar with a 50 miler one side and a 50k the other and lots of recovery time in between them.

A few things didn't quite go as planned leading up the race, but that's life and it's how you deal with those challenges that makes the difference between success and failure or misery and enjoyment.  Hard as it was I kept positive but realistic and continued to do the best I could.  After having a cold/flu type bug that took me out for almost three weeks I managed to get to one week away from the race feeling like I was at a reasonable level of fitness but knowing I wasn't anywhere near as fit as I had planned to be at that point.

I left home on Friday afternoon, drove over to My Hood (Wy'east) and spent the night in the car.  Well when I say spent the "night" it was more like a few hours of attempted sleep as I was up at 3am to get prepared for the long day ahead.

My mental preparation was done in the week leading up to the race so Saturday morning was simply a case of getting up and going for a run in the hills with a bunch of like minded people.

For this race, although it's my longest run to date I decided my minimalist Lems shoes were the best option.  I had ran 34 miles with 7,500 feet of climbing the week before the race in them and my feet felt great, so I decided it was a good idea to go a bit further in them.  My reasoning for doing this would make the blog rather lengthy, so I may cover that separately in the future.

At the start line it was still dark at 4:45 ish so we needed headlights.
I'm right in the middle of this picture between number 28  & 50.  My head was in a really calm place and I wasn't even thinking about the long day ahead, I was just really grateful to be there and enjoy the event.

Almost time to go,  I'm the old person on the right.  I usually go light, but for this race I used my running vest/pack so I could carry all the food I needed and it was somewhere to stash my headlight and long sleeve shirt once it got light and warmed up.

The race started at 5am exactly.  We had to do a group howl before the start.  I guess it's not the Wy'east Howl 100k Trail Race without one!

A few miles into the race it got warm and light.

Being happy and smiling helps in a lot of ways.

I think this is somewhere near to the turn around point probably at about mile 28 ish.  Wy'east was looking much smaller now!

I'm not in this picture, but I liked this view, it was very typical of the whole route with the trees and dusty dry trails.

For such a warm and very dry place there were lots of patches of green trees and lots of wild plants.

When it warmed up it was tempting to jump into these cool streams.

Wy'east in the distance.

Somewhere around mile 38 on a seven mile long climbing section of the route I was in a bit of a low point feeling the fatigue and knowing there was still a long way to go so it was the first point I stopped running and slowed down to a fast walk.  As much as I love running up hills I was really looking forward to getting to the top of this one and running down hill for a bit.  I had no intention or thoughts of stopping, I just didn't feel like running much of it and hoped it would save some reserves for the remaining 20 plus miles.

Having now slowed down I knew the huge lead I had at the beginning of the climb was slowly shrinking.  I knew I was in 7th place at this point and at the turn around point I could see I was really far ahead, but I had no idea how fast anyone was gaining on me so it was good motivation to keep going.  I thought I could maybe stay in the top 10 for the finish.

In that section after having ran 30+ miles on my own I was glad of some company when Kami Semick caught up with me and we started a conversation and that got me back on track.  Kami is an elite ultra runner athlete with a lot of experience, I didn't know that it was her until some time into the conversation when we exchanged names.  That's another thing I really love about ultra running, nobody cares who you "are" or "aren't" we are all out there suffering/enjoying the sport together!

We went back and forth for 20 something miles taking it in turns to take the lead and to keep us both moving forward as fast as we could.

I think I still have a smile in this picture.  This was taken in the last 7 mile section.  You can smile and tell yourself it's only 7 miles to go which is usually just a warm-up run distance for me but it doesn't necessarily make it "easy" when you're already at mile 50 something into a run.

I crossed the finish line in 13hrs 30 minutes and 10 seconds.
Still smiling but really glad to be finished and looking forward to some real food.
Kami came in just a second or two behind me and she was also happy to finish and also to see me get into the top 10.  The conversations we had kept us both going for that last 20 miles.

Credit for all the photos above here goes to Steven Mortinson.
https://vimeo.com/stevenmortinson


In 8th place overall and 5th male.  Not bad for my first 100k race!

Elevation profile.  Total climbing was about 11,600 feet.
First half was 5,100 feet gain and 6,500 loss, the return was 6,500 gain and 5,100 loss.
In short, a lot of climbing and a tough return leg with more climbing than the first half and higher temperatures.

The age I feel... Ha! ha!

Cool finishers award.  We got a pint glass too, but that's currently in the dishwasher as it was used after the race for a much needed nice cold drink.

The good stuff:

• I had a great time.  That's always number one goal.
• Had some great conversations along the way. 
• As usual at theses events I met some really interesting people that I know I will see again.
• I finished the race. Bonus!  
• I was struggling to make a good estimate of how long this was going to take me, but I had sub 14 hrs in mind on a good day and 13 hrs on a really good day.  Got bang in the middle of that and happy with the finish time.  The placing doesn't matter and is just a bonus to do well.
• The race was really well organised.  Thanks Jeremy at Daybreak Racing.
• Thanks to all the volunteers at the aid stations.
• My minimalist Lems shoes gamble paid off.  I'm glad I used them and not the alternative.

The not so good stuff:

• Need to work on eating more during a long race.  I took lots with me but I just didn't eat it.  I think I faded on the long grueling climbs partly due to lack of fuel in the tank.
• Add more speed work to my regular running!  I neglected that partly due to losing pretty much three weeks training so I got slower over time.
• There's always room for improvement in mental toughness training too.

If you got this far, thanks for reading my blog.  If not then I guess I done a good job of curing insomnia!