Great Eastern Endurance Run (GEER) 2009

Posted on the Ultralist:
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 2009 20:06:11 -0400
From: Steve da sleeve
Subject: My GEER 100K race report: extremely long (of course!)

I ran the Great Eastern Endurance run in Lyndhurst, VA saturday – I am pretty sure it won’t happen again, though even as I write this, my legs stiff and sore and with swollen feet, I am (sort of) reconsidering! GEER is an event that has a 1/2 marathon, a 50 km and a 100 km all on mostly the same course in the Blue Ridge mountains. The trails are quite technical at times, with *lots* of climbing, 15,000 of elevation gain for the 100 km These are single and double track trails with roots, rocks and (for this day at least) 6.32 billion small lakes or ponds to navigate around or swim through (actually I think the technical name for these is “puddles” but that word doesn’t seem remotely adequate) with some rocky jeep trails and a bit of asphalt and dirt road.

My training was very good for this race, not quite enough hill work perhaps but I was fairly confident. I hurt my hip a bit in the last weeks before the race and was worried about that but it turned out to be a non-issue. GEER 100 km was to be a test of sorts for me. I ran Rocky Raccoon 100 miler in February and loved it, so I decided I would try one or two or even three 100 mile races next year with at least one one being a mountain race. GEER, with it’s reputation of being extremely tough, and with 15,000 ft elevation gain on rocky trails seemed to be a perfect litmus test. 62.5 miles of that also seemed long enough to qualify as a long mountain race but a little more approachable than 100 miles. I decided if I did OK and liked it I would figure out a mountain 100 for next year. Also in the same spirit I signed up for a flat road 50 miler 5 weeks afterwards in Chicago, and the JFK 50 miler three weeks after that to test my ability to recover! With all that in mind my goal was to finish and not to worry at all about time, not that I am any kind of a speedster or anything – quite the opposite. The cutoff was a generous 19 hours.

Race day began at 6 AM, with rain drizzling down, temps in the upper 50’s, very humid and damp, with dense clouds and fog, and it got worse gradually during the day. Worse for me that is. For, say, a duck or a small-mouth bass I would guess it got much better gradually during the next 19 hours. The rain never stopped the entire race. At around noon it began coming down in earnest and in buckets!

In the 10 years I have been running marathons and ultras, I have never had to run in the rain but for a few minutes. I rather like running in the rain actually, but this was pretty awful after a while. During the last 10 hours of my 19 hour run – I came in dead last, 30 seconds past the cutoff – this weather gradually ground my normal ebullience down to a stubby nub of irritation. There were times I was almost in despair, coming upon lake after lake – very deep puddles stretched across the trails and maybe 30 feet long – with the only way around bushwhacking in the dense trees and bushes and mud. I tried to run through these lakes but the mud and depth made me kind of nervous. With the rain pelting down on my wet chilled body I guessed that falling in all the way would have likely finished the race for me. Maybe. I was pretty determined to complete this 62.5 miler though. As a Scot ( more particularly an Aberdonian) and a thrift store goer and generally price savy I was not going to waste my race entry fee, not to mention the cost of the hotel, by not finishing. Actually this aspect of my character got me into this mess to begin with. The entry was $60 for the first few to register, half price. That’s buy one 50K get one 50K free! Who can resist a sale like that, less than a dollar per mile?!

I started out very conservatively, trying not to worry about the fast  50Kers running with the 100kers. They had (only) 31 miles to go, but I knew that the race for me would start around 40 so I was determined
to go slow and steady in order to have some reserves left for the later climbing and the night running. There were some speedy runners for sure and I soon fell into a steady slowish pace slogging up the
first steep incline. This went straight up for a mile or so then I ran along a ridge with supposed beautiful views. I saw no beautiful views this day though as the world was enshrouded in fog and rain. I was something like 10 minutes off the cutoff at aid station 2 – which scared me a little! It did not occur to me that I would be *that* slow! I sped up and ran pretty fast down a steep 3 mile gravel road to aid station 3, grabbed some food and then turned around and power- hiked, jogged up the same road passing quite a few runners. By the time I hit the 4th aid station I was about 90 minutes under the cutoff so I relaxed a bit and tried to enjoy the day. The climbing was relentless, up and down on rocky and rooty terrain. We were
warned about yellow jackets in the race briefing at 5:30 AM. “Watch out if you are alergic.” Hell if I know if I am allergic I thought and forgot about it. Lo and behold at mile 22 or so a big yellow bastard landed on my ankle and stung me. I yelped pretty loud, freaking the guy behind me! He looked all around like we were being attacked by swarms of wasps, flinching while I jumped up and down swearing and batting the nasty off my foot. I guess he might have thought I was having an epileptic fit or something. He said “Where? Where? I don’t see any” after I told him I got stung, I replied “I think I killed it!” For the next 10 minutes or so I monitored my vitals while I ran, pulse elevated, well yes but I am running, short of breath, um yes, dizzy… NO.. I am not allergic as it happens fortunately and the sting was actually not such a terrible thing. I was a bit worn out at that point, only 1/3 into the race, but the sting pain completely took my mind off my tiredness and when the adrenalin eased off and I went from a rabid half sprint back to my
normal pace I felt… good! I entertained myself for quite a while imagining what my antics must have looked like!!

I had a few bad moments between miles 31 and 47 when I was totally alone and rain had become heavy. Actually at the beginning of this stretch I was jubilant, babbling a bit to a runner who stuck with me for a few miles, at how great it was to get past 30 miles and how wonderful it was to be running in the rain and other such nonsense! I think I scared him off. He eventually started walking and said he might see me later. I am not a fast runner so I was pretty sure he’d eventually catch up but it turned out he dropped out. Of the 88 people that started the 100K, 50 eventually dropped out.

There is a long long section between the next two aid stations that just goes up and up on a nasty rocky jeep road. It was towards the end of that bit, when I was at my wits end, and the rain beginning to really come down, thinking I might have taken a wrong turn and got lost, when I came across another runner also struggling.

I like to race because I like to chat with other runners and make friends. I train alone the rest of my life (running clubs don’t appeal particularly) and I am generally rather introverted. When I race though I have found I really enjoy running with someone, at least for a while. My normal introversion often gives way to slightly eccentric jubilant babble! I try to control this since it becomes irritating even to me after a while! Sometimes, though, I find myself running with a complainer. You know what I mean I think, someone who
is more focused on the hard stuff – too rocky, too windy, too wet, too long… I try to avoid these types, I know how hard it is, what I want to talk about though is how cool it is, or how fun, or why we are doing it or music or art or (politics – actually not so much about politics…!) Brian was positive and very nice and easy going, a perfect person to hang with on a run, so we ran together for the rest of the race. He said when we first met he was worried at running in the dark. He had done GEER a few years prior on an easier course
(he said) and freaked out during the night portion. He was worried, it seems, about hillbillies with hatchets and no teeth, and weird sounds. Also bears. One or two 100K runners had already dropped apparently because of a big bear appearing in the middle of the trail on the ridge. Big animals scare the shit out of me, mainly dobermans, the backs of horses, and mountain lions, but bears not so much. The ones around here (there I mean, in the Shenandoahs) are black bears not grizzlies, and are not too fond of human meat I’ve been told.
Anyway I was way too tired to worry about being eaten and I actually liked running at night, so I told Brian I’d stick with him through the night, happy to have some company at last. We ran the last portion of the long uphill bit that had me frazzled and half defeated before, together to Bald Mountain Summit aid station that marked mile 40. Only 22.5 left!

I was not lost as it turned out, just slower than I thought so it took way longer than I had calculated. Either the mileage was wrong on the course description, or my ability to judge distance and mileage as I run – normally pretty good – was way off. For the rest of the event I was continually surprised, sometimes shocked, at how LONG it took to get to the next aid station.

The people at Bald Mountain Summit aid station were just the nicest most helpful volunteers in the world! Ever had Ramen noodles made with Gatorade rather than water? Actually I thought it was disgusting but apparently people love it, Brian did, and the Ramen chef was very proud of this dish! We hit this aid station two more times and always the volunteers started cheering and came out of their tent into the rain yelling encouragement when they saw our flashlights in the distance as we approached. From Bald mountain summit we finally got some down hill, though it was too rocky and slippery to really run properly, and so we descended into a valley in a dense wood. It was getting towards sunset by now (that’s what they call it but frankly I didn’t see no damn sun all day… for that day sunset should have been renamed “the end of all things good and the beginning of a wet hell.” Or “Run away run away fools, find shelter and beer, you don’t
want to be here you poor sorry wet running idiots.” Or something maybe a bit shorter like “yuck-time.”)

Brian stopped suddenly and said “WHAT WAS THAT?” I almost collided with him. “Um” I replied. Earlier he had kept asking if there were any people around while we ran along the valley path. There were none but he said he heard voices. The rain was coming down hard but since we were in pretty dense forest we just got sprinkled on, but the sound of the rain masked and distorted all other sounds. Turns out Brian had a bit of a hearing problem because of working in engine rooms in the Navy.

“Is that a BEAR” he shouted and pointed. “Um” I replied. “Where?” I couldn’t see anything. It had been getting darker so I looked harder in the woods. Maybe there was a dark shape like a bear there. Despite my earlier bravado I was getting a bit freaked myself. I said to Brian “No need to worry man, even if there is a bear. Black bears are wary of us, they don’t attack, prefer to slip off and if we make enough noise any bear is much more likely to leave than do anything else. No worries!” I was just parroting something I had read
actually. If there was a bear I planned on spraying Brian with the last of my sports drink and running like hell so that maybe the bear would eat him. Do bears like Amino? I have to research that one before I do this event again I think. We cautiously jogged looking here and there. “THERE!!” Brian said. “Um” I said, my heart racing, and then I saw it, a big dark shape in the woods. It was HUGE, bigger than I ever imagined, and sort of bushy and had leaves all over it like it had been rolling in a pile, or like it was a big bear shaped
bush. “I think I see it, yes I can it IS a bear! Fucking hell” I shouted. Brian said “no not there, over THERE!!!” and pointed up the trail. A white shape was moving away from us on the trail. Polar bear? No it was another runner. Phew! Crisis averted, or rather false crisis created and proved wrong. Feeling slightly foolish and laughing a bit we ran past the runner. I said “hey man from behind you look like a bear!” to the runner and he gave me a nonplussed, slightly confused look.

We got to the 50 mile mark at long last. Cool, 12 and a bit more. I can do that I thought. It was full on dark when we took off and went UP the mountain. I had no idea at that point just how hard the next 12 miles were going to be. If I had I probably would have cried. Or maybe run back to the bear valley looking to get eaten. Later on in the worst of it I imagined myself sauntering into the woods yelling “Bear? Bear?! Come and get it, EAT ME you furry fiend!!” Right then though I figured at our slowest we could finish in 4 hours, and while that would be slow indeed, it would still put us in at midnight, an hour before the 19 hour cutoff. After getting cheered in by hundreds of adoring fans, and receiving a special “you be a TOUGH mofo”
handshake from the RD, I’d grab some hot cheesy lasagna, pick up my goody bag full of good things and a nice XL technical T shirt, proudly put on my medal or buckle or whatever the finishers award was, skip to my car as people shouted “way to go STEVE!” and “I am amazed at how TOUGH you are you macho stud!” and “you da MAN Steve da sleeve!” and drive to the hotel with a bemused smile on my rugged handsome face – newly rugged and handsome because I had just conquered The GEER 100K. A cold 6 pack was waiting with my flask of Scorpion Mescal, and after a couple or three I’d turn in by, say, 1 AM and sleep till 10.

Turns out I was off by 60 minutes – on the wrong side that is, it took us 5 hours to finish the last 12 miles. The next 6 miles to the aid station was up hill all the way and very steep for the first 4.
Having to slow down so much caused my body temp to plummet and I was shivering like a leaf in the wind about half way up. I was so tired  and cold I couldn’t bring myself to reach around and unhook my second
water bottle full of Amino sports drink from the back of my pack, even though I was pretty sure my blood sugar was low, and I was parched. Also in the pack was a nice warm long sleeved shirt, dry for sure as I had it in a plastic bag, and infinitely smarter to wear than the soaking wet tank top I was wearing under my rain poncho. You might relate if you have been in a similar situation: 14 hours of running in the rain, 50+ miles, dark as all hell, hurting most everywhere, and *still* raining. I just could not make myself take off my poncho and take off my pack and unzip it to get at the dry long sleeved shirt. I knew intellectually that it was just moronic not to do this as I was becoming afraid I was getting hypothermic, but the process seemed so daunting I just couldn’t do it. So I told Brian we had to run to get warmer, he was shivering as well.

In spurts we jogged or power-walked and fast-hobbled towards the next aid station – Bald Mountain Summit again – where there would be a fire. I did finally reach around and painfully pull out my second
bottle of Amino. We splashed through some smaller puddles and cursed and bushwhacked around the lakes and finally after a long long time we arrived at the aid station. 6 miles left, and downhill. I gritted my teeth and striped off my tank top and poncho in the wind (the fire was away from the tent, in the rain, and anemic at best) and with the help of the wonderful aid station volunteers I pulled out my warm top and got everything back on. Wow what a difference! Our time buffer for being pulled from the race was severely stressed but we still had a reasonable amount of time to finish. I figured we would probably be in by 12:20 with a time of 18:20.

Unbelievably I was off by a full 40 minutes. I don’t know what happened, we just kept on going, down the steep and slippery rocky single-track trail, along a ridge into the woods navigating the rocks and roots rather poorly by this time. Got to the last aid station, 4 miles from the finish, and 30 minutes ahead of the cutoff. I think it was 11:30 when we set off to do the last 4 miles. No problem right? Down hill “runnable” (I now absolutely hate that word) on “groomed” trails. Neither me nor Brian found it particularly runnable though.
Maybe on fresh legs in daylight with no rain? Try as I might I couldn’t get any speed and the 4 miles took forever. I stopped looking at my watch till we got to the bottom, with 0.3 miles left on asphalt I finally looked and saw it was 12:45. OK fine I said to myself, run this bit and get in a few minutes before 1 AM, get to the car, get to the hotel, open a beer, hop into an ice bath, do a shot of tequila and then take a hot shower, maybe one more beer after that. Almost there, woohoo! So we ran and ran and the 0.3 miles
stretched into maybe 8 or 9. Finally we got to the turn that took us into the finish area. There were a few people cheering, and Brian – a fast runner as it turns out, he ran a 3:10 marathon in Boston – is 15 meters in front. He takes the last turn and I hear “TEN, NINE, EIGHT, SEVEN” is this a countdown to the cutoff? Nah my watch said 12:57, “SIX, FIVE, FOUR…” My heart beating wildly I ran faster and turned just in time to see the big clock with the red LED numbers read 18:59:57. Brian sprints in and finished at *exactly* 19:00:00 and the few people that were there went wild! The photographer said “I have NEVER taken a finishing photo where the clock was at exactly the finishing cutoff time!!” “You might get this one for free!” he said to Brian.

And that was it.

I ran in, I think it was 19:00:13. No one noticed though. I was not sure if I should walk to the clock or just sit down. I eventually remembered there was no timing chips or anything so I just stood there for a bit while everyone was slapping Brian on the back and congratulating him and talking about his amazing sprint to the finish. He was all smiles, it was nice to see that! After a minute or two someone noticed me and gave me a finishers thing – a sort of ceramic medal. I asked for my goody bag and someone gave me a plastic bag with a T shirt in it. I put the medal thing in the bag and looked around. There were maybe 10 people in the tent, and still some oldish lasagna left in a pan. I got a paper plate and found a plastic fork.

It was such an anticlimax after that long hard epic run in the rain. I was sort of numb and cold and sore and depressed and I wanted to just get the hell out of there. I felt a bit like an intruder. So I said goodbye to Brian and went to look for my car. It took me a long while to find it in the dark, I was somewhat disorientated and it was very dark. I went the wrong way but eventually saw someone and asked where the parking lot was. I tossed my dish of lasagna in the bin and sat in the car for a bit with the heater on. Then I drove back to the hotel, thinking “never again!” Sounds a bit melodramatic right?!
I was actually very proud of myself. I did not once think of quitting and I know I helped pull Brian along in a few places. I kept my sense of humor and smiled and joked with the wonderful aid station volunteers all race. My heroic finish though was a bit sad. When I got to the hotel I popped open a beer and looked in the goody bag for the ultrarunning magazine Brian had told me we all got. There was a T shirt, medium, too small for me, and the medal thing and nothing else. I skipped my ice bath, had a hot shower and crashed at around 3 AM.

I woke up feeling …OK! Often I have a bit of post partum depression, mild but definitely there, after a race. But this time I think I got it all out in the 2 hours or so after the race. It is not the end of the season for me, I have two more races to look forward to this year and maybe I’ll do better in those ones! I am not so sure
about a mountain 100 anymore though. I am aware and feel fine about my relative mediocrity in this sport. Watching some of the faster runners gracefully hopping from rock to rock like mountain goats while I trumped down the trail, graceful as a dancing bear, brought that awareness home rather emphatically this time around. I’ve never been last and I have never missed a cutoff. But who cares right!!
This time around though I did not have fun. It was a really hard race for me and so I am not sure I will actually do a mountain 100 miler next year. F*ckit, no way, I am not a total idiot…or… maybe one with less elevation gain…. hmmm… Leadville 2010 perhaps? Nah.
Or…hmmm…….

The morning was beautiful, sunny, clear, & cool. Not a rain cloud in sight. Just perfect for running I thought!!

Steve has a website at:
http://www.gwu.edu/~music/faculty/hilmy.html

Race website: Great Eastern Endurance Run

---

Multidays.com The home of multiday running news and events.