Pre-race:
This was the first relay event I've participated in - I had been asked to fill in at the last minute for a relay in the past, but work scheduling didn't allow it, so ever since then I've been excited/waiting for the possibility to join in one. To make it better, our team joined with the Alzheimers Association to raise money for the local charity chapter. Aside from things like fundraisers for boy scouts and band in high school, this was my first charity/fund raising event.
At first, knowing that I've built up my distance for a marathon in recent history, and that this was going to be coming up only a handful of weeks before Lake Placid, I wanted to do one of the longer rotations, and initially I was seeded into one that put me at about 19 miles. The plan was that I would treat this as a long run - even though it'd be split into three different legs, the fact is that there would only be several hours between legs - so I couldn't treat it like individual runs with normal amounts of rest in between. However, in the weeks leading up to it, I ended up being plagued with successive soft tissue injuries. As of two weeks before the event, I was thinking I might have to drop out entirely because the 11 mile threshold run caused visible bruising and swelling (though minor), and I saw no way I'd heal up enough to be able to do all 19 miles. After some emailing back and forth with the team captain, and after a couple days of reasonably encouraging healing results - I switched slots with someone, and ended up with the first two legs being in the 4-5 mile range each, with the last being 7.something miles. By this time, I was pretty certain I'd be able to run the first leg, which made me feel much better - had I paid my own entrance fee, I'd have been ok with losing the money and having to drop out. But after having raised nearly $700 in charity, I felt like I'd be letting people down if I didn't give this race what I could, while still considering other events like the Patriot (four weeks out) and Lake Placid (nine weeks out). By being able to run at least one leg, it set my mind at ease a bit. Around a week or so before the race, it was starting to look pretty good for my being able to run the second leg as well. The third would have to be played by ear.
On Thursday night I met up with the rest of the team - only two members had I met previously, everyone else was new to me. So after work, we went out for dinner & drinks at a local restaurant and chatted briefly as the few people who hadn't met introduced themselves and met face to face with people who had been just about spamming their email inbox over the past two weeks. This group had a tendency (and I include myself in this) to let the emails fly fast and furious.
On Friday morning, we met up at Mt Wachusett, the start of the race. Our team was slotted to start at 9am. We gathered around 7:30, attended orientation, got our team picture and all the normal pre-race stuff.
Van 1 rotation 1:
At 9am the gun went off, and our first runner took off with about a dozen other teams that were starting at the same time (the first wave started at 8am, and the faster teams were to start later at about 2pm). We watched the first leg for a bit, then his van mates had to get going to meet him at the end of his leg and switch runners. The first leg was only 2.8 miles, but it was virtually all uphill, going to the summit of the mountain. I was in van 2, and we knew we wouldn't be up for a few hours, so we went back to one of our teammates houses to hang out for a bit.
Around noon or so our van headed to the first van transition area (VTA) at Assumption College. This is the transition that marks the last leg for one van and the first leg for the other, and it's an opportunity for the whole team (minus the person running) to get together and chat a bit and exchange any pertinent information. But mostly it's an excuse for goofing around and making fun of each other, and check out how other teams have decorated their vans.
Van 2 rotation 1:
After the exchange, van 1 headed back to our teammates house to shower, eat, and rest up before their turn would be coming back around again. As for our van, we had a system going - meet the person running about halfway through their leg (usually around mile 2.5 - 3 or so), make sure everything is ok, ask them if they need anything like water or gatorade, and then head to the next transition area, wait around for a bit while the next participant gets ready to run their leg. Rinse and repeat 6 times, and with around 10 miles left in the rotation, call folks from the other van and let them know that it's time to head to the next VTA so they can take over.
My rotation was 2nd to last in the six person rotation for our van. By this time, we had already passed a number of teams (and keeping a tally on the side of our van), but one team in particular was our main target - a team of women who were wearing tutu's. I believe they started at 8am, so it took us a while to catch up to them, but in the legs leading up to mine, we were gaining a lot of ground. Since I knew I'd likely only be doing two legs, I decided to do my first leg waay too fast to catch up to them. After putting out a 6:40 first mile, with the HR jacked up to 170, I knew I overdid it - but I also felt that I could likely sustain that intensity for the distance. I ended up catching up to the tutu around the 2.5-3 mile mark, and for the rest of the leg, continued adding distance - I didn't want to take the chance that this was their slow runner and that they'd catch right back up.
Almost immediately, my legs were getting sore, so I knew that my next leg (at night) was definitely not going to be as fast - I'd have to keep the HR at a more reasonable level. Also, since our van's last leg was at Hopkinton State Park, I took the opportunity to soak my legs in the cool water of the reservoir. Not quite an ice bath, but it was something.
Van 1 rotation 2:
After we were finished with our first rotation, our van headed out to get some food, and back to our teammates house to rest up a bit, such as it was. We handed the baton off to the other van around 5:30, and by 9pm we were alerted that the other van had about 10 miles to go - so when you consider about an hour and a half of back and forth driving time, some time to eat and shower - it left maybe 30-60 minutes for any sleep.
We headed out to the next VTA (Bellingham High School) to wait for our other van. This started becoming the point in the whole event where you doubt the wisdom of signing up. Having been up all day, not necessarily having a great nights sleep the night before, it being dark out, knowing that the next 4-5 hours there will not only be no rest, but you will have to run a handful of miles as well - it all adds up to 'why am I doing this again?' But once the baton is handed off, it's back to business.
Van 2 rotation 2:
The night legs are interesting. On one hand, they are definitely creepy because there are long stretches of little/no light - if you are on a major road, there are street lights, but there are also more people on the road who may or may not be drunk or obscene. If you are on a minor road, you don't have the traffic, but you also don't have as many street lights. For guys, the bigger concern is drunk drivers or people not paying attention, but for females this can be a dangerous situation. We saw a group of three people running together, which made a lot of sense for safety reasons. In our teams case, we just closely followed our female teammate in the van. On our way to one of the transition areas, we stopped at a Dunkin Donuts to fill up a bucket of ice in anticipation of my needing to ice my ankle after my leg was finished. Every other place was closed (it was around 11:40 at night), and the DD was closing up - so we had to go through the drive through and explain that we had a bucket, and just wanted ice because we were in a race and were a bit banged up.
My second leg was just over 4 miles, and began at about 1:30am. I settled in to a 155 HR, which ended up being just a tad faster than 8 min/miles - just about right for marathon pace. By this time in the event, we were seeing very few teams ahead of us, or very few teams in general at all, so I had little external motivation or reason to increase the pace at all. About 1.5-2 miles into the run, I started feeling the ankle. It was minor, but I also knew from experience that it was only going to get worse. By the time I got to 3.5 miles, it was building and I realized that if I was feeling it this much being on two advil, that there was no way I could trust it for the 3rd leg of over 7 miles. It was at this point that I knew this was to be my last leg. My only hope was that I'd finish and not set my recovery back significantly.
Van 1 rotation 3:
When I got back to the van, everyone was passed out. The other van was notified that we were close to the VTA (Oliver Ames High School), and after the transition, our van headed to the next, and final (for us) VTA at Apponequet Regional HS. Once we pulled in (probably around 3:30 or so), everyone tried to get some sleep. I somehow managed to get a couple hours' worth even though I was sitting in the front seat of the van - just barely enough to feel somewhat refreshed, but not enough to avoid general grogginess for a bit after waking up. The way the course was laid out, the 3rd legs for both vans were the longest, and the 2nd legs were shortest - so whereas we had a super-quick turnaround the night before and didn't have a chance to sleep - this time we had probably an extra hour or so while waiting for the other van. Then around 7:30 we got the call from the other van to get ready.
While we were waiting, we noticed that there were some transitions already happening - and these people were cruising. The ultra's. We were wondering when they'd show up - those who started at 2pm the day before. Apparently in the past, they'd show up and pass the team during the night legs. However we (at least us in the 2nd van) hadn't really encountered this yet at all. We had an earlier start time, so that accounted for most of it - but we knew at some point these teams would be showing up and our +/- ratings for passing people would start to show some minus's. Apparently now was that time. But, before too long, it was our turn again.
Van 2 rotation 3:
As I mentioned, the third legs were the longest - generally between 6 and 7 miles for each person. So it just meant a bit more time waiting. When it came time for my leg, my replacement had already been made aware that I wasn't going to be able to run, so he put my number on and forged ahead. Technically, thats against the rules - if someone drops out, the next person is supposed to run and the slack gets taken up by whoever it falls to (in this case, it would have been runner #1 in the first van). However, with this being the last leg, the rule could be skirted by simply saying that no one was available to run, so the ball kept dropping until it got to our designated replacement. We had a brief scare that morning because in getting out of the van, he managed to twist his knee a bit, and at the time he wasn't sure he'd be able to do his own leg, nevermind add an additional 7 miles. However, ironically, I had twisted my knee similarly a couple weeks ago, and in my case I just found that although it didn't feel quite right, the knee was still stable and as long as it was kept moving, it sorted itself out in pretty short order. During his first leg, we checked in and all indications were that his knee felt fine - so all was good.
At the end of the race - the whole team gathered up a few hundred feet from the finish, so when we saw our last runner, we all joined in and crossed the finish line together and then posed for pictures.
Post race:
All in all, this was a real fun event, and I'd definitely like to do this kind of thing again. I feel as though I have unfinished business to take care of, since I wasn't able to run the last leg.
Here is where things got wierd, though. The rest of that afternoon, I was careful with my foot because it wasn't feeling all that great. I figured I set my recovery back at least 3-4 days - I was glad I bailed after the 2nd leg in terms of recovery, because I felt like I was at a point where if I continued on much more, the setback would have grown exponentially. I was even limping/hobbling a bit that afternoon. Later that evening, I looked into things more, trying to find out more precisely what part of me was injured - and once again it came up as some sort of strain/sprain of the peroneus longus tendon (most likely), cuboid syndrome (many symptoms, but not the incipient injury that leads to it), or a stress fracture (not likely, but can't rule it out). What I did find, though, was something called low dye taping, to help stabilize the cuboid. I gave that a shot, and it felt ok - but then again, I had a couple advil at that point. I called it a night and went to bed.
Eleven hours later, I woke up on Sunday morning. I put my foot down and it wasn't perfect, but actually felt a bit better than I was anticipating. I hobbled around on a crutch for a bit that morning and got my bucket of ice water and a bucket of warm water, and alternated 5-7 minute soaks between the two for about 30 minutes or so. I retaped the foot, and it felt.. really good. Throughout the day, I did the alternating soak thing 3-4 times, but continued with my typical errands and walking around and realized that my foot was feeling better than it had over the past 4 weeks, even through range of motion spots where it had previously been feeling tender. Somehow, even though it felt like it was on the verge of blowing out again 24 hours before, now it was suddenly feeling 100% healed. This actually pissed me off a bit - why couldn't it have done that a few days before hand!?
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