2023: The Year I Made Running My Side Chick
I signed up for a 100k. This is why I did it and what I learned
Cool vibes can be influencing. If I had to run to the top of a mountain to get those views you see above, then I could deal with the fact that I hate running.
Long, slow distance running is of no interest to me. I like running fast, I LOVE sprinting, and I enjoy a long trek. But running slow for a long period of time is something I always wanted to completely avoid.
Back in 2019, I came across adventure racing. I never heard of them before.
My cousin was telling me about this cool race where the participants had to run, bike, hike, and kayak all while navigating a course for several days across the Amazon. This sounded really cool to me. So I looked into it.
Like I said, I love to trek, which is why this captured my interest. Also, these races seemed to always be in some really cool place, in nature with amazing scenic views. That directed a little bit of my attention towards what I would need to do to jump into one of these races.
Although I love to hike, bike, and kayak, I really hate running long distances. But, I’m actually naturally good at it. My body is built for it. Since I played soccer growing up, I did a ton of long runs. To say the least, it’s well within my background to pursue it if I wanted.
Fast forward a few years and that same cousin was telling me about his Grand Canyon rim to rim run he did. That’s about a marathon distance with nearly 5200 feet of elevation gain. It sounded both cool and torturous at the same time.
He casually asked, or suggested, that I need to do it with him at some point. I casually responded with a, “Yeah, sure that sounds fun….not!” I’d go hike it, but running it? Nope!
He mentioned that he was going to do it again the next year (2023), but do a rim to rim to rim this time. Okay, so that’s about 45 miles and over 10,000 feet of elevation gain. Chances of me doing this are getting slimmer and slimmer.
He offered that I only do the rim to rim and he’ll continue on. For some reason, I thought, “What the hell. Doing something like this once isn’t a bad idea.” So I said I would!
This decision was made over Christmas of 2022. So early on in 2023, I started slowly increasing my slow distance running. At the same time, I was playing in an indoor soccer league. Unfortunately, in the first minute of the last game of the season, I rolled my ankle really badly.
This was not the typical rolled ankle I usually experience as a soccer player. This was one of the worst ones I’ve had. After assessing the damage, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to train enough to make the Grand Canyon run in June 2023.
As I was sitting on my couch icing my ankle one morning, I came across a post from an old friend I had 10 years prior. It was a picture of his foot and ankle torn up and blistered. The caption described the picture as the outcome of an ultra distance survival race that he did the previous year and that he was going to do it again the next year, saying to let him know if anyone’s interested in it.
A little disappointed that I couldn’t join in on the rim to rim run that I committed to, I immediately looked it up. It was on a mountain in an exotic and remote island in Central America. The venue looked amazing! And the race was almost exactly one year away. I immediately messaged him to ask about it.
He responded that I should sign up. It had a 25, 50k, and 100k race options. Considering I had no long distance running experience, I asked if I should sign up for the 25 or 50k.
He said something like, “Man, ef that. I prepared for the 100k in three months. You have a year. Do the whole thing!”
Given that I have the kind of mentality that if I put my mind to something, then I can do it, I purchased a ticket for the 100k race which had nearly 20,000 feet of elevation gain scaling two volcanic mountains in a hot jungle environment, while I sat on my couch icing my bum ankle.
But hey, I had a whole entire year to prepare for it!
At this point, it was early March of 2023 and the race was the first weekend of March, 2024.
It took me another four weeks before I could even lightly jog on a treadmill.
It took another eight weeks of me being able to run lightly on the treadmill for a few minutes up until I could do 10 minutes with no pain.
In the meantime, I did lots of walking and hiking to at least get some miles in.
After a few weeks of doing 10 minute light running on the treadmill prior to my strength training session, it was now June 4th and I felt like I could do my first long road run. I figured I’d test it out at the local park that has a five mile loop around the lake.
I planned to go down and run for somewhere between 15 to 25 minutes to ease into it. I didn’t want to delay my ankle recovery any more. As I ran, I felt fine. I ended up running the whole five mile loop in 43 minutes.
First time in probably several years running longer than about a mile and by the time I was done, I felt pretty good. This was a good sign to me.
But after I finally cooled down, I realized I was actually quite exhausted. As the day went on, I felt more and more exhausted. I clearly was capable of more than I initially expected, but was also way more out of shape for this than I thought I would be.
I remember going home and it hitting me what I just got myself into. I ran five miles with only about 400 feet of elevation gain. I am supposed to run 63 miles with 20,000 feet of elevation gain…in a jungle. Is this possible for me?
So I immediately went into planning mode. Obviously being a coach myself, I started parsing out different mile stones and strategizing how I was going to fit this in my lifestyle. This eased my mind, seeing a plan laid out in front of me that depicted the staircase I needed to climb.
The first step was to continue hitting the treadmill for my strength training warm ups and accumulate easy miles while doing the five mile loop week after week, simply allowing myself to adapt to the new stress of long distance running.
Once I was able to do about three weeks of consistent lake runs, I began to accumulate more miles on that run, adding about one mile at a time every two to three weeks. Until I got to about seven miles, which is the longest continuous run I ever did in my life training for soccer back in college.
I noticed that I just felt crushed every single time that I ran. I was able to increase my distance, but I started to realize at some point I wouldn’t be able to continue that. I would look at my running pace, but didn’t really pay attention to it much at first. Then it hit me that if I have to get myself to be running dozens of miles, I can’t be running at this 8:00-8:30 mile pace anymore.
Growing up playing soccer, you were expected to run longer distances to be fit for a 90 minute game. But those training runs were way shorter than a 100k so I tended to run fast. On top of that, any sort of running I did in my workouts throughout my life were at a fast pace. So my calibration of running was built on those experiences.
I finally learned how to run slow. I dialed back my pacing to about a 9-9:30 pace and this felt amazing. I barely ever felt like my heart rate would spike or my breathing labored too much. Not only that, but I was conscious about everything during the run. My form, my surroundings, my ankle, and numerous other thoughts. It started to feel like I was just going for a hike and I could really just be present.
Wait, was I starting to enjoy this? Was running slow and long distances starting to become interesting to me? I thought about that for a few weeks as my miles started climbing through July and into August from those seven miles to about 12 miles. Which, by the way, took me well beyond the longest run I’ve every continuously done.
The five to seven miles that I became very accustomed to were about 45-60 minutes of running. I realized that anything longer than this just became annoying to me. All I could think about was how many other things in life I could be doing that was more productive. It was at this point that I realized #istillhaterunning.
The part of it that I enjoyed though was the peace. I would go down to the lake, or a hiking trail or any trail that was in a nature type setting and just started pounding pavement.
No friends.
No headphones.
No music.
No podcasts.
Just me, nature and the sounds of my breathing and feet hitting the ground. It was very peaceful to me.
It also gave me much needed time to think. I feel like I never have time to allow my brain to relax and wander. To daydream and not really pay attention to anything stressful.
Every time I went for one of these runs, it felt so good to just allow my mind to wander off aimlessly and think about life.
I always felt like I was solving all of my problems during my runs.
BUT, this only lasted for the the first 40 to 50 minutes. After that, I got extremely bored with it and wanted to do something else.
Either that or at some point the running just became hard depending on my pace, the weather, or terrain.
Anyways, to spare you the details of my running progressions, this essentially lasted through the summer and into the early fall. Just increasing volume of zone two running while varying the terrain, since I did have some massive amounts of climbing to do.
I also doubled up with this each week. Instead of continually accumulating miles on a single day, I switched to accumulating miles in a single week, running two long distances about 10 to 12 miles while still doing short runs in my gym sessions.
There was no need for me to do anything beyond that.
I wasn’t trying to enter a new sport.
I wasn’t trying to win.
I was going for the EXPERIENCE!
So all I cared about were three things:
Finish the race
Don’t suffer during the race
Don’t get hurt
I wanted to enjoy the process of it, take in the views and remember that it was more than just a race.
There was one big problem I ran into getting into the fall though…..cold temperatures in Pittsburgh.
I started thinking about the winter months ahead of me in Pittsburgh and how I would navigate this. If I was going to be doing this race in a tropical environment in the southern hemisphere in March on mountainous terrain, then it was going to be hot, humid and….not flat!
How was I going to continue increasing running distance while adding elevation gain on trails in the woods when it was about to be freezing, snowy and icy out?
Well, fortunately, we had a mild winter and the temperatures didn’t get to be as cold as normal or for as long, nor did we have much snow fall. So I was able to keep my outside running up through about the Thanksgiving time period (late November).
After that, December and January became cold enough to keep me from going out into the frigid temperatures to run. Nor was it safe to run on icy ground when it was those conditions.
So I took to the treadmill and got creative with my strategy to meet the demands. I did tons of flat and incline treadmill running, walking and hiking. On top of that, I would mix these with sled pushes, lunges, step ups and different types of carries. I even did tons of extensive lower body plyo’s to simulate the plyometric effect of slow running.
I was just trying to cover all bases of general adaptations that would have the biggest carry-over into a 100km trek with 20,000 feet of elevation gain.
I never though I would every say this, but there were a few times those two months that I did a straight 90 to 120 minute treadmill session with no breaks. Bouncing back and forth between flat, incline, running and walking.
But whatever, I had to do to get the job done.
This sounds torturous to pretty much everyone. And everyone I talked to would just say something like, “Ya just throw those headphones in and get it done.”
Nope, not for me. Never put headphones on and if there was nobody in the gym, there was no music on at all.
Again, just me, my thoughts, and the sounds of breathing and foot contacts on the dull treadmill.
If I was going to be running on a mountain in the jungle, I wasn’t going to put on any headphones. I am not an extrinsically motivated person. I don’t believe in relying on that. Intrinsic motivation to do what you must do is key to a strong mindset and accomplishing things that are very hard.
This was a great way to practice that. Especially because I hate running!
These were the times that I really tested my true patience!
So at this point, we’re now getting to about February of 2024. One month out from race day. I was accumulating about 40 to 45 miles total in the week. Just a tad under where I really wanted to peak my weekly distances.
But it is what it is.
Fortunately, the weather was kind of bouncing around and if I stayed ahead of the reports, I could get outside for some really long treks, hitting both trails and roads to get the miles in.
Considering I’m only a month out from race day, I knew I had to experience at least one very long trek for two reasons:
Test out how I do with my fitness, gear and nutrition
Peak my training progression so I have time to taper down
So about three to four weeks out I planned about a 25 to 30 mile trek in my area to see how it would go. My plan was to just accomplish the distance and the elevation, which would only be about two to three thousand feet. But I didn’t care about pace, nor the time.
Just get it done.
I found a day mid-week that was going to be sunny and a high in the 50’s (fahrenheit), which is warm in the winter time. It’s actually almost perfect for a long trek. I definitely wasn’t going to overheat, but it wasn’t too cold to bother me.
I started out at about 10am. Had my gear packed on and nutrition planned out. I knew my general path and was just going to keep moving for as long as I could to test it out.
I ended the trek at about 21 miles and 3,000 feet of elevation in four and half hours. Not quite the distance I wanted, but about eight miles more than I ever moved in one time period.
Not only that, but I ran about 90% of it. I only walked a few times when the elevation gain was steep.
I only stopped because at this point, I was starting to notice a lot of weird pains in my whole body. I didn’t want to injure myself, so I just made my way back to my car.
Now, I’m about three and a half weeks out from race day. I tried out my first long distance trail run and hit about a third of the distance. And I felt like shit.
I knew I wasn’t going to be fully prepared for a 100k race with 20,000 feet of elevation. But I also knew I was still going to do this.
At this point, it was just about tapering down my volume so that I felt really good for race day.
Short fast forward here, about five to six days out before my flight, my friend calls with some bad news. He had some personal issues come up in life and he can’t make the trip.
This caught me completely off guard. It’s no fault of my friend and I didn’t take it that way, but I just didn’t know what to do at this point.
I’ve literally never done a long distance run event before, let alone in another country that I’ve never been to before in a tropical, jungle type of environment, which I’ve also never been in before.
I already knew there were many aspects of this event that I wasn’t sure about. But doing this with a couple other people who have done this exact event took that pressure off.
Now I was going to be there almost completely on my own. Also considering that my test run didn’t make me feel fully ready, this was a lot to think about in a short time.
He suggested that I just go do it and that it’s still going to be an awesome experience. He connected me with his buddy who was going to meet us down there. He’s done the event multiple times and would give me a full run-down of what to expect.
After talking with him, it sounded like the trip down there was going to be a bit sketchy (that’s at least how I was interpreting it) and he agreed that I wasn’t ready to do the full 100k. He agreed that I possibly, and probably, could finish it. But it would be such a suck-fest that I most likely would hate it and it would ruin my whole trip.
I appreciated the honesty from him, and even though he was actually trying to get me to still go, I made the decision to cancel the trip (which turned out to be a story in itself….sigh!)
It was a complete bummer.
Sitting there thinking of how cool the whole experience would be, the time to travel in a different culture, participate in an event on a tropical island with other people from all over the world, and all the hard work I put in for almost a year doing something that I hate, it was hard to think about.
One of the things I thought about during my runs that past year was writing this article and what I planned to put in it, posting a picture (like the one above) of me standing on top of an active volcano that I just conquered and writing about my experience.
After a few months letting that go, I figured I should write about it anyways. I mean, the article wasn’t really supposed to be some travel article. It was supposed to be about the journey leading up to the event. With the event itself being the culmination.
In the end, I still learned the same things:
Give things a chance before you write them off completely - I do still hate running, but I’ve found a small way where it’s important to me. I continue to run the lake for three to five miles about every 10 to 14 days to maintain my aerobic endurance and keep a physical activity that provides peace and me-time
Do hard things, even if you hate them - At the beginning of this journey when I really hated the running, I was finding small wins in how I felt about it afterward. I realized it was making me better and stronger doing something that I hated, but still had a lot of meaning and purpose. I eventually learned after researching into it that it’s actually an important health benefit to perform tasks that you hate, building the strength in a part of your brain called the AMCC (Anterior Mid-Cingulate Cortex). This point of the process happened early on. I was focusing on the “I hate this” part so much. Knowing that there was a benefit of it actually gave me a lot of motivation and shifted my focus from those thoughts.
I still hate running - Ya, I learned this. At one point, I thought I might like it. But before I even started the journey, I would tell myself I hate running. Realistically, I don’t think I knew that because I refrained from it since college and never really experienced true long distance running. But, yes, in the end #IStillHateRunning
What am I going to do now?
Will I keep running?
Will I sign up for another race like this?
Will I sign up for some adventure race or multi-modality trek?
Well, I’ll continue to run. I think it’s important for my overall health and functionality. It’s a physical activity that, in the end, does feel pretty good. As long as I don’t spend hours on it
I’ll likely never sign up for another race like this. And I mean exactly like that race. Just a run.
Would I do an adventure race that involves running, but also biking, kayaking, and hiking? Absolutely! Those sound way more interesting to me than just straight running.
I wish I could’ve posted a picture of me on top of that mountain with the beautiful backdrop, but sometimes life just doesn’t work perfectly the way you want.
In 2023, I learned that me and long, slow distance running just don’t jive well together. Which is why it will just remain my side-chick.