Red Wing Trail Challenge 60k

I have had some pretty horrible races over the past few years, but I feel like I'm back in the saddle. I just needed to run an east coast 60k in swampy July heat to break the curse.

 Rambling out of the start through the tall grass. All photos taken by Kris M Lowe unless otherwise stated.

The Red Wing Trail Challenge 60k (38 mi) is four 15k loops through the Red Wing Recreation Area in the foothills above Poughkeepsie with an impressive 6500 ft of gain. Some of the trails are rocky and rooty, some are smooth dirt, but maybe half are mowed/trodden tall grass, which really added some extra friction and footing uncertainty.

It was around 70 degrees at the start. I saw foggy valleys on the drive in - you can figure what that means for the humidity.

I ran tight with eventual winner Stephen Krohley on the first lap, both getting our bearings on a course we'd never run. A lot of east coast ultras are loop style, so you're eager to figure out all of the details on the first lap so that you can use them to your advantage on later laps. In reality it's a great excuse not to go out too hard, kind of a gentleman's agreement to hold the reins until lap two.

The course takes you through a short stretch of mowed grass trail before granting you a few miles of crisp single track through thick woods up the first climb. It's steep, but just before it tops out, the canopy clears and you hit thick grass and the occasional sticker bush (a theme for the rest of the race). 

As we popped out of the woods and into a clearing around a lake, we both joked about "yeah this is going to hurt later". Not like, "lol racing hard" but, "man alive, this is a steamy ol' field that is gonna hurt in the noon sun."

We slammed the second climb and descent and in no time started on the big third climb, with plenty of little false summits and a steep 300 foot booter at the end that pushes you through (what else) more thick grass and sticker bushes.

 

    Coming in after lap one. It ain't so bad out there! 

We refilled bottles at the start/finish, but Stephen got the jump out of the aid station while I fumbled getting ice into my arm sleeves. It was starting to get moderately steamy in the field, but the woods remained a welcome relief from the sun. For now.

My legs started feeling a bit heavy during the flat section along the creek and the lake in the middle of the lap. I realized that I was going to need to drink more. I'd put down a little over 1L in the first 9 miles but that wasn't going to be enough in this heat. I slowed up a bit and forced myself to drink the rest of my first bottle going in to the mid-way aid station.

I had caught up to Stephen somewhere around the second climb, and we both kept pushing each other up and over the third. The boomerang climb, midway through the descent and back up to nearly the same peak elevation, was already cooking. It's exposed gravel and breeze for a few hundred feet, a shimmy across the mountaintop in sparse (shadeless) trees, and then a quick descent into the musty bottomwoods. 

Coming in after lap two. All right, it's hot.   

 

For me, this was now all about temperature control. One bottle would become the drencher, filled with pure water that I'd keep dribbling over my head and shirt. The other would be a double/triple mix of Skratch, easily getting me to 800 mg/hour of sodium. I'd go through each set every 4.5 miles.

 

I finally dropped back from Stephen at this point and told myself to keep it steady. Key was to keep shuffling uphill when I could, even if it felt slow, and hoof it on the flats when there was shade, because that was where all the gains would be made. No one was hammering the downhills - they were steep, and short - and no one was going to be ripping it around the lakes - it was so sunny you'd be blowing up.

 

I felt the darkest going down the second descent on lap three, toward the mid-way aid station. I realized I was just feeling nauseated and needed a Tums (ultrarunning food = sugar = acidic stomach), so I popped one and felt better within a few minutes.

 

Cue the belief, as I got to the mid-way aid station, that I could rally up this climb and claw back a few minutes. Nope. The woods were now a hot box, though at least they still had shade. In this heat, the trickling creeks are spiteful, loud enough to inspire hope but too shallow to cool off in. 

 

I was a mess on the third climb. It was hot, I was running out of water, and I had accumulated enough salty sweat that it was starting to sting my sticker bush scratches. You always hit this point with heat, though - you find your limit, and then you have to find your way back.

 

 Coming in after lap three. Feeling better, mentally. Physically, cooked.

 

At the end of the third lap, I knew I'd finish. I was in second place, I was still moving with some purpose, and I hadn't puked, so at this point, I probably wouldn't. But I was down on fluids. So I came in, filled a bottle with water, drenched myself, and then sat next to the aid station table and drank a can of Mountain Dew. It took a while. Maybe 5 minutes. Maybe 10 minutes. But then I got up, filled my bottles, and left at a good clip, ready to get out of the sun.

 

Bro, BRO. I don't know how the body works in the heat, but you do hit a point where it feels like your brain is melting and your chest is on fire and then, seemingly out of nowhere...the body decides it can hack it. It can sweat enough. I can balance the internal systems. It's like it finally gives in and says, "dang, you really need to do this, I relent - have at it."

 

I was wrecked on the first climb, but by the open fields around the lakes, I was hauling, but not fast. If you make it a hobby, picking up your feet even if you're not moving very quickly, your brain thinks you're doing better than you are, and it decides to stop being such a bother.

 

 Ready to finish this thing.

 

I drenched myself heading into the aid station, head to toe. Still didn't help much. 

 

The last climb was surreal. The heat of the gravel was reflecting back at me, giving me flashbacks to Colorado. Bugs were starting to swarm in the mid-day sun. But over four laps, everyone had trodden the grass and bushes enough that it was easy to fly over the top of the final climb.

 

Photo by a very thoughtful @lecktrishun.

Second place, 6:49:13, pound-for-pound the hardest short-distance ultra I've run. I will definitely come back, the Conquer the World (CTR) community is outstanding and they made this an awesome experience.