“Once in a Lifetime”

Stage 6:  There was a rest day after the long march.  We were dirty, hobbled and tired, but happy to have the long march behind us.  The only thing standing between us and our medals was a short, 8-mile route that ends back where we started, in the San Pedro town square.  

Collectively, we spent the rest day eating our remaining food, inventorying our bumps and bruises and trading stories of our time in the desert.  Spirits were high and the sense of achievement was palpable. As we were tucking in to our last freeze-dried meals, we got a surprise in the form of baguettes and apples. A nice touch by the race organizers which was met with raucous appreciation from the racers.  After dinner, we were treated to some live music. Not a bad way to say goodbye to camp life. One more fitful night of tent sleep, followed by an easy re-assembly of our rucksacks and we were ready to go. 

Stage 6 was a staggered start, with a 7:30am flight and a 9:00am flight.  The idea was to have everybody reach the finish line around the same time, so some people were notified ahead of time that they would have the earlier start. I never got a tap on the shoulder putting me into the early group, so I slept late.  I get a little worried as I realize that pretty much all of the people I’ve been running with all week are making their way to the start line and pretty much all of the fast runners that I only see in camp seem to be waiting for the late start.  In a mild panic, I ask the race organizers if there’s been some mistake. I think they are amused by my concern and let me know that my cumulative time for the week falls on the 9:00am side of the dividing line. I’m not getting an award for this, but based on how the race started for me, I’m pretty pleased. 

The final stage is mostly uneventful. I was by myself for most of the time and had a chance to reflect on the journey that started with training several months ago. It was emotional. And in a blink, I was rounding a corner and taking the last few steps into the town square. It was great to see so many familiar faces cheering you on and to finally have a (surprisingly heavy) medal put around your neck.

Many of us spent the afternoon drinking beers poolside, talking about how valuable events like these are to reset your stress levels and life perspective. Of course, there was lots of talk about what’s next. I won’t be seeing this group in Antarctica (seriously, several people are going there next for a Racing the Planet race), and while I just want to spend several weekends on the couch watching American football and playoff baseball, I did hear about a stage race in the Himalayas that sounded interesting...

The group cleaned up pretty well and we had a fun time at the awards dinner. Lots of hard work goes into staging an event like this as well as competing in it. And by the time you’re done, there’s a kinship between the competitors and the race staff and crew.  Which translates into lots of drinks and laughs at the awards dinner.  Like most nights, this one reaches a point where it needs to decide what it wants to be. Normally, I would have led the charge toward “big night”, but with a 6:00am wake up call and a diminished tolerance due to a week of drinking nothing but water and electrolyte replacements, once I saw the tequila shots being poured I knew it was time for me to take my leave. 

This was an adventure I’ll remember for a long time. Thanks to those of you who followed along and provided support and encouragement. 

Til next time,

Ernie 

“More Pie”

If you want, you can go online to get race results from the Atacama.  What I’m serving up here is the inside story of one man’s time in the desert.  We pick up our story at stage three, but first a word on camp life.  There are roughly fifteen communal tents with 7 or 8 people per tent.  The tent has a plastic sheet of a floor, so you don’t get dirty (rule 1: no shoes in the tent).  But if you don’t want to feel the hard ground underneath you, a cushion or sleeping pad is advisable.  I was prepared for this, but when I share the realization that I had never gone camping or even slept in a sleeping bag before, some of the people here find that fact simultaneously amazing and hilarious. 

Meals are a bunch of people standing around a fire pit while the camp staff serves up the boiling water that turns our freeze dried meals into real entrees.  Not sure if it is the exertion or the length of time in the camp, but by the end of the week I will be convinced that these meals are so good that we should start keeping them around the house.  A couple more thoughts on camp life: 1) you hear a lot of conversations that start with phrases like “were you in that race in Patagonia last year?”, 2) I’m told that the port-a-potties are an upgrade from previous events, 3) snoring.  There is a LOT of snoring. 

And with that, let’s recap:

Stage 3: this is the hills and torture stage.  We spend a lot of time trudging up hills, often hills so long you have to take multiple breaks before reaching the top and so steep you have to bear crawl the final feet.  Usually, the organizers hide the checkpoints and finish lines so that you think the misery is never going to end.  Today, the organizers take the opposite approach and show you the finish line from a few miles away.  You think, “I can handle that” only to get closer and see that the ever-present direction flags are not pointing you to the finish line at all.  Instead, you find yourself on a diabolical detour that takes you around a corner, down a sand dune, scrambling across some rocks…you get the picture.

This is a long 24.3 mile stage that ends with me desperately gasping for breath and laughing at the absurdity of what just happened.  I had built this up as the key day; that surviving stage 3 gives me a one-shot run for a spot in the Long March.  More long march later, but it does remind me of a story I read once.  A New York lawyer makes partner only to give up his partnership to become a law professor.  This is big news because the firm is prestigious and lucrative enough that partners don’t generally leave.  The lawyer’s response reminds me of my desert madness: “making partner at one of these firms is like winning a pie-eating contest where the prize is more pie.”  I have another strong day and collect more attaboys from several of the truly elite athletes in this event.  All of which sets me up to stake a claim to a spot in the long march.

Stage 4: There’s a course briefing every morning, which I rarely attend because, well…I’m conflicted about meetings in the middle of my adventures and also because I need to repack my cartoonishly heavy rucksack before our 8am start.  I hear today’s briefing though.  “The first section will be very hilly” we are told.  That is factually true, but it doesn’t come close to portraying how heart-pumping and leg-burning the start to our day will be.  The first mile takes forever and seeing as the first checkpoint has a total distance of 10k and a cutoff time of 3 hours, those of us who normally start the day with conversation and good humor, start this day with grim-faced calculations of when the course sweeper might arrive.  I’m not in any real danger of getting swept off the course today, but for the first time I’m aware that the dream might not end with a rolled ankle or heat exhaustion, but with a tap on the shoulder and a polite request to turn in your timing chip.  Seriously, we lost some people today.  It’s actually sad to come back to camp, hear the stories and see the reconfigured sleeping arrangements.  I am comfortably inside the cut line though and have achieved the goal of taking a shot at the Long March.

And what of the men of the Endurance?  Well, a seemingly innocuous change in barometric pressure leads to a debilitating blizzard and a series of other hardships.  At another point, one main character comments that he feels sorry for the hardships of another character, while that character is noting in his diary that “the rapidity with which one can change one’s ideas and accommodate ourselves to a state of barbarism is wonderful.”  OK, not helpful to my current situation.  Shackleton will have to wait until after the race.

Stage 5: Today is the Long March.  Usually, a race day is broken into three or four checkpoints.  Today we have nine.  And the 47 miles we have to cover are nearly as many as the two previous days combined.  As Robert Cray would say, “…the forecast calls for pain.”  The early part of the course includes a visit to the Atacama salt flats.  This is crusty, sneaker shredding earth that you have to watch every step of the way.  So that’s fun.  Later, there is a multi-hour hike (many run it, but not me) to get to a sand dune that is one kilometre long and maybe 150 feet high.  No one is going to run that. 

If the day ended here, it would be a fairly conventional 23-mile stage 5.  It doesn’t end there.  The night course is essentially a second helping of misery heaped on top of the suffering.  

But now, there’s strategy in the form of an “overnight” checkpoint.  You might think this means you sleep, get up, have breakfast and continue with the race.  You would be wrong.  What this overnight checkpoint does is give you access to hot water so you can take a break from energy bars, Gu gel and other staples of the endurance athlete.  You do get access to a tent and you can decide to sleep.  But six hours after entering the tent, you will be kicked out and sent back to the course.  Oh, and those hours are not free.  Your official race time does not stop while you’re in the overnight checkpoint.  So most people eat, regroup, check blisters and get on their way.  I had the Mac n’ Cheese (it really was delicious after 11 hours of hiking), but didn’t see the point of checking blisters. 

No need to belabor the detail, but our night went off the rails around this time.  “We” were a small group by this time...and one struggle, all struggle.  We eventually made it to the finish line, but with a time that none of us will brag about.  The accomplishment, though?  I suspect that we will brag about that for years to come...

Ego was bruised after stage 1 and I was still leaking confidence as I lined up for stage two.  Took some advice from one of the competitive runners and set my watch to remind me of an hourly snack schedule.  It made a huge difference and I had a really solid day.  Stage 2 was the day of the river crossings.   We were in and out of freezing water 20ish times, had a brutally steep climb to a tunnel carved into the mountain and cruised down a  set of terrifying sand dunes that probably 90 feet high.  When I walk/run it in from the dunes, I pass a few people and get some attaboys from the checkpoint crews.  I’m not moving very fast but I’m mostly keeping my agony to myself.

Speaking of agony, the men of the Endurance have fully evacuated the ship and set up what is basically a shore station on the ice that has them stuck there in the first place.  The Endurance crew are waiting out the Arctic winter and trying to make things as normal as possible  There is lots of talk of communal meals and socializing as the close quarters create a community out of this disparate group of people.  There is also lots of talk of the utter desolation of a polar winter.  We may come back to the topic of desolation.  For now, we are also building a community here in the desert.  Every night, the hobbled competitors gather round makeshift tables to eat their reconstituted meals (after stage 2, I had spaghetti Bolognese, which was delicious after 8.5 hours of hiking/running).

Anyway, my post-race appetite is returning, which I view as a good sign.  But things change quickly out here so I’m sticking to my strategy of showing up, getting moving and seeing what the day brings.

Til tomorrow,

Ernie

Today was the first stage.  And I woke up grumpy.  Camp 1 was literally freezing and there was copious snoring in my communal tent.  It was a festive atmosphere once we got started.  Beautiful landscapes and friendly people.  Lots of time alone though.  The game in these long events is to occupy your mind so you don’t spend too much time contemplating the darkness.  To that end, I have a series of music playlists teed up as well as an audiobook.  I thought it would be a bright idea to pick a book about the indomitable human spirit.  Someone told me once that tales of human suffering might have a negative effect if you listen while doing your own suffering.  Turns out that was good advice as the first sentence of the book was “The order to abandon ship came at 5pm.” Uh oh…

A story about a protagonist named Ernest choosing a risky course in the  name of glory. I probably could not have picked a worse book to listen to.  It also turns out that my day started to go sideways about the time of that first sentence.  Real heat, being alone in the vastness of the desert, a too heavy pack (11.5kg) and a 6K hill climb at the end, combined to make my 21.5 mile stage last an agonising 7.5 hours.  Once done, my stomach wasn’t interested in food so my condition took a turn for the worse for a bit.  Eventually though, I was able to eat some food and start to feel normal again.  Tomorrow is 23 miles with lots of river crossings so who knows how it will go but I will be at the starting line…

Til tomorrow,

Ernie