My First Ultra Race - The 2018 Pistol Ultra 50K Race

Up until this point the longest run I completed was a 16 mile trail race.  I decided it was time to push myself and try something longer as my friend Mike had already ran the Firewater Ultra 100K the previous year.   

The Pistol Ultra takes place in Alcoa, TN along a section of the Maryville-Alcoa Greenway which is right at a 10 mile loop on pavement for this race.  From my understanding as of now it is the only state certified ultra in Tennessee.  I also realized the guest speaker was Catra Corbett also known as the Dirt Diva and she was also running the 100 miler so I thought this must be a pretty big ultra race and seemed like the best option for my first ultra.

I have not been very good about consistently training and my plan is usually to just run until failure... and then finish the best I can. Not the ideal plan to have for an ultra race but it always seemed to work for my half marathons and 5K races.  The morning of the race I am extremely pumped and excited.  I am at the front of the pack ready to shoot out of the gate which is exactly what I did and at a 7 minute pace.  First mistake.
First and second lap I averaged around 8 minute miles.  For the next 18 miles though I got into a comfortable pace with another runner Jennifer that I know through other races and we stayed around 9-10 minute miles for this entire time.  Not bad I thought to myself this is easy and I feel great.  At this point everything is all rainbows and unicorns and I am enjoying every moment of my first ultra already thinking about the finish line.

I have always heard about the runners wall that hits runners around 23-25 miles and I found it.  Mile 21 hit and I started to feel slight knee pain and on mile 24 I tanked and my right knee started aching terribly and I noticed I was favoring my right leg pretty bad because of my knee.  At this point Jennifer has pushed on and I am trying to talk myself into running and not walking.  My next few miles were around a 14 minute pace and I pretty much held anywhere from a 12-14 minute pace the rest of the race trying to endure the pain in my right knee which I am pretty sure at this point is my IT band.  For the last mile I was able to get up to a 12 minute mile but it was all I could with the knee pain I was having. In this race you pass the finish line multiple times since you are running a loop which gets you excited every time you see it.  They have a huge american flag hanging over the course right before the last segment before you cross the finish line.  As I turned the corner an saw the flag I realized I was about to complete my first ultra race.

I finished the race at 5 hours and 34 minutes.  As I crossed the finish line my wife, one of my daughters, and our friends Jimmy and Dawn were there to watch me cross the finish line.  That was an amazing feeling to finish this race even though my whole body was hurting at this point.  I managed to finish 3rd in my age group and set the Tennessee state running record for my age in a 50K race.  It was a great feeling to finish within the top 3 of my age group but I was hurting so bad I could barely even walk and I did not feel like moving or eating at this point.


The next day as I was looking at my shoes from the race I noticed real quick that the heel of the shoe was completely smooth on my right shoe.  At this point I started learning all I could on running form, shoes, heel striking, and pretty much anything else you can think of including reading books that most ultra runners have read.  I bought new shoes and took a chance on the Altra Timp which is the best decision so far, milestone Pod, new socks, tried to change my stride, my pace, etc and continued running.  So here I am now.  Starting over.  This blog is for me to help train and find out what works and what does not.  I can say that as of right now there are only a few things that I have found that are helping me at this point. Shoes, pace, stride, and training which I just recently started doing to get ready for my upcoming races.  So far for 2019 I have the The Pistol Ultra 50 Miler in March, Three Sisters Ultra in April, and the War Hammer 100 in June.