On Failure…Bear 100 2024
Sunrise from Logan Peak.
A roiling pot of emotion, that is how I would describe my current state. If you want the truth, I am mostly feeling pretty dark about the experience.
After the challenges at High Lonesome I badly wanted to put together a decent 100 mile run. I’d been steadily moving up on the Bear 100 waitlist and unsure if I’d accept that spot knowing the Snowman Race in Bhutan was planned for a few weeks after the Bear. After struggling through HiLo I decided that I would commit to the running the Bear. I wanted to redeem myself after the DNF in 2023, I wanted to run well, I wanted it to go smoothly. I wanted it to be a big training event for the Snowman Race. I wanted to finish it healthy. I wanted a lot.
After HiLo training went pretty good. I had a decent amount of running, all good quality. I had a lot of biking, as coach of the mountain bike team and via commuting. I even managed some regular strength training. Two weeks out, when I started to taper, I was feeling confident that I could have a good run at the Bear and not finish destroyed which would set things up nicely for the Snowman Race in Bhutan.
I’m going to pause for a moment here and add a few observations I’ve made in the last 36 hours as I’ve viciously interrogated my self about the outcome of the Bear. First, the past several months, or maybe even year, has been some of the busiest of my life. Work projects, on various fronts, have been growing and expanding. I’ve put in more time to building and expanding Alpine Endurance Medicine than ever before. I’ve continued with all other work, and consistently accepted or even sought out more. I’ve also been deep in a very personal journey in regard to faith, belief and spirituality, that despite being a very inward experience, has taken a physical toll. Our family is committed to various endeavors in our community and thrives as we spend time outside. So much in the mix here and the math may be obvious to the outside observer. Has it been too much? (Likely).
Another observation I made was that of commitment. Running 100 miles is really really hard and to finish this type of run it demands unwavering commitment to the finish. It is certain that running 100 miles will test you physically, emotionally, and mentally. Any opening or weakness in resolve to finish may very well crack open even the strongest and most prepared, introducing doubt and weakening commitment, resulting in a desire to stop. To quit. Before I started the Bear this year I set up the perfect environment for failure as I put one stipulation on the run. The second edition of the Snowman Race in Bhutan is the most important event for me this year. I committed to not destroying myself at the Bear in order to maintain the potential for success at Snowman. This, I think, may be why I failed. It wasn’t that I lacked good intentions or priorities, it was that I made an easy out for when things got hard.
Seven days before the Bear 100, during my last set of uphill treadmill intervals, Bryn came in to the room obviously upset. She broke down as she explained that she had just tested positive for Covid. She had been under the weather for a few days but felt much worse that morning. A quick test proved that she had Covid. It was raging through the community again and knocking people off their feet for about a week. I was so sad for her as she was two days out from her second to last high school mountain bike race. She loves racing so much and she was very upset that illness would disturb her plans. Chloe and I went to the race on Friday as we normally do, and the rest of the family came up Saturday which gave Bryn another day and a half of serious rest and recovery before she would try and race if she felt up to it. On race day Chloe raced great, and Bryn, who was feeling better, had a great race all things considered. Unfortunately as Saturday wore on I started to feel the beginnings of a cold; fatigue, sore throat, chills, and body aches that slowly built to a crescendo. The drive home after the race was a struggle as symptoms progressed. The next morning was no better. I tried to get as much sleep and rest as possible, medicines, witchcraft and anything else I could do and the symptoms persisted. Wednesday morning, two days before the Bear, I felt marginally better. Still very tired and body adjacent, but improved. I had been questioning if I should start the race or not, and my ego, demanding redemption, convinced me I could still make it all work out just like I had envisioned.
When I left home on Thursday afternoon I had convinced myself that it was all going to go great. I feigned my way through check-in, pretending everything was fine. Sleep was fleeting that night as I tossed and turned through alternating chills and sweats. In the morning I put on my kit, strapped on a smile and joined the other runners at the start. It was a beautiful morning and it felt great to be running with people on the Bear course. What didn’t feel super great was the actual running. My heart rate was high for the effort and pace, and my legs felt choppy and clunky. I was running what would normally be a conservative and controlled pace, but, given the circumstances and the day, it was too much. I was aboard a sinking ship doing my best to keep the boat afloat.
Stuck in second gear at Right Hand Fork
Ironically my stomach and fueling plan was working great; no nausea, and a steady stream of calories to the tune of at least 80 grams of carbs an hour. My feet felt good too, which was nice as they are often a challenge for me in hundred mile races. Despite the positives I felt like I was dragging a tire, or riding a bike with 4psi in the tires. I was stuck in 2nd gear for hours as I tried to keep my resolve to finish together.
At Tony Grove, 50 miles in to the race, I was starting to crack. With tears in my eyes I told Tanae that I didn’t want to be “here”, and she understood that I meant I didn’t want to be in a very similar situation I was in at the exact same spot as last year when the wheels came off the bus from my ignorant misuse of creatine. I ate well, pouted a little, used some humor to side step the darker emotions I was feeling and then got up and continued. After I left Tony Grove I crossed paths with Bethany, one of the race directors, while I was wrestling deeply with the emotions of a seemingly impending failure. I cried as I briefly explained my struggle and was given one of the most empathetic and meaningful hugs I’d felt in a long time. Bethany, thank you for that hug and your kind words! I forced a clunky shuffle through my favorite part of the Bear course in the Naomi Wilderness. I stopped and dipped my hands and face in the creek and paused to try, just for a moment, to be grateful for the experience I was having. There as connection to place with a deep emotion that I am not sure we have accurate words to describe, and then that was quickly replaced with a feeling of deep disappointment as I honestly acknowledged that physically I was not up to the task of completing the 100 miles. That is the moment I quit. I still had 6 or so miles to run back to Franklin Basin, but they were a formality, as I knew it was over.
Now, there are many who read this that will be quick to the positive. Find the silver lining, look at the glass half full and I am often that person who thinks that just trying to run an ultra is a brave thing and should be applauded. As I ran and walked those final six miles I beat the shit out of myself. All of the terrible things you can think of to say to a quitter I said, and probably much worse. I am not sure why it went so dark, but I swam in it and allowed self immolation to an extent I had never permitted prior. I was pissed at my belief that I could do this nearly impossible thing only to once again come up short. I was mad that I permitted myself to try even when failure seemed so likely. I was angry that I hadn’t done a better job of preparing myself for this outcome of failure. I despised my ongoing reckless optimism in the face of difficulty. Eventually my fury waned, and in its wake a feeling of sadness. Sadness for having not found the redemption I sought and sadness for being such an asshole to myself. With less than a half mile to the Franklin Basin Aid station I stopped briefly next to a lone Aspen in a field. I extended my hand touching the tree and held that connection through a series of deep breaths. The emotions settled to a calm, a type of baseline. I then collected my physical self and shuffled in to the aid station.
There was no decision to be made as I had decided miles ago that my Bear 100 experience for 2024 was ending here. I informed Tanae and walked to the exact same location as I had last year and told the volunteer for the second year in a row that I was done. It was a surprisingly emotionless moment, I signed the DNF paper and walked back to the van. I was able to spend a few delightful moments with my dear friend Jared before Tanae and I got in the van and drove home.
The more time I spend dedicated to this craft of running the more I learn that I don’t know. This was not the hardest thing physically that I have tried or done, it was not the hardest mentally either, but for reasons that seem simultaneously obvious and elusive it is proving to be one of the hardest emotionally. I feel I understand the hard skills of ultra running well and have a certain level of mastery and that seems to have opened a portal to the mental and emotional aspects of the craft that are proving far more challenging. At the end of the day it does not matter if I finish an arbitrary foot race through the mountains or not. It is a life of chosen suffering that is truly a profound gift in a world where so much suffering is forced on humans. There are many lessons that could be pulled from this experience, and I am certain that over time I will grow from this experience. After some honest reflection of the past 24 hours I think the most dominating lesson is related to why I was so angry with myself, it was because I quit before I started. I gave myself all the space and room to have an easy out when it got hard and I took it. Sure, I could, can and do justify the decision because of a more important goal on the horizon, there was also the element of illness, but I don’t like that I chose that road. I have long enjoyed choosing a hard path, doing the challenge, seeking the edge. This time felt like I came up short.