Monday, August 25, 2008

Getting Lost and Aunt Bursa

Note: Don't get lost when you are leading a 100 mile race around mile 75 because you probably won't win.

BUC member J thought he could still beat the field while taking a 45 minute detour and a 7 minute nap at Cascade Crest 100 this past weekend. Almost, but not quite. J was looking strong and had a 20 minute lead over the next runner at mile 68 when he and his pacer, fellow BUC member D, decided to challenge themselves a bit more by running more miles. Just goes to show that you never know what may happen at a 100 miler. Seriously, though, strong work to J for not dropping out after this setback, and digging deep after getting lost to finish in a very respectable 21:47. Nice job!!! I'll leave the true race report to J himself after he gets done crying over 4th place. He's great at descriptive text (see previous post). Congrats to Tom Ederer from Seattle and Suzanna Bon from Sonoma, CA who ran for the win at the 2008 Cascade Crest 100. Full results.

Speaking of crying...BUC member E didn't even try to run over 33 miles at this race because he was too busy dropping out and whining about his little IT band issues. Turns out Aunt Bursa is the real culprit of his issues. Inflammation of the bursa between the major trochanter and the ilio-tibial band (basically the fluid sac over the pointy part on your hip and under the IT band) caused huge pain while running during the race. Everything was feeling great until I started feeling pain around mile 25 and every foot strike (specifically downhill) caused a most unpleasant pain around the hip with lovely painful twinges on the lateral part of the knee. Rather than risk further injury by grunting through 67 more miles, I decided to call it a day so that I can run more and drink cold beer and sleep. Tough and disappointing decision considering how ready I felt, but, after a PT session this afternoon and prescription stretching with the 'ole foam roller, things look promising for getting back to it real soon.

Finally, HUGE thanks to BUC member D "Never Stops Running" D. D ran the El Vaquero Loco 50k last weekend with a great time of 6:43, paced J for 47 miles this weekend, and is probably running the 2008 Madison Marathon (in Montana) next weekend. Full schedule for D this fall. He proved to be a great crew and pacer (except for getting lost...no pacer guilt, D) and provided great books on CD for the drive.

1 comment:

Charlie said...

BUC reader C commends J for his stick-with-it-ness and strong showing at the cascade crest 100(+). C has learned that red ribbon is difficult to pick up in the dark (perhaps more so for Montanans, or mathematicians).

C is trying to hire Cesar Millan to train a cascade mountain goat with glow sticks on its horns to lead J on the climb to No Name Ridge next year.

C wishes BUC had existed during his tenure in the Bo-zone, back when a lazy ultrarunner could sign up for the ridge run during happy hour on Friday night before the race. C would have heavily diluted the BUC mileage results, perhaps necessitating a formula change. C believes in rounding up and always tries to stop running at X.1 miles.