While you were sleeping

I was shutting off the alarm and feeling my way for the bathroom.

Team Sheeper, a schmancy multisport team based in Menlo Park, was hosting their annual Ultimate Run.  (Sheeper, as far as I can tell, has a tendency to organize ridiculously epic workouts - 300 mile bike rides, or whatever, for no particular reason.)

The Ultimate Run is an 18 mile run from the parking lot at the Woodside School, over to Wunderlich Park (which I never knew was there), all the way up, nearly to Skyline, 6 rolling miles over to King's Mountain Road and Huddart Park, and back down to the parking lot. 

It's crazy!  It's insane!  It just might be my only real opportunity to put some miles in before I fall way behind on my marathon training plan, which is on my schedule as needing to start sometime in these two weeks we're on holiday in Thailand.  Although I have little hopeful thoughts that we'll get out for a jog around town to get a local feel for the places we visit, I don't think it's realistic to plan on too many 2 hour runs.  It's hot, it's humid, in Bangkok it's crazy polluted...and more to the point, there's so much else to see and do!

A friend mentioned the Ultimate Run about two weeks ago.  At that time, my longest run since my 13 mile run in November was 9 miles.  Doubling it - and adding a mountain - seemed a little unwise.  So I immediately made myself do a 2 hour run (at the end of which I was really weary), and last weekend I did a shorter but way hillier run - the PG&E trail at Rancho San Antonio.  I also read somewhere that if you are in a pinch and need to dramatically increase your mileage without doing yourself too much damage, you can alternate running and walking (say, 8 minutes of running, then 1 minute of walking) and supposedly go up to 50% further.  So that was my plan, but I knew I'd have to  get there early.

Runners were starting the Ultimate Run in several waves according to projected speed, hoping to finish around the same time so they could all cook pancakes in the parking lot.   The first wave was set to go at 6:30. 

I picked up Rad, and we met some others in the parking lot, but didn't get going till about 6:50.  He and Tracy wore headlamps and led the way.  It was about 35 degrees.

I tried to be very purposeful about the walking breaks, taking them from the very beginning, because I know very well that no matter how great you feel at, say, mile 8, you can be real trouble just four miles later if you haven't paced yourself.  Rad's training so far has topped out at a half marathon last weekend, so he was amenable to my pace.

I was actually pretty beat by the time we got to the top of the hill - only 6 miles in.  The mountain top was pretty well clouded in, but there was one meadowy patch that allowed in a couple of beams of the rising sun - that was very satisfying.

But on we went into the cloud and (periodically) the rain.  Rad and I continued run-walking (or, as I prefer to put it, rokkin') the whole way.

Here are the lovely ladies of the second wave, who passed us near the top and made sure we made the correct turns.  We needed the help.

On the way back down, we were  passed by the final wave, of the very quickest runners. 

They are humoring me to make it appear they are struggling to keep up with me.

Victor is apparently sponsored by Polar.

Victor also gave us some directions on how to leave the park - to follow the signs for Phleger Estate. 

Little did we know that was a detour that took us about a mile out of our way - two, once we backtracked.  We were suspicious, and it got kind of Blair Witch - debating whether to continue on this questionable course or to just suck it up and go back the way we'd come.  Rad checked his GPS, but we were deep in a ravine and he had trouble finding a satellite.  Eventually we did turn back - but poor Victor was so certain he just kept going until he and Derek were practically to Skyline.

Anyway, Rad and I trudged towards the exit - his GPS said we had gone 19.6 miles - it was another two or three to the parking lot - when we saw a familiar blue car near the bathroom about a mile from the bottom of the trail.  We'd been gone so long Lorraine had worried about us and sneaked in the Service Entrance to the park.  We gratefully accepted a lift the rest of the way.

The rest of the way to...pancakes!  Bucks was jammed, so some fifteen of us ended up at Brian's Restaurant in Los Altos.  (Only about two of us belonged to Team Sheeper, so we didn't want to mooch their parking lot pancakes.)  Ace rolled out of bed in time to join us, and to participate in one of his favorite Sunday morning activities: playing with babies!

Comments

[TheQueen]

Ace is hot. I know I should say something less direct but damn. Ace is hot.

[kelli]

Okay, that run at least looks like a lot of fun. Good people, beautiful scenery, etc. Lordy, I'd need both to get me to go that far when it is cold outside. 18 milers in Phoenix are asphalt, the color beige, stucco, maybe a little dry and dusty green and did I mention the asphalt?

And Ace and babies. Huh. Which one is cuter?

[TasterSpoon]

Q - It's his manly 11 o'clock shadow. You should see the handlebar moustache.

K - Oh yeah, freezing rain is WAY funner than dry heat. Seriously? That is the cutest baby I know. Also, I make him cry without fail.