For the last three years, I told myself I'd run in the GLIRC Six Hour Run at Sunken Meadow State Park, on the north shore of Long Island. There were always conditions though: I had to lose a certain amount of weight (I'm a big dude, not exactly a runners body), and get my pace down to something that wouldn't totally embarrass me. It didn't happen the last two years, but this past Sunday, after an awesome couple of months of intense training and dropping pounds, I headed out to Sunken Meadow to run for six hours straight.
I had a goal of running 30 miles. The weeks leading up to the race, I was running a pretty consistent 9:10 pace for anything under 10 miles, which is basically the fastest I've been running in a solid 5 or 6 years. Keep in mind that I do 98% of my running in Long Beach, where the only elevation is the ramps going up to the boardwalk, maybe 12 feet up. I knew doing a six hour run on the hilly north shore was going to add a good amount of time to my overall pace, but I figured I would be able to keep it under 12 minutes throughout.
The course humbled me, big time. The course was half on trails and half on pavement. The off-road portion was sandy, full of gravel, and HILLY. The "rolling hills" that were mentioned in the race description turned out to be the first section of Cardiac Hill (the worst hill to run on Long Island), and some other stupid smaller ones. Nothing rolling about them. Trust.
Anytime I'm training for something longer a 15k, I break down the distance into shorter distances. For Sunday, with my goal being 30 miles, I broke it down into five 10ks, which I know is 31 miles, if I could do 30 maybe I could do 31?
I ran the first 10k in just over an hour, about a 10:04 pace. Miles 24-28.8 I did at a 9:37 pace.
In between miles 7-24 I went anywhere from 9:56 to 14:10 at mile 16.
It's those in between miles that get ya. The excitement of doing something new wears off, and you start to realize that you have five more hours of running ahead of you. I don't think there's anything in this world that I want to do for five hours at a time. Do I really want to punish my body on steep hills and a rough terrain for the rest of my Sunday afternoon? The Jets are playing the Pats, and I still have two more hours until the final horn sounds. I trudged on.
The most common question I got when I told people I was going to do this, or afterwards when I told everyone what I did, was "Don't you get bored?
I don't understand this question. I don't think it's possible to get bored when you're out running in one of the nicest state parks on Long Island. I saw dozens of different birds, saw some really interesting plant life, and met some really cool people. This race draws people from all over the country, and even one guy that I talked to for a good 2 miles was here visiting from Dublin, Ireland. It blows my mind when people say that running outside is boring. Even if you aren't in a state park, running anywhere on the island or in NYC has to be more interesting than jogging on a treadmill with a ridiculous television in front of your face.
At the end of the six hours, I only was able to do 28.4 miles (my Nike running app was a little off in the woods). Am I disappointed that I didn't hit 30? Kind of. 30 was the number I had set in my mind going into the training for this. But when I take into consideration that the course was way, way more difficult than I anticipated, and it was my first time doing any run over 4.5 hours, I can proudly say that I am officially an ultramarathoner. Hell, I even came in 38th place out 110 runners!
For the foreseeable future, I am going to concentrate on getting my half marathon time down. Looking ahead to next year, I'm absolutely going to plan on doing another ultramarathon. After reading Cary's account of the Canandaigua Lake 50 miler, I'm thinking that's going to be the one. Also, major, major props to Cary for finishing that race with such an impressive time!
