One _____ at a Time: August 2013

Oh, you don't know The Man? [class shakes their heads] He's everywhere. In the White House, down the hall, MISS MULLINS... she's The Man. And The Man ruined the ozone, and he's burning down the Amazon, and he kidnapped Shamu and put her in a chlorine tank! OK? And there used to be a way to stick it to The Man. It was called rock ‘n’ roll. But guess what. Oh, no. The Man ruined that too with a little thing called MTV! So don’t waste your time trying to make anything cool or pure or awesome, because The Man’s just going to call you a fat, washed up loser and crush your soul. So do yourselves a favor and just GIVE UP!!!

-Dewey, School of Rock

TO BE DONE.

RACE REPORT - Burning River 100

What does running your first 100 miler through the Cuyahoga Forest feel like? It feels "pure and cool and awesome", like you and your kick-ass crew are making beautiful music on instruments that have been designed by 4 billion years of evolution, and are having sex, and head banging, and are kicking The Man square in the dick as he yells at you to just GIVE UP, but YOU DON'T, even though it hurts like heck because your feet have turned to bubble gum and blisters after running 12 hours in nonstop rain, and you come to the end of a 21 hour day of torture where some of your favorite people are waiting and cheering you on with cowbells, and you get to see how happy they are... to see you happy.. to see them watch you.. doing what you love. It might be the COOLEST feeling in the whole wide world. And to be DONE.

If you've ever been stuck in a traffic jam after a tough day at work, when your car's AC is broken, and your blood begins to boil, then you've felt the helplessness of spiraling toward confounded levels of epic constipation. At this moment, The Man certainly has his grip on your colon. But then you go on a trail run, and you realize that it gives you the exact opposite feeling. So you say to yourself, I should do more of this. Your wife echoes, "You need to do more of this." Then it begins to snowball, exponentially. You put an event on your calendar and hit the "Pay Now" button. Everything changes.

Albert Einstein was once asked what the most powerful force in the world was. His answer was "compound interest"-- in other words, exponential growth-- where something grows (and doubles) at a fixed rate of time. Although it seems obvious that the bigger something is, the bigger it grows, one of the most common of human oversights is that exponential functions tend to sneak up and overwhelm us, whether they're bacterial growth on the surface of a pond, the consequences of interest bearing debt, or this time, the accumulation of miles beneath my feet. Somewhere along the line, they just kind of snuck into my life like a volcanic blister outbreak. To an outsider, the miles may have gotten out of hand ("Enough is enough"). But to me, the last couple of years of running have been one of the rare sacred spaces where I feel like I get to make beautiful music.

At some point in the training period, your friends, family, and colleagues inevitably question the sanity. "I just don't see the point," they say. They're not wrong to ask, "What does running 100 miles accomplish that running 50 didn't? Do you really need to double it? Is that why you're so skinny?" You struggle to muster the exact words for a defense that captures the positive feelings it gives you. These positive feelings, in fact, may be their lifeline too-- the only thing keeping them alive for asking such lousy questions.

Internally, I play out their logic, What does running 50 miles accomplish that running 26.2 didn't... that 13.1 didn't... that 10k didn't... that 5k didn't... that the trip to the mall didn't? How did this repeated doubling happen, and why? And is the mall The Man? (You're damn right!) In front of us both is piling up evidence of self-indulgence-- the yard is overgrown, social events and responsibilities skipped, superbowl stats ignored, internet browsing muscles atrophied.

In a moment of fatigue, an ugly temptation creeps in. The ego jumps at the opportunity to distance itself from the company of all others with a restraining order of exactly 100 miles, creating a "geography of purity". At the center of the geography of purity is, of course, pure meddlesome ego. Extending from the center are concentric circles-- barriers representing ever greater and denser levels of impurity. First the 100 milers, who are a select few. Then the 100 k-ers. Then the 50 milers. Then the marathoners...and so on, until you reach the farthest outskirts of ego-city-- where the masses of "untouchables" reside-- the so-called "washed up losers."

But if you could transcend the ego's pathetic ground game, you'd soon realize that the separation is an illusion. The ego is me AND he is the washed up loser AND he is everyone in-between AND everyone "left out"... of a place that really does not exist, anyway. The 100 miles of trail separating Cleveland from Akron, Ohio are actually helpful in exposing the sinister illusion of separation for what it is. Not many other experiences leave you feeling so broken and mortal and in need of bridges to others, for their company and their aid.

Looking peppy. Give it time.

HOW 100 MILES ACTUALLY GET RUN
(not philosophically)

RACE DAY FOOD
50 medjool dates soaked overnight and blended with water into 10 cups of "date-o-rade"
30 super ripe bananas blended with water into one gallon of "banana-mamma-jamma"
20 small canned potatoes (+ 10 to shove down your pants and forget about till bath time that night. )
10 half dixie cups of The Man-Cola
4 half cups of Heed (electrolyte)
10 Salt Stix pills
3 cups of Ramen noodles
1 handful of pretzels
3 gels
2 homemade energy "blue balls" (recipe available for purchase for $1zillion)
15 Advil (I'm not proud of this but it might have been less unhealthy than dropping out at mile 40 and having to start over)

The most important thing after food is a kick-ass crew, just like Oceans 11.

The Cuyahoga River used to be scary-- it caught on FIRE! Hence the name of the race-- Burning River 100. Susie, my saintly/devilish woman, helped prepare me physically and mentally to face my fears.

Behind every good man, there is a badass woman or two or three.
Why do they look so happy? Do they not know what they're about to do?

5AM Squire's Castle. It's GO time.

Me (It's a Topper baby) and Franklin (half-nekked) building bridges to awesomeness. We ran the first ~55 miles together, then did some yo-yo-ing back and forth before his belly did some yo-yo-ing.

We've got a rainy day on our hands. All-damn-day!!!

Susie doesn't even look like she was up all night from the Tom Petty concert right outside our window the night before the race. "Crazy 'bout Elvis. Loves horses. And her boyfriend, toooooo."

At ~45 mi, my knee was throbbing and my stomach was doing hula hoops. I told Franklin that he looked so strong that it would be best if he went ahead without me. Shake and Bake was cooked. Then I discovered a powerful combination that worked a miracle on me-- two advil, two potatoes, and a cola. Voila! I'm back from the dead and would soon find myself running a few more aid stations with my dude.

Lee Ann (Crew cheif extraordinaire and high priestess of trail running-- Part Michael Vick's pit bull, part Santa Claus), and Cincinnati favorites, Mike and Colleen, gearing up for pacing me through the second half of the race, and keeping me sane.

I'm soooo happy to see you right now, Pater. You ready to rocky and roll?

Literally, the rockiest section was about to strike. I spent days building the ultimate Enrique Iglesias playlist for the second half of this race...but I didn't resort to it even once. It wasn't necessary with the kind of company that I kept. Great people, my crew.

What's this?! A special guest appearance straight from his monstrous 4th place finish at Badwater 2 weeks earlier-- Harvey Lewis, here to keep everyone entertained, as usual.

His advice-- "Stretch it out."

Whoop there it is. Tag team back again. The four of us Cincinnatians, Me, Franklin, Colleen, and Pater, would soon bump into Kyle and Dave from Cincinnati as well. The forest almost started to smell like Skyline Chili behind us.

Colleen, keeping me focused. My mind keeps detaching from the moment.

Heck! I'm STILL smiling.

My dad, and brother Matti D (made the trip from Cincinnai), Lee Ann, and Levi (Franklin's son) got to spend a LOT of time together waiting for me and Franklin, and then cheering us on. Ultra-running is way more a team sport than is given credit for. Crewing an ultra is the HARDEST thing in sports. I'm so grateful for their support.

Finally some sunshine! Susie was there to pace me at dusk through a really beautiful section of rolling hills. I was feeling VERY good and rode a wave of energy for a stretch of about 25 miles that I've never experienced before. It was like I was being controlled by the spirit of Ricky Bobby.

It's no Ironman finish line glam, but it's way more beautiful-- brother Matti, mom-in-law Nancy, dad-in-law Ben, and my dad standing in front of the finish line on a random street corner of Akron, Ohio, with a timing clock in the background. "Where the heck is Chris? He's way off pace. He must be hobbling on those blisters by now. I wouldn't be surprised if Lee Ann were carrying him on her shoulders."

Several other runners through the night tried to hitch their wagon to the gravy train was Lee Ann and Chris sloshing through the woods. Unanimously, they all said Lee Ann was the BEST pacer they'd ever seen, which she certainly is. She has a gift.

I was especially grateful when she fished me out of the creek that I fell into it at ~85.

I had the pleasure of pacing her for part of this race two years ago, which is where she planted the initial seed.