Subject: HURT II - Whew- am I glad THAT is over! From: akabill Date: Thu, 07 Feb 2002 06:00:04 -1000 Aloha Ultrafunner, Liz Brandt gave me permission to forward her rather unique account of traveling the tra(va)ils of HURT II aloha, aka ****************************************************** Hi akabill, Here's my account. Liz Subject: RE: Good Luck Whew- am I glad THAT is over! It rained on and off the days before and during the race. Add that to 50 pairs of feet tromping over the course and you have one huge pig trough. I believe I was close to the LAST 100km finisher in 28 hrs 10 min. I ran my very last mile in a torrential downpour, which led to a near flash flood (water up to my knees). But it was a very cool experience and I'm glad I hung in there. Because of the trail conditions, I couldn't do a whole lot of running/quad pounding, which seemed to preserve my quads for later. I really never had a problem with them. Maybe it was due to the leg weight training I've been doing. I did, however, get 2 humongous blisters (one on each big toe). I tried to put compeed on them, but after a few hours in soaking wet shoes, it slid off. Jane joined me as my pacer as we took off for loop 3 at 9:20 pm. I was minus one flashlight after donating one to a lost young couple at dusk. They said they wandered off the trail- she was in a sport bra and flip flops and he was barefoot! It was cold and rainy and getting very dark. I told them to take my extra light- it had an hour of battery power left- and to get the hell off the mountain- fast. Hopefully they made it. Anyway, Jane and I had enough light sources remaining for our journey, plus more stuff in the other drop bags. Soon after leaving the Nature Center, it became pretty apparent that Jane wasn't a very happy camper about the trail conditions, elevation changes, etc. She was bitching and complaining more than usual- could have been the added fear factor. I think she saw her life flash before her eyes several times as we negotiated down the Nuuanu trail to Jackass Ginger. It was UNBELIEVABLE! Here we were- about 2:30 am- no moonlight- pouring rain- Jane had my pinceton tec halogen handheld and I had my halogen headlamp. The normally sarcastic Jane wasn't saying a word! I really didn't know until later, but she was scared shitless. I pretty much blocked it from my mind, but it was true- one slip and we were going off that cliff! As we FINALLY approached the aid station at 5 AM, Jane fell in the river. That pretty much was the icing on the cake. She said "Screw this shit- you're going back out by yourself- I'd rather have hemmoroid surgery again than to go back up on that suicide ridge- you're insane". Yes- she's not really one to mince words. But I knew that going back up wouldn't be as bad as the trip down, so I gobbled down some minestrone soup, grabbed some extra double A's, and cruised out of there sipping on a Redbull. That was one of the worst things for me- fighting that overwhelming urge to just lay down and sleep in the middle of the trail. But the Redbull really helped me with that! I clawed my way up Nuuanu with more energy than I had the previous 2 laps! It also helped ease the stomach problems I'd been putting up with for the last 10 hours (not sure if it was the Hammer Gel I was consuming in large quantities or the tissue rejuvenator or Succeed caps). But fortunately, it was feeling much better. Coming up out of Nuuanu, below the ridge, I had to take an emergency crap (the kind where it was coming out NOW- where you couldn't just squeeze your butt cheeks together and hold it). So there I was- the drop-off on one side and a rock wall on the other- not a whole lot of options- and I sure as hell wasn't going to hang my butt off the cliff. So I ended up crapping right there by the wall and stuck a big rock on top of it. At the top of Nuuanu, in the pre-dawn grey, I ran into Richard China, modeling the latest in Hefty bag wear- a rather nice shade of blue. We stopped to chat a few minutes and then he headed off down "suicide slide" to call it a day (he wasn't going to make the 10am cutoff to be able to continue on to loop 5). But, hey- at least he'll still get credit for a 100km finish. About an hour later, I ran into some nice Korean ladies on a morning hike. They asked me how far I was running and almost freaked out when they found out I said, "sixty some" and not "sixteen". I thought the one lady would surely have a coronary, "You mean you out here all night- no go home"?! And then I thought to myself for the first time, "Yeah, that probably would seem weird to a normal person-hmmm." Almost to the top of Hogsback, Monica Scholz and her brother cruised by me (she was coming to the end of loop 4). Yesterday at the race brief was the first time I met Monica, and she seems like a really nice person- very real and unassuming. And surprisingly enough, she doesn't really LOOK like a runner, but don't let that fool you! Back at the nature center, I had 2 more miles to go, and believe it or not, I was able to talk Jane into joining me! I was craving coffee with lots of crème and sugar, but had to settle for noodle soup and the last piece of pumpkin pie (my 3rd piece):) At this point I KNEW I had the finish in the bag, come hell or high water (it actually turned out to be the latter), thus the finish itself was rather anti-climactic. As soon as I touched the finish banner, Patricia Carroll led me off to the "lab rat room". You see, she's working on her Masters degree and 22 of us agreed to take part in her study on enzyme levels in runners. Before the race we did an EKG, temperature, blood pressure and gave blood and urine samples. Then we had to duplicate the procedure right after the race. We'll get the results at a later date- should be very interesting. You should see the stuff we got for the race- a really cool HURT beach towel, a shirt depicting Hawaiian pigs running up and down the elevation map, a finishers polo shirt and a very nice handmade finisher's medal, compliments of akabill. And the race bag was classic- a handmade Hawaiian fabric bag with a drawstring- very cool. I finally got to place a face with some of the names I've been reading about (Brandon Sybrowski, Monica Scholz, Lisa Smith, Ian Torrence, Hans Dieter) and some of the HURT folks as well (Greg Cuadra and daughter Christal- who had the BEST aid station I may add, Ed Bugarin and Felisha LeRand). I already knew most of the other folks there. And just like everything I read about last years's event, this really IS a first class event. It's really hard to do that while being laid back and low key, but they pull it off great. Thanks to ALL for a great time! Liz Brandt