Aug 16, 2008 - Pikes Peak Ascent

PPA Results
Overall Place - 86/761
Gender Place - 76/628
Age Group Place - 14/99

This race report ended up being crazy long, but it was a pretty intense day which deserves a little more than a paragraph or two. Unfortunately I have no photos, but hope to beg, steal, or borrow some from others that post on the web. One of the blogs I frequent has already posted a picture of himself and what the conditions were like at the top. He finished about 30 minutes ahead of me.

PPA Race Report: Well, yesterday was the Pikes Peak Ascent.....I'll just start off with 'WOW'!!!! As my last few posts leading up to yesterday showed, there was a powerful storm settling over Colorado for the weekend. This brought much cooler temps and a lot of rain statewide (which fell as snow above about ~10K elevation). Having only run Mt Evans Ascent 3 times, Leadville Heavy Half twice, and Pikes Peak Ascent once, I still feel like I'm pretty new to altitude/mountain running. For every one of those races, I was fortunate enough to have cool to mild temps and clear weather - so basically perfect conditions. The forecast for this weekend forced me to try and prepare in ways I've never had to before. It kinda stressed me out a little. I quickly quit caring about any goal times I had set (sub 3 hrs) and began worrying more about how to deal the adverse conditions. I've gotten a little more serious about running this year so this was going to be a big test to see how serious I really am and how serious I may want to become.

Part of my Friday night was spent checking weather forecasts and figuring out what I was going to send to the top. I couldn't remember how big the sweat check bags were so I tried to pack a little on the light side. I also had to make sure I had plenty with me in case the road to the top got closed like a couple years ago. This stranded runners for several hours, and from what I read it was kind of a nightmare. I decided on a fleece jacket, long sleeve shirt, long running pants, gloves, and pair of socks. I stuffed everything in a garbage bag and was able to compress pretty small so I was sure I would be able to squeeze that into the sweat bag. I also wrestled with what I was going to wear during the run (shorts or long tights, short or long sleeve top, etc). That would be a decision I would have to make just before the start of the race (and I decided on long pants, long sleeve top).

The day started way early with a 3:15am wake up. I ate a little breakfast, threw my stuff in the truck, and left Conifer around 3:45am. It basically rained the whole drive down which had me pretty down. I never considered bagging the race, but I kept thinking to myself how stupid this seemed. I guess common sense kept asking me if I was really going to knowingly run up a fourteener into winter conditions with practically nothing - WTF?!?!? It was about 5:30am when I arrived in Manitou Springs - early enough to park just a couple blocks from the starting line and Memorial Park. The rain had eased into a mist, but I went ahead and threw on my heavy duty rain gear anyway. I was going to do everything I could to stay dry right up to the start of the race. I walked over to the park and picked up my bib and sweat bag. It was a little bigger than I expected so I was happy about that. I spent the next hour doing my normal prerace routine - hydrating, stretching, laps thru port-o-john lines, etc. About 15 minutes before the start, I went ahead and got rid of the heavier rain gear I was wearing. I threw on the light rain jacket I was going to run with and decided since I had a little more room in the bag, I would send the rain pants to the top as well. Of course now that I was minimally protected, the rain intensified. I dropped off my bag at the vans, made one last stop at the restrooms, then walked over to the laundormat next to the start area. I was hoping to meet some guys from the Fourteenerworld forum I lurk on, but there were a lot of people crowding under the small overhang. Since I didn't know what they looked like, wasn't sure if they were even still there. It was less than 10 minutes before the race so they may have already gone to the starting line to find a good spot (they're pretty fast and belong at the front of the pack). I decided to go ahead and join the crowd building at the starting line as well.

Last year, I started towards the back of the pack and ended up getting caught in some of the congestion going thru the narrow switchback section called the "W's". This year I staged myself a little closer to the front, maybe a 1/4 of the way back, in hopes to avoid that. After a final weather report, singing of 'America the Beautiful', we went thru the 3-2-1 countdown and then off we went. Of course it was raining harder now than it had all morning leading up to the race. A few minutes after the start, there was also a loud clap of thunder. This was truly insane!!! Fortunately, it was the only thunder we heard. About halfway up Ruxton, it was clear I was not going to be able to run with the rain jacket on. I was just getting too hot so I took it off and tied it around my waist. It didn't take long to get soaked but I was comfortable temperature wise so I wasn't too worried. I did wonder how this was going to affect me above treeline though. The first half of the race went well for me. The rain had lightened up and the cooler temps (50s ??) were definitely beneficial. As we entered the W's, I saw that my positioning at the start was paying off. Everyone seemed to be good with the pace as there was a nice single file line of people running, not walking, and very little passing. As we got higher up, runners began to spread out some and I began to do some passing. My splits up to Noname Creek (~52:00) and Barr (~1:30:00) were pretty good and actually on pace for a 3 hour run. As I left Barr camp, one of the officials reported there was light graupel about a mile up. Looks like things were going to get fun pretty soon.

Maybe half way up to A-Frame, I was teased a little with a couple quick gusts of wind - yeah it was pretty cold. I also began feeling a few pellets of grauple and hail/sleet. To this point, I had been running without gloves. My hands were a little cool but after passing Barr Camp, I had pulled my long sleeves down and had them gripped into fists which worked pretty well. When I reached A-Frame, I was asked how I was doing and if I was cold. Amazingly I was still doing well even though I was pretty damp. The report above treeline was wind, cold, and some light, frozen precip. I decided to go ahead and put on my liner gloves but actually struggled a little bit with that. I had been running with them in my pants pockets so they were a little damp. My hands were also wet and I guess a little colder than I thought as they weren't working as well as they should. Once I finally had the gloves on, I pulled the sleeves back down into my fists and began running again.

When I reached treeline, I immediately began feeling the wind. It was definitely cold but not as biting as I had feared. At this point it was just a nuisance. I was still able to maintain a running pace and felt like I was still making good time. Fantasies of actually running my goal time of 3 hours began filling my head. After a little ways above treeline, I began seeing small pockets of accumulating precip around, but the trail remained in pretty good condition....just wet, no ice or anything. The clouds/fog were also thickening up which was actually probably a good thing - I couldn't see the summit and how far I really had to go. As I continued to run/jog, I just kept my head down and focused on the trail. As I got higher, the winds began picking up, the wet trail began to get covered in slush and the surrounding terrain was turning white with accumulating snow & ice. As I followed the trail, I would alternate getting pounded in the face or the back of the neck with cold, stinging ice pellets and snow. I probably should have put my rain jacket on, but I was already soaked and since I still didn't feel too cold, I figured I would just wait until I absolutely needed it. Kind of a dangerous move I guess, but I was less than 2 miles away and still moving quite well. The trail really began to turn to crap over the last couple miles which caused my pace to drop dramatically. At this point I quit thinking about time and just concentrated on moving as quickly as I could, but taking care with the snow/ice covered trail and rocks. The 16 Golden Stairs leading to the finish was nothing more than a quick hike for me. It became a little quicker after there was a flash of lighting immediately followed by a loud clap of thunder!! Shortly after that clap of thunder, I heard the announcer mention something about runners now being turned around at A-Frame. Damn!!! A friend of mine from Alpine was running in wave 2 and was likely affected (along with about 1000 other runners). With the turn around back to Manitou, that meant she had to run ~20 miles instead of ~13 miles.

I crossed the finish line with a time of 3:12:30..... ~2 1/2 minutes faster than my time last year. No time to enjoy the feeling though. There was a flurry of officials around me placing my finishers medal around me, tearing off the part of my bib used for results (and now for tracking), guiding me to my sweat check bag, then hurrying me into a shelter that was adjacent to the Summit House. This was now being used for medical and I guess to keep runners out of the Summit House. Although I was inside the shelter, because I was no longer running/hiking I became quite chilled, but a least I was out of that ridiculous weather. Looking around I could see I was in much better shape than a lot of the other runners though. I can't tell you how many people I saw around shaking uncontrollably with violent chills and being treated for hypothermia. It was kinda scary. I was encouraged to go into the restroom to change, which I did. I didn't realize how cold my hands had gotten so I spent a few minutes with hands under the air dryers trying to warm them up. It took several minutes for them to thaw enough to even move, much less try to untie the knot on my sweat bag (I ended up using my teeth). After changing and chatting it up some with the other runners, I was now all about getting the hell off the mountain. I threw my rain gear back on went back outside to collect my finishers jersey and head for the shuttles. After I was back outside, it really hit me how bad the weather had become. It was full on winter and becoming a very dangerous situation. All the volunteers, SAR, medical support, etc were doing an incredible job with all us crazy runners out there. Enough cannot be said for these people and the great job they did under very difficult circumstances.

As far as how my 'test' went, I feel pretty good about the run and how I handled everything for the most part. I know some luck played a little bit of a role too. Overall I would say I passed the test, but I know this was strictly a pass/fail grading system. A few degrees colder, winds a few mph stronger, running a few minutes slower, more lightning...things could have been much different for me and this could have easily gone down as a FAIL!! I learned a lot this Saturday which I know will help me in future races...possibly the Imogene Pass Run in three weeks.