“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.” Or in my case, punched in the gut. This year’s Hellbender 100 was my first race that I went into with an actual plan, prior race “plans” followed the FAFO philosophy. Fuck around and find out. Boy have I found out using that strategy, but this year the plan was to play it conservative for the first 50 miles then once I hit that halfway mark is when my race would start. It honestly was exciting to have an actual plan and patiently wait to start my race, my mantras for those first 50 miles were “hold, hold, hold” and “ease, ease, ease”. There’s a lot of excitement at the start of a race and those beginning miles, it’s like this the thing, this is what I’ve been working towards, the energy of the other runners is contagious, it can feel electric. It’s hard to hold back but I kept my mantras, kept the plan in mind, and held steady.
“Hold, hold, hold.” I’ve been holding steady for 50 miles now, I was itching to race. I felt good, I had been eating and drinking consistently, my legs felt fresh, and my mind was ready for the approaching night. My watch hit 50 miles, and I was ready. I picked up the pace and started my race. I don’t think I even made it a mile until I felt that familiar feeling, that feeling that everything might fall apart in a second, the nausea hit. Within a minute of it hitting, I was projectile vomiting. I didn’t panic even though I knew this could be a race ender, I’m no stranger to a puke session and I know I can rally. So, I rallied. I knew the next crewable aid station with my pizza dinner and electrolytes galore were only 5 miles away, I just had to get there and “replenish, replenish, replenish”. I hit a good flow going downhill on Heartbreak Ridge, and I thought to myself maybe just maybe I can recover and still perform. I made it to the aid station, housed some pizza and redbull, changed clothes, got my headlamp out and ready for the night. I left the aid station with two pizza slices sandwiched together and hopeful. If I could keep everything down, I had a chance. The plan was alive.
Here comes the true gut punch. Not too long after I finished my pizza sandwich, it and everything else I had just consumed made a violent reappearance. I tried to keep my head, to keep hope that I could still perform, but in a way I knew my “race” was over and now it was time to survive. At that point, I tried to make sure I focused on hydration and shooting gels to the back of my throat to get something in my system, but it was futile. Too much liquid or a gel hitting my palate, triggered a forceful rejection of whichever said substance. I couldn’t recover, nothing stayed down, I was empty. The death march began.
The funny thing about a death march or this death march in particular is that it felt like being in limbo. The body moves so slow you feel as though you’re going nowhere, when your energy is so drained and you haven’t slept in over a day, things start to get interesting. It’s here where you really start to question, “What am I doing?” “Why am I doing this?” “Is this real?” “Are those trail markers real?” “What if I’m lost?” “Am I lost” “If I were to die here, how would I feel?” “How many miles until I’m done?”. I think what’s funny about these questions, is depending on your mind state at the moment those questions come up you can either take them at face value or they can get quite deep and existential. It’s this moment and for these questions, that people prepare their “why?”. The proverbial “why?” in running and ultrarunning and probably anything else you do in life, is meant to be your answer in this moment. It’s what is going to help continue moving forward, what is going to help you push through the pain, the discomfort, that raw and vulnerable state you enter when you have pushed to your limit, what will hopefully get you across that finish line for that shiny new buckle.
There is no “why?”. This was my answer this go round with questions that pervade the psyche during a 100 mile effort. Maybe that’s not 100% accurate, it’s just that I didn’t have some deep meaningful answer that gave me a sense of purpose or reason for enduring the suffering I was currently experiencing. So what got me to the finish line? Do I just love suffer? No, although I think there are quite a few people who believe that is true of me. But, the answer for me that I came to between the dry heaves and hallucinations was this, “This is everything I ever wanted, this is what I came here for.” I know, I know. You’re sitting there saying, “Oksana, you just said you don’t love to just suffer for sufferings sake, that sounds an awful lot like you love to suffer and in fact seek it out!” What I mean by “this is everything I ever wanted, this is what I came here for.” is that I came to this race to have the experience of running a 100 miles. The experience of running a 100 miles is unpredictable, nothing is guaranteed, there are so many variables over such a long distance and time, anything can happen, it can be incredibly joyous and heartbreaking. You plan and plan and then somethings happens you didn’t plan for. What do you do? How do you react? What happens if you move through the pain? Who do you become? How much can you endure? This is why. The experience of feeling scared in the dark and alone and still moving forward, the feeling of heartbreak of reaching for a goal and falling short, the feeling of extreme fatigue and still moving forward, the feeling of facing yourself in one of your most raw and vulnerable states, the feeling of utmost joy when you see aid station volunteers and friends and how for just a second the pain melts away, the encouragement from strangers in the dark, the feeling of 99 miles in your legs and still attempting some sort of run or hobble, the love that encompasses a 100 mile race atmosphere. That is the what I came for. The experience not the pain.
I’ll continue to dream big and race with a plan, I’m sure one of these days I’ll get to see it through. However, if it goes out the window that’s okay, because I’m still lucky enough to get to experience this silly sport filled with life, love, heartbreak, dreams, pain, and so much more.
