Rocky Raccoon 25k Race Report and some other junk…

Huntsville State Park, oh how I love this place! I think I would spend some time there every weekend if it were not a 100-mile drive from my home.

I woke up at 3am on November 5, 2011, made the coffee and put my race gear in the car. Thankfully, I had leftover scrambled eggs and deer sausage left over from dinner the night before, so I did not have to worry with that. I just warmed it up and headed the Honda in a northeasterly direction at about 4am!

I ate my breakfast promptly at 5am, as my race started at 7am. I planned to run as much as was humanly possible for me in order to finish the race in a respectable time (for me). Typically, I am not a runner, but a walker/racewalker. Everyone knows that racewalking is not possible on the heavily root covered trails at Huntsville, so I usually run a little when I race there. This day was going to be different because I have been waging an internal battle with myself: Do I want to be a competitive master’s racewalker, or am I really just doing the racing because it is fun?

Packet and chip pick up was very efficient and organized! East Texas Ultra Runners Paul Stone and his crew always put on a great event. Bib #181 seemed like a good one… I watched the start of the 50k at 6am, and then walked back to my car to get my race gear assembled.

It was still a little dark outside when the race started and a friend had forgotten to bring a light. I jogged slowly from the start so the friend could benefit from my flashlight. When the sun came up enough for all of us to see the trail without the light, I bid my friend farewell and began to tear up the trail. I say that with tongue in cheek, because an average 13:00 per mile pace is not necessarily tearing up the trail. However, for me, maintaining that pace for 25k would be a huge pr (personal record) for this distance on trails. I was feeling fine, the temperature was in the 40’s for the start and it was a beautiful day! I finally figured out what caused my electrolyte problem in the past (too many Endurolytes and not enough water) so I made that adjustment. My race fuel was Hammer espresso gel/chocolate gel mixed with 2T Now Egg White Protein powder and a little coconut oil. I had a handheld water bottle filled with Heed that I refilled at the aid stations. Sadly, I left my little flashlight at the first aid station. That flashlight served me well through Tejas Trails Kapt’n Karls 3 race series, so I guess I will have to go buy another one. It is very bright and easy to carry because it came with a wrist strap. I cannot imagine what made me walk off and leave it. 

Back to the trail… I was having fun and really pushing myself, passing back and forth with a couple of runners who were about my speed. There were a couple of moments where I began plodding along, not really feeling in to the race. I had to tell myself to pick up the pace because a friend, Erin Taylor-Talcott, has recently enlightened me. She got something from our conversations that I had not noticed. It is a mental thing that happens to me about 2/3 to 3/4 of the way into my races no matter the distance. I start to feel fatigued and disgusted with myself, and I always slow down only to pick up the pace after a mile or so of feeling bad. If it were a nutritional problem, it would be time based or even based on a specific distance. I think it is my mind telling my body I suck, and I will never get any better at this thing called racing. Every time I started to plod, I would tell myself “Run, Dammit! You can do better than this.” I would run until I HAD to walk again, uphill or downhill, it did not matter.

Finally, I arrived at the H-T Rex aid station, 2.8 miles from the finish. I had been drinking more water this race, so had to use the porta-can. I looked at my watch and saw I was only 2:52 into the race, so I mugged for a photo (thanks Mariela) and ran up the hill to cover the last section of the trail. A little history about my Rocky Raccoon 25k finishes: the first time I did this race in 2008 I walked the whole thing in 3:36; the second time I did it in 2010 I ran/walked it in 3:43 (the running slowed my overall finish time); this time I ran/walked it in 3:22. I am soooo proud of this! It is only a 14 minute pr for the distance on trails, but if you consider my run/walk improvement of 21 minutes, that is a substantial improvement!

Race photos can be found here for a while... Your Sporting Image and enter bib #181.


Now for the other junk:

I would not be where I am right now had I not changed my lifestyle from Standard American Diet to Paleo Diet. NO QUESTION. I effortlessly lost 35 pounds; I eat as much as my body wants to be fed, as long as there are no grains, legumes or processed foods, very little fruit, occasional full fat Greek yogurt, and plenty of coconut oil, good quality meats and lots of veggies. I maintain this weight loss without food logging which is a definite plus. I do not have to kill myself exercising, and still get pr’s. I can lift heavier things without worrying about straining my back. My total body composition is changing. I am no longer an apple shaped woman. My waistline continues to get smaller even though I am not losing any more weight.

The question I have to answer now is this: Do I want to put the additional stress in my life that trying to be a competitive master’s racewalker will cause? I started doing marathons because I really enjoy them, and gave me a good reason to try to maintain my fitness level so that I will continue to enjoy them when I participate. Then I found ultra marathons and trail races. Those are my favorite, because even the elite athletes are welcoming to the whole crowd, even if it takes you twice as long to finish the race as it does them.

I am going to go back in time a little. My husband and I used to have a weekend drag racing car. He worked on it, and I raced it. That was so much fun, from the burnout, to staging the car at the Christmas tree! The adrenaline rush of taking off and speeding down the strip does not compare to anything I have ever done, or will ever do again. The problem with drag racing is you can be as fast as you can afford to be. I was really good with my reaction time. If .500 was perfect, I was usually in the range of .501 to .510. The other drivers all tried their best to goad me into going in for the dial-in and competing against them. Everyone pitches in some money, and you predict your finish time, the one closest to the “dial-in” wins the pot. It was not long after that, we sold the car and stopped going to the drag strip. When I thought about competing, the fun was all lost.

I would appreciate a little feedback… I have not written anything for the blog in a long time, mainly because I have been going over this compete vs. participate dilemma for a long time.  I may come back and add a photo and a couple of links later, but really needed to get this off my mind.

Paleo? Me?

I have been thinking about starting to blog again. But, finding the time to write is a real challenge for me. These pictures show the overweight, struggling me... the trainig pic is over the summer, doing a 12 hour overnight training walk with some friends in Houston.

I finished my first 100 mile event January 1, 2011. I was really overwhelmed at the time, so happy and proud! This was my third attempt, the first two ended in DNF. Not that a DNF in a 100 is the end of the world. Each race has its ups and downs, and Did Not Finish is better than Did Nothing Fatal! The self portrait below is how I looked right after the race, at my heaviest weight in a long time.

Immediately after the race, as I was driving home from Phoenix, I had a huge revelation. I will never reach my goal of having my name added to the Centurion list. I was 20 to 25 pounds overweight, and yes, I did just walk 100 miles, but it took me 45 hours of a 48 hour race. The more I train for ultras, the more crap I ate. I was desperately trying to keep my energy level up. It seemed as if cookies were the answer. I also ate twice as much fruit as I did vegetables. Trapped in a low fat, high carbohydrate cycle, I just kept gaining all the weight I had lost back, a couple of pounds at a time.

The back story on the initial weight loss: I have always been a carbohydrate and sugar junkie, and after I stopped drinking alcohol to excess… sugary foods were the next logical step. I moved from one addiction to another. When I realized what had happened, I was all the way up to 215 pounds. That was in 2004. My back was such a mess; I could hardly get out of bed in the morning. I went to the doctor for one thing or another (I don’t remember the reason) and the doctor finally got through to me. He told me if I kept this yo-yoing with my weight up, I was going to kill myself. You might as well just stay fat. That was the straw that broke this camel’s back. I started walking, a little bet every day. The more I did, the better I felt. So I looked for an eating plan I could live with. I changed my carbohydrate intake to brown. I ate more fat (olive oil and peanut butter), and I ate lots of vegetables and fruit. I lost 70 pounds in about 9 months and found racewalking. I never knew I had a competitive bone in my body… now I was racing regularly and have even won a few walking competitions. The more I raced, the more I wanted to race and I did my first full marathon in 2006! Wow, that was awesome, but I know there is more. That’s how I found about the Centurion list. In order to get one’s name added to the list one must walk 100 miles or more in 24 hours or less at a judged competition. Competition meaning there are more than one person making a Centurion attempt. This is the goal I have had in mind since 2006.

Fast forward to where I am now, driving home from Phoenix on January 2, 2011. I was ready to give up on my Centurion goal because I had let my food addictions take over yet again and was back up to 170. I mulled this over and finally posted something silly on Facebook about the Bataan Memorial Death March Marathon. If they would count the 20 extra pounds I am carrying around, I could just add a 15 pound pack and enter the heavy division of the marathon. A new, awesome friend saw it and sent me a private message about Paleo, and the rest is history.

January 12, I flipped the switch and removed everything containing sugar from my food intake. I already drink high quality coffee black with no cream or sugar, so I could still have my cuppa joe. It is amazing how when I set my mind to NO SUGAR, I was able to just quit, cold. I was still eating a few grains such as one slice of homemade wheat bread made in to French toast, or a serving of organic oatmeal. I talked to a couple more friends about slowly cutting the grains and they suggested that would just be self-torture, so, January 18 I flipped that switch and have had NO grains since. It took a couple of weeks to learn to eat when hungry and to stop obsessing over food logging, and I lost 6.5 pounds by January 22. It was so easy; I didn’t even feel like I was depriving myself of anything. Oh, and drinking coffee is no longer a necessity… but a pure pleasure. My energy level had increased dramatically! I didn’t start my serious training until after I had lost a total of 12 pounds, which was January 30. Can you believe it? I lost 12 pounds in 18 days with little effort, and this time, I can actually see the weight coming off my waistline. It’s like a miracle for me, as I have ALWAYS been fat, even when I was thin. I know a lot of people who read this will understand that statement.

I have been absorbing everything I can find online and recently bought the revised edition of The Paleo Diet and The Paleo Diet for Athletes by Loren Cordain, Ph.D. and The Paleo Solution by Robb Wolf. I also love reading from Mark’s Daily Apple. I am sure I will buy Mark Sisson’s book next. The folks at “Strong is the New Skinny” are also great sources on inspiration. I love to read the testimonials people send in about their amazing transformations, physical as well as emotional!

Today is February 23, 2011, and my weight this morning was 151.2. That makes my total weight loss to date 18.8 pounds. I am back to my endurance training 4 days a week, and desperate to find a way to include more strength training to my routine. I know ST is critical… maybe with a little exterior prodding, I will be encouraged enough to find a way to fit all the things I need to do into my schedule. I posted on FB the other day and will repeat here that my lumbar spine is pretty jacked up… no disc material left between L5 and S1, so there will be none of that: “Lift Heavy Things”, I will have to figure out how isometrics and resistance bands, etc can make a difference. I am stronger, but don’t want to derail my endurance training because I did something stupid with weights. Oh, and check out this calf muscle. Isn't it awesome!




Maryann, who is so happy to be where she is today, only needing to lose another 5 to 8 pounds, but ready to let the body decide what it wants to weigh!