The G Running Diary

The Lighter Side of Ultrarunning: American River 50M: 4/8/05

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In general, when people hear about ultrarunning, they think it's pretty weird. So what would they think if they knew it was a social gathering? How odd that people get together just for fun to run 50 miles? But that's the part that brings me back to the American River 50 Mile run. It's fun to see everyone and to meet new people. American River is a popular choice for a first 50 miler. It was mine and Don's, back in 2000.

We planned to drive up to Sacramento Friday night after the traffic, leaving home about 7:00 pm. Then we started thinking about how that would still take at least 2 and a half hours, and checking into and out of a hotel would take time, so why not go to bed early and drive up in the morning? So there we were, getting up at 2:15 am for a 6:00 am race. During the week we had been going to bed at that time. How confused does the body get? It seemed ok. I drank a Monster energy drink and talked for the whole drive.

Since we arrived right at 5:00 am, it was easy to park, and convenient to the porta potties. And, we checked in before the busloads from Auburn arrived. We said "hi" to bunches of people, and then the crowd gathered on the bike path for the start. And we were off. I was trying to stay at the back, but ended up more in the middle. It felt good to shuffle along slowly, ever so gradually getting up to speed. No shock to the system here.

The course follows a bike path along the American River for most of the first 27 miles. This seems to be a popular running and biking path, and even with signs posted saying, "trail closed for event," there were quite a few bikers. Some had that awed look on their faces and told us we were great, because they realized it was a 50 mile running race. Others were just rude because all they could see were runners blocking their path. Then there was an organized training run that looked like Team in Training. They were running in the opposite direction from us, so we got to see all of them. They were in various states of conditioning, but the ones who gave us the most encouragement were the women at the back, who were, not to put too fine a point on it, rather overweight. I was most impressed with them.

Time flew quickly. The aid station breaks popped up pretty often, and I kept finding that I didn't need much of a water refill. That's a bad thing. The weather was warm. I had started in a short sleeve top and no jacket, and was warm from the start. So, I should have been drinking more. All the aid station workers were nice. They included a range of people from experienced ultrarunners to non-running people who just wanted to help out. There were quite a few spectators too, considering it was an ultra. Some of the aid stations are easy to access, so people hang out along the trail waiting to cheer for their runner. Of course, they cheered for everyone else too. My favorite was the guy yelling "Alright Leslie" to Leslie down the road, but then made sure to say "Oh, good job you two," to us because we were right in front of him.