Embrace the Suck (OR “It’s not the heat, it’s the Stupidity”)

The trail somewhere on Catherine's Fat Ass' course

An Air Force Colonel I knew used this expression once (crediting the Army for it) and I think it’s an apt one for a run like Catherine’s Fat Ass 50K - You can fight the suck, or you can embrace the suck..but either way, it’s gonna suck.

For those of you unfamiliar with the term, a “Fat Ass” is not just that thing we all sit on all day. In the world of Ultra Running, it’s a trail race that has no entry fee, no give aways, no awards, and usually no aid stations. Thankfully, Catherine’s does have aid stations. This year, it had two full aid stations (this is food and drink) and one water stop which was a naturally occurring spring.

CFA is run out in the beautiful Massanutten Mountains, which is part of the Shenandoah’s. It’s always in July and it’s always HOT. This year it had the dubious distinction of being scheduled for what weather forecasters were predicting to be the HOTTEST day of the year yet! JOY! (or as my friend Tamara said, in her voicemail to me wishing me luck “good job picking the hottest day of the year to do your come back 50k hahahahaha”. It’s good to have friends like this.) The temp supposedly got to 101 that day. But whatever. At some point hot is hot and really, once you start sweating it just doesn’t matter.

The other part of this was the fact its highly possible I was not quite yet in 50k shape. But like the 2nd title indicates intelligence has nothing to do with ultra-running. Besides my friend Charlie and I had a plan. Plan A was to finish the whole course. Plan B was to NOT finish the whole course. Most ultra-runners typically employ those two plans at the start of every race. The day before the race Charlie was already discussing ways to short cut, you know, if medically necessary.

This is really me, really running at Catherine's

A Map of the course as drawn by me:

Highlight of this “run” are as follows:

1. At the start of the race, the Race Director offered maps due to the course change. I took one, looked it over and realized, it’s a topographical map. After all these years of trail running, I’ve never learned how to read a topo map. So, I took my chances that there would be trail markings (there were) and I would be with someone who had a clue (I was) I handed it back.

2. During the first part of a climb a line of us are hiking along and the conversation behind me goes like this:

Guy1: Boy do I hate snakes. I hope we don’t see any (editor’s note: we have rattlers and copperheads in these here parts)

Guy2: [launches into monologue about poisonous snakes the do's and don'ts etc.]

Guy1: [whimpers]

Guy2: [proceeds to launch into a monologue about poisonous spiders]

3. The trail starts out up [and uphill] the Orange trial, but then veers off into a SERIOUS UP (Pink trail). At several points we wondered where are the ropes to help us along, because seriously, we have to climb THAT? It’s the kind of up, when you are coming back, is definitely a down, but not the kind of down mere mortals like us could actually RUN down.

4. Hit the dreaded Purple trail,which due to course directional changes this year we get to go DOWNHILL on. YAY! Do some actual running. Feels kind of good!

5. An aid station! Yea! That took how long? Yikes.

6. Now a gravel road to get to the next trail. Years past, we ran down this road from the opposite direction, which is why I never recalled the road as being so STEEP. Yes, another UP. But at least it was not as UP as the trail we just came off of. I think.

7. Stopping to take a dip in the creek that ran alongside the road because dang, it was hot and now sunny due to less shade.

8. Pitt Spring; greeted by two volunteers with pitchers of spring water which they would pour over your head, or use to fill your water bottle or camelbak, or in our case, BOTH. AHHH sweet relief.

9. Volunteer telling us the trail “trends” up before the climb (Orange trail). Yea. Right. Not our definition of “trend”. This was definitely another climb.

10. Munching on my Tostitos as Charlie says, “Hey! What was that black thing?” Me: “HUH?” (I was busy digging them out of the camelback) Seconds later a runner comes from the opposite direction (yes, this person is heading BACK – we are still heading OUT) and says, “Didja see the black bear cub?” Ugh. I missed it ‘cause I was eating. Although my plan, if we saw the mother, was to toss my PB&J at it as a distraction so we could waddle away.

11. Bear scat

12. Running with the retired Army guy who hangs with us for a while and entertains us with stories of his two deployments to Iraq. I learned a lot about explosions and Army issued sunglasses.

13. YAY! A downhill. Unfortunately it’s a stream bed with moss covered rocks, big honking rocks. It is not the type of terrain most folks would call, “runnable”. Unless you are a mountain goat.

Yellow trail photo taken off the web. There was not this much water on it the day we ran

14. Aid station! Double YAY! The turnaround aid station has awesome ginger cookies, Pringle like chips and PB&Js and icy cold water and Gatorade. Sort of like Nirvana in the middle of nowhere.

15. Back UP the rocks.

16. Back to Pitt Spring and deciding that the Purple trail aid station is a nice place to drop out of the race.


17. Receive an air conditioned lift by a wonderful race volunteer back to the start/finish. I did not want to get out of his car. Did I mention it was air conditioned?

I wish I had more pictures of this course as it was beautiful and challenging. I did not bring my camera as I was worried the heat would damage it, or if not that, the copious amounts of sweat coming off my person would short out the electronics in it.

I am not in the least bit disappointed that I went to Plan B for this race. I was pleased with how I well I did. I think I had some left in me to finish the course if I HAD to (like if it was the only option for getting back to the car), but really. There was no need to kill myself. The glory would have all been minimized by my imminent death at the end, so. Really. We enjoyed the after party in the parking lot where I consumed the best tasting veggie burger I have ever eaten in my life and an icy cold beer. Made the whole thing worthwhile.

Just wait til next time!

Ch-ch-ch-changes

The summer of change has begun

Pre-school/daycare graduation was a big event. The teachers had the kids practicing dance moves, reciting poems, the pledge, etc for weeks! A room with a stage was booked, caps and gowns were ordered; specific clothing items were suggested for wearing the day of; seriously. It reminded me of, well, graduation. Except when i was in college I sat waaay in the back of the basketball stadium, with the other journalism students and someone passed a bottle of champagne up and down the aisle. Also, it was really really warm that day. And we did not get to recite poems, sing or dance. Which colleges should totally reconsider. Graduation would be fun, rather than mind numbingly boring. Which Ian's was NOT. His was fun.. and cute even..

Trying to get his award ribbon on- note its backwards. He's CEO material for sure

Yes, it appears to be his first kiss, but they are dancing; I forget what song, but I think its Mambo #5.

He was jonesin' for the balloon you can't see in this picture..that is what the red line is. He wanted me to SIT by myself, away from the other parents, so no one else got the balloon. This is why I have no friends.

Ian had to memorize a poem; it was a very existential poem, about a hot dog. Unfortunately Blogger is not allowing me to upload. Well, its uploading then NOT working and its making me nuts. So, if you want to see the video go to my Facebook page. If you are not my friend, oh, please, be my friend!!! Also, the video of the kids doing, only what I can describe as, the "white kid hip shake"

"Summer sun, somethings begun, but uh-oh those summer..days"

At a birthday barbeque... The boys insisted on wearing our running shirts (newly bought, and not stinky) They thought they were hot little stud muffins. And they were hot, because it was approx. 500 million degrees out.


A nature hike at Potomac Overlook Park in Arlington. We are hanging out on some rocks, moments before we decided to just walk around in the water.

The Udvar-Hazy Air and Space museum out near Dulles Airport. If you come to the DC Metro area you should see this the new Smithsonian Museum (its perhaps, 4-5 years old now). Its WAAAY cool. It has the Space Shuttle Enterprise AND the Enola Gay, plus just lots of really, really cool planes, heliocopters, gyroscopes and whatnots. And also, its totally fun to say, UDVAR-HAZY. We should have named the boys Udvar and Hazy..also, on a 100 degree day, it is air conditioned and HUGE and a great place to run around and not bug anyone.





More Udvar-Hazying

And, that's it for this post. i gots nuthin' to say (which is really unusual)