Ultra Trail Mexico: Take Three

Not much to do now but wait...

 Here we are again: UTMX take 3.

I received a text from my brother-in-law yesterday (he came down to Mexico last year to run the race) asking: You ready for UTMX? Part II answers that question; part I is a review of the race in its third edition.

 

I. UTMX overview from a middle to back of the pack perspective:

This is year three, and the race has grown up. There are 497 people starting the 100k distance. That growth is good for the long-term stability of the race, but it’s going to slow things down for the middle to back of packers in the first kilometers. However, that’s ok because every year this race goes out way too fast. It’s a 100k; it’s not a race to El Zembo, the first aid station. I’m anticipating some standing around breaks in the early part of the race before the pack splits up. I hope those easy early kilometers will pay dividends later on when climbing up to the Mirador from San Sebastian.

  Take a look at last year’s splits. Lots of folks have stellar runs to the 50k point and then tank in the latter half. Also, this year there is an added mystery bonus: The course is 2 kilometers longer and it looks like most of that distance is gained in the canyon. Comparing this year’s course profile with the previous year’s course profile, it looks like there will be more climbing in the canyon as well. Times should be slower this year.

 One takeway from the last two years is that the first 40+k of the race is mostly cool and covered. You won’t need to drink as much here. I carried two bottles, but only filled one up at the aid stations. However, when I got to the highway crossing at 49.3k, I should have filled up both bottles and drank at the aid station. The next section is hot and exposed all the way to Peña de Aire, where the course goes down into the canyon. You definitely don’t want to go down into the canyon behind on hydration: especially with the canyon section being longer this year.

 For me, the two most important aid stations are 49.3 (usually run by Pedro Fletes and the Solo Para Salvajes crew) and Peña de aire at 60k. I don’t like to waste time hanging out in aid stations, but it’s worth spending a few minutes in each of these to make sure you’ve eaten and drank what you need to.

 The canyon is by far the most technical section of the course and it comes at the point where runners are getting fatigued. My suggestion is to enjoy the beauty of the canyon, because the biggest “suck” of the race is coming: the 6k climb out of San Sebastian back up to the top of the canyon at Mirador aid station. This is an exposed road, hot and dusty. It also goes on forever. I’m not sure if Ferro just enjoys making us suffer or there really isn’t any single track climbing up out of the canyon in this area. This year I hope to get to Mirador more or less in one piece and keep moving. Last year I was wrecked at the top of this climb and had to sit down, wasting a few minutes in the aid station feeling sorry for myself and trying to recover. In 2014 I climbed well and arrived at the top to find Marcos Truyols, who I had been chasing after running with him for the first 45k. He pulled away and put lots of time on me before the finish. This serves as another reminder that a lot can happen in this last 23k or so of the race: don’t spend it all getting to Zembo or even to the 50k mark...

 The good news is that after mirador there is only one more significant climb. After some flat road running to Ahuacatitlan, the course goes straight down to the river. It’s so steep (and so late in the race) that it can be hard to go fast here. Gravity helps, but is somewhat limited by how thrashed one’s legs are. At the bottom is the major river crossing of the race and then straight up a winding goat trail. At the top the course flattens for a bit and then eventually heads down to the last aid station (Santa Maria Regla...it’s right across from the Hacienda). Last year I was feeling great here and stopped for less than 30 seconds. However, in 2014 I was beat and had to sit down for a few minutes and drink a Red Bull. The dream is to have enough water in my bottle and just run straight through.

 After this there is a short climb up to the Prismas Balsaticas and we enter the park through a back entrance, run along the cliff, cross the swinging bridge and then head out of the park, around the presa and through the back streets of Huasca before arriving at the finish. There is a little hill in here about a kilometer or two from the finish. If someone is chasing you at this point, that hill is where you can lose them.

 Enjoy the finish: it’s one of the best.

Part II.

 Back to the questions Jeremy asked me: am I ready? Sure, I’m ready to finish, and I’m mentally prepared as well. My training has been consistent, but the miles haven’t been huge, and as always, getting climbing in is difficult: midweek I run in Parque Hundido and then on the weekends I get out to Bosque del Tlapan, Desierto or Ocotal. I did do a few tune up races. I’ll log them here because depending on how things go on Saturday I may do it differently next year.

August 20: 20k Arcos de Sitio in Tepozotlan.

 This is a newer race in the Salvajes line up and it’s awesome: very technical and hilly, lots of rocky single track, plenty of climbing and a cool finish across an ancient viaduct. I had a great time running, but my time was something like 15 minutes slower than when I ran in 2014.

August 28: Mexico City Marathon

 Each year I sign up for the marathon and then hem and haw about whether or not I really want to run it. For me to run a marathon well I need to do long runs on pavement, and I just don’t do it: on the weekends I head for the hills. I convinced myself about three days before the race that I was going to sell my bib and go run long in desierto. But then the guy I was going to sell my number to already had found one so I decided to run it. I ran slow, but steady splits until the final 10k where I fell off the pace a bit, but it was still faster than my time from 2015. However, it took me forever to recover. Marathons are brutal. I lost 4-5 days of training, and I wonder if the marathon was a mistake. Always fun to run the race however.

Sept. 11: Ultratransnavajas 60k

 Five weeks before UTMX, I thought this would be the perfect long effort. I was a bit worried about the extra 10k, as the previous year it was 50k. The smart thing to do would have been to run a hard 35k. Apparently I can’t seem to do the smart thing very often. As it turned out, I should have been more worried: this race was an absolute beat down. I ran 7:26 for 50k last year so I thought I’d run around 9 hours. Andoni loves to make brutal races with ridiculous climbs. Just over 11 hours later --totally humbled, and feeling stupid for telling a few people I thought I’d finish in 9 hours-- I stumbled across the finish line. My one positive take away from this race was that when things go bad --it felt like work right from the starting line-- I can gut out a finish. But man, I’m not going to lie: I hope UTMX goes better.

 I’ll find out on Saturday...

Into the Canyon: Trail de Cañon (Peña del Aire) Race Report

Dalva Looooves the Zip Line

Scouting the first descent with Oriana

  I’m trying to understand the correlation between a terrible night’s sleep followed by a decent race. I haven’t slept so poorly before a race since the 2014 Angeles Crest 100.

 Finally fell asleep and then woke at 2:50am. Of course I fell asleep once more two minutes before my alarm sounded at 4:50am.

 The previous evening, Oriana and I had driven to Peña del Aire, which is a phallic shaped rock where the race would begin.

 We got there just before sunset. We walked down to the head of the trail that leads down into the canyon, and I was reminded of how technical this descent is. No way I was going to do this without a headlamp. I hate running with a lamp all day just for an hour of light in the morning, but I was going to have to deal with it.

 As the light faded over the canyon, Oriana and I drove back to the Cabañas: we timed it as exactly 22 minutes and 21 seconds. The plan was to leave at 5:15 in the morning. Tough to get the whole family moving at that hour, and Natalia was racing the 20k and wouldn’t start until 7, so I was looking for a ride to give the family an extra hour of sleep.

FYI: It's 22 minutes and 21 seconds from this cabaña to the race start

 No Uber in Huasca and the taxi drivers don’t get up that early.

 

However, the caretaker had mentioned that the folks in the neighboring cabaña were also in the race, so I went and knocked on their door to see if they were running the 40k and maybe could I get a ride? I felt like a stalker rapping on their door at night, but the couple answered --if warily-- and sure enough one of them was running the 40k. The great news is they were happy to give me a ride. Unfortunately, they were planning on leaving “around 5:30.” I politely but firmly mentioned that it just took me 22 minutes and 21 seconds to drive to Peña del Aire. They appeared unmoved by this fact, and while I had several other arguments at the ready, I really wasn’t in the best negotiating position considering that I was an uninvited stranger knocking on their door at night --possibly interrupting an intimate moment-- looking for a free ride. I also inferred it was not an opportune moment to express my reservations about Mexican concepts of time, so I just assured them I’d be outside and ready by 5:20 (hint), thanked them, and then went to bed, staring at the darkness for hours while my family slept around me.

                                                   Amazing Place!                            Photo:  Fotografix.com.mx

 The next morning I was outside and ready at 5:12. I met my other neighbor, Horacio, who was also looking for a ride, and the couple, Diego and Erika, were happy to bring him along as well. It was foggy and dark. And 5:31. We were off.  We chatted away talking about races we had run (as always in Mexican trail running circles, it turned out we all had run several races together without knowing it) and we blew right past the turn off for the Peña del Aire.

 Despite the fog I knew we were wrong, and so we stopped and turned around. But several other cars were heading in this direction and said it was the correct way. There was some mildly panicked discussion, but we retraced our steps, found the correct turn and we were on the slow dirt roads to arrive at the start.

At about 5:57 we could see the lights of cars heading into the parking lot.

It was at this moment I thought it best resist the urge to restate the wisdom of my suggested 5:15am departure.

 We rolled into the big grassy field that was the parking lot, and it seemed they wanted us to drive to the farthest part of the lot. It was 5:59. I wondered how rude it would be to simply open the door,  jump out of the slowly moving car, yell thank you, and run to the start.

I suppressed that urge as well.

 We parked. It was 6:00 by my Suunto. I noted lots of car lights still coming into the parking lot, Probably the race would start late. Nope: the countdown had begun 10, 9, 8….

 

...Time to run….

1. Kudos to Trail Run Hidalgo for starting his race on time. Some said they should have waited a few minutes, but that will just lead to all of his races starting late. They don’t; they start on time. Word will get around and people will be there when they are supposed to be.

     2. Thank you to Diego and Erika for giving me a ride.

     3. Maybe a 5:20 departure next year? ;)

 Perhaps the reason I couldn’t sleep the night before is that I had been anticipating this race for months. The canyon is well-known to many trail runners, because at kilometer 60, the UTMX 100k race descends into the canyon on the same trail where we would start our race. There are many things I love about UTMX, but the canyon section is, for me, the jewel of that race. However, at UTMX we only spend about 7 kilometers running in the canyon, and I’ve always wanted to explore 

more.

                          Awesome descents like this all day.                   Photo: Martin Forstmann of Fotografix.com.mx

 I don’t want to bore anyone with a blow by blow of my race, but I knew going up the first major climb that I was going to have a good day. I was wrong: I had a fantastic day. Part of the reason I felt great is that I’m finally starting to get into some sort of shape; but the more important reason is that the route was freaking fantastic: a true adventure….a dozen river crossings, several sketchy, loose rock technical down hills, and beautiful single track all day long. Also, as usual, Trail Run HIdalgo got the important details correct: the aid stations were plentiful and had the necessities, there was beer at the finish, and the course was marked heavily. Flags all over the place. Too many, for my taste, but I understand that the organizers don’t want people getting lost down in the canyon.

                           Natalia at the finish!                                         Photo: Fotografix.com.mx

 Despite the awesomeness of the race, two or three runners still found reasons to complain on facebook after the race.

 As an old teacher friend once told me: “Guy, you could invite some people to the ice cream store every day and they’d complain because they had to walk.”

 More on that later.

During the last 15 K, I was catching people and moving well. I completely submerged myself in every river crossing to keep cool and then I rolled up to the second to last aid station. There were about 4 runners here, so I quickly refilled my bottle, chugged a coke, ate some watermelon and kept moving. I was anticipating the last climb. What I was not anticipating was the climb to get to the last climb: slippery loose gravel and just stupidly steep. Most races end with a nice downhill or a straightway. Instead we had a two plus mile climb up to the top of the canyon. After moving so well all day I was reduced to a bit of a spit dribbler, and most of the runners I had passed at the last aid station caught me, which is to say they hiked by me. The Peña came into sight, and the trail flattened out near the top and I managed some sort of shuffle jog, climbed out of the canyon, and then had about 30 yards to the finish line. A little “sprint” and then I laid down under the tent after crossing the finish line. Man did it feel good to know I didn’t have to go back down into the canyon.

Being a little overly dramatic at the finish, I think. Really just wanted a beer.    Photo: Fotografix.com.mx

Neither that short description of my race or the photos do justice to these trails or the rugged beauty of the Canyon. You’ll have to go next year and find out for yourself. But please, before you do: consider a few things: most of this race is run in areas of the canyon that are not accessible by car. If you twist an ankle or underhydrate or show up unprepared, you are going to have to get yourself out of trouble and get to the nearest aid station. That’s the runner’s job, not the race’s. An unsettling idea has been creeping into trail running that the organizers can (and should) make everything “safe.” That’s not going to happen without ruining the adventure of trail running. If you are uncomfortable crossing a river that comes up to your hip without a rope or someone there to watch you, or you can’t find your way up out of the canyon if your race goes sour, please choose another race.

 Trail Run Hidalgo has made a name for themselves creating races that feature lots of single track with steep climbs and descents in beautiful locations on technical trails. I’ve enjoyed their Mountain Challenge race in Chico, and the Ultratransnavajas near Tulancingo, but Trail de Cañon is now my favorite. The Canyon is truly a gem: if it were in another country we would all be saving for airfare and dreaming about running there. I think we might undervalue it a bit because it’s only a couple hours outside of Mexico City. But be warned, while this might “only” be a 40k, better to think of it as a short ultra. For comparison: In 2015 I ran the first 50k of UTMX in 7:20. It took me 7:43 to finish the 40k of the Trail de Cañon.

 Three races on the calendar: Mexico City Marathon at the end of August, Trail Run Hidalgo’s Ultratransnavajas 60k in September….And then the UTMX 100k on October 15th.

 Hoping for a few more bad nights of sleep before October.

 

 

Back to Jemez.

Pre-race (over) confidence: Up and down, no sweat.                            Photo: Randy Grillo

I’ve never felt good at Last Chance Saloon, the final aid station of the Jemez Mountain Run. Three years ago I was here after 50 miles in the mountains, and my stomach couldn’t take anything. At the 2016 Jemez, I wisely opted for the 50k, but when I arrived at the final aid station only two miles from the finish, I didn’t feel much better. I didn’t want to eat, but needed something so filled up my bottle with ice and coke and started marching up the switch backs that lead up out of the aid station.

Feeling Fantastic 8 seconds in! Check out that Heel Strike! Textbook.                  Photo: Randy Grillo

Jemez almost didn’t happen this year. Back in January I had made plans with Truyols to fly into Juarez, cross the border and then drive or take a bus up to Santa Fe. Stop in Alamogordo along the way and visit my sister. I’m not sure why neither one of us looked at the mileage: it’s around 300 miles from El Paso to Santa Fe. We would have to make that trip twice in 3.5 days, as I couldn’t ask for more than two days off of school. While not impossible, pretty ridiculous, especially considering I can't drive for more than three hours before my lower back starts freaking out at me.

It seemed that events were conspiring against the trip. At school we planned our big NWEA celebration on the Thursday I was supposed to be flying. And then Truyols went back to Spain to get a job because he refused to relocate to Playa Del Carmen. If you can't understand why anyone would refuse a work relocation to Playa Del Carmen, you don't run in the mountains. 

Putting this in there because I don't run with a camera and don't have many photos. 

  One late afternoon I was sitting alone in my office at the end of the day, coming to terms with cancelling the trip. No visiting my sister in Alamogordo; no hanging out with Randy and Pati in Santa Fe; no trip through the mountains in Los Alamos. Damn, I should have just booked a ticket directly to ABQ, I thought to myself. And just for fun, I checked, expecting tickets in the 600-800 dollar range.

296 round trip from Mexico City to ABQ. Wow.

You know you are in New Mexico when...

Never seen tickets that cheap to a smaller hub in the US like ABQ, but still, 300 bucks is 300 bucks. I hesitated for a few minutes and then I remembered the ole’: “we usually regret the things we don’t do.” I pressed submit, and the trip –in a shortened version—was on. I’d be arriving at midnight on Thursday and flying out at 6:00am on Sunday.

  The original plan had been go to Jemez and run the 50 miler again. I’d finished in 15:30 in 2013, my longest 50 mile time by more than three hours. A tough course with two long climbs, Jemez is a great race but requires showing up with your A game. Two weeks before the race I ran the Mountain Challenge 33k in Chico, Hidalgo. A short run but with lots of steep climbing. I went out fairly hard and paid for it on the return: I was crawling up the climbs. I started to question whether I was prepared for 50 miles in Jemez. I also began to fret about the 6:00am return flight, so a week before the race I sent an email to the RD requesting a drop to the 50k.

  I could have dropped down distances during the race, as Jemez does a very tricky thing: any 50 mile runner can decide to run the 50k, but this decision is made 20+miles into the race after a very long climb. Many runners make this switch, and one of the great mental hurdles to finishing Jemez 50 mile is taking that left turn at Pipeline Road aid station and dropping down into the Caldera.

  By the time I got to the first aid station, it was pretty clear to me that it was not going to be a spectacular day. I felt like I was working too hard, and feeling like you're working too hard in the opening hour of a 50k is a bad sign. I arrived at Camp May ready for the long climb up Pajarito. This was a new single track trail winding between new growth trees that are returning after the 2011 fire. Warning to future Jemez runners: there is a big old false summit on this trail. When you think you are at the top, you still need to head straight up a couple ski runs. And then finally the descent to the ski lodge. Speaking about the descent: Jemez is a logical and easy course to follow, and it’s flagged fairly (though not excessively) but this descent mixes it up from cool single track in the woods between ski runs, and occasionally it just barrels straight down. It's fun to run, but not a "logical path." Pay attention here and watch the flags.

 I normally don’t use a drop bag for 50k, but they had the option so I picked up the other half of my gels, applied some more sunscreen (which they also had in the aid stations—they think of everything in this race), changed into a short sleeve shirt and I was off. I felt decent and was able to run everything until the climb up to the aid station.

Pipeline Road aid station is where the 50 milers have to make the choice: turn right and finish with the 50k, or drop down into the caldera and go for 50mile. I was so happy I’d made the choice a week earlier…

  …I thanked myself for that decision all day long.

Jemez boasts a great finish: a long 7 miles of descent on single track before arriving at the final aid station –Last Chance Saloon, or Rendija Canyon—with a two mile climb back up to the finish. I was descending decently all day, but it was not to last. This area –like almost all of the race—is totally exposed because of forest fires in 2000 and 2011. I slowed and it was a struggle just to keep running. A couple runners passed me. Not the finish I was hoping for, but you play the hand you are dealt, and I finally struggled into Last Chance Saloon, flirting with nasuea and lacking energy. It was hard for me to believe I’d finished the 50 miler in 2013. In fact, I’d felt great on this section three years earlier (despite barely making it out of the Caldera) Funny how the mind works: having set my sights on the 50k, the 50 mile seemed unfathomable. And how the hell had a completed two 100 mile races? Was I a runner in decline? Had a run my last ultra? Should I just forgo water and fill up my bottle with ice and coca cola?

I could at least answer one of those questions: it would be the coca cola train to the end.

Those were the thoughts I had as I primarily hiked up to the finish. There were a couple times I swung my arms and shuffled my legs in an attempt to mimic jogging. Unconvincing. A dude passed me just shy of the final steep climb up to the Possee shack. A dude I hadn’t seen all day. Nothing quite like being passed by a dude you haven't seen all day. There was a fleeting thought of chasing him. Fleeting. Apparently I'm afraid to vomit, or just like to avoid pain.

And then I put my hand on a cactus trying to pass a couple 15 mile racers who were still on the course.

 There would be no glorious recovery.

 However, picking the spines out of my hand turned out to be a great diversion, and I ran up to the Possee Shack for the finish and there was Grillo already a few beers in after his 15 mile finish. I had to lay down for about 30 minutes, but I eventually recovered and began drinking the excellent Session IPA that Bathtub Brewing, a local brewery and sponsor of the race, was pouring for free.

  Randy and I stayed to watch runners from the 50k and 50 mile finish.  While it wasn’t great running weather, it was world class beer drinking and veggi burrito eating weather, and we made the most of it.

 if I can find 297 dollar round-trip tickets I’ll be back next year.

Leaving Jemez