The race results are posted at Score This:
Before boring you with data and analysis, I want to relate a few anecdotes that tell volumes about what the BPAC race was really like.
Elizabeth Hurdman. Elizabeth was the fourth overall woman and first in 50-59 with 35.75 miles (11 full laps in 5:56:01). A nice performance but there's more to the story. Elizabeth is legally blind. She has no peripheral vision, only a narrow cone of central vision. If she looks straight at you, she sees the details of your face. If you are off to the side of where she's looking, she doesn't see you. When running, she has to continually look around, scanning everything around her. Elizabeth finished the CanLake50 in 2005, the year it was cold and wet. Elizabeth has done two hundred milers since then. Every time I saw her on the out and back she was smiling. When I talked with her after the race, the one thing that came through loud and clear was how much she loves running.
John Ehntholt and the new course record. As I was finishing my last lap, John was outbound on his 16th lap. I asked him if the lap would get set a new record. His reply was "Yes. Give my apologies to Todd." (Todd Baum set the previous record on the Amherst course last year. Todd's 45.50 miles is still the Veteran's record.)
Most ultra records are set with no audience and little recognition. That was not the case for John. As he completed his final lap, he received sustained cheers and applause from the many runners and volunteers gathered at the finish.
Awards Ceremony. Almost all of the many award winners stayed around and were able to be recognized. That is one beauty of a timed race... we all finish at the same time.
New this year there was a Super Veteran's category. Joe Reynolds and I both had the same distance but, as he finished this last lap well ahead of me, he received the first place award and went back to where he was standing in the crowd. When I received my second place award, Joe came by up to shake my hand. I was truly honored by his gesture.
After all the awards were given out, Carl Pegels, a former director of the race, called for a round of applause for Sue Devlin, the 2009 race director. The applause and cheers were long and sustained. As early members of this Yahoo Group may recall, Sue stepped in at the last minute to take over as race director. She not only saved the race but made real improvements to the event (chip timing, online registration and most especially, the potta pottie at the start/finish line).
Race Report
Race Goal. My base goal was to do 10 laps (32.5 miles) in under six hours. What I really hoped to do was finish 11 laps in something close to six hours and if everything went perfectly, run negative spits.
Race Reality. The first couple of laps I used my heart rate monitor to keep my pace slow enough. As planned, I did a short walk segment every mile, i.e., 3 walks per lap. I did this on every lap, from the first lap. My first five laps went by exactly per my plan... all laps were in the desired 34 minute range except for my second lap when I lost some time due to an brief episode of knee pain and more time lost opening a child-proof bottle of Advil.
The knee pain was a curious bit. It came on suddenly at about mile 5 and caused a sharp pain in the left knee. For about a mile I thought I was going to have to drop out. Then it went away. My guess is that something about my gate and the camber of the bike path was irritating a tendon. Usually these odd pains show up during the taper before a race. This one was in the race.
After five laps things changed and the pace I could sustain ratcheted up. Laps 6-8 were in the 35 minute range and my last two laps took 36 minutes each. The slow down wasn't huge, my first half/second half splits were 2:54 & 2:59. But, by the end of lap 10, I was DONE.
Even Splits and Uneven Cost. Even splits are not achieved with an even effort. As the miles go by at the same pace, the cost to maintain the pace goes up, slowly at first and then more rapidly. This is true whether the measure is perceived effort, respiratory rate, heart rate, etc. As heart rate data is easy to capture, I'll share my average heart rate for each lap.
1 - 140; 2 - 142; 3 - 145; 4 - 148; 5 - 148; 6 - 152; 7 - 152; 8 - 155; 9 - 157; 10 - 161
Your numbers will vary. For this aged runner, 140 is at the upper end of an easy/recovery run effort. 161 is just about my anaerobic threshold, just shy of real huffing and puffing, e.g., in a tempo run.
By the way, the October surgery on my left foot for Morton's Neuroma seems to have been a complete success. The foot has now made it through four months of training and the BPAC race without a recurrence of the pain. Following a bit of recovery I should be good to go for more training and the Niagara 50K on June 20th.