Slow But Steady Paid Off on Saturday at the Bulldog 25K Trail Run

I've talked about the Bulldog 25K/50K Trail Runs a number of times in this blog. But in summary, it is a challenging loop/double-loop course run entirely within Malibu Creek State Park in Calabasas, with each loop having a total elevation climb of nearly 4,000 feet, including the climb up 2,528 foot Bulldog Mountain.

Since coming back from my post eye-surgery 5 1/2 week hiatus 5 months ago, my training got off to a rusty start and has been steady, but not memorable. I did get in several 10 mile runs as well as a slow 2 hour run that I counted for 14 miles back on July 28th. I also ran up Boney Mountain very slowly on July 6th. But nothing intense that would fully prepare for the hammering that took place this past Saturday on the Bulldog 25K course.

So cutting to the chase, I ran the 25K race on Saturday without incident in a reasonable 2 hours, 6 minutes, good for 2nd Male Master overall, 1 minute away from the first place master.

I gave it my best shot. My fitness level is back to I'd say about 75% of where it used to be. I still don't have the speed I used to have, so I gave up a lot of ground in the early going of this race. And my timing was a bit off so I had to make an unscheduled pit stop on behalf of my bladder. But hey, we were running in the wilderness so no big deal :>

The uphills of Bulldog are brutal, just brutal. Relentless. You start thinking, about halfway up: "Why am I here? I could be sleeping right now. What did I do to deserve this? Are we there yet? How much further?" as you start the long, steady, climb up the mountain. For the most part, the surfaces are ok, but there are some sections at the top where you're running downhill on the rock face of the mountain.

With age and experience comes the wisdom to conserve your energy running uphill on a course like this because, having run the race now 5 or 6 times....once your mojo is gone, you're toast. And I saw this happen to someone on Saturday. The guy with the knee high black socks.

There was a guy that looked like he was 10 years my junior that reminded me of me last year. I passed him at some point, maybe the 6 or 7 mile mark, on an uphill. He was walking. Looked like maybe he blew a gasket...like I did last year. Then came a downhill and he just hammered it past me. I thought, if the rest of the course is downhill, he's got me. But I knew there was plenty of uphill to go.

Sure enough, the next uphill he walked as I slowly but steadily dug in. Nothing fast, nothing fancy. Just shortened the stride, kept the pace even and kept the forward progression up the hill. Then he blew by me again on the downhill. This happened 4 or 5 times until finally he didn't appear at the the next downhill. It was actually kind of fun for me and it kept my mind off the soreness in my calves and quads. But I was now alone....for a bit.

And then the most extreme of the downhills came. You think downhills are easy, but this one is like dropping from a plane. I'm sitting here Monday night at the computer and my shins are still sore from the pounding.  Yet another young buck flew by me on this section of the race to my surprise. I was able to keep him in my sights for awhile, while grimacing through the steepest of the downhills, but ultimately he got away.

Bulldog doesn't end when you hit the bottom. There are some more tricky, hilly, twists and turns until you hit the flats...then there's about a mile of running until the finish...of the 25K (the 50Kers of course run another lap).

I was in pain at the end, but a good pain. Yet again, the Bulldog 25K chewed me up and spit me out, leaving me itching to train harder next year and drop below 2 hours.

By the way, the support along this course is fantastic. They go out of their way to take care of you, both 25K and 50K. They required us to carry at least 20 oz of fluids during this year's race after the extreme heat of last year's Bulldog. They refilled my bottle with icy cold water. I was quite impressed!

Going With the Flow When Things Go Wrong in a Local 5K/10K Race

My very first 5K race was on June 6, 1993 (yes, I know the date because I've updated an Excel spreadsheet of my running mileage and races going back to my first "official" day of running on May 5, 1993) and for years I was pretty serious about most of my races.

If you pay your $30 for a local race, you're usually supporting a local charity or cause, but with that there's some expectation that 1) the course will be accurately measured, 2) your time and place will be accurately reported and 3) there's a reasonable level of logistical effort placed into the race, including adequate course supervision, signage, available fluids, etc.

In the early days of my running, all this stuff was a really big deal. I'd be royally annoyed, particularly if the course was not accurate. Actually, I still get annoyed at that. No one should be hosting a race if they can't measure the course correctly as most of like to compare the time on the course to previous races.

But overall, today it isn't quite as big of a deal for me if something goes wrong at a local 5K/10K race. I'm not as serious about my training and racing, so when things go awry, I don't cry :> Case in point was this morning's 10K at Balboa Park in the San Fernando Valley. A friend of mine asked me this week if I wanted to run the race to support a breast cancer screening facility. My family being out of town, I said sure, knowing full well I'm not well trained to run a fast 10K.

There was a 5K and 10K, with the 5K starting 10 minutes before the 10K. I found it odd that our race bib numbers did not distinguish which distance we were running. It was basically left up to the timekeeping system to track who started the 5K at 8 a.m. and who started the 10K at 8:10 a.m.

Boy it was a hot day today. Low 80s at the start of the race. Today I was running for survival, not for speed. Heat is not my friend. 'Twas a sweatfest indeed out there. But it was fun...finishing! My time was 40:30, about a 6 1/2 minute per mile pace, which is exactly what I expected to run. The course was almost pancake flat but with the high temps I knew breaking under 40 minutes would be a challenge. The last time I ran the 10K distance was over 2 years ago, in just over 39 minutes.

So I was happy with my time, and, surprisingly, I finished 2nd place overall. There were 2 guys in front of me for a long time, but apparently the first place guy took a wrong turn somewhere. Thanks dude! I finished 3 1/2 minutes behind the winner, who lives in Palmdale (heck he must be used to temps in the 90s and 100s!) and is 17 years my junior.

But back to my original point...things can and do go wrong. Sure enough, they posted the results of the 10K and I was nowhere to be found. Others who also knew they placed well were also not on the list. Sure enough, many 10Kers were timed as if we ran the 5K. So instead of a 40 minute 10K, I was on the 5K results with a time of 52 minutes.

Fortunately the timers were receptive to resolving the issue and made sure to make appropriate corrections. But it didn't happen until after the event MC announced the incorrect race results. Knowing that the 10K results were way off, I approached him and very nicely let him know they the results were quite wrong and that the timers were making corrections. He pretty much ignored me and said this (the sheet he was holding) is what was given to him. Would have been nice for him to at least ask someone, but he went on and announced the "winners" and handed out the awards to many of the wrong people.

In my younger days I would have complained and bitched and moaned. Today I just laughed about it. There were others that were kind of annoyed about things, like why they only give medals to the top 3 in each age group (she thought it was top 5), etc. But it was so hot out there that most people moved on to the rest of their day.

Bottom line: Most of us run local races for fun and camaraderie. So when things go a bit wrong, as things quite often do in these local races, stay cool!