For the past few weeks, I had really ramped up my mileage and got in some good quality runs and I felt confident heading to Okotoks that I could hit that 40 yards. Of course, I needed somebody else that was able to go for 40 hours or more - either that, or I had to win the event which would give me automatic selection to the team, regardless of the number of yards completed.
The other thing to consider was that on the same day as my event in Okotoks, there was another silver ticket race taking place in Ontario which would see some top runners competing against each other. There was a possibility that they could also go beyond 40 hours, so I was keeping a close eye on that event too. To some degree, we had the advantage in Okotoks as the other event - The Persistence Backyard Ultra - was starting a few hours before ours did, so it was highly likely that we would already know that result by the time we hit 24 hours+. It was going to be exciting and I was ready for it!
We set up our basecamp on the Friday lunch time in Okotoks, securing a perfect spot away from everybody else in a nice shaded area, which would be perfect for keeping the dogs cool and calm. The Sheep River was just a mere 100 yards away, and the plan would be that Andy would take the pups down to the river to cool off whilst I was running, before coming back and being available to crew me. The weather was still really hot and the forecast was calling for temperatures close to 30 degrees celsius, so we needed to make sure that not only was I kept cool, but Andy and the pups were able to keep cool and comfortable too.
Things appeared to be perfect when leaving things on the Friday afternoon, but later that day, storms moved in to the Calgary area, and there was a huge windstorm that swept through race HQ. A message from the organisers suggested that anybody that had already set up their crew area should return immediately as some tents were damaged, and things had been blown all over the place. Thankfully, just as we were about to head back, we received a message from a good friend Kevin, telling us that he had managed to salvage our gear, and had taken down our 10 x 10 tent to stop it blowing away or getting damaged, and had put it in our smaller popup tent to keep things safe overnight.
We knew we would need to arrive a little earlier the next day to set things up again, but when we got there around 8am, somebody had decided to set up their aid station just 5 feet away from our popup tent and there was now no room for the 10 x 10 that would be the main crew area for me - the pop up was more to keep the pups out of harms way, whilst all my gear and food would be in the other. I was so frustrated, and tried to explain to the other people that we'd already claimed this particular spot, without trying to sound like an ass!
We tried to put the larger tent up again and it was only then that they realised what we meant - they moved another feet away, and our door now opened right in their apparent area. It wasn't ideal as I now felt like we were pretty much on top of eachother, and the dogs would no doubt go crazy and be unsettled. With the race starting in a few minutes, there wasn't much I could do, so I headed off for loop one whilst Andy tried to set things up for a second time, in between trying to keep the dogs calm.
Things went downhill from there, and I never was able to get my mind back into the game. At the end of the loop, whilst Andy was trying to fix the sides back on the tent, April broke free and came running over to me whilst I was running into the finishing straight. Thankfully she only jumped up me to say hello, but the damage was done. Whilst out on a following loop, Andy was STILL trying to set things back up and was unable to really focus on crewing me. The dogs were tied securely this time, but somebody walked over to chat to Andy about April having got loose, and despite Tillie barking like crazy and clearly being uncomfortable with somebody approaching her, she ended up lunging at said person. She did no damage, but the fact she had lunged was enough.
As I finished that particular loop, I was escorted by the organisers back to our crew area, where I was told that our dogs could not stay and they would need to be outside of the area, and that Andy would need to stay there with them and come over to me to crew when I finished each lap. I had nobody else to crew me, there was no way I was going to leave the dogs 200 yards away on their own, unattended, whilst I was being crewed by Andy, and the whole suggestion seemed unfeasible. I was not happy at all, and I basically exploded in frustration and was ready to walk away just 3 or 4 hours into the event.
I was firmly trying to explain that the crew area was huge and yet somebody had stupidly pitched their stuff right next to us despite all teh space, we'd set up the day before deliberately choosing that spot because it was away from everybody else, blah blah blah. I was fuming about the whole situation, wasting a lot of energy when I should just have been focusing on my race.
That next lap, I punished myself by running as hard as I could, knocking out 35 minutes or something stupid in my frustration and still just wanting to walk away as I felt my race had already been ruined. I never really got back into things, even when good friends stepped in to crew me later on in the day which gave Andy more time to attend to the pups. The pups were no more trouble for the next 20 hours and were so well behaved, yet those two instances had spoilt things.
To be fair, my laps were coming in pretty steady after that for many hours, and whilst I wasn't enjoying things as much as my previous BYU, I was at least getting back into things a bit. We had scorching hot weather where we were sweating cobs, then we had hailstorms and flooded pathways on a couple of laps leading to soaking wet feet and clothing. Without Andy, my nutrition went tits up, and I found myself being sick mainly because I had just been fed sugary foods rather than stodgy, I was getting so hungry, so when I had a bowl of mashed potatoes, I ate them too quickly which caused the vomiting.
The whole event is just a blur now, but I know that at 20 hours, when there were still 12 of us going but the race out East was already over and I knew I was pretty much guaranteed a spot on the Canadian team, I decided to stop as my heart was not in it, I was disappointed and still somewhat frustrated, but I had truly had enough mentally and wanted out.
I had higher hopes for this particular race, but circumstances meant that it all went belly up. I'm normally much better at adjusting to the unexpected, but it was just too much effort that weekend.
The good news is that the event was of course very well organised, and cameraderie amongst the runners was excellent, and things would have gone much, much better had that darn wind storm not blown through on the Friday which caused a domino effect on my entire weekend.
But I'm one of those people that puts those bad runs behind me, learns from it, and just moves forward. There will be other opportunities to get my 40 hour DNF in a backyard ultra - a week later I had confirmation that I had made the team for the team world championships and would be heading out to Summerville in BC in October - I was filled with relief, and over the coming weeks, I was determined to work hard and get myself in even better shape ready to do Canada proud. I was ready to do it.
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