Death Valley Marathon - December 2010

Early December I headed to San Diego to visit my very good friend and travel companion.  She had agreed to join me on a road trip from San Diego to Death Valley for the trail marathon through Titus Canyon I had signed up for; http://www.envirosports.com/default.asp?PageID=20888.  The road trip was quite a bit farther than either of us had expected - about 6 hours through some very interesting south eastern CA landscapes.  

We arrived Friday late afternoon in Death Valley National Park, checked into Furnace Creek Ranch and then went to explore while there was still some light left.  First stop was the beginning of the Badwater race, (a 135 mile running race from Badwater, Death Valley to Mt Whitney)  knowing I will never do this race but I have great admiration for the people that do.  It takes an amazing amount of spirit and will power to complete this race.  

Furnace Creek Ranch was a bit like a camp, in that everyone staying there was either running the marathon the next day or was supporting someone running. Dinner was primarily a carbo load and talk of running and weather.  Friday night was a sleepless night for me with pre-race thoughts and concerns. 

Saturday morning - race day.  Furnace Creek Ranch was filled with anxiousness from the 300 runners busy registering, getting their breakfast and making sure they have everything ready for the event.  After an entertaining briefing of the course, rules and time cut offs by the race director we loaded up in buses that would transport the runners to the start line in the desert about 45 minutes away.  The run is through Titus Canyon on a dirt road that is almost exactly 26.2 miles, starting elevation is 3,460 ft climbing to 4,900 in the first 9 miles then drop 500 ft then climb the red rocks to 5,250 ft, the highest point in the run, then 14 miles of downhill all the way down to 250 ft at the finish line.  

The bus rides are not my favorite part of an event and this ride was no exception, usually it is filled with nervous chatter of how many marathons people have completed, what there time expectations are, this ride was no different except that it was more extreme.  Most of the runners had completed well over 10 marathons, a few ultra runs (50 K or 50/100 miles) and an ironman triathalon or two.  To be honest I was not the exception, but it always makes me nervous talking about it and this particular race I had not trained very well for - actually it would be more honest to say that I did not train for it at all, so my expectations were pretty low.  My goal was to finish and enjoy the course knowing that I was in no shape to actually "race" this, although I am always open to having my expectations exceeded.  

Start line of Death Valley Marathon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally the race gun sounds and we are off on the rocky road jockeying for positions.  I started at a moderate pace hoping to be able to sustain it.  Typical to my race/event experiences with endurance events there are many conversations along the way, they start with how many of these have you done, which ones and towards the end of the event focus on finishing and hopefully not talking about what hurts.  When you start going down that road everything hurts and talking about it just makes it worse.  The race was difficult for me but very beautiful landscape that were easy to get lost in.  Not being able to use an ipod was a disadvantage for me for that kind of race - I like to lose myself in the music and landscape, but this time it was sounds of foot steps.  Titus Canyon just kept going and going, the canyon gets as narrow as 10 feet wide at some points.  Towards the end I just wanted to be out in to the big open landscape, when I finally turned that last corner and hit the big open landscape it was quite a relief.  My energy came back and I set my eyes on the finish line 2 miles away and set a good quick pace to the end.  

Finish line at the Death Valley marathon

 It was a low key finish in the middle of the desert, water and some food.  It was really great to not be running anymore. The advantages of not maintaining a quick pace was that I was not sore from running, just tired.  Back to the Furnace Creek Ranch for a beer, steak dinner, race stories, race awards and general celebration of the day.

Sunday, after breakfast, we headed back to San Diego through the very interesting south eastern CA landscape of massive solar projects, utility projects, a jet plane cemetery, mines and mine towns and vast open landscapes.

Me at the finish!