Salt Lake Foothills 50K in Salt Lake City, UT

Race date: May 6, 2023

The night before the Salt Lake Foothills race is the usual tossing and turning garbage. I manage a few "naps" over the span of midnight to 5 am. I don't know why I become so nocturnal before a race. I say to my brain, "Look you idiot, you're going to be running for half the day tomorrow - let's go to sleep!" And it says, "No, you'll be carrying me with you while you run, you donkey!" (Except it uses the Biblical version of donkey.)

I wake up in a daze, eyes puffy, and make the drive to the mouth of Emigration Canyon. It's cold this time of the morning. 40 F and windy. I hem and haw over how to dress for the weather. I settle for a t-shirt and Allen Iverson arm sleeves I got from a golfing event at work, small knit gloves, and an ear band over my cap.

Like livestock we're corralled to the starting line. At this point whatever I'm carrying is what will sustain and protect me over the next 31 miles. I'd love to run a race with a supply wagon by my side. Fellow racers gather in small groups and begin making little disclaimers about why they aren't ready, how their training was impacted, etc. I hear someone telling the guy next to him about how he played pickleball recently and his hammy is really tight. That ought to buy him at least 5 minutes of waivable race time.

The race begins with the course heading steep uphill. They do this to quickly space out the runners (the confident mountain goats bound ahead while the realists know they have 30 miles in front of them and taking on a hill aggressively in the first mile requires pay back later on).

Twenty minutes in, the sky breaks and a beautiful, morning sun shows its face. I take comfort knowing the giant ball of burning gas didn't sleep, and here it is putting in a full day's work on my side of the world. 

I don't like running cold, but I hate running hot. Makes me kind of panicky. With the sun out I ball up my arm sleeves, gloves, and headband and tuck them behind a rock to retrieve on the return trip, when I'm delirious and tired of running. We descend a hill and the sky clouds over. A north wind whips down on me and I'm immediately uneasy about my decision to abandon my warm things. I'm not far away from Donner Hill, the Donners being a party of people who sadly know more than anyone about wrong decisions while traveling.

We begin pounding out hills. Yes, they are "foothills," but dang they ruin legs in short order. I'm trying something new, possibly disastrous. Earlier in the year a couple of my friends talked me into joining them on a multi-day fast. I did it, and then I toyed around with fasting more since then. Because doing not-fun things is fun. Then, on a trail running Facebook group, I read a post from a chap in England who finished a 50K which he started 18 hours fasted. I'm inspired, and I try it for this race. Because blindly following internet people is a good thing to do. I finished eating at 1 pm Friday and the race began at 7 am. So, from the staring gun, my body is in fat burning mode, which is supposedly a more consistent energy flow than the fluctuation of carbs. What could go wrong? 

In trail races you find yourself alone, often. It doesn't take much time for people to put distance between each other. But at the moment I'm in front of a couple chatterboxes, and I'm enjoying eavesdropping. Some guy who is a little more color coordinated than I think is necessary (light blue shoes, light blue socks, light blue shorts) is talking with the girl next to him. They're both recent college grads. He proceeds to tell her about playing pickleball the day before and that being a big mistake. It's the guy from the starting line! There's nothing wrong with recycling material. 

At mile 12 the big ascent begins to a radio tower on a hilltop. Almost 1500 vertical feet over a couple miles. By mile 13 I decide it's time to break the fast and start on some simple sugars, because my legs are screaming at me. Dextrose and glucose, down the hatch. These hills can extinguish your will. My body is negotiating with my brain the prospect of sitting down on the trail to cry and/or take a nap. 

This is a lovely race, being amidst rich, green hills overlooking the sprawling city below. I imagine people enjoying a quiet, casual spring morning downtown, visiting little bakeries to pick up pastries and warm drinks while 1,000 feet over their heads 100 people are running around in the dirt.

Ever tried to eat an apple while doing an aerobic activity? My mile 19 aid-station fuel choice is a challenging one. As I'm chugging uphill I'm also trying to consume a hard, crisp fruit without inhaling what fails to get chewed. Thankfully nobody is near me, as hearing someone eat an apple falls squarely in the unpleasant category. Add heavy mouth breathing to it, as well as spewing out partially chewed bits after sucking the juice from them, and it'd be hellish. 

At mile 22 I attempt Superman. Forced into it by a little root or boulder, my feet position themselves squarely behind me and my torso goes horizontal. I fail to defy gravity any longer than is usual before I hit the ground, hard. 

A word on trails in the foothills of the Salt Lake Valley, of which I have a knowledge of from both running on and lying on. Falling on these trails is not like falling on the loamy, organic soil of alpine forests and related areas. Salt Lake Valley foothill trails are made by angry little dwarves who pour uneven, sloppy cement, push in pieces of crushed and jagged rock before it sets, then dust the surface with a fine layer of silt. Makes pavement look like a welcome landing spot. 

I collapse with one fist squarely under my left rib cage. With the impact the air leaves my lungs. Various body parts really hurt, but I'm also not running anymore. I'm resting, and that feels pretty good. I lie there in the dirt, contemplating love and life. Then I realize nobody but me can finish the race for me, so me stands up, dusts off, and gets back on the proverbial horse. Cowboy up, as they say in the rodeo circuit. 

At the mile 26 aid station, as I show up dusty and bloody with injured ribs, I really give the volunteers an earful for not responding when I pushed the nurse call button a few miles back. Then my eye wanders over to the spread of food and drink. An aid station worker points to something and tells me it's Nuun energy drink. I shot-glass a cup of it, thinking it's a grape flavor, to find out I accidentally grabbed Coca-Cola. Very well, let's have the caffeine and high-fructose corn syrup of the word's number-one beverage take me home. I roll on.

My wife and kids are waiting at mile 28, where the trail dips down into the city. A wonderful surprise since I wasn't expecting them here. Except I'm trotting along shamefully slow at this stage, and my 7 year old could beat me to the finish line. As I make the final push, I pull out my phone and play my favorite Last of the Mohicans Theme remix. Who can't move to such sounds?

At the finish line (there actually isn't a defined one, you just run to a small crowd of people gathered around a folding table) the race director records everyone's time by rounding to the nearest minute. Time is man's invention, not Mother Nature's. You gotta love the chillness of a sport centered around her.