Race Report: Mental Health Ultra - Half Marathon, November 2024

Last year, November 2023, I ran the Mental Health Ultramarathon 10K. That was "just" one lap through the rolling hills of the Brown's Mill Battlefield trail system in Newnan GA. That was also the furthest I had ever run up to that point.

This year, November 2024, I ran it again. 

The Mental Health UltraMarathon is definitely a "grassroots" style race. As we were milling about near the starting line, I heard one of the volunteers at the packet-pickup table say, "This is the Brody and Friends race!" Brody, the race director, was a local guy who had worked for a local run shop (one of the race's sponsors), and indeed had lots of friends show up to have some fun running in the woods on a chilly autumn day. Even all the other sponsors were local, from the Coweta County Recreation Dept, to Pathways, a counseling service that was based out of Newnan (and the main recipient of funds raised by the race). 

The atmosphere at the start line was distinctly relaxed. The Start/ Finish line was little more than a line drawn with somebody's boot across the gravel sidewalk. The aid station was a 10X10 pop up over a picnic table. The racers' drop bags were all lumped together on the benches under the gazebo. And although the countdown to begin was not as casual as the lighting of a cigar, it had that feel to it as first the 50K runners, and then an hour later the Half and 10K runners, jogged off down to the trails.

In November of 2024, I was moving up in my distance. The last year I had done the 10K loop (which was more like 9K, but ok... we'll go with the common names rather than precise names) in about 1:15, on a day when we had nothing but rain and cold and mud. This year, I moved up to the two loops "Half Marathon", which was all part of the master plan of distance running. Back the previous January (2024) I had run a "half marathon" in an official time of 3:14. At that race, the Huff N Puff Trail Race in Jackson, I had come in 81st overall (out of 94), and the 30th female finisher (out of 40). I learned a lot from that half marathon that I had put into practice in my training over the summer for this race.

 The evening before the race Pravin and I had gone to stay at our friends in Newnan, with the kids, so that I didn't have to make the hour-plus drive by myself in the morning. I had done that last year, and it was a huge relief to not do that this morning. Now, getting the kids all settled in their beds after a bedtime snack had taken a good amount of time, so I didn't get in bed at what would usually be a "good" time, but I figured with all the pre-race jitters I wasn't going to sleep well anyway. As I lay there, waiting for my alarm to go off, I ran over all my strategies in my head. I had trained all year by heart-rate, but I knew I was leaving performance on the table if I slowed to a walk every time my heart jumped into the "anaerobic zone" on my watch. I told myself (and anyone who cared to listen) that I was going to use the HR monitor to inform, but not to dictate my performance. Also, I ran through the nutrition strategy I was going to use for the race. It's just a half-marathon, as some people may say, but I had learned from the previous winter that I need to eat those applesauce pouches and drink those bottles in order to keep myself going. I didn't need to starve myself to get to the finish line. I needed to arrive in good shape.

Finally, the alarm went off. I did the usual breakfast things, and soon Pravin was dropping me off in the parking lot just before sunrise, with a quick kiss and a "I'll see you later!" After getting checked in, I did what I customarily find myself doing to turn the agitation I feel at a race into something resembling productivity: I started making conversations with whoever was around. Also, at some point the Race Director was trying to do some give-aways. I think he was looking around for people that he didn't know, rather than give more gifts to his friends (that's a good quality in a race director!), and as we made eye-contact, he offered me a Salty-Britches visor. Now, I know visors are not really all that fashionable, but as anyone who has been around me knows, I'm not all that fashionable either, so I told him, "I'll take a visor!" I'm glad I did, because it came in handy down the road (or trail).

My cousin Nate, from Texas, texted me to tell me he was going out on his morning run so we were "Running Together!" I loved the idea that we were running together, even if in a virtual sense, because it gave that little bit of impetus to keep on going when things got tough later on.

Then, some time around 8am, it was my turn to hit the trails.

My goal time for this race was to finish in 2 and a half hours or less. I was projecting a 10K time of about 1:15, which I knew was possible thanks to several summer trail training runs, and then doubling it. Of course, most people aren't able to hit their splits like that, so I had planned to push the tempo while I was fresh and adrenaline-filled, knowing my pace was going to slump at some point and then every minute would be a battle. Now, that said, I was also planning to keep my heartrate in the "Aerobic Zone" as much as possible, but I told myself to not be afraid to push my heartrate over the next two hours.

One of my irrational fears about running, and one thing that has held me back or taken me now four years of consistent training to get around, is the fear that my heart is just going to give out on me and I'll drop dead in the middle of a race. This may seem like a ridiculous fear, but the whole reason I started running was related to blood pressure issues that began in 2020 (of course) with my third pregnancy. It took me a long time to trust that my body could handle the stress that I was putting on it. Now, in this half-marathon, I knew I could be smart with my energy usage, but also I could push up against that edge more than I had previously been comfortable doing.

So how did this plan work out in implementation?

Firstly, I was able to stay under 13:00 minutes per mile average for the whole first loop. Even when I had to course correct as I started going down the wrong trail. Thankfully, I realized something was wrong, and didn't end up losing too much time. And the next time around the course had been marked a little more clearly at that same point, so I was definitely not the only person who struggled there. At the 5k mark I started catching the fast-out-of-the-chute 10K runners, and the early leaders of the Half Marathon. One of the guys was a 10K runner I had chatted with at the beginning.

"You're half-way done with your first lap!" he cheered as I came up beside him. 

"You're half-way done with your whole race!" I cheered back. And then I passed him.

As we got about a mile out from the start/finish, I saw one person, one of the 50K runners, going the wrong way back toward me. "Am I close to the finish?" he asked, "My watch already says 10K?" Oh dear. I told him to turn around and go the correct way on the trail, but my heart went out to him. That's not a great position to find yourself in loop one of a 50K!

I finished first loop in 1:05:00. I knew from my Garmin data, and from running this the previous year, that was only a 9K distance time, but I was still super happy with that number and rode that elation going out into the second loop. There was a huge crowd of people at the start/finish area, so I just got in, topped off my water bottle, dropped off my jacket and sweaty hat, and headed back out, no time lost. I realized later that I probably should have checked in with someone who was doing timing (old school clipboard timing!), but I had no idea who was in charge and who was just hanging out, having fun, so I carried on my way.

On the second loop, my mile splits wobbled. I went from a 13:10 up to a 15:06 at mile 8. Looking back, I realized I was starting to bonk, and was dealing with stomach cramping. I had to slow down from my pushed pace on the first loop, but thankfully once I drank a little more, and changed my apple-pouch schedule, things smoothed out. All throughout this loop, my HR remained elevated, but it was my legs that were so tired the didn't want to cooperate. Midway through the lap I saw two more people who were going the wrong way. I was able to pass another couple of the half-marathoners, even going at that 13:30 pace. But then, less than a mile out, I tripped on a rock and fell. Wearing long pants really saved my knees! That's definitely not the first time I tripped during the race, but it was the first time I couldn't get my feet back out in front quickly enough to save me. I hiked for a bit to let the legs recover from the shock, but then I had to pick up the pace because I heard something magical. 

"That's Mommy!"

It was my kids. Pravin had brought them over to the park for the start/finish area based on when I had thought I might complete the race, and they were standing on the edge of the clearing, watching intently through the woods as every runner came towards them. When I heard them, I started jogging again. I came out of the woods and they ran next to me back to that line in the gravel where my second-ever "Half-marathon" was done!

According to Strava and Garmin, my total was just over 10 miles distance at an average pace of 13:01 minutes/mile. My total on my watch was 2:11:51. The race organizers credited me with a 2:02:57. I was 10th place overall (out of 27), and the 5th female to finish. I'll take top-third percentile placement any day! Of course, this means I had still not ever actually crossed 13.1 miles in a single effort in either a race or a training run, including my half marathon last January, which was over 12, but less than 13 miles.

This race was a good test of my nutrition strategy. At first, I was going to take a fruit pouch every 30 minutes, but then I found I wanted to move it back to every 2 miles/ 20 minutes because I was burning through calories at a much higher rate than my normal long run effort. Also, this race I used Gatorade in my bottle, and next time I would make sure I had some plain water because it made swallowing the apple pouches so much easier than trying to wash them down with flavored drink. I just couldn't swallow enough Gatorade to make a difference. I was definitely getting underhydrated out there. Staying on top of my water intake would have helped incredibly. So, I made notes for the next time.

Speaking of next time, There were several points I made  to practice over the next few months before my next race. First of all was the training. I definitely needed to add more hill training into my weekly runs, as well as more lower-body strength training (those good-old exercises like squats, lunges, rucking, etcetera). I think this would really have helped me get my legs to be more durable deeper into the race. That 8 mile mark is about as far as my legs wanted to go.

Long Pants were definitely the way to go in this race! Even though all I had were lightweight "hiking" pants from Amazon, they provided enough warmth and coverage from the leaves and stick along the side of the trail while running through the woods. I was sad that they ripped during my first race after purchasing them, but I'm going to patch the knees with similar fabric I have at home (and add a padded knee for all my future falls), and keep going! Even in the summer, I've found that covering my legs means less sunburn (hugely sensitive), which long-term is better than the "cooling" effect of shorts or running skirts. For this temperature range on race day, where I needed jacket at the beginning and two layered shirts at the end, what I used worked out. Last year, on this same race it rained the whole time and everything I wore got soaked.

Now, I'm not sure about my strategy for speed. Maybe it would have been better if I had held a more conservative pace at the beginning? As they say, "Go slower to go longer".  However, I do want to say I still felt really strong after my second loop, as if I could have gone out for more. Oh, yes, I was certainly tired, and was looking forward to a long nap, but I wonder if I could have kept going all the way to the actual half-marathon mark and beyond.

What's next:

I had already signed up for a marathon in January. As with the Mental Health Ultra, I had run the Huff N Puff shorter distance (half marathon) but now felt ready to move up to the marathon distance. Of course, I only had November and December to really train to jump those extra miles, and Thanksgiving, Christmas, Winter Break, and New Years all happen in the middle, all of which mean shorter training weeks.

Some time in the spring, I'm hoping to do a 50K training run simulation of some kind, I was hoping maybe in April to do the "Cubihatcha Challenge" on a Friday where Pravin is home to watch the kids. That would be four eight-mile loops run between the hours of 8am and 4pm. But then I discovered the Cubihatcha Resevoir trail was closed for the foreseeable future. So I'll have to try something else. Maybe a "backyard" style ultra where I run 2 mile loops of my neighborhood until I hit my goal distance.

 But, in order to acheive these things, I'll need to integrate all the observations I've learned from this fall training block into my training moving forward. That means run AT LEAST four times a week (five would be better), do the strength and mobility workouts, and add on top of it all "cross training" adventures with my kids like hiking or biking.

To sum it all up, the Mental Health Ultra really gave me a boost of confidence that I'm going the right direction with my training and all these efforts are not going to waste! One of my runner friends asked me, "Does it surprise you that you've come this far?"

Honestly, it doesn't surprise me, because I've always been a self-motivated go-getter, but it does, in fact, delight me. I'm right where I want to be, which means my training is neither too hard nor too easy, but right in that sweet spot of "Just Right!" Let's push it and see if we can level up!