Across the Years 2025 - 2026
December 28, 2025 - January 3, 2026
Two races for a double hundred, number 87 and 88
My sixth double hundred in less than five days
Special visitor and all the smiles
For the past 4 years I have been completing two hundreds at six day races. For them to count you have to run a separate race for each hundred. For example you can run a 48 hour and a 72 hour. If you are fast you can complete the 24 hour and the 48 hour and the 72 hour for three hundreds. I’m not fast and apparently I’m getting wiser because I signed up for the 48 hour and then the hundred mile instead of the 72 hour. This allowed me to complete a hundred with far fewer hours on the loop. Very nice.
This was a special ATY for me as I had a special visitor. Aurora, our daughter came to walk a few loops with me. For the past four years she has been attending University of Arizona. Usually she is home in Seattle when I head to Phoenix for ATY. This year she had a job that she had to return to in Tucson after Xmas. Just my luck that she wasn’t working on December 31st so she drove over two hours to walk with me. We talked and walked and the miles just flew by. She then went out and proceeded to procure yummy food and we had dinner “loop side” while heckling other runners. I was very touched by her spending time with me, it warmed my heart for the rest of the race.
I like to tease, harass, cajole, heckle runners while I’m on the loop. Just trying to bring some levity and smiles to others as we complete this difficult task of racking up hundreds of miles. (This also takes our minds off of how painful our feet are.) It is how I enjoy my time on the loop. This ATY was no different as I reconnected with friends and teased the smiles out of them. We had a wonderful time supporting the queen and legend of ultra running Ann Trason. She inspired us all with her positivity and goofy comments.
As usual I learned a few things. One is that I usually wear a running pack as I like to have all my things with me and I don’t want to be bothered to stop and take a sip of something or whatever. At the end of a multiday this can wreak havoc on your back and shoulders. For the first race I started without my pack and carried a hand held. I set up a chair with the necessary items I might need and my pack hung over the chair. This worked for most of the day. The second day it got hot and so I used my pack so I could have extra fluids and ice on the loop. But then was able to take the pack off at night. I thought gee I can even try and learn new things and I don’t need my running purse with me at all times, it’s only 1.4 miles away. I told myself I’m all grown up. For the second race I wanted to try something new as well, drinking lots of liquids and not just water. So I had coconut water, Nuun, UCAN, rehydrate, Powerade, root beer and lemonade. By the end of these events I am so done with water yet I’m dehydrated but I don’t want to drink water. Well after drinking so many other liquids water became refreshing. Duh always learning.
The new course is not my favorite but I learned to love the dirt as it was so much softer than the concrete. I really like that there are real bathrooms about every 20 feet(exaggeration). The sunsets and sunrises are beautiful and the air quality after all the fireworks is bad but not as bad as at Camelback, the previous ATY site. We had a lot of sun the first two days so it was hot and there was a lot of wind the first night. We had some rain, mostly sprinkles and some overcast days later in the week so we had all the weather. During a couple of down pours of rain the course had many puddles some almost covering entire parts of the course so I understand why they had an alternate course option ready. If we had sustained rain the course would have flooded in sections. I still believe they could use more of the paved parking lot to get us off the concrete which would make for a nice course for our bodies. My feet and my knees are quite achey after being on the hard surface.
So here are the numbers. 131 miles in the 48 hour race. Not my best but my goal was 125 so happy I was able to surpass it. I warmed the top spot, first place while waiting for my friend Amy to take over. My day off was bliss. I squeezed my legs with the recovery squeezers four times. I slept a lot and ate real food. The second race was the hundred and my mindset was, it’s just a hundred. Previously I had done the 72 hour for the last three years after the 48 and when I sign up for a 72 hour I’m going to be on that course for 72 hours. So signing up for just a hundred, well it was blissful. In the hundred I took it super easy. I knew Aurora would arrive sometime in the afternoon and we would be walking so I ran all morning and racked up 25 miles before she got there. When she left I walked until 70 miles and then all of the sudden I found myself running again, not fast but I was in running motion and I hung on to this running and walking thang until I finished the hundred in 36:52. Not fast but a finish is a finish.
Because I’m going to do this again here are even more numbers for me.
48 hour- half, 2:45, marathon, 5:55, 50K, 7:08, fifty, 12:35, hundred K, 16:30, 75 miles, 22:12, 24 hours, 78, 100 in 31:06, 102 in 31:49:23
100 miler- half, 3:11, marathon, 7, walk and dinner with Aurora, 50K, 8:53, fifty, 17:33, hundred K, 22:12, 75, 27:01, 100 in 36:52:50
Grateful I can still do these thangs. Thanks for your support and reading these musings.
