« Hello? Anyone Still Out There? | Main | Stage 1: "Welcome To The Jungle" »
February 22, 2007
Pre-Race
I had no earthly idea of what to expect in this race. I fully believed that there was a good chance I had gotten in way over my head. Despite these impending doom-like feelings, I prepared as well as I could for the race.
My race goal was simple (even though I had no idea if it was remotely possible): I wished to finish in the top 5 women. My race strategy was equally basic (but two-fold): 1) I wanted to run each day, from Day 1 to Day 6, steadily and evenly (I didn't want to peter out into exhaustion as the week progressed.); and 2) I also wanted to run my own race the whole way.
We left frigid Wyoming on early Friday morning (February 2nd) and we couldn't have been happier to take off. It was a ridiculous -12 degrees Fahrenheit on the car thermometer on the way to the airport that morning! After a long travel day, we arrived into San Jose, Costa Rica late on Friday night and crashed into the race headquarters hotel.
On Saturday (February 3rd) morning, one day before the race, we began the day with a short 30 minute acclimation run through the neighborhoods surrounding the hotel. It was only mid-morning, but we could already feel the heat and humidity of Costa Rica! What a difference from our winterized training grounds! However, we were so happy for the sun and warmth that we didn't much care about how much we were sweating.
We spent much of Saturday pretending to be in chill mode. However, it was most difficult to stay calm. Our hotel room's balcony opened into the hotel's courtyard, which served as race central. At any given moment, one could look out into the courtyard and see a slough of chiseled, muscly runner bodies that did nothing but send jolts of adrenaline through my body. And, anytime I left the hotel room, I would undoubtedly engage in conversation with another racer that would induce a similar adrenaline-surging effect.
Racer check-in was an obstacle course of signing one's life away on roughly 12 legal forms, talking briefly with the medical crew, taking photographs, and receiving the route guide for the race.
Immediately after check-in, we scampered to a little restaurant down the street from the hotel to eat and dive into the route guide. Prior to this moment, we had received little to no information regarding the race route, and we were excited to finally study our path for the next 6 days. When we opened the route guide, we found virtually nothing! Apparently, this was part of the fun of this particular race, not knowing much about what we would encounter each day! Alright then, bring it on!
On Saturday evening, there was an opening ceremony of sorts in the hotel. In all honesty, I don't think I paid much attention to the actual meeting. More like, I was scanning the crowd for women who I thought would become my competition out on course!
After the opening meeting, we had pizza for dinner (Pizza has become our pre-ultra dinner of choice for some silly reason.), put the finishing touches on our packing (Packing for the race turned out to be an art form of sorts. Each competitor was allotted only 24 gallons of storage space for all the supplies one would need for 6 days of racing and camping. Getting everything to fit in a 24 gallon box required ingenuity and patience.), and tried to tuck ourselves in early for the very-early race morning wake-up call. Believe it or not, I slept very well the night before the race.
Posted by Meghan at February 22, 2007 4:53 PM
Comments
Yeah! I've been checking to see when you'd get back. I can't wait to hear more about your race! I do know how it ends:)! Congrats on that! I won't give it away. Glad you had a safe and grand adventure!
Posted by: Jenny at February 22, 2007 6:24 PM
Glad you're back - and I don't think we'll be bored! Hope you've got pictures too.
Posted by: backofpack at February 22, 2007 6:54 PM