The Baack Paack

Hey all, Make sure to read Part I, then Part II before reading this post!  Thanks!

Many thoughts run through my head during races, however this saying was a dominant force over the entire weekend.  Almost my mantra that I recited from time to time on the course.

I had put a lot of training into racing this weekend.  Sure, I could have done more, but everyone thinks that looking back.  I needed to focus on #2, remember #1, and enjoy #3.   When you have a personality such as mine, #3 can be hard at times.. but we will get into that later on a different post.

I had just completed the Super distance race of the Hawaii Trifecta weekend it was Sunday the 16th of the 2015 Hawaii Spartan Race weekend, about 10:40 am and I was hungry.  I went to my go to quick energy snack of grapes.  Man, these tasted so so good.  Maybe the flavor was enhanced by the sweat salt and other “muck” on my hands, or the fact that I didn’t wash them before eating them (sorry Mom..), they were delicious.

 

 

Finishing the Super before 11 AM was a great feeling.  I was done the longer of the two races for the day before the heat of the day, and I have one more to go, four miles and change until I complete my trifecta in two days.  Mission accomplished.   I was sitting thinking about this with Gail, who had finished about an hour earlier than I had (super freak!) and with two other 20 something racers as well as a wife of someone who was out on the course. (She didn’t say much)  One of the racers was from Hawaii, and was very gregarious, while the other was from Croatia, (who spoke perfect English) and this was his first trifecta weekend and first time on all three distances.   I pounded grapes and Cliff bars as we all spoke, and soon Gail said “I can’t delay this any longer, I am going to get it done.. want to join me?”
I raised up an open palm for a high five, and replied “I’ve got at least 30 more minutes to sit here and try to cool down, you go kill it, and I will see you in Temecula.”

She slapped my hand and took off to the starting line.

This left a bigger spot of shade for me to take advantage of, so I did, worming my way into the shade I am sure to the horror of the silent wife, because I smelled.. bad.  As in, when you can smell yourself, you know you smell bad.  I apologized to here, but she was a trooper and stayed in the shade next to me.. until my shoes came off.  I think that was the straw that broke her back.  Either the stench or the view of my very nasty looking feet was all she could take, and she was out of there.  The other guys sitting with me, didn’t even blink twice.  They knew the drill and they knew the enjoyment of getting you feet out of the wet shoes, if even for an instant.  So sitting there in the shade, we talked about the course, ate, drank water.  Talked about what obstacles sucked.. ate, and drank water.  Talked about what obstacles we had left to do, ate, and drank water.  For 30 minutes we followed this routine, at which point I decided I wanted to start to get ready.  Off came the blue compression socks, (yes, the matched the distance color of the Super race) and on came the Red 2XU compression sleeves. Hey, what can I say, it helps remind me what distance I am running, just by looking at my feet. (#Trifectaproblems), as well as a new pair of Runners World synthetic socks, which I really, really love to wear during long runs or OCRs.

I knew if I sat too long three things were going to happen:

1. I was going to stiffen up
2. It was going to get real hot
3. I was not going to want to go back out there

Sitting here now, writing this, I am thinking, of course I was going to go back out there! However, at that moment in time, I was hot, tired, and loosing power faster than I could shovel it into my mouth.  I knew I needed to make a decision, and the decision was to get up and get it done.  I bid my shade mates fair well, and told them I would see them on the course.  I refilled my Geigerrig, packed two cliff bars and put on the vest.  Man, this thing was dirty.. and stinky.

I sighed deeply.   “One to go” I muttered and headed to the starting line.

 

Systems check and reality check

At this point of the day, there were doing official “waves” every 15 minutes, but you could leave to go back out on the course at any time you wanted, you just would not get the “Ra-ra to get you pumped up” speech.  I elected to just take off to get it done.  Fueled by fresh fruit and cliff bars, I jogged over to the water obstacle (the stream crossing) and plopped in.   This time, I was almost alone in the stream, and I could feel the cold water on my calves.  It felt great. What I wanted to do was swim in it, splash around to try and cool myself off.  However, this “water” had about 2″ of visibility and was more brown murky liquid than water.  I elected to not swim and pressed on.  I passed the OUT walls and started to jog up to the hill, then the jog changed to a power walk until I met Tad at the cargo net obstacle.  As I climbed I told him I planned on finishing in about 2 hours, so I would see him then.  He agreed and with that, I was up and over the wall, now back on the trail leading back down to the grass lands.  Hitting the fields and grass lands for the past two days, every time I got just past the 1st mile I would do an internal “systems check”, as in, I would ask myself.

(Please realize that this entire conversation was going on in my head, I wasn’t actually talking with anyone…)

“Hey, how are you doing?”

During the Beast I got back “100% feeling good”

During the Super I got back “100% a bit stiff but I am good”

This time, the reply shocked me: “60%”

Sixty percent?  WTH?  My body is telling my brain you only have 60%?  What is going on?

Then it hit me.   The jogging stopped.  Every time I would push to jog, I had nothing left.  A fast 3 mph walk was all I could muster.  I could now feel the heat radiating off the grass pushing back up to me. I could feel it burning my face.  The sunburn on my arms ached.  My legs, while not cramping were increasing in soreness and pain, and my shoulders ached with every movement of them.  My head was starting to pound from either the lack of caffeine over the past two days, the lack of water in this heat, the lack of sleep in the past two days or a combination of all three.  Things were not right in Jay town, and I had at least 3 miles left to finish this thing.

Houston.. We have a problem.

Time to SUCK IT UP and engage zombie mode.

 

Zombie mode and obstacles

Zombie mode is a term that I coined for myself back in 1995 when I thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail.  Zombie mode is where you literally shut off your brain, shut off all thoughts and just get one foot in front of the other.  You don’t try to remember anything, talk, or smile, you just get it done.  Kind of like when you are diving home and you mind goes elsewhere, and before you know it you are in your driveway?  Yeah, like that.. except your mind doesn’t have the energy to go elsewhere.  It shuts off completely.  No thoughts, no emotions, nothing. Like a zombie, you are just moving forward, not because you want to, but because there is something wired in your DNA that does not allow you to stop or quit.

I don’t like racing in Zombie mode.  It isn’t fun.  These races, these tests, are supposed to be fun.  Even when they suck, (such as a up hill stream run) they can be fun.  You can laugh at how sucky it is.   When I hit zombie mode, it isn’t fun anymore.  Quitting is never, ever an option, so that wasn’t even on the table as an option.  However, I was struggling to find the positive for my body to focus on and was coming up empty.

Low and behold, this motivation would come in the form of another racer.

Approaching the 8-9′ wall (for the last time!) I had all I could do to keep on a fast walk.  I was draining energy quickly, almost like I didn’t put the plug in a boat before I left the dock.   No matter how much I drank or ate, I was just getting weaker.  So, when I saw this wall in front of me, there was a moment that I though, “Hell.. I am going to have to BURPEE this thing..” (FYI, you never EVER, burpee a wall.. you can always find someone to help you.)  My help came from another racer who was standing at the top of the wall, helping folks over.  He was playing the role that I did in the Beast race yesterday, giving back to others.  He looked at me and asked where he should grab.  I told him my plan, where to grab and how I was going to throw my left leg – and did a run at the wall.  I barely got my fingers on the top, and slid off.  Taking a minute to get some air an internal motivation back into me, we locked eyes again and I vaulted to the wall.  Grabbing the top he grabbed my right armpit and leaned back, giving me the leverage I needed to hook my leg and secure the top of the wall.   I thanked him profusely and he smiled back saying ” Hell, I got help all three times on this one, I had to give back”.

 

 

And that my readers… is Karma in action.    Give a little when you can, get a little when you need it most.

 

 

I followed this racer until we got to the next water station, then he powered on while I tried to calm some racers down.

 

But we don’t have any cups!

Hitting the water stop I got there just as the volunteers showed up in a pickup truck and several boxes in the back.  One volunteer grabbed the trash bag, tied it up and threw it in the back of the truck.  Another was getting a new bag ready for the trash, the driver, let’s call him Jim, yelled to the guy in the back:

“Tony, throw me a box of cups..”

“Jim, we don’t have any..”

What do you mean? he replied.. “We started with 4 boxes we have only been to two water stations..”

“Ahh.. I left two boxes at each one.. should I only have left one?”

“Ok, get in, we need to go get those other boxes” said Jim, and off they all went back in the truck.

As I witnessed this happening in front of me, I managed to find a clean’ish cup on the top of one of the water stations, and I proceeded to use that one as the above conversation ensued.  As they were driving off, three racers showed up, two males and a female.

 

“Hey, where is the cups?” one asked

“They ran out, they have to get more” I replied, “the tanks are full however”, patting one on the side with my free right hand.

“but.. but.. there are no cups!” said the same racer.

“right” I replied.  “just fill your bladder and drink out of that”

Meanwhile one of the three had dropped to one knee and was using the spigot as a water fountain.

“Here” I said, holding my now empty cup towards him, you can use mine.

“but.. but…” he stammered.

 

And that folks is what we call Vapor Lock.   As bad as I was feeling, as much as I was hurting, this guy was far worse.

 

He was standing inches from hundreds of gallons of water, but was fixated on the lack of cups available – and without a cup in his hand, he didn’t see a solution to how he could get water.  Forget dropping to a knee and sucking off the spigot, forget cupping his hands to get the water, and definitely forget using my “dirty” cup.

 

This is one of the side benefits as to why I love OCR racing.  Seeing the struggle that folks deal with. Most of them are height or effort related, and I truly enjoy helping them past the struggle, as they are usually struggling on a wall or a cargo net or some other obstacle.  This poor cat was struggling with the notion of ‘no cups’.  Maybe he was OCD, and this was a big deal, or maybe he had a thing about germs, or a bad history of drinking fluid without cups.. I don’t know, but it was all I could do to not laugh at this guy who was  * FREAKING OUT * that there were not any cups to put water in.
As I left him standing there staring at the water tank I took my “used” cup, slowly passed it in front of his eyes, and put it on top of the water container as if to say.. “hey, here is one right here…”

I bet he didn’t even see it.

Half way to glory

Before I started the sprint I changed the “GOAL” setting on my TomTom watch to 4.8 miles.  This meant that at 2.4 miles it would vibrate to tell me I had completed 50% of the distance.  Just as I rounded the corner of where the green / blue markers turned to the right for the Beast and Super course, and the red markers for the Sprint went straight ahead, my watch buzzed.  YES!!!!!!!  Half way completed.  I was on the backside now.  No more up hill barbed wire crawl, no more bucket carry, not more massive hills.  I was on the back side of the sprint course baby!  For a moment there, I might have even jogged down hill for about 200 yards, things were looking up.  Then I saw it.  The Z wall.

When I was sitting in the shade after the Super course with my shade mates, we were chatting whether the Z wall was going to be on the Sprint course.  I didn’t think it was on the Sprint, but the super.  One of the racers agreed with me, the other didn’t.  We left each other with the phrase.. “You will know when you see it”.  Well, I saw it, and the thought of doing 30 burpees was soul crushing.  At the Z wall, I didn’t think about it, I just picked one and hit it. This one had the normal pegs for the first wall, the thin 1×2″ strip for the second wall, then the normal pegs on the blind corner.   I made it through the first wall with ease, struggled on the second, but with solid foot work, (and a spot from a fellow racer) nailed the transition to the third wall, and leaped to ring the bell.

Clang Clang!

No burpees for me!  I returned the favor of the spot, (this guy didn’t need it) and off we went power walking towards the road walk, and the next obstacle.

Soon I was at the last sand bag carry, and I plowed through it.  I looked down at my toes and just put one foot in front of the other.  I didn’t look around to see the various movie locations and their signs (you could see several from this hill), all I did was stare at my feet and breathe.  Up, over the top, across, back down, drop off the bag.  Start walking again towards the stream, the final barbwire crawl, and then the burpee fest.  I was not looking forward to that ending at all.

 

Who is missing a red watch?

I was half way through the barbwire crawl when a quicker young racer flys by me, then stops and says “Hey!  I didn’t think I would see you!”  It was one of the shade buddies, the local from the island.  I smiled and told him, “I told you, you would catch me”  He smiled, threw me a wave and took off.  Within 30 seconds of that I hear a voice from behind me:

“Who is missing a red watch?”

I immediately though, that sucks for someone.. and glanced at my left arm to find no watch on it.. then I remember I switched arms this morning for the Super as I had some irritation on my left arm that the watch was rubbing and bothering.  Looking at my right arm I realized I WAS that sucker!

“Me!” I replied turning around to see her standing up holding the watch in her hand.

I stepped over the rope crossings and walked back to her, thanking her for finding it.
“No problem” she said, and continued on.

Phew!  That would have really sucked, and Vicki would have killed me if I had left this on the course.  I strapped it back on my wrist and continued back on the course.

Reaching the rope climb I was exhausted.

30 burpees. A set of 10 followed by 3 minutes of break, then another set followed by three minutes of break. etc.   Yeah it took like 12 minutes to do 30 burpees.

Then I went to the spear throw.  OK.  this is it.  You going to rock this, and then be so excited you are going to rock the multibar and finish on a super high! No Burpees.. here we go… ready, set.

…..

and the same result as the throw during the Beast course.  It stuck it, and pulled right back out.

DAMN IT!

30 burpees. A set of 10 followed by 3 minutes of break, then another set followed by three minutes of break. etc.   Yeah it took another 12 minutes to do 30 burpees.

Which brought me to the multibar set.

30 burpees. A set of 10 followed by 3 minutes of break, then another set followed by three minutes of break. etc.   Yeah it took another 12 minutes to do 30 burpees.

I power through the last set as quick as I could threw my pack on and headed towards the slip wall, running up, I grabbed the top and pulled over to the other side.  Getting to the top I spied the camera guy and took one of my last action shots of the race.  I was almost done, I could smell the fire, I could see the finish. The triple Trifecta for the year and the weekend trifecta was within sight!  I jumped down the back side from the first brace of the wall and raced to the fire.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Where I threw a “five” at the camera guy, signifying my 5th Sprint of the year.   I was done!

 

Upon finishing I grabbed my shirt, my medal (sans the pie piece as they ran out of them) 1/2 a banana and promptly grabbed my checked bag and crashed in the shade.

I was done.  Literally and figuratively.  I was hot, and exhausted, but I was finished.

 

I must have laid there for 30 minutes just trying to collect my wits as well as strength to get up and get out of here.  I was toast.  I have to thank Tad for his patience and the VERY cold bottle of water that I proceeded to put in my arm pit as well as forehead (maybe even in that order) to cool down my body temp.  I was wrecked, but… I was finished. 2015 Hawaii Trifecta Weekend was a success, and I didn’t break any of the BaackPaack’s three rules.

1. Everyone who starts, finishes
2. No hospital visits
3. Nobody dies

 

 

 

 

 

For those interested in any stats of the courses this is what my TomTom measured.

Beast: 11.92 miles, 2726 calories burned.

Course map:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Super: 7.02 miles, 1417 calories burned.

Course map:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sprint: 3.91 miles,  894 calories burned.

Course map:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

See you all next year, with team BaackPaack in tow!   AROO!