We Conquered These Mountains Together. Cougar Mtn 50k Race Report.
What an incredible journey my very first 50k turned out to be. Let me start by saying this: If you’re reading this, you probably have more experience with running difficult trail races than I do. I’m a ballerina trained in the art of emotional expression. I have slender arms, toned legs, and spend my winters with three family members: Mouse King, Snow Queen, and a Nutcracker. During performances my hair is more flammable than lighter fluid, and my face is painted with thick make-up that could inspire rap lyrics. I wear tutus, and I can’t tell you the best way to run uphill, downhill, or if barefoot is better. I dance on the tips of toes and have come to live with black not being the new orange just the color of my toenails. I’ve been equal rights from my first curtsey. And I’m a barista, too; I like my caffeine tall and with lots of fancy sugar. As far as running goes, I can tell you that wine will register you for longer and longer races, if you let it. One rainy summer night after being warmly motivated during a Friday Night Issaquah Wine Walk Erin Stone, my partner in crime, asked Trey for advice on training for the Cougar Mountain 50k. Letting the wine flow I proudly exclaimed, “I’ll pace you!” Trey’s quick response of “Forget that! Just run it.” left me with a lethargic, “oh, okay.” –Ah, that wine.– I truly believe this race is only for the crazies. 31 miles with 7,500 ft. elevation gain? Yes, only the true grit type. But the next day, as our dehydrated selves slogged along Cougar’s trails for significantly less mileage than planned, we discussed the accountability of running this race together. That’s the moment I knew I was in. No turning back, no backing down, no deciding this wasn’t for me. I couldn’t leave Erin stranded. This was going to happen! We started with a five mile loop and the more we trained together the more we developed our friendship. We shared spider web sweeping duty, and eventually we stopped politely hiding behind trees that were way off the trail to pee. Towards the end of our training if you had to go pee, you would just step to the side of the trail and ignore courtesy. We saw amazing things during training, too. We watched an owl swoop out of a tree, we watched people pick mushrooms, and one night we spotted a set of eyes glaring at us through Erin’s headlamp beam. It turn out there’s a mutual scariness between deer and two girls running trails at night. Luckily, we were wearing our matching Saucony Peregrine trail running shoes. We must have appeared to be a medium sized bear –super cute- with four green feet and glowing eyes because the deer ran away faster than we were going to run away. We kept each other in-check during our runs. Erin loved running on Cougar Mtn. She had her favorite loop and it was tough to pull her away, but I knew we needed to start running more on Squak Mtn. Not to mention, one run we had taken five wrong turns and added three extra miles because of me. I wanted to quit. I was done with that stupid mountain. I was done with the race, but Erin assured me that all my whining was just because I needed to eat some food. I’m buying chocolate bars, next time.
For the race we devised a perfect system of who would lead specific sections for optimal pacing and confidence boosts. –Gees, that sounds elite.- But it’s what we needed. We needed each other to pull through moments of doubt. We had goals, and being strong women we weren’t going to let anything stop us: Sub-seven hours. Oh yeah, after several months of training we finally signed up for the race a few days before. All that training could have been for nothing, but we were ready. Race day brings out a different side to me. I get lost in being unconfident, so I knew I needed to blindly enjoy the race. No watch for me, and Erin promised she’d keep us on track without me knowing. Looking back, we were about twenty minutes under goal pace in the first ten miles and my hips could tell. Erin was having an up day, and I was having an okay day. I complained and Erin listened. She could have smoked me for sure, but we stayed together just like training. As we arrived at the last mile Erin asked if I was sure I didn’t want to know the time. A part of me did, but I held out. As we hit the gravel for the final meters and Erin demanded that I look at the clock: 6:30. We did it!!! Un-freaking-believable. I was so excited to make way under our goal that I stopped to pose for pictures. –No shame.- Erin called me out and I jumped over with finish line with her. We finished with a time difference of .001. I was crowned the ‘official’ female overall winner. Who needs that though? We conquered these mountains together while making fun memories and that’s all that matters to us.
