2024 Livingston Oval 6-Hour
First Race of Comeback
After my 12-Hour at Six Days in the Dome, I had to address the medical issues plaguing me. Back in a-fib beginning some time before Six Days, I finally agreed to having an ablation scheduled for September. My training response to that left me gasping for breath with even moderate exertion, so I also underwent a heart catheterization to ensure there were no blockages. After that I had to accept that reconditioning was going to be longer and slower than I had hoped. Now almost 6 months after my ablation, I'm finally at a point where I'm ready to race and evaluate my fitness and endurance. I've had some very encouraging workouts, both long runs and intervals, but still bothered by needing longer recoveries than expected.
Packing is minimal as all I need besides what I'm wearing are my running clothes for the race and any food and drink I want to bring to supplement what the aid station has. I can relax Friday morning by watching the Nike Indoor Nationals for high school. It's only a 2 hour drive (providing I don't get lost), which will leave me time to make the drive from hotel to park to be sure I know the route, and also to check out the course. My legs felt very tired on Thursday. I hope that's only a pre-race taper effect, and that another light day or day off will get me back to feeling strong for the race. I'm hoping to hold a 14:00-14:15 pace for 3 hours, then see what I can maintain after that. I expect no less than 20 miles, and think 24 miles is a possibility if I have a good day.
It's only a 2 hour drive if I avoid rush hour around the metropolitan New York area. It took me 2 hours and 40 minutes. After checking into the hotel, I drove to the park to check out the loop and do some walking and jogging to loosen up after the drive. Despite that I managed a wrong turn at a confusing intersection on the way to the race Saturday morning. I checked in and chatted with the race director and one of the runners, both of whom were at the Ethan Allen 6-Hour I ran back in 2019. The race director won that one. This was his first race as the race director. It was very low key with "manual" recording of laps rather than chip timing, but it was entered directly into a keypad and we had results posted online by the time I got home.
Some runners would love the conditions, cloudy and temperatures between 41-45F. That's a little too cold for me. I wore jacket, ear warmer, and gloves the entire race. Mid-race we also picked up some wind and the last hour or so a light sprinkle.
We had a small field of 20 runners and I dropped to the rear quickly except for a walker. We had no leaderboard, so I had no idea where I was as far as place until results were posted online. Also no digital clock or display showing laps, time, lap time, etc., so I had to track all that myself. It had a real old time feeling, which was fine with me as it also meant a very enthusiastic group of volunteers, even when the weather worsened the last hour, and I could focus on the race and not be distracted by the standings. The first 3 miles fell right where I had planned and hoped I would be, in the 14:20 range. My paced slipped after that and I was between 14:30 and 14:40 for the next 11 miles except for the 2 minutes I lost for a port-a-potty break. Naturally it was occupied and I had to wait. One of my goals was to maintain run-walk for 3 hours. That's almost an hour more than I had worked up to in training. My pace hadn't slowed yet, so I maintained run-walk for as long as I could while keeping in mind I didn't want to exhaust myself so much that I couldn't keep a reasonable walking pace to the finish. I finally shifted to walking after 14 miles at about 3:26. I think I cut the margin very close, because any pause in concentration resulted in a temporary slacking of pace. I also had to increase my calorie intake. Except for one mile when I spent extra time at the aid station and one for another port-a-potty break, I was able to keep the pace under 17:00. When I've pushed too hard early in other races, I've slow to 20:00 or slower, so this was a significant victory for me. As time ran down, I considered whether I could resume run-walk, but my metal calculations indicated I probably couldn't gain enough time to complete an additional lap beyond what I could do walking. I finished my last lap at 5:56:41, 52 laps for 22.88 miles officially and 14th of 20 runners.
Overall I was encouraged by my effort and results. I exceeded several goals, namely maintaining the run-walk well beyond 3 hours, and completing more than 20 miles. Mentally I kept myself in the race and didn't let fatigue or the cold, wet conditions tempt me to stop early, even when I reached my minimum goal of 20 miles with 50 minutes left. While I haven't yet registered, my next race will probably be the Dawn to Dusk to Dawn 50K on May 11th. I would like to run sub-8:00 there, but I'll need the 2 months training and hopeful increase in fitness to get there.
