Race Report: ZF Get In Gear 5k

This was by far not my fastest 5k but it certainly was special - the first actual 5k road race that I got to run with #SuperD, made even more special by the fact that it's his 10th birthday!!

He and I have done a few organized group fun runs before, and he's done one or two of the 2-mile races with me from the Brew Series, and he and I did the Tacky Sweater 5k on the trails in December. 

We got out to ZF in Fountain Inn pretty early on Saturday, and it was fairy nice weather (not too hot, overcast). We got our photo with the team and before long we were off! 

The course is a small lollipop with a loop at the midway point and a fairly long out-and-back.

First mile was a lot of walking and I was worried that we'd be walking almost the whole race. Once we got to about the halfway point, there's a little off-road portion and he seemed more interested/excited about this. Then on the return straightaway he must have gotten his energy because he was flying and didn't stop at all!

Mile 1 - 12:07

Mile 2 - 11:15

Mile 3 - 9:07 (one-mile PR for Super D!)

He was so proud of himself and excited at the end of the race. Can't say he's pumped for another one but at least he got through this one with a smile. 😁

Napped on the way to the race

Excited to run with neighbor and friend J

Race Report: Reedy River 10k

It's been over 15 years since I first ran this race, as it was my very first 10k and the first time I ran slightly more than 6 miles.

I signed up for this race without much planning since a friend offered a registration when they had signed up and couldn't attend. My thinking was that since I'd recently run a fast half PR at the end of February I might be in shape to beat my 10k race PR of 47:47 from 2017 at the Peachtree Road Race in Atlanta. I do have a 10k distance PR of 45:23 during Leg #8 of the Ville-to-Ville Relay in 2021 but since it's not an actual 10k race, it seems questionable to count it. 

Anyway...

All the thinking that I was in good shape for a fast race was a little bit off since I didn't actually continue to do any speedwork training whatsoever since the end of February. That, plus the fact that in the past 2 weeks I've done a 100-miler and the Ville-to-Ville Relay maybe made that aspiration a little bit far-fetched. Still, I decided to just show up and do what I could.

Got to the race start with plenty of time to spare and found other friends who were also racing. Opted to drop a hoodie in my drop bag to have at the finish just in case it was a little on the cool side. Temps for the run were hovering right around 60 which was super comfortable. Did a ~2/3 mile warm-up jog and lined up with about 5 minutes to go.

A few announcements, and off we went! The first mile goes down Main Street/bears left on Augusta towards the baseball stadium, goes around the block where the stadium is located, then back down Main Street til you get to the Creepy Kids Park (Linky Stone). Circles to Westfield Street, then takes Broad past the Peace center, across Main Street, onto McDaniel before entering Cleveland park and heading towards the zoo.

These first miles were pretty steady, in the low 7's for pace. I felt ok but definitely not super strong like I would have hoped. I just couldn't get settled into a pace that felt good, and struggled to keep pushing. As we looped by the zoo and back around the park, I couldn't help myself thinking about the hills that I knew would be part of the last mile of the race. We'd have to climb up by the Cancer Survivors Park, back up towards the Governor's School (though thankfully not all the way to the top of that hill), and then climb up out of the park. After that, it was one more time up the Broad Street climb from Richardson to Main Street before hitting the final block of downhill onto Falls Street. The run down Falls was longer than I expected so I wasn't able to push as hard in the final stretch.

Splits.

Ended up with an official time of 45:56, which I would say is more than respectable. I'm still chasing that sub-45 time but I know I'll have to work hard and be intentional about it. The good/bad thing is that there aren't many 10k races in the area, so it may be next year before I attempt it again. 

Good enough for 1st AG!
That was unexpected with this large of a race

The Country Mile - First 100 Buckle!

So.... I ran 100 miles this weekend. 😳

The event: the Country Mile 48-Hour Ultra

Location: Beechwood Farms in Slater-Marietta, SC

Format: 4.167-mile loop around a strawberry farm, complete the loop as many times as possible in 48 hours (noon Friday to noon Sunday)

I signed up for this race as soon as it opened up after I participated in a few beer laps at the race with D and Ivy last year. It seemed like such a fun party atmosphere that I figured it would be cool to try for a new distance record. 

Over the fall & winter chatting with various running friends, I decided it was going to be time to attempt my first 100-miler and try to earn my first buckle (yes, belt buckles are what you get for doing 100 miles).

I took the Friday off from work and met up with a group of Spartanburg folks who were doing the race. We enjoyed a breakfast in the parking lot of a gas station near the race site and once everyone collected together, we caravanned over to ensure our camp got to set up all in a row. 

Not loitering

Group HQ for the weekend

Our spot ended up being perfect - halfway through the loop (~2 of 4 miles), or about 100 yards off the beginning of the loop about 1/3 mile in, and right next to port-a-potties.

Pink star marks the spot

Everybody got tents set up and had some last minute snacks, then we headed to the start area to begin the adventure.

Sparkle crew

The first lap was nice and steady, but it was already starting to get warm. This was the first weekend of temperatures in the 80s and nobody was ready for it. 

Only on lap 1, 23+ to go

I wish I could remember which laps happened at what point. I know I continued until about 2 or 3 in the afternoon then decided to take a break for a while when the hottest part of the day rolled around. Did another lap or so before some more Spartanburg friends arrived (they had to work that day so arrived around dinner time) and brought pizza! Food and maybe a beer lap, then we established a group of about half dozen of us that continued through the dark hours of the night. I wanted to hit the halfway point (50 miles) before I took a break to sleep, but unfortunately that meant I didn't stop until about 5am. 

First half of laps

Crawled into my hatchback where I had my sleeping bag spread out and shut my eyes for a couple of hours. I would have liked to enjoy the early dawn hours to run when it's the coolest, but I needed more than just a short nap so I got back up around 7 to continue on. Got some breakfast at the start/finish area and did laps until about 1pm then took a long break of several hours to avoid the heat/sun. I was sunburned on my legs from Friday afternoon and felt like I had to avoid all of the harshest sun hours. 

Once the evening rolled around I got back out and did another session of long night hour laps in the dark. These got pretty miserable and my feet ached so badly. I also got a horrible blister on my left foot and had to stop for the night with 2.5 laps left to go. We did make a plan that, as a group, we would meet up at our camp for the final half lap in the morning. The target was to meet at about 9am, so I got up around 6 with the goal to do 2 laps before 9. Ended up having some food in the middle of those 2 laps and was delayed a bit, but made it to camp about 9:30 and then had plenty of time (about 90 minutes) to start the finish party. 

Once we finally had everyone gathered, we started the final half party lap with beers in hand and music playing. Basically danced our way to the finish line for the last 2 miles, picked up friends from other camps as we went along, and by the finish were hooting and hollering our victory!! This was probably THE most fun of the entire weekend and made allll the pain worthwhile. 

We crossed the line, celebrated with Fireball, and sat down for another meal. 

Ringing the bell with my shiny new buckle!

Sooooo tired but YAY

Yeah, I'll probably sign up for next year.... 

Things to catch up on...

Apparently the stress of being sick and training and recovering and doing too many things took the place of being able to keep up with this blog. Going to work backwards to recap a few events before they escape my brain!

Here's what's being updated (links to the back-dated entries will be added as I get the posts written):

• 3/14-3/15 GORUCK Bragg Tough & Basic (link)
• 3/8 Milliken Earth Run 5k
• 3/1 GORUCK Savannah St. Paddy's Day Basic
• 2/22 Greenville Half Marathon (link)
• 2/14 Lovers Lane 2-Mile with D
• 2/1 Green Valley 10-Miler

Update: as of early May, I have updated as much as I'm going to do. Will try to restart and be more consistent going forward!

GORUCK Bragg Tough & Basic

I spent the weekend of March 14-16th at Ft. Bragg in Fayetteville, NC. This event weekend is known as the "King of all rucks" and is considered to be a next-level difficulty from any other similar event. I've done a few Basics before (~5-6 hour challenge events) but this event was to be my first Tough (~12 hour challenge event). I'm not sure why I decided to pick a really difficult Tough to be my first one... go big or go home, I suppose??

Anywho, I only signed up a few weeks in advance and I knew I would be under-trained for the event. Most of my Q1 2025 focus has been on the Greenville Half Marathon, so it's been all about miles and speed. Strength work has been all but nonexistent and ruck miles have been minimal... usually paired with a casual dog walk. So, all that being said, I was hesitant to show up knowing I wouldn't be at my strongest. 

But I showed up anyway.

BRAGG TOUGH

14-MAR-25 2200H

I took the day off from work on Friday so I could drive up to Fayetteville (~4-4.5 hr drive) and it turned out to be quite a pleasant, uneventful drive. I allowed myself several hours of buffer time, planning to arrive mid-afternoon to an empty Air BNB that I was sharing with a half dozen other participants who were all doing the HTB (Heavy, Tough, Basic) that weekend. The Heavy wasn't scheduled to finish until 5 or 6 pm that evening, so I had a few hours to relax, nap briefly, take a walk around the neighborhood in the beautiful sunny 70-degree weather, and stretch the legs after the long drive. I ordered pizzas for the house so they'd have food when they got back and have a couple hours to regroup and be ready for the 10pm (yes, overnight) start of the Tough. 

I'll be honest, I was nervous as heck. I couldn't relax, couldn't really nap. I packed and repacked my bag several times. Changed my mind about what I was going to wear, what shoes I was going to use, how many layers to bring. 

The other participants in the house were all carpooling, but they did not leave early and we arrived with about 5 minutes to spare before the event was to start (YIKES). Still, gave me less time to stand around and be nervous on the site... just kind of had to show up and jump right in. 

I won't go into a lot of detail on the events of the night, but suffice it to say there was a LOT of heavy sandbag carrying and many many miles of rucking. We got divided into 12-person teams early in the night and from that point on we were in that team for the rest of the event. I had some really strong team members, including Allison ("08") who was incredibly kind and encouraging and helpful. I went through some dark "I don't want to do this anymore" moments in the 2-4am range, but once we finished a particularly difficult challenge, I had a 5 minute nap by the bonfire and the sun came up, I felt somewhat renewed. The best (??) part though was, after a few hours of doing trail work as our morning service project, we were gathered in formation and thought we were about to receive our patches. 

Cadre Chuy: *walks in front of formation with a stack of patches in his hand*

"Who's ready for some patches?"

*a few half-hearted "woo!"s from the group*

Cadre Chuy: 

*throws stack of patches on the ground*

"Psych. Follow me!"

And off we run around the complex behind a building that conveniently has hoses nearby. PT ensues (pushups, flutter kicks, dive-bombers, side-straddle hops) with hosing and cursing and such. The finisher? SUGAR COOKIES. Now that you're nice and wet, go roll in the sand piles and get covered head to toe. Leave no inch uncovered. 

The side-straddle hop! In cadence!

The flutter kick!

The pushup!

And NOW it's patch & beer time.

Not only completed the Tough, but received my "V" (five) Patch from Cadre Barbarossa for completing five events under his direction, one of which had to be a Tough. This dude is one of the real Cool Cats!

The Tough class

Patches & Beer

So, covered in mud/sand/sweat and arriving back at the Air BNB, I had just enough time to shower aaaaaand then...sign up for the Basic (which was to begin in approximately 90 minutes). 

BRAGG BASIC

15-MAR-25 1300H

So, having just rinsed all the sand out of my hair and dirt from my feet, I put on a fresh set of clothes, grabbed a few slices of cold pizza, packed my ruck back up, and headed back to the compound. The sun was out and it was warming up, but still a solid breeze kept the actual temperatures on the lower side. I'd been cold overnight, very thankful for the combination of polartec jacket and windbreaker, but this time opted for just a long sleeve tech shirt. It was just the right amount of coverage.

To begin with, right off the bat, we go from standing in formation doing introductions/admin stuff to "everybody run into this pond and do pushups". 

Listening to Cadre Dan in the People's Pond

Running out of the pond around the helicopter.

The rest of the afternoon was an interesting assortment of individual, partner, and team challenges. One of my favorite parts was actually just running a loop (~1.2 miles) with the rucksack. I felt super strong during this and was 17th out of 100 people to finish! 

I struggled in the later parts of the event with just being totally depleted strength-wise, but thankfully the team and partners were able to pick up (literally) whatever I couldn't. That's the great thing about these events, there's a team you can count on!

By the end of the event everyone was happy to get their patch and beer and settle down by the fire for War Stories & Beer (and pizza!).

Swamp Fox Ruck Club, represent!
(Greg, John, Cadre Fagan, me)

A weekend of hard work

I don't have any grand closing thoughts right now, but there will be more. 

Race Report: Greenville (Swamp Rabbit) Half Marathon

Ok this post is long overdue (being written in early May and back-dated) but I wanted to mark the occasion that I was able to achieve my goal of a PR in the half marathon and finally get a sub-1:40 time!!

It was chilly at the start and I was thankful for the throw-away sweatshirt I thrifted the week before. I wore it for about the first mile before I shed and tossed it. Was also late for my wave start... was in the port-a-potty line and couldn't hear the announcements, next thing I know I was wandering towards the start and looked at my watch... it was 7:02! Whoops. Thankfully it was a chip start and finish, so I just lined up with the Wave 2 starters and got on my way. 

I struggled to settle in to a comfortable pace in the early miles, but I also knew those miles would be some of the hillier ones and I shouldn't get too worried. Still, I wanted to stay on or ahead of target just in case the struggle got real in the final miles.

I stayed steady and knew I was on the mark for pretty much the whole race. The sun came out and it ended up being a beautiful time on the course!

Soooo proud of these splits... consistency and training!

🎉

Swamp Rabbit Half Training (Week 8 of 12)

Well, I went from a really strong week of training to... having the flu for most of a week and being in bed, not running at all, skipping a race, missing a birthday dinner, and just generally feeling sorry for myself. 😭

Boooooo flu

Monday

3.8 mi ruck 30#

MLK Jr day, holiday from work, solo day all to myself... Didn't want to run after the 2 hard weekend runs, so I thought I'd go for a nice aggressive ruck hike. Packed up and went to Nine Times Preserve, found a nice loop and started off... not a quarter mile in, I was dying from the pack weight and the steep, relentless climb. 

I swear it felt so much harder than this!

It was lovely with the frost on the ground and was good to be in the woods, but dang. I was exhausted by the end. 

Tuesday

6.2 mi @ 9:35/mi

Did a double loop on the XC course for 10k Tuesday because I still felt like I needed a break from the hard weekend. 

3.1 mi @ 9:55/mi

Snow Run at Rockers! 

Wednesday through Sunday

walks

...aaaaaand I'm sick. Sneezing, chills (fever), congestion, coughing. Probably flu. Yuck. Kept the step streak going with walks but that's all I did the rest of the week. I was SO SAD to miss the Snowbird 50k on Saturday 😭 but having a birthday coming up and bigger races in the near-term horizon, I needed to make smart (dammit) choices.