Stay Strong - Run Long

I have always said that you can have a great race, but there is no such things as "perfect" race, but this one was DAM close. I've written in length in the past how much I love the Dam to Dam. The 5k was my first ever race and the 20k was my first ever long distance race so there will always be a special place in my heart for it. Whenever I get the opportunity to speak to anyone about long distance racing, this is the place that I direct them. There are hundreds of races within 2 hours of Des Moines that are over the 10k distance but all of them pale in comparison (on the roads) to the Dam To Dam. Enough gushing about how much I love this race, on to the race report. This race has gotten so popular in the last couple of years that the window of opportunity to register is becoming slimmer and slimmer every year. Because I am just a person that needs to get signed up, the registration opened at 8:00 and I was registered by 9:00. No questions. Just did it. Now, Mrs.

"What a freaking day". These are the words I kept uttering to myself and to my pacer Byron as we very slowly approached the finish line of the Free State Trail Run 100k . It was an incredible day and an awful day mixed into one 14 hour and 45 minute stretch. One with dramatic highs and traumatic lows, but one that I won't soon forget, nonetheless. The decision to do the 100k started just days after the 2012 12 hour Equalizer . I missed my goal of 100k (or 62 miles) by 5 miles in the 12 hour event. I was obviously elated to have completed the 57 miles and had a great time with friends and family that were able to join me, but something was missing. The 5 miles has haunted me ever since that day in October. 5 miles. What if I would have drank more? Could I have done it? 5 miles equals one extra hour on the course. In the grand scheme of things, one hour doesn't seem like that much, but on that day it did. 5 miles and I would have been able to coin myself as a "

I sit here at my desk the morning after one of the biggest tragedies in marathon history with a heavy heart. Just to be clear, I was not there but I have "lived" it through Facebook, news articles, and my friends first hand accounts. My heart is heavy and I'm conflicted. On one hand I am ecstatic that all of the people that I know who were there are accounted for and OK physically. One friend of mine finished, literally, 3 minutes before the bomb went off. I had been watching her times on the feed all morning. She was having a rough day. I could tell from the times. When I saw her time come up as 4:06 I was relieved and filled with joy for what she had endured. Her times over the 26.2 miles were steadily getting slower so I was just happy she was able to finish. At that moment, I sent her a text message congratulating her as a "BOSTON FINISHER". She is our running club president and one to always return a text, always picks up the phone (even during a run) a