I could title this part six.

Six times I’ve lined up at Leadville to race the Leadman/Leadchallenge race series.

Six times I haven’t completed the entire series in alloted cut-offs.

For those of you unfamiliar with the series of races: they start at the end of June in Leadville, Colorado (elevation 10119’) with a marathon, followed a week later by a fifty mile run (or bike), a month later by a hundred mile mountain bike, a 10k run and a week later by a hundred mile run.

That is a lot.

That’s a lot for someone in their twenty’s or thirties, it’s even more for a master’s athlete. You barely recover from a marathon then on to a fifty-mile run, recover, train a bit more and on to a hundred mile bike and 10K run, really try recover and on to a hundred mile run. (I am laughing at the absurdity of it all).

To catch you, up I wrote about this last fall when I DNF’d for the fifth time.

I have finished the run twice (both times hours before the cut-off) and made it to the finish line fifteen-minutes after the cut-off on the hundred-mile bike. But, finishing the entire series under the cut-offs has alluded me.

This year was no different and like always there are still things that I am learning and taking away.

Where there is failure there are always golden nuggets.

Find the Positives

I shed a tear almost immediately after the races, who wouldn’t? But I was comforted when I looked for and found the positives. That’s how I’ve trained my brain - always look for the gold nuggets. Any sport psychologist or mental performance coach will tell you this.

What worked?

What were your strengths here?

What did you learn about yourself?

Here are some positives that stood out for me:

I’m persistent, some would say stubborn. I don’t give up easily. Even in the face of continued failure and adversity. Persistence is a key trait of grit. Develop it.

I’ll keep getting back up. Even when I knew the cut-off was coming I kept pushing it. On the bike I made it through two cut-offs with seconds to spare. I relish that feeling of coming in at the wire. That was unbelievably fun.

I learned a ton the past two years from my coach Maddison Russell on training and racing on the bike. This has been invaluable.

I can ‘turn it on’ when it comes to focus on descents, I felt so much more comfortable going down the major technical descents of the hundred mile bike. There’s confidence and efficacy building.

I learned I CAN do a fifty-mile run the week after a marathon, whoa. My legs felt no worse for the wear.

I learned that I’m really comfortable just grinding it out all day. Keeping my head up and just moving forward.

I learned that I move really well through aid stations without a lot of crew and support. Crew needs to match their athletes demeanor. If you’re a mellow person, then the crew needs to be mellow. Less is more for me. Match the athlete’s personality.

Looking at the results of the race it was incredible to see nine men in my age group finish the race series. Seven of those men ran the hundred run under twenty-nine hours, three of them under twenty-five hours. Two of them road the hundred mountain bike under nine hours! That’s amazing! Six of them under eleven hours. This race series is possible even as you get a bit older.

Why do I point this last piece as a positive? (oh no you’re comparing! Guess what! Comparing is okay if you don’t get hooked on the unhelpful rules - the shoulds and the musts “I should be like this.” Comparing here gives me hope and efficacy. Seeing others my age get it done not only inspires me, it fuels me with the confidence that I’m not chasing the impossible. If others did it, I certainly, eventually, can. It’s in how you look at…

Self-Compassion and Self-Acceptance

Reflect on the reality of the challenge.

This race series is hard. It’s really hard.

Like a lot of ultraendurance athletes we tend to normalize what we do.

When did running a hundred miles become a normal every task? Add a hundred mile bike ride and fifty mile run to that and the task becomes immense. Those aren’t normal every day tasks, even running a marathon isn’t a normal everyday task! However, normalizing it is easy to do when you surround yourself with ultraendurance athletes every day and also work with, and associate with, the best coaches in the business. I do this for a living, so it’s easy to see how it becomes normal in our minds.

Making my way through Outward Bound feeling great.

Add age and lack of experience on the bike to the picture and the challenge becomes daunting.

Even Rob Krar and Dave Mackey, some of the best ultrarunners in the world, didn’t finish this race series. Nor did more than half of those that started. The reality is, is that this is extremely hard to accomplish even for the best of the best. There so many things in this race series that has to go right to make it work

Stress

I tell this to every athlete and I’m no acception: stress is stress. Addmittingly, the past year has seen an increase in personal stressors I won’t dive into here. That increase has caused difficulty sleeping and less tolerance to higher training load. Add COVID and an injury to the mix then there are some HUGE stressors. It’s essential to address those in training. While for the most part we can adapt to different stressors in our lives and they may not impact your training, many stressors together add up.

Could I have defered to another year, possibly, but there’s no guarantee that stressors won’t be there in another year.

I could have managed the stressors better. I could have brought out all the relaxation and self-care tools. Set boundaries and mixed up the training a bit more, and take more rest days. Like a lot of athletes’s I’ll follow my coaches training to the T’ which isn’t necessarily a good thing, sometimes taking a break or switching things up is not just necessary but essential. Listen to your body. Actively seek out relaxation and recovery strategies, make them a part of regimen instead of something you’ll get too.

Evaluate Your Why

Why the heck this race? What about it that interests you so much? There are bigger challenges out there, why this one? It really comes down to the love of the area, proximity to home the history and ultimately the challenge. I love chasing big goals. This is fun.

Take a Break from it

Grin and bear it. Time was ticking at Hope Pass and the leg's weren't moving.

While I’m not sure if I’m ready to move on, nor am I absolutely sure that I won’t be doing this next year... I haven’t given up hope that I can do this. I’m giving myself plenty of time to think about it. I don’t plan on structured training for at least three weeks and even then I don’t want to think about it. I want to go out and have fun. Climb mountains, ride long distances without the concern for ‘training.’ Get on some adventures with family and friends and live. If I do train it’s going to be flexible which I believe is essential.

You have to give your self a break, not just physical but mental. Put a pause on it. Step away. Three weeks or three months. It doesn’t matter. If you’re working out for fitness you won’t lose a lot. (Just listen to this podcast I did with Jason Koop and Adam Ferdinanson several weeks ago).

Summary

Look for the positives and what you learned from the experience. They’re always there.
Self-acceptance and self-compassion are essential. Acknowledge the reality. You’re trying extremely hard things that most humans don’t do. That’s AMAZING!
Acknowledge the load. Stress is stress and when you’re doing a feat that requires a lot to go right, added stress can mess with that. So many things have to go right during the race series and during the build.
Evaluate your why, look at why you’re doing this. Is it about the belt buckles or is it about the intrinsic reward of doing hard things?
Take a break from it. Get off the bus. Take look around and smell the flowers. Then get back on when you’re ready.

If you’re getting hooked and pushed around by your most recent race reach out to me, here. I’m a mental performance coach and LOVE to help ultrarunners get to the next level.

Lessons Learned: Figuring Out Failure Part II