Dick Collins fire trail 50 mile race 2011

So here we are. My first Blog.

Okay well let me just tell you a little about myself. I'm a 54 year old massage therapist raising a 15 year old son. I work from home and have been involved in the world of holistic health for over 20 years. I quit drinking over 23 years ago, I quit smoking cigarettes 10 years ago, and I have tried to live a healthy life all this time.However, one day I saw a photo taken of me without my shirt on. I was shocked when I saw myself. I could not believe what had happened. How did I get so out of shape?
Well I had to do something, and I had to do something right away. First thing I did was to do a "cleanse". And yes I did the "Master cleanse". I did it for 10 days followed by 5 days of reintroducing real food back into my diet, and not just the same old crap that I had been eating. I lost 13 pounds and started eating healthy organic food, if I ate meat I ate grass fed beef, and I stopped eating anything with High Fructose corn syrup.

So what does all this have to do with running, much less running the Dick Collins fire trail 50 mile race? Everything. I started eating right and started feeling better, which in turn gave me the energy to run the five blocks to the coffee shop down the street. I was so tired when I got there, and as I walked home, I thought what if tomorrow I run to the coffee shop and then run down the six or so blocks to the beach, and then I could walk home from there. And that's just how it happened. Blocks turned into miles which turned into 5 miles, which got me thinking maybe I could run 10 miles. Once I ran 10 miles the old bucket list came out. You know the list with the, I'd like to run a marathon some day,- right! Like that was ever going to happen. But I ran the 10 miles and I found a little voice inside that said " What do you think Paul? You got what it takes?".  I started all this last year, just before my 53 birthday which is in June. In August, 2010 I ran my first Marathon up in Santa Rosa. Running a marathon changes you forever, but  I knew that if I didn't have a goal, an up coming race, that I might just end-up sitting on the couch watching TV or something. I'm weak like that. I have to trick myself into doing things I don't like. So I ran the Fresno marathon, followed by the Oakland marathon and..... What! Did I say I hate running. You heard me. I never liked running. Running hurts. It takes a lot of time and I was never very good at it. So I trick myself into running by registering for the next race. If I pay for it I have to train for it.

That's how I found trail running. I needed a run and the only thing I could find was a trail run. I had never run a trail run so I said "Okay I'll try a 13 mile trail run". OMG as they say. I was so taken by the experience that I was hooked. I loved it. I had never done anything so hard, so thrilling. I felt like I was part of - part of the whole. The whole one with the cosmos thing. That one trail run was all it took. I was hooked and there was no turning back. One trail run turned into a 30k which turned into a 50k, (The Ohlone wilderness 50k trail run) fallowed by my second 50k. It wasn't long before the 50 mile run had to be tackled. Marin Headland 50 miler was my first. Finished in 13 hrs 12 sec.

If you run a 50 mile trail run, you are sure to start thinking about a 100 mile run. You starting thing about western state, about qualifying. That means running 50 miles in under 11 hours, and that brought me to Sierra Nevada 50 mile endurance run. I thought I might be able to run this race in under 11 hours. It had less climb then my last race and most of it looked sort of flat, but there was the heat to deal with. And it kicked my butt. I was pulled out of the race at mile 40, when I failed to make the 5 o'clock cut off. I don't know how it happened, but did I learned a very important lesson. That is, I have to worry about the cut off times then I can worry about finishing under 11 hours.

Which is how we got here at the Dick Collins Fire Trails 50 mile race. I had to finish a 50 mile run before the cut off time of 13 hours.  I did. 12:27:43