Did it last year. Have fun and let us know how you made out!

Oh my lord that race looks so freaking epic. I must do that eventually :)

Have an amazing race! My advice on courses like that is always go as hard as you can whenever it is even a bit runnable, because you'll have plenty time to recover when rappelling down cliffsides :) Post a report afterward too!

---

------
David Roche
"The Happy Runner" book: https://www.amazon.com/...Longer/dp/1492567647
Coaching: https://swaprunning.com/

I'm surprised you haven't done it yet. Seems right up your alley!

I'll try to pontificate as eloquently as you in my RR. But I certainly won't be in any contention for the W. Either way, it's going to be epic. This might even surpass AmZof in the Suffering:Dollar ratio.

Yes, I'm in, but I trashed my back 2 weeks ago over training after a 4 year layoff. I'll see how it feels Sunday morning. I hope to at least walk it and treat it as a long day of vertical.

True story about Escarpment - I did it in 2009. It was so hard that I entered 2010 Ironman Lake Placid so that I would have something easier to do that weekend the following year and not have to return to Escarpment. It's that hard.

---

2015 American Zofingen Du is May 17.
R.I.P. Chris Gleason

Not AmZof long course. Still the hardest thing I ever did.

---

2015 American Zofingen Du is May 17.
R.I.P. Chris Gleason

Umm...is now an appropriate time to start freaking out?

Yes, especially with the chance of T-storms Sunday. Dying is a real possibility up there.

---

2015 American Zofingen Du is May 17.
R.I.P. Chris Gleason

Hey MSU tri - fellow Spartan doing the "race" Sunday too. I did it last year. Remember what happened to Devon Gardner last October in East Lansing - you will feel like that. Go Green!

Bucket list. But the website alone is daunting. I've since heard ML, and now JM, say how hard it is. I'm not sure I'll ever man up.

Best of luck. Weather looks good so at least you have that going for ya!

Can't wait. Self-inflicted endurance-related pain is the best kind there is.

You're going to do amazingly! Make friends with suffering, and you'll never be alone :)

---

------
David Roche
"The Happy Runner" book: https://www.amazon.com/...Longer/dp/1492567647
Coaching: https://swaprunning.com/

It's not self-inflicted so much as inflicted by the thousands of rocks you traverse. Honestely, the downhills are significantly worse than the uphills. First uphill of Windham is actually really fun. The ascent of Blackhead is also really fun in the sense that it is insane - check out the video on mountainpeakfitness.com. I must say that I had zero fun on the downhills however and last bit seemed to go on forever.

Yea, I hiked up to North Point about a month ago and realized that I would be running down that section of the trail at the end of the race and then started to get a little scared for my ankles, knees, and face (I'm too pretty to bash it into a rock).

Any tips on nutrition? I'm planning to bring a handheld bottle with HEED and some GU. I have a Camelbak and a nathan waist belt too, but I think the handheld will be most versatile.

You need both hands for this race, so I would advise against the hand-held. I wore a Nathan vest and just put a bottle of coconut water in it, and with that and drinking lots at the aid stations, I did not get dehydrated. I had all kinds of other issues including screaming quads and a really slow race compared to almost everyone else, but I don't think I was dehydrated. Especially going up Blackhead, you need 2 hands and on the descents you need 2 hands.

yea, I ran the Mt. Greylock Half with a Nathan belt and it was ok, but the bottles kept on bouncing out on the descents. So, while I'm sure your warning about the hand-held is valid, I think I might try to just flip it around and carry it on the backside of my hand if I need to climb on all fours.

how did you make out? Pretty cool race, huh.

Very cool race. I made it out of the woods without any cuts, broken bones, or even without falling (maybe I wasn't running hard enough?)

3:45:38, 26th Overall and 15min faster than I expected, so I was really happy with it. The constant stress of breaking my ankles may have been worse than the actual pain of the race though!

And the handheld bottle worked out very well, almost better than I expected. The Camelback bottles have a nice feature that seals the bottle by twisting a little flange on the lid. When it was sealed, I could still use my hands on the rocks without squirting water out of the bottle.

Wow - great job! I was hours behind you carefully picking my way down the mountain. Dreamed of jagged rocks last night. Not sure how the heck to go fast down hills on that course.

Nice job! That was about the same time I went my first time at ETR also.

Sure makes the trails at AmZof seem pretty tame by comparison, eh?


PS - Gotta give a shout-out to my buddy Bruce, who set a massive PB at the ripe young age of 50, going 3:20, good for 8th OA!

---

float , hammer , and jog

Thanks Murphy'sLaw! Now if only I could learn to drink like you :)

It was definitely tame by comparison. I couldn't imagine running that trail after biking. I don't even think I took more than 20 consecutive strides on decent trail the entire time. But it was still incredible.

I actually managed to get a RR up in a decent time after this race, if anybody cares to read it. http://finnnder.blogspot.com/...30k-race-report.html