My first attempt at doing an ultramarathon distance running event will have to wait, as the race director has informed us that the officials in the town and county in which our event is being held have told him that he cannot have the event at this time. In a world that has been overrun by a virus that no one really knows enough about, caution must be exercised to avoid a fate worse than the pandemic that has already been declared.
The race director has given us a ray of hope, however, by informing us that the race isn’t canceled but rather postponed until late October. That made me feel a lot better about this dumb running event because I wasn’t really prepared for it as I would have liked. After overdoing it in the fall with an Ironman, a marathon, and a couple of local road races in a span of a month and a half, I needed to give my 56-year-old legs a break rather than continue to beat them up. I had created an ultra training plan and then kept editing it down in mileage after my persistent leg injury just wouldn’t heal. I finally got it down to what was similar to a marathon training plan, but I was still cutting runs short and running slower to make sure that I could at least get to the starting line of this dumb idea. After going up to Beloit and running three loops of the course I felt pretty good about having a good chance of at least reaching my goal of getting over 50K.
So maybe I might be better off running the race in the fall and take advantage of a full summer of training. But then I checked the calendar and see that the new race date falls on October 23, 2020, twelve days after Ironman Louisville. At first, I thought that the new race date might be too close to the Ironman for me to have enough time to recover, but I think I might be alright. My current plan is to now train for the Ironman for the next 30 weeks since I have made it my “A” race, and then take the days leading up to the ultramarathon event very easy or off and show up being adequately prepared. One thing I have learned about Ironman training is that it will get me ready for anything.
See you in October for the Big Hill Bonk – Last Runner Standing!
an amazing run 