2010 10 29 ten finishes at superior sawtooth 100

Susan Donnelly Ultramarathon Trail Runner. Motivational Speaker. http://www.susanruns100s.com

Ten Finishes at Superior Sawtooth 100!

Date : October 29, 2010

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Crossing the bridge to the gravel road and finish number 10.

This was my 10th finish of this race. Of any race.

I’m still not sure how ten finishes happened so fast. The first one seems like yesterday but the finishes happened over the past twelve years.

Maybe it has something to do with being my favorite race. It was my first 100- miler and will always be at least my sentimental favorite.

Whatever, the finishes certainly didn’t happen as fast as they seemed. The took twelve years.

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I was injured one awful year, and the race was cancelled another so I’m incredibly grateful that both the race and I made it this far, through all life’s changes together.

How was this year’s race?

The short answer is “wonderful,” since I love being there no matter what. But on the realistic side, the cancellation of Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc meant I missed the “long run” I needed for running Superior well, got a month-and-a-half longer than planned, and walked into this race in less than stellar shape. While that’s a little disappointing, I love this place in a way I can’t explain – it’s like my soul is totally at home and at peace here. So just being here, regardless of the circumstances, renews me.

Peaceful morning on the trail.

And because it’s my familiar “home” course, I decided to take something I tried last year a step further. I wanted to focus on a mantra, as much as I could during the race that all the runners “be safe, happy, and peaceful.” It didn’t matter if I won or was last or didn’t finish at all, as long as I directed this toward everyone here. It definitely felt right and I was curious about trying it in a race, but it was also incredibly counterintuitive in a competitive situation. So I sat down, thought it out, and there wasn’t even a logical reason against it. No matter what else happened, this was ultimately something I wanted and at the very least, wouldn’t sharing the

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trail with happy runners make for a great day?

So on chilly race morning, race director Larry Pederson gave the start and we took off across the high bridge spanning Gooseberry Falls. I ran with Lynn Saari early on and then at different points with John Taylor, Molly Cochran, Dallas Sigurdur, Vigilio Regalado (all the way from Mexico!), Brad Birkholz, and Jason Husveth. I also got to see Mary Croft, Brian Poeppel, Maria Barton, and Jen and Zach Pierce at the aid stations.

The start!

As I ran, each mile reminded me of memories that had happened at this place and this one and this one‌ So many memories popped up, unbidden. I wanted to savor them all, even the tough ones. Some stayed for a moment and some lingered over the next hill and through the next grove of white birch. Between the memories, the company of friends, and my mantra, I was smiling inside and out.

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Good running today. Photo courtesy of Zach Pierce.

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Love this section.

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Rare, grassy field.

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And then there are the rocks...

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Great leaf color this year!

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One of the bridges.

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A loooong boardwalk along a beaver pond in twilight. Keep your balance!

The running went smoothly, under the bluest skies and best leaf color I’ve seen in a long time, at least until I arrived that night at Heidi’s Finland aid station. I had outrun my drop bags a bit (which is both good and bad) so my next to last drop bag was waiting here with my rain jacket inside. The weather forecast held the usual chance of rain at night but someone at an earlier aid station said the radar was clearing and chances had diminished. I was sorely tempted to leave my bulky rain jacket in the bag instead of lugging it all night to the next drop bag, several aid stations away. Hmm…what to do? I waffled and hung around for a moment, trying to decide. At the last minute, an impulse made me take it anyway on the reasoning that it wasn’t a horrible inconvenience and I’d rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it.

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Heidi presiding over the aid station.

That simple decision saved my race. Not long after leaving Finland, on my own, a light rain started, the kind that you know will let up any moment. I didn’t think much about it until it kept on past the casual drizzle stage and the temperature began to drop. That wasn’t forecasted but forecasts here rarely hold true in every nook and cranny along the trail. I finally gave up and put on the rain jacket but soon got so cold that it felt like I didn’t even have the jacket on. The cold became my single focus. It was fast growing from a discomfort into a problem and I needed to do something before it got worse and I lost options.

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Maria in the rain at the Crosby-Manitou aid station. The next section is a long one.

Options were already pretty limited. I was well into the middle of a long section and only had on shorts, a short-sleeved shirt, gloves, and a blue featherweight jacket tied around my waist that was soggy from hanging out below my rain jacket. The blue jacket was wet but was also the only layer I could add, so on a gamble I took off the rain jacket, zipped the wet blue jacket on over my T-shirt, and put the rain jacket back on with both hoods up. The combination was just enough of a barrier to keep me out of danger if I kept moving as fast as practical and lucked into enough hill climbs to keep warm.

The night ended up as one of the coldest I’ve been, certainly for the longest, in a 100, but after hours of numbing cold, dawn finally warmed things up enough to allow me to relax and let my mind wander on slightly longer leash. Judging by the light and my location, I might be ahead of last year’s pace and it might be possible to get to the Cramer Road aid station far enough ahead of the marathon start that I could see Cathy Drexler and Wade this year. Cathy was running the marathon and if I got there too late, I would miss seeing her like I did last year.

With a little work, I rolled into Cramer Road well ahead of the marathon to find Cathy, Wade, Cathy’s sister Joanne and even Carolyn Krampe, who was also running the marathon and who I also hadn’t seen in years. It was great! I stuck around and we talked and laughed, despite Larry Pederson’s frequent prodding for me to get moving before the marathon flooded the trail

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with runners.

Wade, Cathy, and Joanne.

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With Carolyn Krampe.

He had a valid point. It wasn’t much fun at 74 miles to get passed on single track trail by a bunch of Red Bulled marathoners in their first couple of miles. In the back of my mind, race instinct tried for a come-back by complaining that I was frittering away a valuable bank of time standing there talking but I know my priorities. I didn’t want it to be years before I saw any of them again. Time with “long lost” friends easily trumped a difference in finish time that doesn’t matter anyway. The best life, for me anyway, isn’t about some number.

So when Cathy and Carolyn left to line up for their race, I finally (and stiffly) left the aid station, trying to put as much distance between me and the marathon start as possible. Unfortunately, my legs loosened up but simple parts of the trail stayed unusually hard.

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Beautiful running.

This wasn’t normal. I thought through my causal tree and finally identified the likely culprit – the night had been so cold I hadn’t drank much and was now dehydrated. I knew better but had been careless, so now my heart was working overtime to do things (including digest the solid food I ate back at the aid station) my tired legs would still have been happy to do. There wasn’t much to do about it midway between aid stations except keep moving as best as possible and plan on drinking extra at the next aid station.

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And beautiful rivers.

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Running beside Cross River.

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It rained so much that the trail turned into a stream.

While I was struggling along, the tidal wave of marathoners came rushing by and all available focus switched to surviving upright on the narrow trail while these faster, fresher runners blew by. I can usually keep up with the back of the pack marathoners, but not today.

Once they were mostly by and I got some water at the next aid station, things headed back to normal. It takes a while to dig out of a dehydration hole, but I’d get there and I was so happy to still be running on the trail in a brand-new morning that I had to grin. Happiness more than outweighed tiredness and tight muscles.

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More graceful trail.

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The upper reaches of dramatic Temperance River.

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Photo at the bridge over Temperance, courtesy of Cathy Drexler.

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So happy to be here! Photo courtesy of Zach Pierce.

Miles of familiar trail rolled by but the immensity of ten finishes, along with everything that had happened in my life over those years, didn’t hit me until the very last section. I was passing three female hikers and they asked which race I was running – the marathon or 100. I happily replied “100,” and almost followed with “this is my tenth one” when out of nowhere it hit me. I started tearing up (which makes it hard to breathe – not recommended). I never set out with “x finishes” in mind, it just happened because I love running this race. Somehow, the race and this trail always give me way more than I put into it and it’s been a rock-solid touchstone when everything else is shifting sand. The journey to this moment has been blissful and depressing and everything in between, and I was overwhelmed now to have been able to enjoy something so special to me, so often.

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Brian Poeppel at the next to last aid station.

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The weather's clearing for a gorgeous day.

Sooner than I wanted, I turned onto the last downhill and found myself closing fast on the end of the trail. The gravel road came into sight at the end of the trail and I was saying a mental thanks and farewell to the trail for another year when Cathy Drexler stepped into the trail. She had finished her marathon and come back out to run my tenth finish in with me. I couldn’t have imagined a better way to do it. Cathy’s one of few people who’s been here since I have and loves this race like I do. Injuries prevented her from running the 100 the past several years and I’d missed her. This was the perfect surprise and the perfect antidote to any impending postrace blues, like a long-delayed family reunion.

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Caribou River, the crossing that signals the end. The finish is at the green-roofed lodge on the upper left.

Talking with her made the gravel road disappear and the next thing I knew we turned the corner at the lodge to see Larry and Colleen waiting ahead. I was done. It was over, just like that.

I couldn’t wait to start ten more.

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With RDs Colleen and Larry Pederson at the finish.

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Another finisher's jacket. Can't believe I'm done.

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Got to see Steve Krampe at the finish.

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Hanging out with Lynn at the finish.

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Brad Birkholz and John Taylor.

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One more shot of Cathy and Wade and the finish. Next year!

Questions As finishers and crews talked, ate, and waited for others to finish, I got a lot of questions about my tens finishes, so I thought I’d include a sample to close this out.

You live in Tennessee – why travel up here for a race?

Long story. A good friend and I talked our parents into sending us to Sweden on an exchange in high school and I fell in love with the landscape. Years later, I briefly dated a guy in Minneapolis, which didn’t work out but gave me something much, much better – Minnesota.

It’s so like Sweden, I loved it immediately. Since I was running marathons, I started running Grandma’s Marathon each year but when the marathon experience didn’t do it for me anymore, I started running ultras and gave up Grandma’s.

I knew I’d never be content until I’d run a 100 miler, so after a year of shorter ultras, I looked for one in Ultrarunning magazine and lo and behold, spotted Superior 100, about four months away. That was it. I had to try it and there was just enough time to maybe train for it and figure out how to run 100 miles. Plus, if I didn’t finish, it was far enough out of my geographic location (pre-Internet) that none of my running friends would know!

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In that first race, we started in a thunderstorm and with all the roots so slippery, I ended up pulling the muscles in the back of both knees so badly that I had to walk and shuffle the last 30 or so miles…but no way was I not finishing. In spite of the pain, I loved it and loved being out there. I was hooked.

Which was your toughest finish?

I’ve never thought about it that way, but probably the year following several major deaths and upheavals in my life. You can train your body all you want but if your soul is tired and need to heal, it doesn’t matter.

Which year was your best?

Not really one. They’re all treasures that make me smile.

What’s changed over the years?

In the first years I ran it, we had to divert onto the nearby highway for five miles because the Superior Hiking Trail Association didn’t have an easement across a segment of private property. It was a necessary evil so I coped by memorized the creek crossings and town signs so I’d know when I was approaching the welcome turn back on to trail. One year, we ran the road in the rain with 18-wheelers slinging rocks up from their tires as the sped by at 60 mph+ in the next lane. A rock hit next to my eye so I started looking down whenever a vehicle neared.

That section taught me I could grit my teeth and push my way through parts of a course that weren’t…my best “skill set.”

We start lower down the shore now (Gooseberry Fall State Park instead of Silver Bay) and in the portion of trail where old and new courses overlap, we run some old day sections at night now, and vice versa.

The first incarnation finished in Grand Marais, a place I’m grateful the race introduced me to, and the last downhill was an absolute killer. After running 98 or 99 miles, you thought you were due a coast into the finish, but instead were faced with a steep rock staircase of narrow footholds that descended forever. I love downhills but this one was tough by anyone’s standards and absurdly hilarious coming at the end of the race.

There was also the section from Cascade River to County Rd 45 we hit in the dark wee hours of the morning. The Cascade River park building aid station would have at least one forlorn body lying somewhere on a bench, but also had someone making hot oatmeal, which I looked forward to for miles. Leaving there, the trail to County Rd 45 teetered along narrow, two-plank boardwalks that were always-wet and slanted like crazy off the side of the cliff we were (supposedly) running along…in the dark. One slip and you’d have a good shot at a broken bone or impalement. I was always amazed (and weirdly delighted) we were allowed to run that and would love to see it again sometime. At the end of the section, the guys in the RV at County Road 45 were always waiting in their camp chairs under the awning, cooking the best egg and

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hash brown breakfast imaginable, like an oasis of comfort food.

There also used to be a remote aid station manned by ham radio operators that I’d hit in the dark or early morning. Sometimes there would be a body or two in the cots and sleeping bags, sometimes not, but after hours in the dark by myself, it was always reassuring to hear the generator a few miles ahead and know I was nearing this small outpost in the woods.

We also used to do the loop around Oberg Mountain, and I can still recognize the exact spot after this loop where I turned my headlamp on each year.

There didn’t use to be a marathon but there was a 50-miler directed by another RD and started/finished so we never saw them on the trail.

One year the race was re-organized as an out-and-back. I hated losing the ability to see 100 miles of that trail and that sense that you’re going somewhere, and lobbied hard to keep it pointto-point. There were only a couple of point-to-point trail 100s at the time so it was a great asset of the race. Still, I’d rather run 50 miles of the trail than none and things always look a little different on the way back.

I swear I still remember the old course better than the new one!

What have you seen on the trail?

Besides the tons of great scenery, I’ll never forget seeing moose tracks in the trail firmly imprinted over the footprints of the runner ahead of me early in the morning after the old Bally Creek aid station. Also, turning my head at night one year and seeing a moose eye reflected in my headlamp but being so tired and sleepy I thought an overzealous hunter was using driveway reflectors as markings. Saw a pair of beavers this year, for the first time in the race. There are also sometimes bald eagles wheeling in the sky. Mice scurrying across the trail. Nighthawks swooping through my headlamp beam. Leaves turning if you’re lucky…

This is where I started my ritual of stopping somewhere in the middle of the night, turning off my headlamp, and staring up. The stars are incredible, well worth a few moments of looking, though I and Leonard Martin are the only ones out of a group of friends to miss seeing the northern lights one year.

It’s often just as much what I hear. The jackpot is hearing wolves at night, when I prefer to run alone. Their howls are so unlike coyote yips and so wild that hearing it always gives me a rush, and it has never bothered me to be out there alone with them. I also listen for owls, and occasionally hear a great grey owl, something I never hear in Tennessee.

Anything else you remember?

The people. I think there was at least one year where Cathy and I were the only women running it (back in the Stone Age). Then there was the 80-plus degree year where I found

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Steve Krampe suffering and about to drop in the in the Sugarloaf aid station, and coerced him into running on, only to have him pass and beat me. Those early years hanging out at the finish with the small band of finishers were special, watching others finish while sharing pizza and Johnny Gooch’s excellent home brew. I love the finish line now but those those were good times – before, during and after the race. A lot of laughing and fun with that small, intimate group of mostly regulars.

One other change that’s nice is that I can’t breeze through aid stations now because there are so many friends volunteering at the aid stations. Even crews I recognize. I don’t want to miss seeing anyone and I’d rather say “hi” than grab something and go.

Anyone special?

Last, but absolutely, certainly not least, the race directors who sacrificed their own time and energy (and probably money) to put on the race and made it possible for me to get ten finishes.

Larry and Colleen Pederson (and family) who take excellent care of us these days, and to Darlene and Brian Poeppel (and family), whose friendship has been one of the enduring treasures of running this race for so many years. I was always grateful for them taking on this somewhat thankless task, but even more so now that I direct a race. For anyone who quibbles about the layout of a course or the food or the support or whatever, try directing a race of this magnitude and length. It’s a heck of a lot of work. Until you walk a mile in that RD’s shoes, you have no grounds for complaint. I only direct an out-and-back 50k, and believe me, the logistics of staging a point-to-point 100-miler make me wonder in awe.

Any funny stories?

Probably the funniest is about my first one. I wanted to get ready for the awards party in town after the race and since my legs were incredibly stiff and the backs of my knees out of service, I jumped in the hotel’s hot tub for 20 minutes or so to loosen up so I could walk. I made it through the post-race dinner still pretty stiff and sore, but woke the next morning to find one leg swelled up so much from the knee down that I got a bonus trip to the Grand Marais ER the next day. My boyfriend and I got to the small local hospital 5 minutes away and were searching for the ER, but there weren’t many people around, just a guy pushing some wheeled equipment in the opposite direction. He hardly registered in our determination to get to the ER. That is, until we learned that he had been pushing the mobile x-ray machine that they needed to scan my elephantine leg for a blood clot. By missing him, we ended up driving the two hours down to Duluth, chasing the x-ray machine, waiting in a much bigger hospital, and driving two hours back north again to Grand Marais early the next morning with a clean bill of health but a whopping load of sleep deprivation. We had to delay our plans to spend the week after the race canoeing the Boundary Waters, though we still managed a little of it. Lesson learned? ICE after a race, not heat!!!

These days, the bulk of the decorations in my office come from this race – Larry’s awesome wordwork, my five-year buckle and the crystal wolves from my win at my fifth finish are favorites.

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It seems like a silly passion at times but I love it, so why not?!?

Wow, my ten-year award, a table hand-made by Larry Pederson with my times engrav

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