The Pulse Endurance Run

I've done some crazy races and physical challenges, but at the end of each one of them I've always thought the same thing; "That did not destroy me like I thought it would." Some did me in physically, some more mentally, but I was never to the point where I knew what it felt like to be destroyed, at my limit, totally spent. I finally found out!

I've had a lot of people ask me why I've never attempted a 100 miler. To be honest, I couldn't handle the anxiety of that. The months leading up to a big race, my anxiety is usually through the roof. I needed something with less pressure to see what I could physically handle. Our friend Dan told us about a timed event in Boise call the Pulse Endurance Runs. I did a little research, realized it would be perfect, signed up, and then went about talking it up so other people would sign up with me. 😂 Suffering is always more fun with friends! Seven of us Idaho Falls Trail Runners went over to do it. 

The Pulse Endurance Run is a series of timed races that takes place at Eagle Island State Park near Boise. You run a 2.8 mile looped course as many times as you can for the duration you signed up for. Running in loops sounds miserable, but it ended up being great. You run right by the aid station, and your crew area so often that you don't have to wear a pack or even carry anything with you. It was a huge morale boost every time we rounded the corner and saw our canopy and crew members. Mark, Steph, and I did the 24 hour race, and Jen, Joyce, Cheryl, and Larissa did the 12 hour race. It was a great weekend!

Sometimes when we post about our races on social media, it seems like it's all sunshine and roses. Trust me, it's not! I'm gonna be very real in this blog post, and walk you through what this event was really like through me eyes. Distance running is not a glamorous sport, so be prepared to hear about the color of my pee, and my emotional meltdowns. 😅 

We left Idaho Falls on Friday morning to make the 4 hour drive to Boise. We went straight to Eagle Island to set up. We had the BEST area! We set up two canopies, and a tent that had everything we could have possibly needed (except for a hot tub, and that would have been nice). Steph's blackout tent was perfect for changing clothes, and it had a cot in it for our runners or crew to take naps if needed. The canopies also had cots, chairs, tables full of food, all of our supplies, and even a motivation station. We even lit them up at night! It was the best to round the corner and see our little glowing area through the dark hours.

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Setting up and checking in!

Jen and Shaunie setting up a canopy.

Steph getting her tent all ready.

Mark even ordered us an IFTR flag so people would know we came from across the state.

Bailey was on her spring break, so she spent the day with us. She was in charge of the banner, and when she held it up for us to read, we were DYING! 😂 We were laughing so hard!

That's better! 

Here's our cute area!

This was 30 minutes till race time! Things were getting real!
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These people are truly as rad as they come!

Our start time was Friday at 6:00 PM. Even our 12 hour runners opted for the night race.

I took a picture of the trail on the first couple laps, because I knew it would be dark soon, and once it got light again, pictures would be pretty far from my mind.

We had a big white board hanging in our canopy to keep track of our progress. It was so nice to be able to keep track of how all of our runners were doing, and know when they reached their goals. Every loop Bailey, Shaunie, or Eric would update our mileage, time, and how many laps we did.

We had a board where we could write notes to each other, and our crew would switch out the motivational quotes every couple hours. It was fun to read the board for a little 'pick me up' each time we went past.

We were only running for a couple hours when the sun started setting.

I wanted to run pretty consistently for at least a 50k. We stopped for food and drinks at our station, but otherwise Mark and I didn't walk and just kept a nice steady pace. We hit our marathon distance somewhere around 10:45 PM. We were both feeling great!

The race ordered pizza for the runners late on Friday night.  Mark enjoyed that! 😂 My non-runner and road runner friends are probably thinking, "You actually eat pizza during your race!?!" Yes! We are out there for a lonnnnng time, so we need real food. They also had quesadillas, spaghetti, soup, bacon, pancakes, egg burritos, ramen noodles, etc...

The race was timed perfectly with the full moon. It was cloudy a lot of the night, but when it came out, it was awesome!

We reached the 50k mark around midnight. Mark and I were cruising the beginning! I always just run by how I feel, and I felt good! Don't worry, there is still plenty of time for me to crash and burn later. At this point, we were WAY ahead of our schedule. 

Once we hit the 50k distance, we were starting to feel the stiffness. Mark decided he needed to walk a loop. I walked with him for a mile, but then got antsy and decided to start running again. I wanted to get as many miles in as I could while my body was still feeling good. I noticed that I had been running for over 6 hours already and I hadn't peed yet, nor did I have to. That was a little bit concerning, but I have run that far lots of times before without peeing. I was making sure I stopped at our station every single loop, and I was drinking lots of water, and having electrolytes. There was nothing else I could do, so I didn't worry too much about it.

I ran alone for a lot of the night. This was basically my view for hours! I had a kick butt playlist that I was jamming out to, and I was really feeling great! 

Mark and I ended up together off and on for the rest of the race.  We celebrated our 50 mile mark together at 4:45 in the morning. We were tired, but honesty feeling beyond thrilled with how things were going at this point. This was officially new territory for Mark, because he had now surpassed his farthest previous distance (R2R2R of the Grand Canyon).

We knew we were so far ahead of our schedule, and only needed 20 more miles to reach our event goal. Even if we tanked big time, we knew we would have PLENTY of time to reach it. That's a good feeling that carried us through a lot more miles.

At 7:30 in the morning (13.5 hours into the race), I reached the farthest I had ever gone. That's a great feeling! I was tired, but the sun was coming up, and Bailey had just got there to be our pacer, so I rallied!

Half way through the race you are aloud to have a pacer out on the course with you. I had run a lot of the night hours by myself, and I was starting to feel it. I was so excited when Bailey showed up. I still had some run left in me, so I had her do a lap with me where she timed me for 3 minutes of running and 1 minute of walking. Mark and I had done that together for a couple laps, and it works out well. Gives your mind something to focus on and makes the laps go by faster. In case anyone is wondering, I had been running for almost 14 hours and still hadn't peed. Not great!

Seeing the sun come up was just what I needed!

When we signed up for this madness, Mark and I had a goal to make it 70 miles in the 24 hours. I reached that goal at about 10:20 AM. Part of me was thrilled beyond belief, because now I was pretty sure I could get 80 miles. Part of me was totally dreading the thought of now getting 80 miles. It was kind of like my body was telling me, "You just reached your goal, so now I'm gonna fall apart." From this moment on, I started feeling EVERY SINGLE STEP! I can honestly say that I stayed in pretty good spirits, because I'm a pretty positive person, but at this point I started falling apart a little bit emotionally.

The moment my watched showed 70 miles!

This is the first time I sat down in the race. My goal was achieved, so I gave myself a minute to regroup and get my wits about me. I was starting to get dizzy and light headed each time I stopped. I was still eating little bits, but the thought of food was starting to sound repulsive.

Meanwhile, Mark was still steadily working toward his 70 mile goal.
Sidenote: Mark has surgery scheduled in a week. His tendon detached from his bicep. Durning the race, his arm and hand swelled up huge! He had to undo his watch. It had gone down a lot by the time I was with him again to take a picture. 😳

Mark, Steph, and I all ended up at the canopy at the same time, so we decided to take a picture together while we were all still alive.

This is what we really felt like. 😂

This is one of my favorite pictures from the race. Soooooo much truth to it!

Bailey updated the quote board right when I knew I would need them most.

Bailey, Mason, and I were all with Mark when he reached his 70 miles. It was an emotional moment, but I tried not to let myself go there yet, because I knew we still had 5.5 hours to be out there.

A year ago, Mark was still adamant that he would never go more than a 50k distance. He was positive that his body couldn't do more. It's amazing what happens when you decide to make your mind be in charge of your body!

This is Shaunie. She was our angel through the night. Bailey helped her for the first couple hours, but then left to sleep, because she knew she would be back to pace us in the morning. Shaunie took care of all 7 of us runners through the entire night. Each time we rounded the corner and saw our lit up area, Shaunie would realize it was one of us, hop out of her chair, update our board, get us food, fill our drinks, give rub downs, etc... She basically kept us all alive though the night. For her it probably doesn't seem like much, but to us, it was everything. Just to know you had someone there waiting for you to come by was a huge morale boost. She truly was the best!

Bailey took a lap off, so I did a very painful lap with Steph, and Eric walked a lap with Mark. This was the lap that I hit 80 miles on. I had been going for over 20 hours, and my body was screaming at me! Things had not been fun for the past 10 miles, but from this point on they were downright torture!

Between doing laps with me and Mark, Bailey had already gone a lot more miles than she planned on or should have. She didn't want to leave us alone in the state we were in, so she just kept plugging along. Her feet were killing her. At the beginning of this lap, she said, "I'm tired!" I said, "Well, you're 8 months pregnant!" She responded back with, "Well, you're old!" 😂 That's why we needed her with us; someone needs to keep it real. She covered about 20 miles with us!

It was during the next lap that Bailey looked over at me and saw that I was wiping tears away. I had reached my limit. Everything hurt so bad! My back was having spasms, the back of my knees were locking up, my right baby toe was a solid blister (I didn't know that's why it hurt until we got to the hotel that night), my right ankle hurt with every step and wouldn't bend, my top left thigh hurt to even touch, my shoulders were cramping up, I was exhausted, etc... I was walking along like I was built out of Frankenstein parts. I had exceeded my goal, so I could have made it back to the canopy and been done, but I wasn't sure if I even could make it back to the canopy. Bailey talked me through it, and when I got back I took a seat. She immediately left to walk the course backwards to help Mark finish up his lap. When she met up with Mark, she called me to tell me that if I could eek out one more loop, I could possibly make 90 miles. I had an hour and a half to hobble through 2.8 miles, plus whatever I could get on the short course for the last few minutes. I can honestly say I was not sure if I could do it. I sat there waiting for them and had an internal argument with myself. On one hand, I should just be happy with what I accomplished and be done. But on the other hand, I signed up for a 24 hour race, and my 24 hours wasn't quite over yet. Somehow I found it in me to get out of the chair and start moving again. Mark was trying to make his own goal, so I told him to just go and not worry about waiting for me. He rallied and took off! I was amazed!

I told Bailey not to be offended if I ignored her on the last loop. I was just going to put my headphones in and blast the motivational playlist I had made just for this moment. Don't ever underestimate the power of music. Those lyrics got me through a physically painful, and emotionally rough time, one step at a time. I laughed out loud when I was going through the final field and 'The Final Countdown' came on. It was beyond perfect!

The race had a quarter mile loop that the runners could enter for the last hour. That way you could still be getting distance even if you didn't have time to make it through a whole 2.8 mile loop. Pacers were not aloud to do that part with the runners. Once I got back to that point, I knew that if I just kept my body moving forward, I would hit 90 miles. I just took it one step at a time. I met back up with Mark, and right when I saw him the tears started coming. I tried to tell him I was gonna reach 90 miles, and I couldn't even speak. Then I saw Steph and knew that she had gone 73 miles. I tried to tell Mark that too, but I couldn't get it out. If I tried to say anything, I just cried. It's a hard thing to describe. It was so many emotions wrapped up together. I think I felt so much pressure, stress, anxiety leading up to the race, and once I knew I was a few minutes away from being done, my body just released everything all at once. Plus you add the sheer exhaustion on top of that, and the pain I felt with every step. Then the emotions of being so beyond proud of myself, Mark and Steph, that I was just a total basket case. Mark told me he didn't think he could get 85 miles unless he could run. I told him to run! I said just take the first step, and within 7 steps your body will know what to do, and he could run for a few final minutes. HE TOTALLY DID IT! He took off running, and the tears just came even more when I saw that. I was AMAZED! He reached 85 miles!

I stoped my watch right when the final horn sounded. I ended with 90.5 miles in 24 hours.  I have been ragging on my body lately. I've been gaining weight, and dealing with injuries; basically feeling the effects of being 48 years old. But right at that moment I loved my body beyond words and felt very grateful for it. It accomplished something I never thought would be possible. 

When I finished, Bailey came up to me and I started crying, so then she started crying. A cute lady that had been cheering for me saw the whole thing, and captured this picture for us. She sent it to Bailey, and it might be my favorite picture from the whole race. 😭

Mark and I had no idea how we were doing in comparison to other runners. It was a fun surprise when we found out that he was the 2nd male finisher, and I was the 2nd place female finisher. So fun!

All 7 of us exceeded our goals! I'm beyond proud!

12 Hour Crew:

Cheryl-42 miles and a marathon PR

Joyce-43 miles

Jen-40 miles (after an emotionally draining week from the passing of her brother)

Larissa-43 miles (after just getting out of a boot for tendonitis)

24 Hour Crew:

Steph-73 miles

Mark-85 miles

Tricia-90.5 miles

The aftermath:

I finished half way through the loop, so when it was over, I walked over by the finish line. Just in that short distance, I got super dizzy and light headed. I knew I was going to pass out, so I closed my eyes and grabbed the rung of a ladder that was in front of me. I felt Cheryl grab onto my arm. I was just trying so hard to concentrate and not go down. It was like Country Fan Fest all over again. The next thing I know, I'm being lowered down into a chair and Bailey was handing me a cookie that she got from someone. That seemed to do the trick. I just needed to sit there for awhile and get some food in me.

We had to drive about 30 minutes to our hotel, and getting out of the truck and up to our room was not pretty. I tried to assess the damage in the shower, but I couldn't even bend down enough to reach my feet, so I stopped caring and just wanted to get into bed. I took a muscle relaxer and surprisingly zonked out. Every move during the night was painful, but I actually slept better than I thought I would. Remember when I talked about not peeing during the race? I peed one time, it was super dark, and hardly anything came out. I woke up during the early morning hours and had to pee, so I thought that was a good sign. I couldn't get out of bed! It took me 10 minutes to get to the hotel bathroom (which was like 10 feet away). By the time I made it back to bed, I broke out in a cold sweat and felt really sick to my stomach. A few hours later, we all started to wake up. Moving was next to impossible. I seriously couldn't even sit up. I whispered to Steph asking where the massage gun was, and somehow Eric heard me from on the couch in the other room and had the gun to me in seconds. Then he went down and got us a pre-breakfast and brought it up to us, because I wouldn't have made it down to the first floor to eat without throwing up. Once I got food in me and the nausea and dizziness stopped, I was much better. Oh did I mention that I couldn't get my socks on, so Eric did that for me too. He probably had no idea that when he decided to marry Steph, he was gonna be marrying Mark and I too. 😂 While we ate breakfast, he hauled all of our language to the car so we wouldn't even have to go back up to our room. So very grateful for him!

We were laughing in our hotel room because this was the shadow on the wall. The massage gun came in quite handy.

After the 4 hour drive home, Mark came in the house and said he could actually feel the fluid gathering in his feet. He lifted up his pant legs, and his feet and ankles were HUGE! He had full on puffy feet and cankles! I had him lie on the ground and put his feet up on the couch. It had me a bit worried, so I told him to look it up. It said he probably needs to get more exercise. I died! 😂

It was such a great weekend! Reading the end parts probably doesn't seem like it, but 3/4 of the 24 hours was awesome. The last part was awesome too, just in a very different kind of way. We knew what we were getting ourselves into, and although it was tough, if given the chance we'd do it all over again knowing what our results would be. There is something I can't even describe about pushing your body to it's limit and then making it do more. Rewarding is not even accurate enough. Now we will spend the next week or two suffering the consequences and giving our bodies time to recover. But for now, I'm signing off, because we have a much needed date with Steph at Ahhhhsome Relaxation!