Orcas Island Fat Ass 50K
General Thoughts: Painfully Wonderful Views: with 7000 feet of overall elevation gain the race makes you work hard. When not climbing, you are running along a beautiful lake, past some waterfalls, within an amazing forest of trees, or along a ridgeline with spectacular views.
Friday: Orcas Island is one of the San Juan Islands. The San Juans are a chain of islands just below Vancouver Island, BC. The islands are accessible by ferry, small plane, or other forms of water transportation. I attempted to make the ferry leaving at 3:30pm on Friday from Anacortes, WA. The car in front of me got on, but I did not. So, now it is time to wait for the 5:45pm ferry. While waiting, I had a chance to do some more investigation of the island I was traveling to. Orcas island is home to 5000 year around residents. Orcas Island was home to numerous farming communities in the 1900s. It is comprised of the five communities Deer Harbor, Doe Bay, Olga, Orcas Landing, and West Sound. I arrived on Orcas at about 6:45, so it was dark and hard to see. But as I drove to my destination, Moran State Park (Race Headquarters), I notice the interior of the island had small farms and fields. I continued to drive and some of the roads take you right along the oceanside or along lakes, beautiful. I arrived at Moran State Park and went into race Headquarters. The race headquarters is the Dining Hall of the State Parks Kids camp. Dinner was being served, and some people were coming out of the kitchen. On the far end of the hall was a TV with some ultra running movie being viewed. The room had small groups of men and women chatting, and an occasional beer could be seen along with the bottles of water and food being consumed. I registered and then went to the T-shirt table. This year the race director had visited every local Thrift/Goodwill/Value Village store he could and grabbed old shirts and sweatshirts of every kind and color. The Orcas Island Fat Ass logo was printed on them and in a heap on the table you picked the one you wanted. After picking my shirt it was time to go check into Doe Bay Resort and Hostel. There is an option to stay at the camp with most of the other runners, but I was late on registration and the camp was already full, so I went with the Hostel. Staying at the hostel was no different than staying at the camp, except for having to drive the 5 miles to the race. Doe Bay had a much better view in my opinion too. I picked my bed and warmed up my homemade calzone from my Thursday night cooking spree. I went outside by the ocean for a while and took in the stars and the almost full moon. It was relaxing, which is good.
Saturday: After an okay sleep, Paul a fellow hostelite had a cold and smoked. His snore was weird and loud. But I was wide awake by 6 am with a race start time of 9am. So I got dressed and left for the start. I had pre made some breakfast burritos and ate them. I got some coffee at the dinning hall at camp. I watched the early start of the 50K at 8 am, chatted with a few people, and just waited for the race to start. The day started around 32 degrees. It was cool with a little fog hanging around everywhere. The forecast called for high 30, low 40’s with sun. The first debate of the morning for me was to wear running pants, or just shorts. In the end I chose pants, and feel like it was neither a great choice nor a poor choice. The race started at 9am. After having chatted with a few people who had done this course before, the general verdict was this: “Hard, I don’t know why I’m back I said I would never run this race again”. My thoughts, “Oh great, well let’s just hope I make the 7 hour and 30 min course closure time, maybe I should have started early.” Off we went. The race in my mind comprised of 3 different 10+ mile sections. Section 1 takes you from the camp to the southern boundary of the park. It winds through forests, past streams, up and over some small hills. Then it climbs up almost to the top of Mt. Pickett. This section finishes by taking you past Cover Falls, Rustic Falls and Cascade falls. It then dumps you into camp for the first of 2 full aid stations. Section one is a good warm up for the rest of the race. A short ways into this section I ran into a guy I had run with before on the Tiger Fat Ass course in early January, and then saw again at Bridal Trails, Chandler. Chandler and I were running at the same pace and so we just made it more or less a team effort. The clock said 2 hours as we entered the camp at what says mile 9.7 on the race map. Overall I felt good the first section, but I did get a little warm is sections, but then it was nice and cool in other sections. I took my vest off and which helped keep me more regulated temperature wise.
Section 2 starts out and you parallel the park road heading west then drop in by Cascade lake and run along that for a while. Then you hit the west boundary of the park and the climbing starts. The first section of climb takes you up what I think is a trial only for this race. It was more of a minor scramble for a few 100 feet than a hike or run. Then after that little gem of an up hill comes the power line trail. This in my opinion was the worse climbing section of the race and you roughly go from 400 feet to 1900 feet high. The sun was out, it wasn’t too hot, and I felt pretty good on the climb. The reward for the climb was an awesome gentle down hill run on the north end of the park through a beautiful forest. It was the best running part of the course and possible one of the best trails I have ever run on. It dumped you next to Mountains Lake. It was a very beautiful and fun part of the course. I felt pretty good until I got about half way around the lake. I started to feel my legs get a little tighter. I was following Chandler and at this point just kept my feet going so as not to lose him. I knew I could make it, but I needed to be pulled by something. We went around the lake and entered the water only station mile 19.4 at about 4 hours and the start of section 3.
Section 3 starts with the 3 miles up to the top of Mt. Constitution (2407ft). The first 1.1 miles of the climb is where most of the vertical gain comes in. I took the lead from Chandler and felt good after grabbing some water, and a moment to rest. The climb seemed to go fast and then you have a ridge line run up to the top of mountain. On this ridge line run was the most spectacular view. Across the sound you could see snow caped Mt. Baker and other mountains of the Cascades. The sun was out, and it was a great view. The view left me with refreshed sense of energy and excitement. I felt like stopping and taking it all in for a good look, but just said, “I will come back and take it in another time, I got to finish this thing.” At the top of Mt. Constitution is aid station number 2, I took some more fluids, ate PBJ, and of course some M&M’s (gotta love them). Then we took off to finish this race. So down we went onto the steep, long switch backs till we came back to retrace part of the trail from section 2 in the other directions heading towards the top of the power line climb. I felt good and pushed the pace as best I could, but mostly just taking it at the pace I felt comfortable with. Once we finished that part we started the final descent towards Cascade Lake. Chandler took the lead and we powered down the hill. The quads were burning up by the time we made the lake and we had picked up a friend of Chandler’s and a runner I had run with before, Alan. Those two picked up the pace and I did my best to keep up. It was hard and it felt like a kick one mile too early. The lake was beautiful and after a while Alan took off for the finish and Chandler and I held it together to finish with out anyone passing us at the end. We came in at an unofficial time of 6 hours and 36 minutes. It was a beautiful day, with amazing views, and a respectable finish.
After the race, it is a great atmosphere. There was food, beverage (1 keg of Sierra Nevada, 1 keg of PBR) and a blue grass/folky band called Southern Skies. After I showered I hung around a while and met some of the other runners. Then it was time to call it a night.
Sunday: Time to head home. The sun rise was amazing. The ferry ride home smooth and the drive home was uneventful. Overall a great weekend, great race, and great memory.
Race Gear and Nutrition:
Shoes: Montrail Nitrus
Running Pants: Brooks
Running Shirt: REI Long Sleeve poly spandex blend
Socks: REI
Vest: Sporthill
Hydration drank from one Nathan Handheld and one Amphipod handheld: Before the race a Hammer Nutrition H.E.E.D. Started with H.E.E.D. in both bottles, at 1st aid station filled one with water and one with NUUN Lime, at water station filled one with water and one with Nuun Orange Ginger, At top of Mt. Constitution filled one with Nunn lime and one with water.
Nutrition: 6 Hammer Gels (Vanilla, Banana, Chocolate) carried in the pouches of my handheld bottles and on my Amphipod waistband case, 1 PBJ, 2 hand fulls of pretzels, 2 salt tabs, 2 chocolate covered coffee beans, and of course hand full of M&M’s at the last aid station.
