After running my first 50K last year, I decided to try another this year–partially to keep my motivation for running longer long runs and partially to prep for the Chicago Marathon this year.  Last year’s race was during the day, hot, partially over trail and with one big hill.  This year I decided to do the inaugural Christmas in July put on by Runners4Wellness.  This was an overnight six hour timed run, on pavement and for the most part flat, from what I’d heard.  However, there was one big thing I was concerned about and that was that this race was over a one mile loop (see map below).   The reaction from everyone I spoke with was “ugh, a one mile loop?”  But I was running it with two friends and hoped that it wouldn’t be that bad.   One thing tough, I figured there would always be someone running close by, so there wouldn’t be long periods of running by myself if I separated from the two people I was running it with.

The 6 hour run started at midnight.  The 12 and 24 hours runners had started earlier so there were already runners on the path.  For the 6-hour, there were about 50 people who were at the starting line.  The loop was a little less than a mile.  On the map to the right, the run started at point A.  There was a slight elevation near the beginning and then a slow downhill.  At point B was the major hill of the course (15 – 20 feet elevation).  At point C there as a sharp right turn that continued a small elevation and then after that, for the most part, it was either downhill or flat.   I don’t recall the exact temperature but it was probably in the 70’s.

I ran the first  7 loops before taking a short gel/water break.  To my surprise the first 7 loops didn’t seem as arduous as I had imagined.  In fact they went by rather quickly.  As did the next 7 loops.  Around the 15^th or 16^th loop, I ended up separating from my friends, but as I had initially thought, there weren’t too many times that I was running by myself and the nice thing about the one mile loop ended up being that during the rest of the race, I was able to group back up with my friends periodically.  However, at the times when I was running by myself, it was really nice to have the supports there.  There was a gentleman near the beginning, and another near the sharp curve at point C, however, my hat goes off to the woman who was half way up the hill at point B.  She was there at least for the six hours that I ran and the whole time she was standing up and cheering.  At times, I think that may have been a more difficult thing to do that actually run.

At mile 21, my left knee started to hurt.  This was most likely due to the sharp turn at point C and the constant run in a clockwise direction.  We were supposed to switch directions after two hours but there was glitch in the sensors I believe and we weren’t able to.  I was glad I had brought a knee support with me though I hadn’t used it in the last four years.  It definitely helped me continue with running.  Also, after this, I made sure to walk up the hill as well at the turn at point C.  I finished my 26^th loop at around 4:40.  This was also the time that the sun slowly began to come up.  It was around loop 29 that I really started to lose my energy and motivation.  I’m not sure it was just the mileage or whether it was the fact that the sun was out and I could much better gauge the distance I had left in each loop but it seemed for the next two loops it was really one foot in front of the other.  Fortunately on my last loop, another runner started talking to me.  I can’t recall her name, but she was from Naperville and doing the 12 hour run.  Her energy and conversation really made the last loop bearable, and luckily for me, I caught up with one of my partners in crime and we were able to finish the last loop together.

At the end of this, I had completed 32 loops in 6 hours for a total of 31.04 miles.  About 0.03 miles less than a 50K, but at that point, I wasn’t really counting.  I had a great run.  The race was surprising well organized and the swag was great (a hoodie, a shirt and a medal), the runners were a great bunch of people to be a part of and the volunteers and supporters rocked!

I definitely plan on running this race again next year.