In 2021 when most races were still canceled or uncertain, I decided to run all of the Finger Lakes solo and self-supported. I ran 9 of the lakes unsupported, and the last 2 self-supported. I was successful at the first 10, but DNF'd the final one due to extreme weather, poor planning, and overconfidence. Needless to say, it made it on my future list of things to do...
A year or two later, I mentioned to Matt that I wanted to try again and asked if he was interested. Trying again solo didn't seem like fun, and I likely would not have found anyone else who would join. We tossed around the idea for a while and loosely planned it but never got to it. Earlier this spring, we decided to squeeze it in after a very busy marathon training season when we were both in good shape. Not ultra shape, but good-enough shape.
We went out and drove the route the night before, spraying temporary road paint spots where we hid our aid and a few turns that we thought could be easily missed. We dressed as construction workers with safety vests, cones and clipboards so as to not attract attention during our frequent stopping and road painting. It worked. We had food and water stashed alongside the road every 10 miles or so, and a special beer stop at mile 69. It took somewhere around 3 or 4 hours just to drive around, using all of the same gear drop spots as my first attempt.
We got pre-race dinner at Pizza Aroma in Ithaca, went home and got an ok night's sleep, then worked a full day on Friday.
After work, we headed out to the start at the chiropractic college in Seneca Falls and parked in the lot that you probably needed a permit for. We went counter-clockwise around the lake for no particular reason. We wore some old bibs from a race two weeks prior in an effort to make drivers think that we were in part of a larger event- so they would give us more room on the road. It might have worked. Perhaps the drivers there are just naturally more courteous than we’re used to. If you look closely in the photos, we crossed out ‘Mountain Goat’ and poorly scribbled in ‘Cayuga Lake FKT’. We were committed from the start.
The next 90 miles was kind of a blur, here is a short list of things that definitely happened at some point:
-Heart rates were very high early. Not sure why, but it seemed like we were struggling to figure out how to run slow.
-The span from the mile 20 aid station to the mile 30 aid station felt like it was about 50 miles apart
-Even on a Friday night, everything in Ithaca is closed. We made it to the one open gas station to get some water right before closing time.
-It is possible to hydrate entirely with carbonated water. Other than ~20oz of emergency water that we stopped and bought, Matt’s supplies consisted only of cans of Polar seltzer.
-A wolf! (or more likely a fox) ate our mile 40 aid station. It even drank the water and my juice! Luckily it did not get the red bull at mile 50, or the residents in the sleepy town of Lansing would have had major issues that night.
-After the 40 mile point, you have the authority to relieve yourself anytime and anywhere you want, and we did. Closer to the 50 mile point, pavement doubles as a plate for your food, a bed, a pillow, etc.
-I kept trying to tell Matt how awesome the sunrise is during an overnight ultra, but I was proven wrong since it never really came. It was just kind of glowy/hazy starting at 5a and lightened up a bit until 630. Fortunately, the sun was really blasting at mile 90 when we wanted it the most.
-We had our own personal goal spots marked. Mine was at 65m, at the exact corner where I dropped out last time. His was at 75, which is the farthest he had ever done. We celebrated both with naps and ice cream.
-When the woman at the breakfast market asked if we were walking or running, the answer was ‘yes’. In all honesty, we actually walked very little. I wanted to walk more, but Matt was physically unable to stop running at times, so we just went. A minute or two of walking leaving each aid station, the massive hill in Ludlowville- I would estimate only 1 or 2 miles of real walking. The running pace was at times pretty close to walking pace, but we were definitely doing the running motions. We did sit/lay/sprawl/sleep on the ground a fair bit too.
-We need to find a more reliable weather app. It was apparently a 0% chance for the entire 23 hour run, yet I only remember about 5 minutes where it wasn't raining.
-Wells College in Aurora is closing and was holding its final commencement ceremony. They drained the bank account and chauffeured all the graduates in really nice horsedrawn carriages- go out with a bang I guess.
-There were some definite low points where we were so out of it that we hardly could remember our own names, but Matt somehow still remembered to take out the battery bank and charge the Garmin at every aid station.
-That battery bank was a champ. We had two phones (one usb c and one lightning), two bluetooth speakers (one usb c and one micro), a garmin (some proprietary charger), and an mp3 player (micro). It kept everything alive for the entire 23 hours using a variety of charging cables that we brought or found on the side of the road..
At around 4p on Saturday, two lifeless bodies limped back into the parking lot in Seneca Falls, a total of about 20lbs less than when we began (for what it's worth, we ran the entire last 6 miles without stopping). Fortunately, our vehicles were still there. Unfortunately, they were a stick shift compact and a motorcycle- the drive home was not pleasant for either. At the finish, it was now 80 and very sunny. The photos make it look like it was a beautiful day. We’re not sure, we slept for the next 20 hours.
Would I recommend it? Maybe, it is a really long way to go on pavement. What got me through it was the novelty of a lake loop and checking the last box for my lakes. There are some good climbs, but the terrain and elevation is not dynamic enough to make it easy on your body. You utilize such a small range of motion and that really starts to wear on you.
We are not the most traditional runners. We are silly and take it just seriously enough to get through it. On a good day, we are great runners. On a day like today, anything goes and our only goal is to finish and have more fun than anyone else out there. Sometimes 24 hours goes by quickly, this one did not. Sometimes you can't remember a single thing that happened on a given day, this was not one of those days. A day later with a little over 90 miles covered and we’ve got some interesting stories that we will never forget.
All in all, it was even more fun than breaking a gift card in half by folding it back and forth a bunch of times.