Started at 9:20 pm on Thursday, July, 28th in Port Townsend. Went out into the night quickly. Riley Nachtrieb and her grandfather, Stan were my skeleton, yet strong crew, later to be joined for several hours by Virginia Reinert. Riley (first FKT-holder on this route, paced me on her bike every third "section" (average length of 7-8 miles between crew access). Most of this strych was very familiar territory, as my sister & family used to live in Port Townsend, and my brother & family in Sequim. Ran lots of workouts on the main bike trail sections spanning from Gardiner to PA. So, once I made it through the night, I began to transitioned into heat-running gear (bucket hat, arm sleeves, etc) around the long paved bike trail section leading into Port Angeles (proper) waterfront; 55 miles in.
Tried to get electrolytes down in anticipation of the hot, sunny weather to come. Virginia paced me through the PA waterfront, up the hill past families streets, passing one customers property I had worked for many times. Now for me, most all the sections to follow would be "new." I was, however familiar with stretches of 101 that I had driven and some sections of the route I had paced Riley on her FKT finish, several months previous.
My favorite section was the Lake Crescent on because of the pure beauty of the water, trees and mountains. This was God's country to me, however at the time of day I ran through there, it was quite hot (I believe over 80° F). I once hobbled down to the lake to splash cool water all over and refill my filter bottle. First filled my filter bottle under a walking bridge where the Spruce Railroad trail started, temporarily aluding my crew as I cooled down in the small creek.
The rest of the miles were hot before dark and somewhat of a blur, but steady. I used my pole almost constantly from about mile 65 onward, especially on uphill, like the road leading up to Lake Crescent. Took advantage of every accessible creek to cool down. I did manage to sneak under my previous 100-mile personal best en route, as a noteworthy bonus.
The final sections after dark that Friday-Saturday morning, were a "mere" 24 miles. Seemed like not much in comparison to the 118-miles I had already come, but proved to be slow and more painful (feet & knees mostly). I had a goal to get under 30 hous and had to focus in these two sections to keep on that pace. The finish was exciting, but without much "speed" and I had to keep moving to avoid beginning to fall asleep. I reached the long stretch in La Push down to First Beach minutes before 3:00am, so decided to pick up the pace and try to get to the finish by 3 (Saturday morning). I think I missed it by about 45 seconds. Anyway, it didn't matter to me, as I was finishing, asking Riley where to walk down to the water at. I heavily used my poles to step down to the beach, over logs and rocks, then noticed the tide was out, so we jogged down farther to reach the water itself. I touched it and tried to end my activity on the GPS watch. Failed to hit the pause button at first, but then got it after being coached by Riley. I was finished and my mind/body were spent. What a journey to remember!