So I started the trail at around 4:11am on the morning of November 8th. I slept at the Lee Pass Trail Head the night before since a lot of people park their cars overnight and backpack the route.The 8th was a full moon and it was a cold clear sky with lots of stars before I headed out. The only thing I was worried about the night before were the mountain lions since there were signs everywhere at the trailheads with sightings and the fact I was going to be running alone in the pitch black until around 7am.
My plan was to go from Lee Pass to Hop Valley Trailhead where I cached some water, Hop Valley to Wildcat Canyon springs to fill up water, then Wildcat Canyon to Grotto. I had 4L of flasks on me, but the weather on the way there was very mild and during the 16 mile stretch from Wildcat to Grotto, I only drank 2L. I was hitting my pace chart perfectly and feeling good. I made it to Grotto 10 min behind schedule since I had to stop the couple of times to fill up water, and my pace was purposely comfortable knowing I had to make it all the way back. I still made it to the bottom in 7:32 and then took about a 20 min break at the 37 mile point to fill up my flasks and eat. My legs were feeling it a little bit because it was a 5,000 ft. descent in 5 miles and it was all on hard rock/concrete at the bottom.
On the way back up it was right around Noon and it was incredibly hot with no shade on the east side for the way back up. The hike up was a slog and I was worried I didn’t fill up enough water. I carried 3L but since I was going slower and sweating more, I was drinking more. The spring that was right at the top/bottom of the big vert section was really funky and I didn’t trust it. It smelled like sulfur and I just didn’t want to risk it. I started to try and filter water from a slow trickle from a rock but a hiker passed by and gave me the remainder of her Nalgene which was a huge life saver. After the climb once it was on more run-able terrain again, my knees were starting to flare up pretty bad. It got to the point that I was limping and decided I needed to call it at the next trailhead. If I didn’t bail at the West Rim Trailhead, it was going to be another 7 miles to Hop Valley and then 13 to Lee Pass.
So I was able to set an initial Self-supported men’s FKT for the one way and bummed that I didn’t make it the whole way back, but I pushed my comfort zone and learned a lot. I did a huge section solo during the dark at night, ran the longest I’ve ever run before, learned a few more nutrition takeaways, and pushed my body until I felt like I couldn’t. So all-in-all a big win.
From a nutrition standpoint, going to the 750mg sodium tabs was a huge help over the 500mg tabs I was doing before. I took a bunch of 60gram carb chews from Precision and I like those, but I definitely found I need more variety in food and not just straight calories. I brought some cliff bars and croissants and those were helpful, but I only had a few. I think next time I’ll try to switch it up with some candy like twin snakes or gummy bears and then some Belgian waffles or something. I never cramped though which is progress as well.