Mt. Washington Training Run

--from Dave Dunham

Injury forced me to miss my second Mt Washington road race in the last 7 years (I have run it from 15 times from 1988 to present, missing 1997 and 2004) and immediately following the race I said "I'm going to run up some time this year".  I said it to no one in particular, but as my mileage increased and the days began slipping by, I sent  out an invitation to the CMS-boy's to see if anyone would like to run up with me.  Rich Bolt and Kevin Tilton both responded with resounding "yes" emails.  Kevin lives in Conway and has run the course a few times in training.  Rich and I would be doing our first training run on the mountain.  I was a bit nervous as it would be a long day (15.2m roundtrip) and my longest run thus far was a 10m on the trails the previous weekend.  We pick this weekend as the bike race is going on so there will be a lot less traffic on the road.

Here are the notes on our day:

3:15 AM crawled out of bed.  Thunder and Lightning outside, pouring rain.  Drove to Rich's house in Manchester.
4:00 AM Rich took over as driver from his house to Mt Washington so I could stretch out my hamstring.  Pouring rain and brilliant lightning in the first few miles of driving.  Rich cracks open a couple of Red Bull's and we both start waking up.
5:00 AM we stop in Lincoln NH at the 24 hour Dunkin' Donuts.  I get an "old fashioned donut" and a Large Coffee.  Rich gets a coffee and a donut as well.

During the next 30 minutes we maneuver the Kancamaugus pass and Bear Notch road without seeing another car.  Rich has very few chances for rally car moves, but I have to do a lot of juggling with the coffee cups to make sure we don't spill in any of the turns.

6:00 AM we arrive at the Pinkham notch visitors center to meet Kevin.  He shows up a few minutes later and we decide to not carpool and drive both cars to the base.  We get caught in the race day traffic.

6:50 AM we make our final preparations, decide what to wear and what food/drink to bring up.  It is 60 degrees and cloudy at the base and 50 degrees with rain, fog, and 100 foot visibility at the summit.  I go with a long sleeve and carry water and 4 gels.  Rich and Kevin both go short-sleeved and carry a bit more substantial pack (in which we stuff some warm/dry clothes for the run down).

7:00 AM we are off!  The bike race is scheduled to go off at 7:30 but will probably start a bit late.  Mark Pitts gives a hello yell as he finishes his final tune-up on his bike.  He is one of the few who run and bike the mountain.

We run pretty easily and chat, I'm working a bit harder than Rich and Kevin, but they are both only looking for an "easy" run.  We pass very few hikers on the road and after 1/2 hour we aren't passed by any cars.  Conditions are quite good below the tree-line and sometimes we even get a decent view.   I'm struggling with a donut that just doesn't want to settle down.  I guess it is better than an empty stomach.   Looking up all we see are clouds.  The wind doesn't really seem to pick up until we hit 5m and even then it isn't too bad.  We hit a lot of fog and rain at around 5.5 and it stays like that right to the top.  We pass a few bike fans in the last few miles.  Thinking they are original one says "the running race was months ago".  Not very original...we heard that a few times on the way up.  It gets very wet and windy in the last mile and we can hear above us in the fog the announcer calling the bike race.  We cross the line in 1:29:26 and head for the summit.  After a couple of pictures we hit the summit building basement to warm up and change clothes.  I take my second gel of the run (the first at 1/2 way) and we head out for the run down.  Just before we start down we catch the first 2 riders coming in.  They hit the finish in under 59 minutes and only a few seconds between them.  Off we go!  The bikers are grinding it out and we descend trying to stay out of the way.  The bikers tend to take the turns wide so there are a couple of times when we almost collide.  None of the bikers seem to be having fun.  It looks like way too much work.  We discuss entering next year.  I claim that I'm going to enter and push a bike the entire distance without every actually getting on it.  There is some spirited discussion about that being "illegal".  We'll see....

We get below 5m and the weather is back to being decent.  The bikers are still clumped together, but more and more seem to be pushing the bike rather than riding.  The bikers also leave a lot of trash behind.  There are numbers everywhere and empty gel packs litter the course.  We pass the last biker right around the 3 mile mark.  He has a long day ahead of him.  There are colorful rain jackets all over the side of the road.  We pass a pick-up truck that is cleaning up a lot of the trash off of the road.  The last couple of miles are steep and the downhill pounding is taking a toll.  We hit the bottom in 1:05:51.  I for one was pretty tired afterwards.

10:00 AM we hit the road.  Rich takes a short cut on Dolly Copp (SP?) road.  A narrow winding dirt road that cuts off some of the travel home.   I get to see Rich do some rally driving as he drives at an ungodly speed on the straights.  I mention something about cars coming in the other direction and Rich scoffs at the idea.  We (fortunately) don't see another car on the road.

By 1PM I'm home and start to feel really sore from the down hill run, but happy to have got my Mt Washington run in.

Thanks Rich and Kevin!

Splits:
Up = 1006 (.9), 1134, 1142, 1145, 1212, 1207, 1212, 748 (.7) (total 1:29:26)
down = 1531 (1.6), 843, 852, 843, 853, 844, 623 (total 1:05:56)

Tandem Results: 12th annual Mt. Washington bicycle hillclimb