Race Report – Cape Fear 24 Hour Endurance Challenge
This weekend was my fall A race, the Cape Fear 24 Hour Endurance Challenge. The race is run in a small park in Lillington, NC which has a 0.59 mile paved loop that you complete as many times as possible in 24 hours. There’s one well-stocked central aid station at the start/finish line. You qualify for a medal if you complete 100k and a belt buckle if you surpass 100 miles.
I ran this race last year and it featured 8.5+ hours of heavy rain at the start that caused all manner of things to go wrong. This year, fortunately, the weather was fantastic, starting off around 45 degrees, rising to near 80 and then falling back into the upper 40s with perfectly clear skies.
I went into this race with the goal of taking a shot at 100 miles, but ready to take 100k as a win, if it didn’t work out. I didn’t think my training would really support a solid chance at the 100 mile mark, but I wanted to give it a try. I started out with my normal pattern of running a mile and then walking a minute. I went out too fast in the nice, cool conditions, which were probably the first really nice running weather we’ve had here since last spring. All went well until the temperature hit the 70s under the full sun with very little humidity. At that point I started having problems with my mouth drying out completely, making it very difficult to take in food because I just couldn’t chew and swallow much of anything. I subsisted on orange slices, grapes and Gatorade through most of the daylight hours, as a result, and those aren’t the most calorie-dense items for sustaining the effort I was putting out.
As darkness fell, I was slowing down my running and walking intervals and it was very apparent that 100 miles was going to be out of reach. I decided at that point to just finish out the remainder of the 100k and call it a day. I finished just after midnight and am pretty happy with the result, overall. I could’ve gone longer, but the miles between 62 and when I finished would’ve been largely empty and put more strain on recovery and readiness for the upcoming Wine & Dine races.
At this point, I think I’ve pretty well determined that the 100k mark is the (un)comfortable ceiling given my training based on an
@DopeyBadger plan with a 16 mile maximum long run. I can go further if I supplement the training with a significant volume of additional walking, but my job has prevented me from doing that consistently lately. At this point, I’ll likely table any more 100 mile attempts until I have the time to devote to additional training (maybe after retirement).
All in all, though, I’m very happy with the race and consider it a success. It was my 10th ultra and 5th of 100k or longer.
I definitely recommend the race to anyone interested. It has all levels of runner out there, with many people camping along the side of the course and dropping in and out as they want. Some folks even had a bar set up with a regular drink schedule. The Campbell University School of Osteopathic Medicine has an RV that sets up with a professor and med students giving on-course support for issues and keeping runners on the course, as well! There ended up being ~20 100 mile finishers and the winner completed 139 miles in the allotted 24 hours, a new course record!
Thanks for reading!
