Montaña del Oro 50k - A Beautiful Way to End My Running Season

After marginal success at the THNGBVD, I was feeling energized for my next race. It is also a 50k, but with half the climbing, half the driving, and more than double the scenery. What I didn't anticipate was triple the rocks, or should I say, trip on the rocks.

Situated in Central California just outside Morro Bay, Montaña del Oro is one of my favorite places in the world that isn't also known for its chocolate or giant surf. Just the drive out there in March, through verdant fields and hills, rocky outcroppings and oak trees, is heaven. “Man, that’s fuckin’ pretty”, I would say to my wife. I could live here. Fortunately, we arrived at Morro Bay in time to catch the sunset with dinner. A few sea otters were playing just outside our dinner window. Good omen. It was a wrong omen. But it seemed like a good omen.

Montaña del Oro State Park got its name because the Spanish conquistadors saw gold everywhere they went. The same way the we runners see glory with every race we sign up for. But like these putas, we usually come up empty handed. Your experience may vary. Just getting a race held at this park has been a challenge for the race directors, PCTR, so I thought I should give them a solid local Quicksilver Running Club representation, show up and win the 50k. Then I saw Nickademus, recent winner of the Barkley Marathon, at the start. Thoughts went through my mind: should I keep pace with him and drop him at the last loop, should I drop him on the first climb and demoralize him, or am I just being delusional like a self serving Spanish sailor? I thought I'd let the trail play itself out.

The race starts on the sand at Spooner’s Cove, a place I first described as “looks like Hawaii, feels like Alaska”, on this day, definitely felt like Alaska. Temperatures were barely above freezing and the already gusty winds were forecast to get to gale force by mid-morning. The first few miles were relatively flat, winding along the bluffs with amazing views of the stormy surf to our right. The surf was not the monstrous stuff of surfer dreams. With that, I was able to focus on keeping pace with the lead runners. Granted they were probably a half mile or more ahead of me, but I could still see them.

The 50k course consists of three loops, each starting at Spooner’s Cove. Pretty convenient for the Mrs. who thought she just came for the ride but ended up helping out at the start with J. Lo. (seriously, Jennifer Lopez is the co-race director’s name, though there are probably 301 of them in the Philippines). Two and a half miles into the first loop, we start climbing a canyon, slowly at first and then suddenly where you’re climbing a trail and then, boy, that escalated quickly. Actually, I escalated pretty slowly. It’s not a huge climb, only 1,000 ft, but it’s in just 1.5 miles so you gotta make sure your glutes are awake. By the time we reached the top of Oats Peak, gale force winds coming off the ice cold Pacific made sure we were definitely awake.     

The next four miles were downhill back to Spooners. Now is my time to shine. At least for a mile. Just when things are going your way, wham!, pie in the face. So I had a trip on the rocks and twisted an ankle. I always thought my achille’s heel was my bad knee, but nope, it was my bad ankle. It could have been worse. At least my foot was still attached. Brittle old man, am I. Actually, I don’t believe that old age makes one brittle so much as the accumulation of injuries, starting, for me, with sprained ankles when I was 18 playing soccer. And later, torn knee is from playing soccer, too. Argh.

So now I had to figure out if my ankle was acting up FIFA style or it was a real injury. I walked a bit and then ran a bit, then ran a bit more and walked a bit less. I lost a few minutes but not a lot the rest of my way down to Spooners. Good omen, don't fail me now. First loop done, not in too much pain, I decided to start the second loop. 50k runners are allowed to drop after two loops and get an official 38k finish without having to run the third and final loop. Par for the course, I hid the severity of my injury from the wife (after hiding it from myself, of course), and soldiered on. Feet, don’t fail me now. Spoiler alert, they will.

A mile or so down a river canyon and that was enough. I was not going to have a happy day. Turned around and finished a half marathon, 7.5 miles pre-injury, 6 post-injury. Balance. Got my post-race tacos from Chef Yaku, so however disappointed I might be about the race, any run that ends in tacos can’t be all bad.

One benefit of the early “finish” is that it gave us time for taking the scenic route home. We stopped for coffee and pastries in Pismo Beach. We took my new favorite road, CA-166, what I refer to as the “Montana road in California”, stopping for lunch in New Cuyama, and then over the snowy Ojai mountains. Basically, we ate our way home. Very nice.

I’m recovering at home. Had another recovery surf session, albeit in much smaller 1-3 ft waves than last week. Keeping my ankles in ice cold water is sorta like keeping it on ice, right? My bad ankle is swollen and discolored, just like our last President - ba dum ching! I may have a cousin in Korea with that name - Ba Dum Ching. My apologies. When I’m facing weeks, potentially months, without serious running, I have to make bad jokes to stay alive. Real apologies to my wife who will be victimized by my presence next several weekend mornings. I promise I’ll find something to get me out of the house soon.