Peterson Ridge Rumble 40M

 
My mom, Rylee Dog and I arrived in Black Butte around 3:30p last Saturday and unloaded the car. Butte Ranch/Resort is about 10 miles from Sisters, OR where the Peterson Ridge Rumble 40M begins so it was nice to be able to stay so close. After the car was unloaded, we all jumped back in the car to scout out some of the aid stations along the route as neither of us were very familiar with the area. Turns out that most of the aid stations were very accessible via car so my crew would be able to easily follow me during the race. We took Ry on a little hike just off of Aid 2 in order to stretch his legs and for me to see a little of the course. I was immediately impressed with the trail and the views of Mt. Washington and Black Butte. It was definitely going to be a gorgeous run if the weather held off. A theme of the trip soon became me constantly wishing that I had brought my mountain bike as well. The singletrack begged for mountain bike. I would soon learn that the Peterson Ridge area is teeming with miles of mountain bike friendly trails. None of which I have ever ridden before. I am definitely thinking of coming back for my birthday for the 2nd Annual SistersMountain Biking Festival Sept 24^th & 25^th.

Ry Dog

After this we headed back into town to find some place to eat dinner, after many back and forths, we eventually settled on Three CreeksBrewery just outside town. My mom and I got the reservation and waited for my Dad, Adam and Megan to arrive. It was the first time since I’ve turned 21 that I went into a brewery and didn’t have a beer. I decided that we would have to come back tomorrow for my victory beer. That night I got my kit ready and provided my crew with the necessary instructions and directions and ended the night with a quick game of chutes and ladders.

The morning came quickly as I am never able to sleep well before a race, always wishing I had more time to sleep. We (Adam, Mom and I) packed up the supplies and then headed towards Sister’s Middle School where the race began. Megan and my dad opted to sleep in. We arrived at the trailhead, and I proceeded to check-in along with many others. I saw some familiar faces and chatted with a few people. After this, I headed back to the car to gear up and do a little warm up run followed by some light stretching. Before long everyone was heading towards the starting line. Adam rushed to set up his tripod and camera, (He was acting as my personal photographer, as well as, the unofficial race photographer) while I settled in midpack. My goal was to start out very conservative and try to get to mile 20 without feeling too shitty. Looking back at my training, I had, for me, a solid base mileage around 350 miles, however, most of that consisted of many shorter runs. Looking back, I foolishly only ran 1 run longer that 20 miles, and that was the Gorge Waterfall 50k. It’s become apparent that doing fewer longer runs will be more advantageous than lots of shorter runs. Stupid rookie mistake. So as you can guess, I was a little nervous/unprepared going into my first race at this distance. I had no intention of “racing.” I just focused on surviving. I planned for 7 hours on the course, but was hoping it would be less.

That's me in the middle - blue shirt

Anyway, the countdown ended and the race began, as I settled in with a group of runners from the Portland area (unintentionally). I chatted with a guy named Larry, who I ran with at the end of the Gorge Waterfall 50k. After a couple of miles, I decided his pace was a little fast for me so I settled back in another group. This group had a conga line of about 10 individuals. We all swapped places many times, as some of us pulled off to pee. At roughly 7.5 miles in and just past Aid 2, I came up on Adam (in a hunter’s blind in a tree) snapping some shots, as well as my mom. We chatted briefly and then I was off. We repeated this process many times over the next 3 hours as I would come in and out of Aid Stations.

AS2

AS4

Eventually, I made it to Aid Station 5 at about mile 24. I was feeling really good at this point so I barely stopped running as I came in. I headed down the long dirt road towards the 2^nd half of the race. I decided that I needed a few things mid run so my crew was able to drive up alongside me as I was running and handed me my iPod shuffle, a fresh bottle of perpetuem, some advil and took off my sunglasses. I felt like I was in the Tour de France with my moving support car.

My support car along side of me. Feeling good at mile 26

Eventually, they peeled off, and I headed up the loooong dirt road to Aid Station 6. This was the longest interval between aid stations at just under 7 miles. I felt really strong for the first half, but my second wind was short lived. I passed a few people on this long uphill grinder, but couldn’t seem to make any progress on this one older gentleman. I had the urge just to sprint up past him but that would have been very unwise to blow my reserve just to pass one guy. We both alternated running and walking and eventually made it to Aid 6. I restocked my nuun bottle, took a gel, some gummy bears, an orange slice and an endurolyte pill. Just after leaving Aid 6, I got my third wind and just felt awesome. I was cruising downhill on some sweet single track and passed a bunch of people. Coming down into Aid 7 was one of the most beautiful parts of the whole race. From the ridge you could see Mt. Washington, Black Butte, all Three Sisters and Mt. Jefferson. It was amazing. And yes, I was singing to myself.

Coming into Aid Station 7. Mile 35

Leaving AS7 with Megan in tow

Coming into Aid 7, I wanted to make a very fast transition so I quickly refilled my nuun and headed off. Megan wanted to tag along and provide some extra motivation so she jumped in behind me as we headed off. I was still feeling pretty good at this point and wanted to make a strong push, but I knew that I still had a little over 5 miles to go so I decided to conserve energy for a late kick. I told Megan that I wanted to have a strong surge at the end and to watch for my break. Shortly after this, roughly 2 miles from the finish, I hit the low point  of the race. I was running out of energy and my third wind had completely faded. The other gentleman that we were running with began pulling away. Megan tried her best to get me to pick up my pace, but I knew I only had energy left for a short kick so I held back. A few minutes later, the highway came into view, and I knew that it was only half a mile or so till the finish. My adrenaline surged, and I shot off like a rocket towards the finish. I completely dropped Megan as this surge completely surprised her. I came onto the track after passing two individuals and was able to run down one more runner just before the finish line.

I finished with a time of 6 hours and 20 minutes, which was a lot faster than I had predicted. Unfortunately, I didn’t place that well. I got 40^th out of 114 finishers and got 6^th in my age group (Results). However, this was the first run that I had completed where high caliber/sponsored runners have shown up. This course was also very flat, compared to most ultras, and was therefore, much faster. I tend to race better with routes containing lots of vertical. The first place finisher came in at round 4 hours and 45 mins, not exactly sure but ill have to look it up later. In the end, I was happy with how I felt during and after the race, as compared with my last 50k, however, I would have been happier with a placement in the high 20s. After the race, I chatted briefly with Jason Leman, a friend from Gonzaga. He ran the 20 mile race and placed 4^th! Big congrats to him. He is also lined up to run the legendary Boston marathon so best of luck! Jason is more plugged into the ultra scene in Portland than I am so hopefully I’ll get to know him and the other runners better over the summer. We concluded the event with some beers at Three Creeks Brewery. And I indulged or should I say, choked down a Hoodoo Voodoo IPA (not bc the beer was bad, but I just wasn’t feeling the beer yet). So what’s next? Hmmm… probably some good mountain biking adventures, some good long trail runs in the Gorge and Mt. Hood and maybe, just maybe, a 50 miler at the end of the summer….. we’ll see….

Dad, Adam, Me, Megan, Mom

UNT

Bryan

Gear used:
Montrail Rock Ridges
Nuun
Hammer Perpetuem
Bag Balm
Teko Socks
Toe Caps!
Clif Gels
MHW Refueler Shorts

Right after AS2

Adam the Photographer

Coming into AS4

AS4

Kick to the finish

Passing a dude right b4 the finish line

Bryan Mullaney Blog Commercial

NW Blog Promo from Adam Schwartz on Vimeo.

Adam and I are putting together a "commercial" for my blog. Adam needs to get some footage for his demo reel so he came up with his idea. Not sure when the next commercial will come out, but here is a quick preview. Let me know what you think.

Bryan

Cove Palisades

This past weekend, my dad and I, along with some of this friends and their sons headed down to a cabin on Lake Billy Chinook outside Cove Palisades State Park. We left Portland early on Saturday morning and arrive at the cabin at 10am to a sunny sky, but chilly conditions. We quickly got to work sweeping, racking, and burning a winter’s accumulation of pine needles other debris. We had three burn barrels going in order to clear the area of the highly flammable pine needles. The area had a huge forest fire a few years back and thanks to some heroic work by firefighters and stoic homeowners they were able to protect all of the cabins along the river. Since then lots of fire prevention tactics are regularly performed in order to prevent future fires. Hence the burning of all excess flammable debris.

After most of the work was done, while the rest of the crew cracked beers and ate lunch, I geared up and headed out for an 8 mile run along the Metolius River. I wasn’t exactly sure if I would find singletrack, but I was guided by some friends to head down past Motley Campground and look for singletrack off the dirt road off the back of the campground. After getting up early and working all morning, I was pretty tired by the time that I headed out. But the weather was perfect with clear sunny skies and warmish conditions. I would have been happy with any dry conditions. Oregon had just experienced its wettest and coldest March in all its recorded history! So I was desperately in need of dry, warm conditions. I was also trying out a new pair of shoes, Montrail Rogue Racers. I had just given back another pair of Montrails that I had been wear testing, with which I was very pleased so I wanted to get another pair of lightweight shoes to test out this summer.

The singletrack trail turned out to be more of a fishermen/game trail so I stayed on the old fire road for the whole trip. It was nice to get out and see some different scenery, but I quickly got bored as the road was mainly flat and straight. After the run, we headed out to chop down/scavenge some firewood and fired off some rounds with some of my dad’s guns. Typical redneck behavior, but it was fun. That night we made a huge fire, drank beers and ate like kings.

In the morning, we closed down shop quickly and headed back to Portland. I look forward to returning to Central Oregon on Saturday to run the Peterson Ridge Rumble 40M this Sunday. We will be staying at our friends house in Black Butte just outside Sisters, OR. Looking forward to the whole weekend, just wish the race was on Saturday so I could spend Sunday in and around the Sisters area. Look for the race report coming out late next week.

UNT

Bryan

Tuesday Night Group Run

As some of you may have heard, I was granted the privilege of running the inaugural version of the Peterson Ridge Rumble 40M after being wait listed earlier this month. Since will be my second ultra of the year and first try at a distance above a 50k. I am excited and nervous about this attempt due to my poor performance at the Gorge Waterfalls 50k this past March. I have attempted to gain as much hill training as I could in the past couple of weeks, but it’s hard to gain any real climbing fitness in that short of time. Hopefully my largest base mileage to date will help give me some edge, but my limited number of long runs will definitely not  help the cause.

This past Tuesday I was able to hook up with a friend of a friend from school, Jason Leman, who also competes in ultras, and he informed me that a group of ultra runners meet up every Tuesday in Forest Park at 6pm by the Leif/Thurman gate to do a 7-8 mile group run. I have been looking for a way to plug myself into the ultra community here in Portland, and this meeting looked like a great opportunity to meet some people. So I met up with Jason and this group on Tuesday to get a good training run in and to start introducing myself. I am still trying to learn everyone’s name, but one that I do remember is AmySproston, from the Montrail Ultra Running Team and winner of the Pine toPalm 100M. We chatted briefly about a pair of Montrail's that I am wear testing and how she is looking forward to their release. In the end, it was a great run, and I was able to push myself harder with more accomplished and experienced runners. I will definitely be meeting up with them as often as possible.

Tomorrow, I am briefly heading down to Central Oregon to help my dad’s friend open his lake home for the beginning of the season. My dad’s friend’s camp includes 1 larger cabin with 4 smaller bunk houses located on Lake Billy Chinook. The house runs off solar power and generator power when needed, has no TV, no cell service and no other ppl this time of year. In the summer, the area is occupied by a few other residents. Summer activities include watersports like wakeboarding, waterskiing and tubing, ATV riding and hiking. While the weather may be crummy, I plan to do at least 1 lap of the Tam-a-lau Trail and get some nice desert running. I am keeping my fingers crossed that I can stay in the rainshadow of Mt. Hood and stay away from the precipitation, while also getting a much needed change of terrain.

UNT

Bryan