NJ Ultra Festival 100: Pre-Race Thoughts

I'm in taper mode at the moment, which means that the time I would usually spend running is being spent freaking out about my upcoming race. In about a week, I will attempt to run 100 miles on a trail for the first time in my life. Yeesh! To ease my nerves, I thought it would be useful to write out my training and lay out some concrete goals for the race. Here goes...

Training

Despite some nagging Achilles tendinitis issues early in year, I ran my highest monthly mileage ever (255 miles) in February, and I'm on pace to match or surpass that mark again this month. Here's what my weekly mileage looked like for those months:

Week	Distance (mi)	Comments
2/1 - 2/7	73	First full week of running after 2 wks off
2/8 - 2/14	71	Still feeling good!
2/15 - 2/21	67	Febapple 50M (9:17, 3rd place)
2/22 - 2/28	44	Recovery week
2/29 - 3/6	70	Lenape 50K (5:49, 3rd place)
3/7 - 3/13	79	10K trail race + 35mi TGNY training run
3/14 - 3/20	62	First week of taper
3/21 - 3/27	31	Easy running from here till race day

Most of my training mileage came in the form of "medium-long" runs, as prescribed by Uncle Pete's marathon training plan. These runs were typically between 9 and 15 miles, with the first half of each run at about 9:00/mi and the second half at 8:20/mi.

I'm pretty happy with the mileage that I managed to put in over the past 8 weeks. My only concern is the lack of hill training that I was able to do. As my last hard workout on 3/19, I ran an 18 mile loop around Round Valley reservoir, which included 3,800 feet of climbing. It took my quads 4 days to completely recover, which is not a great sign considering the Ultra Festival course has 5x more elevation gain than that over its 100 miles. Oh well...

The Course

The NJ Ultra Festival has traditionally been held on flat trails, leading to blazing fast finish times over the past few years (2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015). This year, the race organizers decided to mix it up and move the course to the Princeton-Blairstown Center in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. The new course now features over 16,000 feet of elevation gain and an equal amount of descent over sixteen 6-mile loops. [Note: the course was originally supposed to be a 10 mile loop, but one of the land owners backed out at the last minute]

Elevation profile for each 6 mile loop

For comparison, the tallest mountain in the lower 48 states (Mount Whitney) is 14,505 feet tall. For further comparison, the climb from Everest base camp to the top of the mountain is a paltry 11,500 feet (although, as I understand it, it's slightly chillier there than in New Jersey). The good news is that all this climbing will be excellent preparation for my A+ race in October - Grindstone 100 - which has over 23,000 feet of elevation gain.

Since the course is located entirely on private land, I have not been able to run any of it. However, the race organizers hinted that the trails there are comparable to the ones at Febapple, minus the FUS sections. This means that it should be fairly runnable terrain for me. On the other hand, this thing is apparently part of the course as well.

This should be fun at mile 98!

So it appears that this course will be a throwback to my obstacle race origins. As fun as that rope bridge looks, it might be a bit much for me after 20+ hours of running.

Race Strategy

As with all ultras, my main goal is just to finish the race. However, after weeks of preparation and some successful early season races, I want to make sure I get my money's worth. Here are my somewhat conflicting ideas on how I'll approach the event:

1. Run patiently, but assertively: I don't want to burn out in the first half of the race and be forced to walk for the last 15 hours. But I also don't want to finish with the feeling that I didn't give 100%. This is a delicate balance in any race, but particularly so in 100 milers. Luckily, my finish at Febapple, where I maintained an 11:00/mi average pace, gives me a good indicator of my current fitness level.
2. Let the terrain dictate my pace: One of my favorite features of Strava is the "Grade Adjusted Pace" (GAP) that is calculated for each segment of a run. GAP accounts for the fact that running uphill is harder than running downhill, so your uphill pace should naturally be slower than your downhill pace. In the case of this race, I want to run at about a 10:30/mi effort level for as long as possible, which might mean a 16:00/mi pace on uphills and 9:00/mi on downhills. Some of you might recognize 16:00/mi as a brisk walking pace - that's exactly what I plan to do! Walk the ups, bomb the downs, and maintain a steady pace in between.
3. Even(ish) splits: In marathon running, the mark of a good race is running an even split, meaning the first 13.1 takes exactly as long as the second 13.1. In ultramarathon running, even splits are almost impossible because muscular fatigue eventually slows everyone down, regardless of how cautiously they ran in the first half. The most successful ultrarunners will typically slow down by 5-10% in the second half of a 100 miler. Mid-pack runners like me should usually aim for 10-20%.

Goals

In order of least difficult to most difficult

1. Finish under the 30-hour cutoff: I have the fitness to finish the race, but ultras are unpredictable. A lot can happen in 100 miles, so this has to be my bottom line. Barring injury or a lightning strike, this should be doable.
2. Sub-24 hours: This is the holy grail of ultramarathons: 100 miles in a day. Gordy Ainsleigh was the first person to do it back in 1974, and thousands more have done it since. That doesn't mean it's easy.
3. Sub-22 hours: This would be close to my TGNY100 time from last year, but on a much harder course. This is a stretch, but it's within the realm of possibility based on my recent races. If this happens, it means every part of the race has gone perfectly for me.
4. Win the damn thing: I'm not going to chase the front-runners if they set a quick pace at the beginning of the race. But you better believe I'll push hard if I'm within spitting distance of them around mile 80.

And lastly, here's my ideal pacing strategy for the race, based on the original 10mi loop course. My times will probably be slower on the new course, which has more elevation gain and river crossings. [My original #3 goal was sub-20, but that is much less likely in the new course]

Distance (mi)	Pace (min/mi)	Lap Time	Total Time
10	11:30	1:55	1:55
20	11:30	1:55	3:50
30	11:30	1:55	5:45
40	11:30	1:55	7:40
50	12:00	2:00	9:40
60	12:00	2:00	11:40
70	12:00	2:00	13:40
80	12:00	2:00	15:40
90	13:00	2:10	17:50
100	13:00	2:10	20:00