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Bear 100 2001 Report(ID): Ted Schuster

The Bear 100
Race Report
Ted Schuster

Having the words "Indian Summer" on the race t-shirt wasn't fitting enough
for the weather we had during this wonderful event.  The days weren't too
blistering hot with a nice breeze, and the night portion was absolutely
perfect, every so often running through warm up canyon currents that would
sent a warming vibe of adrenalin through your body.
This had be a long awaited event for me, the weeks prior to the race I found
myself nervous beyond belief, the days prior to the race I found myself
counting the hours and minutes hoping they would move by faster so I could
step up to the plate.  The date of the race was ironically perfect for me,
the start lied one year to the day since I had a compound fracture of both
the bones in my ankle (seen the movie Misery?), and the race finish lied on
the date that I underwent orthopedic surgery to repair everything. I've
thought long and hard the last year on how incredible it might feel to
finish a 100-mile race, but I had no idea just how incredibly joyous even
the start would be.  As the race director, Leyland Barker, said "Go" we all
took off running, I was overwhelmed with goose bumps, the time had finally
come!

Some took off seemingly at a blistering pace up the gravel road that would
be by far the best footing we would see for the remainder of the race.  It
was easy to get lost in the moment; it's a great feeling hearing nothing in
the darkness but the sound of shuffling feet during the beginning of a race.
As we moved from dirt road to trail, the miles got notched into the belt and
the sun came up as we ran up trough vast sagebrush meadows and ridgelines.
About a mile from the first aid station I was running with two others while
we "slightly" got off the trail as we made a wrong turn and briefly lost the
trail heading into Maple Creek.   After a one-minute stop to fill up the
water and drop my headlamp and long-sleeved shirt off with my dad I was off
again.  Heading out on the same trail we took into the aid station we could
finally see some more of the other runners in the daylight, everyone was in
excellent spirits.  As we ran up the washed-out streambed again a couple of
us briefly lost the trail, as we realized this and made our way back we met
others who had done the same thing, it didn't take long and the group of us
had found the next flag and were off and running...well hiking.  This
section had some tough ups and downs in it, that brought me quickly to a 3-4
mph pace, a bit sooner in the race than I had planned on.  After another
quick aid stop the route found its way up a dirt road that took us up to
Danish Pass.  This was a nice, mentally easy section, which we just had to
keep plugging away on the uphill.

Leaving Danish pass we continued to be blessed with the incredible scenery
and fall colors.  I'd never seen so many bright/extreme colors in the
mountains.  Some of the leaves were so bright that I would describe them as
hot pink! And everyone was even saying that it didn't even compare to things
the previous year!  The trail took us directly up the ridge and then
followed it looking out over the huge canyons on both sides.  On our left we
could see the road and some of the crew vehicles proceeding to the next
station, that was neat being able to see them way down there, wondering if
they could see us or even had a clue where exactly we were.  As it turns out
they could see us, and my dad actually got a picture of me off in the
distance.  After dropping down to Beaver Creek, the miles just kept slowly
plodding by, relatively uneventful until darkness fell.  I remember thinking
and then telling my dad that I couldn't remember a more difficult
thirty-mile stretch to begin a race, and this was the beginning of the
longest one!!
My hope and plans were to try and log 50-60 miles throughout the day, and
then simply keeping moving at night to tackle another 20 or so during the
darkness.  Well I was on pace, but I just hadn't expected to be hurting as
much as I was.  I arrived at Paris Canyon (mile 50), with very sore feet.  I
had been really happy with the lack of "problem blisters", but I did have
some good hot spots going on.  I'm really happy that the topic of taping is
on again off again on the List, I used a tincture of benzoin with the tape
and it worked incredible!  It's simply too easy and too smart not to use
before a race.  But still pulling into PC Aid Station, my tank was running
low.  I knew I didn't want to rest, but I knew I wanted to try something
else as night approached.  One of the aid station workers (who were all
incredibly great by the way!) mentioned that due to the darkness and the
terrain he thought that I'd be running very little of the next section.  I
was actually thankful to hear this, as this gave me an idea to switch shoes
and go for a hike.  So after some great clam chowder I put on my lightweight
Danner's and took off walking into the night.  This section seemingly took
forever!  I had been leap froggin back and forth with some other runners and
we all caught up to a volunteer who was hanging glow sticks.  The trail in
this section was up and down and quite rocky.  We passed him as he slowed
through the thicker areas, but then he caught up to me, sitting beside the
trail removing a rock, after some ridgeline and meadow sections that he
could breeze through.  I caught up to him a couple miles farther, and asked
him (hopingly) "it's not too much farther is it?" he replied "no, not too
much further, maybe two miles".  Two miles!!  I thought to myself, not too
much!?  That seemed like the moon right then as I was thinking the next aid
was roughly about ¼ mile ahead.  Well, thankfully someone heard my whimpers,
and made me right, it wasn't very far as I pulled ahead of him.

The hiking boots were a welcome relief to my feet, as they rubbed different
areas that weren't "hot spots" yet, but I wouldn't have wanted to go very
much farther in them than I did.  Once he arrived at the aid station, we
both joked how happy we were that he had over estimated the remaining
distance.  By the time I arrived at Dry Basin (57 miles), I was quite hungry
after the long, slow going section.  I sat down and was handed the best
tasting ramen noodles I've ever had.  I had two cups, and then some broth! I
spent almost 20 minutes here, which I believe was my longest aid break,
throughout the night. After switching back to my trail shoes, I was revived
by the "lightness" of my feet and my full belly.  I took off into the night.

Although there was an obvious leapfrog game going on throughout the day,
once it had turned dark I hadn't seen too many people on the trail (right
when I would've liked to cling onto someone!)  After really no contact since
darkness first fell, I caught up to one of my fellow leap-froggers Paul
Ralyea, he said that he was thinking about taking a quick nap, and I agreed
that that didn't sound like a bad idea but recommended that we could put
some easy miles on if we just kept moving.  We walked for quite a ways
together, talking about things that sleepy minds discuss, until his headlamp
died.  As I stopped to shine mine on his pack he told me to go ahead and he
wanted to take a break after changing his batteries.  After making certain
he was sure and fine I plugged on, only to find out later that his knee
(that had been hurting all day) had finally got unbearable and he pulled out
at mile 75.
The section between Danish Flat (66) and Copenhagen Basin Rd (75) was
definitely the most frustrating for me.  It really seemed like the miles
were literally creeping by, and as it turned out they really were.  Shortly
into this section I stood in the road and closed my eyes, and instantly fell
asleep into a dream.  Shortest dream of my life, as I woke up catching
myself falling backwards!  At one other point during this section I sat down
to drink a few swallows out of my water bottle and found myself waking up to
a loud snore I let out, another quick 4 second nap!  About half way through
this section my frustration kept me awake, I was really having a hard time
figuring out if I was still on the right trail.  There are many different
turns here, and it seemed like in the course directions every other sentence
was a new instruction, quite confusing to me at four in the morning.  Some
reports from years past mentioned inadequate course markings, I think they
were for the most part much better this year, but I would recommend some
"feel good" flags in some tricky areas.  You know, those areas when you are
hiking down the trail and you pass other trails (that aren't marked) and
correctly keep going, but in your head your thinking and wondering if you
missed the trail turn already.  The only other thing with the flagging was
the colors, they were yellow and red, which were quite difficult to see with
the bright backgrounds.  The yellow stood out like a sore thumb on the
evergreens, so next year I would recommend having yellow and blue.  I don't
think I made any real wrong turns in this section, but I certainly was
clueless whether or not I was going in the "right" direction for much of the
distance.   Definitely one of those aid stations that one is extremely glad
to see the glow through the trees!!  Once I finally arrived I sat down and
stayed for a few minutes before worrying about my ankle stiffening up, so I
got up and left.  This was hard because they had a great fire there and
really wanted to do anything they could for me.  My dad was to skip the next
aid station cause he was taking some folks back to the start.

The next sections weren't too brutal.  Right as the first daylight was
breaking through Jim O'Neil caught up, just as we had been leap-froggin
throughout the previous days' light.  It was nice to finally meet him at the
race, as he's a fellow MT Lister.  Congrats to him as he did an excellent
job of picking up where he left off last year! Well as the sun came up, as
expected so did my spirits.  I asked Jim if he thought we were out of
contention for a 30 hr buckle and he said he sure thought so especially with
the last section of trail.  Well, as I said, I felt better in the day light
so I slowly pulled away, simply wanting to hurry up and finish.  I felt
great pulling into Paris Canyon, and didn't really think I was even going to
take a break, but they were so nice and considerate I had to take a few
minutes to eat some of the items they thought would taste good.  Well they
sure did!  But soon I was off again, very much looking forward to the next
three miles.  ALL on gravel road!  It was great, if my knees had anything
left I could've flown down it, as they didn't I maintained my regular
"moving forward" pace.  Overall, I was really pleased with how my ankle held
up.  Obviously this was the first big mountain test for it, and I really
think it passed.  Although I was overly conscious of the ankle while
negotiating tough sections I did tweak it a couple times.  The one thing
that did take a toll was the fact that I couldn't really use my right leg
for any kind of braking, on the down hills, so my left knee seemed to be
quite sore due to the constant pounding I put into it.

It was great to finally make it to German Dugway (93), just knowing that
this was the last stop before the end was enough to keep me going as I said
a "hi and thank you" to them as I continued by.  There'd been some
discussion about the next trail section, and how it was slow going and
rough.  Well, I guess here's where I simply agree with all those
descriptions.  It was a trail on a very steep slope that side hilled
relentlessly up and down, all the while looking down onto the nice gravel
road below.  It was at this point that I just wanted to hurry up and get
done, but there was really no way to "hurry up", you definitely had to just
take this section slow and careful.  I passed Robert Lisey (I think) with
his pacer on this section and told them that I didn't need to worry about
the fun of finishing and sitting down and popping one of my blisters cause
due to the side hilling it'd just popped.  I told my dad that when it popped
if I'd had a sterile knife I would've cut my foot off!  Man, did that burn!
Well we finally side hilled up and over the saddle and then hooked up with a
cattle trail leading down the other side into the Cub River Canyon.  After a
few more series of trail directions I made it out onto the main road leading
back to The Deer Cliff Inn.  The finish of my first 100.  All of the times I
had pictured this scene while running on some road training somewhere
weren't correct at all.  I thought I'd be running on air, emotionally flying
into the finish.  Well as it turns out, I was numb, couldn't feel a thing, I
did cruise across the line thanks to this though, in 32:10.  Such an
indescribable feeling, I won't even attempt to put it into words.  I can say
that my first thoughts were to sit down and take my shoes off though!
So to sum things up, my first 100 miler, the Bear 100 was a great
experience!  Although the "youngness" of the race is still apparent the aid
stations were, in my opinion, great.  They had everything I would ever want
and the volunteers were the nicest most considerate I have ever come across.
I wish one could afford to spend more time at the stations to show more
thanks to all of them.  And thanks to Leyland Barker the RD he put on a
wonderful event and certainly has the making for something huge.  The
scenery is spectacular, the weather was spectacular, I hope it's at least
half that perfect next time; I can't wait to try for that sub 30 buckle!

PS.  The one other thing that I failed to touch on was my headlamp.  I had
just gotten a new 4-bulb LED, and due to the full moon the light was very
diluted when I wasn't under a thick canopy of trees.  I ended up switching
back and forth from my spare minimag and the LED throughout the night.  So
everyone might pay close attention to the moon phases if they are using an
LED light.
And feel free to view some race pics my dad took along the way, forgive him
he's my dad and he really only took pics of me.  I told him next time to
shoot pics like they were free.
http://www.geocities.com/mountainparadise/Bear100Pics.html

Ted Schuster
Missoula, MT
(now going into a long winter's rest!)