I once got mad at an employer for making what I stated as “arbitrary goals”.  The climate of the industry was such that the number of variables working against me was so overwhelming I couldn’t envision a scenario where I would succeed.  My frustration took me all the way to my Vice President who responded with “There’s something wrong with what we’re doing if you find the goals to be arbitrary”.

The goal was what some people refer to as a BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) and they are meant to be a little “Pie-In-The-Sky”.  The term BHAG was pioneered by Jim Collins in his book “Built To Last” and in-fact is defined as 10 to 30 year goal that provides a marker for progress toward a future vision.  This is where the breakdown came in with my employer.  I was looking at my BHAG as a short-term goal!

Saturday I found myself once again in a drunken stupor of fascinating only on what I want myself one day to become.  In the purest sense I lost track of the moment in favor of a wished-for future state.  While I made a goal that was definitely a vision for my future, it wasn’t fair to myself to think of not reaching it as failure.  Sometimes success is hiding in what we choose to stubbornly see as failure…

Bandera 100k has become somewhat of a tradition for me at this point.  This marked the third year that I would take on the challenge of running some of the most rugged terrain possible for a trail runner.  It was different this year, I had some successes under my belt that made me feel like I was capable of competing in the big leagues.  As has happened so many times at Bandera though, I didn’t truly give the race the respect it deserves.

My past year of running has been filled with some incredible firsts for me.  A 100 mile race at Tahoe, a HUGE performance at Lost Pines Marathon, a HUGE PR for 50 miles, a HUGE PR for 10 miles, three solid sub 19 minute 5Ks…one that put me close to breaking 18!  My confidence was probably a little overinflated to think finishing Bandera in the low 10+ hour range was less than a race of a lifetime.

I pushed myself to get out with the lead pack, telling myself I was in the company of the elite, it worked…for about 15 miles.  But I was starting to feel something I hadn’t in a race this long, my heartrate was completely out of control.  I was running the flats and downs comfortably fast but as soon as I got to a climb (usually a chance to recover the heart rate) I was finding a shocking spike that surged thru my body…weakening me mile after mile.

It was only after a short (seemingly fortuitous) chat with one of my heroes, Steven Moore, that I realized what I was doing to myself.  Steven asked how I was feeling…my response wasn’t a very good one 15 miles into a 62 mile race.  My thinly veiled response, “I just can’t find a rhythm”, was actually a denial that I was pushing myself too hard.  When I heard Steven talk more about his philosophy to build during the race (see title above), I knew I was on the wrong path.  I wasn’t going to pack it in…but I certainly wasn’t going to let myself burn out!

My goal soon became to simply finish with a 10:xx but even that would prove to be a challenge.  I slowed my pace, recovered my heartrate and pushed forward…hiking the steep slopes to conserve my energy for the flats and downs.  I soon was battling a fading energy level and mental resolve.  At the halfway point, I tried to redirect my thinking…even joking around with the volunteer crew at the TrailRoots aid station.  My coach Erik took me out of my own head if just for a short while, taking some goofy pictures with me.

I’ve been in dark places during races before and I was getting there again.  The math calculations were stirring in my head, “If I can keep X pace thru this split, maybe I can still get that 10:xx?”  Luckily these thoughts tend to build on each other and keep you occupied when the alternative may be to beat yourself up.  It wasn’t until the final 10 miles that I really started to recover mentally.  I knew it would be close…but how close?  And if I pushed harder now would I completely burn out and hit the “Death March” wall?

Between mile 52 and 57 I managed to pass 5 people…the only confidence-builder in the race at that point was that I still had the power to do so.  In the last 4 miles I passed two more…one of them cheering me on with a “Nice finishing pace!”.  My watch had just died, I had no idea what my pace was…but I figured I could make myself hurt just a little more for a few more miles.  I was putting the hammer down in a now dark and rocky descent into the last mile of the race.

As I entered the campground and saw the approaching clock, I knew it was possible I could have done more.  The anger at myself for going out so fast overcame me.  I was so distracted by the frustration, I almost turned the wrong way into the parking lot.  With a final time of 11:07 I hadn’t reached my goal, or even my secondary one.  What I HAD done was accomplish a PR by 35 minutes though!

I also learned a valuable lesson of relativity and perspective that took me a while to understand.  Making BIG goals in ultramarathons is a shaky proposition when so many variables can come your way:

• Is nutrition dialed in?
• Are you using new equipment (this was my first race in Hokas)?
• Is your head right?
• Are the conditions conducive to your best performance?
• Is your race strategy in-line with course design?

There are so many questions to answer in addition to “Did I train right?” that our only true solace is to focus on “What is my current situation and how can I stay present in this moment and learn?”

It’s a lesson that nips at the heels of your psyche when you let your ego tell you what to do.  That lesson is true in running as it is in life.  Ultrarunning’s biggest teaching moment to me remains…sometimes you find success in what feels like failure.