Dave James and Max King chugging up the flagline trail.
The idea started back in January 2010 and it was just that an idea. In conjunction with Visit Bend we landed the USATF National Championships for the 50k distance. Visit Bend would put up the $3000 prize purse and Superfit Productions (me) would take care of the rest. I was immediately inspired buy the challenge of putting on an ultra here in Bend. With a big snowfall piling up late I knew that I would have a small window to explore the course and get this race off the ground. Little did I know what it would take to put on a race like this and where it would eventually end up.
From the start I was thinking Flagline trail and Metolius Windigo trails as the crux of the course. Originally I was staging at the Wanoga snow park which had ample parking and some theoretically decent options for connecting to the trails I wanted to use for the course.
First setback… snow. Central Oregon had a phenomenal late snow season and a cold spring that allowed the snow up high to hold incredibly well and hindered me from doing any recon until mid August. With the race day being the 25th of September this was understandably causing some confidence issues from potential participants.
Second setback, starting at Wanoga. Starting from the snow park was causing lots of issues, long boring dirt road finish, long boring dirt road start, and being too far away to allow for the inclusion of the happy valley climb into the course. I rode several options from Wanoga and spent several hours on the mountain bike trying to make the course work out from that starting venue. After 3 tries I still wasn’t happy with the course starting from Wanoga.
Epiphany. Start the race from Mt Bachelor. This was a late Idea and I was less than a month out when I decided to pursue the venue change. So to the phones I went. With the help of Tom Lomax from Mt Bachelor a starting venue was beginning to come to form, albeit very late in the game. Only two weeks or so until the race was scheduled to start. Starting from Mt. Bachelor had all kinds of perks. Hard parking surface and lots of it, great views, and close proximity to the trails I wanted to use. The only foreseeable drawback was that you had to cross 4 lanes of highway to get to the trails. This was a definite speed bump in the plans. Keep in mind we are about a week out at this point. So after discussion with Tom Lomax and Deschutes County we decided to move the start from the Sunrise Lodge to the Pine Marten Lodge. This would allow us to cross the highway where it was two lanes rather than four. This move made lots of sense for that reason alone. Also it allowed for a course that I thought would stand up to any 50k in Oregon as far as difficulty, views, and surface to run on. I was able to run on Flagline and Metolius Windigo and come back into the Start Finish with minimal pavement running. So everything was set. The detriment was that now I at Tuesday of race week and up until that point I had nothing to talk about except ideas and those don’t sell really well when folks want to sign up for a 50k national championships and the course isn’t really solidified until two weeks out. I knew getting things out this late would negatively affect registration and was ready to take my lumps and put out a course I could be proud of rather than one that just met the distance and didn’t showcase the great trails we have here in Central Oregon.
Race Day
With cool am temps and clear skies we gathered up the herd of 74 starters and gave them a quick rundown of what to expect and sent them on their way. The men’s field was very talented and competitive so they took things out fast. Reports from aid 1 came in and they had covered that 8 or so miles in a blistering pace. David James came through in under 50 minutes with a good gap on Erik Skaggs and the rest of the chase pack. For the women Kami Semick appeared to be on a mission and was moving along in first. The pace continued to be fast through aid 3, 4, and 5. I was getting updates via text and it looked like Eric Skaggs was on route to a win with Max King just a minute or so off for second. As I was waiting about 3 miles from aid 5 to see the leaders come through and guide them in on my bike and I was wondering where they were as at the pace they were running I was figuring that they should have been there by now. Then I got a call from Jeff Browning who had been riding behind the leaders on his bike all day. This was not a good call. He said “dude, we are at Horse Camp, we got directed off course.” I knew exactly where they got off course but I didn’t understand how as it was flagged and I had people at the junction. So off on my bike I flew as fast as my “I’ve been up since 4 am” legs would take me. I was irritated and confused at how this could have happened but I knew that the faster I got there the less people would get off course and I was hammering to mitigate the damage. As I rolled up to the intersection I was surprised to see that a volunteer at that junction had in fact re routed the course to go down to Horse Camp. Flustered I quickly re flagged the course the correct way and jumped back my bike to try to catch folks who had been misled. I caught a couple of early starters quickly and masters contender Tim Monnaco was heading back up with Jeff Browning behind him on his bike. Got them back on course and began getting the beta on who had fell victim to the mistake. Jeff began rattling off the names of the folks who had been lead astray and it wasn’t a really pretty picture. Looked like the top 8 which included 1st overall female Kami Semick where all off course and heading back to the finish on the road. What a disaster. I was super frustrated and wondering what to do and how the hell this could work out. With some counseling from Jeff it was decided that all the people who went off course were getting their money back and a comp for next year if they would come back. What happened next was nothing short amazing.
At the finish apparently Max King got there first as he had the most familiarity with the course and realized the mishap and took a route back that got him there ahead of Erik. Rather than cross the finish line and claim the national championship he waited for the top runners to get there and work out a solution to this dilemma on their own. It was decided by the time I arrived back to the finish that the places would remain the same as they were at the site of the wrong turn. Then all of them crossed the line in order and that was that. Considering that there was money and a national championship on the line it was by far the classiest move I have witnessed in running ever. It goes to show that the ultra community has integrity and class that took a bad situation and made it work out for the best.
Besides the drama of the last few miles the race went off without a hitch and people were raving about the course and I continue to hear good reports. That said a few people need to be recognized for all the hard work they put in to make the race a success.
Aid 1 captain Curt Ringstad and his crew.
Aid 2 Dan Harshburger and his crew for hauling in the water and supplies in a wheelbarrow to refresh runners after the Flagline climb at aid 2.
Aid 3/4 Colleen Moyer who not only had a double aid station but recruited all the help for the aid stations and organized supplies and food for all the aid stations. Without her who knows would have happened but I can honestly say that there is no way it would have come off half as good as it did so if you know her or even if you don’t next time you are around be sure to thank her.
Dave Pickhardt and Mitch Thompson, a couple of friends of mine who have been in on the course design from the beginning. They have spent lots of hours in the saddle with me riding all over the high country trying to find this course. Dave helped me mark the whole course the day before and was up there at the beginning doing everything from registration to guiding the runners at the start. Mitch pre rode most of the course that morning and caught some vandalism at mile 5 that had removed the flagging at the intersection so runners would have had to guess which way to go. These two guys will be part of the race crew next year and will help execute a perfect race next year.
Dan Montoya a local ultra runner and really nice guy was there beginning to end doing just about anything that came up and had some good ideas for next year already.
Jeff Browning local running machine who chased the runners around all day and got tons of footage with a helmet cam and is sorting out the footage for a sweet video that will hopefully be up really soon.
Dan and Kathy Harshburger who organized aid station 2 and 5 and then hung out in the woods for several hours to make sure everybody was doing ok.
Chris and Darla Askew who manned two turns for several hours to let mountain bikers know what was going on and to steer you all down the right path.
