A Fly on the Wall of Ambiguity

For an experienced ultra-runner, pacing another runner in a 100 mile trail race is like being a fly on the wall of one’s own chosen abyss of suffering. I had yet another opportunity to experience that genre of voyeurism in the Vermont 100 two weeks ago. A friend and training partner, Kevin, signed up for this race as his first 100 and asked me to escort him to the finish.

The concept of “pacing” a runner in a 100 mile race was conceived as a means to keep a compromised and potentially late-in-the-game delusional athlete safe during the literal and emotional darkest sections of an event. Since those who run 100 milers frequently enter challenging altered states and severe bouts of physical and psychological discomfort, pacing was designed as a way to guide a runner to his destination while lowering the incidence of face plants, passing out on the trail, wandering off trail into a void, choking on one’s own vomit, yada, yada, yada. I summarized pacing to my rookie Western States pacer this year as, “I am the drunk person at the party who is trying to have a good time, and you are the designated driver. Your job is to keep me safe so I can party on.”

The pacer makes sure the runner is eating and drinking properly, she encourages the runner in his labored efforts to run and helps keep the body and mind moving forward positively. The pacer constantly negotiates what she should say to the runner in a “walking-on-egg-shell-type” relationship in which verbal expression needs to be carefully planned and executed.




"One of the Many Covered Bridges in Pristine Vermont..."

Pacing is sort of like a mini adventure race except that one of the teammates is really messed up and the other is fresh, and the two only go as fast as the messed up one can manage. If the pacer is fit, she sees the experience very clearly, can multi-task easily, and keep pace without effort. For an experienced ultra-runner, pacing is like looking in the mirror of ones own usual race condition and the reflection most often isn’t pretty.

A pacer will escort the runner for 30, 40, or 50 miles+. This distance depends on the difficulty of the course and, therefore, when a runner is expected to hit sunset. Strange things happen for runners when the lights go out. Pace slows, perceptions change, motivation can wane and most definitely decision making is altered. In an otherwise crazy moment in a runners race, the pacer can become the voice of reason and calm during that last stretch of darkness and/or sunrise to the finish line.

As with most all 100 mile racers, Kevin struggled a bit and then a lot the last 20 miles of his race. He grew sullen, he had fits of temper and frustration, he ran courageously and solidly, he walked with difficulty and through it all he pressed on. I watched in fascination the expected demise of an otherwise strong and capable athlete. 100 miler’s reduce humans to a throbbing mono-focus and the pacer gets to take it all in with enthrallment.

The pacer observes this odd spectacle and asks, yet again, why she herself chooses to partake in this nature of difficulty. And somehow through the ache she sees something bright and worthwhile. She sees the rawness of the person, the undercoat, the warrior, the peeled away layers of self. And she realizes that this type of exposure could very well be the authenticity that eludes most people in life—the epiphany of who we truly are. Perhaps the rawness of the human, striped down to nerves and blood and emotion is the genuine essence of self. A 100 mile race is a measurement of success that is very honest and pure. And through the dirt and the sweat it all seems simply worthwhile and unavoidable for those who chose to live in a world of ambiguity and challenge.

Post race, I asked Kevin what was different in this race from other Ironmans or 50 milers in which he had participated. He said it was this raw pain. During and post race, he had experienced a unique and novel means of suffering. A unique and novel means of tapping into depth—a primitiveness. For him it was an affirmation of who he was as an athlete. And just a couple weeks post race—he’s already planning the next challenge. Amen.