Stevens Creek Striders Reservoir Trail Half 2022: shorter and faster!

Since I started blogging in March 2007, 1 year into my ultra running journey, I set my mind on one mission: if I couldn't run faster since I had passed the theoretical athletic peak typically around 30 years for long distance running, I could always go farther, hence the blog title. While that looks like a dangerous mantra in a sport which has no length limit by definition (anything beyond the marathon distance), many rankings use 10 or 5-year increment age groups which means that we have many opportunities to reset the bar then get faster among our peers without necessarily having to go that far. Having started running competitively in my late thirties, that gave me opportunities to get faster through my forties and fifties like finally breaking 1:15 for the half marathon at 49 and my 3:18:05 PR on the 50K at 52 (with a mini stroke as a bonus, no less!). Now, today's hilly course, wasn't suited for getting faster than 10 years ago, on a flat and asphalt course in San Jose, and before this nasty injury which took more than 3.5 years to heal.

Although it was my first run of this event which is now in its third year, I did write about the course in my previous post, after running it twice in last week's blazing heat. And I've admitted I had completely misread the course description, and the amount of cumulative elevation in particular. With this insider knowledge, which I made available to all as a matter of fact, I ran the first miles with some reserve and intimidation.

At least the heat wave had finally passed, just in time, not just for us, runners, but also for all the firefighters combatting several major wild fires across California. From what I understood, the weather is so messed up that the extreme heat created some major condensation which resulted in major storms especially in South California which, in turned helped with pouring rain over the local fires down there (but not on the Mosquito Ridge fire which has destroyed part of the Western States trail this week). While it was cooler, I still got a good sweat running the 4 miles from my home to the Stevens Creek Park. I reached the Villa Maria parking lot just before 8:15 and there was already a good buzz going. While preparing, I did chat with a guest from Sweden, used to leveraging business trips to race abroad (Jonathan Borrill).

For a big change, it felt really good to get back to a blue wave with a strong show of our Quicksilver Club. Not everybody made it into that shot but we had 4 women and 9 men registered, representing the potential to score across the three team divisions: Men, Women and Mixed.

A few fast men from Excelsior returned, in particular from their dominance at Skyline 50K. But a good contingent from Pamakids was also present to protect their comfortable team ranking leads toward another likely Grand Slam for 2022.

A few Impalas were returning to show off their speed, after a strong start of the season at our first race, Mountain format, on Mt Diablo, in January.

With the remaining heat, I wished we would have started earlier, at least at 8. As we were approaching 9 am, I was surprised by the lack of readiness and urgency to get lined up at the start. I learned that the Rangers had notified Robert, the Race Director, of some backup at the Pay Station, and the consensus was to delay the start to all for everyone to get in, very fair. It ended up building a delay of only 10 minutes, that was very fair and worth it.

Michael Dhuey, a long-time Strider, and pro-am photographer, covering a huge spectrum of topics like big safari game in Africa, local animals from bees to birds or at local zoos, the Moon or shooting stars, offered his skills from the pre-start group picture to action shots at two spots on the course, then covering the finish line from 10:30 to 1:30. A long volunteering shift, thank you Michael! And Michael definitely confirmed he was also expert at shooting wild human trail runners too, great shots. Not to forget a super fast processing and same-day publish turnaround! Look at this original pre-race picture, gorgeous!

How do you call a picture of the race photographer? A selfie! ;-)

I asked Robert to add to his briefing a warning about the dangerous tree blocking half of the single track, after the 3 switchbacks right off the start (you can see a video in the Relive.cc flyover in my previous post). I was probably in 20th position in that section, I can imagine it took a few minutes for the conga line to clear. Meanwhile, I lost sight of the leaders within 2 tenths of a mile, wow! But, again, I knew what was on the menu in terms of climbing, so was fine with even letting 3 Impalas in front (the Impala Racing Team is a fast women-only club based in San Francisco).

The top 3 runners in the first short climb (Photo credit: Michael Dhuey). What do I see in this picture? Youth for sure, but more importantly, super strong glutes!

Per our nice private tradition, I did catch and pass Jason Reed (Excelsior) by the end of mile 2. Jason is just back from 10 days in Argentina where he represented the US at the World Championships of... snowshoeing. And he is getting closer to enrolling me in that other running sport. Last winter and spring I was still feeling my tendon injury too much to risk it again but, based on the great progress over the summer, that would provide some additional good glute strengthening. Tempting...

I passed a couple of runners in that Tony Look Trail section which I know so well for having run it dozens of times when I was a Strider myself. So, yes, I was having fun, even jumping in front of Michael's camera, despite the uphill (in Shiran's absence, someone had to do it!):

I admit I was a bit surprised about the lack of protection while crossing the somehow busy Stevens Creek Canyon Road. There was a course monitor for sure but it was mostly up to us to gauge the risk and best spot for crossing that tricky road curve. Special thanks to the Park Rangers for allowing us to cross this road 4 times!

I had walked a lot in the climb to Mt Eden last week so I was really impressed that Stuart kept his solid jog up the first steep climb (0.6-mile long). I walked less this Saturday but, still, too much to my taste for such a short race. Sure enough, I crosse the leader before I was even at the top, I was at 4.6 miles, he was at 5.9, already a 1.3 miles, that's huge! I crossed the next two runners at the top (4.7 miles) and, by the turnaround, I had counted 10 other runners, including the lead female. I kept sight of Stuart all the way back to the aid station on Tony Look Trail and passed him as he made a quick stop to refill his bottle.

Stuart was stronger on the way up, that put some pressure on me to keep pushing all the way on Lookout Trail, one of the most challenging parts of the course with numerous switchbacks, lot of poison oak on the side, some roots and stairs but, most importantly, an irregular slope with steep sections. Before getting on Fern, I looked behind and couldn't see any other runner than Stuart.

On Coyote Ridge, I crossed a Park Ranger truck with lights on and avoided making eye contact with the Ranger in case they asked me to slow down! ;-) I already had to stop and walk in order to pass a horse, now was the time to get some speed toward the plunge into the Fremont Older Preserve. Needless to say, and carrying my usual two bottles anyway, I didn't stop by the aid station, which allowed one of the volunteers to catch these action shots.

Before the end of the downhill on Hayfield Trail, I crossed the leader again on his way back. This time I was at mile 9 in 1:24 and he was at 11.2 or so, another wow!

I made some time up in the downhill, so much that I got sight of another runner before entering the Seven Springs Loop and caught him by the end of the downhill. As he seemed to be struggling, I approached to pass on the left but he made an acceleration, that was bold! I used a few hundreds yards to slow down in order to swallow a GU Energy gel and paid extra attention not to trip in case a coyote would show up (right?). Before getting to Hunter's Point, I approached that runner again and, taking advantage of him taking down his glasses, made my own acceleration and, this time, built a good lead (that was Ryan Ruiz of San Jose). Actually, I was gaining on 2 other runners, catching the lead women, Jennifer Bayliss right when we got back on Coyote Ridge. (Photo credit: Stevens Creek Striders volunteer at the Coyote Ridge aid station.)

Then I closed the gap with Excelsior's Victor Skorapa, passing him shortly into the steep final downhill. I kept pushing so hard that I clocked 5:54 for mile 13. That being said, my GPS ended up with 13.48 miles so maybe that mile was short as others ended up reporting between 13.2 to 13.4 later on Strava. Still, that looks faster that most others, although Strava didn't grant me any trophy on that run. :-(

Although I couldn't see anyone behind now, I kept pushing hard in pursuit of my first and main goal for the day, at least breaking 2 hours. I started the final climb back to the Villa Maria parking lot with 1:57 on my watch and managed to cross the finish line in a time of 1:58:36, phew! (Photo credit: Michael Dhuey.)

At 51, Jennifer took the overall win for the women with a time of 1:59:33. I told her that she exploded the previous course record but I was wrong, Samantha Moore ran 1:58:44 in 2019. Still, amazing performance, with the Impalas taking 1, 2 and 3, go gazelles! As for the men side, I was 7th overall, 3rd Masters and 1st in my age group, but so far behind Patrick who had won in 1:37, almost 6 minutes faster than the course record Chris Schwab set in 2019. That blazing performance translates into a 82.34% Ultrasignup race score for me, dang, so little for the big sweat and what I thought was quite an honorable performance otherwise. After 3 editions, I'm 10th on the top times, this isn't going to last long...

Pre 2021:

And you had to break 2 hours to make it to the new top 10...

1:37 is REALLY fast on such a course, a race which has enough cumulative elevation to represent two (2!!) Mountain races in one! Mountain races are typically 10 km long with 500 meters of cumulative elevation, the sum of D+ and D-. Today we probably climbed, then descended about 2,800-2,900 feet, that is 1,700 meters for the overall sum.

Top 3 men were 25, 32 and 29, followed by 2 Masters, teammate Gaspar Mora Porta in 1:47:51 then Excelsior's Karl Schnaitter who killed it too with 1:48:45. I still feel bad for falling so much behind but, at 58, maybe I do have a problem for wanting to chase these youngsters! ;-) Practically, what this means is that I need to keep working on my glutes because that's my current limiting factor after this 3.5-year injury. And it's not getting easier to build or rebuild muscle after 50...

Successful fueling strategy today: 1 pre-race Vespa pouch, 1 pre-race GU Energy waffle, 2 GU Energy gels (mile 4 and 10), 1 GU Energy Brew bottle, 1 Succeed S!Caps.

With our Club President, Stuart, taking 10th in the Men in 2:03, our club have a potential Men win. Interestingly enough for a good fight with Excelsior, Gaspar finished just ahead of Karl, I finished just ahead of Victor and Stuart just before Oliver Chan. It helps when Chikara doesn't show up! On the women side, we did have 3 finishers but the fourth recruit by Laura got distressed in the last miles and dropped before the finish for medical reasons. It was her first trail half marathon and she got her hydration off balance unfortunately. Thankfully I heard on Sunday that she had recovered, phew!

The Striders offered a nice hamburger afterwards and, short of any drink, the icy popsicles got quite popular. Also a nice assortment of candies and bars for extra carbs. But the best was all the tables in the shade, providing a great opportunity to catch-up with the community. Many thanks to my ex fellow Striders for this event which I hope, as a USATF Pacific Association club-organized event, becomes a new cornerstone of our MUT season. I can't name all from course monitors (hey Charles) to aid station volunteers, but special kudos to Robert for a flawless and professional race direction and Mandie who got some good additional heat training before this month's Spartathlon, from running the course in the morning to fix the marking after it got vandalized over night, to the extra heat of cooking a few burgers for us! I also enjoyed a short chat with course sweeper, Mike Kreaden, who is just back after 3 months in Chamonix and a successful completion of UTMB 2 weeks ago! Happy birthday Mike!

At 75, teammate Jim Magill wasn't the last finisher but the eldest. He took second in his age group to another teammate and Strider, Steve Patt, 73.

For once, I left after the last runner made it, i.e. after 1:30. It was actually so weird to feel a few drops of rain on the way back home, albeit nothing much to save our backyards from the nasty drought. Overall, including the commute on foot, 21 miles logged this Saturday and lot of social time at a cool low key but very challenging event. Looking forward to the 4th edition next year!