Mike Kreaden and the Stevens Creek Striders have organized Run 4 Amma, a fundraiser for cancer research at UCSF, for the past 15 years. As you read in that last post, the Striders are giving us a huge help by manning the Bull Run aid station, a spot on the course all the 100K and 50K runners hit twice, meaning about 600-700 individuals to handle. A service so essential to our Quicksilver race that, despite the many hours Stuart spent directing last weekend, he was again on deck, to return the favor.
For Run4Amma, the 50K and 30K races started at 7:30 and our Quicksilver aid station was at miles 10.5 and 14. Mike, the RD, had asked Stuart to get ready by 8:30 for the first runners. Looking at the overall 25-participant field, I was a bit dubious about that timing. I decided to run the 13 miles from home up to Skyline and was aiming at getting there around 9 am (Stuart had two other experienced helpers from our club: Guillaume who ran last week's 100K in 12:08, and Luciano, another member of our ultra team).
I left downtown Cupertino around 7:10 so I was a bit late despite a below 10 minutes average pace on this long climb. Running on route 9 isn't much fun, although the traffic was mostly upward. I remain amazed how many speedy cars use this road like it was a racing circuit, duh! I ran on the left side of the road and, at least, didn't cross any cyclists (to me there are the biggest danger when they cut corners at 50 mph...).
An anecdote on the way up: I was surprised to discover a new development, some conservation contribution from... Larry Ellison. Good surprise give the bad opinion I have of him about our Californian values otherwise... It's a hospital for wildlife and it opened in March 2025. And they are even looking for a supervisor (application)!
Back to Run4Amma, as I predicted, the first (male) runner arrived much later, at 9:23. Then 3 women at respectively 9:23, 9:31 and 9:33. Then, the field got really sparse, we certainly spent more time waiting than filling bottles. And I did fill a few but I mostly took the time to take pictures of the runners, posted in this Google album (please download the pictures you want, I may not keep that album for ever).
With the light field (25 participants) total, it took more than 3 hours for everybody to go through our aid station, and that was only mile 14 for the second passage. Besides the broad range of paces, we learned from one of the runners that there had been a major incident, with a young runner falling on his face and losing consciousness long enough to seriously scare those around him. He recovered consciousness fortunately but was so disoriented he couldn't answer basic questions. This happened to one of my sons as we were skiing, more than 10 years ago, he couldn't recall he was attending Yale, that was scary indeed.
With that, one of the long-time Striders, Peggy, spent quite some time at the scene and ended up being the last runner coming through our station.
As if that wasn't enough for one day, another Strider, Pat, was sweeping and tripped. She got to our station with a bloody face, what a day! A car, or rather face, wash was in order...
We hadn't enough coverage to reach the RD, and the radio wasn't going through. Thankfully Mike stopped by our station later this morning to confirm the injured runner had been well taken care of by the medics and was in stable conditions, pending more concussion-followup exams.
I ran a much more pleasant route back home, down on Charcoal Road, Table Top Mountain Trail, crossing the refreshing Stevens Creek, then along the creek on Canyon Trail, then Stevens Canyon Road, up Lookout Trail, Coyote Ridge, down Hayfield Trail to Fremont Older, Prospect Road and along the track, to McClellan and Pacifica. For a total of 29 miles. Back to the title, helping some, running some...
Relive.cc flyover (click on this link or the picture below):
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