Nathan Schiller

This race consisted of a 5K trail loop around the South Mountain Reservation, in New Jersey. It offered three options:

• Run one lap
• Run as many laps as possible in three hours
• Run as many laps as possible in six hours 

I did the latter, so my race lasted from nine a.m. to three p.m. … ish. 

A few other things

The race was self-supported; only water was provided. No problem—typical for a timed race in January in the Northeast. I set up a huge camping chair not far from the start/finish for easy access to gels, snacks, fluids, and ran with a light vest, carrying fuel for a couple laps.

If you wanted your time posted online, you had to write your name on a leaderboard and check off laps. I did this.

The atmosphere

This was a festive race—no surprise, given the mantra of Sassquad Trail Running: “Every run is a trail party!” 

Many thanks to all team members and volunteers, who spent time and energy ensuring that chumps like me could drive in, have fun, and drive home. I highly recommend this race and their others.

My strategy

I’ve never run a six-hour race, and I hadn’t run any part of the course in nine years. So my plan was simple: go out quickly (but not fast), get comfy, and never push the pace. The story of my contemporary ultra life; more later.

I figured laps would take 25-30 minutes, and that there was no reason to conserve energy. If I reached the start/finish at 5h30m with tired race legs, I’d still have an opportunity to eke out another lap. If I got there at 5h36m with “fresh” legs, i.e., legs “only” 90% depleted from 5.5 hours of trail racing, no chance. 

The course

This was a 100 percent trail course—not a single step on manmade materials. I divided it (roughly) into three sections:

• 1.25 miles flat, net downhill
• Half-mile relatively steep descent (~150 ft cumulative drop)
• 1.35 miles rolling hills back home

The first section consisted of double-wide trails, perfect for 50K speed pace (at least initially), despite some modest mud patches and a big log.

The descent curved one direction then another. At first the footing was easy, then steep and rocky. For most of the day on this section, a bright winter sun hovered behind, casting long and disorienting shadows on the ground. That plus the tears from the wind forced a lot of focus and sacrificed some speed.

Side note: Saturday, January 28, 2023, was a beautiful trail running day: 35 degrees to start, warming to 50, mild wind, no rain.

The backside was double-wide packed gravel (I think?) for 3/4 mile, then turned into single track, somewhat muddy and rugged, but always with enough stones to step on, and the ground never too gooey.

After the first two laps, I understood how to run them. A fine day for optimal lines and staying upright: I never lost a shoe or tripped or turned an ankle, just banged their insides against the rocks.

My run

I felt good going out, but I knew on the first downhill that the day wouldn’t be perfect. At my first mental check-in, at 90 minutes, I wanted my legs to feel nothing. But they felt like they’d run ninety minutes. 

I believe the course record is 15 laps. I knew that would almost certainly be impossible for me right now, and probably only an ambitious lifetime goal. When I finished my seventh lap around 3:03, I knew 14 was impossible too. But 13 seemed doable.

Some context: a detour

I did my first marathon around my 21st birthday. I enjoyed it, wanted to get faster, but more so wanted to go farther. I gradually worked through 50K, 60K, 50M, 100K, 77M, training unscientifically. I liked running with friends, or alone in woods, or with friends in woods, or exploring the city. 

Racing was always one small element, but it became exponentially more enticing as I improved. Once entrenched in 100M shape, I signed up for a 24-hour race (with a nine p.m. start time). The course, a flat paved 5K, looped a lake outside Boston. 

My goal was 120, but my conditioning wasn’t clear. Four months earlier I started a 100M on a course I didn’t care for, at a time I didn’t quite care to run. I was overtrained and unmotivated. DNFs can crush spirits, but I was happy with a quick 50M training run. 

Two months later, regrouped and reenergized, I finalized 24-hour training with easy overnight loops on empty country roads. But the next weekend I got married; the next two weeks I ate and drank all over Italy. 

Then the race. A slow and steady effort brought out, over the hours, an existential pain. When I reached ~108 miles sometime after 21, I—or, I should say, my wife and friends who spent the day supplying me with ice and companionship—calculated that I needed one more lap to win. I walked one and stopped, gladly.

Afterward I was excited to slim down and build back speed. I eyed a local half marathon PR course in early fall. For three restless weeks in August I swam and walked. Then I went to a familiar flat trail for a speed workout. I took one fast step and felt a shift in my right hamstring.

Strangely, I could still run, and run fast. It was just a knotty sensation in the upper rear of my leg. I couldn’t train hard, but I did enough for the half PR. Then I went for the MRI. A tiny tear, as expected.

For two years I didn’t run. Just PT and some swimming, War and Peace on the elliptical, summer centuries on a bike. For two more years I reintegrated running, riding waves of progression-regression. 

By then I had a base, in legs and lungs, to train for a 50K trail race, and raced one successfully the first Saturday of 2020. My first in five years—I was itching for more. I signed up for a longer race in the spring, but the pandemic canceled it. 

It was a surreal and terrifying time; I ran haphazardly. On an atrociously hot and humid June morning, I went for 10 miles pushing half marathon pace, took a short break, then went for the full 13.1. A mile in, something in my right thigh shifted.

This setback I managed proactively: rest, attention, and a finally-accepted clarity: don’t push distance at speed. Pretending I could chase 2 in the 8 with my aged-out slow-twitch fibers? What was the point, if it risked the simple luxury of three easy miles at will? 

Again I built back. When I entered a 25-miler this past fall, I honored my pledge: go out quick (but not fast), only cruise, never push, no risk.

Back to the Fat Sass (not SaaS)

As my race phased into four hours, I felt a twinge of tightness in my right hamstring. In the old days, pre-injury, I did things like go out too fast in a 50M and run the last 17 miles with bonked legs, laughing through the consequences of my idiocy. Now the possibility of a single cramp in my (probably) healed injury area made me consider stopping. 

Instead, I slowed and monitored. When I finished my 11th lap at 4:57, I made two more contingent on a stabilized leg situation. It took a few minutes for that to fall through. 

I finished with a fun slow lap, enjoying the woods in a way I hadn’t, and completed 37.2 miles (60K) in 5:31:37.

Lessons learned

• Every time I cross the race fuel threshold and can no longer stomach branded glucose, I want only two things: fresh watermelon and ramen noodles. Will plan accordingly.
• I have the daily fortune, despite perceptions of my county, to run and train on hills and trails. Yet to absorb hours of rugged race-pace downhills, my quads need mileage. Time takes care of that.

Non-running running improvements needed

On a “max feasibility scale,” i.e., the degree to which I and my lifestyle are willing to bend to this great and essential hobby:

• Rest and cardio ought to improve from 10 percent to 50 percent
• Strength and calisthenics from 55 to 90 
• Diet and weight from 65 to 80 (during peak training) and 90 to 100 (during taper) 

I never felt the pull of play-acting professionalism, and I definitely don’t need to bench today what I benched in high school, but it would be nice to weigh what I weighed back then for the few short sporadic stretches of time when being there would justify getting there. To put it simply.

What’s next

Rest. To get in shape for this race, I upped mileage more than my spreadsheet suggested. Now the decline. 

In April there’s a four-hour race in Harriman, a little loop up and down a bunny hill, which happens to be one of my favorite training pit stops. That will be fun. 

Anyone know a good local trail 50M in late May or June? 

Then, if all goes well, a 100K in fall or winter. 

In the meantime, how about a marathon PR, or the Knickerbocker, or 14 (15?) at the next Fat Sass? 

And then, 12-18 months from now, 100M. It took me a decade to get there the first time. A decade to return sounds about right.