to Milwaukee, WI:
We started at 7:00 a.m. on the 29th running up the lakefront path. Our friends Melissa Pizarro, Ed Cook and Kim Fitmiss joined us initially. We were in great spirits and we engaged in plenty of Shenanigans throughout the day:
Over the course of the day Kim, Melissa and Ed headed back to the city leaving Alfredo and I to buckle down and crunch some serious miles before dark. We were lucky most of the day because we had the wind at our back and the temperature stayed right around 28 degrees. We had some very long stops to eat which allowed us to dry off some clothes as well. We were not in a hurry.
As the night fell and we approached Waukegan, we were joined by pacer extraordinaire (and KM 100 female winner) Shelley Cook!! We also had some crew assistance from Alfredo's wife Kiki!
It got a bit colder at night, but nothing major. We had a few moments. We also struggled to find places that were open for food and drink. We had a major high when we hit the Wisconsin border:
But then a reality check when we realized we had many sad and dark hours of pounding the pavement to go.
And then the greatest crewperson in the history of man joined us! Tony Weyers!!!!!
This man saved our lives. He crewed us for over 12 hours in the cold dark emptiness of the world's flatest and boringest country roads. He got us shakes and coffee and (cheap imitation) Gatorade. We would not have finished without him.
I'm not going to lie....during most of the second half of this run we decided it was a bad idea, too much pavement, completely stupid. Alfredo started with a injury that kept nagging him. He was a warrior. The night hours were cold and boring. Although we heard Shelley Cook's life story due to an unfortunate overcaffination incident, not much happened until the sun came up the next morning and we enjoyed some Racine Danish Kringle.
This picked us up a bit. Then we had a rather long debate about where to finish. The Fourth Base is actually in West Milwaukee, and the prospect of running through Milwaukee wasn't attractive to anyone. So we decided to run till we saw a Milwaukee sign. And we begged Tony to find the closest Milwaukee sign. It ended up being 91.5 miles to the sign....and it was 91.5 miles to the Fourth Base too. Go figure.
As we got closer our friends and family came out to join us. We actually raced the last 2 miles. I have NO idea why.
I want to thank Tony Weyers. He carried us. Shelley Cook kept us from losing our minds at night. Ed Cook, Kim Fitmiss and Melissa Pizarro - thanks for pacing and joining. To all our family and friends that cheered, followed us on FB and/or sent us messages, you were the reason we didn't quit.
These types of events are hard. Set aside the fact that we ran 90 plus miles all on pavement in below freezing temps. The real challenge is that there is no real good reason why. We were asked that question countless times along the way. Eventually we started cracking up when people asked. We never had a good answer. "Because we said it out loud" didn't make sense to people. "Because we can" seemed arrogant. There was no buckle or medal. It's not on Ultra Signup. Most people will never know we did it and we have nothing to show for it. That's the best part. We just did that.
I ran the entire distance in Hoka Bondi B's. Most of the Strava Data can be found here (in parts).
