Salt Flats 100 Endurance Run 2018
May 4-5, 2018

I am going to attempt to capture my 100-mile experience.

The night before the race, May 3rd, at the pre-race meeting, I was fortunate enough to meet some fellow Coloradoans and several other great folks.  I headed back to hotel feeling pretty positive about the next day.  Last year I did not make connections and I am sure being alone was a key to my DNF at mile 50 in 2017.

Back at the hotel, I fiddled with my gear and decided to consolidate my nine drop bags down to three.  Mostly, I was concerned that later in the race I might get confused so I wanted it to be simple.  After an hour of thinking and rearranging, I finally had my three drop bags ready.  Really it was four bags if you count Hastings twice as aid station #5 and #7.

I slept, sort of, from 9:30 pm until about 4 am.  I awoke with three hours until race time.  Plenty of time to eat, prepare, and pace around triple checking everything.  Once all the taping, lubing, and such was complete, I ate and packed the car for the start line.

The drive to the start from my hotel was only about 5 minutes.  I arrived at the start of the Bonneville Salt Flats at 5:30 am.  I was one of the first cars there other than those who camped on the salt all night.  A car pulled up next to me after a few minutes.  I did not know either of the people in the car, but as fate would have it, I would spend the entire race with one of them and half the race with the other.

The first ten miles of the race are down the Bonneville Speedway--famed location of land speed records and a favorite spot for car commercials.  After about 8 miles I noticed that two runners ahead of me were doing a run/walk cycle.  My wife uses this method and I have tried it before.  I thought that it would be a good way to spend some time talking with them and trying it out.    We ended up talking and run/walking all the way to 50 miles as a three-person team.