A mindset to keep moving forward
Dave lives in Charlotte, NC, and has a small roofing company. When he started the company he did everything himself and it was very physically demanding work, then as the company grew he started doing more office work and became very sedentary and had bad eating habits. He gained weight and in the early 2020’s he realized that what he was doing was not really the life he wanted, so he started to change his eating patterns. He started exercising consistently and got in good shape.
He decided to take a backpacking course with Chad Wright, a former Navy Seal and ultramarathon runner. He had always wanted to go backpacking, but didn’t know how to do it and it seemed like a good way to get into it. While there, he met several ultramarathon runners. He heard them talk about ultras, and he’d never heard of anyone running those distances. These ultra runners gave him pointers and helped him as they all hiked some tough mountain trails.
When he got back home, the idea of running took hold. He didn’t think he was ready for an ultramarathon, so he decided to do a marathon. The only race he had done was a 5K about ten years earlier. He couldn’t find a marathon to enter so decided to go out and run 26.2 miles on his own.
He was going to do it at the track at the high school right outside his house, but they ended up closing it because of the covid. So he went to the park, down the road from his house, and they had some nice trails through the woods. He found a 1.1 mile loop and just ran it. It took him 9.5 hours to do that marathon, and he couldn’t walk for 2 days afterwards. He was exhausted, butt showed him what he could do.
He was very active on Instagram because and posted his story on Instagram. His running buddies gave him a ton of encouragement along the way, and one of them, once he finished, told him that if he could do that they needed another person to join their group on a hike through Atlanta. It was 40 miles up and down mountains.
Dave drove to Atlanta and slept in a hotel for the night and met everyone in the morning at Stone Mountain at 4:30 am. He joined a group of about 37 people. The hike took about 15 hours. The camaraderie was great and Dave says that since you are walking for hours next to a lot of people you really take the time to get to know them. At some points they had to cheer each other on when they finally got to the last push up the mountain. The energy was high and Dave ended up again with the idea he could do even more.
A group met for lunch the next day, and one of the guys he met told him that he had signed up for an ultramarathon coming up in a few weeks. They invited him to join them if he was crazy enough. It was the 100 mile race called the Georgia Jewel. It had 14000 feet of elevation and they give you 36 hours to do. Dave did the calculations based on his 40 mile backpack hike and thought he could do that so he signed up.
His training for the ultra was a couple of 3 mile runs and some mountain biking. He had no experience in the world of ultras. He didn’t even know what an aid station was. He says it was a mess. He had no idea what he was doing. He remembers they started running at 4 o’clock on Friday at a moderate pace and after the first aid station he came to a long, steep climb on stone steps. He told his running buddy to go on ahead because he couldn’t keep pace on the steps. On the way back, he was so tired he was afraid he would fall off the steep steps going down. The course sweepers caught up to him and helped him to the next aid station. He wasn’t able to finish. But he did 72 miles and 10,000 feet of climbing. He says that he found his limit.
Dave says he’s stubborn and he doesn’t like to be defeated. He found his limit, but he wanted to see if he could change it because if he could change that he could change anything else in his life.
At that race he met a woman, and, as they were talking, he told her that he needed to find a 100 mile race that was flat and no elevation gain. He wanted to get the distance first and then work on getting the elevation. She told him about the Long Haul 100 in Tampa, and he completed his first 100 mile race there. He was helped by the camaraderie and encouragement of the trail running community there. He sprained his ankle at about mile 60 and had to do some walking, but he finished in just under 30 hours.
In January 2021 and in February he did the calendar challenge where you must run a mile by the date on the calendar. So on February 1 you run a mile, February second you run 2 miles and so on and so forth. He ended up running 411 miles in February. The last 4 days he was running a marathon every day, and he did it even though that last week was exhausting. But he chose something hard to do which made him feel amazing afterwards.
Tough Mudder and Ragnar
Dave says tough mudder races have always been on his list and he decided to run one to test himself. It was a fun event because it was an adventure, and one of his friends who lives in Atlanta ended up running and doing it with him. so they had a great time together. They did it in 6 or 7 hours hours.
He and his friend did a Ragnar race the week after. It was a relay race, and they had 6 people on their team so they each only ran about 18 miles.
He decided he was doing well so looked at the 1.1 mile loop of the last-man-standing race called the Midstate Mile and decided to enter. He thought to himself, “How hard can it be?” But the course took its toll. You have to be at the starting line every 20 minutes. And Dave couldn’t keep the pace. He had enough strength to continue, but ran out of time. He missed the start and was counted DNF. But everyone who was out of the race stayed to support the runners left in the race.
This year Dave will not be racing, he realized the lack of training he had when he first went to the last-man-standing race. He had plantar fasciitis last year right after that race and realized some rookie mistakes he was making. He had to take a break for a while, but ran the Tennessee mile at the same course in December, he did well but still has a lot of work to do before he can compete in the last-man-standing.
Dave is working to make distance goals this year, and they will be modest. His routine now is to do strength training a couple of times a week with running at a good heart rate the other 5 days. He says that strength training is developing stabilizer muscles he didn’t realize existed several years ago. He’s also working to adjust his diet to bring in the right amount of calories so he doesn’t become exhausted due to calorie deficit.
Bridge Questions:
One thing Dave should always have for running is a pair of socks.
The weirdest thing he’s seen when he’s been running is a possum that ran right under his feet and stopped.
The phrase that sums up his philosophy of life is “I chose this.”
Where you are in life is the result of choices you made. And if you want to change your life, make different choices.
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