On Saturday, March 31, I woke up in Huntsville State Park intending to run the Hog's Hunt 25-K Trail Run with Nancy Christensen, Tamay Tipton and Alissa Inman. I'd slept pretty well in the lakeside camp shelter, in spite of a few late-night wake-ups: a baby crying a few campsites away; a bullfrog noisily seeking a mate; the loud and persistent chirping of crickets. The forecast the night before had been a 60% chance of thunderstorms, and when we rose at 5:00 am we could hear thunder rolling in the distance. Still, I hoped it would somehow stay distant, because I just couldn't get my mind around running through dense pine forest in heavy weather. It began to rain in earnest by 6:15, but the tall trees outside our camp shelter kept me from being honest about it. One glance at Raven Lake told the story as raindrops pelted the otherwise glassy lake. By the time we'd walked to the Lodge we were pretty well saturated. Runners of all shapes and sizes huddled in various states of wetness. Some were draped in disposable black trash bags; others sported cheap, clear rain ponchos. Most of us, however, wore only our regular running attire and bounced and stretched to stay warm. I'll be honest here: I felt really discouraged by the thunder and lightning, which was coming more frequently in louder and brighter bursts. Standing outside awaiting the start, it was impossible to hear the announcements over the torrent of water hitting pavement. It felt black as the darkest night under that canopy of tall trees and I kept thinking How dumb do you have to be to go running in the dark, through a forest, in a lightning storm? Suddenly a car horn sounded and the race was on: 300 soaking wet people trampling through the dark, like cattle in a slow stampede. "We must be insane to be doing this," somebody behind me said. Nancy quipped, "All people with low IQ's, please head this way!" We jogged for about half a mile on asphalt when I heard a woman squeal in front of us. Then there was a funny little clickety clack sound, and Tamay said, "Look! It's an armadillo!" The poor little guy chose that inopportune moment to cross the road, and he scurried this way and that, dodging dozens of running shoes as they tried to dodge him. Then we hit the single-track trail. The path alternated from packed, moist dirt to hilly, root-strewn climbs. There were large sections of trail awash, ankle-to-knee deep and flowing like a small river. There were whole portions of trail reduced to the kind of gushy, sticky mud traps that sucked shoes and socks right off people's feet. About a mile into the race, when I began to think it couldn't possibly rain any harder, it started raining harder. I kept an eye on runners ahead of me as they tried skirting around the edges of the puddles, bogs and creeks that the trail had become. I attempted to do the same until it occurred to me what a colossal waste of effort it was. I was already drenched and muddy to the insides of the lucky marathon socks Nancy had loaned me. From then on I kept to the center of the path, whether that meant leaping over large exposed roots, squishing and slurping through sticky red mud, or wading through murky streams. Eventually a kind of dawn emerged, and the rain backed off from torrential to just hammering. When I wasn't cautiously plotting every footstep (comparing the journey to the most technical mountain bike ride I ever did on the Colorado Trail), I'd glance around to see the gorgeous, dense pine forest. It contained many vibrant shades of green, thick carpets of red pine needles and delicate white blossoms dotting the forest floor. Birds sang and squawked and twittered; squirrels chattered overhead. At one point we emerged from the forest to cross a long boardwalk over the lake. Clumps of water lilies and tall marsh grass and flat glassy water made for a pastoral scene. I only saw Alissa once: during the early out-and-back portion of the race she was headed downhill as we were headed up. She looked nimble as a gazelle, blissfully unaffected by the conditions. (Alissa would turn in an impressive time of 2:07, the second female to finish overall.) Tamay pulled ahead of Nancy and me after about five miles, and we lost sight of her graceful, blue-clad form before reaching the second aid station. The people at Aid Station No. 2 had Stevie Ray Vaughan on the boom box, Christmas lights strung on the awning, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, orange and banana slices, oreo cookies and what looked like a pile of vitamins. One of the aides had a pot of coffee perking on the Coleman stove, but he cheerfully told us it was not for the runners. "We encourage you to graze, but not to camp out," he said with a grin. I scarfed a pb&j quarter, a couple of orange slices and, after brief inquiry, swallowed what turned out to be an electrolyte capsule with a couple of shots of blue Powerade. Nancy and I had stayed together most of the time up till then, taking turns leading, trading smartass remarks and pointing out the natural beauty that surrounded us. The rain was now barely a drizzle, and the temperature was just right. There were lots of nice features to the trail that had been marred but not destroyed by the weather, and I think we enjoyed pointing them out to each other. It made the mud-slogging, creek-wading and root-dodging more bearable, I guess. At around the ninth mile, my electrolyte pill kicked in and I felt like Popeye after a can of spinach. I took off, full of optimism, ecstatically in flow, telling myself I had just warmed up and could now run an easy 10-K to the finish. I felt warm, loose and fast. My casual goal of finishing in under three hours suddenly seemed too easy. I wasn't wearing a watch because I had started my first trail run with the singular goal of finishing and I didn't want obsession with time to corrupt it. But now I was super-charged, picturing a glorious finish, setting a personal record. The intoxicating state of flow lasted a mile, maybe two. The next thing I perceived was that I was falling, hard, hands and arms splayed out in front of me, left knee grazing a root. "Huh," I thought. "How'd that happen?" I stood up, tried in vain to brush off the mud and grit, and started running again with a little more caution. I thought that this mile seemed no more rooty than the rootiest of the previous ten, but before I knew it -- "Dammit!" -- I was on the ground again. This time my right knee took the brunt of the fall, and when I stood up, it really hurt. I started running carefully now, determined not to fall again, all thoughts of PR's and spectacular finishes behind me. Then I fell again, this time landing flat - oof! - face-planted in mud to my teeth. I didn't perceive that I was tripping over anything. It seemed more like the ground just kept giving way beneath. I pictured that sport drink commercial where the runner turns to stone and crumbles to bits and I started to feel scared. Self-doubt crept in and I ended up falling two more times. I ate my packet of Gu and walked, counting, for a hundred steps. My thighs and quads felt like slabs of marble and my knee throbbed. For the next little while I decided I'd run 1,000 steps and walk 100. I counted aloud, breathlessly, to 1,000 and then to 100. Run 1,000; walk 100. This strategy started working for me as I climbed a series of tight switchbacks that were now, with my bricklike legs and disoriented mind, the greatest physical and mental challenge of the whole course. There was no one in front or behind me; it was just me and that twisting, turning trail. All my mind could handle was this: Run 1,000. Walk 100. Run 1,000. Walk 100. I followed the tape and the yellow signs down a gentle slope to the third aid station. I ate some fruit and drank some water and watched other runners start back up the hill. "Surely those are 50-Kers," I told myself. The aid station was at the end of a trail where it met pavement, and I looked around for the signs that would tell the 25-Kers to head along this fabulously easy, flat terrain to the finish. "Where do I go?" I asked pitifully, and everyone pointed up what now loomed as a godforsaken, never-ending mountain. I reached the top of that incline only to discover I'd left my mood back at the bottom. It occurred to me - devastatingly - that I could not go on. I knew there were only a couple of miles left, but I just could not muster up the image of myself doing it. I was barely moving; I could hardly pick my feet up as I jogged; they were dead weight, dragging behind me. The mud, the roots and the coursing rivulets of water were no longer amusing distractions. They'd become demoralizing obstacles I felt I couldn't face. But there are little angels everywhere, and my slumping body language must have spoken of despair to the runner coming up from behind. He was a tall, lean, mud-splattered Aussie with short black hair - I never saw his face, but his accent gave him away. "You okay?" he said as he jogged past. "Yeah..." He never looked back, just offered me this: "Your mind's gotta tell your body to do it." I waited till he was out of earshot before saying, "All right then, Body. Do it." My body didn't immediately respond, but I think she realized there was little choice. They couldn't exactly land a helicopter to airlift me out of there, for one thing. For another, my mind, just as involved in this endeavor as my poor, abused body, was pretty firm on the matter. Part of the training mantra I'd been saying for the past three months went, "I run no matter what the weather is like and I never quit on a run." Finally I was facing the very conditions that the mantra had been designed for. Later, after a scorching hot shower, warm food and a couple of ice cold pale ales, I would recall that moment of the race in a different light. As it was happening, it felt like I turned on the power to make it to the finish in spite of what my body was doing to me. But in hindsight I realized that I finished because of it. For it's when I feel totally used up and hopeless and have to dig way down deep to come up with anything resembling the will to go on - it's in those moments that I feel most alive. It sounds hokey when I look at it in writing, but that's it, that's the reason I got into endurance running. It gives me the recurring opportunity to experience doing something - finishing something - just when it seems most unlikely or impossible. There's been nothing on earth to give me that power the way a critical moment like that does. The last couple of miles were unremarkable. No spectacular bursts of speed, no humiliating falls to the ground. No glory, but no shame, either. Just methodically finishing what I'd set out to do at an even, steady pace. The last bit of trail gave way to pavement, and suddenly I was out of the surreal forest and back amongst RVs, SUVs and clean people in warm dry clothes. I heard the heavy breath and footsteps of someone speeding up from behind. "Come on!" he said as he came alongside, glancing at his watch. He was someone I'd passed and been passed by several times during the race and it was good to see his smiling face again. "We have four minutes left to break three hours. We can do it!" The last little bit of energy I'd apparently been saving burbled up to the surface and I picked up my pace. A handful of people were cheering at the finish line and I saw and heard Tamay yelling my name. I felt the smile return to my face, and yes, I made it, my longest run yet, 15-and-a-half miles in two hours and 57 minutes. I finished.