Friday: 9:30pm:  Sunset: All things considered, it has been going well. The mountain picture show has been very entertaining, slipping past, one frame after another. The weather has been pleasant, overcast with a slight breeze. But, my energy disappears with the day’s light. As the sun sinks down, so does my body into the turf. The plug is pulled, the power outage complete. The last bit of light slips away, darkness surrounds me, and dozens of tiny lights flicker on as I look down the mountain behind me. Sure is a pretty night. Seems a bit cold, my temp dropping as lack of work fails to warm me. I take my jacket out of my pack and slip it on, still sitting still.         I am coaching 5 people in this 100 miler, as well as 8 people in the 50 milers, and another 6 in the 50km. Besides that, there are another 6 in the 100 mile that have been sort of training with us. All in all, we have a good group here. TJ is already in front of me and I begin to wonder who I will see next. Would be hard to explain why I am sitting on my butt right now doing absolutely nothing. It’s time to get up but I can’t seem to find the energy. And so I am still sitting when Allen comes by, “You ok” He asks? Calorie crash I tell him. Made a mistake and didn’t bring enough with me up this climb. He hands me a chocolate bar, and then Daniel is there. They’re concerned about leaving me, but I tell them to go on. I’ll pull it together in awhile and get going again. So they leave and I get up as they pull away. I find the motivation to go after them but my lights seem to be acting odd. Besides the severe lack of power, my headlamp dims soon after I turn it on. I stop to extract my backup hand held light, but it too starts to fade soon after. Damn! My energy deficit is so low I’m sucking the energy out of everything I touch. Seems almost comical. Another person comes by and sees my light predicament, so he offers up a ride if I can hang on. But I cannot. He disappears quickly ahead just as I find the first real muddy area. With 2 very dim lights, I have no choice but to plow strait through the muck, heading directly for the next glow stick. For some odd reason, the comedy of the situation seems to provide a tiny bit of energy. My jacket is right on the edge of being too warm, but I get cold each time I remove it. I should take it off and run faster but the logic of this evades me. I stop to get some calories at Elk Camp, but they don’t seem to have very much to offer. The broth tastes very good but it just aint near enough. I take off out of there soon enough and continue my sloppy slog through the mud, and then I find the snow. Not the soft white picture postcard powder, but the sharp two foot ledges that you have to use your hands to climb up on. Dodging the postholes across the top for three paces and then jumping off the other side down into a muddy bog. The snow is mostly frozen hard but occasionally I posthole and need to lay down just to roll out of it. If I weren’t having so much fun playing in the snow, this would be very frustrating. It’s certainly slow, but at least I’m not sitting still. The glows ticks seem to be following a creek, so I’m either in snow or mud. I transition between one and the other in a mindless strait line from glowstick to glowstick. A few dark shadows flit past me going rapidly the other way. I nod to each one without thinking that none of them can see this simple acknowledgment. None of the shadows have a personality until TJ comes by. We speak for only seconds and then move off in opposite directions. John is next, struggling with his own demons. The mudland twixt the trees gives way to an open field, where Allan and Daniel move        The road finally and then a short grassy track down to a muddy mess of a jeep road covered in pools of water, mud, and snow. With my limited light, I can’t tell which is which til I slip, slide, or slush. I get down the road about a quarter mile, knowing that it’s a mile to the Porcupine Aid Station, when I suddenly become unsure if I’m on the right road. I’ve heard tales of people taking the wrong road for a few miles right down to the highway. The thought becomes so overwhelming that I stop. I can’t see any ribbons or glowsticks in either direction. I have already passed two roads leading off to one side that were also unmarked. Could I have gotten off track the same as many others have done in the past? I turn around and head back up the road, unsure, checking the snow and mud for tracks. My light just doesn’t bring out any tracks that I can see. It’s a problem with both, my eyes and the light. I’m simply running blind and begin to wonder. And then I see a green light coming towards me and know without a doubt that it’s Diana. I want to just wait for her, but my feet are now frozen cold as ice, so I turn around and hurry on back down the road until I see the lights of Porcupine. The lights of the station are pointing out so I’m even more blind than I was in the dark. I slide through one last mud hole just before crossing the last bridge.        Janice & Kara are sitting outside in lawn chairs, waiting on us. Janice gets up and follows me into the building where they weigh me. I avoid the main interior, choosing to sit in the hallway by the open door instead. They bring me my drop bag and Janice gets me a grilled cheese sandwich. My feet are a frozen glob of mud, but it makes no sense to spend the time changing socks or cleaning my feet when I’m just going to roll back through the same mud bog as soon as I leave again. Still, I can’t seem to feel my feet. Janice brings me a cold coke, which I try to use to wash down the cheese sandwich. My stomach is so sensitive that nothing is going down easily. I change into a warmer shirt and dry gloves, and then stuff a hat in my backpack too. I take a lot of time to do very little, but can’t seem to get going. I’m so thoroughly trashed I can’t think clearly. Diana comes in, sits nearby, and soon has a gang of medical people working on her feet. Lynn comes in with her, but he goes into the warm interior. Kara comes in to remind me I’ve been here long enough, so I get up to leave. Before I leave, Janice gives me her headlamp and I take my emergency flashlight from my drop bag.        Saturday: 2:00am: Middle of the night. I stumble back out the door, cross the bridge and start back up the muddy road. But now I can see and it’s much easier to avoid most of the bad areas. I can even tell the difference between mud, snow, and rock. I see Gabe just before I get to the road. We both stop to visit for a moment, but he appears to be doing well and I suspect he’ll be with me in pretty soon. Right after Gabe is Amanda and then Ricky. Diana, Lynn, and another guy come up from behind and I hook on to their formidable armada as the four of us sail through the slop. 30 minutes later and just before the bogs, we cross paths with Stuart and Henry. Stuart looks good but Henry has a thousand mile stare in his eyes that is pretty telling. I hope he gets past it, but he’s going to need a large nudge from somebody to do so. And then, I see Fagan, looking like he’s doing ok, but so close to the cutoff, that he may not have enough time left to stay in the game. Lynn’s engine is running hot, so we all hang on and ride his wake. The combination of my good lights and his lead keeps me out of much more of the soup than I did earlier. This also makes us much faster. We roll into Elk Camp just as Robert is heading up the opposite way. He is too far back to make the cut and knows it. Diana visits with him while we go into the station for coffee and calories.        Funny how little mix-ups cause really odd situations. Lynn and I get a coffee and sit in the shadows away from the fire and when Diana comes in, she doesn’t see us. Some people are just leaving as she arrives and she thinks it’s us. Also, these people go out real fast and she takes off after them. It takes us a few minutes to realize she’s gone and a few more to realize she’s hammering down the trail trying to catch us. We can see her Green light moving quickly away from us. No way are we going to catch her, unless she stops or gets to the next station and figures it out. Still, we are going faster than we normally would. We pass another trio who tell us Diana blew right through and said she was trying to catch somebody. This goes on for about a half hour before we finally catch up to her, walking. Surprises her when she sees us running up behind her. The whole episode give us a big jolly laugh, which is nothing but fun. Now that we are finally past the muddy muck, I can really start to roll and find that I am waiting for Diana every now and then. Spring Marsh is one of the places I stop to wait. When she gets there, we talk about me not waiting for her. While I usually go downhill much faster than her, I am very slow on the uphills where she is much stronger than me. So, I pick it up and cut loose. I start slowly and then get into a full blown downhill sprint, that lasts clean down to the Narrows. I ask for a coke, which they don’t have, so I keep going. The perfect downhills turn into a few uphills and a few steep downhill switchbacks. When the trail turns to another muddy bog next to the river, I wade thru the side of the river instead of the muddy slog next to it. So my quick turnover run slowly degrades into a walk by the time I stroll into the Footbridge aid station.   Takes me about 20 minutes to take care of business: load up on food, remove muddy shoes and socks to wash my feet, drop the night gear, and put on fresh clean day gear. The gaiters reek and I just can’t bring myself to put them back on. Diana is coming in just as I walk out with Allen. The ‘Wall’ is the big dog of this course and my short goal is to reach the top at Bear Camp without trashing myself. I slip into a high altitude breathing technique and rhythm where I focus on my breathing while I take easy comfortable strides. The ascent is slow but continuous, where a few people pass but I make good progress. I’m lucky enough to have a large cloud with wispy strands hanging over my head. Without it, a complete meltdown would be certain. A few of the mud bogs have dried out so that its half solid and half soup and can be negotiated if I’m careful. Parts of the climb are a stream but much of that is bedrock underneath and not all that bad as long as I stay right in the middle. The bulk of the climb is behind me before the lead 50 miler goes by, then Hans, and then Lynn. Bear Camp is a tarp on the ground surrounded by stumps. Allen is holding down one of the stumps. I adopt another across from him just as Diana strolls in. So far, our timing is pretty good. The worst of it is over, but we’re still a long way from home. We’re under the trees for most of this next section, but you can already tell that the clouds have cleared and the sun is patiently waiting for us to clear the trees. We decide to take a short break when we get to the Stock Tank, but it seems to be taking us awhile to get there. The trail is runable for the most part, not much for big climbs or descents, but the occasional mud bog keeps popping up to slow us down. Attempting the high side of one such muck hole, I slip and slide directly back down into it and sink half way to my knees. I had been attempted to stay high and dry for a time, but all bets are off now. I finally give in and plow strait through each stream we cross instead of hopping rocks to stay dry. After a few of these, I begin to realize just how good it feels to cool my heels on a regular basis. Diana, Allen, and I push and pull along at odd intervals, each of us struggling along as best we can. Diana seems the most relentless, driven to finish, while Allen seems to be comfortably rolling along like its no big deal. I, on the other hand, am starting to drag. When we finally do reach the Stock Tank, it is a wonderful oasis. A deep, cool, heavily shaded area, with the sound of running water pouring out of a pipe into a circle of rocks. I kneel down to put my head in line of the rushing spray, then refill my bottles with the ice cold mountain water. After quenching my thirst, I lay down in the shade and close my eyes for a few glorious minutes. It is enough. We start back up and take out of there a little more refreshed but it aint long before we are out of the trees and under the direct sunlight. The others start to pull ahead of me as the heat begins to silently steal my strength. I fall well behind on a short stiff climb only to find them sitting under a lone tree on a hilltop with Lynn. They start to get up as I get there but I need some of that shade too, so I sit down next to Lynn as the others get up and go. He seems to be having a bad moment and we talk about it. We both get up and follow the others, each of us plowing through the streams and mud holes. Saturday: Around Noon: Cow Camp, sits out in the open, minus any shade whatsoever, so when we stumble in, we sit under the suns direct vision and the only thing that appeals to our pallets is cold fruit. I ask for and receive a bowl full of melons, grapes, and oranges. The others do the same. There is some confusion about exactly what mile we are at and how far the next station is, all of us disagreeing with each other. Diana says she wants to be at Dry Fork in an hour and a half, to which I tell her, there’s no way we’ll be there that soon. Add an hour, I say. So now she’s on a mission and begins to hammer away while I try desperately to keep up. Allen pulls ahead of all of us, while Lynn and I trudge along side-by-side, well behind the others. We have a nice chat while we cool our heels in one stream after another. Mark Heaphy comes up and runs alongside to visit as he passes. We can see Dry Fork ahead and well up on the ridge. It seems such a long way away. Allen is gone, but Diana is just ahead of Lynn and me when we make the final climb up into Dry Fork.        Joyce is waiting for us, as is Henry, Robert, Daniel, and Gabe on crutches. He tells me that he fell and broke his leg in the mud only minutes after we spoke up on the mountain. In my over heated state, when Henry offers up an ice cold ice tea, I accept and down it quickly. It’s so good that I down another just as fast. I look at some food but my stomach is out of sorts and I just want to sit for a minute and so nothing. Joyce & Henry both offer up different foods, but I just don’t have eyes for any of it. Diana heads out, says she’ll see me in a bit. I tell Joyce I have the urge to barf, so she hands me a large Ziploc bag. I promptly empty my stomach into it with two large hurls: nothing but Arizona ice tea. Well now I’m empty of calories for certain, so I ask for another bowl of cold fruit. It seemed to work well at Dry Fork, so lets try it again. Santhosh comes in just now and asks what I’m doing here. He started the 50miler at 6am, so he’s about 35miles into his race while I’ve done 85miles. He is one of our Rogue runners. Waiting for you, I tell him. Joyce brings me a bowl full of melons, grapes, and cantaloupe. As I get up to leave, Santhosh says he’ll catch up to me soon. Joyce walks out with me, while I eat, moving slowly uphill. I finish the bowl of fruit, then capture a kiss from my wife before she turns back, leaving me alone. When I turn off the road and enter the trail, I try to force the pace a little and find that I can, so I start to plow ahead. By the time I reach the road on top and start down, Lynn and Mark have joined me, and then minutes later, Santhosh. Our little caravan continues to grow as a few 50 milers climb on board and hook into our energy. I get a buzz going and start to run a little and then a lot. A big hard wind blows through out of nowhere and then a sprinkle of raindrops. Oh boy but I can feel it coming. The wind and the cool is bringing me power. More than the food or water, the wind and the rain are enormous sources of energy to me.  I tell Lynn that if it rains, I’m taking off. Minutes later, the rain comes with a large gust of wind and pushes my ON button. I start to run and spin faster and faster. Santhosh and I pull ahead of Lynn and Mark and continue to hammer. We cross the high roads and then the field chopped up by many hooves into an uneven trip obstacle course that made it awkward coming through yesterday. Now, it all seems so insignificant, because it’s raining and I’m flying. I can hear somebody right behind me but I’m going to fast to see who it is. My senses are on hyper alert status, searching each section of trail immediately in front, making snap decisions to turn here or skim there. I don’t know how I choose the right turn each time but for this moment in time, my mind seems to be working faster enough to stay ahead of everything else, which is always going pretty fast. Thirty or forty minutes is about how long it lasts, but my goodness, how much ground I’ve covered in that piece of time. I stop and wonder why I stop, when I realize it’s not raining any more. I have a 50 mile runner with me but Santhosh has fallen off. He’s only 30 yards back and soon with us again. I can’t see Lynn & Mark, but Diana is just in front of us as we roll into Upper Sheep. Still, our combined energy seems to grow, the strength of it carries us forward with an amazing momentum. The same sort of energy that carried us out at the start, now brings us back in. Damn what an awesome feeling. But, even in this elevated state, I still cannot climb as quickly as the others. I tell Santhosh to take em on up and over, as I plan to go up as best I can… very slow and easy. There is one last creek with a log bridge to cross just before the final climb and Diana struggles across, so she ends up behind me and we climb together, well behind the others. When we reach the top, Santhosh is alone waiting on us. So why didn’t you go on with the others, I ask? I am only in this country for one more year, he says, and I’d like to say I finished once with you on a 100mile course. Wow, well, that is hard to argue with and one heck of a nice thing to say. The field rolling off the summit and down into the valley is completely inundated with multicolored wildflowers. It’s so overwhelming, that we can’t help but to steal a moment just to take it all in. And this moment, this vision, I know, will last a lifetime, forever imbedded in my mind. Lynn & Mark come up behind us and join us just as we begin our descent. My down-hilling reputation is know to those with me and they insist I lead, so I do. The downhill starts well, but then my feet begin to hurt. I slip off the trail and into the grass to arrest the pain just a little. Mark asks if I’m ok. I tell him my feet hurt more than usual. Maybe you have some rocks in your shoes, he suggests. I decide to stop just to check and sure enough, I dump a large flock of pebbles. They of course, do not wait for this dalliance, and I don’t expect them to, but now I am behind them. That is, until the snake. Santhosh is in front and suddenly he jumps strait up and makes a turn in mid-air. An odd noise escapes him before he hits the ground. The rest of the gang scatters… and so does the snake. During the commotion, I jump back into lead, but minutes later we are at the final fresh water spring. All of us stop to top off and then quickly back to the rapid descent. We’re making great time, but its really tough on everybody’s feet. Still, nobody wants to turn loose, so everybody stays in the pace line: me, Santhosh, Diana, Lynn, and Mark. The trail undulates over the hills, but always downward, sometimes shallow and easy, but usually steep. Through one muddy swamp section, Santhosh & I plow right through the middle and we momentarily separate from the others then pull ahead on a steep down hill. We drop past Mike Price, who is dragging a badly swollen knee just before Lower Sheep aid station. None of us needs anything at this point, so we stop only long enough for the other three to catch up. Still plenty of downhill, so the pace continues, but now with Santhosh in front, maybe just a touch faster than it was before. We start to hit a few uphill bits and pieces but Santhosh keeps on churning, until I finally suggest he ramp down a little. The valley becomes a slot canyon with a raging river just under the rocky single-track that we ride. At each turn, we expect to see the final station where the road begins, but at each turn we are disappointed to see that we aren’t there yet. Again and again this happens to the point that we are all over anxious and it starts to kill our energy, destroy the drive that has held us to task for so long. Our little gang hangs onto to Santhosh as we walk and run until we finally roll off the trail into the Tongue River Trail Head aid station. It is a glorious moment, which we revel in by standing still and staring at each other and the aid station for a few seconds. The aid crew is asking to help us but we simply stare at them, not wanting or needing anything more than to get on to the finish. We still have five miles of road, so we all turn and get after it. We simply aint done yet. We start to run, but after all the wonderful single-track trail, the hard rocky road is just too much. We switch to walking quickly and find it difficult to switch back to run mode. Lynn and Mark decide to run regardless of how bad it feels and quickly roll away from Santhosh, Diana, and me. On our right, the powerful Tongue River runs parallel the road we’re on, on our left a large rock walls reach well above the trees. Tall trees hang overhead, offering some shade for a while, but eventually we get past the rock walls and the trees. The land opens up around us, but the river remains constant, and the sun comes out to play more hell with my body. We do run every now and then, but I struggle with it so. Diana tries to get us going now and again, saying something about a beer at the finish. Matt Crownover meets us on a bike and rides along with us for a bit.  A bit later, Dan-O meets us too and continues on with us. He tells about the adventures of all the others but not in any detail. He and Diana try to get us running, but I am finding it very difficult to hold a run for long. Not sure why exactly. Usually I finish very well, and I was also running very well just a few miles ago. So we continue on in a stutter start and stop manner until we enter Dayton. We decide to run the rest of the way in, but not until we hit the pavement. It can’t be very far at all from that point and you gotta look good finishing, regardless of how you feel. And so we do, upon reaching the pavement, start to run and keep going across the bridge, down the main road, turn at the statue across from the Crazy Woman Saloon, and into the park. All our friends are waiting on us, cheering and waving, as we round the track and cross the finish.        My Rogue crew had mixed results. The mountain by itself was tough enough, but the mud added a component that slowed everybody more than we anticipated. We had broken legs and bruised ribs, cut faces and bruised egos, but mostly we had a grand adventure with a desire for more. I suspect that we will be back again, and maybe we will be even more prepared for whatever the mountain dishes out, and maybe the mountain and the weather will be more forgiving. Ya never know. And that’s quite all right too.