Nolan's 14 Race Report by Matt Mahoney Aug. 30, 2002 This was the 4'th annual Nolan's 14. The 2002 edition of the race was south to north this year, starting at Blank Cabin near Shavano at 6:00 AM Aug. 22 and ending 60 hours later at the Leadville Fish Hatchery near Massive. Based on my two previous attempts, I had no illusions of finishing, so I was quite happy to make 11 summits (to Huron) to end at Winfield. In 2000 I had made 10 summits (Massive to Yale). In 2001 I had made 11 (Massive to Princeton) but was over the 60 hour cutoff on the last summit. This year I stayed within the cutoffs. TRAINING For the first 6 months of 2002 I averaged 17 mi/wk running, 94 mi/wk biking, 6 mi/wk walking, and lifted weights twice a week, all of this at sea level on flat terrain in Florida. My longest runs were a 50 mile trail race in late March (Croom Trail), 40 miles in late May (Wickham Park), and a 28 mile training run on July 7. In late May I also took up indoor rock climbing, and was climbing 5.9 by the time I left for Colorado on July 23 to begin my acclimation. Once I arrived, I immediately began climbing above 14,000 ft. elevation: 7/23 Fly to Colorado 7/24 5 hours on Mt. Evans summit ridge 7/25 Democrat, Lincoln, Bross in 3:52 7/26 Torreys and Grays (via Kelso Ridge, class 3) in 4:04 w/Joseph, Shawn 7/27 Off 7/28 Oh be Joyful 25 mile trail run in Crested Butte in 6:52 7/29 Maroon Bells traverse (S-N, class 4) with Scott Brockmeyer in 9:42 7/30 Capitol Peak (class 4) with Scott in 10:15 7/31 Bike 9 mi. 8/1 Bike 24 mi. to Columbine (LT100 bike course) in 3:33 8/2 Bike 33 mi. over St. Kevins, Sugarloaf in 3:50 8/3 Evans-Bierstadt-Evans via Sawtooth (class 3) with Duncans 8/4 Off 8/5 Elbert in 2:57 (1:52 from Halfmoon, 0:07 on summit, 0:58 run down) 8/6 Challenger, Kit Carson (class 3) in 8:32 with Mike Bur 8/7 Crestone Peak-Needle traverse (class 4) with Mike in 14:10 8/8 Easy day at sand dunes 8/9 Bike 4 mi. 8/10 Leadville 100 bike race, pulled at 95 mi. in 13:30 (cutoff is 13:00) 8/11 Leadville 10K run in 53:54 (about 12 minutes over sea level time) 8/12 Holy Cross via Halo Ridge (class 3) with Mike Bur in 8:40 8/13 Bike 4 mi. 8/14 Massive, 7 hours 8/15 Bike 4 mi. 8/16 Bike 4 mi. 8/17 Leadville 100 mi. run in 29:26 8/18 Off 8/19 Bike 6 mi. 8/20 Bike 4 mi. 8/21 Off 8/22 Nolan's 14: Shavano, Tabeguache, Antero, Princeton 8/23 (cont'd) Sleep 4 hours, Yale, Columbia, Harvard 8/24 (cont'd) No sleep, Oxford, Belford, Missouri, Huron 8/25 Off 8/26 Fly back to Florida GEAR I used a waist pack with 2 20 oz. water bottles. I carried food (trail mix, peanut M&Ms, cookies, sometimes a package of meat or sandwich), FRS radio, 2 flashlights (one 4 LED with 3 AA batteries, one backup incandescent with 2 AA batteries), maps, compass, duct tape, caffeine, ibuprofin, vaseline, and toilet paper. Weight was about 3 pounds plus water. I refilled the water bottles from streams as needed without treatment. For clothing I had unpadded bike shorts, synthetic T shirt, long sleeve polypro shirt, light jacket, rain jacket (polypro, 4 oz), rain pants (polypro, 4 oz), knit hat, and polypro gloves. I tied the clothing around my waist when not wearing it. I wore Merrill Sprint Blast without socks. The gear was the same as I used at the Leadville run except for the extra jacket and radio. ROUTE Starting at 6:00 AM Thursday, we took the Angel of Shavano trail from Blank Cabin (class 1) to the summit in a little over 2 hours, then the rocky saddle over to Tabeguache (class 2) just before 9:00. From here there is a choice of routes, but everyone returned to the saddle and descended loose rocks and scree to just above Brown's Lake and only briefly below treeline. At this point I was climbing with Bobby Keogh and Steve Simmons. We found a dead calf near the jeep road, then climbed the road briefly west before ascending the steep slopes to a broad plain at about 13,000 ft. We crossed this north to pick up the jeep road again to Antero, summitting just after noon. We ran down 8 miles of jeep road (Bobby and Steve behind me) to the Baldwin Gulch aid station around 2:30 PM for some of Jon McManus's excellent sandwiches. Although we were allowed to cut the switchbacks on the road, I found it easier to stay on them. Bobby and I started up Princeton through Alpine, past the Busted Ass Ranch to the forest service trail that gradually ascends east along the south side of Princeton toward Grouse Canyon (good trail, but not on any map). We initially missed the right turn onto the trail from 292C (there is deadfall across it at the start) and had to go back about 1/4 mile. At about 11,000 ft. the trail disappears and you have to climb through open woods along a gully to a basin above treeline. We went too far north into the basin before climbing the ridge on the right, and did not discover our mistake until we climbed point 13636 to the west of Princeton. Bobby had never seen the course, but I had trained in this area and should have known better. From 13636 we could see the correct route, which required a 500 ft. descent on grassy slopes, then traversing a jagged ridge (with a class 2 trail with a little off route class 3 scrambing) south to point 13971, which we could bypass on the north side, and then on the west ridge to Princeton. We summitted at 7:38 PM. Last year going north to south I had climbed grassy slopes from Maxwell Gulch to Princeton on the NE ridge, so this seemed like it should be a good descent route. I am sure it would have been if we could have found it in the dark. Instead we were on rocks most of the way down until we found ourselves above impassable cliffs, and had to climb back up class 3 in the dark. We were too far west, although we weren't sure at the time. We argued about which way to go, and decided to traverse east, and again went too far and descended into "loose rock hell", a gully where every step started a small rockslide. After a very long time, we reached the Colorado Trail at 11:30 PM, which was an hour longer than it took me to climb the same route last year. From the trail, we walked/ran 8 miles to Avalanche Gulch in about 2 hours with good footing. Along the way we caught up to Steve, who had passed us on Princeton (taking the correct route) but was lost looking for the aid station at a road crossing 2 miles before the actual location on 306 (paved road). At the aid station, Hans Dieter Weisshaar had his camper and made us ravioli, scrambled eggs, and other good food. Steve and I slept for 4 hours until daylight. Bobby continued on, going with Rickie Redland and Richard Hypio, who had arrived a few hours earlier and had already slept some. After an hour for breakfast, Steve and I started up the Colorado trail about 7 AM, climbing north to 12,000 ft. to pick up the east ridge of Yale. Steve was slow at high altitudes, due to his lack of acclimation (he flew in Tuesday). I climbed the class 3 rocks along the trail for fun as I impatiently waited for him to catch up. We summitted about 11:30 AM, then took the west ridge around the north cirque and bushwacked down the steep avalanche chute (filled with aircraft wreckage) to the N. Cottonwood aid station set up by Blake Wood. We stayed an hour, then climbed the steep south ridge of Columbia at 6:08 PM. At the start of the descent we were hit by pellet snow and there were several lightning strikes within a mile. I descended to a rocky bowl at about 13,600 ft. and stayed there until the lightning passed. We took the grassy slopes down to 12,600 ft. to avoid the rocks and then climbed west back to the Harvard ridge as darkness fell. Sometime during this climb I lost my FRS radio and Steve loaned me his, which he was not using most of the time. On the Harvard ridge we learned that Bobby, Richard, and Rickie had gone south instead of north and were lost. We regrouped and the 5 of us summitted Harvard at 10:18 PM. We descended the NW ridge to Bedrock Falls on slopes that seemed a lot rockier than when I climbed it last year. We broke into smaller groups, bushwacking down to swamps, where I got stuck in knee deep mud. We made Fred Vance's aid station about 1:30-2:00 AM where Richard dropped and Rickie stayed a few hours before deciding to continue. I was impatient with Steve's and Bobby's slow pace so I started for Oxford on my own. I climbed the rocky avalanche chute but could not find Matt's Avenue (a game trail I had discovered going east just below treeline) so I bushwacked east and upward until I crossed it. I made other minor blunders, crossing a rocky bowl below the Oxford basin, thrashing throgh the willows, and climbing way too many rocks to get to the south slopes of Oxford. Steve and Bobby made a worse blunder, climbing the left side of the basin to Belford. In the full moon, we did not need flashlights. I reached the summit at 4:18 AM and met Bobby and Steve on the way from the saddle as I headed toward Belford (5:38 AM). They were wearing shorts in the bitter cold, 20's with 50-60 MPH wind. At the Missouri Gulch aid station they got a call that a runner needed a jacket and pants. I took the nice new trail up the east side of Missouri's NE ridge, rather than the class 4 climb from Elkhead Pass that the top 3 runners took. I summitted at 8:52 AM with Bobby an hour or two behind and Steve still in a sleeping bag with hypothermia. That is the last I heard from them during the race. My radio had fallen off my belt clip several times during the descent (grassy slopes), including once into a stream. It would not transmit after that, but I could still receive. Steve did not have a radio (he gave it to me), and Bobby's did not seem to work either. I was very tired at Clohesy Lake (11:30 AM), could not run downhill due to sore legs and feet, and could only climb 1000 ft/hr, half the rate when I started. This is also the point in the race where your mind stops working. I was on good trail up Huron, but it seemed to go the wrong way so I got off it and bushwached to the left up to treeline. There, I did not recognize the basin I had been in many times in training, and thought I was too far north, so instead of climbing to the north ridge of Huron, I crossed a boulder field to the south side of the basin to climb dangerously exposed and loose dirt to a saddle in the southwest corner that I thought would be the Huron-Brown saddle. Only when I gained the ridge did I realize where I was, the south ridge of Huron. This actually wasn't too bad, and I made the summit at 3:06 PM, and walked into Winfield at 5:25 PM. Hans picked me up and took me to race headquarters in Buena Vista, abandoning Steve and Bobby. They summitted Huron around 5 PM and reached Winfield at 8 PM. At headquarters, Dennis Herr (who dropped on the first day) went back to Winfield to pick them up. They had already started hitchhiking back to headquarters and were in another vehicle.