Hellgate Section I: Nightmare on Horton Street (midnight to dawn)
A bulbous near-full moon shone bright over the Blue Ridge Mountains of southwest Virginia. Aaron and I turned off our headlamp and climbed the long gravel road through the moonlight, glancing up at the magical starry sky. My husband Aaron is a legend who has finished all 21 Hellgate 100km++ ultramarathons, but tonight he was limping slowly on a bad ankle, which led to our surprise encounter atop Hellgate’s highest, coldest mountain. Aaron had promised Race Director David Horton he would finish and not break his streak, but he was in bad shape. “Is that how you greet me?” Aaron quipped after I vomited in the bushes. I was a mess too. Running long races makes me depleted and nauseated, but I can generally hold back barfs unless triggered by something, like the sight or mention of food or an encounter with a human that causes distress. I have a habit of puking when I encounter people on the trail I don’t like, which my friends find hilarious. Of course I like Aaron, but I didn’t like the state he was in.
After two “Sissygates” in 2021 and 2023 where everyone wore shorts in balmy weather, I finally got the “real” Hellgate experience this year, complete with frozen feet after the early stream crossing (Aaron’s tip #1: we slathered our feet in diaper creme this year to prevent blistering and it worked). Despite bundling up with tights, a long sleeve shirt, and a houdini jacket, my fingers still froze. So did my hydration pack’s bladder hose. (Aaron’s tip #2: Aaron told me (after the fact) to blow air into my hose during subfreezing conditions to remove the water from the hose and keep it from freezing.)
My frozen fingers voted to leave Aaron behind and keep running to maintain body heat, but getting to share some romantic moonlit miles with Aaron is a rare treat that I couldn’t pass up. We exchanged war stories (i.e., I complained loudly about trifles while Aaron silently suffered for real). Aaron expressed the right level of indignation at my story about the guy who hit everyone with his flailing poles during the crowded opening mile. I was even more pleased when Aaron agreed with my suggestion that poles be banned for the first mile. I enjoyed schmoozing too much to pay attention to my plummeting body temperature. My teeth were chattering so hard by the time we met our crew, Mike and Anthony, at the Floyd’s Fields aid station (Aaron’s tip #3: Mike wore a LED light vest at night aid stations so I could easily identify him in the darkness amid the glare of headlamps), I left early without eating anything, and never saw Aaron again.
For me, Hellgate is by far the longest, hardest race on my calendar and getting me to the finish at Camp Bethel is a group project. Aaron’s friend Matt crewed and paced my first two Hellgates. When Matt realized he’d be in Hawaii this year, I roped in my trail running friends Mike and Anthony. Mike and Anthony are new members of our Woodley Ultra Society (WUS) trail running group in DC, but they seemed up to the task because they (a) are unflappably zen; (b) have already seen me puke (I puked after Catherine’s Furnace 50km, during and after Highland Sky 40 miler, while pacing Trevor at Hardrock, and after the Richmond Marathon that we all ran together in November); and (c) are saints. On the other hand, Mike and Anthony are bachelors in their early 30s who had never seen a woman fall apart on their watch and wrestle with the question of whether to intervene or leave her alone. Matt was a father who’d “crewed” three childbirths.
I didn’t want Mike and Anthony to be deer in the headlights, so I tried to prep them. “When you first see me at Floyd’s Fields, mile 24, around 5am, don’t be scared if I look like a wet rag and puke at the first whiff of food. My fuel will be organized into three buckets: savory, sweet, and liquid. But don’t be surprised if I never touch most of it. Don’t offer me anything or mention any foods by name, because that will make me puke. Just give me what I ask for.”
When I first ran Hellgate in 2021, I was myself a deer in the headlights. Hellgate was Aaron’s show and I was a scared mouse who deferred to him on everything. I was crewed by Aaron’s friend, listened to Aaron’s music mix, used Aaron’s hydration pack, and followed Aaron’s food plan. This year, I asserted myself by bringing my own friends to crew (note of clarification: Matt is now also my friend, not just Aaron’s), picking my own menu (ramen was this year’s food winner), and making my own music mix that toggled between folk, classic rock, and 90s grunge. Because STP rock.
Hellgate Section II: Here Comes The Sun (dawn to pacers)
“Jenning’s Creek, the fifth aid station, will be my low point,” I had warned Mike and Anthony. “At my first Hellgate, I just sat there on a bucket and puked between my legs. But,” I chirped, “When dawn breaks on the next climb, and the sun’s rays begin to thaw my hands and face, I’ll become human again.”
Hellgaters sometimes can’t explain why they sign up for this insufferable race year after year, like rats that keep touching the electric fence and never learn, but one reason I do it is The Dawn. I still have 40-odd miles and plenty of challenges ahead, but light has triumphed over darkness and the frozen nightmare is behind me. I tolerate pain better when friendly faces beam smiles and beautiful vistas shine around each turn. At daybreak I turn on my music, and Smashing Pumpkins, Neil Young, and Andrew Bird lift my mood (and my pace) across the open grassy fire roads.
Accommodating someone else’s slower gait is always painful for me, and the slow, choppy miles I shared with Aaron flared my chronic knee tendinitis. I stretch my legs on the grassy fire roads after Little Cove aid station because my knee tendons are screaming. It helps to run it off, but all the runners I pass probably think I’m cruising too fast with 50k still to go.
“I won’t see you at the sixth aid station, which isn’t crew accessible, but I’ll be in dire need of a burger at the seventh aid station, Bear Wallow (mile 42), where Mike can jump in to pace me. Expect me to be wrecked. The rocky trail between Little Cove and Bear Wallow has loose boulders hidden under leaf piles and winds around in endless loops that try my patience or, as Aaron puts it, really blows dead goat.”
“So I don’t need to talk the whole time?” Mike, our club’s foremost introvert, was concerned his pacing duties would require goods he couldn’t deliver.
“No,” I assured him. “I’ll be non-verbal by then. Your main job is to say kind, encouraging things to other runners we encounter on the course when I’m too sick to speak. It can be hard to know what to say when someone is obviously suffering and crawling along. You can’t just say Great job! or Looking good! or Almost there! You have to be positive without being obnoxious. It’s an art.”
Hellgate Section III: I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends (pacers to finish)
I looked like a kicked puppy when the Bear Wallow aid station had no burgers this year. The promise of a patty got me through the “Devil trail.” Anthony made ramen, but I accidentally packed “extra spicy.” My fueling plans kept whiffing. Mike, why does my Coke taste like shampoo? Mike took a swig and concluded the soap was not rinsed out during the last cleaning. I laughed deliriously. You boys are trying to poison me. I staggered into the 8th aid station, dangerously behind on my calories, only to learn that the Blue Ridge Parkway closed for ice on the road and the aid station had to be taken down. After so many food fails, I went full zombie in the Forever Section. All I could mutter was “No” whenever Anthony tried to get me to nibble something. Come on, Martha, one gummy bear….. I answered in the negative with another puke.
I realized after the fact that I went over my pacer Do’s and Don’ts in detail with Mike when we spent seven hours running together at Vicki’s Death March a couple weeks before Hellgate, but I never conveyed the same information to Anthony. A golden rule in ultras is that crew is always blameless and responsibility falls 100% on the runner to give explicit instructions. Writing out my personal Rules For Pacers might have been helpful:
Don’t: (1) Mention food (if I want something, I’ll ask for it); (2) Ask me questions; (3) Tell me my time/place/age group standing; (4) Say anything about mileage; (5) Wear a watch that beeps every mile; (6) Try to get me to run any faster.
Do: (1) Please say encouraging, kind words to runners we pass when I get too ill to speak; (2) Always stay behind me; even on the gravel road where we’re side by side, stay a half a step behind in case I need to veer to find the best line; (3) Feel free to tell good stories (unless I say blueberry, the code word for please stop talking), just don’t expect me to respond.
There tends to be an inverse relationship between a pacer’s ultramarathon experience and how easily they follow these guidelines. The only time I get into tiffs with pacers is when they start to assert themselves and give opinions, like when Sean egged me on to pass more women at the Frisco Half Marathon. I ground to a halt and wouldn’t take another step until he promised to stop. I’ve been racing since I was 14 and I know when to push and when to ease. It’s my body, and no one know my body’s quirks and contradictions as well as I do. My body often responds counterintuitively. To make knee pain better, I need to run faster. When I’m gagging on gels, I need a bacon cheeseburger. I guess it’s no surprise that one of my favorite pacers was Matt’s teenage son Andrew, who wasn’t even a runner (just a hiker). He brought no preconceptions as to how much I should eat or how fast I should go, wore no beeping gadgets, and had a zen-like knack for saying sweet, sensitive words of encouragement to runners we passed. We exchanged no words, and Andrew may have thought he was superfluous, but quite the contrary. People wonder how I finish Hellgate on few calories, but companionship is caffeine for extroverts. A few kind words from a Liberty University student (and an unexpected prayer to Jesus Christ) once transformed me from a puking mess to a surging gazelle at Horton’s other race, the Promise Land 50km++.
The final climb up the road from Day Creek is a death march. Getting passed by a bouncy woman running up the hill looking impossibly fresh shoved in an extra dagger. (Are you even allowed to run that climb?) But I always manage to summon 6:30-minute miles on the final descent, and when we reached the top of the climb Anthony wagered I had plenty of runway to pass her back. “Predictable chaos” is my Hellgate motto, and despite all the mayhem during the race, my finish time is always 15 hours, plus or minus, three times in a row. Only this year I got my puking out of the way in the Forever Section and, for the first time, did not puke on Horton’s finish line.
By finishing top women’s master but outside the top-10, I pulled off the rare feat of getting a pacer and a puff jacket. Hellgate has an unusual rule that top-10 men and top-10 women can’t have pacers, so one of Anthony and Mike’s biggest concerns was that their participation might cost me a puff jacket. I assured them if I had to choose between puffs and pacers, I’d go with pacers. For a short-distance runner like me with a bad stomach, the choice is really between pacers or DNF.
Aaron’s 17 hour 34 minute finish time (26 minutes under the 18-hour cut-off) was the slowest of his 22 finishes by far, more an hour slower than even his worst Lyme disease year, but he preserved his streak, which is all that counts. Fellow streaker Darin cut it even closer and finished with a mere 90 seconds to spare. Ultimately, the Hellgate story of the year went to my friend Laney, who finally finished Hellgate under the cut-off on her fifth try, after coming in just 2 minutes over the time limit two years ago.
Anyone following the trends of 2024 should not be surprised that three WUS women — Nora, Keavy, and I — took home Patagonia puff jackets for top-ten or top-masters finishes. WUS women are making a comeback, thanks to Barry’s Friday morning trail runs (Barry also ran Hellgate this year, his second finish) and a new-and-improved generation of WUS gentlemen, of which my crew Mike and Anthony are standard bearers.
When I first ran Hellgate in 2021, only top-5 women got puff jackets (I finished 7th and missed out). I didn’t object; I accepted Aaron’s explanation that this was fair because women are such a small fraction of the Hellgate field compared to men. A higher percentage of female competitors already got prizes (1 out of 6) compared to men (1 out of 12). Equal prizes would make this imbalance worse. However, one could also reason, if we want prizes to be proportional to the size of the group and not have groups where it’s easier to get a prize than others, you’d have to take almost all the prizes away from the old guys, where there is sometimes only one or two competitors. Good luck with that! After some lively debate among the Hellgate race committee, the policy did change in 2022, and women and men now get equal prizes at Hellgate. Fortunately, each year, the field of women at Hellgate is getting larger and faster (the top-10 women all ran under 14 hours this year), meaning over time the question of prizes and gender will become less relevant. For now, I’m enjoying my puffy.
Nothing beats a good trilogy (Lord of the Rings, the original Star Wars), and my third Hellgate felt like a good series finale. My first Hellgate in 2021, was an act of desperation during a hellish pandemic year when I was willing to try anything to beat the blues, even Aaron’s crazy ice race. My second Hellgate in 2023 proved I’d actually come around to love Aaron’s wacky tradition and appreciate David Horton. To understand the significance of my thirds Hellgate, you need to know the dynamic between me and Aaron. It’s not always easy being married to everyone’s golden boy. Nothing symbolized our relationship more than the Yom Kippur dinner at Aaron’s parent’s spotless apartment in Rosslyn. My father, in typical Nelson style, drank too much, ranted contrarian politics, fell, broke a lamp, and spilled blood from his head across their marble floor. It took three Hellgates for me to stop being ashamed of my puking, Nelson-hot-mess style of ultrarunning and invite friends along for the view. (Although I’ll never stop worrying that Mike and Anthony were scarred.)
In one significant way, I was less of a hot mess this year. For the first time, I stopped puking enough to enjoy the post-race party (I just did just one small puke in the bushes outside Camp Bethel while waiting many hours for Aaron to finish). We even hit a diner on the way home for dinner (whereas last year I spent the ride home puking in the back of Matt’s van). Being present for the post-party is a big deal. Hellgate’s cast of characters is what brings me back each year — not just the runners, but the longtime volunteers and crew (and of course Horton) who pour their souls into this race. Hellgate is a profound experience that I return to not because I enjoy suffering, but because the challenges I fight through and the friends I make along the way shape me more as a person than the shorter, easier races I win. I woke up the morning after the race and squealed in bed to Aaron I want to do it again!
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Congrats to Aaron on overcoming all of those obstacles to finish Hellgate #22! Woohoo! Martha, congrats on a great run and of course congrats to all of the other Wussies who participated. It is “special” to be part of the Hellgate cult.