Mr Trail Safety Speaks!

I'm going to aim for the knockout points right up front, and flat out tell you that the ideal pacer is above the average runner, and a tough, lean, canny guide and wily co-competitor for the above-average runner. The ideal pacer is an expert, the ghillie for the hunt here, and if you're gunning for a buckle, all the positive help you can get is for the better. However, we all start at the beginning. If this is your first time pacing, think very carefully about the following: Are you up for "running" [or not] above or below your comfort zone? Do you have romantic notions about the task ahead of you? This encompasses both overt or cryptic attachments to your runner [provided you know them], and/or the business about being out all night and the brutal part of the day. Have you run at night? More than once? On the course? In bad weather? Do you have an urgent, time-sensitive appointment Saturday or Sunday? Too bad. You'll miss it, guaranteed. ...

A while back there were a spate of posts on the presumed dangers and evils of NSAIDS. Whooooooooo, was I scared. There were sober-faced recitations of all the really Baaaaaad things that it would do to you, followed by 2nd-hand fatuous advice from MDs regarding same. But guess what? NSAIDS were taking the heat for incompetent training, bad "coaching" advice, and poor judgement by many ultrarunners. Several years ago, we were all treated to an account of a gal who turned her guts inside out at Across the Years, who was dehydrated, went to the hospital, was a CCU guest and all that...and NSAIDS got the rap. I can hear the wailing now, and little hands pounding away on the keyboards. Relax, it'll get yr minds off Jeopardy questions regarding the Southern flag, [of which there are 2: the civil ensign and the battle flag, but that's one for the re-enactors out there]. I digress. Where were we...pain killing! Pain killers MASK pain. Imagine. Blocks transmissions at c...