Scout Mountain 100 DNF

On my list of goals for 2025 was (and still is) to complete my first 100 mile race. I began looking at races for my objective in fall of 2024. Scout Mountain was my ultimate choice for many reasons. To list them quickly they are because Scout was a reasonably affordable very mountainous race within a shorter drive from my house during the springtime. Running on flat surfaces poses no interest to me, races and travel are expensive, and I wanted to be in good shape for the summer and have something to occupy my time all winter. In retrospect training through a Montana winter is pretty tough but I would still do it again and all the other things I look for in a race remain the same.

I started building an aerobic base in October after a short break from running. I built up to regular 35 mile weeks while being very sick multiple times and spending many hours on the treadmill due to some sub zero temperatures and my lungs already being compromised. By the end of February I started to do very structured training for the first time. I was coached through this training by Krissy Harclerode who offered me it for free which was incredibly generous of her. I know her through “Black Iron Vert” a lifting program I have done for two years now. My training consisted of slowly building my base even higher to 50 mile weeks, strides, hill workouts, back to back long runs, and uphill athlete focused strength training twice a week.

In April I ran the best race of my life (Spitfire Ultra 55k) and crashed and burned shortly after. I had some contralateral knee and shin pain pop up concurrently with feeling absolutely fatigued all the time. Reducing my training volume did nothing to help the pain go away so with three weeks left until race day the only tool in the bag was to stop running completely which ended up being for 11 days before I started again. This was definitely not how I wanted to show up to the starting line of my first attempt at 100 miles, I even asked and was denied (expectedly) a deferral. With nothing to do except choose to run or not, I decided to at least not completely waste my money and put some trust in the incredible base I had built over March and April. Luckily when I started running again a few days before race day, the rest helped and things felt good enough to give it a go. You neve know if you don’t try!

Race day rolled around and I showed up with an extremely dialed race plan and two pacers who planned to crew me from start to finish and pace me from mile 35.3 onwards. If I was going to do this I was planning to take literally every ounce of help I could get. Jacob and I got dinner with my friend Zach Tucker the night before the race. Zach and I had hiked across New Mexico on the CDT together and he was running the race as well. By 10 pm I was sleeping in my tent at the finish line area (Mink Creek group campground). I slept a measly three hours but I wasn’t expecting much. I always sleep poorly the night before races and what really matters is that I slept extremely well the previous night. I felt like the first person stirring but I just laid in my tent trying to get some shut eye until a reasonable time to wake up. Eventually I got around to making some coffee and reading over the detailed plan I had printed out so I could go over it with Jacob later.

The race festivities started at 8am. I got checked in and talked to a few different information booths in order to gain free raffle tickets. My pre race photo was taken by a professional photographer with my bib #. Once my feet were taped for blister prevention and my vest was packed I went over the whole plan with Jacob. I showed him all the items I might need inside of the crew backpack I would make him or Savannah carry to every aid station they were due to meet me at. The other instructions were mostly to have X amount of water prepped and ready to go as well as a pre sorted bag of gels and other food I planned to eat during each stretch. Simply put, I didn’t want to have to spend my brain power on anything I didn’t have to while running and I wanted to be as efficient as possible at every stop. Jacob and Savannah were prepped with enough instructions that I could in theory not talk to them for the whole race. After the race meeting I got some last things together and headed to the starting line at Lead Draw with Zach and Jacob.

At noon the race started and I took it very slowly down the hot and exposed trail in the middle of a sagebrush field. I tried to position myself near the back of the pack so I didn’t have to worry about people trying to pass me. I always think the first mile of a race feels so bizarre in the sense of what a weird thing it is to go out and run with a bunch of people all at the same time. I was quickly drenched in sweat within the first hour but I personally really enjoy the heat and I had plenty of electrolytes on me so I wasn’t worried. On top of actually liking the heat I did do a small amount of heat training during the 10 days leading up to the race. The climbs were no big deal and I was feeling good. I ran by myself and didn’t talk to anyone all the way to Walker Creek Aid Station at mile five where I filled up on some water and grabbed a couple of extra gels. After the first hour I tried to watch the time and eat something every 20 minutes. For the entire race I mostly ate gels and rice crispy treats.

Leaving Walker Creek Aid Station I ended up falling in behind three other ladies all from Pocatello including Wendy who had ran the race three other times! It was so nice to chat with them and have some company and people to pace myself off of. I joked that together we made up a quarter of the women’s field since only 17 ladies were running this race. All together a total of 60 something people started. On the last hot climb to Good Enough Aid station I lost everyone behind me and started passing a lot of people on the downhill including Zach who I was very surprised to see. At the aid station I got my drop bag and a girl named Kyla who I know from Bozeman was there and she helped me get my poles untapped from the bag. I didn’t finish all my nutrition from the first section but I was very close. I grabbed 1.5 liters of water and headed out with a strong power hike. I had done this section before actually on the last day of training I had before I decided to take a break from running because my shin and knee were hurting me so bad. I knew the climb was long and a relatively steeper one so I used my poles and tried to take it easy.

At the bottom of the Old Tom out and back I was expecting a water cache and there was one except I had to go downhill to get to it. Very stupidly I decided to carry on up Old Tom with no water. I didn’t want to waste the extra energy adding a small amount of distance and vert to get the water before heading up. I thought about what a stupid mistake I had made the whole time but it actually didn’t end up being bad. The climb was easier than I thought it would be and I made it to the top just fine before I let myself start having some of my gels. An old man gave me a pink wristband as proof of my getting to the top. He was standing there with a giant staff and six labradors surrounding him with an epic view in the background. It felt like something out of a movie. When I pulled out my phone to text my pacers that I had made it to the top I noticed that the multicolored screen malfunction that I was having before the race got significantly worse. I texted them that my phone might be completely broken soon just in case they tried to contact me. I was mostly bummed that I wasn’t going to get to take as many pictures as I had hoped. It was fun running down Old Tom and seeing everyone else going up after me. Apparently I was in 20th place and I would remain in that position until City Creek Aid Station. Back at the bottom of the out and back I corrected my food and water situation, filled up my flasks and took a couple of salt pills offered to me by another runner named “Red Dog”. He told me he only goes by his trail name when running so I told him mine was “Early Bird” he was a fellow thru hiker and Scout Mountain would be his 31st 100 mile race.

I ran most of the way between the Old Tom water cache and South Fork aid station. The terrain here was beautiful fields of flowers on a two track dirt road and easy rolling down hills with the occasional flats. For this part I stashed my trekking poles in the back of my running belt. By the time I got to South Fork I had eaten pretty much all the food in my vest. I was pretty stoked for the sign that I was doing really good on nutrition minus the Old Tom mishap. At the aid I saw Savannah and Jacob for the first time. They gave me my new water bottles and food, I brushed my teeth and gave them my trekking poles. I originally planned to do this section with only a belt in order to take a break from my vest but I wasn’t feeling good enough to do that. I wanted to carry my vest with extra water in case I was slow. It wasn’t until I left South Fork that I really felt like I was slowing down at all because my legs were getting a little tired but not sore or tight. The only thing that was bothering me at this point physically were my glutes that felt tight before Old Tom. I just have never had them feel like that in a race before. They felt like they were both dead and tight at the same time and I had to focus on using them.

Right before I got to West Fork Red Dog passed me and we ran the last mile together. I find it so easy to hold someone else’s casual pace vs running on my own sometimes. I shared with him that I had a headache all day and he encouraged me to try a small dose of ibuprofen. At West Fork I got resupplied with food, water, trekking poles, headlamp, and headed out of the aid station with Savannah pacing me for her first section. Within an hour it was night time and we had our headlamps on. I got a second wind during the dark and the climbing got easier. Red Dog ran with Savannah and I during most of this section. It was really fun to run with the two of them. I felt talkative but it was just easier to have two other people talking. Sometime between West Fork and Gibson Jacob the lateral side of my right FOOT started hurting and my headache wore off. I told Savannah what was going on and she recommended a shoe change so we told Jacob to have my second pair of shoes ready at Gibson Jack mile 47.3. The water station at mile 41 ended up being non-existent which made several runners including myself pretty frustrated. I was right behind a lady who had ran the race before and she told me there was no water there the previous year either so I didn’t waste too much time looking for it but we were running low on water. At one point when I pulled my last flask with a flip top out of my belt it busted open and I was left with nothing for the last few miles. Luckily Savannah was kind enough to share some of hers. I also completely ran out of food during this section as well, it was the third time in a row I used up all my nutrition between aid stations! I was proud of myself and I felt like I was only one gel short of my estimated consumption.

At Gibson Jack we had to wake Jacob up early to get ready for my arrival. I was at a 28 hour pace which I wasn’t expecting at all and I was feeling great besides my foot pain but it wasn’t that bad yet. I got on my new shoes, drank some broth and we left. My phone was also completely dead so I left it at Gibson Jack and didn’t get it back until the race was over. I made Jacob play music for me and he did most of the talking which was great. Both him and Savannah set 20 minute food timers for me and would tell me I had to eat every time it went off. We were all really good at sticking to the timer. Eating did get a little harder which made me exclusively switch to gels that I would slurp and push down with water as fast as I could. I tried precision fuel and hydration gel for the first time and it was SO GOOD. The texture was better than any gel I had ever had. After eating a 90 gram one as fast as I could we had to slow down my eating to every 20 minutes. During this section I also noticed how dry my lungs, throat, and mouth were feeling and I drank a lot of water just to soothe it. Even at night all the flowers on the course were popping. The city lights of Pocatello looked so pretty in the distance. By the time we dropped down to Cusick Creek I told Jacob that my foot pain was escalating pretty quickly and getting intense. At the aid station there was a group of ski patrollers cooking pad thai. I was so excited for the gourmet food even though I couldn’t eat much of it. The aid station vibe really got me distracted from my foot pain as we high tailed it out of there. As Jacob and I did the last few miles to city creek he had to call Savannah to wake her up because I was still on a 28 hour pace but my morale started crashing as we arrived at 4am mostly because of my foot pain. I hadn’t anticipated getting to City Creek any earlier than 6am. 

When we finally stopped at the aid station I started to get really cold. I put some arnica gel on my foot and took one more ibuprofen. I was so glad I had my poles with me from West Fork to City Creek. I had originally planned to pick them up at City Creek but they were definitely needed once my foot started hurting. Leaving City Creek with Savannah was when things started to hurt significantly bad. I felt like I was limping going up the hill but since going up was easier than going down, I pushed through it. I really enjoyed the long climb and the sunrise was beautiful. All of a sudden the trail got extra steep and very rocky. It reminded me a lot of a section of the AT in New Hampshire and I was having a good time going up. The rock transitioned to an even steeper pitch of sagebrush and arrow leaf balsamroot fields at the top. I took off my shoe and waited for Savannah. This is the first time I noticed that my foot was swollen and I thought it was a little blue in color. When Savannah caught up I was ready to go. Unfortunately I ended up limping the easiest miles of the course all down hill. I made Savannah play music for me just to distract me from the pain. It was the only thing that helped.

Getting to Elk Meadows Aid station was such a drag because of how bad my foot hurt. When we got there the two of us sat down for quite a while. I drank a coke and went poop for the first time during the whole race at one of the portable toilets they had set up inside a bathroom tent. I could tell Savannah was pretty gassed too. I felt bad for her not getting much sleep and how slow I was moving and dragging out the run. I was pretty grumpy at this point as well. I just had to laugh at how bad I thought the two of us looked. At Elk Meadows we saw so many other people who were running the 50k and they were all looking so fresh. For the first time during the race I saw the sign that said the aid station cut off time and noticed I was falling behind and getting closer to the time but still plenty far ahead.

I felt like I left Elk Meadows aid station even worse than when I arrived and I limped 20-30 minute miles all the way downhill to West Fork. I remember crying and thinking there was no way I was going to be able to leave that aid station. I kept asking Savannah how far we were and even though we were moving forward it felt like West Fork just kept getting farther and farther away. By this point the last of the 50k people had passed us and now the first 50 milers were blasting by. Stepping off trail for them to pass me was excruciating to be honest. Savannah had to text Jacob and tell him that we were going to be at West Fork so much later than we had originally thought. Like hours later.

At West Fork Jacob had a chair set up for me in the shade. I sat down and we pulled off my shoes. He helped me change socks and Savannah handled all my nutrition. I iced my foot and drank some ice cold orange juice which really hit the spot. My foot was looking a little better than I had thought that it would based on how it felt. Both of their attitudes were so good I was somehow convinced to leave the aid station. I was so shocked I was actually leaving with Jacob as my pacer this time. From West Fork on, it was so hard to talk to Jacob. I let him tell me stories and I would just give him thumbs up. Three miles in he gave me music to listen to. I was really limping at this point and using breathing techniques to handle the pain but somehow I can still move 20 minute miles uphill when I am limping. Lots of practice from thru hiking I guess. When we were a mile from South Scout I really started to break down once we had to go downhill again. I tried my hardest to run and I literally just couldn’t do it because my foot hurt like hell. I cried the last few minutes as we were walking in.

Once I was in a chair we pulled off my shoes and my foot looked the worst I’ve ever seen it. Even my ankle that didn’t hurt me at all was swollen. When Jacob touched it all of a sudden I started feeling pain behind my ankle where it hadn’t before. I knew everything was just so mad because of whatever was wrong with my foot. I had continuously gone downhill in terms of foot pain for the last 40 miles and the swelling was alarming. We took off my compression sleeves and iced it. I just kept crying. I couldn’t imagine limping on it for approximately 20 more miles let alone the next ten up and over Scout mountain to Big Fir Aid Station. I told them I wanted to be done because I was really worried about doing permanent damage to my foot and being able to work on it in a week. They tried so hard to convince me to move on because I told them not to let me quit. I really thought my foot was beyond the means of what is normal to experience during a 100 mile race. Everything else on my body was also hurting my shin, my glutes, my throat, my knees were popping, my quads were getting tight but none of that was important, just part of the deal.

After sitting on it for an hour, my mind was made up. I would not be finishing Scout Mountain 100 because I thought my foot injury was serious enough to affect my job and being able to run for the rest of the summer. I didn’t even care about the race result, only the healing process my foot would have to go through and whatever could be wrong with it. I was convinced I had stress-fractured it or badly sprained it. 
We sat at the aid station all the way until the cut off time watching other runners come in and waiting for my friend Zach who we saw had not DNFed yet based on the online live results. I was so impressed at everyone coming in so close to the cut off and still heading out. There was a lot of carnage to be seen including a guy whose ankle looked just as bad as mine and someone puking in the grass on the side. Zach came in with 20 minutes left to spare of the cutoff time. We saw him head out with his awesome pacer after attempting to take a five minute nap. He told me it felt like he was hitting the gas pedal as hard as he could and his body wasn’t getting anywhere. I left with Jacob and Savannah to get some well deserved dinner and got a call from Zach about an hour later. He was DNFing as well and turning around to come back to the aid station.

I’m bummed it wasn’t my day but I am personally so excited to try again. I had such a blast at the race and am absolutely thrilled with how well my body performed minus my foot injury. My legs felt more or less great the whole time, my nutrition was spot on, and I didn’t feel too bad from the sleep deprivation. I feel so proud of myself for even showing up to that race period and feel so confident about the call I made. Now the hard part will be practicing patience with my healing foot. I hope I can try a different 100 mile race in the late fall or at least before the calendar says 2026. Only time will tell!

Post Race:

It took about four days after the race for the majority of my swelling to go down in my foot and ankle but a week and a half out I am still experiencing significant pain in the same spot and still a little puffy in the area. Unfortunately my ten days off of work (including the race) are over and I have to return to being on my feet and serving tables to pay the bills. During that time my foot did improve enough to be able to walk on it and go on two very slow hikes with my mom where I got to sit down frequently. After my first day back to work with two shifts my foot pain regressed. I’ve been icing it and doing what I can to improve it. I can only hope the next week of work  goes somewhat okay because I can’t afford to not work or pay a doctor to look at it and have them tell me to put a boot on it and rest. I’m going to do that anyway, following the advice of two different medical professionals who told me the same thing with the exception of work. I can only hope that working doesn’t make it worse and try to avoid working two jobs in one day if I can. I’m doing everything in my power to get it taken care of.