Race Report: 2024 Midwest States 100

This race wasn’t on my radar at all when I was planning my 2024 race calendar, but I had a gap so when Jenny threw it out there, I had no reason to say no. The race was pitched to me as having a “really neat grassroots remote feel” and being “sneaky tough because it’s a lot more technical” than it looks on paper. (Both descriptions happened to be true). I sweet talked a buddy into running it with me, and we signed up after doing minimal research. I mean, what more do you need to know about a race other than it’s a cool vibe and sneaky hard?

That vibe was definitely in full swing when we arrived the day before to get our packets. There was ZERO cell service in the park, which only enhanced the old-school feel, but once we walked up to the lodge area, it was a party! There were camping tents pitched along the lake front, a sweet finish line chute lined with pinwheels, music, and people milling about chatting. The packet pick-up area was hopping and featured a second large tent with some really cool merch. The funny thing is, despite the “modern” amenities of the start/finish/lodge area, the race really DID still feel super grassroots. The juxtaposition of being both isolated (no phone!) AND embraced into this vibrant community was already a completely unique experience..

The entire 100k and 100Mile field just prior to the start.

Did I mention we did minimal research before signing up? Like, we had downloaded the course GPX file; it looked like a lollipop with Aid Station #3 situated at the point where the stick met the pop. Race morning we figured out that we’d run out to Aid Station #3, then run a lollipop loop, then back the way we came to the start/finish. If you were only doing 100k, that was it. If you were going for the hundo, you had to turn around and run out to Aid Station #3 AGAIN. Okay, cool, mentally could be a challenge but nothing we haven’t faced before. We lined up for the pre-race photo on the lake, and then moseyed to the start line. I decided I wanted to start sort of near the front; if this was going to be technical I didn’t want to risk being caught in a conga line early. The group of runners plunged down the grassy bank along the lake and into the woods. Our progress was stopped almost immediately by a steep set of stairs built of railroad ties…and then again by a GIANT tree down across the trail…and then again by more stairs. After that the first 5ish miles were fairly smooth, sprinkled with more log hurdles. Little did I know this would prove to be one of the most runnable sections of this entire course. Going into mile 6, just before Aid #1, the trail turned into sticky mud pits reminiscent of the fire swamp from Princess Bride. (I was also pretty sure we’d see some ROUS’s given all the warnings about dangerous wildlife in the park.) Some of the pits were shallow enough to trudge through and some had logs and sticks across them as makeshift bridges, but all of them were VERY sticky and wet. Another runner made the mistake of not using the log bridge…and ended up sunk up to his thigh in a watery mud hole. Mental note: use the logs, even if you have to slow WAY down to do it. The fire swamp conditions persisted until the second aid station around mile 13, and actual running was limited to half- to three-quarter mile jogs between the pits.

Tiptoeing through one of the many mud pits...and my shoes were still white!

I need to take a quick minute to talk about the aid stations. Despite this park being VERY remote, the aid stations were incredible. I’ve never been to a race where every single aid station had hot food, snacks, drinks, music and armies of humans ready to refill water or make broth or find aspirin. These volunteers knew how to do it up! They even strung lights in the woods along the trail for about a quarter mile leading into the stations. Let me tell you - this energy was critical later in the race. 

At Aid #2, we grabbed a snack and then took off in search of Aid #3, located at 19.2 miles. At least that’s what the route said, but the remoteness of the course meant that even my Garmin had no idea where we were and I was already almost a mile off the count. Guess I really was in the fire swamp and there was no way to know how far I’d actually wandered! While there was less mud in this section, there were more trees and steep climbs, so the “runnability” of the course hadn’t improved. Usually by this point in a race I have found my groove and am feeling really good - not this time. The constant changes in pace, cadence, climbing over or ducking under were really messing with me! I kept waiting for that sweet spot, but it never came. The terrain made it impossible to get into a rhythm and I had never realized how important that was to my running until now. Fortunately I was still with Daniel, and chatting helped take my mind off the misery. We had drop bags at Aid #3; we restocked vests and dropped clothes, then headed off to the lollipop loop. The volunteers here also informed me I was the second woman…but my mood was so awful I couldn’t even care. I was in the dark here and the idea of 80 more miles of that stop-go-tiptoe-jog-hop progress made me want to poke my eyes out. 

A rare section where running was possible - the boardwalk.

While the loop still featured significant climbs, downed trees and mud, there was also an ATV road! FINALLY! At least one full mile I could run! In fact I think it ended up being a couple miles, and being able to let the legs go was refreshing. We got through that 20ish mile loop and back to Aid Station #3 in decent time. Daniel was feeling really good and told me he was going to “blast off”. While the running had helped, I knew that I was staring at 19 miles back through fire swamp and downed trees and my mood had not improved much. Frankly, I was happy to be alone with my misery. I left Aid #3 with a dark cloud over my head and trudged on.

I had never been this down this early in a race. It was a strange feeling: I knew I was doing well, I knew I was moving as fast as I could be on the terrain, and I knew I would finish. But I also felt terrible and couldn’t pull myself out of the mental mire. It was almost like I was watching a movie of myself. Movie Gibson was struggling and miserable but my “viewer” self floating above was still like “Yeah, girl, you’re crushing, keep going and stop being such a Suzy Sourpants!” About the time when I had almost convinced myself I was going to quit at 100k, I noticed I was gaining ground on another runner. And not just any runner - the woman in first place. The realization hit me like a jolt and I picked up the pace to catch her. 

As I settled in behind her, we started chatting. Andrea is a working mom from Indiana, at the race with two of her children and her husband. She was funny and real and we quickly fell into a camaraderie. She was running the 100k and so was on her home stretch. She mentioned this was going to be her longest race, that she went out WAY too fast and was struggling hard. I don’t know what happened in my head, but at that moment my entire demeanor changed. I decided that I was going to get Andrea to that finish line, in first place for the 100k, if it killed me. Her watch was dead, so I gave her regular updates on our pace and distance - though these were wildly inaccurate since GPS was nonexistent in these woods. We rolled into Aid #2 together, she met her family for a quick wardrobe change, I grabbed a snack and we rolled on. We talked about everything under the sun: kids, running, work, chafing, wild animals…and Andrea was always checking in because she was convinced second place was creeping up on her. I liked her competitive spirit and told her there was no way she was going to get passed on my watch. We were a duo now. Aid #1 rose out of the woods ahead and we decided we’d try our damnedest to finish before we needed a headlight - even though we knew we had 6 miles of mud to traverse first and the going would be slow. At one point, Andrea was balanced on a log over a mud pit and almost lost it; I reached out and grabbed her to keep her from falling into the muck. When we hit those steps and knew it was a pretty easy ⅜ mile jog, we started moving. We popped out of the woods just after dusk, and started running up the bank through the pinwheels and into the cheering finish line. I stayed right in her pocket, hand on her shoulder, shouting encouragement until we crossed and she was engulfed in hugs from her family. I peeled off to the aid station to restock my vest, grab some hot food, and prepare for 40 more miles. Before I left, I ran over and gave her a HUGE hug, told her I was incredibly proud of her and thanked her for giving me the boost I so desperately needed. I left the start/finish buoyed on the excitement of getting her to her goal and ran off into the night.

Alone again, I let the adrenaline push my body forward and the negative thoughts out of my mind. If Andrea was the only woman ahead of me before, that meant I was now the lead woman in the 100 mile race. The out and back design of this last 40 miles meant I would know exactly how far back second place was, and what I had to do to keep this W. Passing runners was also extremely helpful for my mental state, both for my mood and my fatigue level. I rolled through the next 13 miles at a blistering 15 minute/mile pace. About 2 miles out of Aid #2, I heard a very loud rustling and every hair on my body stood up. It’s dark, I’m VERY alone, and the limited park info I did read was all about the frequency of bear encounters. I flashed my headlamp around the trees on either side of the trail and almost swallowed my tongue when I saw a gigantic, fur-covered, prickly creature between the trees not two feet off the trail. “Is it a bear no bears aren’t pointy what the hell is that it is huge holy crap it’s a porcupine wait can they shoot quills or is that a myth it’s looking at me holy hell they are ENORMOUS…” Once I registered that it was not a bear (or a ROUS), I quickly continued on my not-so-merry way. Perhaps a mile later, I finally came up on another runner going my direction. To my surprise it was Daniel. I honestly didn’t expect to see him again after mile 40, but here we were. The early burst was catching up with him. “Did you see that porcupine?!” he immediately asked. “DUDE IT WAS HUGE” I replied and hopped around him. I won’t say I was feeling good by any stretch, but I at least wasn’t miserable anymore. I could maintain this for another 22-23 miles. Besides, things were looking up. I’d caught Daniel, we were still making decent progress, and passing runners coming the opposite direction was encouraging. We made the turn at Aid #3 and started the final stretch. Somewhere my watch died. Not that it mattered because it was completely wrong anyway. All I know is I was trying my hardest to get back to the stairs because I knew from there it was less than a mile. My feet were blistering from the wet mud and sliding around inside my shoes on the uneven ground and were starting to really hurt. Finally the sun came up and we made it to the stairs. Daniel said we had to run it in…which I did, begrudgingly. And you know what? Somehow at the end I was actually smiling. Happy to be done for sure, happy to have won, happy to have known how difficult it was, and yet not giving up, extra happy to take my ruined shoes off. Happy to see Jenny and Michelle, even though Jenny insisted on taking pictures of my superbly disgusting feet. Happiest of all though for Andrea and her 100k win, and for Daniel scoring a top 5 finish.

This race was like death by a thousand paper cuts, or in this case, mud holes and downed trees. But I was just mostly dead, just like Wesley in the Princess Bride, and if there was one thing that was going to save me from death, it was love and friendship. In my case it wasn’t Billy Crystal with a chocolate covered hazelnut. It was a new friendship with Andrea forged in the fire swamp as we pushed toward her goal, and an old friendship with Daniel trudging through the night keeping each other awake, and a general love of this crazy sport we call ultrarunning.

Photo Cred: Jenny Thorsen - IG: @luoyunghwa