Was It A Test?

On tap today was a 50K race in prep for my 50-miler in two weeks. Going loooooong is a bit weird. If you run 3-4 miles the day before to loosen up for a half-marathon, does that mean you are supposed to run about three times as much for a 50K? Well, that's what I did yesterday, I ran 12.5 miles as my pre-race "loosen up" run, because I have no idea what I'm supposed to do. I wasn't quite sure if I should be doing the race because I caught a bad cold on Tuesday and was knocked out until Thursday. Come race day, I felt much better but I still had some congestion in the lungs, and I usually don't mess around with lung stuff. The Universe must have picked up on my hesitation because I arrived to the race this morn, and learned that the race director and his crew pulled a no-show. No check-in, no aid stations, nothing but crickets. About 10 minutes after the scheduled race start, and a lot of denial, runners slowly set out to run the unmarked and unmanned course in the Santa Cruz mountains. Of course I followed, I was getting my long run in damn it. There were several wrong turns taken, but with each mistake, there was a fellow runner present to point me back in the right direction. There was a waist deep river crossing. There were no aid stations. But all of us runners took care of each other, offering others what little food or water they had. In the end, a group of runners and I managed to squeeze out 29 miles, just 3+ miles shy of the intended 50K. The camaraderie was amazing, and though I would have loved aid stations and a chance to race, this experience was nice...quite nice actually. If this was a test, we all passed today. Oh, sorry for the lack of pics lately, I'm still working on getting a new camera.