Having driven straight back from Santa Rosa, barring a quick pitstop to get gas outside the Pea Soup Anderson’s restaurant in Santa Nella, CA, I discovered my webserver is inexplicably down that hosts runkevinrun.com. We had a split-second power outage back home and I’m not entirely sure if the server got fried or just needs to be unplugged and plugged back in to resurrect it. Problems for another day.
This then is a quick recap, dashed out in an MS Word document, to be posted… some day. But it’s Sunday, August 24, 2025. I spent the night in a strange AirBNB, a life-size doll house “cabin” that was most assuredly not up to code. I knew this going in – I wanted a cheap place to stay and I paid frankly more than the place was worth. But the bed was comfy enough, far better than say driving up and then sleeping in my car for a few hours (an option I have used in the past… albeit not for many a year). The place might best be described as “Cool Hand Luke’s Box” meets a one-room setting for a cheap-o horror movie. I texted family and friends last night and told them if they didn’t hear from me in the morning, to know that I died doing what I always do – being a cheapskate and trying to save a couple of bucks recklessly and unnecessarily.
I survived the night however and made my way to downtown Santa Rosa for the start.
I’ve run this race before… a few times actually… and I always forget that it’s relatively flat with just a few hills that take you by surprise because it’s predominantly so flat. It’s usually quite warm in August but we had practically perfect running conditions – 55 degrees at the start, a marine layer through my finish so no direct sun to overheat. But that also can make me a bit loosey-goosey on hydration (and not just me).
It’s hard to resist running through a vineyard… I still miss the days of the Medoc Marathon, the world’s longest marathon because tipsy/drunken runners stumble about and never move in a straight line between the countless wine stops (Side note: in the Bunion Derby of the early 1920s, water was considered unhealthy for long distance runners and many entrants ‘hydrated’ with whiskey… or was it bourbon? Something alcoholic. Science through research CAN change its tune… but trust the research and the science and don’t just cry ‘fake’ or ‘rigged’ or whatever the hell kneejerk ‘ignorance is king’ muckety mucks might be shouting, yeah? Trust in the science until there’s a peer review discussion/publication that may refute it… because rationale is rational and off-the-wall is off-putting).
Pardon me… I digress. During the race, I stopped at the De Loach wine stop…
Alas, like a variation on Alanis Morrisette’s tune, they poured me the one white wine I really don’t like. It was Chardonnay on my Running Day. A little too ironic to foolishly ‘hydrate with wine’ AND to “hydrate with crappy wine.’ (Another side note: come to think of it, I’m not big on Chablis… and a few others too… ya know something? I may have finally attained a life goal of being a wine snob. So, yay me! )
In the end, I maintained a pretty strong pace through mile 18 and then… didn’t. I finished, I downed an electrolyte (I don’t normally but, well, wine), and I drove home. From the time I left to the time I got back, 35 hours had elapsed. But that’s a different kind of run.
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POST POSTING / POST SCRIPT:
A thunderstorm caused a power failure for a few minutes and when power was restored it was enough time that the webserver could reset. Nature heals technology. So this is being posted on August 30, 2025.
