Tortugas “A” Mountain 24 Hour Run

So, I did a thing. One I’ve never done before. I ran the Tortugas “A” Mountain 24 hour run in Las Cruces, NM a few weeks ago. I’ve never run a 24 hour race before because most of them are usually run on a track or short loop course. The idea is to run for 24 hours to rack up as many miles as you can. Running on a track for a day and night never really appealed to me, but this race was on a four mile trail around “A” Mountain. Well, I decided to give it a try and since I had recently celebrated my 58th birthday I set a goal to run one mile for each year on the planet. 

Organ Mountains as seen from "A" Mountain

The race was sponsored by the Southern New Mexico Trail Alliance who maintain the trails in this area and also organize the Sierra Vista Trail Runs. This race, however, was run "fat ass" style, “No Fees, No Awards, No Aid, No Wimps”. We started on Friday evening at 6pm going clockwise around the mountain and reversed direction on each completed loop. Runner wrote the time they finished each lap on a board posted at the start/finish area.

Tortugas Mountain as seen from the Organs

Mt Taylor 50K 2021

 The muffled sound of a hundred feet padding the rocky dirt road, a whiff of dust stirred up from the forest floor and the disorienting ovals of light from runners’ headlamps greet me at the beginning of the Mt Taylor 50K in Grants, NM. I carefully scan the road for rocks lest I break my ankle in the first half mile of the race. Mt Taylor (11,306’) or Tsoodził is a sacred mountain to the Navajo and marks the southern boundary of their homeland. According to the website NavajoPeople,

“[Tsoodził ] is important in the Blessing Side ceremonies and the Enemy Side Ceremony. Mount Taylor was once the home of Yé’iitsoh (Chief of the Enemy Gods).
Once the sun is up, sunrays are all around and Mount Taylor is adorned with sunlight.

After thinking about what you want to do for the day, you start to plan your activities…Thoughts such as, “We want to progress,” grow from small plans to large plans and Mount Taylor has the power to satisfy that wish.”

View from Mt Taylor elev. 11,302

My hope is that Mt Taylor will be kind to me today and allow me to progress up her steep slopes and to safely return to the race finish line. I’m barely awake and simply keep my mind focused on the path. I share the trail with about 150 other hearty runners, but I stay in the back of the pack and pace my self. Before long the road becomes steep and I shift into power hike mode to conserve as much energy as possible. I expect my journey to last about 9 hours.