Storm The Dam Marathon Kansas

 I picked Storm the Dam marathon for my Kansas state after I accidentally signed up for Pikes Peak Marathon for my Colorado. My intentions had been to do Kansas and Colorado next spring as a double in the Dust Bowl series with Mainly Marathons and then i would finish in June with Hawaii.....but this all changed on the fateful night at 10:30pm when I checked my facebook page one last time and my running buddy Scott Sunday had posted a post that he couldn't believe Pikes Peak was still open....of course I had to run downstairs and sign up! So then I had to find a Kansas and I preferred to get it done this year. El Dorado Kansas is 870 miles away - I talked to my friend Heather to see if she was interested in knocking out Kansas and told her I would drive and we would just share gas cost if she wanted to go....she's the best and is as crazy as I am and loves running and seeing new places as much as me so we make a great running team!
During the New England Challenge plus Vermont my son had heard many marathon maniacs speak of how many stars and different stats and he asked how many I had. I really didnt know but the last time I had updated my runs I did notice that I had 8 stars, I can't tell you when I got 8 stars and don't care to take the time to find out but my son then asked how do I get 10...which is the highest level for a marathon maniac.  We looked up the criteria and to get 10 stars you must do 30 different states in a period of 365 days or do 52 marathons in 365 days.....so we got adding up all the different states as well as the number of marathons I had done in the previous 365 days. Hey we were driving all over New England so we had plenty of time to do some calculating while driving to the next run! After some figuring he realized if I finish Kansas on June 7th that would be 30 states in 365 days!! If that run fell on June 8th I would then have to recalculate and I would still have the capabilities of reaching 10 stars but it would be a couple months or so later due to the fact that I repeat a lot of states for fun.
Now I am still not released to run with my shoulder and things have really been hurting but this run is important to get the state of Kansas out of the way and also now to qualify me as a Titanium Maniac.  We got to Kansas and the weather was calling for torrential rains for the entire run....I was nervous the race would be cancelled if their was lightening they were calling for and I was also nervous due to the course being on all trail and muddy and slippery with my shoulder.  That night the rains came in and it poured!!! The course was flooded so badly they had to reroute some of it as the bridge we would be crossing was gushing so bad we would have been swept away. We did however get fortunate to where the rain stopped during the event but the course was a mud bath, and when it wasnt muddy we were in ankle deep slosh with loose grass getting stuck all over our legs. There was also 3 creek crossings per lap but these were not just creek crossing, they were slide down the mudslide into the creek (one knee deep) and then climb up the other side which was like a mud slip and slide trying to grab ahold of any branch to help yourself up. Heather waited for me the first lap at one of the slip and slide creek crossings to help me up and was worried about how I was gonna do this without jeopardizing my shoulder recovery.  I only have my left arm to try to pull myself up with and that was tough, running in the slosh and trying to keep balance was rough - each time I would slip my immediate reaction was both arms would jerk as to balance myself so by the end of the race my right shoulder was sooooo sore.  When I saw Heather on the second lap she checked on me and I was a little concerned as to how I was going to go around another time with my shoulder and I said I didnt drive 870 miles here to not finish Kansas plus it was going to get me to Titanium!!!
After the run there was a shower at the campground which was a slice of heaven! We were sooo dirty, one of those mud slide I did have to actually just sit and slide down it and land in the big stream of water. We started home to Ohio and knew we would be stopping somewhere half way, we got almost to St Louis and was great because we got to stay with Jorge and Paula!!!!
Since this run I have found out that my bicep tendon repair did hold but during the recovery I now have a torn rotator cuff, The doctor told me the first part of August after doing the test about this and suggested another surgery with a quick stitch to anchor it back and a shot of cortisone since the inflammation has not gone down and I have been in a lot of pain, I chose the shot of cortisone only because I dont have the time to recover from another surgery right now and hopefully soon I will be able to start some therapy that will help things get stronger and possibly better on its own. If not...when the time comes it interferes with my lifestyle then we shall see. Pain I can deal with as long as I can still do the things I want to do.