Ruth Anderson 100k 50 mile

There's good news and there's bad news. The good news is

1. I didn't hurt myself,
2. I kept the hip flexors under control and
3. I went past 50k finally at Ruth Anderson.

The bad news is I had the familiar drop in pace sometime after 20 miles from 9+ minute miles to 12+ minute miles. I wanted to get past my personal (2 times) 50k barrier at RA so kept going at that point (about 4:59). However, when I was getting close to 50 miles, I had a little chorus of pains singing from my right ankle and knees with a steady background accompaniment of pain from my quads and hip flexors. I was tentative going into the race because of my knees and didn't see much point in going on to complete a 11:30 or worse 100k so I quit at 50 miles.

I think the problem with the drop in pace is lack of conditioning via 30+ mile runs for the ultra distance. That didn't seem to bother me at Helen Klein though and I did have a problem in the past where 40+ practice road runs on consecutive weekends left me exhausted for a few weeks (iron deficiency?). So I'm planning to incorporate a 50k per week (but maybe no more than that for now) and I'm taking iron. My next race is a 6 hour (tentatively) so 50k should be plenty to prepare for that.