Cassie Scallon won the 2012 Bandera 100k in Texas and became the 2012 USATF 100k trail national champion. Scallon talks about her win at Bandera, her plans for 2012 (IAU 100k World Championships, 3 Days of Syllamo, Ice Age 50, and Western States), her 2011 season, and her easy-going approach to training.
Cassie Scallon, 2012 Bandera 100k Women’s Champion, Interview Transcript
iRunFar: I’m with Cassie Scallon, women’s winner of 2012 Bandera 100k. How are you feeling today? How did your race play out today?
Cassie Scallon: Sore. It played out kind of perfectly, without any planning at all. I went out with the lead women, I think I needed to do that, because I wouldn’t know what pace to run on my own. We went out pretty fast, but I was able to steadily move up. Right at halfway, I went into first and that worked out pretty well.
iRF: Who were the leaders in the beginning. You were with Liza [Howard]. Was there anyone else?
Scallon: Darcy [Africa] led the group and another woman [Kara Henry] was ahead of me for a little bit and on some of the flat sections, too.
iRF: Did you have any real down points during the race?
Scallon: Yes. I ran out of water three times and was out of water about 30 minutes each time. I was frustrated and dehydrated.
iRF: So did you take some more time at aid stations to catch up?
Scallon: Yes. Sean [Meissner] and Meghan [Arbogast] were just awesome at helping out there, dumping ice on me, just getting me everything I needed.
iRF: How about physically aside from the dehydration? How did you handle the rocks? It’s a very technical course with a lot of limestone even when you’re not kicking rocks.
Scallon: I like technical, so I think that played in my favor a little bit, but it beat me up a lot. I haven’t been running on a lot of that kind of stuff. I haven’t been running a lot at all lately. It beat me up.
iRF: You won JFK 50 miler in the third fastest time for women on the course. What have you done since then? You and Sean have been moving around the country.
Scallon: Right. Little runs here and there, but I haven’t run longer than 20 miles since JFK. It’s been very sporadic. I’ve spent a lot of time with my family and a lot of time not really feeling like running.
iRF: So what are you looking forward to in 2012? Do you have a plan?
Scallon: Not a definite plan, but hoping to be on the National 100k team and go to Worlds [in April] and possibly going back to 3 days of Syllamo [in March]. In May, I may go back to Ice Age 50 miler and, then, of course, Western States 100 miler [in June].
iRF: Have you done a 100 miler before?
Scallon: Never.
iRF: How do you feel about your 2011? Pretty good year?
Scallon: Yeah. Everything kind of came together. None of it was planned. I didn’t purposely change my training or anything like that. I just started running well.
iRF: What does a typical week of your training look like? You’re good on the technical. You ran fast at JFK/ I’m sure people would want to know how you train.
Scallon: I don’t plan anything at all. I don’t have a training plan. Sean kind of encourages me to go out for long runs once in awhile. So we do that together. Other than that, it’s kind of just wherever we are we go out and run for a while. A lot of times it’s just hour long runs.
iRF: You’re not hitting the track every once in awhile, you’re just going out and having fun on the trails?
Scallon: Yes.
iRF: Congratulations and keep having fun out there on the trails!
Scallon: Thank you.
