Rucking Ocala National Forrest
Back in January I attempted Operation Ocala. I made it to mile 45 at the 3rd checkpoint. I thought I could go on after changing my socks, attending to my blisters, but as I got back up I was locked up. I was with 3 others, and we all made it there together and unfortunately, we all dropped like flies at that CP. I never rucked until 2023 or even knew what it really was. My friend did Operation Ocala 23 and I remember following him with his live track and watching some live videos, it was pretty wild. His blisters were knarly. He later got me into rucking later that year and I did a few rucks. My first long ruck we went for 40 overnight but only made it 26.2. I was dead. All with 25lbs dry weight. That was in early December and Operation Ocala was coming fast in mid Jan. I was able to do a few more 20 mile before Ocala and I felt ready. The biggest things I learned from Ocala 24 were that it's all mental. The feet are going to blister, the pain is going to come. The road to the end is longer than you could ever imagine. That day on the way home I couldn’t ever imagine doing that again. My wife picked me up, I could barely walk. Everything hurts. But by the next day or so I was so motivated to get back out there. I was so upset with myself that I had stopped. I know I could have just started moving again work through the pain and get more miles in. Here I am 15 hours into that ruck. It's roughly 8am. I have just enough time to get to the end at 5pm. I had work in the morning. I had a 2 hour drive home. So many things just stacked negatively for me that ending this was the easy way out.
I found myself wanting to attempt this again right away. I could not wait a whole year. I remember my other friend Josh asking me that he would ruck with me when I posted some of my training activities online. He had been in the Army and he ran and hiked. I asked him if he wanted to do the trail with me soon, and he said yes.
We set the date for Feb 24-25, 2024. We had 5 weeks to prepare. I go to the gym regularly so I kept my legs trained well. We did 1 ruck together late jan, 20 miles it went well. We found some hot spots and made some changes. I had new shoes. I was trying Altra Lone Peak 8. My issues at Operation Ocala were that my pinky toes were trashed. My pinky toe naturally goes inward towards that next toe and just gets squished. The Lone Peaks, like most Altra, have a wide toe box. I rucked a few 20s and even a marathon before the next attempt. I played around with toe spacers, toe socks, double layer socks...I knew it was going to be an issue. Some things helped but nothing was going to be a solution. I just accepted that going into it. I knew If I can keep my toes decent I can make this. My cardio was fine , I know how to eat and drink etc. It was all feet for me.
Josh and I met Wednesday before the ruck and figured out where we would drop water off and planned the logistics of getting there and back. The plan was to take both trucks and park his at the finish line which was the end of the Florida Trail. Then we would take my truck and stop at 3 spots approximately 15-21 miles apart. It was more base on access with the trucks we found the easiest highways where the trail intersected. So the route was, start at Fort McCoy, Check point 1 was 18 miles away, Checkpoint 2 was 21 miles away from there, and checkpoint 3 was roughly 15 miles away then like 12-13 more to finish.
We had to carry all the food with us, and I had extra water at all times since the checkpoints were 5-7 hours apart. I had 4L of water at all times. We chose to leave for Ocala at 730a. This way we did not disturb our natural sleep and we could complete our morning routines. By the time we got to the starting point after all the stops it was 1130. We wanted to start by noon. We started a few min after but close enough.
My shoes and feet felt good. I had vaseline on the toes, XOSKIN toe socks, a pink toe spacer on the outside, then Dickies thick boot socks over that along with the Altras. All the layers were sitting well, and my feet felt good. I had about 30lbs total on me. A backpack and a hip sack combined. In my backpack water, food, extra clothes, first aid, emergency tent, bear spray, insect repellent, head lamps, back up batteries, electrolytes. In my hip sack I had phone, batteries to charge phone, cords that were ready to go. This way there was no fussing around when trying to charge phone. I had some more food, compass, bear bell, and whistle.
Weather was perfect. Clear skies, 68 for the high 40s for the low. Light wind. It was gorgeous. Our pace started good. High 17 min miles which was expected for us. Im not a fast rucker, im not a fast runner. Anything sub 18 for me is great. I do from time-to-time shuffle but I chose not to do so on this ruck.
The first leg was great. I did almost step on a pigmy rattler which made things a little exciting.
We got to the first check point , you have so much time to play it in your head what you need to check on, fix, charge, etc. It never seems to go as smoothly and it always takes longer. But we got our water refilled, took a quick break and got moving again, It was a 34 min mile combined on that stop, not too bad. 16-17 min break.
By this time the sun was setting and the next checkpoint was 21 miles so we set out for the next 7 hours. Navigating the Florida Trail is not too bad. I would say it is well marked. We did get lost in January but I had a better map this time and I knew some of the mistakes we made in the past. I did not want to get lost this time. That was one thing that really tired us out . There is a big lake on the trail and it feels like it takes 3 hours to go around, that's because it does. You see a lot of campers around here, but the trail wasn’t really to busy. We passed less than 10 people the entire time. One thing that was helpful for me is knowing the familiar areas. I knew what was coming and it made it like a connect the dots game. It would be like the hike was mentally mapped out in my head. I knew we had to get around the lake, then later there would be a creek crossing, then a sketchier creek crossing , then a board walk etc. That helped me mentally keep going almost as something to look forward to.
Again, this is mostly mental. This is what got me here. Do hard things. The mind and body are limitless to some extent. You choose what you can and cannot do. The body will persuade you but the mind is the real boss. You go through moments of ups and downs. Filled with doubts, regrets, runner's highs, sense of pride etc. Pain comes and goes. You think you have something brewing on your feet and then it will work itself out. I tried my best not to mess with my feet, but at CP2 I did a sock change just on the boot socks and I took off the toe spacers. I had some hotspots for sure but was not ready to dive into that.
The night was probably my favorite part. The weather was cooler, no sun heating up your skin. It’s quiet other than some music I was playing. I think I went from Eminem to country to classic rock back to Eminem then death cab for cutie. I was all over the place but it all helped. There were some parts of night and day where I was so into the music I think I was dancing a singing along, im sure me being delirious helped.
I mentioned food and drink earlier. Here is some more details. I drank 2L of water 4 hours. In the water were 2 packs of Gator Lyte. Plenty of sodium mag and potassium. I'm not crazy about Gatorade but the Gator Lyte drinks and powders are perfect for me.
I ate every hour. Protein bars like Gatorade bars, and METrx bars. Swedish fish sugary gummies hit the spot, some pop tarts, and I saved a bag of skittles for the last few miles. I don’t normally eat that crap so It was a nice treat. According to my Garmin watch i burned over 7000 calories and I ate close to 5000 I think.
I did have a chest strap on too for more accurate heart rate monitoring. Garmin is great for these activities. I cycle, run, ruck, etc. and Garmin is great at tracking all of that. I did use Strava for the map portion. I downloaded a friend that actually completed Ocala24 map and that was extremely helpful. Thank you Clint.
As the sun rises it’s always a great feeling. We were over the hump. We encountered a burning forest at one point in the night. Not sure if it was prescribed but it was very odd to see these trees burning at night with significant flames. There are so many different areas that you cover. Miles of pine trees over hills you can see for so far, scrub oaks and brush where you can’t see but right in front of you, and everything in between. There were overall many prescribed burns that had just happened so you could see more than normal. Not much wildlife though, not sure if that was good or bad. Many deer tracks not no deer.
One of my highlights of the night was making it to the spot I quit at in January on Mile 45. It was a dirt road. I told Josh to take a picture of me, I flicked off the camera, had a sense of pride and continued on. I was now going into an uncharted trail for me.
The morning started great. We made it through the night I was trying to do the math and thought we would finish around 11am. 23 hours total. After the sunrise excitement settled down reality was starting to set in. We were slowing down. I was going as fast as I could but overall, it was about 2 solid min slower and that number was growing. My feet were starting to sting. My shins were in pain. My shoulders were tired. My back had blisters from the pack that were not going away anytime soon. My hip sack was rubbing into my legs. Everything was breaking down as expected. I went into this knowing that it was going to be hard and painful. I did not think that if I prepared good nothing bad would happen. That's where I went south the first time. I was prepared this time to embrace the suck. And that's just what I had to do the last 4 hours. Those last 4 hours 12-14 miles or so were hard. Josh was hurting as well. I had the map and I could see the finish line but I made one small mistake. The Strava trail I downloaded was 66 . 63 miles so I was using that number as the finish line. Strava and Garmin must calculate the miles differently. I did not know this so when you are mentally preparing for that finish line you give it your all. Everything you have but that finish line was further than I was preparing for and I didn’t realize this until the last 5 or 6 miles. We were crushed by now and knowing we had to go further was a lot to digest. I was talking to Josh and myself, or I guess yelling....” This is why we came here , It’s not for the last 60 miles, It's for these last 3 or 4” Everything slowed down. Our pace was hitting 23 min miles. About 5 min slower per mile than how we started. Add that to 4 or 5 miles and it's an additional half hour. Things were just stacking up negatively for us. We ran into some hikers, so we knew the trail head was closer. I asked them how far they had been hiking and they said about an hour or so, someone said 2.9 miles...So we finally knew what we had left. If it took them an hour with fresh legs, what did that mean for us. 1.5 hours...? Now time was a crunch. I know this was an unofficial attempt but I still wanted to be there within 24 hours. I was getting doubtful. Josh was as bad as me. Just shot mentally and physically. Quitting was not an option. We had trucks 70 miles apart and no other assistance. We just pushed and pushed. “GO ONE MORE”. I had my son write that on my hand. I knew I would need it. One for step. One more min. One more mile. And so on. I looked at it many times during the ruck. I can’t explain how slow time and miles passed at the end. The last mile took the longest. We were so close about ¼ mile away and I felt something pop between my big toe and the next toe. That area had been tender for a while but the blister popped. HOLY COW It stung. I went from a slow pace to a limp real quick. I am grateful this happened the last ¼ mile and not the last 5 miles. I don’t know what I would have done. We limped on and pushed with everything we had and made it to the trailhead at just over 67 miles in 23.5 hours. I told Josh as we had a few miles left, the pain would go away as soon as we got there. We just have to get there. I told him he was a F**king Badass! I said many will never even attempt something like this. I was just trying to be as positive as I could. Every time I looked at my hand “go one more” (got that from Nick Barre) it would choke me up a little.
The next few hours we ate some pizza. We must have looked like 2 90-year-olds with walkers coming into the restaurant. We had to drive back to my truck. My feet were rough but not as bad as I thought. It's crazy how much pain and stinging can come from a little blister. I guess your body is really good at telling you to stop. I was mentally prepared for that. I knew what was coming.
The ride home was long, 2 hours 20 minutes from the Rodman trailhead. My wife and son were waiting for me. Dinner was cooking. I limped in, i could barely move. My wife tore some band aids off my back, and I screamed so loud like I never knew I could scream that loud it hurt so much. Then I iced bathed my feet. Another painful moment. I ate and crawled into bed. My feet and legs were swollen and still are (the next morning) I took the day off of course so that's how I have time to write this. I am moving better today than expected though. I will be fine. Josh is doing good too. He will be fine. We will be fine. It was a big commitment to revisit this quest.
I can now move on. I will continue to ruck but I like trying new things. Ultra running is something I have in my sights. I have never ran a marathon but I just rucked over 2.5 of them in less than 24 hours. It was equivalent to doing 21 5ks.
I share all this because we have much more potential than we think. We can do anything. It may not happen all at once but if you want something bad enough you can do it. Long distance really lets you dig deep with yourself. Even during training, I went on 7 –8-hour rucks and you can really work on yourself out there. I call it training but it was still a hobby to me or just a fun Sunday morning. Put in your favorite podcasts or music playlist and just start rucking. It’s a great zone 2 exercise. That helps build endurance and just overall makes you healthier and stronger. The mind gets stronger too. You think the normal day to day challenges will even be a blip on my radar after this? That\s what it's all about. Doing hard things. When you raise that baseline of what is hard, the normal "hard' stuff is a walk in the park. Challenge yourself. Embrace the suck and bring some friends with you to enjoy the ride.
