Today is a red letter day on the local running calendar — Dipsea and Double Dipsea application day!   At precisely 4pm, applications for this year’s 7.4 mile Dipsea become available on the Dipsea website.  And because 500 slots are awarded on a “first-to-apply” basis, time is of the essence.  But, like all things Dipsea, it’s more complicated than that.  You can’t just fill out an application and hit “submit”.  No, that would be too easy.  The timing of applications is determined by when they are received at the Mill Valley Post Office (94942) and must be received through normal postal operations (mail or overnight delivery), as in you cannot just walk in and hand the application to the clerk.  So, the result of this is a mad dash to print out and complete the applications and get them to either the Mill Valley or San Rafael post office in time for overnight delivery, cutoff being at 5pm for receipt of overnight mail.   It makes for an interesting scene at what otherwise would be a sleepy afternoon at the post office.  Long lines of people in nylon and spandex all excitedly talking about the upcoming race, and hoping they’ll get in!  For those who can’t count of being among the first in the door, the race allots 100 slots to people who include “bribes” with their applications (they are specifically referred to as “bribes”, and are tax deductible), which are used to support college scholarships for local runners and to help fund the organization.  And finally, people are invited to submit “sob” stories as to why their application should be picked from the stack.  More about that, and the inspirational “sob” story of my wife later.   In addition to those methods, 750 slots are reserved for so-called “qualifiers”, the fastest runners from last year’s Dipsea.

So why all the excitement and hoopla over a race?  Ahh, for anyone outside of Mill Valley, let me give you a first taste about the Dipsea, of which June 2016 will be its 106th running, making it the oldest race in America, other than that little old marathon they run in Boston.  But long history is only part of the story.  The terrain is unique, 7.4 miles from Mill Valley to the ocean at Stinson Beach, climbing 670 steps to get out of the town, then dropping into Muir Woods, climbing up an impossible stretch called Dynamite, eventually reaching a particularly gruesome part of the trail appropriately named Cardiac, before a precarious downhill over steps, roots and rocks to the beach.  Overall, it has about 2100 feet of elevation gain.

But (and I sound like Bob Barker on the Price is RIght”) that’s not all!   There’s more that makes the Dipsea exceptional, and unusual.  The race is handicapped, with the oldest and youngest given varying degrees of head starts, and top flight “scratch” runners forced to run down their elders to win.  Men over age 74, women over 66 and kids under 7 get a whopping 25 minute head start over men age 19-30.   The handicaps ramp down, so that a 58 year old like me starts 14 minutes behind the first group, and I have an 11 minute edge over the greyhounds.  As a result of the handicapping,  polished trail runners in their 50’s and 60’s — who can run the 7.4 miles about 15 minutes faster than I can — routinely win the race.  

Add it all up, and it is a local spectacle that also brings in trail running zealots from around the country.  In the weeks leading up to the Dipsea, the steps and trails that make up the course are filled with people getting in Dipsea shape, which inevitably means reacquainting oneself with the punishing steps that are a kick in the ribs over the first two-thirds of a mile.  Unless you truly are a beast, the best approach is to take the steps two at a time, in a fast but steady walk that still leaves enough in the tank for Dynamite, Cardiac and a downhill dash to the beach.
The clock on the Dipsea website now says it is now  88 days and 17 hours to the start time!