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A 100-mile race rarely unfolds exactly as planned. Over the course of 22 hours and more than 100 miles, the body gets tired, the weather changes, the terrain becomes harder, and even the most carefully prepared race plan can eventually stop making sense.
For Oliver Bieser, Run Rabbit Run 100 became less about executing a perfect plan and more about learning how to respond when that plan was no longer enough.
Starting With Confidence
Oliver began the race with a controlled approach. Rather than rushing the early miles, he trusted his pace and allowed the race to come to him.
Between miles 17 and 30, that patience began to pay off. He moved up several places and made up 30 minutes on the lead, giving him an early reminder of his resilience and ability to compete.
That section of the race mattered because it gave Oliver confidence that his training had prepared him for the challenge ahead. For much of the race, he stayed close to his expected pace and managed his nutrition and hydration according to plan.
But in a 100-mile race, a plan is only a starting point.
When the Plan Starts to Fall Apart
Around mile 60, the race began to change.
The trail became increasingly muddy, and his waist lamp eventually ran out of battery, forcing him to switch to his backup headlamp. More importantly, the accumulated fatigue was beginning to catch up with him.
Oliver knows that no matter how carefully a race is planned beforehand, being sore, tired, or sick can make it difficult to keep following that plan. At some point, the body starts making its own decisions.
That was when Oliver had to let go of the idea that the rest of the race could be perfectly executed.
As he put it, the final 39 miles needed to be "willed, not planned."
He still stayed close to his expected pace for most of the race and continued to fuel and hydrate according to plan. But the focus had shifted. It was no longer about controlling every variable. It was about responding to whatever came next.
When the Conditions Take Over
The biggest test came around mile 81.
At approximately 5:30 in the morning, cold rain began pouring and continued for nearly two hours. The trail quickly turned into a shallow creek, and the rain eventually soaked through Oliver's jacket.
He began shivering uncontrollably and had to slow to a brisk walk.
By the time he reached the mile 89 aid station, his lips had turned blue, he could barely open his hands, and the shivering had made running impossible.
A volunteer quickly recognized what was happening and brought him inside. Warm soup, a space blanket, and a seat beside the heater gave Oliver the opportunity to recover. The stop cost him 20 minutes, but it also gave him something more important: a chance to reset.
After eventually getting warm again, he was able to leave the aid station and continue.
Remembering That He Had Been Here Before
The physical conditions were difficult, but Oliver had another challenge to manage: his own emotions.
After his Beaverhead 100K, Oliver had talked about learning to adapt when a race does not go according to plan. That experience became important at Run Rabbit Run.
When the familiar feeling of "I need to quit" began to appear, he could recognize it for what it was. He had been in that bleak headspace before.
That did not make the moment easy, but it gave him something to work with.
Instead of letting the feeling decide what happened next, Oliver was able to draw on the experience of having come through it before. The ability to pull himself out of that mental spiral had become stronger.
By the time he left the mile 89 aid station, he still had 13 miles ahead of him.
Finding a Way Forward
The final miles were no longer about chasing the race plan. They were about continuing forward.
Oliver eventually completed 103.02 miles in just over 22 hours, with more than 17,500 feet of elevation gain. He finished 12th, but the result was not the part of the experience he was most likely to carry into his next 100-mile race.
Instead, he remembers the feeling of leaving the mile 89 aid station.
After reaching such a low point, he had managed to recover, regain his spirit, and keep moving. For Oliver, that became evidence that even extreme discomfort and difficult conditions do not necessarily determine how a race has to end.
It also reinforced something he had believed long before Run Rabbit Run.
There will always be moments when quitting feels like the easiest option. There will always be an excuse to stop, especially when you are tired, hurting, cold, or far from the finish.
But having experienced that feeling before, and knowing he could move through it, gave Oliver a different perspective.
"There is always an excuse to quit, but rarely a reason."
For a race that lasted more than 22 hours, perhaps that was the lesson that lasted the longest.
