Running in the family

By Nadine Gilmer

Sun contributor

I used to call myself an avid runner, but after hearing about Norm Plumstead, I think I’ll call myself an avid couch potato now.

Plumstead has lived in Empire’s “New Neighborhood” for seven years, he is a father, husband and Honor State Bank employee, and he recently raced 100 miles. Most people would get tired just reading that sentence.

On June 5 Plumstead ran the annual Kettle Moraine 100-mile race in eastern Wisconsin after he and his wife Cile left Empire the previous day and left their two children, Henry, 6, and Brody, 3, with their grandparents. Plumstead arrived at his friend Adam’s house on the other side of Lake Michigan in time for a carbohydrate-loaded pasta dinner and some shuteye. The race began the following morning as 151 athletes challenged the hot Wisconsin humidity. The Kettle Moraine race is divided into two loops. The first loop is 100 kilometers (roughly 60 miles), which is more than most of us could handle in a single day. By the time Plumstead reached the 100k mark, the Wisconsin sky had already been raining for three hours.

But that didn’t faze Plumstead, a veteran of 10 marathons over the years and always a humble presence. Plumstead is the epitome of a runner. He boasts not an ounce of fat, nor any bulk. To train, he often subjects himself to grueling runs two days in a row, sometimes running a distance that exceeds a traditional marathon on Saturday, then do it again on Sunday. Luckily, for runners in northern Michigan, our summers are perfect. The weather is rarely too hot or too cold, and our neck of the woods boasts plenty of low-impact, scenic trails, low elevation and flat terrain.

Plumstead began his running days while living in Chicago when he and a friend challenged themselves to run the 1996 Chicago Marathon. Ironically, he hated running in high school, but the challenge of the marathon, and the desire to impress his equally athletic girlfriend Cile (now wife) was enough motivation to take on the marathon.

“Especially when we were dating, I wanted to appear as fit as possible to her,” recalls Norm. “She’s always been healthier than I am. She helped inspire me to be a runner or, at the very least, to continue running.”

Plumstead and his fried won no medals during that first race. In fact, he says, they “were passed by two people dressed as M&Ms … so it wasn’t the greatest marathon. … But it gave me the bug to try to improve my time. Most runners in most races aren’t trying to win, they’re just trying to improve their own (personal record).”

This kind of drive is the reason why he didn’t stop at the 100k mark in Wisconsin last month, even though it was still raining fairly hard. “I’d never really run for that long in the rain,” says Plumstead, “It was nice at first because it cooled things off. It was pretty hot and humid before the rain came, but having your feet wet for 20 hours was kind of a challenge. Even at the start, the trails were kind of damp. The grass was wet and then the rain came and turned the trail into mud. That was the hardest part for me. I didn’t know what to expect in terms of blisters.”

Once he passed the turn-around point at 62 miles was when the race started to grow more difficult, says Plumstead. “Almost every runner at long distances like this will walk the up-hills and run the flats and the downhills. But it slowly became progressively harder to run. For the last 20 miles I had to power-walk. I couldn’t will my legs to walk anymore. They were like Jello. When I crossed the finish line I was very, very, satisfied and very relieved and glad it wasn’t a 101 mile race.”

The entire endeavor took him 24 hours and11 minutes, earning him sixteenth place among 55 finishers.

So how do you cool down from something like that? How does one recover from running and walking 100 miles? Well, the Plumsteads got in their car, and fell asleep.

“We had a limited amount of time, unfortunately,” says Plumstead. “And it was hard because Cile was also up for 24 hours crewing for me. When I finished the race, Adam was asleep, so he drove at first and we took turns driving. Cile and I were both asleep when we got to his place where we showered and slept a little bit. Then we drove back to Michigan because Cile had to work on Monday.

“Fortunately I had Monday off, so I could kick back and relax.”

After 24 hours of running, Plumstead dedicated Sunday to eating. “Anything that sounded good, I ate.”

And now it’s Cile’s turn. Norm promised her that it would be her turn to train now that his 100-miler is over. Cile is eyeing the Cherry Fest 15k and the Grand Rapids Marathon.

As for Norm, he’ll be waiting to train so that he can do things a little differently for his NEXT 100-mile race.