Why Whole Foods Hit Me

And why I'm daydreaming about this year's race calendar

This Sunday, a couple of hours before the Super Bowl, I’ll host the monthly Zoom meetup for paid subscribers. I’m excited to welcome a special guest for a Q&A: Brittany Charboneau of Denver, an elite-level road marathoner who’s also winning trail marathons (including the fiercely competitive Pikes Peak) and eyeing ultras. Her background as a comedian and actress gives her a unique approach to running, coaching, and life. If you’d like to be a part of our conversation and receive bonus content, subscribe at the supporter level of $6/month.

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Sunday morning, I found myself staring at the triple-rowed salad bar at the Whole Foods in Santa Fe, New Mexico, overwhelmed by choice.

I haven’t shopped at a Whole Foods since we moved year-round to Colorado in May of 2019. The closest one is three hours and forty minutes north, on the way to Aspen. Same goes for Trader Joe’s.

I had forgotten how many salad items one could choose from—every type of grain mixed with every type of green, with every type of veggie, protein, and nuts and seeds. Beets come shredded or sliced, purple or golden. Tofu comes grilled or raw. Goat, feta, blue, mozzarella, and hard cheeses are crumbled, grated, cubed, or sliced.

I spooned and sampled things I rarely buy or make for myself at home, like the falafel balls with tahini, and chunks of seasoned butternut squash inexplicably labeled “paleo friendly.”

I felt as if I had time-traveled back to my old life when I shopped at the Whole Foods in Oakland weekly. Only now, I wandered the aisles with a new, conflicted perspective, my appreciation clashing with dislike.

The salad bar and deli of the Oakland Whole Foods where I used to shop weekly. Photo from Lowney Architecture.

At the abundant seafood section, I picked out a fresh crab—something we used to eat in California and never do anymore—and as they cracked and cleaned it for me, I marveled at the variety of smoked and pickled fish. Then I selected multiple types of dips, dressings, and salsas that our local grocery doesn’t offer. And chocolate-covered snacks we obviously don’t need. But I passed on the most precious and trendy items. Since when did they start making breakfast cereals with turmeric?

In our old life in the East Bay Area, we had access to any kind of restaurant and any big-box store. It created a surfeit and consumerism that I have let go without really realizing it until flashback moments like at the Whole Foods. The pandemic cut our habit of eating out a couple of times a week; our meal at a restaurant in Santa Fe on Saturday was our first dinner out in over a month. We rarely shop for anything outside of our local grocery or hardware store.

The profuse plentitude of a Whole Foods market—with its lush and leafy floral section, its coffee/smoothie/juice bars offering every possible milk substitute or nutritional supplement, its artisan bakery with too many types of cookies to try, its fresh pizza and sushi bars tempting me to skip cooking and buy prepared foods, its natural-beauty-product aisle making me feel inadequate for using Ivory soap—all feels bewildering and wasteful. This store prides itself on environmental consciousness and sustainability, yet it pedals a lavishness and excess that feels unsustainable.

I typically shop at a small grocery in Telluride (overpriced because it costs so much to transport things and employ people here), where it’s prudent to check the expiration date on fresh foods because they tend to sell slowly and go bad, and I stock up on basics at the more affordable City Market in Montrose.

But my favorite food source comes from two local female entrepreneurs whose services help us eat more like locavores. One is a butcher who sources meat regionally, from small-scale ranchers, and she tries to use every part of the animal without waste. I subscribe to a box of selected meats, show up on a certain day, and buy whatever she has picked out for me that’s fresh that week. She’s also a local runner, so we chat at the counter of her little shop. Going there feels like a throwback to simpler times (see story I wrote about her here).

The other is a woman who started an online shop to source regional, seasonal food. Her offerings are limited, but always fresh and delectable. I go online and select whatever veggies and fruits are in store that week, fresh milk and cheese she gets from a nearby dairy, and baked goods from a local bakery. The veggies come in paper bags, not plastic clamshells. On Monday afternoons, she drives her truck down our driveway and drops off the box of goods outside our door. If I’m home when she arrives, it’s another chance to connect and chat.

I admit, I got a bit giddy shopping at Whole Foods last weekend—and stuffed from the salad bar selections—but I don’t miss it (except for the opportunity to occasionally buy a cracked and cleaned fresh crab). It was a reminder that sometimes less is more.

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We went to Santa Fe to drop off our horses for eight weeks of training. They had been standing around a pasture in lower-elevation Montrose for winter since it’s too cold and snowy to exercise them at home from December through spring. During their winter pasture time, I visit them once a week to ride but generally feel as if I’m neglecting them while they hang out dormant and lose fitness. We decided to board them now through March with a trainer who rides them several times a week and elevates their skills and fitness.

Trotting Cobalt & Maverick last Saturday morning to stretch their legs before a long trailer ride to Santa Fe.

This trainer, Katrin Silva, is one of the few people I know who’s also an ultrarunner and equestrian. She’s a Grand Slammer (having run the Western States, Vermont, Leadville, and Wasatch 100’s all in one summer) and incredible dressage rider with none of the snobbishness sometimes associated with dressage. She teaches our boys Cobalt and Maverick the principles of dressage while under a Western saddle, making them more responsive, relaxed, and athletic.

This Instagram post from a year ago shows me riding with Katrin and working “the boys.”

sarahrunning

A post shared by Sarah Lavender Smith (@sarahrunning)

Sending the horses there feels a bit like when we used to send our kids to a summer camp—it’s an enriching experience, and they come home happier and better adjusted from their time there. Yes, it’s expensive, but the cost fits with my conviction that it's better to splurge on experiences than stuff.

If you’re a horseperson, I encourage you to check out Katrin’s site to read her blog and order her book.

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Last week, I received news I got a spot in the June 25 San Juan Solstice 50. I ran it once before, in 2018, and I’m eager to go back to the old mining town of Lake City and try to do better.

My searing memory from the SJS50 comes from around mile 42, as the route ascended one of the day’s more manageable climbs through a forest. The prior 40 miles were spent mostly above tree line, including many miles along the exposed Colorado Trail where snowstorms or lightning can force runners to deviate from the route and seek safety below the ridge.

Runners on the San Juan Solstice 50 course. Photo courtesy of the event’s Facebook page.

Thankfully, we had mild weather that year. But a totally unexpected problem cropped up. As I pushed upward through an aspen and cottonwood grove, with cottonwood pollen flying around like feathery cotton balls, my lungs started to shut down. Some combination of pollen and stress from heavy breathing all day sparked an asthmatic reaction. I had to sit on a log with my head between my knees, breathe slowly to catch my breath, and then hike a bit more until I had to sit again to calm my lungs. The gunky sound and feeling from my chest made me worry I was developing HAPE (high altitude pulmonary edema), which I wasn’t, but that fear triggered a mild panic attack. It just goes to show that unexpected problems crop up during ultras, especially in the mountains. I managed to get through those final eight miles at a painfully slow pace, taking over 14.5 hours to reach the finish.

Now, I have a better handle on how to recognize and manage exercise-induced bronchospasm in high-altitude ultras, which can lead to wheezy breathing, gunky lungs, and an inability to breathe deeply without triggering coughing. An inhaler helps but is not a magic bullet. In training and on race day, I need to avoid hyperventilating and work on deeper, slower breathing to reduce the stress on my lungs.

My race calendar now looks like this. I’m excited about the destinations and variety!

• Ventura Marathon (Southern California), February 27

• Behind the Rocks 50K (Moab), March 26

• Desert Rats 50K (Fruita), April 16

• Miwok 100K (Marin Headlands north of San Francisco), May 7

• San Juan Solstice 50 (Lake City), June 25

• High Lonesome 100 (near Buena Vista), July 22

• Telluride Mountain Run 40, August 27

One race is not on the list above, yet it tugs at me: the Grand to Grand Ultra, September 18 - 24. Registration recently opened for it, following a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic. I did this event its inaugural year, 2012, and again in 2014 and ’19. The first two times I finished 3rd and 2nd, and the third time, I was the female champ and only woman in the top 10.

I have a love affair with this race, which covers 170 miles from the north rim of the Grand Canyon in Arizona to the Grand Staircase near Bryce in Southern Utah. It's a self-supported stage race, meaning, competitors carry all their food and gear for the week and camp along the way. Only water and communal tents are provided. It’s been listed among the world’s toughest ultramarathons.

Part of me wants to go back, 10 years after the first one. But I have another weeklong trip already planned for September. And three times is enough, I know. After the spring/summer race calendar, September should be a month of rest. Right?

I mention the event here because if any of you reading have interest in it, feel free to hit me up with questions. I’ve written numerous articles on it (such as this) and reports on my old blog (such as this), and I successfully coached several clients to finish the Grand to Grand and similar self-supported stage races.

Reflecting on these past races and planning for future ones becomes my version of daydreaming. I get lost in my head while picturing the landscape, planning the logistics, mapping out training. I confront fears of what could go wrong by imagining how I’d troubleshoot and remembering how it feels when the race goes well.

Where do you dream to run this year?

“Running” in the heat of the 2019 Grand to Grand Ultra, on a route that features desert plateaus, forests, sand dunes, and climbs up vermillion cliffs like this.

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Another Colorado-based newsletter that I like and recommend, Cole’s Climb (colenoble.substack.com), interviewed me for its “Trail Talk” podcast; you can check it out here if you like.