PORTLAND, Ore. — Portland State alum Camelia Mayfield's connection to the Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run – one of the Grand Slams of ultrarunning in the United States – goes back to the womb.
 
Seriously.
 
Mayfield's father, Marcus, had a lottery entry for the race in late June 1992. The only problem? Mayfield's mother, Karen, was due to give birth to Camelia around the same time.
 
The race's official website lists the current chance of winning a spot in the race with a single entry into the lottery as 2.5 percent. What's more, those lottery tickets only come from select races throughout the year that you have to be fit enough to finish.
 
The lottery odds were a little better for Marcus Mayfield back in 1992, but it still wasn't easy for him to give up a spot in the race. His decision? He raced, even as his wife went into labor with Camelia.
 
"I was the fourth child in my family, so when my mom went into labor on Sunday morning, when most finishers of Western States cross the line, I think she knew that [my dad] would likely miss my birth," Mayfield said of the family's memories of that day. "I was born in the early afternoon and it wasn't until later in the evening that my dad and uncle (his pacer that year) were able to make it back home to Ashland. I'm sure that it was pretty hard for my mom to be taking care of a newborn while my dad was still recovering from a 100-mile footrace."
 
But while the Mayfield family has let Marcus have it when it comes to jokes ever since, his decision came full circle when Camelia raced in her first Western States 100-Miler in 2018. Camelia placed seventh in the women's race and 30th out of 299 finishers overall that year – incidentally beating her dad's finish from 1992, when he placed 72nd overall.
 
Camelia performed even better last month at the 2019 race, shaving more than an hour and a half off her time while finishing in 18 hours, 13 minutes and 31 seconds. Camelia moved up two spots from the 2018 standings, too, placing fifth in the women's race and 22nd out of 319 finishers overall.
 
And so in addition to Camelia being born, a family-wide connection to the Western States 100-Miler and ultrarunning in general was born on that fateful day in 1992.
 

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It seems like a no-brainer, then, for Camelia Mayfield to say that Western States 100-Miler was always one of her top goals in running, even while she was competing at Portland State. The family connection to the race, coupled with the fact that it is one of if not the most prestigious ultra-races in the United States makes that obvious.
 
However, the process to get to the Western States 100-miler hasn't been as easy or obvious.
 
First off, Mayfield needed to build up her training miles. The longest collegiate distance, after all, is only 10,000 meters (6.2 miles), though Mayfield was well-trained at that distance, having made the 2015 NCAA West Prelims in the 10k in her final year as a Viking. Fortunately for Mayfield, former Portland State distance coach Jonathan Marcus was fine with her beginning that build up while she was still in college. Mayfield won the women's race at the Hagg Mud 25k in February of her senior year, and won the women's race at the Mt. Ashland Hill Climb Run (a 13.3-mile race) in August.
 
Between those two races, Mayfield ran at the 2015 USATF Mountain Championships, held in what would become Mayfield's adopted home of Bend, Oregon. Mayfield showed promise against what was most likely her toughest field to date, finishing 13th over an 8,000-meter course that gained 1,700 feet of elevation over two 4,000-meter loops.
 
The following January, Mayfield committed to running her first full marathon at the 2016 Eugene Marathon at the end of April. Her finish? First. What else? Mayfield finished her first full marathon in 2:47.45, beating her nearest competitor in the women's race by more than 10 minutes.
 
Following that, Mayfield ran her first 50k (just over 31 miles) at the Flagline 50k in Bend. She won that race, too, placing seventh among all runners and beating 37 male competitors in the process.
  It was shortly after that that Mayfield decided to go for a qualifying spot at the Western States 100-Miler.

There are three ways to get into the Western States 100-Miler.

There are over 100 races you can run in order to get lottery tickets for the race. That leaves you with the small odds Marcus Mayfield faced back in 1992, however.
 
You can also earn an automatic berth if you finish in the top 10 at the previous year's Western States – something Camelia was able to take advantage of following her seventh-place finish in 2018, but not something available to people trying to crack into the race.
 
The third option is to hunt for a golden ticket, given to the top two finishers at five to six races throughout the year.
 
That's what Mayfield decided to go for, and it was obvious to her and her coach, Thomas Morgan, where she'd have to go to get it.
 
"I think [Thomas] had more faith in my fitness than I did, but I figured that trying more competitive races and traveling a bit farther to get to higher competition races would serve me well in the long term," Mayfield said. "I figured since I was placing as the top female and among the top all-gender finishers at local races in Oregon that it was worth it to put myself on the same stage elsewhere."
 
The Lake Sonoma 50-Miler in April of 2018 was where Mayfield would find her golden ticket. Mayfield actually placed third in the women's race at Lake Sonoma, but when one of the top two finishers declined the entrance to Western States, it passed to Mayfield.
 

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The specifics of the Western States 100-Miler are enough to turn most people away, or at least turn them into long-distance hikers. Still, given the demand for entries from ultrarunners across the country, it's clearly a sought-after race for more people than just Mayfield.
 
The run takes place along the Western States Trail in the heart of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range, starting at Squaw Valley, Calif., and ending in Auburn, Calif. Runners begin the race at 5 a.m. and must reach the finish line within 30 hours. The estimated elevation change projects that runners will ascend 18,090 feet during the course of the race and descend a total of 22,970 feet.
 
"I was prepared going into the [2018] race, but it's a weird feeling knowing you are going to run 40 more miles than you have in any other race," said Mayfield, who's previous longest race was a 100k (62 miles). "It was a mix of being a little afraid of the unknown but also excitement at the possibility of accomplishing a huge goal that I had been working toward for months."
 
Mayfield did exceptionally well for it being her first 100-miler, placing seventh in the women's race – good enough to earn her a return trip for the races' 2019 edition.
 
And now that Mayfield knew what a 100-miler felt like, Mayfield put in some longer training runs going into the 2019 race, including one 40-mile run with over 11,000-feet of elevation gain. Besides that, Mayfield said she didn't stress much about the easy recovery runs as much since she knew she already has a good endurance/fitness base. Instead, she made sure to maintain good strength and health with diligent weight training and physical therapy exercises.
 
It all came together for Mayfield at the 2019 Western States 100-Miler, as even things beyond Mayfield's control broke her way. Mayfield and the rest of the runners caught a stroke of luck when the temperature for the 2019 race, which can be pushing the upper 90s or even into the 100s, was more comfortable than it was the year before. Mayfield said the lower temperatures kept her fresher and better nourished for the early part of the race, which meant she could cover more miles in daylight than she did the previous year. Mayfield estimates she only had to run in the dark for two hours in 2019, a definite advantage since runners are forced to slow their pace to ensure secure footing when running at night.
"I really underestimated my growth in fitness over the last year. Training for trail races is odd. I did a lot of hill workouts, but not as much speed workouts over the two months leading up to the race, so it was difficult to tell if my fitness really was building as I thought it was," Mayfield said. "My coach really encouraged me that I was in better shape, but I figured he was just trying to boost me mentally. I did realize by about halfway through the race that I felt a lot stronger, though, and was running more portions of the race that I had to walk last year." 

Mayfield finished the 100-mile race in 18 hours, 13 minutes and 31 seconds, more than 90 minutes ahead of her 2018 time of 19 hours, 46 minutes and 57 seconds.
 
Mayfield was feeling so strong at the end of the race that she was passed another runner in the final 100 meters, edging Kaytlyn Gerbin by two seconds for fifth place. The late push to beat Gerbin helped Mayfield erase her lone disappointment from the 2018 Western State 100-Miler, when she finished 45 seconds out of sixth place.
 
  "If I had known I was that close to another runner, I could have picked up some more time last year," Mayfield said of the 2018 race. "This year, when my crew member, Jared, met me and Matt – my pacer for the last 20 miles – at mile 99, he told us how close the woman in front of me was. The three of us kept increasing pace and I was finally able to pass her in the last 100 meters of the race.
 
"I couldn't finish knowing that I didn't give it my all to place as well as I could."
 

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The help Mayfield got from two of her crew late in the 2019 Western States 100-Miler is indicative of the support that can surround an ultrarunner. There are the typical aid stations from volunteers at various points of the race just like any amateur run, of course, but the lucky runners will also have a crew of people following them during the longer races.
 
At the 2019 Western States race, Mayfield, who signed a professional contract with Brooks Running in January of this year, had her husband, the two friends that helped her late in the race – Jared and Matt – her mom, her brother and her sister following her in a car. Mayfield's sister even joined Jared and Matt as a pacer for Camelia at various points of the race.
 
"It's a huge mental boost to see the ones you love supporting you along the way," Mayfield said of her crew. "Seeing them reminds me not only that they are supporting me on race day, but in every step that it took to get to that point. It reminds me that I can't give up just because it starts to get hard.
 
"They also can give me things that I know I'll want that they don't have at the normal aid stations. I love Pringles, so that's a staple they always give me. I was actually bummed when I found out after the race that Matt had a coconut cream ice cream bar ready to give me at mile 55, since that was something I really liked last year. This year, I was way too focused on catching the women in front of me that I didn't even see it."
 
Outside of last month's caravan, Mario Mendoza has also been a generous friend to Mayfield within the Bend running community. Mendoza encouraged Mayfield to apply to be a fill-in teammate at the World Long Distance Mountain Running Championships in Slovenia in June of 2016, and was the main advocate for Brooks Running to create a Bend contingent for the Brooks Off-Road Runners program.
 
Additionally, Mayfield's coach Thomas Morgan, a two-time All-American who ran track at Kentucky and competed in the 5,000 meters at the Olympic Trials, has been working with Mayfield for the past three years. Mayfield credits him with focusing her in training so that she can maximize her higher-volume days and ignore the life stressors that can get in the way.
 
Not that Mayfield has ever been too resistant to training. Being based in Bend, where Mayfield says you can drive 10 miles and find great, secluded training runs, makes it easy for Mayfield to find time in her schedule to get miles in. At least, easier.
 
Mayfield still has a day job that she has to fit her training around. She was a full-time child welfare caseworker when she started ultrarunning, and currently works as a Mental Health Practitioner within the ED at St. Charles Medical Center in Bend.
 
Both Mayfield's training and her job have made her thankful for the other at various times since she graduated Portland State. The job helps Mayfield be thankful for her ability to pursue professional ultrarunning, while the running helps Mayfield process some of the emotional hardships related to her job.
 
"Running is how I practice self-care. It's a time that I can think about my interactions from the day and ways that I could improve, or did well. It helps me realize if there is an underlying issue that I need to address," Mayfield said.
 
"Training for these long races also forces me to have a balance with work. I often set boundaries about working overtime because it would cut into the time of my day that I structure for training. Of course, sometimes work does take priority, but it helps me realize my identity outside of my job."
 

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Future goals for Mayfield include possibly going overseas for the UTMB (Ultra Trail Mont Blanc)race in the Alps – one of the races on the Ultra-Trail World Tour. Otherwise, there isn't the defined peak of the sport like the Olympics would be for Track & Field. Mayfield said she does plan on running in the Olympic marathon trials in Atlanta in February 2020, but while she'd gladly take a spot on the U.S. Olympic team if she can get it, she's approaching that race more as an experience.
 
Mayfield's main goal in ultrarunning already came true in the form of her two races at the Western States 100-Miler. A third appearance at the race in 2020 may or may not come about. Mayfield has until December to opt in or out thanks to earning another auto qualifier with her fifth-place finish last month.
 
Mayfield's dad, Marcus, returned to the Western States 100-Miler in 1994 following his infamous race in 1992. Marcus Mayfield didn't beat his finish from 1992 as he placed 84th overall in 1994, though he shaved close to 20 minutes off his time while finishing in 23 hours, 56 minutes and 54 seconds.
 
Still, it seems fitting that Camelia surpassed her father's best time at the race by close to six hours last month. Ultrarunning has been present in Camelia's life since birth, after all. And with her performances the last two years, it's become clear that the Mayfield family's best ultrarunner on that fateful day in 1992 was the one in the womb.