Saturday 113013

Caught this interview with David Horton on the way up to the mountains.  Good stuff.

5.1 miles up in the mountains.  Slow cuz of the altitude, the hills, the snow but mostly because I felt that way.  Back is still tight.  November finishes with 175.1 miles, and thus my lowest mileage on a month since April of 2012.  Probably overdue.  10 days off in there – some due to work, some because it was necessary.  Not worried about it though.  It has given my mind a bit of time to clear and figure out some of what the 2014 chapter might look like.

Did some skeet shooting with the family today as well.  It further convinced me that my shooting skills are like most of what I do – I ain’t that good at it but if I do a lot of it, I occasionally get lucky and hit something.

Friday 112913

Great ATUC cast.  Solid HOR podcast as well.

More great stuff from Ken.

Good amount of Thanksgiving race results to go over.  The most competitive in CO is the Fort Collins race.  Always interesting to see how the Masters do in that, and especially had my eye on Wes, Clark, Vega.  Is Lee Troop a US citizen?  If he is I’d say he is a lock for the USATF XC Masters title if he races that.  Also, Anthem, Boulder (a race I happened to get lucky on one day where no one showed up over 3 Olympiads ago), Broomfield (I suspect short with the times posted) and heading back towards where I grew up, Manchester.  It seemed to me that growing up there was only ONE Thanksgiving Day race and that was Manchester.  Here in Colorado, every town seems to have them.

Back is starting to loosen a tiny bit.  Still a problem.  I can’t see me pushing anything until that clears.

Some shots from this AM’s run.  The road just south of Dillon is still washed out and it does not appear there is a great rush to fix it (understandable as it is a really low use road).  Also saw some birds.  10 miles easy.

 

Thanksgiving 2013

This Thanksgiving was not only Thanksgiving.  It was JZ’s 13th birthday.  Wow – I am now a parent of two teenagers. 

Also had the chicken.  Did not run into any shot and it was good.  Interestingly, it was ALL dark meat.  Even the breast.  Tasted like chicken!

It was a good day, goofing with the kids, enjoying some laughs and food with friends in the neighborhood  A highlight was unexpectedly getting a call from a friend in the afternoon – just to say hi and wish well.  Pretty damn awesome.

Thursday 112813 Green #49

Decided to pass on any T-day racing this AM, and instead joined JV for a jaunt on Green.  My 49th, his 155th.  This was my first time on the hill since August (before Pikes) and since the floods of September.  I brought the camera to get some shots of the new terrain.  The shots sort of don’t mean anything if you did not know what was there before.  In some cases there was just a hillside that you saw every day, filled with trees.  Now it is a gorge, void of anything but very large rocks.

Jeff was kind to me, keeping most of the effort at a hike or a very slow jog.  As my back is still tight up high, I was thankful for the slower pace.  Even though I have not run with Jeff in over 3 months, we fell into conversation like we saw each other every day:  updates on this guy, that guy, the changes to the hill, families, politics, our motivations for running, etc. 

Ken’s recent post came up.  I have not responded to that one yet.  We kicked around some of the same stuff.  I guess it comes down this:  Running is something I enjoy a great deal.  Part of that enjoyment is clearly about the pursuit of being greater than what I am or what I was.  I don't go out everyday just to run to enjoy it.  And so when I perform in races at something that is less than what I expect, it bugs me.  This blog is part of the recycling of that “bugging.”  As much as I say I want to improve, I choose to do other things as well that are big and important:  work, attempt to be a functional father and husband.  There are a lot of other small choices I could make to move me forward in terms of running:  cutting miles, increasing miles, getting to the gym, specific speedwork, diet, etc.  But I am really not that disciplined at getting at that.  So any frustration that comes across in this blog is really not that big but is sort of big.  I get it.  I am not going to be content to say, “hey, that is the way it is” but I will look to improve, but recognize that I am coming up short on many choices.

There is a fun aspect there to me.  It is easy for us to look at other people and say, “hey, you just need to do this and this and you will be this much better.”  And it is probably true, but it is probably not what the person wants.  At least in that moment.  And their ability to see that to some other moment is that basic delay gratification problem we all face to some degree.  It is fun to me to want to be as good a runner as I can be on the track, roads, trails and mountains while realizing I am a corporate weenie, middle aged family guy.  Working through it is part of the fun.  Sure there is frustration at times with that but … hell, I am still doing it so there is something right about it.

Snow and ice in patches up high, so I brought microspikes.  Better bet would have been screw shoes.  6.2 miles.

Wednesday 112713

JT is up for a growler of beer/six pack against me:  He has 45 inclines and I have 48 Greens.  Whoever has the most of their mountain by the tail of the year gets the reward from the loser.  I like my odds as I have a 3 count lead and JT does not run when it gets below 20 degrees.  Plus if he wins, and I have to serve up a six of PBR, Old Colorado City will have to prepare for a night of this.

I circled back and managed to listen to this podcast.  Holy crap.  Short, 20 minute one on Kenyan circumcision rituals and how it might have bearing on Kalejin’s dominance in distance running.  Worth the listen.  As fascinating or disturbing as the circumcision ritual is, the discussion of the possibility of the Kajelin having a genetic advantage is of greater interest to me.  David Epstein reveals that in his authoring of “The Sports Gene” (which I am slowly picking my way through when I am on flights and not reading the latest installment of “A Song of Fire and Ice”) he encountered scientists who were reluctant to share data that would support a hypothesis that there was such an advantage – because of the social implications and that it could impact their tenure.

Recently, I was discussing some of the things I was reading with a business colleague and I brought up Epstein’s book, how it brought some contrast to Gladwell’s now popular 10000 hour thoughts and the consideration of genetic dominance.  This colleague, an African American, was pretty dead set against such a consideration, and was quick to bring up the social environment considerations.  Of course, I don’t discount the social environment impact (e.g. look at the top VK performance list from the ISF and you can’t help but notice the European flare), but I prefer to also not ignore the genetic possibilities.

While on podcasts, checked out the recent ET.  Good show. 

Freil wraps up his aging athlete posts.  Speaking of aging, 80s “music” fans might find this post of how the icons of that decade look now.

Not all of the UK is stoked about the Salazar coaching arrangement.

Back is still tight when I breathe deeply.  Just to keep me in a panic a friend dropped on me that it is probably pleurisy.  Awesome. 

Afternoon was more of this:

Ellroy and Farnsworth ran great today.  Way better than last time.  They had a lot more confidence on the road, trotted quite a bit and even went to a gallop occasionally. 

10 on the day.  2.5 with the donks and then into the evening SUPER easy – like 8:30 pace.

Tuesday 112613

I am catching this after they won (obviously) but Wetmore’s sarcasm is something many of us have enjoyed for years.  Good recap on the XC Nat meet, particularly how CU was 19 points down from NAU at 8k but pulled out the win.

In a more professional regard, I have been watching the thread on the FDA serving the 23andme company a warning letter on its product.

To wrap on the hunting trip, plucked and prepped the chicken.  A thing that I guess is commonplace for a lot of folks, but definitely something this raised in the burbs of southern New England punk had never done.  WARNING  - some folks find these shots less than their liking, and not what they would expect on a blog about running.  You have been warned to veer off if not interested.  But it is really just a chicken.  This will be a compliment to the Thanksgiving bird – and thankfully not the only thing we have to eat.

Guess I am older than I thought as I decided to swing the carving in the PJs.  Awesome.  For what is worth, some back yard chain saw work was done in those too.  Sheesh.

Not sure if I will race Thursday.  The desire is sort of there, but sort of is not.  I might be just as content to do a lap on Green (I have 48 this year and getting 52 on the year would be a nice number and as far as I have recorded, an annual high).  I can see the reasons for getting out and jumping at it, but there are probably as many not to.  Odd feelings I guess, given I was pretty sure that the focus this season was going to be to perform as well as I could that day. 

That has sort of slipped away over November, which has unexpectedly become a month of low miles, days off and little motivation to fight otherwise.  The slight aches and pains, the time off more forced by work and other choices, and the less than personal par performance last week have dimmed the fire a bit.  And I am unexpectedly at some ease with that.  It is almost as if a break needed to be forced on me to realize that I probably needed a bit of a break anyway.  Or maybe that I am welcoming one warmly.

Afternoon – 10.1 miles super easy. Back is still tight.  It is one of those deep muscle things that you feel when you breathe deeply.  Some folks call an intercostal muscle thing.   I have had this maybe four or five times in my life.  Takes a few weeks to pass.  No idea what causes it but sneezing is about like getting kicked in the back.

First mile was with Lucy dog to get her out.  In the field, these three kids had a Rotty on a leash.  They lost control of the leash.  It bowled me over to the concrete (where I made the elegant old man “agh!” sound) and the started on Lucy.  I jumped in, grabbed the Rotty by the ears and brought it down, and it started to whimper.  Could have been a real stupid move on my part but I got away with no teeth marks in my skin.  I did have a skinned elbow from the fall though.  Too pissed to really talk to the kids, I gave them their dog, looked mine over and after assessing she was fine I pushed off.