Week ending 10MAR2024

A bit of a blur of a week as it was a vacation in Ireland.  

Monday night - we made it to Dublin on the train and it was just pouring nearly sideways.  I debated going out, but managed to rally and head to Phoenix Park from the Gresham.  The trip out wasn't bad.  Back, I was face into it and so I was fully drenched by the end.  7.1 miles.

Tuesday afternoon - a sunny day (for Ireland standards) and headed to Phoenix Park again.  After a bit of a warm up, I took advantage of the nicer conditions and did minute on minute off reps.  I really didn't tag these.  I just didn't have any pop in my legs, but I ended up moving well on whole on the run.  8.2 miles.

Wednesday afternoon - we headed up to Malahide.  Last time I was here was 8 plus years ago.  I ran the coast trail, and it was good biting wind.  6.4 miles.

Thursday afternoon - 7 miles.  Last run in Ireland after a 3 week tour.  I hit the castle park and did a few loops up tempo.  Legs didn't feel great but I ended up moving ok.   Did a few hill repeats on the hill near the Grand to finish.

Friday was an all day travel day.  I had a twinkle of a thought I'd run when we got home but I was just too beat.

Saturday AM - got in some miles back in CO with GW.  It was good to catch up.  8.9 miles.  Most of the day was then at the Monarch / Centaurus track meet.  

Sunday AM - 12.6, with about 5 with GW.  Legs still beat, dealing with some low hydration from the travel and being the sun yesterday.  Easy paced.  

On whole, not a bad week, especially with it being a travel week.  Missed the second day for the year on Friday because of travel.  Got a couple of up tempo sessions during the week vs. slogging at 8:30 pace.  

Week ending 03MAR2024

A blur of a week in Westport, then Galway for a couple of days.  Lower miles than typical but some quality.  

Monday AM - explored Westport for 4 dark miles.  Felt pretty good even with the long run in the legs.

Evening - 4.2 miles, headed out on the Greenway trail up to Newport but that got dark real quick.  The trails in town are well lit, but that one had no lighting.

Tuesday - similar exploring.  4 miles.

Evening - 4.1 miles, including exploring the Col. Woods area.

Wednesday - got in seven, very slow on a rainy afternoon before getting TZ at the train station.  I was a soaked rat at the end of it.  Headed out to Clew Bay and back on the rail line.

Thursday - got in 6.3 in the afternoon.  Managed to do some of this a bit up tempo.  

Friday - very easy six

Saturday - jumped in the local Parkrun at Willie K's urging.  It was on the rail line.  It was a colder and nearly wet start but the real stuff held off.  I had pretty low expectations - as I have not really done anything in a bit.  The first mile drops 70 feet and so was quicker - 6:30.  I actually didn't start too fast, and synched up off of what Willie was doing (although I think we was just relaxing).  Once we got to the bay (maybe 1.3 out?) we flipped around started the climb back.  Willie gapped me here but only by about 10 yards.  The second mile was a 6:48.  I could definitely feel that lack of this sort of work in the last mile and the gap grew to 20 seconds.  6:58 - breaking 7 was a chore for me on that one.  20:52 for the finish - better than I expected and got me thinking about the work to break 20.

We took to Galway on Saturday, and then did Cliffs of Moher, etc on Sunday.  I managed 5.2 mile in Galway on Sunday, picking it up here and there - feeling pretty good.  And then I tripped on my shoe lace and cut open my left knee.  Just a scrape. 

Went through 500 miles sometime on this week.  

Ton of pix to post, but I will do that in a separate one.  

Week ending 26NOV2023

Ended the week in PHX, driving back on Saturday.  Did that round on the interstate route to avoid some of the mountain snow - just around 14 hours (we were under 13:30 on the way down).

Six days of running (missing on the travel day), some fartlek stuff, and even some gym work on my retirement community card (no really).  

Sunday was back in Colorado and got in 8 and change with Greg in the snow soup.  42 something miles on the week.  1882 on the year.  

Did this last week.

Couple of weeks ending 19NOV2023

Got down to AZ a couple of weeks ago.  Not much to report on the running front.  50 mile weeks, typically with a couple of days off in each.  

Spent some time watching sunsets.

Some time hiking.

Got a hair cut

Went to NXR to watch the boys run in the mud.

Went and hung with Shad as he won a 100 miler.  

Did a run on a part of the Maricopa Trail.  The whole trail is 315 miles ... it is fairly remote out there.

Week ending 05NOV2023

A somewhat uneventful week for running.  I only ran five days, with one day off because it was a long work day and I managed time poorly, and Sunday off because we drove to AZ.  It was pretty good other than that with a 10 miler on Friday that included ten (or more) 2 minute on segments.  Ended up being a 42 something mile week.

Week ending 20AUG2023 - a trip to the Western Slope

Tuesday - no running.  First day off in probably six plus weeks.

We took the train from Denver Union Station to Grand Junction.  We have thought about doing this for a bit.  It is a pretty cool ride, rising up through the Front Range, the Moffat Tunnel, over through North Park and then down the canyons as you follow the Colorado River.  

Toured a few vineyards, a cidery, a distillery, and a brewery out of Palisade on Wednesday.  Fun.  Did manage to get 5.5 in the morning.

Thursday - six in the morning along the Colorado River Trail in Grand Jct.

Got up on the Grand Mesa scenic by-way.  Awesome drive, and got out and about for a bit of it.

In the evening, hung out at the kick off of the Palisade Peach Festival.  

Friday AM - 4.2 in the AM.

Saturday - we got word as we headed to the rack that the train from Grand Junction to Denver was CANCELLED.  Apparently the big storm that blew in at sunset washed out the track somewhere.  We shifted the car rental to drive it back home.  Of course, part of 70 was closed too because of a rock slide.

The good news was we probably got home about 8 hours earlier than we would have on the rail.  The train is great ... if you have no concern for time.  It is horrible if that is your priority.  I got in 5 in the evening.

Sunday AM - 4 miles before heading out to the airport ... coming up on a week in Cleveland MS.

Horrible training week.  But a fun week.  

The views back in the Front Range were welcomed.

General update ... end of May 2023

Well, I haven't run in about six weeks - or since I was in Chicago in April.  

I don't really know what I did to mess up my ankle but it seems like it is the post tibial tendon.  I am not really sure what level of damage I did to it, but given its slowness to heal, I wouldn't be surprised if it was partially torn.  Even after all this time, there is still some pain there.  I know that walking on it in Japan for 15 mile days didn't help (I could see the swelling at the end of the day) but I was not going to miss that.  

Being in Japan made not running easier.  I could just enjoy where I was at and not worry about it.  It would have been nice to jog with KZ, but I demonstrated a modicum of discipline to not do that.  

Now that we are back, I could start the process of getting it really figured out.  That means doc, referral, probably an x-ray, another read/referral, MRI ... and I think it ends up being the same even if I don't do that:  don't run on it for a bit.  Yeah, there could be something else where they say "hey this is a surgical matter" but that seems unlikely.   I have generally resigned to waiting it out to see if it heals on a 3 month window.

In the past this would have been maddening for me.  It still sorta is, but it is a voice I can manage.  I pulled out of the burro racing game for the summer, and it seems that Pikes will be next unless I am running by July.  

Frankly, it is easy not to run.  It is less easy to live the rest of the day or week or month without running.   I will get back to running, I just don't know when yet.  It is simple as that.  I want to run, play in the mountains, and even compete ... but I am not there right now and perhaps in the least physically conditioned I have been in all of my adult life.  It is simple as that and it doesn't require more analysis than that.

I say that for me more than anyone.  For now.  

The trip to Japan was ... well, lazily said ... incredible, amazing, wonderful.  The posts on it before this are also lazy.  A few pixs grabbed from the close to a 1000 taken.  It ain't gonna be captured well in a blog post anyway.   We kept talking about our favorite parts:  a temple, a shrine, a view, something in nature, the food ... I think for me it was the deep belly laughs with my family.  It has been a long time since the four of us were together long enough to do that for that much.  That was my favorite part and a pic doesn't really need to grab that.  

Japan 2023 Part 2 (Osaka and Kyoto)

We flew from Nagasaki airport to Osaka.  It started a bit tough because Peach Air was not going to allow me to bring my travel guitar with me in the cabin.  Rather than ship it, a recipe for destruction IMO, I left it in KZ's car.  I was fairly convinced it would be melted by the time we got back (but it worked out that it was fine).   Once we got to Osaka airport (KIX), we fumbled around trying to figure out what train to take to get to downtown (a bit of a challenge given the language differences).   Once we got settled, we headed out for eats.  Osaka is an incredible city and we only got a short glimpse of it.  

W

Osaka - I think you could eat out every night of your life there and never see a quarter of the places.  The ones in the back alleys are the way to go for sure.

Then it was the bullet train to Kyoto.  What a marvel.  So comfortable, so easy, so fast.  If I visit Japan again to see KZ, I'd take the train from Tokyo to Fukuoka.  Makes flights seem horrible.  

Kyoto is unbelievable.  It is truly a magical city with over 1600 temples and shrines.  We took hundreds of pictures.  

We ended up wandering a quiet canal alley, found great food and drink, enjoyed the fireflies and the magic of it.  

Our second day there we ended up walking over 15 miles, taking in temples, shrines and an infinite number of Torri gates.

There was sushi of course as well.

Hit up a bamboo forest. 

On our last day, we still walked another ten miles, taking in more ... and again just scratching the surface.  

It was then back to Kawatana (next post).