Thursday 061710

Was going to get out last night for another run – it was a gorgeous evening!  But a friend of ours returned from Mexico, and she brought a gift.  This was crafted by a friend of ours.  Some fine sippin’ …

Up early this morning, an down over to the track.  Did a ladder of 1600-1200-800-400-200 with a full lap in between each.  Followed up with 5 x 150 strides, with the classic float, drive, float for 50-50-50.  9 miles total.  Started at 5k pace, and felt sluggish on the opening lap.  I didn’t do any strides in the warm up to open up and I could feel that.  Settled back though after about a half mile and felt okay.  This work seems to be all in my legs, and not so much in my lungs.  5:38, 4:11, 2:39, 76, 35. 

Last night at JZ’s ball game I was assigned to keep score with “Grandpa Joe.”  He is the grandfather of one of the kids on the team, but a few other kids call him Grandpa Joe because their families go down to visit him in AZ during baseball spring training.  Started yapping with him a bit as we counted pitches.  Turns out he ran quite a bit with the BRR, knows Castro, Durden, Mohr – all the players.  Ran five marathons.  One day he was out running and without warning he blew out his knee.  Meniscus wrecked, ACL, MCL were just disconnected.  No issues with the knee before that.  Ever.  Had that repaired and then two years later the other knee went in the same way (side note – he told me when he had surgery on these, he did not do general anesthesia … as he hates vomiting).  After the second, he decided not to run anymore.  Now he play golf every day and watches baseball.  Trolls the desert southwest.  Used to head into Mexico quite a bit but not so much any more given the border issues. 

I did not like the knee story.  But I guess it can happen.  And if it did, I’d be happy that I rode it as much I could.

Also told me that he had prostate cancer at one point.  They put it into remission once, and then it came back ten years later in a different form and he fought through that.  He gets results back on annual tests now to assure every thing stays in remission.  Told me that if the test come back positive now, he is not going through all that chemo thing again … that he’d “ride this horse out.” 

I knew this guy maybe ten minutes and I was almost ready to cry but I figured if I did, he punch me in the face and tell me not to be a baby.

Afternoon.  Easy 8 miles.

A read on iron that need to drill into.

Video on hill repeats from Magill I’d probably toss in there that doing RIDICULOUS hills (like Amphitheater) a LOT might actually begin to slow you down.  In other words, if you are doing 15 minute miles all the time … getting out there to do sub sixes make not immediately translate well.  In any case, some reference in here as well to springing / bounding (which I don’t do, maybe I should) and downhill strides.

Run easy … via J^2.  Podcast with Vaughn I am going to listen to.

An anti minimalist shoe approach … (thanks to Homie for pointing it out)

Wednesday 061610

AM – slept in.  Needed it, but felt bad about it after I saw how gorgeous the AM was … so got out mid day.  I could feel my indulgence from last night and so had low expectations on how this run would feel, particularly since it was warm (upper 80s).  Surprisingly, I ended up feeling pretty good, and clicked off a relaxed 8 miles.

Various …

… A bit funny in a warped way … but made me laugh.  Never give up.  Even if you are down to nubs. 

… Sauna training for some for WS100.  Ugh.  5 hours a week in a sauna?  Not sure I’d be up for that.   Anyway, a WS100 prediction contest. 

… This time of year, you have to be particularly careful about lightening above tree line.

… Interesting read re: altitude, performance and rest, in the context of soccer – but has applicability to running.

Tuesday 061510

AM – met up with JV early for an easy jaunt up Flag via the road (as he preps for Mt. Evans) and then over the backside of Green.  10 miles, 2600 feet of climbing.  Felt a little mushy from Saturday, but actually once we got moving for a bit, I felt pretty good on the up.

Synchroblogging re: WS100 with some fun stuff from AJW.

Justin does a preview of the SJS50.

Yeah, Mount Evans this weekend, Mount Washington (MW press release) of course, and San Juan 50.  Then there is a 10k in Vail, and the Joe Colton runs.  Hmmm … I might just not do any of them.  JZ has a ball game.

Afternoon – pressed for time and felt pretty good, so about a dozen strides in I decided to tempo this for a bit.  4 miles.

Pix from the day

Leaving Chaut … heading up Baseline
Looking back at the sun rising
Towards the 1st Flatiron from the break at Baseline-Gregory-Flagstaff

“Shall we now head to Green?”
JV heading towards Green (summit in the distance)
Looking west, lots of new snow on those peaks
JV at the summit of Green
A nice section on the down back via Gregory
A shot I took for Lucho.  I think this translates to Wolf Lane.
JZ … ball on the right of the frame …

Dinner … first, choices …

 
Some early f-day’s gifts
 
Lucy in the backyard with some of the milk-man legacy (authentic)
The boy and the Norfolk in a pond they created … both happy.

Monday 061410

AM – 5 miles easy.

Not a lot of chatter on Max King for MW.  But he should be in the hunt.

GOG10 miler results (men)

PM  - 7 miles easy, with JZ, TZ on their bikes.  Was laughing at the last 2 miles.  I was jogging easy at 7:50 pace and a 142 HR on a warm afternoon.  Never would have happened last year at this time.  Little tightness in the right hammie from yesterday, but nothing big.

Various Sunday night stuff

Good little prelude to WS100 embedded in here.

Picked up Foo Fighters, Nothing Left to Lose from the library.  10 year old album I guess but still very good.  In the car, it works well on making the “you don’t have your seatbelt” ding ding ding not be heard.

I enjoy seeing “new” runners progress through what I call the “front end of the curve.”  In their first couple of years, when they dedicate themselves, they see results they confess as mindboggling.  The paces they did in races a year ago become the paces they hold easily in recovery training runs.  Brandon, of course, is one of the guys on this front – all the best to him at SJS Solstice this weekend.  (also in the run from blogs I follow will be Brett, . Jim P., and Burch). 

Another guy who is progressing through the curve is Jayson.

On the flip side, I still grumble about mismarked, inappropriately marked race courses.  I know some people see this as part of the MUT game, but it gets me irked.

KZ is blowing me away with how she dabbles in music.  Tonight she is playing “Falling Slowly” on the piano.  I did not even pick a guitar up until I was 14 and she is picking out chords for tunes.  Wow.

Zion traverse is on my list.

And this “Ring the Peak” thing too.

Mount Washington next week.  Watch the top 50 most memorable people of the MWRR over here.

This time of year in Colorado is amazing.  It is so beautiful, with the green, the lush of the meadows, and the snow capped peaks.  Some good pix from Kraig from the now ultra world famous Green Mountain.  His video of Green is pretty flipping sweet.

The guys in New England are running fast!  Watch that Tilton kid at MW.

As always, great write up by JM re: weekend action.  Justin’s writing is something I enjoy.  His Jared’s People stuff is total LMAO.

Still shaking my head at Tony’s 4:16 in practice at Pikes.

Sunday 061310

Tim G and I had planned to hit the Coal Creek Trail this AM for a long run (3 hours).  Rain yesterday, and the through the overnight, had us thinking otherwise – as we did not want to deal with the flooded out sections, or the mud.

Given that, we agreed to meet up at Erie Lake, do some laps there and then figure it out as to what we wanted to do.  As I drove up the Lake, conditions were not pretty:  misting-raining, with a decent breeze.  Not great.  I was hardly awake, but I knew this was going to be one of those runs that you were soaked to the skin at half a mile in – despite trying to do all sorts of things going into it to stay dry.

30 laps later on the lake we had completed 25 miles.   Ridiculous run.  Never felt compelled to leave the lake as we just got into a groove on the 0.83 lap loop (near the cars for water, change of clothes, and food), and we switched up direction every five laps.  I was content to stop at 24+ miles (and 29 laps) but Timmy talked me into the additional to round it out.  Time flew by as we yapped about absolutely everything and nothing.  We probably looked most ridiculous when we ditched shirts for the last 9 miles – as the wet shirts were promoting nip chaffing.  Two bald guys running in circles, bare back except their HR straps in 40 degree temps in the rain.  Nice.

Coming into the run, I was a bit concerned.  My legs had not felt so great recently.  If TG had pitched up a 2.5 hour run of 15 miles over some mountain, I’d be fine – but three hours at sub 8 pace sounded a little intimidating to me.  We settled in 7:30s right away, comfortably, and without issue held that through the run.  Felt great.  I got a little tightness in the calves towards the end – probably because of the cold more than anything, but nothing bad.  AHR = 148, with it tipping over 150 for the last hour.

95 miles on the week over 14.5 hours, with over 10k of climbing.   171 miles on over 25.75 hours in June. 1904 miles over 279 hours on the year.  Decent week as I got a nice mix of vertical, some shorter faster stuff and a long run.

Saturday 061210

AM – super easy jogging – 10 miles.  Raining.  AHR = 130.  Max 146.

Tim G and I are contemplating a few hours on the Coal Creek Trail tomorrow.  Drop me a note if interested.

Great podcast from EndurancePlanet that I will get back to, several times, re: Flow in Sports.  There are plenty of things in sport to worry about … if you want to.

Various 061110

Defending WS100 women’s champ Anita O podcast interview.  Up at 3:15AM and a self described wimp?  Damn woman.

Apparently in England there is a whole series of FREE 5Ks called parkrun.  Pretty cool, but the insurance backing is apparently an issue to get it going.

Somebody, with snow on the mountain, unsupported and solo runs a 4:15 – casually at Pikes.  Dang, watch out WS100.

Raining pretty good out tonight.  KZ is in a tent over in the Commons for the night doing the all night cancer walk.

Hop Czar

JP recently waxed about his love for Maharaja brew.  Given he was having a tough time finding it, I offered to grab him a few bottles from my local packey (yeah, the old east term there).  I was, however, a bit blown away to see it was running 9 bucks a bomber.  Good beer, but not quite that good (sorry JP).  

I think a better buy is Hop Czar from Bridgeport Brewing.  A fine Imperial IPA at 8 bucks a six.     

Alternatively, I’d be compelled to grab the Flying Dog IPA.

Thank you very much.  Bury my heart at the trailer park.  Oh, the Zack Rabbit Ale from the Spring has aged nicely and finally has a decent head.  I may zap up another batch for some late summer loving.  And yes, I will probably go dry come July … simply as an act of self discipline to myself to show that I can.  The trick this year will be the river trip (as I expect there may be sipping cactus ferment in the mix)

UniHill 2k results?

The results for the Uni Hill 2k from last night off of BoulderRoadRaces.com, do not seem to make sense and do not jive with the story at the Daily Camera.  Guessing chips are jacked.  Anyone know anything otherwise?

Friday 061110

MK (prior multiple time 2:20:xx marathoner, now a 50yo who runs for fun, and just to see where he was at did a 2:18 altitude 800 meter run recently) dropped me a note last night that he was interested in doing Green.  He had never been up it, so I was glad to join him for his initial ascent.

I snuck in a round up Flagstaff (five miles, 1200+ vertical) before meeting MK, Brett and Clarence at the Library.  Rock was also supposed to be in the mix but he was a no show.  I felt sluggish going up Flag.  The legs were a bit tired from the last two days, and I ended up going a bit harder than I wanted in the second run last night (to get away from electricity flying out of the sky)

We took it expectedly easy, and stopped to explain the various views, turnoffs, etc.  The guys were stoked (probably very different than my first run up Green).  Took them up the Gregory Ranger route and down the Greenman-Saddle-Amphitheater route.  It is incredibly lush up there now.  Green meadows, rich trees and TONS of flowers. 

On the way down we ran into Tony and JV.  So, there were two guys who have probably collectively done Green over five hundred times next two guys who just lost their virginity.  After leaving Tony and JV, I did some explanation to MK as to who these two icons of the mountain were.

7 miles (2700 vertical +).  12 on the day, nearly 4000 feet gain.   Was getting hungry towards the end as I did not bring any food.

Green’s profile (starting from the Library).




Calories … according to Matt F, 1 in 5 come from beverages.

A Skyline traverse with no pants at night coming up.

Played around with the music playlist, adding some of KZ’s favorites from the Wicked soundtrack that I have heard only 359 times in the last week.

CU – Pac 10

CU is now in the PAC 10 (or whatever number) conference.

Yeah, everyone will talk about football and basketball.  Whatever.

XC?  Track?  Oregon?  Stanford?!  Damn.   Arizona, WSU ain’t slouches either.  Winning conference ain’t going to be the easy deal it was in the B12.  I think Wetmore has to be stoked.

Thursday 061010

Speed development article

PM – 5 miles.  Pressed for time, so was cruising for the first half (AHR 152, 17:30, drop 100 feet …), and picked it up to tempo for the second half (AHR 170, 16:15, gain 100 feet …).  Felt good.

Evening – 6 + miles.  Had to cut this short.  In the midst of this march, I happened to be in a very large field (Lac Amora open space).  I was enjoying the evening, and then turned around.  I saw the dark cloud coming in from the west.  And it started to thunder.  Then lightening.  Then there was the bolt that hit the field maybe a half mile, mile away.  That got my attention.  Then rain.  Got out of that pretty quick.

Summer, life is awesome.  As cliche as it may sound, I’d like to raise another round, and if your bottle’s empty, help yourself to mine.

Expecting to do Flag, Green in the AM.

Living on Pikes Peak for 5 years

Wow.

Wednesday 060910

Interviews with WS top contenders.

Nick’s “guide” to ultra prep.

AM – tough to get up this morning.  Any case, 2 mile warm up over to BHS, and the 3 x (600-400-200) with a very slow 200 jog between each rep, and 400 jog between each set.  Tried to take these in order of imagining 5k pace, mile pace and 800 pace.  Feels the same as it did ten years ago, but my watch must run faster these days.  1.25 mile cool down.  7 miles total.  (2:01, 78, 37; 2:00, 78, 37; 1:59, 77, 36).

This workout probably be a bit longer (both in terms of distance  -probably closer to 3 miles for me in total “speed” - and time – probably at least 18 minutes versus the 12 here), but I am just working into these (after not doing more than 2k of stuff here through the spring).

I have been asked why I do these sorts of workouts – flat, short – when the events I prepare for are typically uphill and longer.  First, this sort of activity represents a very small percentage of my training (less than 3 percent in terms of typical mileage, probably even less than that in terms of time).  Second, I feel some need to tap this sort of work, because it is the aspect of my running that has degraded the most over the last five years – and hence potentially represents an area that I could gain the most improvement from.

That aside, I have wondered if I have subconsciously grown scared to run fast.  Well, less so about running fast, and more scared of running while hurting.  I know that sounds weird.  In reading various literature over the last couple years about the brain acting as a damper to protect ourselves, I have wondered if it is adverse to running faster, as that represents potential damage it does not want to deal with.

Or I could just be slower.

Evening … I forgot how much I love running at this time.  It is cooler, the sun has set so there are beautiful vistas of the mountains to the west.  The trade off is that while my legs are awake, I am usually tired from a full day.  In any case, I got out on the Lake Link trail and as it was too dark to read the watch, I decided to play a HR game.  The game was to keep my HR as constant as possible – and at an easy level (sub 150), with the challenge being that I was doing this blind and that this course is very varied (rolling quite a bit).  I did “okay.”  I averaged 147, but with a max of 154 (on an 6.5 % grade uphill).  Given the nature of the route, the pace was ALL over the place to keep things dialed in (low sixes on the downhills to high tens on the uphills).  Sorta fun.  5 miles.

Tuesday 060810

Kilian.  Good grief.

I think this is a FKT for the DOUBLE Skyline Traverse.

AM – 8 miles, 3000 vertical.  Green Mountain.  I was supposed to meet JV this AM.  I parked at Chautauqua, and made my way across the meadow to the Flagstaff / Gregory lot and while his cool car was parked there, he was gone.  Hung out for a bit to see if he was just off in the woods with wonder dog Sierra, but never saw him there or on the mountain. 

Made my way to the summit via Gregory – Ranger, and well – my legs are zapped.  Nothing there today.  Might need to back off a bit here for a day or two as this is the third day where I have felt sluggish.

Got to the summit and sat in a soft rain for a bit, and then started the descent.  About a third of the way down Ranger, I ran into Koll and joined him for a re-summit of Green (ugh).  Great to chat with him, as he is getting pretty fit (a guy with a 2:31 PPA in his resume) with a focus on Leadville this year. 

As of this past Sunday, there are ten weeks left in the summer.  I am going to focus on reaching peak fitness at the end of the summer.  So far through the spring, my approach of base-building has been working fairly well.  It has come fairly naturally … be consistent with training, run harder when you feel it, and easy all other times.  I mix in a little structure but nothing overly specific.

With the shift to summer, I feel a need to shift things up a bit to ensure I do reach this goal of end of summer peak fitness.  That said, I need to be careful in how I do it.  Changing up a run or two a week to be more specific ought to do the trick, and not much more than that should be required.  In fact, a total overhaul at this point might be more problematic than good.

PM – hotter, but I actually felt like a real boy again for the first time in a couple of days.  5 miles.  Started easy, but as things felt nice, I upped the ante a touch in the second half.  Felt good.

Monday 060710

After sleeping for two days in the woods with the Scouts, I elected to sleep in a bit – so no morning run.

Justin has a good run down of the weekend action, including mountain running up in Vail.  I don’t see Mario on the start list for MW, but he won both races handedly.  Gates seems to be shaping up into form well.

Afternoon – started at the Flatiron Vista trailhead … and rather do the typical 10 mile lollipop I added on to make it a nice 12 mile loop with about 1000 feet of climbing.  I headed out as typical, but then I cut down the road from the top, to the Fowler trail and then took the road out of Eldorado back to the Doudy Draw Trailhead.  On the upper parts of the trailhead I saw a snake (as it cut under me as I ran – it scared the bejeebers out of me!) and several deer.  I then took the Community Ditch over to the Marshall Mesa. Again, I was both amused and confounded again by the optical illusion of the trail.  As you are running adjacent to the trail, and you see the water flowing down in easterly direction – and you are running that way, it seems very obvious you are running downhill.  But optically, the trail seems to be going slightly uphill.  The GPS measures that this section drops a very very slight 30 feet over two plus miles.  That is more than enough to move water (a negative 0.3 percent grade).

Sunday 060610

Did not get out until late (630PM).  15 miles, and felt sluggish from the weekend shindig.

90 miles on the week over 14 hours, with 11k of climbing.   76 miles on over 11.25 hours in June. 1809 miles over 264.5 hours on the year.

Saturday 060510

0 miles.  At Camp Tahosa with enough energy with Denver Area Council Webelos that we don’t ever need any fossil fuel.  And yes, there is a Statue of Liberty here.

One of many neat events this weekend:  JZ picking through the ashes of a fire, post a flag retirement ceremony, to find the non-melted grommets to give away as honor tokens.

The camp is beautiful and at 8500 feet.  I will look to get back up here for some runs into the high country. 

We counted over 300 bikers on Left Hand Canyon Road as we came back into Boulder.

Friday 060410

AM 16.5 miles easy.  Got out early because it is going to be a busy work day, plus prepping for Scouts this weekend, and hot today.  On many runs lately, I try to make the run a perfect loop, so that I don’t have to trace over a single step in an out and back.  I was off by about 200 yards today.

Last seven days have been 105 miles, with about 14k of vert and 16.5 hours (which might be a high)  I can feel a couple of things barking quietly (left calf, left hip), so tomorrow’s down day with Scout camping is timely.

Another good American story.

Apparently bonking is all in your head.

Lagat breaks the 5k record.   Check out the video and note:  1.) how much bigger Solinsky is than everyone else, 2.) how flippin fast these guys are moving at the the end and 3.)  THE LAST PLACE GUY IS SUB 13:20!