AM – six miles with the dogs (Lucy, Hans). Easy. Listened to a very good discussion with Comrades King Bruce Fordyce (starts about 28 minutes in).
Hans, being my in-law’s dog, regularly lives in the mountains. When he sees me, it is usually up there and he knows that a run is in the works. And when we run up there, he is off leash and running in wide open mountain spaces at his own whim. I call him back when I lose sight of him and worst case, I can tone his collar to get him to come back. Hans is a bit of a freak of a dog. I have run with him where I have gone 15-20 miles at altitude (10k feet or higher). That means he has gone at least that distance. I have actually thought about putting the GPS on him because I have thought he is going 2x further than me with the way he goes back and forth. And even at the end of those runs, he is wanting more. Other dogs, I have seen get weary and come and jog slowly with me at my hip or even fall behind. Not Hans. He joyously runs and runs and runs and runs.
Down here in the flats however, the whole experience is a very different deal. He is on a leash, and running the sidewalks and roads with me. He does not get to bolt off at 25 mph whenever he wants. He is a caged bottle of energy on a six foot line from my wrist. He wants to fight every dog he sees, enthusiastically greet every person he meets and then there are all those dag blammit squirrels. There is definitely a grand squirrel dog war in the brewing. You heard it here first. The squirrels may take out the miniature breeds but they will have their hands or paws full with German Wire Hairs (Hans). Running with him is quite a workout. Good burro training in a way I guess.
I found this video download to be incredibly annoying, but in any case, it has some highlights from the Rocky Mountain Shootout. JM tipped me off that Glen Randall led a good deal of the race before getting caught and ending up fifth. Love to see Randall and soon to be US Citizen Aish go head to head at the Ascent next year. And don’t forget that JT is in the Ascent too -- as he will not return to Pb in 2011.
Mid day, 8 miles. Jogged over to the library and dropped off some materials. Did hard strides (8) of 15-20 seconds.
For the Pikes Peak Road Runner magazine, The Long Run, via a plug from JT, I wrote this article. It appears in there printed newsletter this month.
Pikes Peak by George Zack
For more than half a century, every third weekend in August, folks converge upon the sleepy town of Manitou Springs every third weekend in August. They come there and look up. They look up to a point that is nearly a mile and a half above their heads – the summit of the 14,115 foot mountain called Pikes Peak. Of course, people come here all the time and contemplate that point, and many get to that high summit via hiking, biking, taking a cog train or a car.
But for the folks who show up this particular weekend are bit different. They show up and, their goal is to get to the summit as fast as they can, via running in a foot race. The entire thought of running up this mountain is rather ridiculous. As if it were not enough to run in the oxygen deprived altitude setting of Manitou, a setting that leaves the recently-arrived-from-sea-level-tourist gasping or seeking respite, these “runners” choose to run to a location where there is just over half the available oxygen they’d get if they went to the beach. Along the way they navigate a 13- mile plus trail that climbs over 7,800 feet.
If that were not enough, many of these people will also choose to run back. And there is an even more troubled subset of people in this group –, the D-D-Doubler – those who run the Ascent race on Saturday, and the round trip Marathon on Sunday.
A race like this challenges all in it. This race challenges every competitor, not just the newcomers. Elites are often left wondering why they were unable to perform they way they typically do. The finish area of the Marathon resembles a MASH unit: Runners come not only suffering from the typical post marathon issues, such as heat exhaustion and dehydration, but with hands and knees ripped and bleeding, embedded with rocks and dirt.
These runners are truly nuts. But with them, on the start line, the trail and the finish line, is exactly where I want to be on that third weekend in August. The pure ridiculous nature of this event, the support of the community and volunteers associated with it, and the unbelievable accomplishment of the runners in it – regardless of their final result, creates a buzz of human energy that I am drawn to like a moth to a flame. And like that moth, it does leave me burnt, incinerated.
The 2010 version of this race did not disappoint. With the Ascent serving as the World Mountain Running Association Long Distance Race (WMRA LDR), and the Marathon serving as part of the Skyrunner circuit, a significant international contingent toed the line. Fully understanding that “hanging-out-at-the-summit-of-a-14000-foot-mountain-for-several-hours-where-the-air-is-about-half-what-is-at sea-level-while-you-scream-at-Ascent-runners-to-run-and-not-walk-damn-it!” is not the best idea to be prepared physically for a marathon the next day, I chose that path anyway – knowing it would be emotionally inspirational.
After watching the runners take off in Manitou, I hitched a ride to the top, and then collected with a few other runners a few switchbacks below the summit. From this vantage point, we could watch the runners nearly all the way from tree line through the inish. Shortly after arriving, we could make out a runner making their his way across the long stretch of trail from one to two miles from the finish. Who was this? Who would be the next Ascent champion be?
Glenn Randall, 23, from Mesa, would win by close to 3 minutes in an age record time, and an incredibly rare time for a rookie – under 2:10 (2:09:28, sneaking under PPA legend Scott Elliott’s 20-24 record from 1987 of 2:09:33). Sub 2:10 performances are very rare – as it appears less than 10 men have ever done it. Doing it in a debut at this young age could serve as an omen of records to be rewritten in future years.
The competition was rich behind Randall, as 11 other men broke 2:30 in the Ascent. Sadly, the number this could of have been was compromised, as several top runners (including a few that had raced on the course before), took a wrong turn and cost themselves several minutes in the race.
Sitting near the trail below the Fred Barr sign, my compatriots and I hooted, hollered, yelled and screamed at the runners like students yell for their team at a college basketball game. As more runners came in, there were little races to be won. This was no more evident than the front end of the women’s race where Brandy Erholtz won (2:41:38) by a mere 13 seconds over Kim Dobson.
Despite racers going off course in the men’s race, the men’s team secured the home course win in the WMRA LDR, and the women did their part as well.
While I was inspired by the performance of the top runners, I was also intimidated. To see top athletes – folks who regularly run sub five minute miles in road races – coming in, their faces covered in spittle, hands on their knees as they groaned to the summit, and withered as they completed the race, served as a grim reminder of the magnitude of this event. Any thoughts I had been able to black out about the nature of this event were now very much in the forefront of my brain. Was I really going to do what these people had done and then run back down the next day? And suddenly I felt the tingling of an altitude headache. After a few hours on the top, I felt the weight of the race the next day facing me and took the always nauseating van-bus ride back to town and attempted to rest up for the next day’s effort. Going into the next day, the race set up for questions for the top racers: Would Carpenter risk a fast ascent in the marathon – to secure the fastest ascent of the weekend bonus (1000 dollars) and potentially blow the marathon? Would Tim Parr be able to bounce back in his double from a relatively poor performance in the Ascent? How many guys would add their names to the sub 2:30 ascent list in the marathon?
Would Nelson or Kimmel be able to hold off the unknown international arrivals?
In what has unfortunately has become a “ho-hum, he won again” affair, Carpenter won the Marathon (3:51:34, ascending in 2:17:39) – for his 17th victory on the mountain. Post race, he admitted in interviews that his preparation was not his best this year, and that he had to “lie to himself” to stay motivated through the down. Carpenter has raced himself into being the iconic standard on this mountain. He is expected to win, and expected to do it in a fashion that seems almost non- taxing to him. It is different to see him win where when his ascent is not the quickest of the weekend. A, and his margin of victory over his Manitou neighbor and a quickly closing Daryn Parker (back 83 seconds),
leaves folks wondering – AGAIN – if next year is will be the year where when Matt is will be dethroned as King king of this mountain. On the women’s side, Moab resident Nelson doubled back from a fourth place finish in the Ascent to win the Marathon.
Back in the pack, I had my annual epiphany that the Marathon marathon is a ridiculous level of abuse for the body. Pounding 7800 feet of descent into your skeleton is really beyond the recommended limits that come with our bodies. Add into it rocks, roots, shadows, loose gravel, other runners on the course, high altitude, the fact that you just did a half marathon going up that mountain and blazing heat, and it is clear why the Marathon has titled itself this race is titled “America’s Ultimate Challenge.” Getting to Ruxton Avenue, the road before the finish, presents an odd juxtaposition of joy for having been a part of this amazing event, but also painful relief of it being over
(particularly once you get off that part of the road just above Hydro Street – OW!).
The finish area of the Marathon marathon is a make shift hospital as finishers are found with IV’s in their arms, ice packs on their chests and head, and with nurses and docs cleaning out rock grit from bleeding cuts on knees, hands and (ack) faces. Like any race, there are stories of triumph, races gone well and races gone poorly. In addition to that, however, there is a spirit and energy of incredible accomplishment amongst all these competitors that is palatable. They know they have not completed marathon in this day where when that feat seems to have become common place, but they have completed one of the toughest foot races on the planet. Many limp and gimp away, and feeling the pain in their bodies, will say that they will not come back.
But many, like me, will come back. The pain in the legs, feet and swollen joints is forgotten in a couple of days, weeks and most certainly by the turn to winter. And come the spring, they will be drawn to this mountain race, and look to burn propel themselves up against the mountain again.
AM – 8 miles, out and back on LV Bvld (aka “The Strip”). Saw a good number of runners. Easy. Late night last night. Caught a Blue Man Group show. 
