Wednesday 040815

I am kicking around if I will go down to Lake Palmer this weekend and run a bunch of laps to get in a longer run, or if I head back over to the Front Range and get in some vertical.  I have some dental work on Thursday and will make a call on it after that.   I have had enough dental work that I know sometimes it knocks me back a bit more than I care to admit.

JZ in DC.  Climbing trees because he does that everywhere he goes.

A pic of JZ at the Vietnam War Memorial.

And he got to go to Arlington as well.

News stuff: Good read on why college track sucks, there is an 80 year old guy crushing it on two runs a week and the 2015 Pack Burro Race schedule.  With the Leadville burro race being 1 week out of Pikes, I think I will pass on competing on that one. 

Another Green, this one with Bob.  Up Bear Canyon and then down the middle.  5 minutes faster going up than Monday and 5 minutes faster coming down.  That is what you get when you have someone keeping you honest.  We saw a fox on the fireroad in the climb up out of Bear Creek on the Mesa (the part that is all washed out) and before continue onto the Bear Canyon Trail.  He was just jogging the other way and we passed him like he was some other jogger on the trail.  Bob could have reached out and touch him. 

10.5 miles.  And with that, in the last 3 days, I have had more vertical than any other week of the year. 

If you are from out of the area and wonder what it is like going up Green, Sage did a decent vid of it with the RMR group Monday night going up Gregory.  Alternatively Peter put up a list of the Boulder area Front Range runs.

Tuesday 040715

JZ is in Philly and DC this week.  Here he is at Independence National History Park.’'  Kid has something that I certainly did not have at that age.  Like looking good in stripes and plaid.

Afternoon – TZ:  You should go get some vertical.  GZ:  I don’t want to go to Boulder.  TZ:  You should go get some vertical because you won’t be able to next week.  GZ:  I don’t want to go to Boulder.  25 minutes later I was in Boulder and I did a lap on Green via the middle route. I love that woman.

Oh yeah, saw Joe Grant out there.  Apparently Green is like the Hall of Justice these days because whenever I go there is some superhero out there. 

Monday 040615

Today’s podcast listening:  Jay interviews Yasso.

Mid day – 10.3 miles, 2920 feet of climbing.  Guess where?  Yeah, I found the time.  Or made it.  Or something.  Slowest mile was coming down on Greenman, as it was covered with slick snow.  After the talus field down it is fine.  Bear Canyon all the way up is great.  Saw Skurka coming down Bear Canyon as it comes into the Mesa and chatted it up with him some.  Dude looks fit.

Sunday 040515

After a year and a half, I am done for a bit with this stuff.

Late afternoon – joined Bob over on the Mesa for a few laps with the ditch segment to a little climbing.  12.2 miles.

71.3 on the week.  Not a big week in a lot of regards:  no big run, a day off, not a lot of climbing, no real speed or quality but it is the week I had.  I sort of feel the hidden blessing is that I might have needed it or at least that it was a solid week but allowed me to get my les back under me.

Saturday 040415

Again, not hugely moved to head into Boulder … in part because I don’t want to travel to get there, and in part because I am not interested in snow “running” up high.  Bob put out the query and I convinced him to come over to my place.  I had in mind doing some laps with a touch of climbing, but nothing stupid.  In other words, rolling and run-able.  Not bad, but as Bob said, “your strategy to avoid travel to climb wont work.”  I will need to get to Gold Hill or Flagstaff or something.  15.6 miles. 

Great to run with Bob.  The pace is always a touch quicker when I run with him, but it comes without any additional effort.  Well, at least to start.  :)

Down in Denver this AM.  I always find how this building surrounds this church to be interesting.

Friday 040315

Late afternoon – 12.1 miles. 

Thursday 040215

Nate posts on skeletal versus aerobic fitness.

So there is apparently a new beer mile record.  Got to give it to the guy that he did the capture of it pretty nicely – particularly the frame in frame part.  You still have to wonder why there are not a lot more witnesses.  Maybe that is because law enforcement would get worked up if there was some sort of beer race party at a local HS track.  It would have been perfect if there was some close up on the bottles pre and post.  That fourth beer seems to be foaming pretty hard when he opened it and I almost think I see liquid coming out when he tosses it. 

There is an implied reference to me in this article related to Hokas.  I used to wear racing flats for things like Pikes (they would go from nearly new to shredded in one race), but I am pretty much doing the racing in the mountains exclusively in Hokas now.  Mostly, it helps me pad the scar on my lawn mower foot.

Barr Trail is part of the TC business now and registration is open.  Debating if I will do that because I get back from international travel the night before.

Late afternoon – snow, rain mix and cooler.  10.2 miles. 

I had a great conversation on Leadville, work, WWII life, etc with Andy W today.  Good to have a chat with someone like him that has a depth of Leadville experience.  And even if he didn’t, it is just good to kick stuff around with him.

In a different conversation, a potential pacer said this to me:

Wednesday 040115

How long do you think it is before we see this sort of thing in Boulder OSMP?

You’d think without running yesterday I’d have a suppressed appetite.  It was the opposite and I seemed to eat the doors off the cabinets.  I slept well though.  At least I thought I did.  But I did feel like a lug today.  Go figure.

Mid afternoon – got out on Death Hill – that is what I call my little local stupid steep hill here -- and did 10x on it.  I thought maybe going into it I’d do 20 but my stomach was catching up to me (remember all that overeating?) and the shoes I was wearing were rubbing my lawn mower foot funny after a bit so I threw the towel in (gladly) at 10.  Swung back home (which brought me to five miles), played the porcelain punisher, changed shoes, did a quick business call and headed back out.

I was just chugging through the hill – nuthin’ super hard but just up and down keeping steady.  Apparently I ran about the same I did as I did last June, but a little faster.  Not expecting that, but I will take it.  As this is a good local hill crank, I will revisit, and look to up the ante both in terms of time and count.  The 5 mile loop with the repeats on this hill amount to just over a 1000 feet.

The weather had changed dramatically in my rest period and the winds had really picked up. 


It was one of those winds where you could feel the bits of dirt hitting you in the face, on the arms and legs.  I saw Ray off in the distance, chased him down and ran with him for a bit.  It was good to catch up on Leadman, what he is up to, etc. Second loop was good for 6.1 so 11.1 on the day.

Monday 033015

We celebrated someone’s birthday last night (even though it is today).

This is an interesting and compelling story regarding donkey and vets here in CO.

This video makes the Balch Field House look completely awesome.

Go figure. Compression gear doesn’t do shit.

For those who keep score, Barkley had no finishers this year.  Farthest a guy (Coury) got was three and a half laps.  Yeah … not for me.  I ain’t that tough.

Been on a CCR (no not Creedance) kick as of late.  Today’s listening:

Another hot and windy day.  10.1 miles, steady.  My legs felt heavy to start but they lightened up a bit over the run.  Tripped over 1000 miles on the year today.  Fairly certain I have never done that by April 1.   I was about 670 miles at this time last year, 897 in 2013, 952 in 2012 – but that came off more aggressive January and February months with a LOT of treadmill.  Same sort of stuff in 11 and 10, probably with a lot more mill miles.

Sunday 032915

AM – out before the sun up and got in a run with Vinay.  He is moving out of state soon, so this will probably be my last run with him.  8 miles.

I am getting word that Bob took second at the Austin Rattler.  That sinks any plans I had for him as a pacer at Leadville as that performance gives him a slot.  Need to figure out that pacer thing soon.

The business card I posted on Sunday … I spoke a bit more with that WWII vet about his service.  The guy did time at Saipan.  If you don’t know what that is, look it up.

Afternoon –8 more miles, a little quicker than this AM.  I just roll a little better in the afternoon than first thing in the AM.

100 plus on the week and I have tripped over 400 on the month (402.3), and thus have met my March goal. 

Saturday 032815

The Leadville 100 entry list is up.  Names that caught my eye (in an “oh that is interesting, I was not expecting that” sort of way):  Melody Fairchild and Lee Troop.  More names are gonna end up on that list after this weekend’s Austin Rattler.  I expect Bob to be one of them.

The PPM list is also up.  Hard to say much about that field until the comp bios start coming in.

Train wreck of a run this AM, and I set it up starting yesterday.  I was out in the sun, and so drying out and then went for pizza and a couple beers afterwards.  The whole affair had me up late, sleeping poorly and feeling behind on hydration from the get go.  I got up late and so it was starting to warm up, it got windy.  I screwed around, getting the dogs out, feeling like crap.  I did mess around with a hand held water bottle.  It was 20 ounces and so for one of the hours I was out there I would take a sip, squeeze every 3 minutes.  It works out to just about 20 sips.  It definitely is a method that can work on a hot day.  I am not blasting my system outright with a pounding of water – more like dripping in what it can take and keeping at the hydration throughout.  But it probably works even better if  I start appropriately hydrated. 20.5 miles. 

I had meant to meet up with Brownie this AM on his bike ride to Longmont, but my family got back from Spring Training early and so that didn’t happen.

Got this from Freebird in the comments yesterday – it is a great read.  Every bit of movement adds up, and over a lifetime builds into specific skills. People get all worked up about precise number of sets or “peaking” or nutrition, but most people really need to simply shut up about all these details and go do something physical every day.

Friday 032715

Mid day – a quick jaunt between calls.  5.1.  Then about an hour later, after another call – 5.3 miles.  I spent a better part of the afternoon at the Broomfield HS track meet, helping some, videoing some races, and enjoying the buzz of a track meet.

Thursday 032615

I recently was chatting with a WWII vet and he gave me his business card.
The man served at Saipan.  In my book, when you do that, you can have whatever the hell you want on your business card.

Nice post by Tawnee on her metamorphosis as an athlete. Good read on how she worked through that stuff.   And congrats to her and her guy for getting engaged.

Interesting post by Mario F over on Competitor and his racing demons.

Both of these are interesting to me because it shows me how people who love the sport can become tortured by it. 

A list of the best beers (101) in America

World XC this weekend.  Will be interesting to see how locals perform, like Thweat and Cerake (quite the tat).

Today’s listening:

Early evening – day was pretty loaded so I did not get out until later in the day.  I had a bit of a hot right hamstring last night but it seemed to be okay today.  The first half of this run I was moving pretty well, and even tossed in a surge or two (or ish) feeling pretty good.  I then made a pit stop and from there, I suddenly felt like crap for the second half of the run.  Ah well.  In the last mile the hammie start to talk a bit.  Not bad, but if it is still arguing tomorrow, I might forego the long run this weekend.

Wednesday 032515

Allie M has the FKT for women on the Incline – just a hair over 20 minutes.

Mid afternoon – I found myself screwing around, delaying my get out.  The hardest part on some days is just getting out.  I finally got over the hump and got out. I was a bit tired, and even a touch sore in some places.  So I tried to pick it up some, at least to a bit of an okay pace – rather than just fall into some slog.  7 miles.

PM – I had to close off on some stuff with Greg from XC, so I met him at Flatirons Running tonight.  It was their fun run night, so I decided I’d use that as a way to get me out for another run.  That was effective and I got in another 6.2.  I was surprised at how quick some of it went.  There was a crew off the front running 6:30s from the get go.  When I considered that, it was not particularly surprising, but more a reminder of what I used to do.  I found that just being in a group made me move a bit quicker with little thought of it.  Afterwards they had a Q&A with Scott Jurek.  Here I discovered that I am indeed a cranky old man … people were asking all sort of questions like what his favorite vegan meal was, what kind of stretching he did … I know these are fine and appropriate questions for that venue, but I felt that it would have been a much better session to ask things like if he ever did rub Vagisal on his legs, boxers or briefs, and if he listened to Elevation Trail.

Someone asked what his fastest time on Sanitas was and he said he had never run it.  Somebody spouted that Kilian had done it in 11 minutes.  My quiet phase ended there because that would be like saying El G had run the mile in 2:57.  No, it is just over 14 minutes …

I did get into some small talk with a few of the runners and I had to hide my surprise at a couple of the folks who talked about doing this hundred or another and when asked about their peak training had it at 50 miles a week.  I mean, I guess that can work of course.  But I am sort of surprised that one would go that route … it is harder to pin down what their reason for that would be.  I mean, I guess there could be some reason that has some meaning to them as to why they want to do a 100 miler on such little distance.  But I think I would steer them to a 10k or something on that sort of training.  Just me … and I kept my mouth shut on it.  But not my keyboard I guess.

104.6 in the last seven days.  And it sometimes feels like it is not enough.

John Oliver is great.

I have been on a pause with some of my reading, but I have been going through the WWII in HD series on the History Channel via Netflix.  Also worth checking out is the Rise of Isis on Frontline.  Yes … history repeats itself.

Tuesday 033115

And this day just slipped away.  Work, life, and the like.  I could have forced the issue at the end of the day, but I was tired and decided against it.  A goose egg to finish the month.

The zero scratches at me a touch but I can say it does not bug me the way it used to.  It helps that I have tried to embrace the mentality of taking it while I can, and not worrying when I can’t.  And having a solid few weeks behind me helps too (44 days since the last day off).  I finish March with 412.5 miles, 18615 feet, 56 hours.  On the year I sit at 135 and half hours, 38580 feet and 1007.1 miles.

I came up short on a goal in March that I wanted:  a race.  I am not sure I would have raced well because I ended up chasing the miles enough that I was not doing any significant turn over work, and often my legs were tired.  But racing does keep me fired up, more in a running spiritual sense and that is why I look to do it.

April … I have a couple of goals – nothing as firm as the 400 mile month but fairly clear.  I need to start to get onto the vertical stuff.  A 25k month for many (like JV) would be nothing, but for me it would be pretty significant.  I like to see it come with at least 10 climbs of 2500 (or say 10 Greens) with maybe a 5k effort in there.  Physically, I know I can handle this.  The time management aspect of this is the challenge because it means getting out to the Republic, back, etc.  I have become less a fan of that sort of stuff because the time I am sitting in the car getting there is time I could be doing something else:  work, training, spending time with family, whatever – anything other than sitting in that car.  The challenge is more in the discipline of time management than the physical.  But I need that physical work because I have become less than proficient on the climbs and the downs. 

One big week of travel this coming month, and it is to a flat spot, so that will further challenge the vertical goals.  When I can’t get the vert, I will look to alternatively chase miles or speed or even (gasp) even recover).

Oh yeah, April – nail in pacers and crew.

Tuesday 032415

Mid day – winds are back.  Easy seven miles, but I was slogging in the winds and with tired legs from the last couple of days.

I was having a conversation with a coworker/friend today and he asked me for some training advice.   He said that he had recently started including some faster work in his running and what he did not understand why he was getting slower on his other running days.  I knew a little about his running but I asked a few more questions.  I learned his running was 3 or 4 days a week, and that this inclusion of faster work (200 meter and 400 meter repeats or a 20 minute tempo run) was a new addition to his training, and not replacing any of the other easy running he was doing. 

So this is a bit of the classic quality versus quantity thing and I felt that the Hudson idea that you should not sacrifice quality for quantity and you should not sacrifice quantity for quality was appropriate here.  Except of course when you are deciding to make those sacrifices as part of a bigger idea.  In the case of this co-worker, I advised him that my take was – yeah, if you have suddenly thrown in a new stimulus, and you are feeling it the next day, you are most definitely going to be slower and that is okay.  He kept his quantity the same and then upped the ante with quantity.  His sacrifice?  He is a bit slower on the other days until he adapts to that stimulus.  In fact, if you were always feeling great the next day (or maybe the day after that) you could make the argument that you were not stretching yourself enough in that preceding workout.

I offered to him his choices were to lower the quantity a bit, or to ride it out if he was not risking injury as his body made the adaptations and just be okay with being slower on those other days. 

And yeah, I think it is great when I google search on Brad Hudson quality quantity the first thing that comes back is a Lucho article.

Evening – 7.2 miles. 

Monday 032315

This year’s Mount Washington Hall of Fame inductees.

AM – slow to rise but I got out and down to the HS to yap with Greg as he set off his bleary eyed high schoolers.  9 miles.  I ended up circling up to the kids on the second half of their run and immediately was reminded that their easy pace is just under 7.   It was part of why I headed over there to run … I knew it would wake me up a bit and force me out of the 8+ slog.

PM – I got out to Green with JV.  Well, first I screwed up the start.  JV was going to be a bit late to our original start time and so I thought I would take advantage and get a head start.  Jeff has killed me on Green like 200 something times, and I thought with my tired and non vert acclimitized legs, a little jump would be good.  But I messed up the message and he was waiting for me in the lot.  We figured it out and caught up just above the Saddle Rock.   Good to get on Green (I was draggin’ and the snow up high with my slick shoes made it stupid) and better to catch up with Jeff.  I need more of both.

 
I was feeling the lack of vertical for sure.  Need to be getting at this at least weekly.   On the way down we ran through the RMR crew, and I got to catch up with Mike Randall and burro racer Jon Davis.  Good to chat with those guys and consider some of the summer plans with quadripeds.

Sunday 032215

AM  - up early to get the crumbgrabbers off for Spring Break.  I was tired and felt it.  David C put the call out for a burro run and I took that up, figuring it would force me through some miles.  So I jogged over there (that was good five), then another six and half with Dave and the burros, and the the jog back for another five and change to give me 16.6 on the day.

95.1 on the week, 301.7 miles on March.  5025 vert on the week which still ain’t much but it is more than I have got any other week of the year.

Mo runs a Euro Half Marathon record.

Evening – very honored to be a part of this young man’s Eagle Court of Honor.

Saturday 032115

JZ had a meeting in Highlands Ranch for the Scout camp he is staffing this summer.  After getting him settled, I laced them up and explored.  22.1 miles. 

I had not realized that I was heading into Highland Ranch really until late last night and then I was not sure exactly what JZ’s schedule was going to be down there.  I thought of putting the call up for folks to run, but it was all just too loose to nail something in.

I am sort of stupid with water.  I did not bring any with me and at 2 hours I was pretty parched and about 4 miles from my car to get some.  I can run that far without water, but it just sets up for a bit of a chase then in trying to get hydration back on track.  I can’t afford to do that on longer runs.  I ran this super easy the whole time, never motivated to push it.

Friday 032014

AM 5.3 miles.

PM 10.2 miles.