Merry Christmas all.
Even pack burros are doing it.
Gary and Tim get into the Lance thing a bit and I agree with some of their takes, but not all. I think they are on point that most of us probably don’t need to be “offended” by what Lance is or has done. I think they miss the point regarding if his taking PED’s have a life time impact.
I felt worked all day. That and the holiday of hunkering in was easily welcomed. Zero.
Felt like crud, maybe even a bit sick? I got the dogs out. Hans nearly destroyed this display. We came around the corner and he saw these two Huskies and went bananas.
10 miles. Ugly.
I love this sort of stuff.
Sort of a teenager melt down day. These happen of course. Details are not for here but they leave me a bit emotionally drained, and wondering where several hours went. Got out in the evening to clear the head a bit and wandered to some of the holiday light displays in the neighborhood. 5.1 miles – super easy.
I dig this pic I got from here.
This view of the state is pretty amazing.
Shad’s take of the Grog Slog.
Afternoon – a fartlek, 10 miles. Tool in the ears.
Todd dropped a copy of the Boulder Running Journal for me today. Stoked to get a copy and to be a part of this project … because, again, of Jack.
Got out for some easy running today. 7.1 miles. I was actually in not too bad shape after the 20 plus yesterday. The miles were one thing. The gut feeling okay after sloshing it up yesterday … well, that was another.
70 something miles on the week.
3rd Annual Solstice Slog. Biggest turn out ever. We had at least a dozen participants in some form (including a complete stranger who we picked up in the midst). Seven breweries for the entire trip, and for one there was the addition of a distillery. 25 miles for the full route, but tons of laughs, chatter about accomplishments from the past year, consideration of aspirations for next year, mixed in with a healthy dose of sarcasm and ridicule. Occasionally some solid running. All in all, a great day and one that I am lucky to have. Thanks to all who came out.
Pre start … as was said on the interwebs … “more backpacks than the first day of school!”
Stop 1 – Fried Chicken was had a Post.
Someone feeling their oats after the first brewery.
The guy from the Springs couldn’t make it but he was there in spirit anyhow.
The end of the junior varsity version …
This guy …
The guy in the red is the random dude we convinced into a couple of breweries with us.
Distillery stop. No pix after this beccause phones were lost …
I headed up to Fort Fun with Neeraj for my second beer mile ever. This one was a bit different than my first – which was on a summer night in NJ after a 5k XC race. And it was sort of flat. This time it was up a 800 foot to the mile hill with snow of significance and single digit temps.
It was good ride up with Neeraj – chatting on running, ultras, Lance, etc. After meeting at a local house, we drove over to the trailhead with one of the most respected guys in the area – Sir Nick Clark. Neeraj and I had never been on the trail before, so our first view of it was jogging up in the dark, under the stars, freezing our tails off so we could plant beverages at quarter mile increments. It was then a jog back down to the start, with a review of the rules, and a start of probably a dozen and a half other crazies.
As I cracked into the first beer, and took the initial slurps of Yella, I knew this was not going to be a quick effort for me. The beer was ice cold – so cold there were actually frozen chunks in it. It was as likely to cause a brain freeze as other head conditions. I made a decision on the spot to treat the affair as a social outing, but clearly there were others looking to kill it – including Neeraj. Beers were actually freezing hard. I saw a beer opened and instead of foaming out, it came out as a solid … it was more like a beer slurpee.
Like any beer mile, you get through that second beer and you are wondering what the hell you are doing dropping all that fluid into your gut. This was worse because you were dumping essentially a beer slushy into your gut.
I finished in 28:30 – but probably taking more or equal time to drink the beers as to run. I was well off the lead, with the race being won in probably 18, maybe 16? The cold, snow, the hill, all of it made it for a slow slog. I was laughing most of the time, including at a woman who was barfing with each beer who ended up running near me.
No pix, as I did not carry the camera and it was stupid dark anyway. But a few at the tail and the after shindig.
The race down was probably even more entertaining than the climb … but there was no beer. A ton of wipe outs in the powder though. 5.7 miles. But it took 2 hours.
KZ finished her crochet service project.
Slog this Saturday is shaping up to 22 miles, let me know if you want in.
Last official day of work for me for the rest of the year before taking off some remaining time off for the holidays. Time to catch up on the holiday spirit and all …
The Livewriter – Blogger issue appears to be resolved with the latest version of Open Live Writer.
At some point you have to enjoy Letsrun for the great wisdom and insight like this. (thanks JT).
Lunch time therapy.
10 miles with the boys. Good therapy. We probably would have done some harder work in this session but we were all feeling a bit thrashed from thrashing around in the snow yesterday. And Shad was sort of toying with us anyway. Here he is running backwards and is still faster than me.
Damn leg shaver. I just don’t feel light and easy on these runs yet. Better than I was say a month ago, but just sluggish. Cuz I am.
Another testament to my inbalances … I can tell the left leg is weaker by doing a two stairs step. When doing it with the left, I can feel how it is a bit more difficult than the right. So, that means I do just the left. Over and over.
US Trials standards are released. I think walking 50k in five hours and fifteen minutes has to be the most ridiculous one up there.
Pretty good snow down here today. I ended up having to shovel the driveway three times and the neighbors once. That sort of kicked my ass sad to say. I got out for an easy 8.1 miles. 
Spence runs a sub 5:00 mile for the 40th straight year. Dayum.
Karl gets on with the subjective contests. AOY contests … sigh.
My son is losing his mind.
My daughter is losing hers.
Today’s listening:
Slipped over 3300 miles on the year today.
The Boulder Running Journal 2015 got some press today.
Hal has a book “Endurance” – a short story regarding his son and his foray into XC – up as a Kindle book.
D-bow ran 32 and change for XC. Holy ****. That sort of inspires, sort of ticks me off, sort of reminds me what a hack I was even at my best in this game. And he did it a week after ringing his bell hard at a 50 miler.
Lance hate and love continues. Gray and Sage shot back that it was not cool to have him race. I got on tap to read the lengthier Sharman article a bit later.
So does Galen run the OT marathon after racing Elf? Sully thinks not.
So if you exercise a lot you can have Type II D but not have it?
Late afternoon – 4 miles, super easy with the dogs.
I have to either get serious about addressing my basic and growing imbalances or just come to terms that I am living with them. My left quad is ridiculously weaker than my right. I stood on a chair today (braced against a wall) so I could do some one legged squats (I can still fake it, cheat it a bit with two legged squats). Horrible would be a generous description of bad these are. My knee bend on either leg is pathetic but it is really bad on the left side. I figure I might need to even do more reps on that side to bring that bugger up to speed. This is not going to fix itself overnight. I will probably need to address with machines as well to get some single leg isolation.
