Moab, here we come

In Moab, Utah one of the marks of the coming spring is the descending of runners from Fort Collins and Boulder into the Big Horn Lodge.  This happens in mid-February every year for the Red Hot races, 55K and 33K trail races.  Once again Fort Collins runners look to be over 10% of the field with probably as many from Boulder as well.  It was a lot of fun seeing so many familiar faces out on the trail last year and should be much the same this year as well.

Photo from Alex May

I had a bad race last year, really falling apart pace-wise in the last 10-11 miles.  I can come up with some reasons why and some excuses but what's done is done.  After being disappointed last year I am hoping to run better this year.  Overall my longest runs were longer last year than this year but I still put in several in the 22-24 mile range.  One thing that has been different this year is my overall mileage.  With the streak I have been much more consistent this year and have run about 35% more mileage in Red Hot training for this year.  I have felt overall strong and free of niggling aches and pains as I've tapered down the past couple weeks, I'll take that as a good sign.

I'm still haven't come up with a race day plan yet.  It's tougher for trail races than road races as it's more difficult to compare training runs to race day performance.  This is especially true with the slick rock surface in Moab, which is difficult to approximate here.  I have not found running downhill on slick rock to be as easy as it sounds.  I've tried to include a good mix of trails, hilly harder surface runs like Centennial, and harder effort runs on hard surfaces like the bike paths.  Last year my training was much more skewed to trails.  Originally I was hoping to chop an hour off 2011, so 7 hours or about 12:40 miles.  Maybe that will still be my goal.  Some runs it seems very possible, some it still seems far off.  I still need to think about that one.  Heck, I still need to decide which shoes to wear and what to carry for water/gear.  The weather does look nicer than last year at least.  That will be nice.  Four days of work left, that's a lot of time to day dream about the details ;-)  I'm getting kind of excited to find out how it all unfolds.

Early view from the overcast and rainy course in 2011

100 days

I was going to post either a geeky statistical breakdown or something sappy and inspirational, but I'm already on day 102 and haven't gotten there yet, so here it is.  100 days of streaking, 603 miles, Woo Hoo!  Congrats to Ean on her 100 days yesterday and Mindy on hers come Monday.  Oh yeah, this is all Ean's fault.  Thanks!

The girls climb Horsetooth Rock

I lived in Fort Collins for 18 years before I ever made it to the summit of Horsetooth Rock.  My daughters did it yesterday at ages 8 and 10.  Towers last July and now Horsetooth Rock, way to go girls.

Sandis and Stella atop The Rock

We hiked up with The Nick Clark and his family and Rob and his daughter in the first FFCTR (Future Fort Collins Trail Runners) family hike. We all had a good time hiking with the others but also had some nice father-daughter time when we lagged behind at times.  Though the going was sometimes difficult and very uphill there was very little whining -- possibly the biggest compliment.  We will be awaiting the next one -- maybe on a peak with a little less ice on the way up.

Run to work day

The Official Run to Work day isn't until 24 February, but I couldn't wait.  Actually it is something I've thought about doing for awhile.  The timing of Shannon's announcement with a busy Saturday and icy not very runnable trails made me think "why not this week?".  Like all successful grand ideas, the idea struck and enough groundwork to not be able to back out was laid down before any reality could set in.  I have found that is the best way to do stuff you might otherwise talk yourself out of doing.  For better or worse.


I first thought of the idea on Wednesday while driving to work.  I mapped it out over lunch, told a couple of my runner friends in the afternoon (so I couldn't back out), and packed an extra lunch and extra clothes and such Wednesday evening.  Thursday at work one of my friends asked me what time I had to leave.  Hmm, I hadn't thought that far ahead yet.  The route I mapped was 21 miles, give myself a leisurely 4 hours, arrive to work at 7:30 to have time to shower before 8:00, holy crap, I have to leave at what time?  Like I said above, best to commit before figuring out too many of the gory details.


Thursday night I went out to the unseasonably warm (it was so warm that half-naked co-eds were seen frolicking along the Spring Creek Trail) FCTR social run, told a few folks of my plans to further cement them, and then did my best to do some carbo loading after the run while still leaving early enough to try and get some sleep.


Friday the alarm went off at 3:00 AM.  I found myself more awake than I thought I'd be and hopped right up. I made some coffee, had some pop tarts (the trail runner's food of choice before epic adventures), and suited up.  I went with tights, a long sleeve shirt, wind shell, and hat and gloves.  After drinking the coffee and eating the Gingerbread pop tarts (my children wanted these and then didn't like them, I am secretly OK with that) I was out the door at 3:37 AM for day 74 of the Streak.  


The first couple hours went by pretty quickly as the novelty of running all alone on almost completely quiet roads was fun.  Sometime around 5:30 I began wishing for the sun to come up though.  The next 90 minutes or so before sunrise were tough mentally and my pace suffered greatly during this section.  I took advantage of any excuse I could come up with to stop and take off my pack, look for this or that, etc.  I think I was getting lonely too, as I often am able to find company for my long runs and rarely run for 4+ hours solo.  My mind of course wandered to wondering what this time of night would be like if I had 75 instead of 13 miles in my legs and didn't get to sleep the night before.  Oddly or not, I still want to find out.


Eventually the sun did peak up over the horizon.  It was an impressive sunrise and I snapped quite a few photos as the sun came up.  This all seemed to buoy my spirits  and I was able to pick up the pace some for the remaining 7 miles.   Overall it took me about 30 minutes longer than I hoped (watch not stopped for any stops/breaks), which is disappointing given my goals for the Colorado Marathon, but I have been tired all week after the back to back 5Ks and did run relatively hard for 7.5 miles the night before so I will blame that a bit.  There's still work to be done before that trip down the Poudre Canyon though.


I got around work alright as long as I didn't sit on one place for too long.  My glutes were definitely sore all day but I was able to disguise any hobble for the most part.  ;-)  I was wiped out in the early evening though.  I am sure I was terrible company during the ride home my buddy gave me and once home I nearly fell asleep on the couch while talking to Shawn and the girls.  I still think I'd rather run to work than home from work though, even though it means an early start.


I'll do it again someday, but probably not on 24 February.  I wouldn't want to kill my Trudge the day.  Next time I might sacrifice the shortest possible route to take me by a 7-11 or coffee shop for a little mid-run break and fuel as well.  I'll also have a better breakfast waiting for me at work.  The Greek Yogurt was good but the oatmeal was totally unappealing.  A nice breakfast burrito would have been a better choice.  You'd think I'd have a better handle on what I'd crave after a long run, eh?

Run to work sunrise

Alpenglow on Longs and Meeker

Turning the page

A quick look at the year that was, and the year to come.


2011 Successes

• Mileage goal: 1715 actual miles, my goal was1620 (50K/week)
• Improvement: That's 395 miles higher than the 1320 I ran in 2010 and my highest ever
• Goal Races: My only goal race was the Big Horn 50, my first 50 miler and my goal was simply to finish it.  I did that, and had the best day running ever.
• Other Races
• I set a 5K PB (24:20) in April.
• I was very happy with my Barr Trail Race, I felt I ran a great race that day and blew away my time expectations, and I took a big fall while composing a Haiku to Gryptonite Magic, which makes a great story, and a good picture.  

• 

  The cool looking 'egg' on my left forearm is not visible, but there's some nice dirt and blood on the legs.

• My first ever running streak, 68 days old on New Year's Eve.
• Less measurable, I had a ton of fun with my trail running friends from the Fort Collins Trail Runners.  Running on the Colorado Trail (the second-best run of the year), March Mileage Madness, Greyrock, Crozier Triple, "plain old ordinary" 30 milers with Alex and Mary, 24 Hours of Moab, 24 Hours of Towers, Marathons with Marie, all the December Shenanigans, the Pineridge Downhill Miles, the many, many social runs and associated cookouts/potlucks/beer drinking, taking over the Big Horn Lodge in Moab, the Towers Time Trials, sharing my Big Horn run with so many other FCTRs and many other fun runs I am forgetting to list.

2011 Less than successes:

• I missed my vertical gain goal by a lot.  I set out for 50 miles of vert and ended up with only 38.5 miles.  To be fair I really was unsure of what a reasonable goal was here as I had never tracked it before.
• Missing 4 Towers Time Trials (and the VBM).
• 2 months of not hitting 100+ miles running
• Letting my running drop off the face of the earth in September and October (the above mentioned 2 months).  One week in October my only run was a Towers Time Trial (and it sucked!).  15 mile weeks, oddly, aren't enough to maintain fitness.
• The loss of speed that accompanied the above lack of running. I lost 3 minutes off my 5K time between slacking (and the point right below here). 
• The lack of blog posts between August and November.  Coincidence?
• Gaining 15 pounds since Big Horn.
• No big races or running accomplishments in the fall and early winter (up until Chubby Cheeks).

2012 Goals

• Mileage goal - 10K a day or 2274.3 miles for the leap year
• Vertical gain - 50 miles again
• Towers Time Trials - Make them all
• 150 miles every month
• Have even more fun with my FCTR friends
• 366 Days of Streaking
• Lose 20-25 lbs
• Race Goals:
• Sub-4:00 in the Colorado Marathon
• Run another 50 mile race in the spring/early summer
• Fall 100 or another 50 or a 100K
• Pikes Peak Marathon
• Set new PBs in the 5K, 10K, and Half
• Mid-Pack kind of finish in at least one 50K
• Fun Runs:
• Grand Canyon Rim to Rim to Rim
• Another overnight camping and Colorado Trail run
• Organize the 2nd Annual 24 Hours of Towers

The mileage goal is aggressive and I may have to revisit it mid-year, but I've averaged more than the 43.5 miles a week necessary for the past 8 weeks of the Streak so it should be doable.  One thing the Streak has provided is consistency (which surprised me, but I guess should have been obvious).  Without running any crazy big mileage (15,23,18,17,8 longest runs of the weeks in Dec) I managed to have my highest mileage month ever in December 2011.


I'm excited to continue Streaking.  I have found it great for me mentally and physically.  I have been surprised at how strong I've felt, rather than run down as I thought I'd be.  I've been surprised to see the miles add up consistently, and I've been surprised at how few times (once really) that I didn't want to go out.  Having a run on the docket helps me plan out every day, often before I get up.


I'm 2 days in to 2012, 20.2 miles down, 2254.3 to go.  I can't wait for the rest.