Hang Nine

Kept the spirit of getting in other work going today.  This sort of work needs to be 3 or 4 times a week for it to be effective.  Sure, doing squats one day a week is better than none but it is really not going to significantly impact me in a positive way for mile racing.  My general routinge is things like squats, planks (4 minute routine of a minute on front, minute on side, minute on other side then minute on front again), push ups, Bulgarian Split Squats, etc.  The split squats really highlight how much weaker my left leg is than my right.  I did an extra set on that side to see if I can nudge it along. 

Most of what I do adds up to 15 minutes and it is not with a lot of explicit direction.  At this point, there does not need to be because I suck so bad in what I am doing that doing 15 minutes of anything 3x a week will get some results.  I can refine it later.   It is sort of like the person who has never run what they need to do to run a 5k.  There is no real need to get them to refined workouts to start.  Just run.

Declaring that I am going to chase a fast mile (for me)  this year has “put it out there” and actually been motivation unto itself.  People have weighed in and been encouraging, and that in turn gets the crank in my head moving a bit.  I head out and I start thinking, “ok, how is this run impacting what I can do for a mile?”  It has been a bit of a process over the last couple of weeks to get to that, but I think I am finally getting to that mindset … and so from exercise to training.

Sometimes a week does not make sense.

Afternoon – after a long warm up (7 something miles, that seemed longer because I took four calls through it), I got to a local road hill and did 8 by 15 (well 14 and change) seconds all out.  I could feel my hammies protest the effort, but not in a “oh crap I am breaking something” sort of way.  I like to think I am getting in some work that is challenging the muscles at this point.  10 miles total

This ends March up.  275 miles.  3 days off in the month and while I only had one week of business travel, in many regards this was my busiest work month in a very long time.  I feel good in that I got through it and started the mental transition to some racing goals.

Good read on training camps (in Kenya).

My hamstrings were a bit sore today.  That is not surprising given the faster work I did on them yesterday along with some of the squats and weight work.  I decided to take it easy today.  The icy wind and snow conditions that blew up in the afternoon furthered my resolve to be lazy.  5.1 miles easy.  Most of this was running around giving kids splits in one of their workouts at the track.

I played around with some of those insidious race predictors today.  I started with my guess that I could put up a mile in 5:30.

Comparing that to a 5 flat sets up for a pretty big difference across the board.

Going off my result in January of the half marathon in San Diego (Carlsbad) of 86:30:

Which is all to say, I have a lot of work to do.  Clearly a large part of this challenge for me is shifting my head.  It is shifting away from thinking about getting 10 miles a day, it is about shifting to considering focusing on quality workouts (v. quantity), it is shifting to taking on 20 minutes of strength training as opposed to getting another 20 minutes of running, etc.  Can I make myself do things like Bulgarian split squats 3x a week? 

There is clear a part of my head that looks at me as the outsider and says, “NFW.”  It is too big of a gap to bridge and that I won’t do those things, because while I have been consistent in training, I have been consisent in only doing the training I want to do and not shifting things up too much.  That is true. 

But that is the challenge.  I might come up short.  But to try and come up short is a better result than to not try. 

Race of the day to watch in case you missed it 16 years ago kids.

27.5 FOR THE LAST 200.

I have been wondering about my stride mechanics a bit too.  Because of my lawn mower foot, I have a Haglund deformity on my left foot.  For years it has ripped through the back of shoes like a drill back there.  I mean there has been a distinct hole in the actual shoe because of the bone protruding out the back of my foot.  But interestingly my shoes don’t have that much anymore.  And I have heard from people that have not seen me run in a while that they say my form has changed.  I am not sure how to manipulate that but I wonder if my general aerobic / V02 fitness is the same but my economy at higher speeds has just gone to shit so that I am unable to take advantage of that.

I spoke to someone on the phone today who I did not really know and they said, “oh so I hear you are an ultra runner.”  It was way out of context but I rolled with it.  I queried a bit as to how they got that – not that it is hard to find me … but I do find it is a good reminder to me that I put it a lot out there.  Bottom line:  I see it as a good thing because it keeps me honest on putting forth what I want to be and that in turn impacts who I am. 

Afternoon – I did a warm up of three and a half miles and then swung back to the house.  Grabbed the kids and headed over to the school.  I jogged with Greg for an additional 3 ish miles and then I got to work on the track.  I did 4 x 200 on 200 very easy jog to start.  Either amazingly or not surprising at all, they were easier to move on then Sunday.  38 was a rough start for me on Sunday but these came at 35 low to start and worked down into 34 low over the four.  I guess just teaching the body a bit gave it some memory today.  I then did 8 x 100 with full rest … not a full out blast but again feeling my way into that higher speed.  I screwed up the timing of several of these but they fell into the 17 range.  They actually seemed a bit slower than the 200s because a larger portion of the actual rep was ramping up to speed (I did not hit high gear off the line because I didn’t want to hurt anything).  And then 2 x 200, and these came in around 33.  My left hammy was a not sore at the end, but I was feeling the effort there a bit. Six and half miles over the run.   It was then off to the weight room where I did some squats with dumbells, some core work, some split squats, etc.  A good day.

I did an interview today regarding Pack Burro Racing.  I guess it will be on line at some point in the future.  I was told I could not say “ass.” 

I have been eyeballing some training plans for the mile.  I need to because as much as I think I know what needs to be done, it is appropriate for me to get into some plans to be sure or to correct myself.  There are ones out there that do a work at 5k pace with then mile work above that.  Tgere are ones that are done by old dudes.  Or there is a the no lack of advice you can get on LR.  I’d say I am probably in 5’30” pace shape… so I have some work to do.  There is a pretty consistent theme (or a theme of what is missing) and that is any signficant mileage. 

I have lost my gd ant stick for the hundreth time. 

Late – PM dental appointment took up my typical run window, but as it was a warmer day and we have some reasonable daylight hours, I got out for a bit in the evening.  6.5 miles.  My legs were a bit heavy but I felt compelled to keep the run from degrading to a slog and kept it moving without going to AeT.  For me, that was between 7:20 to 7:50 pace. 

This is what a guy blasting an opening 4:15 mile past you after he falls down looks like.

Pressed for time in the AM, I overcame the insidious voice to not run (because I was pressed time) and instead made a workout out of it.   I jogged over to the track, did four 100 meter strides (starting at 19, and then down to 17 high over them), and then got on 10 x 200 on a 200 meter recovery (50m walk, 150 jog).  The good news is that for the first time in a long time I was not feeling any tweaks in places (like the Achilles).  The bad news is that I have a lot of work I am going to need to do if I am going to come close to even dancing with low five for the mile, say nothing of breaking it.  I started the 200s at 38 low and was able to carve them down to 33 high.   Breaking 2:30 for a half would be quite the challenge, and so that puts in perspective where breaking five would be.  6.1 miles.

The week turned out a bit different than I thought it would be.  With my family away, and starting to get after some miles last weekend, I thought I’d do more of the same this week.  Work was more consuming than I anticipated, but the weather was also a significant issue this week as well.  Nonetheless, I got in a track effort on Tuesday and today, some upbeat running on Thursday and a fair number of miles (60+).

Evening – got Lucy out for an easy jog – 3 miles.

Went over to LCH last night to check out the Good Friday Cantada.  It is a pretty amazing musical performance.

The family got back from a week in Texas just as I got home, so we committed to the AM practice, and that I’d be up early to make waffles for anyone interested.

It was snowing again this AM, and that killed any thought of the Broomfield Shootout on Monday happening.  I jogged with Greg some, and then JZ a bit.  Got in some good strides.  6 miles.

Consider what brand you make yourself.

It is probably PED layden (ro I have come to assume so), but this is a beautiful race and about a decade old.  I wathched this while doing planks post my afternoon jog (8 miles)

By the way, if you look at the racers carefully you’kk see the current latest Olympic 5k 10k gold medalist … way back there (9th in 13:40 when he was 23).

Pikes confirmation lists are up.  And yup, I am not on them.  And yup, I will do quite a bit of eyeballing of those.

AM – I headed over to the track and joined the kids for their practice.  Because of the crazy weather, there were something like 3 dozen kids on the track, attempting to shovel out lanes so they could get some sort of workout it.  That and they wanted the track clear so they could compete in the Broomfield Shootout meet on Monday.  This is the kids doing it on their own (there is no way the school can really say “you have to shovel the track!”)  I am not sure they are going to get 8 lanes clear by Monday – particularly with more snow coming in tonight but kudos to them for trying.  When I swung back in the afternoon they had at least a lane clear all the way around.

Of course, the distance kids are not tied to the track.  Out to the roads we headed.  I joined some of the kids for their fartlek efforts (essentially a bit longer than a minute on, a bit longer than a minute off for 10).  6.7 miles. 

3 time PPA winner Simon wants to give it “one more year.”

Late afternoon – 4 miles very easy.  Sunny and bright one minute, snow squall the next. 

Pix from the Okpik weekend that JZ and I staffed from the Denver Area Council are up.

The more you think about how you feel, the crappier you will probably run.

Kieran pointed me to this good read.  There elements of this I am not completely in agreement with, particularly how marriage is “settling” for something, but the miner analogy in looking for gold in those thar hills has some bearing on my head space at the moment (not in marriage mind you).

My buddy / coworker Tom suggested this Ted talk

I get what she is saying about things being ... divine, or rather Divine with a capital D.  I appreciate her message of "getting it done."  I might hesitate the idea that it is Divinity intervening when you find the whimsical moments of genius or amazing performance, as I personally prefer to consider that it is I that make those moments with the going to work every day ... versus waiting for Dobby to show up.  A nit I realize in what she is saying.

I am not a fan of “the candidate demagogue that shall not be named”, but in this recent Adam and Drew show, Adam does paint the picture as to why so many find him appealing.  It is an interesting perspective, particularly has he makes it a comparison to the hair bands of the 80s (Warrant, Cinderella) and then the blow back reaction to bands in the grunge scene (Nirvana, Soundgarden).

I was pretty stoked that I had cleared the driveway on my own yesterday, even out to the street past the real heavy stuff that had filled in the gutter.  With the neighbors we had even created a back gutter to allow the water to flow down the street to the sewer drain.  Of course from last night’s plowing, I woke up to find a 2 foot high concrete wall of snow slush at the end of the driveway that was not going to be shoveled.  I had to take the car to it to break it up.  Getting the drainage to occur again or the sidewalks clear ain’t going to happen quickly as the stuff that is up all in that area is super heavy.

Afternoon – nice day but really big piles of snow everywhere and some really big puddles.  10 miles, easy to steady.  Listened to the Schlarb podcast on his adventure in skiing the HR course … nutty.

And on the topic of HR, I headed over to Flatirons in the evening to catch “Kissing the Rock” – Matt Trappe’s latest short on that event.  It was a full house, loaded with all the “who’s who” types you’d expect in Boulder.

The flick was good but sure  I would have loved to have more of the Hans story.  That guy has a heck of a story that can’t be captured in 20 minutes.

Oh yeah a touch stiff from yesterday’s shovel-athon.

This is pretty freaking cool.   But they should call it Snowrock or something.

This is a good list.  I am not so much into the life hack movement because most hacks are really just hints at things you ought to be doing anyway. 

Yesterday I ran on the track shirtless.  This morning I woke up to a late spring Front Range winter storm.  Awesome.  It was just an incredible amount of snow in a short period of time. 




I worked most of the day and so I did not get out to shovel until around 3.  By then it was probably 20 inches.  Definitely one of the bigger whacks we have got in March as far as I can remember (although not the biggest).  It was close to 4 hours of shoveling.  Totally one of those affairs where the whole neighborhood was out helping each other. 

I got out as the sun was setting for a few slow miles.  It was very beautiful.  Well, except at the street crossings where the water had gathered up significantly and was stuck there with nowhere to go.  Nothing to do to avoid that … you end up with a cold soaked foot.  There were some really cool fog patterns forming as it started to cool off, particularly near the local streams.  

Just a great snow day.  Meanwhile the kids were texting me images of bats in Austin.  Yeah, they are there for Spring Break.  I realized that I might be not taking care of myself that well as a bachelor.  Recently as I was going to bed I recounted that all I had to eat for the day was some yogurt, a peanut butter and jelly, and a few beers.

As I seem to have let the idea of a sub 5 at PPM slide, and the idea of 5mph at Leadville breeze away … that leaves one fiver goal.  And arguably, it is probably the one I was least likely to achieve out of the three:  a sub five mile.  I can easily rationalize that such days have passed, but if I do that and lower the bar, then the actual results will probably be lower too. 

Plus, I am a bit inspired seeing people buzz around the track these days.  And it is in my roots as a runner.  I never put together a solid XC season back in HS, but I managed to do fairly well on the track (probably that was a bit more for my block and tackle type of form).  Yesterday at the meet a parent of one the runners asked me if I was going to seriously chase this goal.  It clued me in that a.) he was reading this blog and b.) if I was going to do it, I had better get to it and stop just thinking about it.

So it was off to the track to me today (after jogging the dogs for a few miles).  I had the whole oval to myself.  It is Spring Break so the typical noise of Taylor Swift blasting through the speakers and kids working hurdles in nearly all the lanes for afternoon practice was kindly eliminated.  Better off for them … I decided to do the workout shirtless and that is not very pretty.

I decided to do 2 x 4 x 300 with 200 between each 300 and a 400 between sets.  I learned a.) I am a lot slower than I’d like to be b.) I’d have a shot at the girls endurance team … maybe being their seventh “man” on a good day for me c.) my Achilles on the right side is not super fond of this sort of thing.  All the reps were 57-59, and while they were not all out, it was not easy either.  I just sort of like I was thrashing around in the last 100 of each, like I was fighting my own form rather than running tall, easy and strong.

But it was a start for this round of fun.

Light jogging today that came in the form mostly of mostly buzzing back and forth on the track to collect splits for the kids up at a meet in Frederick.   In years past, I’d probably hesitate to call this anything, but I am fine with going with it as a recovery day that flushes out a bit of the stuff from the longer weekend.

Very cool to see the kids steadily improving.  And it is clear, at least to me, that they are improving in fitness in their physical selves, but also in their head space. 

I have been trying to listen to a variety of podcasts from both ends of the political spectrum.  I find this one – Left, Right and Center – to be a bit refreshing as the guests are at least civil enough with each other to let each other speak.  I listen to other ones as well, farther leaning to each side but find that I can only tolerate the anger on both ends so much before I have to tune into some good anger like this.

These runs are so much fun for me.  The conversation is just awesome stuff between guys who give each other crap endlessly but while talking about work (or lack of it), relationships, what is a good beer, how someone is going to crush or be crushed in their next race … and then suddenly you have put 10 miles away.  We got 16 plus today and it was surprisingly easy (although I whined very loudly whenever the pace dropped below 7:30 pace).   Someday I could be in a senior center with these guys and we will be talking complete **** to each other and enjoying it.  Then again, maybe not so much  …  because we can barely hear each other now.

Oh the craziness of running in Boulder?  Less than a quarter mile into this run I saw a guy who made the Olympic squad for the marathon in 1980 (he asked me why I was so underdressed), I saw his wife a quarter mile from our turn around some 8 miles later up at NCAR, and I saw an NCAA 10k champ in the middle of it all. 

The week started a bit out of whack but I manged to have probably my best weekend of training in a while … weekends have generally been about a bit of volume me in the recent past and I seemed to get that without ending up quivering on the couch.  It has been a long time since I had a 30+ mile weekend (and this made up nearly half my volume for the week). 

Post run there was a bit of chatter that we may look to pull off a trip to the Grand Canyon.  Shad has Boston and Bob has a 50k in April, which means we would not have the best window to hit the Canyon.  It was hot when I went there in mid April in 2010.  I would guess it would be even more stupid hot at Phantom in May.  The discussion broke down as to whether this was a trip to see if we could get a fast time in the canyon, enjoy the canyon or to do a door to door how fast can you do it trip … like this:

Clearly very reckless but also a bit admirable given their spirit. 

But basically you should DO STUFF.  Because .., Everyone overcomes obstacles.

Bob recommended that I watch this one from World Indoors (the 800).  It is worth it.

I got the dogs out for some easy jogging later in the afternoon for another 30-40 minutes.

This is a good post on “things you ought to know” regarding running.

After the family pushed off for spring break I headed over the school.  The kids were finishing practice so I got in about 20 minutes with Greg.

Later in the afternoon, I had a quiet window and got in a bit of a longer than usual these days run for me - 14+ miles.  Beautiful winter turning to spring day out there:

Latest chapter I have worked through in Fitzgerald’s “How Bad Do You Want It”

So the apparent leading presidential options are this and this …

Both blogging and ultrarunning are dead. 

This is pretty cool.

Latest ATUC,

Afternoon – got out for about 10k where I started around 8 and the pace naturally dropped down without effort (which was sort of nice), and the headed over the school and jogged with Greg for a bit (40 min).  I got in a few strides too.

It was one of those days where we woke to 8 inches of heavy wet March snow.  Went out and shoveled it and then by the afternoon the sky had flipped to steel blue and the sun was starting to crank.  The snow was quickly turning to fast moving water down the gutters of the street.

I hit the weight room post.  The kids all hit the weight room after every run.  Okay- that is something we never  did in HS.  And these kids are not looking to max their bench.  Sure there is some upper body lifting that some of the kids are doing, but most of the effort is spent on plyos, drills, core type stuff.  Keeps you honest.  Little buggers can do planks all day long, but they all cheat on the pull ups (none of them do a full arm extension).  Good smack talk makes for good work.  The only problem is they blast the most inane crap for music over the speakers.  I replaced it with some of this (and actually most the kids dug it).

Another day where work consumed me much more than I would have expected and I did not get out until later in the afternoon.  I headed over to the school and jogged with Greg some.  I asked Greg if he thought I could get back down under five for the mile and he blurted “no” without any hesitation.  When I poked him about that he elaborated by saying, “well you certainly are not going to get there running with me everyday.”

And he is right.  I have been floating around doing exercise, but not training.  In fact if I were training, I’d be getting up early and getting out and after it.  TZ pointed this out:  “you used to get up and get in a run every day before work.”  That habit has certainly slipped as well. 

It is a bit of a weird negative feedback loop.  In the past I signed up for a race, and then that got me motivated to train because I was sort of scared of the result if I didn’t do that and that kept me on track.  Now I have not signed up for a race and so I am not really nudged to train and then I am more out of shape and thus less likely to sign up for a race. 

Reading I am poking through.

I have been poking through the Clone Wars on Netflix.  In the canon of Star Wars, it is the three year time period between Episodes 2 (Attack of the Clones) and 3 (Revenge of the Sith).  On Netflix it six seasons of episodes with each season being something like 20 episodes.  A lot of it is the just kiddy fun sci fi stuff but there are really great themes that build over the episodes … corruption, deceit, organizations losing their values, people losing faith in those organizations, demagoguery, paranoia, manipulation, emergency powers … and that sort of stuff.  That really sucks me in.  The Anakin Skywalker character is so much better than what got portrayed in the movies.  Did you know Darth Maul actually survived?  While they are all animated and only short episodes (23 min each), they are actually better than the movies because of the building effect they have on each other.

It was a lot busier of a work day than I expect and then we bolted up to Lyons for the kids track meet.  It was one of those Front Range days where the wind was gusting, there were clouds sitting on the mountains, and so the air had a bite.  Not ideal for track.

The Lyons meet is a bit fun – it is a smaller meet – maybe five schools?  Not quite the dual meet I remember from the 80s, but noticeably smaller than the big Saturday invites that are the norm of Colorado HS track these days.  But the other thing that makes the Lyons meet fun is that it is all relays or some alternative event rather than just open races.  So there is the DMR or the Sprint Relay or the 1600 relay (2-2-4-8) or a 1600 team race (4 runners per team and the race is scored XC style) or a 4 x 800.  There was even a throwers 4 x 100 where the only folks who were in it were the athletes that had been in the shot put.  Pretty cool. 

KZ was in the 1600 team race.  She had not done a mile since her freshman year so she PR’d but more importantly she hit the 800 in nearly the same time she had done in the 4 x 800 from last week.  She picked up on that and was quick to realize that she could be hitting her 800 a lot faster.   It was pretty neat to hear the excitement in her voice about getting to her next race to have a chance at that.

JZ was in the 4 x 800 and was 3 seconds faster than his go at it last week but was a bit irked because he “did not catch that guy” in his leg that he wanted to get.  About an hour later he hit his first mile race in the 1600 team race.  Greg had the kids go out conservative with the goal of rolling up as many kids as they could over the remaining 3 laps.  JZ was probably 30 yards down from a guy with 200 to go but caught him with 100 to go.  The kid then threw it into high gear and I have to admit I was losing my freaking mind when I saw the boy bear down and find a gear he probably did not know he had to hold him off.    If that was not cool enough, it is pretty sweet to see the other team mates come by and give him the tag on the shoulder and say “nice kick JZ!”  He was clearly happy with it.  Normally he is level or even a touch down post race but he was definitely buzzing after this effort.  And like his sister, he was already dreaming of what he could accomplish in his next race.  All very very awesome.

So no running today, but my HR did get up some. 

I have been contributing a tiny amount to the whole thing by trying to collect the kids splits along the way – so every 400 for a kids 8 or their mile (or heck 1200 in a DMR).  The kids have come to know this and they know what I pitch back to them.  Something like this:  “okay Joe Runner, you went out in 66 and came back in 68.  That is a pretty tight split for an 800 – nice job!”  or “you went out in 29, came back for the second 200 in 32, but then hit that third 200 in 40.  What do you think of that?”   They are starting to see it and get it a bit.  And that is fun too.

All the way home, KZ and JZ were yapping about training, spikes, past performances, training density, and how to improve. 

Afternoon – 5 easy miles with Greg with strides afterwards.  I was a bit sore and I am not sure why.

AM – I headed up to Lucho’s place to catch up with him and get some jogging in.

It has been way too long since I have seen this guy – and it was just great.  We yammered nonstop for 90 minutes on everything from how to make a souflee to knitting patterns to types of homeopathic remedies for peanut allergies.

If one were doing Pikes, this is a good read of what to consider in training now.

This is sort of nuts (and probably sez something about genetic talent).

Afternoon – the wind picked up like crazy and was probably gusting up to 40mph.  I did strides back and forth as the kids did their workout.  Good for 3 miles. 

Saturday – the kids had a track meet at the HS and I was there with them all day.  The kids were in the early sessions of the 4 x 800m.  It was their first races of the season and it gave them a good sight of where they are in their fitness and now they have a good competitive objective measure they can work from.  JZ had not done an 800 on a track before and it had been a few years since KZ had done one.  Separately they both commented on how that third 200 has its challenges.

We spent the rest of the day at the meet.  There were at least a dozen schools in the mix.  I helped out in gathering splits on everything from the 800s (every 200) to 1600 to the 3200 and even the 4 x 4.  There were some pretty good perfomances to open the season for a lot of these kids (with some running events they would not typically run by going over or more typically under distance), but none of them are hoping this is their best performance of the season.  They are looking to improve. 

I got so wrapped up in the meet and the day that I completely forgot that Saturday was the day to register for Pikes.  I got a text from JV mid day asking if I had registered and realized I had completely spaced on it.  He also shared with me that it was 188 bucks to register.  

I am not going to criticize the cost – because I see that as a simple supply and demand thing.  If you have a product or a service that people want, and are willing to pay for, then you can charge what the market demands.  It might chase some folks off, but if you are filling your till to satisfaction and you have satisfied customers – go for it.  I have taken this sort of stance with races like Bolder Boulder:  a 75 dollar 10k with 50000 people ain’t for me.  It is obviously a great buy for a lot of people.

I long thought that Pikes was a very good buy for a race.  It was often (and probably still is) cheaper than a lot of road marathons.  While it probably does not have the costs of like a big city marathon of shutting down roads, getting police, etc – it does have its own set of challenges in that the course is on a 14er and getting supplies to the aid stations can’t be managed by driving to the A-frame. 

At 175 though, the old man memory can’t help but recall that not too long ago (less than a decade) it was probably half that.  And yeah, I avoided costs for years with comp’d entries to be fair.    I think the Ascent was 50 or 60 bucks when I first did it and that is now 150.  Interestingly for a few years, the Marathon was cheaper than the Ascent by 10 dollars or so because there was some cost consideration of the ride down.

Again, I am not opposed to the outright dollar cost alone.   I dropped close to 400 for Leadville reg last year (which does create the math of cost per mile comparisons) so I am okay with dropping a few bones on races where there is a personally percieved value.. But a combination of the cost of PPM, what kind of shape I am in, what I have planned for rec and work this summer, and what fire I have in my belly right now – I don’t see myself registering for Pikes.  I just don’t put together a subjective value in it … I’d drop 200 bucks to screw around and put up a sub par performance on the hill.  That ain’t worth it.

That is a bit weird because even up through last year, I thought I would do Pikes every year for probably the rest of my life or until I couldn’t.  My thinking has clearly shifted on it and while there is a part of me that is a bit sad about that, I am actually very much – “hey it is okay, the mountain is there when you want to go back, do something else for a bit.”  In fact, I will probably either be at the Leadville course or Pikes that weekend to, at minimum, watch the races if not help or something more.

Oh, back and forth on the track all day, collecting splits, etc was good for 9 easy miles.  My left hammy was a bit irked most of the day though. 

Sunday AM – got out with Shad (who ran a great Salida race), Bob, and Dave over after Mayerhoffer and the donks Boog and Ellroy.  This included paces of 0 miles an hour to paces of 12 miles and hour.  With the number of bikes, dogs, people on the Coal Creek Trail it is always a bit of a challenge … and a bit funny as people whip out their phones and say “you don’t see that every datay

Decent week for me back home … a good number of miles where the pace was nudged by doing stuff with the kids.  Being on or near the track so much has me thinking about goals in that direction … maybe.  The week was a bit more loaded towards the front, and a bit lighter over the weekend – both in terms of quality and quantity - but it was okay on whole. 

Post of the day by far:  “I won that!  That race up there on the TV between the zombie show and the music video with the dad going to jail, I won that.  I’ve run outside!”

So this is where I put forth the question I raised again the other day:  “how much do you expect the government to be involved?”  Should the government be regulating the size of airplane seats?  And if so, to what end?  Of course if I were a politician, and I were seeking to be re-elected, I could see the incentive to take up that cause:  “If elected, I will take up this seat issue for you!”  Actually I found the most interesting part of the article to be how the average weight of our citizenry has increased significantly.

Early afternoon – I did the 8 loop through Lac Amora-Carolyn Holmberg Ruth Roberts.  It was easy but I still sputtered to an even slower pace because of the heat.  A couple of hours later I did another easy 4 and change.

Yes please.

Yeah.  That is the sort of thing that it takes, huh?

I love me some David R, because he is just so damn positive and gracious.  I’d vote for that guy RIGHT NOW.  Go Rhino Party. 

It would seem that the Olympics would be the no brainer on this decision, but my older cynical self can see the allure of the Mt Marathon, particular since the Olympics seem to just increasingly be a PED performance showcase.

I am kicking myself for not having run with this guy out here yet.

You have to ask the PED question when you look at it.  The number all time number 10 mark for the marathon as of today is faster than all attempts at that distance except the world record from 2009 (just in case the Sharapova / Aregawi news of late did not add fuel to that fire).

Afternoon – maybe 70 degrees?  Shirtless five before bringing the kids over to practice.  Felt pretty good on the Lake Link and Ditch Five route.   Buzzed over to the school and got in another five with Greg.

Evening:

The band is getting better over time but I am not sure it can be better than my favorite performance from a few years back. 

Afternoon – jumped in with the kids at the HS again today.  Did the 20 minute warm up with the boys and I realized how jumping out at 7:05 pace for the warm up is something I sort of don’t like (which is why I should do that occasionally).  After that, the workout on tap was up to 8 x 500 at 2 mile goal pace for most of the distance kids. 

For a lot of kids, they have no clue what that means because they have never run 2 miles as a race (or 3200m)  or they have only run a cross 5k or they ran a 2 mile a year ago and they are way way faster than what they were.  As this was one of the early seasons workouts, it was a bit of guess work.  And then there was a bit of discussion for the newbies that it is 82 through 400, not a minute twenty two.  All fun.

I jumped in on various intervals with various kids at different times, but got in probably 3 miles of work at sub six pace.  For me it is sort of unstructured but I am getting some work in, and more to the truth of it, I am enjoying myself with the kids.  I get a bit of a workout but that is certainly a lesser consideration. 

Admittedly, playing on the track and talking that sort of turkey has me thinking more about those sort of events than going back to Leadville or Pikes.  And heck, I am not sure I could break six for a mile right now without vomiting.  No doubt, ego plays on that a bit, particularly when I recall workouts where a few sub five repeat were the norm.  A shot at sub five may have passed me by but it might be the bar I chase and come woefully up short for this summer.

8.1 miles. 

Lip service is plentiful. Folks always claim they are all in. They talk and dream about being at the top, yet few study those at the top and note what it truly takes to be there. Elite performance involves deep study, endless efforts, honesty on all fronts and accountability beyond the norm.

Mid day – got together with Shad, Kendrick and Bob and did some work over on the Sweeney Mesa.  I had contemplated bagging the whole workout because I felt just generally banged up – a bit sore, a bit tired and the Achilles was grumbling.  But when the watch started, I rolled with it anyway.  And was glad I did. 

We did 3 miles on the outer loop and then came back for another couple after that.  I did these at about the pace I was doing the outright Harper Lake laps a few weeks ago, so that sort of bodes well, but still it was only 6:30 pace for the 3.   The lungs were fine for the first two miles but then I was starting to feel how I was working a touch (even though this was race pace for a half just in January).  I cheated the follow up two mile a bit – in that I did the first in 6:30 and then took a break for a couple (I was soft) and then did the second in 6:15.  All in all, nothing special but I was glad I did something rather than bag and do nothing as I had been considering.

As always, running with a group is beneficial in many ways:  the banter and fun of it, the running a little more quickly than you would if you were on your own, and how the time slips away quickly when in the group. 

Shad is rounding into shape nicely.  It is cool to see a guy rising through his fitness week over week.

Sort of geeked out on this fan movie.

Okay, so I will venture into the political.  Thanks to Shad for this one

And from Kieran:
None of this is to say that one political philosophy is right or wrong. That we should choose to ally with those who would wish to promote our interests is perfectly natural. But if it seems like the rest of the world is gunning for our jobs and for our quality of life, it’s because they are. The fact that you have had success for a period of time just means that everyone else is going to come even harder for your share of the pie in the next iteration of the game. And regardless of what any politician promises you, that’s not going to change.

I have been having some entertaining conversations with my kids regarding politics, elections, etc.  KZ will vote in this election and a lot of our conversation comes down to the root question:  how much should government be involved?  Consider any particular issue and that is a question.  Gun control, abortion, gay marriage, health care, national parks, public education including college, physician assisted suicide, marijuana and the war on drugs, the 1%, corporate off shoring, bank regulation, food and medical device management, environmental protections like fracking and climate change, and of course, taxes baby.  And that is just a handful I thought of in 10 seconds.

It is a fun conversation because in some cases KZ think there ought to be government involvement, and then in others, not so much.  That is probably the case for all of us, with a bit of a difference in alignment on the issues.

Later in the afternoon – 5 miles with Greg super easy (8:30s) and then 4 100 meter strides.  I timed the last two to get an eyeball on that and it was 17 and 16 mid.  Sigh.  Rolled through 600 miles on the year today.

It is really fun to yap with the kids at the HS.  They have dreams of PRing or earning a letter or making state.  It is just very inspiring to see that culture of “hey I want to improve” regardless of what that goal is. 

Evening

“I heard them chatting like it was a book club meeting or something.”

Couple more shots of JZ from Okpik that I really liked.

Afternoon – 5.1 on the local loop on Lakeview.  Easy, and warming up.  Shortly after this I went over to the track and helped out with the kids there and that got me another 5.1. 

Evening – a bit fried after Okpik weekend and I felt the temptation to just nap, but I knew I’d feel better if I got some jogging in.  I got out for an hour, doing the 8 loop through the Carolyn Holmberg and Ruth Roberts Open Spaces. 

My stomach was not feeling great.  I was just loaded from the weekend of camp food, but the run helped manage that back to some sort of appropriate level.  I was mentioning to Andy recently that I can feel how sensitive I have become to the travel, beer and rich diet.  It is not a killer, but I can feel the slight difference more than I may have a decade ago. 

Not a great training week for me, but I was not expecting it to be such with the trip to Atlanta and the Okpik camping. 

5 years ago when JZ was a Cub Scout (a Web 1) we camped with his future Boy Scout Troop.  While up there we marched around the lake and saw folks engaged in the Okpik program.  It is a winter camping program where folks build a quinzee (sort of like a snow cave) and sleep in it overnight.  JZ loved the program and wanted to do it right away.  He did the program once in Scouts twice, and we were invited to come back as instructors this year. 

A shot of him teaching Friday night.

Looking towards the Indian Peak Wilderness, Audobon … we camp on the far side of the lake.


Snow was thin in a lot of areas when hiking over but we had plenty for quinzees once we got up into the north side of the hill and in the trees.

We had 23 participants over our weekend.

JZ and the other three staff did not sleep in a quinzee this go around (as we were busy getting everyone going with their own), but here is a shot of JZ in one.


Lunch time.


In the saff tent.  It was warm enough that we never fired the heater and no kids got hypothermic … so we were not forced to use it.




We were out by about 6:30, maybe 7.


But back at it in the AM.





Coming home always means an eager greeting.

It was just really awesome to see this come full circle for JZ.  And to have this moment with him.