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Round and round…

Spurned buddy - Senor Treadmill
Spurned buddy - Senor Treadmill

Oh, he’s drunk. How would he know where we’re going? ~ Del

Wednesday 3 Feb: 1:18, 9.5ish miles, Indoor track Tempo run

Hit the gym for some tempo work and other than the traffic jam that was the track (seems like the whole world was there last night) and some spazzy kids running around (usually the wrong direction) and generally messing things up, it was a decent run. Warmed up for a couple miles at about a 9-minute pace, then ran tempo for 50 minutes at sub 8s, then donned the KSOs for a mile of “barefoot” cool down. It was shorter than I had scheduled but running laps on the short track (1/16th of a mile per lap) can be a bit mind numbing. Honestly, I have gone as long as 1:45 before but that day I was in the zone, no one else was there so I could reverse my direction every once in awhile and there wasn’t a gym full of screaming kids playing hoops and volleyball. So yeah, focus is a bit key.

Overall, I am feeling pretty well. The hamstring was a little tight to start but loosened right up and my knee didn’t give me any troubles whatsoever. So that is good news. I got a room booked for the night of the 12th in Moab and am getting pretty psyched to do that race. Should be fun.

We got a dusting of snow last night up here (whoa!) and so I may head over to Eldora to skate instead of running. Haven’t made that call just yet. Very excited to see Simon Boccanegra this weekend on the big screen and we are cleaning runs at the Bunny Barn on Sunday. Good times. Good times.

~stubert.

January goodness…

February 2, 2010 Run
Feb 2 run. Looks like a seal throwing up or something

And this time, no tears! ~ Tobias Fünke

2 Feb: 6.8 miles, 1:02, North Boulder surges

I put in some solid training in the last couple weeks of January for sure. Logged two more long runs (24.25 and 26.4 miles, 4.5 hours each) and stayed consistent with the rest of the program. For the month, I ended up with 195.3 logged miles – a strong effort all around.

The knee has still been giving me a little grief but seems to be responding positively to increased daily exercises as well as a lifting regimen as prescribed by Duncan Callahan. Duncan won Leadville in 2008 in somewhat brutal conditions and is a fellow Gunnisonite. I am working up to his full schedule as it is a bit more than I can handle right now but after lifting on Friday, I performed really well this past Sunday. Logged negative splits in the 26.4 miles and finished strongly. Virtually no knee pain to boot!

Today I ran on the trails north of Boulder (Eagle Trail system) and did some surges. Finished with 6.8 miles in 1:02 and felt strong throughout. The surges were a little clunky but the rest of the run I ran well and was motivated. I’ll have another week of “normal” training then will taper just a bit for the Moab Red Hot 50K+ on the 13th. Looking forward to running in the desert with a full pack of fellow ultra freaks.

~stubert.

Moving…

I like being old. I don’t have to talk to my parents. Nobody asks me to help them move stuff. ~ Professor Hubert Farnsworth

The blog move got in the way of my posting so I have been a bit off the ball. The last week was decent on the training front. Took Monday off, ran briefly Tuesday but wasn’t feeling super into it after donating platelets that morning, 11.6 with tempo on Wednesday, skate skied Thursday and Saturday, another long run on Sunday (24.25) and then more fun on Tuesday with a 6.2-mile run with surges.

My consistency has been pretty solid. I wasn’t in the mood again yesterday but did a really fun run in the snow today with 4 miles of tempo. One last long run this weekend before the race on the 13th. I’ll let you know how that goes.

~stubert.

True words…

Nothin’ to do, nowhere to go. ~ The Ramones

When one stretches the fabric of the possible, it tends to help to narrow one’s focus as the big picture can become overwhelming. In ultra running, this is often spoken of as “relentless forward motion” or even focusing on each individual step. Where making thousands of steps seems impossible, focus on just moving to that next ridge/tree/fencepost or even just taking one more step can provide results.

Greg Joder, an amazing wildlife photographer, avid sea kayaker and fervent environmentalist sent me a link to Katie Spotz’ post about how to approach endurance challenges as she paddles – solo – across the Atlantic.

During some of my first endurance challenges I wasted too much energy questioning whether or not I could complete the challenge I set out for myself. The truth is that you never know until you try, and the worst thing you can do is not try. I learned to redefine failure, not as a failure to complete the feat, but a true failure as to not try. Fear of failure was one of the most difficult “mental walls” I faced.

Break it down. You don’t row across an ocean in a day so it’s important for me to break it down into daily, sometimes hourly, goals and focus on that one step ahead. If I lose sight of that one step, I can become overwhelmed by the magnitude of the challenge.

Know all things will pass. No matter how tired, hot, seasick, bored, lonely, etc. I get, it will pass. For some of my more grueling one-day challenges, like my ultra marathon (100k run), I can expect to go through all sorts of highs and lows all in a matter of hours.

Do not make it personal. Here on the ocean weather will do what it wants, equipment will break, things will not go according to “plan”. But it has nothing to do with me. So often I can think and feel that things are happening “for”, “against”, “to” me. Things are just happening and I can choose to accept it or put up the fight.

Understand the real challenge is me. The only thing that holds me back is me and it’s not about what happens but how I chose to react.

I couldn’t have said it better myself. Read more about her adventure.

~stubert.