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Sunday run report…

Bob and Stu go running.

Let it flow. Let yourself go. Slow and low, that is the tempo. ~ The Beastie Boys

And a weekly summary! Whee!

Bob and I hit the trails this morning for what turned into a pretty long run. Long enough that we ran out of water and I, being one who can process fluids like wildfire, got into a little trouble.

Click on the photo to get the full effect. Hawk 1, snake 0.

We headed out from Bob and Lindsay’s about 9:30 and did a clockwise loop into the foothills of Boulder. Really a gorgeous day (a little warm for my tastes but I am a great big weirdo – see above). We ran south on Moorhead to the South Campus (or whatever it is called) and then headed up to Big Bluestem. Along the way we stopped for some photos then saw a hawk that had grabbed a snake and was circling above. Cool to see and great for the hawk. The snake… not so much.

It’s getting green out there.

We made our way west to the Mesa Trail then dodged hoards of hikers all the way back to Chautauqua. Seems like every third person we passed knew Bob so we had some nice breaks to check out the scenery and enjoy our time in the outdoors.

Once we hit the Chautauqua, we went over the saddle to the Gregory Canyon trailhead then up and over the first ridge of Flagstaff. By this time, I had run out of water and was starting to bonk a bit so we jammed down to Lolita’s for a fill up. Bob treated me to a great big Gatorade and then I had to find a bathroom. Finally opted for the Library, which had a cool display detailing the inner workings and history of the Boulder ditch system. Yeah, I did say “ditch”.

I saw a lot of this later in the run.

So we meandered our way back to Bob’s and my abs started acting up. Coupled with the dehydration, I was only able to run in short spurts. Oh well. 16 miles total with an unimpressive time of 3:40 or something. That’s okay though, it’s all about time on your feet.

Post run, I had some problems reminiscent of last year’s 50-mile race where I feel like I really have to pee but then can’t. I have to really start working harder on consistent fluid and food consumption. Gonna see if I can set a timer on my watch or something. Running the marathons last fall got me out of the habit of taking sips every 3 minutes and powering down food at a regular clip. Dargh!

So here are the week’s numbers:

Monday: Run, 3.15 miles, 33 minutes
Tuesday: Run, 5.2 miles, 51 minutes
Wednesday: Hike, 8 miles???, 2.15 hours???
Thursday: Run, 4 miles, 35 minutes
Saturday: Run, 6.86 miles, 1 hour 20 minutes
Sunday: Run, 15.9 miles, 3 hours 44 minutes
TOTAL: 43.11 miles, 9 hours 20 minutes

All in all a pretty solid week. I think this week will be fairly mellow leading up to the Dirty 30 on Saturday.

Rach is making origami bunnies right now, which is super awesome. Yet another of her many talents.

~stubert.

Sage Burner update…

Well I’ll be damned. ~ Beavis

So the results have been posted and I ended up 34th overall with an official time of 2:45.11. This put my in 5th place for my division. Pretty sweet!

This week has been kinda nuts but I have been getting out. Monday’s run was short but really sweet. Virtually pain-free. It started a little clunky but quickly smoothed out to a really efficient effort. I was able to just get in a zone and go, which just felt great.

Tuesday I went a lot harder and busted out 5 miles in about 45 minutes. I ran sections of trail that up until now this year, I have had to walk. Starting to feel a lot more fit. I went for a hike on Wednesday that ended up being a lot longer than anticipated and then just hammered out 4 miles on Thursday on the roads down in Boulder. That too was a pretty good effort though I didn’t feel particularly awesome.

I am going out for a 10-miler today (at least that is the plan) and am hoping to hook up with Bobby T for a long one tomorrow. Still contemplating Leadville but I am rally wanting to do it again this year. As always, I’ll keep you posted.

~stubert.

Sage Burner race report…

Yeah, I finished.

I huuuurt. ~ John D. Roach

Today I ran the Sage Burner 25K in Gunnison. I am hurting WAY more than I should for a 15-miler but I think there might have been one flat spot on that course. It was technical and tough. Good stuff.

The weather report said cold and rainy for the start but the weather was actually perfect. Cool and overcast. Great running weather. I started in a t-shirt and gloves and that was more than enough for this course.

There were about 200 starters, nearly triple the number who ran last year. Being one of the newcomers, I was familiar with parts of the course but definitely found myself just following vs. knowing what to expect around the next bend or steep uphill. Subsequently, I just followed the pace which probably resulted in a better finishing time but man, I was hurtin’ by the time I was done.

We started at 8:00 and quickly made our way up, up, up into the Hartman Rocks recreation area. This was my haunting grounds as a highschooler – THE place to ride, hike and (ahem) throw the more than occasional party. The course then followed familiar mountain biking trails (98% singletrack) in a clockwise direction for a nice tour of the Hartman Rocks area.

The pace was pretty quick to start and stayed that way for most of the race. (For me, at least.) The first four miles wound through technical rocky sections and sage brush. I was in decent shape early on, running with a good group, then I stopped to take a leak and found myself running with another group who had someone in it who would NOT shut up. Here I am suffering up steep inclines and she just kept talking. I could have possibly communicated in hand-gestures and grunts at this point so I felt she was adding insult to injury. Makin’ a brotha look bad…

So when she and her crew stopped at the first aid station, I just blasted right through with a solid half-bottle to spare. A couple miles later they snuck back up on me briefly, then I put the hammer down on a long downhill section and my ears (and ego) were given a break. Whew!

The course just kept rolling and rolling. After the second aid station (about mile 7.5) I started really feeling it and started trying to focus on staying smooth, with good form. Easier said than done. My abs started really bugging me shortly thereafter so I just tried to settle in and keep up my mantra of “Most Guts”. Ironic? Perhaps.

I did manage to pick off a few people in the last 5 miles but things were pretty strung out at that point. I was also passed by one woman who really put on the heat in the last climb/descent. I should feel bad but by this point, I was pretty ready for the finish. The last mile or so featured a brutal downhill (down Collarbone Alley). Not really my idea of good times in the last miles but I wasn’t consulted. I blame Wiensie (Dave Wiens, mountain bike legend and all-around nice guy.) I did manage to turn it over pretty well in the last few hundred meters, so that felt pretty good. I finished right in the middle of my desired range of 2:30-3:00 with a 2:45. Not blazing, but I’ll take it. My GPS said it was 16.17 miles, for an average pace of 10:15 mpm. Not too shabby.

Afterward, I was really pretty jacked up. I tried to sit in the creek for a bit but my feet were having none of that. Way too cold. I probably should have stuck it out but damn… my toes were unhappy. I took a quick shower and actually thought I was going blind for a bit (yikes!) so I wacked down a thing of Pedialyte and felt much better thereafter but still a lot more hurtin’ than I should have been for a race of this distance. I attribute this to a few things:

Fast pace: I really wanted to run a 50K pace but mixing the 25K and 50K participants made that more than a little tough
Electrolyte imbalance: I need to get back in touch with my Salt-Stick habit
Ambitious shoe selection: I am too heavy for flats. The Peak XC is a great shoe but at 180, I am just too heavy to run long distances in this set-up. Hey, I tried, it didn’t work for me.
Wicked hard course: As I said before, this course was tough. Not a lot of sustained climbing (like wicked high passes with 3 miles of uphill), but tough nonetheless. Made it tough to get into a sustained groove but hey, that’s racing.

I don’t have results just yet but will let you know how I did in relation to others soon.

Speaking of not keeping score and comparing myself to other golfers (“Height.”), Dad and I hit the links about an hour and a half after I got home from the race. Needless to say, I was a little wrecked at the start but still managed to hit some decent shots. I had some crappy holes for sure but overall, played better than usual. I guess I need to run a boatload of miles before I play. I still logged triple-digits (a completely honest 108 with no Mulligans) but overall, I played much better than normal and considering that was the first time I lifted a club this year, ran 16+ hard miles beforehand, and generally suck at golf, it wasn’t too shabby.

Dad and I capped off the day with some killer grub from the always awesome Donita’s Cantina in Crested Butte. If you are in the area, get your ass in there. Then be prepared to haul an ass and a half out of there.

~stubert.

Saturday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday…

Couloir above Lake Isabelle

Hey Ma, get off the dang roof! ~ Cletus

Good end of last week/start of this week, activity-wise. Saturday saw gorgeous conditions in the high-country so I headed up higher to do 13 miles on Rollins Pass. I started above the tunnel and made my way up the old railroad grade. There were still several large sections socked in with drifts so car traffic was virtually non-existent.

View east from Rollins Pass

Unfortunately, I felt like hammered crap and my abs were really, really angry with me all day so I didn’t turn over the miles as quickly or painlessly as I had hoped given the past week’s progress. It was good to be out, however, and I have learned that there is no such thing as a bad run so though I felt a little discouraged by the set-back, I took it in stride.

Sunday I stuck close to home as one of our foster bunnies was at the end of his journey. Rach does an amazing job giving these special guys a loving home but it is still very hard to see them go. Louis was not an old bunny but had a terminal condition that required additional care and attention so he and his friend, Bruscetta, came to live with us. Rach paired them with two other great bunnies, Sidney and Peanut, then Homer was added to the group for a really cool fivesome. Louis will be missed but Bruscetta can now stay with her new friends, which makes it easier on her for sure.

On Monday Luke, Ben and I headed up to the Brainard Lake area to do some skiing. We got a fairly early start but an inversion made it incredibly warm up high and we were met with breakable crust conditions on the hike in and sloppy, punchy snow on the bootpack up towards Isabelle Glacier. It was a gorgeous day (albeit warm) but the going was much slower than we expected. We decided to ski a protected coulior but I bailed about halfway up to get home to get some work done. I actually felt great. I was a little slow but was being really cautious as every time my right leg postholed in the weird conditions, my right knee would become very grumpy.

I apologized for calling him “Snotter”.

On the way back out, I was treated by a river otter playing in the freshly thawed far-eastern edge of Long Lake. He was playing in the shallow water near the tip of the lake and even posed for me a bit while I took photos. River otters were recently declassified as endangered and are now listed as a threatened species so getting to see the little fella (actually, not that little) was really cool.

Tuesday I ran up near my house. Just kept a steady, relatively slow pace and ran a fun figure eight in the woods. I hit up some of my favorites: Tupperware, Funky Boss, Diver Down and power hiked the steeper sections. Felt okay, actually. I didn’t push the pace really at all and was able to just stay relaxed and comfortable.

Today I doubled down and did a quick run in the woods on some pirate trails (actually got a little off track due to early-season conditions) and then did a fun exploratory moto ride with Luke. We jammed up Rollins Pass to see how much snow had melted in the past three days of seriously intense heat (for May, at least) then went up Mammoth Gulch (which is still pretty socked in) and then checked out the Fourth of July road, which is open and clear all the way to the trailhead. Luke then stole my motorcycle. He has a knack for swiping people’s bikes. (Hey Pete, if you are reading this, your moto is in my garage.) It won’t be long until Luke is kicking my ass in yet another activity but for now, I’ll relish not having to chase him around.

I head to Gunnison on Friday to race the Sage Burner Saturday morning. Since my abs are still being jerks, I am just going to do the 25K event with explicit instructions to take it easy. I’ll let you know how that goes.