Red, White, & Brew

Guess who turns one year old on Friday?

I'll be biking to this.  From my house, hitting Pikes Peak via the highway first.  Let me know if anyone is interested in joining me.

beer 177, 178, & 179

Definitely been much more of a pain in the ass documenting these beers lately than it has been drinking them.

177 was a can of the Indian Paintbrush IPA from Black Tooth.  Drank a ton of this at the brewery in Sheridan and then bought back a bunch of cans.

178 was the Ragnar Hop Double IPA from BierWerks in Woodland Park.  Dropped in here on my way out to the pre-North Fork volunteer campout.

Good times at the campout.  Another night in the hammock for me.

179 was Rolling Rock.  From here on out, when Kircher says "I'll bring the beer," that is going to translate as "you need to go to the liquor store and bring your own beer."  As a Western PA guy, there's still a bad taste in my mouth now that RR is made in New Jersey.

Helped run an aid station at the North Fork 50.  Good times.  Best thing for me all weekend though was discovering the trails out there at Buffalo Creek.  Someone should punch me in the face for living so close to these trails but not getting on them until this weekend.  Holy friggin' christ are those trails awesome!  Did have my first serious bike crash though.  If I wasn't wearing a helmet I'm sure I'd be in the hospital for a while.

Leadville is coming, time to get in shape...

Thurs AM - Seven miles on the Garden roads, just over an hour.  Listened to the new Phish album.  Not usually a big fan of their studio stuff (though I do listen to their live stuff from time to time, maybe 18 or 19 hours a day) but this one is pretty decent.

Lunch - half hour throwing tiny dumbells around the Y.

Thurs PM - Three miles home from work on the old Klein, then 80 minutes around Red Rock Canyon (12 miles) on the Salsa.

Fri AM - Incline #32 with the dog.  There was an Army platoon that had a few minutes head start on us but we whooped them all.  Pogues.

Making the short drive up to Pine this weekend to volunteer at the North Fork 50.  Good luck to all the runners there, and feel free to join me for a PBR when you pass through the aid station.  And, of course, good luck to all those running the big track meet out at Western States.  Give Dooper a high five for me.

beer 174, 175, & 176

174 was the Indian Rye IPA from Snowy Mountain Brewery in Saratoga, WY.  Their beers were OK.  Not a brewery worth visiting in itself but it seems like it would be a fun place to spend the night at.  $100 would not let me steal this glass.

175 marked the return to Colorado with the Hop Diggity IPA from Wild Mountain Smokehouse & Brewery.  I will definitely be getting back to the Ned area for some exploring, can't believe this was my first time visiting.

176 was a mini growler of Mt. Zion IPA from Mountain Toad Brewing in Golden.

beer 173

Speed Goat Golden Ale from Ten Sleep Brewing Company.  We drove through Ten Sleep on the way to Lander and tried to drop by this brewery, but it was closed.  So we kept going until we hit the town of Thermopolis and found a pub that had it on tap.

They still run cattle on the roads in Wyoming.  How do I know this?  Because we about ran smack head on with at least 100 cows.  Mooo.

beer 172

Black Eagle Baltic Porter from my favorite Sheridan brewery.

beer 170 & 171

Thursday after work we bolted over to the grand re-opening of Kinfolk's and then split town for Fort Collins.  It seems most of the breweries there close around 7PM, so I hit a liquor store before crashing at the Pittbrownie Fort Collins mansion.  Picked up some Pateros Creek in honor of Sir Nick, who is going to shock the world at Western this weekend.

 We left for Wyoming early Friday morning.  Didn't make it in time to catch the start of Bighorn, but at least one of the local breweries was open when we arrived.  Sheridan Pilsner from the Black Tooth Brewing Company.  Good stuff.

Of course, no trip to Sheridan is complete without spending some quality time at the Mint Bar.

Colorado brewery #100

After hanging out in Nederland at Wild Mountain Smokehouse & Brewery for lunch and a few beers, $100 was down with making a quick stop in Golden so I could hit the century mark on my Colorado brewery tour.  Mountain Toad got the honors.  The dog thought the place was super cool.

CO brewery #101 will fall soon, as Fieldhouse Brewing is due to open it's doors this weekend.

still alive

Back in the Springs after a kick ass 1500+ mile Wyoming roadtrip. I'll get caught up on posts later, but for now, the highlights:

-Paced Shad at Bighorn.  It can really be described as going for a run with Shad as he crushed the final 34 miles and didn't need me for anything.  I just went along for the ride and enjoyed views like this all day:

-Visited Lander, WY.  This town has a rep as a big climbers mecca, and I took the opportunity to visit.  Included the side trip to Sinks Canyon and drinks at the Lander Bar.

-Saw a two story outhouse in Encampment.

-Returned home via Trail Ridge Road and the Peak to Peak Highway, something I've wanted to do since I moved here.

-Hit Colorado brewery #100 with a stop at the Mountain Toad in Golden.

Kinfolk's is back, baby!

beer 169

Andy gave me a sixer of this for letting him beat me in Leadville.  I got the better end of the deal.

Still pretty sore from Saturday, that marathon was pretty tough.  Did get out Wednesday evening for Incline #31.  Easy 45 minutes this morning on the Garden trails.

Off to Wyoming later tonight.  Fort Collins tonight, Sheridan on Friday and Saturday, a few days in Lander, then back home through Encampment, Rocky Mountain Nat'l Park, and Nederland.  Looking forward to a nice, relaxing vacation and some Wyoming beers.

beer 168

Marc, Josh, and I had originally planned to spend Tuesday night sleeping on top of Rocky Mountain, hiking up there via the Incline.  That plan didn't go so well.

First stop on the bikes was Manitou Brewing.  I had the Spot Hop IPA for my beer of the day.  Then I had a bunch of other beers.  Josh went straight to whiskey.  Kinfolk's will be re-opening on Thursday afternoon, but I think MBC will be my place for pre/post run refreshments.

Then we got the great idea to head over to the Royal.  Of course we all went straight to gin.

We were actually still planning on heading up the mountain and rode our bikes up to Nacheaux's, where we would lock them up for the night.  But she had even more gin.

And the night ended at Nacheaux's.  We did sleep outside, which is technically on Red Mountain, so our goal of sleeping on a mountain was a success!  Drinks for everyone!

This was my view the next morning when I woke up:

beer 167

I get so busy finding new breweries and new beers that I sometimes forget that I have a huge stash (150+) of hard-to-find brews down in the basement.  I raided that stash on Monday evening for this nugget.

beer 166

Felt like shit after the marathon on Saturday, so we bailed on staying in Leadville another night.  Did get out the door on Sunday for a 50 mile ride up to Pikes Peak Brewing and back.  Took me just under 4.5 hours.  I know I need to ride the Pb100 bike course but on Sunday I just would have been pushing my bike up and down Powerline and I didn't feel up to that.  But on the Santa Fe trail I was so fast the Air Force guys didn't even have time to wake up from their afternoon naps to come catch me.

$100 and I hit Green Man before the Tab Benoit show and I finally got to try the Stone Enjoy By 7-14-14. Was not disappointed.

As usual, Tab killed it.  So happy he includes Colorado Springs when he tours.  He should let his buddy Anders know how appreciative the crowds here are.

beer 166

Sweet George's Brown Ale from Dillon Dam Brewing.  They actually had this on tap at The Manhattan.  Good brew, but due to tradition I switched back to house favorite PBR.

I'll get a Leadville Marathon report up but I had a decent race and had lots of fun.  Tough course.  Ran an extra mile and a half after missing a well marked turn but I'll chalk that up to good training.  I know it's the cool, hip thing in ultrarunning to pick on Lifetime, but I thought they did a great job with the race.

Here's a cool pic Brandon took:

Dooper says to me on Saturday morning at breakfast, "Hey PBR, you're good with a computer.  Find out who all those anonymous donors are and thank them for me!"  So if you donated to his Western States trip, rest assured he's very thankful and more stoked than any human being in history.

beer 165

Quick liquid lunch before heading out to Leadville on Friday.

beers 162 & 163

Wed evening and Thurs morning I got out for Incline numbers 29 and 30.  Also got a decent 15 mile bike ride in on Thurs afternoon.

Easy Friday morning 40 minute hike with the dog over in the Garden.  Will bail from work as early as possible to head out to Leadville.  Haven't been out there since August.

I'll be at The Scarlet around (hopefully) 1PM if anyone wants to join me for a few $1 beers.  Don't panic if I'm late.

Good luck to all those running Leadville and Mt. Evans this weekend!

beer 161

$100 and I went to a work happy hour at Bristol, then hit Colorado Mountain Brewery on the way home.  CMB is one of my least favorite breweries in Colorado.  In fact, I'd put them down on the level of a BJ's or Rock Bottom. 

Good news for local trail users and fans of the Ponderous Posterior Fat Ass.  Looks like most of those trails in the Bear Creek area are going to open up soon.  But remember, our efforts to become more like Boulder will continue as the Incline will be closing in a few months.

I got a subpoena at work today.  I'm not on trial and not in trouble.  But even though I've broken no laws, they threaten me with arrest if I don't show up.  Fucking bitches.  Really trying hard to get out of this.

beer 160

Had me a quality Leinie for supper Monday night.  Good stuff, as most beer from Wisconsin is.

Shot of me at Balanced Rock during the Garden Ten Miler.  About 1.25 miles into the race, and O'Day was already a beaten man.  Liz was still ahead of me at this point, but not for long.

My curiosity is pretty high for this place, opening soon in downtown CS.  Burgers get most of the foodie notes here, but I'm a pretty big fan of fries as well.  Lots of competition for this joint, as Bingo Burger is right across the street and they have some yummy fries.

Stuff like this bugs me.  I get it, lots of folks want to quit their jobs and be outdoors.  I would love to get out of this cube and spend my days hiking with the dog.  But maybe not having health insurance isn't the way to go.  How long until something like this happens in the ultra world?  Not that I can talk though.  In another life I spent a summer as a bike messenger in Philly without insurance.  I guess my thought process was along the lines that I was much more likely to be killed than injured, so why worry?

Two hour bike ride home from work on Monday.  Cheyenne Canon, Stratton, Bear Creek, White Acres, Red Rock Canyon.  Much better commute than Mr. Lee (who never bugged anyone for money when he was hit on his bike a few years ago).

Tuesday morning was an easy hour back in Red Rock Canyon followed by a ride to work.

Excited to get back out to Leadville this weekend, it's been a while.  Sharpie and I will be meeting at The Scarlet for beers right after the marathon.  Rumor has it they still have $1 PBR.  The Fuller/Brownie rivalry has been pretty tame the last year or three, so I may have to reignite it by getting drunk and trashing his teepee.

Going to try to ride Powerline on Sunday.  Insurance is all paid up for the hospital visit, but hopefully you will all kick in and buy me a new bike once I break the Salsa in half.  You know, 'cuz my passion is the outdoors and all.

beer 158 and 159

I'm going to kick Kircher in the balls next time I see him for that Peru beer.  Holy shit was that some disgusting swill.  The Oatmeal Stout from San Luis Valley Brewing was pretty tasty though.

Got up Pikes on Saturday with Sharpie and some locals.  Pretty clear from Elk Park to the top, though some crappy weather blew in and we weren't able to run back down.  I'm typing this on Monday afternoon and we did get quite a bit of fresh snow last night, so getting high on Barr might be off the table until the weekend.

OK day at the Garden ten miler.  O'Day threw this down on Saturday so I had to make sure I defended my back yard.  Definitely not my best Garden ever but anytime I go sub 70 on that course I'm happy.  Especially on the heels of a pretty good two day bender.  Lots of people judge their fitness in different ways - heart rate, weight, strava segments - but for me, knowing I had a good race while nursing a raging hangover gives me quite a bit of confidence.  A terrific day on the shit talking front as well, as I destroyed O'Day, Brooks, Liz, and Hessek.  And it looks like I won't race any of those bums again for a while, so they should all expect daily e-mails reminding them of their defeats until at least January.

beer 157

90 Schilling from Odell in the Fort.  Grabbed a brew at Alchemy on Friday before heading over to the Red Rock Lounge to wait for Sharpie.  We ended up closing down the Lounge on Friday night.

beer 156

Road Warrior Imperial Rye PA from the awesome folks at Green Flash.

Thurs AM - Incline number 28 with the dog.

Thurs PM - Easy run up to No Name Creek on Barr Trail.  8.5 miles.  Awesome turnout at Manitou Brewing after the run, nice to see the Thurs evening group back out in force.

A shot of me from the Elephant Rock ride on Sunday.  Feel free to go to their website to order a mouse pad or fridge magnet.

Pikes Peak Sports

Posted a quick Leadman update over on Pikes Peak Sports.  Read it here.

beer #155

Picked this up over at Red Rock Liquor.  Boulder Beer claims to be Colorado's first craft brewery.

AM - Decent seven miler on the Garden roads in an hour.

Lunch - Half an hour at the rock gym.

PM - Had to wait around a good chunk of the early evening for the house alarm guy.  Afterwards I just took the dog over to Stratton for an hour hike.

Got me some tix to see Pearl Jam up in Denver this October.  Big band in the history of my life.  I was talking to my buddy Christian, another huge PJ fan the other day, blabbing about past shows we've seen.  We were talking about the first time we saw PJ (mine was at the Merryweather Post Pavillion just outside of  Baltimore when I was a sophomore at Pitt), and laughed when we remembered that we actually had to use the telephone to call and order tickets.  Dark ages!

beer 154

Hopulent IPA from Epic Brewing.  Not sure if they count as Denver or Salt Lake City.  I picked this one up at the brewery/taphouse in Denver.

AM - easy five in Red Rock Canyon.  Legs are still a bit sore.

PM - 20 mile bike ride through the Garden, around Manitou, and back.  100 minutes.

Strava is very cycling obsessed, with segments and KOMs and such.  I wish they would celebrate every segment with a Lanterne Rouge as well.  Then me and O'Day would get e-mails every day about how slow we each went on all the segments here in the Valley.  "Congratulations, there is actually somebody out there who sucks more than you!"

May

Was hoping for a bigger month on the bike, but it is what it is.  Did finish that 100 miler, the farthest I've ever rode by 35+ miles, feeling pretty good so maybe I'm doing something right.

202.89 miles running, 43.5 hours.  50 miles, and what seemed like 43 of those hours, were at Quad Rock.  Also covered 25 at Collegiate Peaks and 26.2 at Colfax.

281.5 miles on the bike, 24.5 hours.  One third of all that at Greenland, most of the other miles came to/from work.

And just like that I'm looking at the beginning of Leadman.  Marathon kicks things off on the 14th.  Only other long runs I'll do will be pacing Shad at Bighorn for 35ish miles and a few trips up and down Pikes. 

I feel really confident for the Marathon and the 10K.  We'll have to see how those other events go.

beers 151, 152, & 153

What has two thumbs and rode his mountain bike 100+ miles on Saturday?  THIS GUY!  I gots the satellite data to prove it too. Here's an action shot.  You can see how technical and grueling the course is:

Twelve laps around Greenland and then a quick out and back to get 100.1 miles.  Only took me 8.5 hours, so I think they just mail me a big buckle from Leadville now.  I would like to point out that on my way to this monumental feat I crushed Peter's best Greenland 50K time by A FULL HOUR!

The best moment of the day was at lap three.  I was filling up my water bottle and I overheard someone mention that one of the eleven hour riders had finished one lap and gone home.  I was so psyched knowing that I wouldn't finish in last place!

Avery was there at the post-ride shindig so I grabbed beer #151.  Avery Brewing and bikes seem to go together really well for me.

Sunday I got up and did it all over again, or at least the metric version.  Just over 60 miles in 4.5 hours, rockin' the Surly Cross Check. Had a great time at both events.  I know I used to make fun of cyclists for a number of reasons, but long ago runners (especially ultrarunners) passed bikers on the race to overtake triathletes at the top of Toolbag Mountain.

After the 100K, Marc and I met up at Maddie's Biergarten in Castle Rock for burgers and beers.  I went with the Ska Wipa Snapa IPA, a beer that I had never heard of before despite being a pretty big fan of Ska Brewing.  Another quality brew from the Durangatangs.

I was sore as hell on Monday.  Not from exertion, but from sitting on a bike for two days.  Still got out on Monday AM for an easy 40 minutes with the dog in the Garden.  Monday PM was a trip up to the Top of the W's on Barr Trail.  Had been breaking 40 minutes consistently for the past few weeks, but today was closer to 45 minutes.  But I still drank some beer like a well rested and tapered champion!  Firestarter IPA from Bonfire Brewing in Eagle.  Good stuff!