Cracker came through town last night and put on one helluva show. Had the fiddle player along so we heard quite a bit of the old Camper Van Beethoven stuff as well.
Low week on the exercise front, been busy with SAR stuff, mostly helping out with Rescue Run stuff. Over 1000 runners signed up so far.
Busy SAR weekend. Saturday afternoon the pager started buzzing with reports of an injured hiker high on Pikes. Around 5PM the team got the call out. Drove up to the summit and started heading down to find a deaf climber and his dog. The Barr Camp caretaker was also dispatched to help search, and he ended up finding the guy above A Frame and pretty far off Barr Trail. We met up with them near A Frame and began the slog down the hill. Luckily the climber was not seriously injured and he was able to hike on his own, but he was exhausted so it was slow going. 4.5 hours from the summit to Barr Camp. Then another 80 minutes to get down to Bob's Road, where we had a vehicle waiting. My pack weighed about 60 pounds and needless to say when I finally got home just after 5AM I was worked. The climber and his dog are both OK.
My buddy Josh took this pic, I'm the guy in front.
Not long after I got home we got a request to help Teller County SAR with an injured snowboarder on Little Italy, sort of close to Glen Cove on the Pikes Peak Highway. I was in no shape to respond to that but luckily we got a good number of folks to help out. Seems the snowboarder fucked himself up pretty good, quite a few broken bones.
Later on Sunday the call went out for a lost hiker up on the Academy. Again, I was in no shape to pull a second all nighter, so I had to pass. The team located the hiker, but it was awful terrain and they were unable to reach the guy in the dark. We had contact via phone with the hiker, and he settled in until first light. Getting myself a good night of sleep, I was on the team that went in to get the guy early Monday morning. He is fine and he promised he would work on his navigation skills.
This was the first weekend of winter. The weather was quite mild, especially up high on Pikes. Had it been colder, things could have been much worse for both rescues I was involved in.
On top of all that I passed my General class HAM exam, got in a 7.5 miler on the Garden trails just before I started hearing about the Pikes mission, and we are dogsitting an 18 month old lab. Good times.
Low mileage week, though that was due more to recovery from Rocket City than the SAR excuses.
run - 20 miles, 4.5 hours
ride - 19 miles, two hours
hike - 27 miles, 15 hours
I was hurting the last five or so miles at Huntsville and worked hard to hold it all together, and I can tell. Can still feel some soreness as I type this on Friday. Couple of dog hikes, couple of dog jogs, and a few bike commutes this week.
Couple 'o pics from the 'thon:
Decent trip down to Huntsville, AL, to get in my 28th state marathon. Rainy weekend, including the entire time I was running the marathon on Sunday.
Jogged the 10k and 5k on Saturday, then the 'thon on Sunday. Not sure why I was expecting a bigger event, but the whole thing was pretty low key. Good race for me, I finished in 3:37:45. Solid second half too, at 13.1 I was running slightly behind the 3:40 pace group and was in 325th place. Ended up in 224th place about two minutes ahead of that pace group. 1462 finishers. Fastest miles of the race were all after mile 21. Completely different than my run in Detroit. Hoping for a sub 3:30 at Eugene and I'm definitely trending in that direction.
Drank some mediocre beers while trying to stay dry the rest of the trip.
Busy SAR week with a lot of training and the Parade of Lights on Saturday.
I put in for Pittsburgh. I'll find out this week if we're going.
For the week:
run - 41 miles, 7.5 hours
ride - 29 miles, three hours
hike - 24.6 miles, 10.5 hours
Decent week despite a bit too much alcohol over the holiday. On Sunday I made it over to the first Incline Club run of the season for a good ten miler which included the incline.
run - 41 miles, just shy of nine hours
hike - 25 miles, eleven hours
bike - zilch; any riding is basically non-existent at the moment
