Rescue Run

Couple 'o action shots of me at this year's Rescue Run. You can see how icy it was.

Ran 25:02 on a ridiculuously hard 5K+ cross country course this morning. Report will follow. Congrats to #2 female finisher Catwoman!

CCAF

So besides getting all kindsa benefits like groupies and discounts to big races like the Run the Register, being in the Air Force Reserve automatically enrolls me into the Community College of the Air Force.

I don't really want to go back to school, but I figured that most of my credits from Pitt would transfer, I'd take advantage of the 100% tuition assistance for Pikes Peak Community College, take a few classes full of hottie co-eds, and get an associate degree in criminal justice.

So I called up the education center on Peterson this afternoon. Here's the main conversation:

Me: "Hi, how do I get college credits transferred towards the CCAF program?"

Ed guy: "Where are the credits from?"

Me: "The University of Pittsburgh."

Ed guy: (long pause) "Where is that located?"

Me: (long pause): "Uh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania"

Me: (after another too long of a pause from the ed guy) "It's an actual school in Pittsburgh, not some online diploma mill."

Ed guy: "OK, you'll hafta bring in your transcripts in and we'll take a look at them."

So hopefully next week I'll be on my way towards that prestigous CCAF certificate. Hopefully it won't dumb me down to the level of the AF education center workers.

run #32 - back to the Incline

Snow covered and slippery, but the Incline was definitely doable. Took me a whopping 38 minutes to get to the top, and a hell of a long time to get back down, but the slow pace didn't mean it wasn't still a killer workout. For those that did the asshole trail in El Paso, the black top road to the top of the mountain that just about sapped the will of every hasher was no problem for me, since it wasn't half as bad as doing the Incline.

Start time: 3PM
Distance: 4.0 Miles
Time: 1:09:41
Pace: 17:25 per mile
Weather: 35F, chilly but no wind; beautiful views of a snowed in city

FRBs rock!

Here's a pic of the FRB's from the 16.5 mile asshole trail. The sign was found somewhere on trail.
FYI, the redhead Arizona chick offered me a blow job for the shirt I'm wearing in this pic. I turned it down, because she hadn't done the trail (though I did offer her an Austin hash shirt instead). Asshole hounds hafta keep the standards high!

here's to plan B...

...which I knew nothing about.

congrats!

My dad retires today after working the last 600 years at a jewelery store in Sunbury, PA!

blast from the past

Sunday will mark the end of my rookie year in Colorado. Been trying to work on a "best of" post, but the change from Adelphia to Comcast has screwed up my internet at home so it may be a bit late.

But if yunz're bored at work today, here's a link to all my posts from last January. Included are my final days as an Austinite, the Bandera 100K, TexMex '06, Durango Snowdown, and the move to Colorado. And, though it seems like a decade ago, the run up to the Steelers super bowl victory.

run #31 - Rebekah's loop

New course this morning. Down Cache La Poudre to CRC, down Tejon, cut across Acacia Park, west on Kiowa, west on Boulder to the Olympic Training Center, and back home. Good loop, glad I was able to drag myself out of bed on a cold morning for it. Sure wish more people would shovel their walks up here, and that includes the City of Colorado Springs finally plowing some of the side streets.

Start time: 5:15AM
Distance: 5.5 Miles
Time: 53:04
Pace: 9:38 per mile
Weather: 9F, chilly and windy, much better suited for staying in bed

run #30 - CRC happy hour

Met at the Colorado Running Club for their weekly happy hour run. Unfortunately, my watch crapped out just after halfway, so I gotta guestimate. I'm pretty sure I had a good negative split though. Hard run on the slippery Fountain Creek trails, but the free Laughing Lab afterwards is more than worth it.

Start time: 6PM
Distance: 5.7 miles
Time: 44:00
Pace: 7:43 per mile
Weather: 35F, clear but chilly

WOOHOO!

Stanton Moore Trio this Sunday at the Black Sheep!

friends in low places

I actually knew the guy who has been charged with starting the recent apartment fire here in CSCO. Real class act, shoulda been in jail for drug use but the prisons are too crowded here. Looks like they'll find him some space now though!

more TexMex trash...

I'm not gonna steal Gagger's thunder by stealing all her pictures, but I think this one sums up the weekend pretty good...

I'm never drinking Absinthe again!

run #29 - the asshole trail!

I normally don't count hashes as a run, but I gotta make an exception for the recent asshole trail in El Paso! Greatest trail I've ever hashed! Had tons of difficult checks, a check back 69, two beer stops with warm Tecate, a college campus, lots of elevation change, and lots of good Texas shiggy. I was one of four who was fooled into the entire check back 69, which added two miles to trail, and I also decided to bag the summit of Franklin Mountain since we got so close to the top, and at the end trail measured out to 16.5 miles! Woohoo!

Start time: 12:30PM
Distance: 16.5 miles
Time: 4:11:06
Pace: 15:13 per mile (this includes standing around for the beer stops and the class 4 scramble up to Franklin Mountain)
Weather: 60F, warm and sunny

CKH3 #94

Wankers,

Despite the recent debacle that was TexMex, the Kimchi hash will be on the piss again this Saturday!

Start point: Jim's Neighborhood Lounge, 1833 Peterson Road, CSCO, 80915. Not exactly sure but I believe this is near the intersection of Peterson Road and Palmer Park Road.

Start time: 3:30PM

Hare: Grannylingus. He said it would be just a bit shorter than the Asshole trail in El Paso.

on-on
brownie

King Cool

The radio station I listen to at work, 98.1 KKFM, just played Donnie Iris!

shitcanned!

Got fired from my job at the liquor store yesterday! Well, wasn't really fired, but the boss wanted me to show up to work at 5PM from now on, which I'm not able to do. So no more cheaper booze for me. However, I'll once again be a regular at Quinn's Running Club! Of course, no running tonight as I'll be at the bar watching the Pitt/UConn game and then off to the CMC meeting, but I will enjoy a few pints of Laughing Lab and share some El Paso stories tonight.

quick update

Had to run to Kinko's to print out some CoTex rego forms, so I thought I'd post a quick update.

Day 1: I got retardedly drunk, had a spectacular fall down a mountain during the hash, threw up at King's X, and ate lunch at Sunset Pizzera. Great start to the weekend!

on-on to Rosa's Cantina!

TexMex!

Woohoo! Finally time for the road trip to El Paso/Juarez! Just to show yunz how much cooler than the average hasher I am, while everyone else has been singing that horse-theif-gets-shot tune that mentions Rosa's Cantina (I'll be eating there tomorrow!) I've had the El Paso song from the Gourds running in my head.

I'll be offline until at least Monday, hope you wankers can survive without me updating my blog for that long.

new monsoon

OK, so I should have posted this blog last week, but the New Monsoon show was awesome! Lincoln, you're a total fag for bailing on this, I doubt you'll get to see a show this good while you're living in the Springs. Not quite as good as the time I saw 'em after the MOFRO/Galactic show at Stubb's, but I can't ask for a better show at the Black Sheep.

Rest of the pics can be seen here.

Colorado weather

Woohoo! Headed out of town at just the right time! Weather forcasts for the Springs includes another blizzard and highs not expected to reach double digits! All you Coloradians think of the Kimchi hashers this weekend, we'll be running around drinking in shorts!

hey, it's all gonna work out...here's sports...

1. It was really great to see Ohio State get beat so badly last night. I've always thought of that team and their fans to be classless. When I was at Pitt, we, uh, had somewhat of a below average football team, and OSU came to town one Saturday and beat us by 70 points. Not exaggerating there. There was no call for it and I've hated them ever since.

2. If I had a vote in the AP poll, Bosie State woulda been my number one. Well, they woulda been #2, behind Pitt, but you catch my drift.

3. I'm glad Mark McGwire didn't get into the hall of fame. I wish Goose Gossage would have gotten in.

4. Felt super old today when someone asked me my marathon PR. Not too shabby with a 2:55 (better than Lance, FYI), but they asked when I ran that. It was Pittsburgh 1997! A decade ago! Sheesh.

5. Free pint 'o brew to whomever can figure out which comedian said the quote that inspired the title of this post. Yes, Smut, I still owe you a pint from the Kelly Bundy trivia, and you'll get it if you ever decide to hash in Colorado.

fuck Winter Park!

The front page of today's CS Gazette had an article on Alma, at 10,578 feet above sea level the highest town in the country. But recently, the yuppie ski resort town of Winter Park (many hashers were at the Invihash there a few years ago) annexed a mountain so they could now claim to be the highest.

I'm a huge fan of Alma, population of less than 200. Nice little mountain town that I've visited several times due to it's proximity to several 14ers. Only two pubs in the town, the South Park Saloon and Alma's Only Bar (possible pub crawl site for CoTex), both of which get you treated like a local if you visit. Nothing like the yuppie ski bars where you gotta wait 20 minutes for the priviledge of paying $4 for a can of budweiser.

Alma also won cool points with me for taking up a lease for the DeCaLiBro land. When Nicole and I hiked those 14ers last August, we were tresspassing. The mining company, due to liability issues, didn't want folks on their land. Enter Alma, who now leases the land and any liability issues that go along with it. And the hike is now legal. Which gives me a good excuse to go back and climb 'em all again!

Anyways, the town of Winter Park, which sits at just over 9,000 feet, now claims 12,060 feet, because one of it's mountains (probably Mary Jane) hits that height. And of course WP now claims to be America's highest town. And you know that all those yuppie posers who need a ride to the top of a mountain are already buying the "Get High in Winter Park" shirts.

Just venting here. In my short time in Colorado (coming up on the year anniversary, FYI) my favorite places have been the small mining towns like Alma, Fairplay, Leadville, Salida, Lake City...I could go on and on. I find the few major ski towns I've been to way too fake, and it irks me to see the big ski places trying to take something away from the smaller towns.

Read the article here.

AF weekend

Finished up my second weekend with the Air Force Reserve.

Saturday was a bunch of newcomers briefings. Really boring. A lot of the people here aren't from Colorado, so one of the briefings was about the city of Colorado Springs. The instructor asked me where my hometown was, and of course I said Pittsburgh. He then told me that since I was from sea level, if I were to climb Pikes Peak the altitude would make me sick and perhaps kill me! I told him I would keep that in mind...

Sunday was spent in the unit storage shed cleaning weapons. Not my favorite thing to do, especially since I didn't even fire the weapon. But it was fun bullshitting and getting to know everyone. Also got the paperwork to go pick up my uniforms, so I should have some more military pics soon.

Found out that the cop school I'll have to go to is 4.5 months long. It's in San Antonio, so yunz Texans will hafta deal with me during the upcoming year. Trying to get there as soon as I can, I'd love to have an excuse to bail on this Colorado winter.

Tried to volunteer to go to Kurdistan (sp?) for a 45 day deployment to guard an air base that we use to re-fuel planes going to Iraq and Afghanistan. They wouldn't let me since I haven't been to the above school.

As soon as I'm allowed to volunteer for stuff like that, I'm gonna try to go to Afghanistan. I want to do a mountain patrol while I'm young enough that I won't crap my pants if someone shoots at me.

run #28

Got in a decent run this evening, highlighted by a spectacular sunset behind Pikes Peak. Still a lot of snow and ice on this course, which makes for slow going.

Start time: 4:20PM
Distance: 9.0 miles (Monument Creek)
Time: 1:29:38
Pace: 9:57 per mile
Weather: 17F, "feels like" 4F

Leadville week #7

Decent week, though mileage was a bit short due to a 5K race and the Air Force weekend.

Week #7 distance: 29.9 miles
Week #7 time: 5:06:54
Average week #7 pace: 10:15 per mile

Total quest distance: 175.8 miles
Total quest time: 28:07:03
Average quest pace: 9:35 per mile
Average weekly mileage: 25.1 miles

three bands

Stole this idea off of Lulu's blog, but since her blog sucks and nobody reads it, I thought I'd post it here. I listed Widespread Panic, John Butler Trio, and the Beatles. The question has been bugging me all morning though, that's a tough call to hafta make.

If you could only listen to three band/artists for the rest of your life, who would they be?

run #27 - more snow

I stepped out my back door this morning and was greeted by even more snow. Supposed to get up to four more inches from this storm. Big deal for me, since the city still hasn't bothered to plow either Alexander or Willamette Roads from the first blizzard we had. Spent most of the run trying to keep from falling down, this is probably the worst the roads have been all winter. Best part of the run was deciding to call in sick for work today!

Start time: 5:45AM
Distance: 5.6 miles (Knob Hill - east)
Time: 51:00
Pace: 9:06 per mile
Weather: 30F, heavy snowfall

mark your calendars

Just talked with MeatGazer, and the dates for the Sand Dunes hash campout will be May 11-13! Woohoo! Quite a few of those dunes are listed on Summitpost too, so besides getting all shitty drunk I can pad my summit list!

I am not a wus...

Yes, while I did accidentally shy away from the Rescue Run 10K for the much less challenging 5K, I did get my entry in today for the San Juan Solstice! Woohoo! Technical trail running averaging over 12,000 feet!

CS - new live music capital of the world!

New Monsoon will be playing the Black Sheep on Wednesday. Doors at 8PM, $10 to get in. I'd invite everyone over to my place for a warm up but I really don't have much of a place now. We could always hit up the Knob Hill or Wagon Wheel first.

Opening band is Manitou's own Creating a Newsence!

Gonna be a great show!

Lance is a pussy

What a chode. Probably woulda gotten his ass kicked by some of the Colorado mountain bikers before he failed a drug test anyways.

Pussying out on Leadville

run #26 - Rescue Run 5K

Beautiful way to start the new year at Palmer Park this morning! I screwed up and took a wrong turn, ended up doing the 5K instead of the planned 10K. Whoops. Didn't run too bad, and my feared lack of speed isn't as bad as I thought it would be. I ran 22:11, which sounds slow but due to all the ice and the hills, and the fact that I thought I was doing a 10K for the first two miles, the time isn't too slow. In fact, I'll be looking to go sub-20 in two weeks at the Cross Country Caper.

Had quite a few hashers show up, below are Chucky Cheeks, All Nighter, and Bloody Z.

Start time: 10AM

Distance: 3.1 miles through the icy roads of Palmer Park

Time: 22:11

Pace: 7:09 per mile (first mile, up an icy hill, was 7:40)

Weather: 40F, clear skies, windy

great flood of '06

Finally have a bit of computer access, so here are the flood pics. Can't really tell from the pics how much water there was, but trust me it was way more than you ever want to have covering the floors of your house.

run #25 - great way to end the year

Great run with the Incline Club today. Went for an hour up Barr Trail, making it to the point where a road veers off to take you to the top of the Incline. Here the snow became too deep so I headed back down and over for a big loop around Garden of the Gods. Two of the most beautiful places I've ever run. Perfect run to end the year, followed by lunch at the Purple Castle!

Start time: 8AM
Distance: approx 12.2 miles (Barr Trail/GOTG)
Time: 2:24:05
Pace: 11:48 per mile
Weather: 40F, beautiful Colorado morning

Leadville week #6

Much, much better week than last week, that's for sure. Mileage will once again slip the next two weeks due to a reserve weekend and TexMex, but after that things should start to get interesting, assuming the weather cooperates.

Week #6 distance: 40.4 miles
Week #6 time: 6:07:28
Average week #6 pace: 9:05 per mile

Total quest distance: 145.9 miles
Total quest time: 23:00:09
Average quest pace: 9:27 per mile
Average weekly mileage: 24.3 miles

run #24 - the blizzard wins again

Took me over an hour to do the first five miles of this trek, most of it through at least a foot of snow, with drifts up to my waste at points. Real slow, but it sure was a lot of fun! The five mile point dumps me onto the Monument Creek trail and I did the Jack Quinn's loop, and that was fine, except for a little ice where you go under Uintah. So there should be no lame excuses for the usual suspects to bail out of their Tuesday run.

Assuming I'm not lazy and get out of bed for the Incline Club tomorrow, this'll be my first back-to-back long run in my Leadville training! Great thing to do before my race on Monday!

Start time: 8AM
Distance: 11.5 miles (Monument Creek trails)
Time: 2:06:44
Pace: 11:01 per mile
Weather: 35F, nice and calm morning, lots of snow

run #23 - beating the blizzard

Blizzards are a window into human nature.
When they are predicted and they don't hit, most people grumble.
When they are predicted and they do hit, most people grumble.

Glad I got up early to run today, we're being blasted my more snow. Not that I'm afraid of snow, of course (I'm not afraid of anything).

Start time: 5:15AM
Distance: 5.6 miles (Knob Hill - East)
Time: 47:05
Pace: 8:24 per mile
Weather: 30F, nice and calm morning

run #22

Quick run at the Colorado Running Company last night. Easy first mile as we stayed with a flatlander, but the pace picked up pretty good the final miles.

Start time: 6PM
Distance: 4.2 miles (Fountain Creek trails)
Time: 31:15
Pace: 7:26 per mile
Weather: 37F, clear night

I'll be there someday!

The Colorado Mountain Club reports that over 1200 people have now climbed all of Colorado's 54 (I count 56 but whatever) 14ers. I'll be on that list someday! My current count is twelve, and my count for the centennial list (top 100 peaks) is thirteen.

Read about it here.

miracle in Moab

I try to read as many of these kinds of survival stories as I can, knowing it could be me out there someday. This one involved a local trail runner/adventure racer and will be a favorite of dog lovers.

jihad quote of the week

I was just reading about the mess over in Ethiopia/Somalia, and this quote stuck out for some reason.

"Ethiopia is my enemy, I will not sell bananas any more. I will take my gun and go for jihad. Otherwise I am sure they will kill me in my banana kiosk if I wait for them here."
-Muse Ali Omar, Mogadishu banana seller

Winston Churchill would be so proud.

run #21

Decent run despite all the junk food I ate earlier in the day. Pace suffered due to all the wankers who still haven't shoveled their walks, but at least I got in a good run before heading down to celebrate Christmas at Tony's.

Start time: 5:30PM
Distance: 5.6 miles (Knob Hill - west)
Time: 49:18
Pace: 8:48 per mile
Weather: 30F, high gusts of wind, chilly, icy

flood update

Having to spend Christmas day moving all my crap from the basement to the upstairs apartment. Fun fun. Had the professional cleaners come in and they've done an incredible job. After the bulk of the water had drained, they brought in a huge vacuum cleaner and still sucked up over 200 gallons of water. I immediately asked if the vacuum had a girlfriend and if I could take her on a date. Not there are two huge dehumidifiers and several industrial size fans running nonstop in my apartment.

run #20 - christmas eve

Started off just wanting to get a few miles in, ended up with a pretty good run. Almost nobody on the Fountain Creek trails due to the holiday.

Start time: 3:30PM
Distance: 13.5 miles (Fountain creek to Tejon)
Time: 1:53:06
Pace: 8:22 per mile
Weather: 30F, high gusts of wind, chilly and wet

Leadville week #5

Crappy week due to the holidays, shitty weather, work, and the flood.

Week #5 distance: 9.5 miles
Week #5 time: 1:28:04
Average week #5 pace: 9:16 per mile

Total quest distance: 105.5 miles
Total quest time: 16:52:51
Average quest pace: 9:36 per mile
Average weekly mileage: 21.1 miles

fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck...

Came home from work last night to find my apartment underwater. Seems a pipe broke and the drainage wasn't working. Thanks to Z and Lincoln for helping bring the situation under control.

Merry christmas.

avalanche

First Colorado avalanche death of the season yesterday, read about it here. I think skiiers are dorks, but a lot of my CO friends ski, so as NIPS would say, "Let's be careful out there."

Even under a current avalanche warning for Pikes Peak, which doesn't happen very often.

run #19 - screw the blizzard

You know it's bad when your local weather is the headline on CNN.com. But while I had no problem letting the weather cancel work I wasn't gonna let it derail my training. Conditions made for another slow day, but it was good to get outside.

Start time: 1:30PM
Distance: 4.75 miles (Knob Hill - south)
Time: 42:44
Pace: 8:59 per mile
Weather: 32F, "feels like" 18F, slippery but much better than yesterday

not afraid to whoop a gal's arse!

Late Nite thought she could kick my ass too...until I broke her arm! To add insult to injury I even stole her sling afterwards.

Woohoo!

This is a reminder to all of you summer sports enthusiasts that the shortest day of the year is upon us!!! Yeah!!!!! Summer is just around the corner...well kind of...

Floyd vs Lance

Rumor has it that Floyd Landis has signed up for the Leadville 100 mile mountain bike race. Lance Armstrong has already signed up also. Should be a good race! Of course, if either one of those two had any balls they'd be doing the 100 mile trail run so I could kick both their asses!

Update: not a rumor anymore. Click here for details.

hashing in Runner's World

The latest issue of Runner's World (January '07), their annual new year's motivational issue, has "The Life List," a list of things every lame-ass, dorky road runner should do within their lives. Included in the list are places runners should visit (Oxford's Iffey Road track - site of the first sub-four minute mile), places runners should run (Boston's Heartbreak Hill), books runners should read, even people runners should try to imitate (like Steve Prefontaine - I certainly have the heavy drinking part down!). The best item on the list, though, is "Wear a Red Dress." Quoted from the article:

Running is fun. Beer is fun. Put them together and you have the ridiculuously fun sport of hashing. For the uninitiated, one person (the hare) sets off running and leaves clues (usually sprinkles of flour) for the pack (harriers) to follow. At the end of the trail there's beer, if not an actual bar.

The concept originated in 1938 at Kuala Lumpur's Selangor Club -a.k.a. the Hash House- when a bunch of bored Brits created the first "kennel." There are now more than 1500 kennels around the world. "I've hashed in Belize, London, and Helsinki," says Jay Hopkins, the former editor of the hashing info web site half-mind.com.

A U.S. version came in 1988 in California when a woman joined the previously all-male sport and ran in heels and a red dress. The on-on party after has been memorialzed in song, verse, and Red Dress Runs from San Diego to Cairo. Red dress is mandatory. Hairy legs okay too.

sixty one!

The weekend's activities have brought my Colorado Springs pub list up to 61! With a little effort I'll be able to celebrate #69 on my one year anniversary of being a Coloradian.

mountain rescue

Details of a local rescue from the A-Frame can be found on my Pikes blog. Great to know that people like Teresa and Neil, the El Paso County SAR, and others are out there in case I ever get into trouble on a mountain.

run #18 - winter wonderland

Can't believe I got my arse out to run today, but sometimes you gotta force yourself to deal with shitty conditions to appreciate the good weather even more. Colorado was hit with a massive blizzard late this morning, but it didn't stop me from getting a few miles in. Snow was about six to eight inches and still falling, but there were lots of drifts I had to plow through, some reaching well above my knee. Felt like Rocky when he was gearing up to fight that ugly Russian, even had to stop to push some doc's BMW off the curb over by Memorial Hospital.

Start time: 3PM
Distance: 4.75 miles (Knob Hill - south)
Time: 45:20
Pace: 9:32 per mile
Weather: 23F, "feels like" 7F, low to nil visability

white christmas...

So much for the 80 hour work week. My "real" job has closed it's office until Friday. The Springs is getting hammered, supposed to get up to a foot of snow with winds reaching 60 mph. Woohoo! Great running weather! Especially for some loops around Memorial Lake, where there's nothing to protect me from the wind!

on drinking...

"The trouble with jogging is that the ice falls out of your glass."
-Martin Mull (1943 - )

Good luck to all the wankers doing the pub run tomorrow. Should be a great mix of runners and hashers. I better see lots of pics posted (most of scantily clad women, of course).

work sucks

Working 7AM to 10:30PM every day this week, so sorry for not updating my blog every 15 minutes like I usually do.

Great alcoholic weekend with the P2H4 and Tejon St. Pub Crawl.

Pics are here.

upcoming races

Gonna give a shot at getting some of my old speed back into my legs, most of which was left behind when I started trail running. Even signed up for a few local races.

On January 1st I'll be doing the Rescue Run over in Palmer Park. 10K. Mostly road, with a few trails thrown in for good measure. I'll be looking to break 43 minutes, though a lot of that will depend on how bad I feel from New Year's Eve.

On January 20th I'll be doing the Cross Country Caper 5K in Bear Creek Park. Might try to go sub-20, but it is a cross-country race so we'll see.

Gonna do some of the Pikes Peak Road Runners winter series. I'll hafta miss two of them, but I'll be able to get to the eight miler and the Black Forest 20K.

On February 17th I'm thinking about taking my mountain bike up to Denver for the Chilly Cheeks Du, a ten mile bike/four mile run.

On February 25th, MeatGazer and I are gonna go up to Denver and Run the Register. 47 floors, 1,014 steps. Put all my Incline training to good use. Hafta check the calendar, hopefully there's a Denver hash that day.

Also looking to get in some snowshoe races.

And that's the current race schedule. Should keep my pretty busy during the winter.

Leadville week #4

Another good week on the road to Leadville.

Week #4 distance: 32.3 miles
Week #4 time: 3:13:12
Average week #4 pace: 10:17 per mile

Total quest distance: 96.0 miles
Total quest time: 15:24:47
Average quest pace: 9:37 per mile
Average weekly mileage: 24.0 miles

run #17 - return to CRUD

Up early for a good run with the guys from Team CRUD. Ran along the Sante Fe trail onto the USAF Academy horse stables and goofed off on some of the trails back there.

Start time: 7AM
Distance: 9.0 miles
Time: 1:20:29
Pace: 8:56 per mile
Weather: great morning, temps pushing 50F. Could be the last of the good weather for Colorado though...

the incline

One of the staples of my training schedule since I moved to Colorado has been the Incline. I've been known for doing some crazy workouts ever since I started running, but this is definitely the hardest workout I've ever done. I could post graphs and pictures all day, but you just don't get a feel for the Incline unless you've done it. To put things into perspective, I have a 4:32 PR for the mile (and could probably run sub 5:30 nowadays) but I have only broken half an hour on the Incline once. In fact, my 5 mile PR (at the T-Cloud Turkey Trot in Austin) is faster than my Incline PR.

The pic below is a shot of the Incline from the start of the Pikes marathon.

To clarify things, the Incline Club, who I run with on Sunday's (and Thursday's come spring), has nothing to do with the Incline, though most all the members do work out on the Incline.

For more info, including the trespassing controversey surrounding the land, click here.

Run #16 - the incline

Good workout at the Incline today. Didn't quite have the charge up the hill like last week, but still broke 32 minutes. Round trip in 57:14, then some good time in the gym at the Y.

Start time: 3PM
Distance: 4.0 miles
Time: 57:14
Pace: 14:18 per mile
Weather: beautiful, clear afternoon, 54F! Mid December and shorts and short sleeved shirt at 9300 feet in Colorado!

Wooohoooo!

Not only is New Monsoon playing the Black Sheep in early January, but Creating a New Sense is opening! And, if that weren't good enough, tix are only eight bucks!

competitive hashing at it's finest!

Davey Crotchit and I made a bet this morning concerning the Asshole trail at TexMex. The loser has to drink a shoe full of beer. I have no worries as there's no way he'll out hash me.



I couldn't find a pic of Davey, so I posted this one. Free beer to the first person to tell me who the old guy is.

Every now and then Net comes up with something funny. (Please note: this post does not apply to beggin' for it or DNA Princess)

CKH3 hasmas party

I know there were several hundred million pictures taken at the recent Kimchi hashmas throwdown at Arctic Brewing, but for whatever reason nobody wants to post 'em. Until then, here's a random shot that includes "The Chandelier," a beer bong that allows four hashers to simultaneously enjoy a pitcher and a half each of Arctic homebrew in just a few seconds.

Run #15 - some homeless chick let me read the "Kimchi Book of Essentials" while she gave me a cleveland steamer in a port-o-john at Boulder park!

OK, that really didn't happen, just trying a trick I learned from Lulu to spice up an otherwise boring post.

What did happen was that, even after a great workout at the gym, I still had some steam to burn off and decided to do a late night run. So I had a few beers and threw on four layers of clothes and took off.

Start time: 10PM
Distance: 4.75 miles (Knob Hill - south)
Time: 34:37
Pace: 7:17 per mile
Weather: beautiful, clear evening, 41F at 10PM!
Number of beers consumed in the twenty minutes prior to this run: 2 (can of PBR and bottle of Breckenridge Vanilla Porter)

Had it not been for the extra layers of clothes which slowed me down towards the end, I coulda kept under seven minutes per mile. Which gave me a goal for my upcoming Rescue Run on January 1st. I'm gonna try to break 43 minutes (i.e., sub seven per mile). If I were doing the Cap 10K or the Great Race this wouldn't be a big deal, but the Rescue loops through extremely hilly Palmer Park. Should be a good challenge.

I'm moving to El Salvador!

Except I'm gonna make sure I always finish 4th!

Grain alcohol is good

happy anniversary!

It was three years ago today that the 4th ID and the SF spooks captured Saddam. It was also the last time I was in a major firefight, in Bayji, north of Tikrit. Nice to see Iraq has become a bastion of democracy since then, eh?

Congrats again to the mighty 4th, who will return home from their second Iraq deployment this week, take some leave, and move up here to Fort Carson. Sorry ladies, but not all the guys in the division are as cool as me.

run #14 - not so lazy after all!

Forgot that my office closed early today. So it wasn't that I was lazy this morning, it was that I wanted to do a daylight run in Palmer Park!

On another note, I mailed in rego for both TexMex and the Rescue Run 10K today. The rescue run will be my first road race in a LONG time.

Also re-joined the YMCA today (with a big, fat military discount!). I liked the city gym I had been going to, but they didn't have basketball courts and my hoops skills were starting to suffer.

Anyways, the stats:

Start time: 2:00PM
Distance: approx 5.9 miles
Time: 60:26
Pace: 10:14 per mile (sounds slow but the Palmer Park trails are super technical)
Weather: beautiful Colorado day, 50F.

I am a pathetic loser.

When my alarm went off at 4:55AM this morning to awake me for my run, I immediately reset it for 6:30AM and went back to bed. I'll never finish Leadville and should stick to the one mile fun run portions of local road 5K's.

run #13 - Ute Pass

Not sure how I was able to get out of bed this morning, but I drug myself to the Incline Club. Ended up doing the Ute Pass out and back. Felt like hell, had nothing in the tank to get me up all the hills, but I stuck it out.

Start time: 8:00AM
Distance: 8.6 miles
Time: 1:39:46
Pace: 11:36 per mile (had to hike up a lot of those hills)
Weather: beautiful Colorado day, 37F.

Leadville - week #3

Missing the Incline Club on Sunday and all the hashmas parties combined to keep my mileage low this week.

Week #3 distance: 20.2 miles
Week #3 time: 3:13:12
Average week #3 pace: 9:33 per mile

Total quest distance: 63.7 miles
Total quest time: 9:52:15
Average quest pace: 9:17 per mile
Average weekly mileage: 21.2 miles

red dress pics

Pics from the Kimchi red dress @ red rocks can be seen here.

run #12 - the Incline breakthrough

After doing the Incline religiously for over a year now, I finally met my goal of a sub-30 minute ascent. Smoked yesterday's trek in 29:34! Ice made the trip back down the Barr Trail a bit treacherous though, and I ended up doing the loop in 57:38. Of course, any health benefits of this run were negated by the damage I did to my liver at the hashmas party.

Start time: 2:30PM
Distance: 4.o miles
Time: 57:38 (including the PR on the Incline)
Pace: 14:24 per mile (highly skewed by the 2000 foot elevation gain of the one mile long Incline)Weather: beautiful Colorado day, 55F.

P2H4 hashmas party

Can someone fill me in on what happened last night? I don't really remember a whole lot...

I moved from Austin because of the cold weather!

It is currently a full ten degrees warmer in Colorado Springs than it is in Austin. I'm off to do the Incline, then it's time to get my drunk on! Woohoo!

for the St. Louis fans...

Seems like a really great town up there.

warm beer sucks

x-mas pub crawl on Dec 17!

Found this on the internet, think I'm gonna do it. You hafta sign up today if any of yunz Coloradians wanna join me.

pub crawl

rest in peace

Listen to the Beatles while having a brew this evening, John Lennon died 26 years ago today.

life is good

Pittsburgh beat the living tar out of the cleveland brownies last night. Don't look now, but my Steelers have won 4 of the past 5 and are getting hot at the right time...

for the record...

1. So I was talking to Tiffany last night, as she'll be visiting the Springs soon and asked me for some cool things to do while she's here. I was suggesting some of the cooler things around here (the hash, several pubs, the Incline, the zoo...) and she blurts out, "So, are you really gay?" I spent the next half hour trying to explain things, and I still don't think she believes I'm straight.

I know a lot of people I never met read this, so just because all my married Kimchi buddies (who are jealous of my freedom) call me gay, I don't really like dudes. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

2. What's up with people having second and third "favorite" teams? DTR, who says he's a UCLA fan, was rooting for USC. Gagger, an A&M grad, roots for UT quite often. By the reasoning given to me, I should be rooting for Penn State (local team) and West Virginia (Big East needs bowl winners) for the upcoming bowl games, which Pitt has decided to stay out of. In actuality, I'm rooting for those two teams' airplanes to collide 30,000 feet up in the sky on their way home from the bowl games, which I hope both teams lost.

run #11

Made it to the happy hour run at the Colorado Running Club tonight. Nice, easy out and back five miler. The snow and ice have finally melted, though running on a trail in the pitch black that now comes with 6PM doesn't make for a fast time. Tried to hit the gym afterwards, but the damn city gym closes at 7:30PM during the holidays. So I went home and drank beer and ate a huge bag of Middleswarth BBQ chips instead. Oh well, it's the thought that counts.

Start time: 6PM
Distance: 5 miles
Time: 42:38
Pace: 8:31 per mile
Weather: beautiful, clear evening, 35F, "feels like" 25F

math sucks

So this chick at work comes up to me today and says, "I need to test out of college math, can you do the exam for me?"

I told her I took lots of calculus and statistics at Pitt, but that was some time ago and I've killed off a brain cell or two since then. But I figured I'd do my good deed and brush up on some stuff and then take the exam for her.

No dice, had to take the test this morning. And I passed! Woohoo, not that I want to go back to school, but if I did I wouldn't hafta take any more math! Can't believe I remembered all that crap, I really gotta increase my drinking.

celebrate your freedom!

Today is a momentus day in American history - the day that the 18th Amendment was repealed and prohibition officially came to an end.

So, raise a toast today to the 21st Amendment and your freedom to drink!

run #10 - faking the all nighter

So last night on my run I saw a frequent visitor to the Knob Hill Lounge heading into the bar. I was running towards the mountains. On this morning's run I saw him again, heading out to work. I ran the opposite direction, so it looked like I was coming from the mountains. On both runs I was wearing the same jogging pants and jacket. I got a really strange look from him. I wonder if he thought I ran all night?

Start time: 5:30AM
Distance: 5.6 miles (Knob Hill - West)
Time: 47:54
Pace: 8:33 per mile
Weather: clear skies, slippery sidewalks, 20F, "feels like" 10F.

run #9

Added a little extra distance to my Knob Hill loop, upped it to 5.6 miles. Snow and ice are still making the going slow. Took me damn near nine minutes to do the first mile, those lazy Knob Hill-ians (espeaially the wankers at the Olympic Training Center) need to shovel their friggin' sidewalks already!

Start time: 7:45PM
Distance: 5.6 miles (Knob Hill - East)
Time: 45:02
Pace: 8:02 per mile
Weather: clear skies, great view of the moon, 15F.

Lance Armstrong is afraid of me!

If he had a full set of cajones, he'd be doing the run instead of the bike. Can't really blame him though, he couldn't beat my road marathon PR so there's no way he could take me on the trails.

support the troops!

There is no truth to the rumor that Davey Crotchit is ghost writing my blog, though a lot of the stuff he sends me ends up on here.

Great stuff by the Asylum Street Spankers! I haven't figured out how to post youtube stuff, so you'll hafta click here to see it.

HAIL TO PITT!!!

Great pic, shows how clearly overmatched the Auburn Tigers were in the game today. #2 Pitt now stands at 8-0!

Leadville week #2

Results for the second week of the Leadville quest. From here 'till March or so the toughest part won't be the running but will be getting out the door into the frigid Colorado winter.

Week #2 distance: 29.25 miles
Week #2 time: 4:49:28
Average week #2 pace: 9:53 per mile

Total quest distance: 43.5 miles
Total quest time: 6:39:03
Average quest pace: 9:10 per mile

Might hafta start playing with the stats a bit, maybe give the Incline it's own category so it doesn't screw up my average pace so much.

for the songmeisters...

Got the latest hashmas hymnal from Davey, always guaranteed to make beer come out of my nose as I read it. I'll start posting some of the tunes, you Kimchi wankers need to learn some of these for the red dress @ red rocks on Saturday!


Joy To The Girls
Melody - Joy to the World
Joy to the girls,
From the Kimchi Hash,
Your present's in my pants.
I had no time to wrap it,
Now hurry up and lap it,
Repeat that bobbing stroke,
Repeat that bobbing stroke,
Repeat, Repeat,
Until you choke.

Joy To The Girls II
Melody - Joy to the World
Joy to the world,
I've finally cum,
A moment I enjoy,
Now get your fucking beanie,
Up off my shriveled weenie,
And call yourself a cab,
And get me one more beer,
And remember, you're doing it,
Again next year.

this ain't the Army anymore...

The tally from my first day with the Air Force Reserve:

Hours worked: 2.5
Pay to be received: $150.00

Thank you for paying your taxes. Oh, and by "work" I don't mean I really did anything, just sat around in a conference room telling war stories to all the newbys. I really appreciate the Air Force because by them flying supplies into Iraq it reduces the need for convoys along the roads, and hence saves lives of Army folks, but sheesh, it's not really the military. However, in those 2.5 hours, I did see more attractive women in BDUs than in my entire time in the Army.

Good news is that I got done in time to make it to the Pikes Peak hash!

HAIL TO PITT!

The Pitt woman's hoops team now stands at 8-0 after their trouncing of Penn State last night! Woohoo! P-E-N-N S-T SUCKS!

run #8 - return to the incline

Back to the Incline this afternoon with Lincoln. Great workout, I really feel bad for serious athletes who don't have access to this gem. Lots of snow and ice, but there was a decent path up the Incline and it didn't slow me down too much. Bombing back down the Barr Trail was great too, having to watch for ice as well as negotiating all the switchbacks in the snow.

Hit the top of the incline in 33 minutes, very surprising to me that I was able to do it that fast since it's been a while since I did this workout. Still, I'm on a personal quest to finally break half an hour, and this was a good start for my assault on that goal.

Start time: 3:45PM
Distance: 4.o miles
Time: 55:57 (not counting the LONG time I had to wait for Lincoln to summit the Incline)
Pace: 13:59 per mile (highly skewed by the 2000 foot elevation gain of the one mile long Incline)
Weather: clear but chilly, 25F, "feels like" 17F.

I'm finally a Coloradian...

Not only did I put on my brand-spankin' new State of Colorado license plates today, I told my landlord I'd be taking my luxorious basement apartment for another year!

Hot Wheeles

Not many Austinites will remember Hot Wheeles, a very good friend of mine from my early hashing days. We kept in touch long after she left Austin for Annapolis and elsewhere in her Navy career. She's even a veteran of the Newport Moose turkey trot 10K and Thanksgiving dinner at the Teisher house in Sunbury.

But over the past year or so she had kinda fallen off the face of the earth, disappointing for me since she was a pretty cool chick (and against my usual SOP I actually didn't do anything to deserve the cold shoulder).

So I asked Lincoln to track her Navy e-mail down for me. He said, "blah, blah, blah, I'm the Navy webmaster, I can do anything computer related, blah, blah, blah...." And of course he couldn't find it.

Anyways, I just got an e-mail from her. She was on a deployment somewhere. She's back in the USA now, safe and sound.

Thought I'd pass this beta along, since there are Austin hashers who have been hashing for more than a few months and might remember her.

run #7

Still chilly, but not nearly as cold or icy as my last run. By far the worst section, which I almost had to walk because the ice was so bad, was the quarter mile or so I run around the U.S. Olympic Training Center. You'd think that would be the last place to impede my training.

Start time: 5:45AM
Distance: 4.75 miles (Knob Hill - South)
Time: 37:04
Pace: 7:48 per mile
Weather: clear, 25F, "feels like" 16F.

Gonna find a way to add on a mile or so to my standard Knob Hill route this weekend, need to bump up these runs to at least 40 minutes.