the weekend starts on Thursday!

Leaving work soon, a few more tweaks to my drop bags and a good nights sleep before I head to Leadville early Friday morning. Really looking forward to the race. Been living with that DNF for over a year now, can't wait for the rematch.

My crew chief, Katie, will have access to my blog, so depending on how much coverage she can find this may or may not be updated between now and Sunday morning...

Good luck to everybody running (especially Kara!), crewing, pacing, and/or recovering!

Oh yeah, and kudos to the Pikes Peak H3 on their 600th run! Someone drink a beer at the red dress for me!

Colbert Nation

Colbert did a great bit on Colorado's 2nd congressional district last night, see it here. He calls Boulder the "teabagging capital of America." Great stuff!

Leadville predictions

Here's your top five at Leadville:

1. Tony
2. Timmy
3. AJW
4. Duncan
5. Harry

But if it's a tactical race, and everyone runs around 25 hours just waiting to unleash their kick, I could be in the mix...

Go Kara!

Thanks to Shad for sending me this article about my future ex-wife. Kara is going to win the world championships marathon this weekend!

Born to Run

If you missed Chris McDougall on the Daily Show last night, you can see it here.

The book, which I loved, has caused quite a few people to look into the minimalist footwear thing. I'm not sold on it, and think it's a fad that will go away soon. Yes, injuries among runners haven't dropped with the advances in footwear over the years. But we've also seen such a huge number of runners who now do team-in-training type stuff and train so horribly they're setting themselves up for injury no matter what they do or do not wear on their feet.

But who knows. I've been injury free for my 20+ years of running, and those years were built on a foundation of high school cross-country (racing two to three times a week in the Nike Waffle Racer) and following that with track season, spending winter and spring running around in circles in track spikes. Maybe that near-barefoot stuff toughened up my feet and legs a bit.

I did see a few people during the Ascent wearing the Vibram 5 Fingers. I asked each person how their feet were doing, and each one had good things to say. Of course, all the people wearing the glove like sock/slipper things were way towards the back of the pack and I would guess they had been walking since the Cog Railway.

Bottom line in my book - the best way to avoid injury is to train smart and train hard. Shoes are a minor part of the equation. Not quite as sexy as a hidden civilization of barefoot ultrarunners, but it works.

beers...

Just realized I owe a heckuva lot of people a heckuva lot of beer. Here's the list:

Fast Eddy - two Trinity growlers from our Hardrock bet (he'll get these this weekend; FYI, he refused to go double or nothing straight up at Leadville!)

Paul D - I think I owe him a pint of Icehouse from blog trivia long ago.

Yeti - owe him a 30 pack of PBR due to an ill-advised and horribly lost bet from Pikes Peak; have fun drinking your beer, but remember that real men don't need a ride off a mountain!

Smut - think I owe him a pint from some "Married With Children" trivia.

In my defense, I'm not welching here, but it's been forever since I've seen any of the above peeps out drinking beer, which is where these bets get paid off.

Looking to make a beer bet for Leadville, but so far nobody I know who is running has been willing to lay it on the line...

one more reason to watch the Daily Show...

Christopher McDougall, author of Born to Run, is on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart tonight! But I'll be a lot more excited when Girls Gone Wild finally does a Jen Shelton edition...

Leadville weather

Lookin' great so far!

For Saturday: Mix of sun and clouds. Highs in the low 70s and lows in the low 40s. 20% chance of precipitation.

PPM photos

Couple 'o pics from the official race photo guys. See all of my pics here. Yes, ladies, you can order all these in 16x24 poster size!

Denver Post Pb article

Article from Sunday's Denver post, on the REAL race in Leadville. Two hashers, Rosebud (who just finished Hardrock) and Green Piece, are mentioned. See it here.

Leadville MTB post-race speeches

Keith got some good video of Lance and Dave at the awards ceremony of last weekend's mountain bike race. See the speeches here.

Another good video of the race can be seen here.

MOPP hash

Group grope from the second annual superultramegaballbuster MOPP hash on Sunday after the marathon. The top pic is everyone who showed up, the bottom one is all the hashers who ran this weekend. Trail was rough, as we went from the Townhouse Lounge to Kinfolk's and then to the Royal Tavern...

quote of the day

Actually, it's from yesterday, but here goes:

"There are no words to describe him (Usain Bolt). He's like a created game person. He's like a cheat code. That's how good he is ..."
- Darvis Patton on Usain Bolt's 9.58 WR

Leadville

Here's the breakdown for what I'll be doing this weekend:

Mayqueen - 6:15AM
Fish Hatchery - 8:05AM
Halfmoon - 9:15AM
Twin Lakes - 11:15AM
Winfield - 2:30PM
Twin Lakes - 5:45PM
Halfmoon - 8:30PM
Fish Hatchery - 10PM
Mayqueen - 2:30AM
Leadville - 4:59:59AM

Depending on how I feel I may take it out a bit faster and get to Winfield in under ten hours. As long as I don't get too crazy I don't think that would hurt me very much.

Have Mike Safari all ready to pace me from Winfield back to Treeline, about 22-ish miles. Gonna run right through Halfmoon without stopping since that's where I dropped out last year. Wouldn't mind a pacer anywhere during the final 30 miles if anyone out there has the weekend free of plans...

Still working on my shoe strategy. Right now I'm thinking about wearing my Wildcats to Twin Lakes, doing the Hope Pass double crossing in the Raceblades, getting to Mayqueen in the Imogene, and bringing it home in the Saucony Progrid Guide Trails.

Really looking forward to getting that DNF monkey off my back.

Pikes Peak Ascent beer check

Couple 'o pics taken while manning the world's highest beer check during the Pikes Peak Ascent. We were about 50 meters before the sign for the 16 Golden Stairs. Good times! The majority of the runners appreciated that we were out there. If you were one of those douche bags who felt the need to yell at us or lecture us on the evils of alcohol, fuck off!

Pikes Peak taper...

This is me and Finger Pickin' Good of the Little Rock H3 outside the Royal Tavern on Saturday night. We were celebrating his finish in the Ascent, where, despite being unable to maintain eight minute miles as he said he would, he was pretty happy with his finish. Somehow whenever I get really drunk at the Tavern I end up with a traffic cone on my head.

let's be careful out there

Horrible accident up in JeffCo this weekend, read about it here. Hopefully the biker is OK.

Pikes Peak

-Finished in 5:44:44, 101st place out of 540 male finishers. Think 13 chicks beat me. It was my 13th marathon.

-PR'd to Barr Camp, first time I've ever broke 90 getting there. I was beating the second place woman as well as Sully (3rd place woman???). Was on pace to go sub-3 to the summit, but above 10,000 feet the reality of drinking all day on Saturday, much of it at 13,800 feet watching the Ascent, caught up with me.

-Struggled from Barr Camp to the summit. Probably walked about 75% of that stretch. I thought I was in shape enough to run that much, and if I could have I would have had my first sub-3 ascent.

-Ended up getting to the top in 3:24. Not too shabby, but at that point I decided to throw in the towel on the descent and make sure I didn't sabotage Leadville. Spent about eight minutes at the top BS'ing with the PPRR folks and then made the trip back to Manitou in 2:10-ish. A full 20 minutes slower than my previous downhill time.

-Not too disappointed with the day. Got to suffer a lot on the way up without beating myself up too much, then had a blast running down. This race was the reason I originally moved to Colorado and it was fun getting to do it again. Next time, though, I'm getting that sub-3 ascent.

-When I saw Matt Carpenter on the way down, he looked bored.

-Lots of great performances by my friends, kudos to all of you!

More to come on this weekend, I have lots of pics to post...

the weekend is here!

Pikes Peak ain't the only race this weekend. Here's hoping Dave can crush Lance out at Leadville!

And of course, good luck to all of those toeing the line in Manitou! Run hard!

1987.2

Currently sitting at 1987.2 miles for the year. Probably go for a short run tomorrow (after spending 8+ hours above 13,000 feet!) and then sometime on Sunday I'll pass 2000 miles for the year.

My new year's resolution was to cover 3000 miles, and that's looking pretty good. After Sunday there will be 137 days left, so I'll hafta average 7.3 miles per day after that. Shouldn't be too hard, since I have two 100 milers and the Route 66 Marathon to look forward to before the end of the year. Assuming I finish all those, the average daily mileage drops to 5.8 miles.

Won't be taking any breaks after Leadville or Oil Creek. I have big things planned for next year and I'm already in the base building phase for that.

Also seems like I've taken an insurmountable lead over Wiley for out bet on total 2009 distance. I can't even remember what we bet, but I seem to remember it was a tank of gas a week for all of 2010...

huh?

Surfing the web today and came across this. Turns out the heathen educational joints I attended, both Shikellamy High School and Pitt, wasted so much of my time teaching false biology and evolution. Good thing I hardly paid attention in those classes, eh?

Needless to say, next time I visit Kentucky I will definitely be stopping in at this place! I wonder if they'd let me in if I was wearing a Flying Spaghetti Monster shirt?

long strange trip!

Posted on Bart Yasso's facebook page:

I believe Amby Burfoot is only person that attended Woodstock and won the Boston Marathon.

Pikes Peak weekend

It's finally here!

Good stuff in the Gazette about the races this morning. See one article here and another here. Love the pic on the front page of the sports section, really shows how much people suffer during this race:
Special surprise on Sunday, as the honorary starter for the Marathon will be Arlene Stine, who was the first woman to ever finish a US marathon.

Incline happy hour!

Pirate Fever!

Couple 'o pics from the Pirates recent dismantling of the Rockies...

weak!

The Incline Club is having their end of season party this Thursday, before Leadville! Not that it's a party-of-the-year candidate or anything, but it would have been nice of them to wait. I guess they get intimidated by the hundred mile guys and don't want us around, since most people running Pb will already be out there on Thurs.

Anywho, the weather for this weekend, subject to change:

Saturday:
Start: 60 deg, 5% chance of rain
Barr Camp: Upper 50's, 5% chance of rain
Summit: Mid 40's, 5% chance of rain before noon, then 30% chance

Sunday:
Start: 60 deg, 10% chance of rain
Barr Camp: Upper 50's, 13% chance of rain
Summit: Low 40's, 19% chance of rain before noon, then 30% chance
Finish: Upper 70's with a high of 78. 15% chance of rain from noon till 5pm

Weather looks pretty good, so the masses won't be able to use it as an excuse to cover up their pussy-itis this year like so many people did last year.

Kittie!

Woohoo! Just announced, Kittie is playing the Black Sheep on October 19th!

Badwater CNN article

Wow, Badwater made cnn.com. See the article here. Nice write up, though I would argue that Hardrock is much more of a challenge...

post-Hardrock blues?

Reviewing my training log since Hardrock, and it's not very impressive.

Weekly totals since finishing Hardrock on July 12:

7/13 to 7/19 - 8.2 miles, 1:31:11
7/20 to 7/26 - 57.0 miles, 13:05:11
7/27 to 8/2 - 30.2 miles, 7:35:36
8/3 to 8/9 - 49.0 miles, 8:38:36

Not going to inspire a lot of confidence heading into Pikes Peak and Leadville, especially since I'll be looking for PR's in those. Taken a lot of rest days (12 in July alone!!!) as well, and my only long run came on July 24th when I ran up and down Pikes Peak. I'm hoping my saving grace is that, though the total mileage has been down, the intensity has been pretty good, as I've raced twice and continued to work hard with the PPRR Sunrise Strider guys on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

GO BUCS!

the springs of Manitou

Article about Manitou from Channel 7 in Denver can be seen here. Guess I know which stream to take a dump in if I wanna thin out the competition in the Marathon this weekend...

it's time...

Manitou hung up the "Welcome Pikes Peak Runners" banner yesterday!

The Jack Trades!

Trinity Soul Runners

Yet another bar picks up on the running and drinking craze. The Trinity Soul Runners will begin meeting every Monday starting September 14th. Courses will be a little longer than your typical poser 5K distance. Signing in will be done electronically with a Trinity card. Shirts, cheaper beer, all the usual stuff. The Colorado Running Company is helping out, so say thanks to those guys.

The name comes from Trinity's Soul Horkey, my second favorite beer there behind the Awaken.

Leadville pacer

Still looking for a pacer from Halfmoon or Treeline to May Queen, or possibly the boat ramp. Anywhere from 17 to 20+ miles. Hot chicks, especially Kara Goucher, are encouraged to apply, but at this point I'm pretty desperate and will take what I can get...

Hooray Colorado Springs!

Colorado Springs was recently rated the top city to live in by Outside magazine. See the article here. Read the Colorado Springs write up here.

Here's the list:

10. Charlotte, North Carolina
9. Cincinnati, Ohio
8. Minneapolis, Minnesota
7. Portland, Oregon
6. Albuquerque, New Mexico
5. Boston, Massachusetts
4. Austin, Texas
3. Atlanta, Georgia
2. Seattle, Washington
1. Colorado Springs, Colorado

hooray for chicks!

There are much more famous (and inaccurate) stories concerning the first American woman to finish a marathon, but truth be told that monumental event happened right here in Manitou in 1959. Read about it here.

Durango

Just took a big step towards completing my scheme to have my own satellite office in Durango!

wiener wars!

Great article in this week's CS Indy about the hot dog stand in front of the Royal Tavern. Read it here. Seems the candy store that caters to the local church youth doesn't like the fact that they've had to slash the price of their $5 hot dogs because of the competition. Three reasons the story affects me:

1. I love hot dogs.
2. I LOVE the Royal Tavern.
3. Andy Wells, the guy who runs the hot dog stand, is my landlord.

contemplative trail

One of my favorite trails in my favorite local open space, Red Rock Canyon.

Thurs

Recorded my lowest weight, 165.0 lbs, and my lowest blood pressure, 121/79, in years this morning. Also had a good workout on Barr Trail, two sets of 8 x 40 second sprints. Been a great day and it's not even 10 AM!

Looking forward to lunch at Trinity, the PPRR full moon run in Red Rock Canyon, and the Greensky Bluegrass/Grass It Up show at Venue 515 tonight! Woohoo!

Congrats to my friend (who shall remain nameless) for finishing up his community service tonight, which was part of his DUI sentence. Believe it or not, he is volunteering as a bartender to get his final four hours. Just another example of how DUI offenses are more about politics and collecting money and less about keeping the roads safe.

Jerry mirror

Shoulda posted this a few days ago on Jerry's birthday, but I forgot. It's the mirror in the bathroom at Sancho's Broken Arrow.

great shirt

Saw the back of a gal's shirt over lunch that said:

Running In The Great Outdoors
While Your Work Buddies
Atrophy Underneath
Flourescent Light Bulbs...

Priceless!

Which reminds me, I have off this Friday and am looking forward to an epic long run on the local trails while everyone else is at work!

holy crap, another book!

Forgot that I read Bart Yasso's book earlier this year, so I'm now up to three books in 2009 and I'm currently reading another one about the history of Leadville's miners! I need to get a life!

Anywho, good book, lots of cool stories about running, but I find better stuff reading the blogs of local trail runners. Basically the book is what my blog would be if Runner's World gave me a no-limit credit card and told me I wasn't allowed to mention booze or women. I did like the chapter on the Yasso 800's, since I do that workout a lot during the winter months. And a lot of the ultra peeps will enjoy the chapter about Badwater.

Good, quick read. Worth the time, but not really worth forking over 20 bones. I am more than willing to lend it out. The first ten seconds are free, but any longer than that and you'll owe me a beer.

review: Halfway to Heaven

Holy crap, I've now finished two books this year! A new PR!

But this book wasn't the experience that Born to Run was. I had high hopes, as I love reading just about anything about 14ers, and although I can't say the book sucked it certainly wasn't as exciting as I thought it might be.

My beef was that, as someone who climbs and parties on 14ers, this was a very G rated description of climbing them. To sum the book up in one sentence: A guy has a mid life crisis and changes his life for the better by hiking all the Colorado 14ers. Yawn.

There was some cool stuff I got from the book. A few good nuggets about some of my favorite mountain towns like Salida and Leadville and Silverton. There was a chapter that included my buddy Shad. There were mentions of the Leadville and Hardrock hundreds. So the time spent reading the book was not a total waste, but truth be told there's much better stuff on the 14ers.com messge board than what was in the book.

I give the book a C+. Worth reading if you're one of those weirdos who likes reading, but I'd borrow it from me or check it out of the library and spend your money on something better.

Interesting note of his mention of Hardrock, which was going on as he had finished climbing Redcloud and Sunshine Peaks (which I climbed with Katie a few years ago and had a much more exciting experience up there than the author's account in the book). I was running my first Hardrock, and very well may have seen the author at the trailhead. But he writes that we were headed up Handies Peak at that time, which is incorrect. We would have been heading down from Handies.

210

Just found out my number at Leadville, watch out for #210!

There are over 560 people signed up for the race!

quote of the day

Shamelessly cut and pasted from GZ's blog:

When asked about the world championship marathon in Berlin, Goucher said, "If I blow up at halfway, I blow up halfway. I didn't put my life on hold not to take a risk."

HAIL TO PITT!

BIG EAST Projections:	Pts.
1. PITT (8)	161
2. West Virginia (5)	151
3. Cincinnati (8)	144
4. USF (3)	130
5. Rutgers	126
6. Connecticut	74
7. Louisville	51
8. Syracuse	27

First place votes in parentheses

Kimchi 7th anniversary pub crawl

This is one of the last things I remember from Saturday...

Jerry Garcia DIM hash

Trail of the year last night! If you missed it you're a panzy!

HR pics

Couple more pics 'o me at Hardrock, courtesy of Olga V. See the rest of her pics here.

Part XIII: Putnam to Silverton

My brain was so fried at this point that I thought I still had a sub 36 in me. Had 53 minutes to cover the final 5.6 miles. And they were downhill. No sweat, right?

I gave it everything I had for those 53 minutes, but the trail was a bit too rocky and I was a bit too tired. I made it to Mineral Creek, mile 98.5, as the race clock was striking 36 hours. Shad and Katie were waiting on the other side and I gladly accepted a can of PBR from them. Didn't waste too much time here, as I was told there was a runner not far in front of me. I crossed HWY 550 and headed out the Nute Chute towards the finish line.

As I was running way up on the Nute Chute, I could hear Katie and Shad down on HWY 550 honking at me. They pulled off the road and got out to take some pictures. So of course I mooned them!

I did end up passing the other runner just as Silverton came into view. I made one final push up a small hill on a dirt road, took a right turn at the Shrine of the Mines, and began the home stretch. There were no runners in front of me and nobody close behind me, so I took the time to enjoy the final few blocks.

About 50 meters before the finish line my crew was waiting for me. They handed me a lit cigar and an open can of Pabst, which I carried down the state flag lined chute to the finish rock. A puff, a chug, and a kiss later, I had finished my second Hardrock.

Part XII: KT to Putnam

Spend a scant six minutes at KT, leaving at 2:17PM. One more climb to go. And the final climb is so easy it's almost insulting to have it as a part of Hardrock. 4.3 miles, 1,970 feet to the top of Putnam-Cataract Ridge.

I cross a creek and begin the climb. I'm still climbing strong, still passing people. I make a turn on the trail and come across a runner on his knees. He looks up at me and asks me if I have any oxygen. It's the old guy from the east coast! And wow, was he hurtin'! He would eventually go on to finish, way behind me.

Little bit of scrambling before hitting some sound-of-music type grassy fields. I see two runners way up in front of me, and I set off to catch them. From Porcupine Pass down and up to Putnam-Cataract ridge I'm able to run and reel the two runners in. But soon we hit the top of the final climb, and they're gone. Damn downhill runners. Not that I was slacking, I wasn't passed at all on the steep downhill and the two runners I was chasing were still at the aid station when I pulled in, at 5:01PM.

The Putman aid station was a lot of fun. They had a big Texas flag flying and when they asked what I wanted I said, "I'll have a Shiner." And to my surprise, they forked over a bottle! So I sat my ass down and downed the bottle, saying "this is great, but I'll be hating yunz guys later when I have the Shiner shits!"

Pounded the Shiner and checked out of the final aid station at 5:07PM. 5.6 downhill miles to go.

Part XI: Chapman Gulch to KT

I spend ten minutes at Chapman before heading out at 11:11AM. It dawns on me that I have 19 hours until the final cutoff and 18 more miles to run. Last year I didn't hit this "I can average less than 1mph and still finish..." moment until the final aid station.

Uneventful climb up to Grant-Swamp Pass. You climb about 2,700 feet in 3.2 miles to the 11th mountain pass of the race. But considering what you hafta go through to get there, that hill doesn't feel like much.

I cut Paul loose at the top of Grant-Swamp. I tell him I'm doing fine and can proceed without him, so he takes off at a pace I can't match. I wouldn't see him again until the finish line (I believe he ran all the way in, covering the final 60 miles of the course). I spend a moment at the Joel Zucker memorial at the top of the pass, one of the best views of the entire course.

I'm able to run a good chunk of the Kamm Traverse and in no time I'm at KT. It's 2:11PM, and looking more and more like I'd be able to hit the Silverton Brewery before it closed...

GO KARA!

The hottest chick in running was at it again this weekend, winning the Chicago half marathon in a blazing time. She even beat all the guys, winning the race outright. Lookin' for big things from her later this month in Berlin at the world championships...

Mt. Sherman

Made my second trip up Mt. Sherman this morning. It was the 49th time I've summitted a 14er since I moved to Colorado. Kudos to Katie's mom, who came all the way from Wisconsin to bag her first 14er.

mud run

That's me taking on the mud pit on Saturday. Thanks to Christian at the Gazette for the pic. Lots of fun. I ended up winning my heat by so much that I slowed down the final two miles because I felt bad.

20

Today marks 20 years of continuous running for me. Started way back on August 1, 1989, at the age of 13, joining the Shikellamy cross-country team for practice. I made it less than a block before having to stop to walk. I've only recently started keeping a training log, but a conservative guesstimate is that I've run over 40,000 miles since then. Been fairly smart about it too, as I've never missed any significant amount of time due to a running related injury.

Going to celebrate by heading down to Fountain to relive my old cross-country days at the Mud Run.

Was riding over to Trinity this evening and saw these guys in the Garden.