Commute #10

Easy 10K to work, 54 minutes.

The Incline will be officially legal at midnight on February 1st (I'm sure you've received an e-mail asking for money already; the Incline Friends are about to replace Quinn's as the most annoying pseudo-running club out there).  We'll be having one last illegal Incline Happy Hour on Thursday, then O'Day and I will have the 4:20 club head out early Friday morning.  Hixon and my dog might be the first illegal dogs to bag the Incline.

Incline #9

Beautiful morning on the Incline.  About two inches of fresh snow over there, less than what I shoveled off the sidewalk at the house.  Incline up, Barr Trail down, four miles.

Monday

AM - Easy seven miles to Manitou and back, 60 minutes.

PM - Red Mountain with BLOS, Vega, and the dog.  Four miles, 50 minutes.

the week that was

Pretty decent week.  58 miles running and another 13 hiking.

Eight times up the Incline so far this year, including four times this week.  Might be the most I've ever done that hill in a single week.

Looks like a fun week coming up.  Thursday is the last illegal Incline Happy Hour, as the Incline becomes legal on Feb 1st.  $100 and I are going to take a trip to the American Mountaineering Museum in Golden on Saturday.  Sunday morning is the Super Half Marathon and the anti-Super Bowl run up to Barr Camp in the afternoon.

Winter Series II

Decent first half, hit the four mile mark in about 27 minutes.  Then I had to go significantly off course to find a nice, private place to drop a deuce.  Big shoutout to the homeless guy who left behind a new roll of TP.  Garmin shows that I ran a mile and took a dump in 8:54 which isn't too shabby.  8.3 miles, 59 minutes.

Happy Anniversary!

25 years ago today was one of the greatest moments in all of sports!



Really wish Pitt would go back to those old script uniforms.

Commute #9

Changed a flat tire and road a bike to work today.  Boom.  Plus, I took some EPO and got an extra pint of blood squished into my veins.

Incline #7

From the office over to the Incline and back down to Kinfolk's.  Three hours, 13.1 miles.  Ran out of gas about a quarter ways up the big hill.  Was rewarded for the effort with a free PBR at Kinfolk's.

another book

Been on the library wait list since this book came out, got it right before Lance's big date with Oprah.  If I cared about bike racing I'd be a lot more disgusted.  Hopefully this kind of BS never happens in the distance running world.

I'm not a big fan of cheaters, but something in me finds it awesome that Jan Ullrich has made a living off doping:

This post will probably come back to haunt me once Tony and Peter have their beards busted for doping...

Commute #8

AM - Easy run to work.  40 minutes, 4.8 miles.  Flat tire on the bike, so we'll see if I can somehow get that changed by tomorrow morning to keep my dreams of a new bike alive...

Wed

AM - Nice hike with $100 and the dog up the steep part of Section 16.  33 minutes to the top.  3.2 miles round trip.

PM - Easy run to the Top of the W's with the dog.  34 minutes up, 60 minutes round trip.

Incline #6/Garden Tempo

AM - 4:20 Incline with O'Day, Pev, and the dog.  Saw Roger Austin, who did the Incline 371 times in 2012, headed up for his 33rd trip of 2013.  He's going for 500 this year.

PM - Nice tempo run in the Garden.  One mile warm up, four miles hard, 1.4 miles cool down.  Hit the four tempo miles in 7:43, 7:19, 6:17, and 6:21.  All equal efforts due to the terrain of the Garden.

Inspired by GZ's recent track meet at Detroit International, I am going to buy a beer for the person who posts the fastest airport mile to Strava this calendar year.  Must be indoors.  Winner will also get a private performance from Manitou's newest boy band:

Ultra Performance of 2013

The race for that award is over.  Nothing will top this.

Incline #5/Red Mountain

AM - The dog and I cleaned up the Fat Ass flags from Red Rock Canyon and the Intemann Trail.  6.7 miles in 97 minutes.

PM - 10.8 miles, three hours, including my fifth trip of the year up the Incline and Red Mountain.

Fat Ass

Posted the Fat Ass results over on Pikes Peak Sports.  Good times yesterday!  Thanks to everyone who came out to enjoy some great weather on our great trails.

Commute #7

Bike to work Friday.

Then got a nice hike around Prospect Lake over lunch.  Didn't even get stabbed.

O'Day and I went out to mark the final four or so miles of the Fat Ass last night.  Saturday is going to be a great day to run!

Incline #4

Nice run from the house up the Incline and back down to Kinfolk's.  Will be a cold day in hell before I ever skip the Incline to watch Oprah.  Great turnout down in Manitou at the bar.

Fat Ass course gets marked today.  Sunny with a high of 56F forecasted for the Springs on Saturday!

Commute #6

AM - Quick 4.7 miles to work, 38 minutes.  Weather is a bit better today.

PM - 5.8 miles home along the Midland Trail.  Some dude was found dead near the place where this trail passes under I-25 on Sat night.  And that's not even the sketchy part of the trail.

Dude who left his dog up on Mt. Bierstadt has been sentenced.  Read about it here.  My dog says the guy got off way too easy.  She's not the only dog pissed off at the owner.

weekend miles

Saturday - Got the unlucky volunteer assignment of standing around outside.  After two hours I could barely move, so the Winter Series race didn't go very well.  6.9 miles, just under an hour.  Couldn't feel my feet until mile four.  Nice trails out at Cheyenne Mountain State Park, I'd go there more often if I didn't have to drive so far and pay $7.

Sunday - Fuck it was cold.  Low turnout at the Incline Club.  I managed to get in two hours before surrendering.  Intemann, Section 16, Red Rock Canyon.  10 miles.

Temps will be warming up though, including sunny and 50s for the Fat Ass on Saturday.  You definitely won't need any special traction to get to the 12ish mile aid station.  Might still be some ice after that on the Buckhorn/666 loop, but not much.

Hooked On Foniks Wurked For Me

I read a book!

Picked this up based just off what I heard the book was about - some dude goes on a cross country road trip to visit the places where a bunch of rock and roll folks died.  Sounded awesome.

And those parts were.  Unfortunately, the same dude can't seem to get over any chick who ever put her hand down his pants.  And he writes about them.  A lot.

The music parts were really good.  The girl parts kind of made the book drag on.  Nothing about this book changed my mind about reading being a waste of time.

Commute #5

Thought the roads were going to be a lot worse than they were, so early in the week I decided to run to work Friday.  Was actually quite nice out, though still a bit cold.  9.5 miles on the day to and from the office.

CRUD dreamin'

Man, I had the strangest dream last night.

Location: Colorado Springs.  But CS had a huge Mississippi-like river flowing through it.  And CS also had it's own NBA team.  Because me, Rick H, and Brandon S were down at the river catching frogs, which is just what folks here happened to do before NBA games.  And it was new year's eve.

Suddenly, a Navy gunship pulls up and opens fire.  We see the people they're shooting at, and it's Keith G, Mountain Man Steve, and John O from the Colorado Running Company.  Somehow we realize that those three are terrorists plotting to blow up the NBA stadium during the game that night.

The dream then cuts to Paul D's kitchen, which I've never been in.  I'm telling Paul about the plan of the three terrorists, and suddenly Steve is behind me.  A huge fight ensues.  Steve has magical ninja powers for this dream, and he's just whooping ass despite being heavily outnumbered.  I'm unable to join that fight as Cereta (Keith's wife in real life as well as this dream) is trying to take my iPad from me, because somehow the iPad holds proof of the bomb plot.  She's not involved in the plot but doesn't want her husband to go to jail.

I finally get control of the iPad just as Steve produces a gun.  But the gun seems to zap his ninja powers, as I somehow end up locking the gun and Steve's hand into one of the drawers on Paul's kitchen counter.  We then proceed to beat his ass.

I must have been moving around on the bed during all this, because as we were kicking Steve's teeth in the dog got annoyed and woke me up.

Weird.

I did see Steve at his house as I was finishing the Incline last night, so maybe that somehow factored into all this.  He gave no indication he was planning a terrorist plot, however.

Jackson Day 9K

It wasn't all drinking down in NOLA.  We visited the zoo and ran the Jackson Day 9K.  The rest of the trip was all drinking though.

The Jackson Day run is the seventh oldest race in the USA.  This was the 106th race.  By chance, I've run two older races - the Boston Marathon and the Run For The Diamonds 9 miler in Berwick, PA.

Despite being half drunk at the start, I ran pretty well.  Which should be expected at a race below sea level.  Rainy and cold, I started off at what I believed was a ten minute mile to warm up.  Hit the mile in 7:13.  I kept the same easy effort, taking in the sights (including pelicans flying overhead) and not caring at all about the race going on around me.  But I continued to pass a ton of people.  6:36, 6:25, 6:25, and 6:16 were the final miles, finishing the last .6 mile at a six flat pace.  That kind of run would crush me back in Colorado, in NOLA it just served to wake me up before we started bar crawling again.

Fun race, but it seems the weather cut the field in half.  And I did fail in my only goal - to find a bar on the course.  Every one I passed was closed.  One of the cooler things about the race for me was the fact that at the mile markers they didn't have a clock.  They had a volunteer with a stopwatch yelling out times.  Reminded me of my old cross-country days.

My garmin data for the race is here.  It's considered one of the hillier races in NOLA, twice going from one foot above sea level all the way up to four feet, and then raising all the way to eight feet above sea level at the finish.

Incline #3

From the house to the Incline and down Barr to the Cog.  7.3 miles, two hours.  Was really suffering on the Incline despite a snails pace.  Only three more illegal Incline Happy Hours left.  Next week we will be streaming the Lance interview at Kinfolk's.  You'll drink every time he mentions cancer.

Commute #4

Took advantage of the fairly decent weather to bike to work.  Still about froze my toes off, even with two pairs of socks.

Was supposed to be locked into a battle with Ryan K over who would commute to work the most this year, but it looks like the route is on.  Like all the other North CRUD sissies, it seems he can't handle a little bad weather.

Commute #3

AM - Easy 5.6 to work, 47 minutes.

PM - 7.9 miles home, 72 minutes.  Added the climb up Ridge Road.  It's sketch city running on the Midland Trail behind the Red Rock Lounge at night.

Barr Trail

Easy Tues night jog up and down Barr.  40 minutes up, then crushed it back down in 37.  5.4 miles.  Trail is pretty snow/ice free, though we're supposed to get a storm this weekend.

Incline #2

Weekly 4:20 edition of the Incline with the dog, O'Day, and the other dog (Hixon).  25F this morning, felt like a heat wave compared to what we've been dealing with lately.

Fat Ass

A bit short this year, clocking in at 25 miles.  See the beta over here.

Pikes!

crappy shoes/HR/Salida Marathon

Hard to tell from that pic, but I blew out a new-ish pair of Montrail.  Probably had 250 miles on 'em, half of which were easy dog walks or office miles at work.  Blech.

Posted a Hardrock blurb over at PikesPeakSports.us.

Info on the 2013 Salida Marathon is over here.

Commute #2

Easy 3.2 miles with the dog, then jumped on the bike and rode to work.  I don't own the right clothes to be biking in this weather, so I just rode as hard as I could and luckily made it before frostbite set in.  Felt like someone was hitting my fingers and toes with a hammer when I jumped into a hot shower.  About half an hour after I got out of the shower I checked the temp, and it was 7F.

Signed up for the Horsetooth Marathon (yes, they have a full marathon now) yesterday.  Bunch of miles in Mr. Clark's backyard trail system, then a finish line at New Belgium Brewing.  Hell yeah!

commute #1

Shooting for 100 in '13, both running and biking.  Got off on the right foot with a run to work.  5.7 miles there (52 minutes), 4.7 miles back (42 minutes).  If it ever gets above 20F again here in the Springs, I'll up that mileage on the run commute.

Rescue Run Pic

Nice shot of me around the five mile mark of the Rescue Run.  Thanks to PikesPeakSports.us for the pic.

I'll be blogging for those guys through Hardrock this year.  Probably not as much since I won't have the same high end contract as I had for the Triple Crown.  For the record, I believe I'm the highest paid 3:30 Ascent guy ever.

Incline #1

Shooting for 100 ascents of the Incline in '13.  Started the year off right by taking the dog up.  29F at the start, 19F when we finished.  Global warming my ass!

Rescue Run - The Winning Streak Is Over!

44:59 at the Rescue Run 10K this morning.  Really good for me considering the hangover and 19F temps at the start.  Steady effort, more of an easy tempo run than a race, but just the thing I was looking for to kick off the new year.