Manitou Coffin Races

Good times over in Manitou!

3000

5.2 miles home from work, then took the dog up the Incline for the first time last night. Hit 3000 miles for the year somewhere along the way. Holly also had her first trip to the Royal Tavern, big night for her.

Rest day today. Carpooled with $100 to complete the month of October without driving to work. Wanted to take the bus, but $100 made me ride with her so she could park in the special carpool lot at the hospital. I can be bribed with bacon pretty easily.

Picked up a pair of NB 507 at the CRC for an upcoming cross country race I'm doing (I can wear them for short road races as well). Very light, could be the final step towards busting 13 in the 5K.

Found out the Lampanelli show is at the Comedy Works South venue tonight. Changes the brewery plan a bit. Now deciding on one of three close pubs:

Bull & Bush (the top choice, but it might be too far away with the traffic)
Rock Bottom Englewood
CB & Potts (probably where we'll end up, since it's the closest)

Not the biggest fan of the chain breweries, but since I'm trying to visit every brewery in Colorado, it's a necessary evil to visit them. I will say I was surprisingly impressed with the brews at the new BJ's in Colo Springs (even though the beer is made in Boulder and trucked down here).

Thurs

Wed PM - easy 4.2 miles, 40 minutes. Two of those miles were with the dog. Holly ran three times yesterday for a total of 7.5 miles. Then went to the Bear Creek Dog Park. Then helped stuff the PPRR newsletter at the CRC.

Thurs AM - easy run with the Sunrise Striders. 8.8 miles, 1:15. Costume run, I ran as Bob Marley.

One more day to commute and it's an easy one - taking the bus to work tomorrow, then having $100 pick me up as we head to Denver to catch Lisa Lampanelli. Maybe a new brewery on that trip as well...

for Brooks...

...since he's the only dude I know who tools around on a moped.

I was having a drink and I noticed a pretty woman looking at me across the bar. So I gather the nerve to get up and offer to buy her a drink. She accepted and we talked for a while. We really seemed to be hitting it off, joking, laughing and good flirting. After a few more drinks in me I asked if we could go to her place. She said "I can't right now I'm on my menstral cycle". I replied "Thats OK I got my moped right outside, I will follow you!"

tempo?

Easy 15 minutes with the dog to warm up. Was planning on a four mile tempo run through the Garden, but the wind and soreness from the track led to a horriffic first mile. Then the big hill in the second mile didn't help. Did the four mile loop in 31:16, which is almost 90 seconds over my five mile PR. Lots of work to do. This four miler is gonna be a staple from now on, we'll see how I progress from this morning 'till NOLA.

Now it's time to bust out the spandex and PEDs, I'm biking to work...

Tues PM

Commute #39 in the books. 5 easy miles home, 41:19. Tomorrow marks twice the goal I made at the new year for commuting to work. Which is good, since I've failed miserably at the push up goal and the yoga goal is in serious jeopardy...

track

Triumphant return to the CC track this morning. Shitty weather, temps in the low 30s and very windy. But that's only because my crappy-weather-meter isn't calibrated yet, I'm sure I'll be pining for nice days like this come December and January.

15 minute warm up. 2 x 1600m in 6:15 and 6:14, hitting 800m in 3:09 both times. Then 2 x 800m in 3:04. 30 minute cool down.

Not the best workout ever but I'll chalk it up to the wind and being at the track for the first time in a while. Look for those times to improve.

Nice quite from an ex-girlfriend in the recent Clarence Thomas controversy.

"Clarence became not the person I knew when I first met him," she said, adding that he "drank to excess" when they first met and might have been a "raving alcoholic" at that time. When he gave up alcohol, she said, he became "angry, short-tempered, asexual" and obsessive with ambition and what she called "weird things," such as long runs in the dark before dawn."

What's so weird about long runs in the dark before dawn?

CRUD party

Harsha's pics can be seen here.

His video of the pizza eatoff, which clearly shows Fast Eddy sneaking pizza to his kid, can be seen here.

The dog ended up doing pretty well with the crowd, so the 1st annual wine & cheese party is a go. If you're not on FB and didn't get the invite let me know.

38

Finished up commute #38, 5 easy miles straight home, 41:17. That cold front is moving in fast!

Think I already have the commuter challenge clinched, but since I'm this close I just wanna get through the month without using my truck. Had to start her up this afternoon to make sure she still worked...

back at it...

Three post-Bear weeks of 42, 33, and 52 (high due to Mt. Lemmon) miles. A whopping 12 miles last week. Lots and lots of rest days. Think it's time to pick the mileage back up.

Decided I'm gonna go 2:54 at NOLA. That number is screaming at me since it would be a new PR and an automatic qualifier for NYC. Not too much of a stretch, I thought that was what I was gonna run at Boston before I got hurt.

Will be finishing up this week running to work each day (going one month of not using my truck for work), probably hit around 70 miles. Then it's time to start hitting the track and doing some shorter races. I should probably find some 5K and lose to Brandon, that motivation served me well during training for Leadville.

Sitting at 2953 miles for the year. Averaging 9.9 miles a day for the year. Should be able to finish out 2010 averaging at least 10 a day...

Today's morning run was an easy 7.1 miles in an hour. Crazy wind storm last night, lots of tree branches all over the place.

HAIL TO PITT

I always knew Pitt hoops coach Jamie Dixon was awesome, but check this out! I think that automatically locks up coach of the year, but just in case he's gonna win his first national title as well.

CRUD pizza eating contest

Couple of shots from Saturday's CRUD pizza eating contest. I held with Fast Eddy for the first few minutes before falling behind, but I was happy with my performance. The final standings:

1. Fast Eddy, 8:40

2. Rick H, 9:55

3. jt, 12:40

4. Paul D, DNF

Good times at the party, great to see everyone again. Not sure what's up next on the eating front. Pancakes seem to be leading the rumor mill. But I'm going to start pushing for a milk challenge. And one of these days CRUD will finally get around to doing a beer mile...

I weighed my dump a few hours after the challenge, but it came in at a very disappointing .9 pounds.

In other news, I can't figure out how to turn off this underline thing on blogger...

dump

Mt. Lemmon pics are up. Go here, then click on Mt. Lemmon, then search for bib 455.

Big kudos to Footfeathers and Brooks for going 1-2 at Deadman Peaks.

And congrats to Fast Eddy for taking the win in the pizza eating contest. I finished third out of four, also losing to Rick H and beating Paul D. Pics to follow shortly.

Nice run in the Garden with CRUD yesterday. Easy 7.5 miles. Taking today off before slowly jumping back into things next week.

LAHF or die!

A few shots of the Larry & His Flask show from the Nickel on Monday night. Good times! Definitely check these guys out if they come through your town!

136

Had to go bowling for work today. Rough stuff. Set a new PR of 136. I'm pretty sure that is gonna last a while, at least another decade or two until I'm forced to bowl again.

still going

Still haven't used my truck to get to work this month. This past week I have been carpooling with $100, mooching a ride to the hospital and then walking the half mile or so over to my office. Gets me here an hour early, but it still keeps the pressure on Jeremy.

Have only ran twice since October 14th. Would like to say the rest has been nice, but I actually feel worse now than when I was doing high mileage. Think I'm gonna hop back into things on Monday. Decided to attempt a PR in NOLA, which would also qualify me for next year's NYC marathon...

Training should get a boost as Ryan Hall has left the Mammoth Track Club and will be joining South CRUD shortly...

HAIL TO PITT!

The mighty Panthers are the pre-season favorites to win the Big East. See the rankings here. Might not want to look if you're a UConn fan though...

google earth view of Lemmon

Lemmon schwag

Stolen from Jeff B.

Good NY Times article on the race over here. The guy in the blue shirt at the top of the article? He passed me at the beginning of the downhill but I would recover over the final three miles to catch him and somehow stay ahead of him to the finish.

Lemmon

Wasn't expecting anything from this race. Knowing nothing about the course, I had no idea if four, or five, or six hours would be a good time. But running a good time didn't matter, as the only running I had done since the Bear was a few miles to and from work. The main objective was to cross off state marathon #9.

Started very slow, was very happy in the middle of the pack. Hit the first mile in 9:45 and I figured if I could keep under ten minutes per mile to the end I'd be fine with that. Settled in next to a Tucson ultrarunner who had a few Leadvilles under his belt, and behind a smoking hot Tucson triathlete babe. Good place to spend a few miles.

It wasn't more than three or four miles until I started passing people. The Leadville guy and I hung around together, constantly hitting between 9:45 and 9:50 per mile, and lots of people were already starting to slow down. I started to enjoy the scenery of the course, really loved that desert landscape. Thousands of huge cactuses (cacti?) all over the place, lots of mountains, and a cool view of Tucson. It was a very windy road, but I wasn't running tangents as I opted to go for more shade. Was worried that the hot Arizona sun would pop out and fry me, so I really made an effort to stay cool and hydrated. This plan would later be ditched, as I didn't take in any water the final 13.1 miles.

We continued to pass folks as we kept on our steady pace. Around the ten mile mark I figured I'd hit the halfway point in just over two hours, and wondered if I could negative split to get under the four hour mark. Hit halfway feeling decent in 2:02:42, not too shabby since it was 13.1 miles of continuous climb.

I immediately picked up the pace. I knew the hill only lasted another seven miles and I wanted to get some of that sub four time in the bank here. Unfortunately for me, the hardest and steepest part of the climb was that final seven miles. I did run well there, dropping well below nine minutes per mile, but it took a lot out of me. It was around 15 miles or so where I realized that if I really wanted to get under four hours, it was gonna take a much bigger effort than I had planned to give that day.

I debated that issue while keepin' on. Was still passing people, but these people were better runners and not just rookies dying on the mountain. Finally hit the top of the first hill, around mile 20, hurting pretty bad. It was the longest I've ever continuously run up. Imagine putting a treadmill on a steep incline and running that for three hours, that's what the first part of this race was.

Finally hit a downhill and it took some work to make my legs respond. I had about an hour to do the last 10K, and I wasn't sure I'd make it. I was mentally screaming at my legs to turn over, hoping the speed would come soon after. I did still continue to pass folks, though they were now pretty spread out. I was really hurting as I came to the 23 mile mark and saw a gal stretching on the side of the road, completely cramped up. Turns out she would recover and hang on to win the female portion of the race (but still finish behind me!).

I hit mile 24 right around 3:40. Twenty minutes to do 2.2 miles, should have been a piece of cake. But the worst part of the course is the final 2.2 mile out and back. I completely fell apart around 24.1 miles as we made the final steep climb. I was hurting so friggin' bad here it sucks to still think about it. But I did, at the very least, continue to run. And that allowed me to pass two more people who had resorted to walking this section.

At the 25 mile mark I had about 12 minutes to finish up, all downhill, but with my mind and body in such sorry shape I couldn't do math and figured I had blown any chance at 3:59 on the last climb. But I didn't quit and gave it all I had that last mile. Finally hit the 26 mile mark and noticed I had over five minutes to finish up. There was nobody in front of me and nobody behind me so I finally allowed myself to ease up on the throttle. Bart Yasso greeted me at the finish line, which I crossed in 3:56:29. Averaged about 9:20 per mile the first half, 8:40 the second half.

I was pretty smoked after that, so I grabbed my drop bag, full of PBR, and collapsed on the road to watch everyone else finish. 16th overall out of 394 finishers. Wish I had started out just a bit quicker, might have had a chance to beat my Boston time.

Had a blast on the entire Tucson trip! Awesome way to end the season!