Day 3: Thanksgiving Camp!

Today started out a little rocky with a new inch of snow which turned the hill down to the Safeway into an ice skating rink. Ashley, Rachel, Grigory and I made it down in Ashley's Subaru just fine but when we were driving into Snow Mountain we found out that Gwynn had gone into a ditch to avoid piling up on the numerous other cars that were in the middle of the hill and the other car was stuck at the top of the hill. We couldn't do anything to help so we went ahead and started skiing and they joined us after the tow truck and police report. I blame the whole incident in the fact that someone needed to gravel that hill in the morning!

Just when we thought the skiing couldn't get any better it does! another 2 inches fell overnight and it was just enough to make the skiing absolutely amazing! It was perfect corduroy and newly groomed. In fact the groomers took the trail even further up the mountain that it had originally been! There are no other teams here, it's like we have this perfectly groomed ski trail just for us, it couldn't be any better.



We did some great classic technique work along with some video. It was an amazingly beautiful day and by the time we left it was snowing and it is still snowing! We will probably not be able to drive up to the waterfall tomorrow and have to/get to ski from much lower down. Who knows, if we get enough snow maybe we can ski in the valley!

Anyway, everything is going great and we're getting some absolutely amazing training in!

Second Day of Ski Camp!

I meant to write something yesterday but completely forgot so here's the run down on both days.

In August we reserved a condo that would sleep 12 people, thinking that would be enough but thanks to an awesome freshman/newbie class we quickly outgrew that condo. So on Sunday night, yes the one right before Thanksgiving, I began the hunt for another condo. Thanks to the bad economic outlook and the fact that there is no snow in town this was an easy hunt. It wasn't long until condo owners were throwing amazing deals my way. We ended up in a condo that would sleep 8 people for less than $100/night! It's awesome! That was the beginning of an amazing time!

As you drive around Fraser, Tabernash and Granby you can see a decided lack of snow. Actually, saying lack of snow implies that there is some, which there is not. Completely dry and bare. It doesn't look remotely promising for a ski camp... The Snow Mountain Ranch Nordic Center assured us there was skiing and when we stopped by the nordic center then even charged us $5/person. We were thinking this was a ripoff as we drove up the ski trails, places that I had always skied, to a road blockage. We walked past the barrier and there was some snow on the trail, little but we were like the dehydrated sailor "Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner" with no snow so the small amount looked extremely inviting. That was until we just kept going up and up and up and the snow was extremely variable, in fact I don't think you could call it snow most of the time, really just ice and rocks.

After what seemed an eternity of uphill in Zone 3 we crested a hill and saw an amazing sight! Groomed trails, with even a classic track! For some reason, due to elevation, north facing slope and trees, the snow up on Blue Ridges was amazing! Like mid-winter conditions, perfectly groomed, not icy and plenty of it! Suddenly the $5 wasn't looking bad at all! We skied for well over 3 hours, working on skate technique and doing a little video work. Everyone was smiling and happy and we really couldn't have asked for better conditions considering there are only a handful of places in the lower 48 that can actually ski at this time at all!

We opted for not skiing for the afternoon, due to the fact that the trek up to the snow is fairly long, and went for a short run. Michael then made an amazing dinner followed by video analysis and we were all ready for bed.

Thanksgiving Day dawned cloud and snowy! Yay! About an inch fell and it was enough to make good skiing a little better. Another 3ish hours today and we're going to Devin's mother Susan house for dinner tonight, we're really looking forward to it!

Things have worked out exceptionally well so far and we're looking for a little more snow tonight and even better skiing tomorrow.

We're rocking the the training camp!

Letter from the Coaches!

We just wanted to let you know that the Art Auction was a huge success. We made a one night total of over $3000! In fact once all the donations are added to that number I am guessing we'll be looking at closer to $3500! We'll know the exact amount once we get the report from on the online totals but it is easily our best ever one-day fundraising event!

We just wanted to let you know how proud we are of all of you! Everyone on the entire team got out there and worked hard, looked good and made this great event an huge success. We know you all worked extremely hard and we can't tell you how proud of you we are, you make us look good. I just thought I'd let you know that we had many business owners from around town, tons of faculty, staff and students as well as several high ranking administrators and you all behaved in a manner that continues to make the Nordic Team one of the most supported club sports on campus. It is due to your hard work, commitment, cohesion, team work and dedication that this event was a success.

We also want to give a special thanks to Trevor and Liz who have really put their heart and soul into this event, working on it tirelessly the entire fall semester. Also to Marie, Gina, Adam and Joe who stepped up the last two weeks and really pulled the committees together and got the last minute things done.

We'd like to send out a special Thanks to Ken, the owner of Cross Country Connection. He donated the space and the food and bought some art. This is way beyond anything we could have expected so be sure to say thanks when you go into the shop. We would have a hard time running a ski team in the town without him.

To put it into perspective, the $3000 you just raised will pay for the elite team races or it will more than pay for the entire week at Thanksgiving camp, or it will pay all the entry fees for USCSA Nationals, the list goes on....

You Rock our World!

Happy, snowy Jack

I went to Happy Jack today intending to run.. And instead I skied, the whole area is skiable! Nearly got blown off the parking lot, so the winter is there.

Fall Training

Well we just ended the third training rotation of the school year and things so far are looking pretty good. We have a great slew of excited freshman and i think all the returning skiers really took training over the summer seriously. In my case, i did a lot more ski training rather than just biking and am excited to see how it will help me this winter. I also increased my training in zone 1. This, i am hoping, will help me in longer races this up coming year. So, so far YTD i have 30 more hours since school started last year, and have already got to 80% of the total training i did last year. I am also a bit leaner and have been feeling better overall.
it should be a great winter.

pray for snow

adam

Old Balls on Skis!

Hey All! I figured I would give you all some insight into skiing post college! I have joined a Master Skier Program with the Alaska Winter Stars in Anchorage (I know, Katie and Liz, they are like your nemesis but maybe you won't hate them so much now? :)) I workout with the group 2 times a week, they have workouts 5 times a week but let's get serious, I am a 23 year old single girl, and well, sometimes my priorities lie in other places. The make up of the group is about 20 people, mainly men in the 40-50 range and a few women in the 35-50 range. I convinced my friend Amy, a first time skate skier, to sign up to so we cover the under 30 demographic quite nicely! I went to my first circuits practice last week and then this week I went to my first on snow practice. That's right, we have been skiing in AK. There is awesome skiing about 1.5 hours from town at Hatcher's pass, but in town at Kincaid Park there is a sweet 3 k loop that is pretty much ice but it is skiable. So, I show up at my first circuits practice expecting a few jumping jacks, etc, I mean let's get real, there are a bunch of old people in this thing! WRONG! My first circuits practice was quite possibly the toughest practice of my life! We did bungees, medicine ball, box jump, bench press, ab stuff, whatever you can think of, we did it! UGH! All while listening to techno music that our totally awesome coach, Jan Buron had chosen. Jan is this crazy Polish guy who is probably one of the funniest people I have ever met, I am really looking forward to being coached by him, I hadn't realized it until now but this is the first time I have had a non-American coach. So after I barely survived these circuits, we then go for a 20 minute run, then do plyos in the parking lot.... needless to say they are whipping me into shape! My second practice was skate technique and the best way to describe it was I think I probably looked like a horse on ice skates. RIDICULOUS! You would have thought I had never skiied in my life! Luckily, after a few minutes my technique came back and we practiced the transition from one side V1 to the other side while on a hill, and I was able to demonstrate it expertly (Thanks Christi and Rachel!) ......
Being in a master's program is interesting to me, I am still trying to figure it out because I mean, what are all these skiers here for? Why am I there? Before now, skiing was about results to me, I skied in HS to make the varsity travel team, making All-State, etc, then in college it was about going to Nationals. Now I sit at practice in the dark at 8 pm 2 times a week with these people who aren't working towards a national title or to make the team or anything like that, they are simply there for the love of it. It is great, I guess I always have been one of them but it took me a while to realize it, and I still don't think I will ever be able to shake that competitive edge. Luckily for me, Anchorage has a sweet citizen's race series.

So anyway, where am I going with this? Good question. I guess there is skiing outside of college, even when you aren't training for the Olympics! My biggest piece of advice for those looking to the future : DO NOT get out of shape. Trust me, you will regret it! :)

Good news articles!

I just found a couple of good articles out in the news today.

The first one is a summary about why you need to get enough sleep. We have more detailed articles if you are interested but this one sums it up nicely. http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnews/20081016/ts_usnews/10reasonsnottoskimponsleep

The second one is just a quick one about the Industrial Food Chain that is really straight forward if you are interested in diet.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/usnews/20081020/ts_usnews/10thingsthefoodindustrydoesntwantyoutoknow

Fall Training...

Well it's that time of year, when nordic skiers start to get grouchy. This might seem a little counter intuitive for some people, I mean it's getting cold and it's actually snowed! Therein lies the problem, it's cold, it's snowed and we're still rollerskiing!

This is the time of year when the training gets the hardest. Despite the fact that we ran in snow yesterday there is very little chance that we will actually be able to ski for at least 3 weeks. Starting now though, every day we'll gaze at the ski and look for snow, we'll put on the ski clothing and go for a run and we'll even put on the ski boots, hats, gloves and rollerski!

As we move into this part of the season I want to give a quick rundown of the team and training. So far we have 40 people who show up for practice at least half the time, this is the largest, consistent groups we've ever had. Within this group we also have some of the most dedicated people we've ever had.

The men's team has returned from the summer inspired. Last fall they were inspired but hadn't put in the time during the summer to really make a difference when they started racing. They have definitely put their money where their mouth is this time with several of them doing perfect training all summer. They do not want to be 3rd again and they have done everything they can to make sure that doesn't happen.

The women's team is also looking strong. Returning two of our top women, who missed last year, as well as some great talent from last year and several dedicated and fit new freshmen should have an astronomical effect once we start racing. We've never had such a complete group of women, not just a superstar but potentially 3-4 superstars!

We also did some changing in the training this season. The first major change is providing the opportunity to train with the team 6 days/week. We have required practice M, W, F and Sun and optional practice T, R. Our hope was that it would give the athletes who were training every day someone to train with and it might inspire some who didn't always train every day to put in a few more hours. So far we feel that this is exactly what's happening.

We also added a fall low altitude camp where we went down to Fort Robinson, Nebraska and did some hard workouts. You can read all about that in an earlier blog from John. We think this camp was a huge success for both low altitude and team cohesion.

On the whole we feel that this fall has seen the best training we may have ever had. What I mean by this is that we have such an amazing group of athletes. We have often had a handful who are extremely dedicated and fit but this is one of the first times we've had upwards of 20 who are with many of them coming to fall with a solid summer of training.

Anyway, whatever happens this season we are extremely excited and proud of all our athletes, it's been a great fall!

You Rock Our World!

Snow!

It's snowing in Laramie!

Woohoo!!

I'm done with a three day intensity block (3x5x1:00 classic on tue, 10x1:15 track, and 4x4:00 this morning) and done with my responsibilities for the week, all that is left is catch the Gangl tonight, and then off to Columbus, Georgia for my buddy Erik's wedding, let the debauchery (and by that I mean rest of course) commence!!!



Joe

Night classes suck

Ugg. Usually I'm in bed before nine, but thanks to my mandatory Tuesday night hell of class from 7-9, I'm about an hour behind. Other than that class though, today was a good day. I woke at 6 as usual, took my time getting out the door because I had enough time today, and did a nice specific strength/intensity workout. 

I double poled to the hill just east of 30th and Reynolds, turns out it is just about a minute long, which was exactly what I wanted. I did three sets of 5X1 hard up this hill, with only the recovery of coming down, plus a little more time and a drink in between sets. The first set was double pole. This went pretty well considering I've been kinda slacking on my double pole, which isnt good. However, I was still manage 4 very good quality intervals, and the last one was still pretty good, I just bogged down on the steepest part of the hill a little. The second set was double pole kick. This is usually my weakness, but thanks to my newly strong back, I felt better double pole kicking today than I've ever felt in my life, hoorah. I felt amazingly strong on the last set as well, which was just striding up it technically well with a lot of power. 

After my intervals were finished, I took a slightly longer way home and ended up with a total workout of 1:15. I'm going to try to add in a little more warmup and cool down inn the future, but I think this workout may become a staple of my routine, I felt it helped me a lot mentally, and definitely makes me work technique and strength a lot. 

Up for the next couple days is a track workout of 400m repeats tomorrow, and then either a long slow skate or V2 intervals thursday morning, depending on how I feel after the track. 

Chao

Weight Vs. Performance

My pre-bedtime discussion this evening will focus on the topic of weight vs performance, more specifically, weight vs uphill performance. I was riding along with a visiting friend of mine today who is a competitive cyclist. He's about 21 and a very strong rider with some solid results. As is a common problem with young cyclists in America, he's never had a coach. As we rode, the topic turned to body weight and climbing in cycling races. He was talking about how he felt his strength was in the hills, and he tried to keep his weight down because he wants to continue to be able to excel there. This is a pretty common sentiment among cyclists, especially younger ones, and is a myth which I think sometimes pervades skiing as well, which is why I would like to address it.  

When going uphill, it is not a matter of WEIGHT, but USABLE weight. While carrying extra bodyfat up a hill isn't going to help you out any, carrying larger amounts of muscle up a hill is not going hurt. In fact, it often helps. 

Of course, the best climbers in cycling look like skeletons with skin.....

but there is a big difference between a race that requires more than 3 hours of climbing, like a mountain stage in the tour de france, and a ski race where the total time climbing MIGHT be a half an hour. 

The biggest problem I see with athletes who try control their weight, which was this young cyclists problem, is that they end up shorting themselves on recovery. If you are counting and cutting calories, your body does not have the protein to repair muscle damage, nor the carbohydrates necessary to refuel muscle. So you end up with a toss-up, do you gain weight, but weight that enables you to generate more force, OR, do you keep your weight down so you don't have to generate as much force? Well, it seemed to me like an easy question to answer, but like many cyclists, my young friend remained unconvinced. So I steered us towards a long climb, told him to keep up. At the top I sat and waited a few moments for my friend to catch up. When he made it up, I asked him how much he thought I weighed, and we determined that I outweighed him by about 50 pounds, him being about 5' 9" and 135lbs, and I being 6' 1" and 185 lbs. I asked him again what he thought was better, being more fit, or being more light? He seemed to have changed his mind.

As I said before, it is not about the WEIGHT, it is about USABLE weight. As my friend noticed, it doesn't matter if you weigh very little and don't have much to carry, you still have to be STRONG to climb a hill fast, whether that be on two wheels or two skis. It comes down not to weight, but the ratio of specific-strength to weight. 

So the take home message is don't worry about what you weigh, toss the scale, and focus instead on optimizing that ratio, trying to be as absolutely specifically strong as you can, and eating well to minimize body fat, and then just kick some ass! 

Until next time. 

Ahh rest days

Today was a glorious rest day. 

Until fairly recently I hated days off, I just got antsy and lost motivation because I felt like I wasn't actively striving to reach my goals. I knew rest was absolutely the most important part of a successful training plan, and I did ok at easy days, but days completely off felt horrible. Recently though I've been much better at staying focused on rest days by focusing all of my energy on conserving energy. Wait,......

What I mean is, when I take a day off now, every spare second I have I am either laying down with my legs elevated (very good for decreasing inflammation due to muscle fatigue, thus speeding recovery), eating, or napping (often with my legs up). All of those are performed with a water bottle at my side (I try to drink enough to pee clear all day, hydration (not to much though, and make sure you get some electrolytes either with your food or drink) aids recovery as well). This helps me focus because it keeps me feeling like I'm doing something. A day off now isn't a LACK  of training, it's an ABUNDANCE of rest. Think about it. 

I little bit of perspective goes a long way

This morning I had a crappy workout. Well, it started out that way at least, legs not feeling to snappy, just not feeling that into it. As I rollerskied, I was starting to get down on myself, as I often do when I don't feel so good. As I thought about it, I wasn't feeling BAD, just not awesome. after that realization I got to thinking about it, and I haven't had a "just ok" workout in a while. that got me feeling better, because as a rising athlete you're always told "Everybody has bad days." After that I felt much better, relaxed a bit, and the rest of the workout was MUCH better, I still felt a little tired, but my technique improved and it started feeling fast and easy again. After I came back home I checked my training log, and the last time I didn't feel absolutely kick-ass was August 19th. I'll take it. 

Let's Get Some!

So after watching this , i found a strong desire to never roller ski again...ever.
(the video format didn't work but here is the youtube link)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUig2HsX2o4

Fall Intensity Camp

So it's Sunday night and I'm sitting in the library, again. I needed a study break so I figured I'd post a new blog.

This weekend, a group of us from the team traveled to Nebraska for an intensity training camp. Some of you may be questing "why Nebraska?!". Like you, I was also wondering why in the wide world of sports would we be going to Nebraska? Were we just going to harvest corn and chase cows with our ski poles waving frantically in the air? To answer that question, we were traveling to Nebraska to do a Low alititude, intesity training camp. The elevation there is somewhere in the ball park of 3000' above sea level, and for those of you who arent familiar with Laramie, we reside at 7200' and do a majority of our training in the region of 8000'. With that being said, it now makes more since why we'd go to Nebraska for a low altitude camp, but intensity? This usually means hill bounding and a time trial. I was quite sceptical of their being any hills taller than a cows rear end in Nebraska, but I was soon to put my disbeliefs to bed.

Friday afternoon, we had three car loads leave Laramie early so we could get to our destination and make check in time and still have time for an early evening run. The rest of the crew were to leave sometime later around 4pm due to class constrictions. The drive was long as any drive through Wyoming and to part of Nebraska would be expected to be. Things were looking pretty dismal and flat as we trekked futher into the corn state until, to my surprise, we started seeing some sandstone formations, trees, and were now dropping in elevation rather quickly. We then pulled into Fort Rodinson, Ne. I have never been to this place but I was quite impressed. It was an old cavilry fort built in the late 1800's and early 1900's. As we first opened the doors, we were all amazed at the size of the house we had rented for the weekend. It was an old officers home and was simple HUGE! With sleeping for twenty, we were more than comfortable.

After settling in, we organized and went for a slow run down an old railway that has been transformed into a gravel jogging/bike path. It was really interesting to be at this lower elevation because the tempuratue was warmer and the humidity was higher than what we were used to back in Wyoming. After our run we had an amazing spaghetti dinner and then awaited the arrival of the later group who had seemed to manage to put a group of all out of state freshman in one car and hope they'd be able to follow. Well as it turnded out, that was too much to hope for and we didnt see the last group of younin's until somtetime after 10 pm.

The next morning we were heading out to do some hill bounding. We ran out a dirt rode into a field hoping that it would lead us to the hills off in the distance. I dont know if we were lucky or if it was some kind of cruel joke, but we managed to come across the most brutal hill in the ENTIRE STATE!!!! This thing was steeper than the alpine resort that we do our bounds on during our summer camp! AND ITS IN NEBRASKA!!! I was pleasantly surprised and my legs were quite unpleasantly shaking at the end of my final bound.

Later that afternoon, after lots of food and rest, we went for an easy roller ski on the most amazing pavement ever! The entire fort had a one to two lane wide roads that went all over the place and had some mild little climbs and downhills to them. This is by far the best place I have ever roller skied. We then grilled a bunch of burgers and brats and were able to just relax the rest of the evening.

6am came way to early this morning. The sun was still down and it was quite chilly outside. It was looking up to be a great morning for a roller ski time trial. After a short breakfast, we were off. There is a scnenic drive about a qurter mile away from where we were staying and this is the location where coaches had decided to do our 6km time trial. The course started once we crossed the first cattle gaurd. Its started off as a long mellow climb good for V2. Kari had started ahead of me and her and I were coming up to a heard of huge long horn bulls. As Kari stopped I decided to just keep going as they started to run parallel to the road. It was really cool and I was reminded of the running of the bulls and then quikly rememberd images of people getting trampled and then immediately thought maybe I should've done as the tall cowgirl did and stopped. Luckily they crossed the road and kept going and I was able to continue onward. After another cattle gaurd and maybe 2km, the road started climbing rather quickly and did not stop until the end, 4km away. It was a great test on my legs as they were burning and my technique was begining to fail about halfway up. It was all I could do to hold it together and finish strong. At the top a few of us guys were walking around getting ready to get a ride back down when all of a sudden Zgenyha (no idea how to spell his name), the Russian Monster, had already started to go back down on his rollerskis!!!! I imediately thought "DEATH!". Next thing I know, Joe and Dan are on their skis and heading down too. "CRAP! Now I have to do it!" I thought and put my skis on, took a big gulp and started my deathwish down. I was shortly followed by Grigory, our other Russian Wonder. Now if any of you dont know what roller skis are like, well just think of them as really short skis with two wheels and absolutely no way to stop! We quickly gained momentum because the top was the steepest part. The hill was a curvy, one lane road with no guard rails, some gravel, and lots of cow poop! it was like doing GS alpine race trying to avoid the mass quantities of crap! The whole time I'm thinking this is nuts! One little thing wrong and I could end up seriously injured if not dead! Yikes! Finally we got to the two lane road and there was a little bit of an uphill ahead to slow down on so I got in my full tuck and bombed the rest reaching speeds over 30mph if not closer to 40+mph After the run off hill it was a gradual long down hill to the two cattle gaurds. I started my roller ski "snow plow" and look back and Grigory is still tuck skating. "What is he doing?! Does he not know there's a cattle gaurd there?" I thought as I begin to slow down enough to stop by turning around. Lucky for Grigory there was a pull off shoulder that he was able to just bairly make it around to slow down and turn around. Otherwise it would've been a definate cattle gaurd faceplant! After that, he and I skied easy all the way back to the fort and met up witht he rest of the group.

Next thing I know we are all packed up and ready to leave. And after another long drive and almost losing the same car that got lost the firt time, we were back in Laramie and falling back into our normal day to to routines. So here I now sit, still in the library, having not studied my anatomy for the last hour, thinking that you know what, Nebraska can be a pleasant surprise and be a fun adventure when you go with the right group of people for the right reasons.

Until my next rediculously long blog post,

sincerely,
John Kirlin

UW STXC MTNBR

so i did the UW STXC MTBR this weekend while eating KFC, approved by the USDA and shown on ABC. any other letters i can through in there? well, this was to be my first mountain bike race. I have done some road races but never a mtn race. So i figure i'll try the short track because its like a crit ,but on mtn bikes. So i got up at seven ,had a good breakfast and headed up to Happy Jack. i registered, got a cool number plate and headed out to ride the course. It was nothing technical, which is good for me. It went through the "meadow" ( not the meadow ski trail) and down ridge. Now, i have never done a mtn bike race before but i thought this course was a good one, a good climb and a long descent to rest. There was a good number of us in the "C" division. The race ended up being 4 laps, the first lap i got a head of a few guys and rode the climb fast to put in some distance. 2nd lap nothing happened, i just rode. 3rd lap i caught a CSU rider and attacked towards the top of the climb, no counter. He caught me on the descent and i stuck to his wheel through the line. We get the bell, 1 more, i knew i had to put in a strong attack to get me to the line ahead of him. Well, i was out of the saddle ready to jump and he dropped his chain and swerved into a tree. Bummer dude, but i was going to attack anyway so it worked out well for me. I held him and a guy from School of Mines off to finish top ten.
overall a good experience, i think i will have to do it again,
keep the rubber down.

What makes YOU feel tough?

As I was midway through a two hour pouring-rain-rollerski this morning, I started to think about what makes me feel tough, which made me wonder what makes other people feel tough?
For me, it's doing workouts in crappy conditions that would make a sane person say "Hell no."
Nothing makes me feel like more of a badass than hillbounding in rain/hail/snow/mud. This morning made me feel pretty tough because it was 6AM, pouring rain, and everyone else is passing me in their heated cars with hot cups of coffee in their hands.

But what makes you fell tough? And do you do workouts specifically to make yourself tougher?
If you have access to this blog, feel free to write a long post in reply, or if your a reader, please reply in the comment section.


Keep your tips sharp

Joe

Tenderfoot Triathlon!

This first weekend of school we have started a new tradition of going to Salida, Colorado for the Tenderfoot Triathlon.

This year we only had one tough guy who was willing to head to the race with us, John Kirlin. So John, Becca, Rachel and Christi headed up there on Friday with an early race start on Saturday morning.

Saturday turned out to be an amazing day, beautiful but not too hot.

They did the start of the swim differently that before and it was great because we were able to choose our own group of four for the swim so we all went in one lane, it was way better even though I, Christi, was the slowest swimmer and had a few laps after everyone was done.

The race was an olympic length triathlon with a 1km swim, 40km bike and a 10km run. It was a excellent fun time! Everyone finished in a reasonable time, Rachel, Becca and I didn't have our times by the time we left but John did and he won the 20-29 age division and was 6th overall! He did fine on the swim, did a great job on the bike and had a real solid run time. Quite impressive for his second triathlon!

I've uploaded pictures, graciously taken by my mother, to the ski team picture gallery. Check them out!

20 on 20

Before I was a skier I was a runner and before I was a runner my sister was a runner. I was talking to my sister the other day about running and the topic of marathons came up. I expressed some interest in running a marathon and she told me about what kids on her team used to do for their birthdays. They would run a mile for every year that they were alive. I thought it would be a great idea to try and see how I did on a longer run. Unfortunately, I overlooked the fact that my sister and the kids who used to run the birthday runs are really good runners. I still can’t beat my sister in running races, which is going to change next year in the bolder boulder. If only my leg hadn’t fallen asleep! Perhaps I should have drawn the connection between her old teammates who ran this insane run and her old teammate who just won the Leadville 100 mile trial run. But did I? Of course not!

On my birthday I woke up at 7:45 to try and finish the 20 mile run early. (I suppose I could have run 20k but I’m a real American). In my stupid string of ideas that eventually lead me to try this run, I thought “You know what would be fun? To run this whole thing on a track!” Well I did start on a track and I ran 21 and one half laps on the LHS track before I gave up that horrible plan. While I was running on the track I started in Zone 1. After I did some calculating I realized it would take me almost six hours to finish at that pace! I couldn’t handle running for six hours on a track so I gave up and got in my car and drove home.
When I got home I was really bummed. I didn’t want to give up and after some encouraging words with Julianne over texts I decided I would finish the run or at least try my best. So I decided to go up to happy jack and measure out seven and a half miles in my car down the dirt road opposite the tie city parking lot. And I did. After a few more encouraging texts, setting my water bottles behind trees along the road at 3 mile intervals and a plan for my girlfriend to come cheer me on an hour after I left the parking lot (2:13 into the run) I set out. The out and back run was much better than the track, though it wasn’t perfect. I went from running on a flat track on a relatively cool morning to running down a dirt road with a lot of hills at almost 9,000ft at midday in 85 degree weather. But hey, there was more to look at! I didn’t run this stretch of the run at anything close to Zone 1. My max HR was 190 and I think my average was around 170 something but I couldn’t run for six hours! On the scale of eventful runs this stretch of the run, the out part, was extremely uneventful but that was all about to change at the half way point.
I thought Julianne would have met up with me sometime before the halfway point; she was going to drive up and cheer me on! But I got to the half way point and turned around and nothing. I ran back to my first water bottle and realized that I didn’t want to drive all the way back out there to pick it up so I decided to carry it. About that point, 14 miles, is when the difficulty of the run hit me. I can honestly say that’s the first time in my life I’ve run for 3+ hours in zone 3. Small goals my friends! I picked objects that were pretty close to me and I made it my goal to get to that point, so on and so forth leapfrogging from object to object. At about 16 miles the clouds were getting really dark. I heard thunder off in the distance but I kept going. When the flashes and thunder were seven seconds apart I was about to assume the lightening position. Just then the double OG, Julianne, and her pug rolled up in her 1990 Honda Accord on the dirt road. It was awesome to get some encouragement on the last past of my run, I gave her my water bottle and I took off at a good pace for about half a mile but then the storm was getting really bad and I decided to call that section of the run at 17.5 miles and I got a ride back to my car from my awesome girlfriend.
I thought, “Hey I’ll just run the 3.5 miles that I have left in town.” I got back to town and there was an even bigger storm going on in town. At this point, I just wanted to be done, but how could I quit so close to the end? I couldn’t! So I bit the bullet and started to run the last 3.5 miles on my parent’s treadmill. Running on a track is heaven compared to a treadmill. I ran to 18 miles and couldn’t take it! I got off and went upstairs, still pouring and thundering. It might be worthwhile to add, by this point it was already three something in the afternoon and I didn’t want to spend my entire birthday on the run. So I ate my pride and ran the last 2 miles on the treadmill. It was horribly slow and painful at that point but I did it and I made it to the end of 20 on 20.

The whole event took me from 7:45 am to 3:40 pm. The actual running was somewhere around 4 hours but I can’t tell you the exact amount of time because I don’t know. Is there a marathon in my future? I’m not sure, but I am pretty sure that I should stick to middle distance sprints (and skiing of course!)! I wish I had something more to write about other than my epic runs but that’s about all I’ve done this summer. I’m sorry if my tale was boring but I hope you smiled at least once reading this ridiculous story of mine.