Training Log Archive: Swampfox

I was surprised and puzzled when I noted that Spike has logged only a few minutes less in training time than biggins for the past week. When I mentioned this to an acquaintance who is a trainer for the UW football team, he said they were puzzled by this development, too. That was even more surprising to me--that folks over at the football team were following stuff like this--and I said so. But he said they are always looking to add a decent city auditor or a good biggins or two to the roster.

C • I assume 3

Began the day with an O' course at Diamond Bay. Even found a few ribbons, so there's a chance I was doing something right at times. For added speed, I wore bright pink tights, which the wildlife must have found very alarming, as I didn't see any (wildlife). A fair bit of the running was rougher, and it felt like I was moving okay everywhere, so good.

I ran at Happy Jack, running right over where the very large snowfield near the Visitors Center used to be (the last bits of the snow there melted yesterday.)

But not before waiting out a half hour of rain at the parking area, listening to the news. I didn't have the right clothing for the rain, and was very happy to see it more or less finish up at the end of the half hour.

Noted that some more trees have been cleared off sections of single track, done over the weekend. Still plenty enough trees down across trails to keep the chainsaws happy for a while.

I had planned to go out for a short bike ride and then a longish run, but was unsuccessful insofar as very strong and violent winds blew me so many miles off course that it took me many hours to back home, and that was only after being towed a good bit of the distance on I-80 by a semi-truck driver who took mercy on me. Otherwise I would probably still be out there, hoping for a favorable shift in wind directions that might favor me with a tail wind.

By the time I got home I was so ravenous that I ate a dozen soft boiled eggs with ketchup, a four slices of bread peanut butter sandwich, and also a large spiny lobster that I found crawling in the bathtub which I fried in butter (the lobster, not the tub) and then turned into lobster risotto. That was almost enough to take the edge off my hunger.

UW had graduation today; while I was biking by the university I saw one guy in shorts, Keds (shoes), and a graduation gown, who was running pretty hard. He was either very happy, or else he was very late--and to me it looked more like the latter. It was really almost too nice a day for graduation, to go by the historical norm, or even by last year's weather. But I guess they had it anyway!

After biking, I headed out for O' at Devil's Claw, where the waiting hills were bigger than the wind. My hill climbing fitness showed; I was able to jog up everything, but it felt the very opposite of fast. On the other hand, I was at least moving fast enough not to pick up any ticks today, so that's something.

There were still some deep and large snowdrifts in the terrain, firm enough to be quite good to run on. By the time I was done, my legs felt pretty smoked. Maybe I should go back to the Forest Service and tell them I have changed my mind and I want all of Laramie Daze to be at Devils Claw (none of it will be, this year), and could they please bring in some fill dirt to make the hills even bigger.

I just looked outside (it's night) and saw some antelope walking down the street. Maybe they are looking for the night O' start.

With the gates on the roads into the National Forest now open, I wasted no time to head to a new area now accessible, and elected to run at Pitcher Hill. In my mind, outside of Telephone Song, it is the "sagest" area we have here, and while you don't have to love sage, if you're going to run at Pitcher Hill and thrive, you do have to learn to deal with it. Good stuff.

When I was done and back at the truck, I took off my shoes and realized they had done their last run. These were inov-8 OROC 340s which I've had for so long I can't even be sure how long I've used them. 4+ years, is what I'll go with. However long it's been, I put *a lot* of hours and kilometers on them, and they held up far better than any other O' shoe I've ever had--and that's a lot of shoes over the years.

So what am I going to do now? Well, since I bought 2 pairs at the same time, I think I'll pull out pair number 2, and with any luck I'll be fine for another few years of training (I race in a lighter shoe.)

C • Now what 2

The weather was supposed to be poor today, but in the end it only rained a little and really wasn't so bad, it just wasn't sunny, with things brightening up just a little towards the end of the day.

I was happy to see that the gates on the roads into the National Forest had been opened up today, which makes access to most of the maps here much easier!