12 Mile Run on North Shore

James and I ran North Shore trail yesterday.  I had actually never done this trail, not even on the bike.  It turned out great.  Initially the weather was looking a bit tougher, like freezing rain or sleet, but it was beautiful!  Sunny, about 34 degrees (felt warmer due to the nice sun), great day.  We got a bit messed up trying to find the trailhead from where we parked, detouring maybe a mile along the water before doing this crazy climb up through the blackberry bushes to get back to the road, then down the road to finally find the trailhead.

We'd originally planned to do 10 miles, but got to the parking lot at the other end (roughly 5 mile point), and were both feeling good, so decided to go a bit longer to see what was beyond.  Finally, at 55 minutes in (and we think right about 6 miles), we turned around, mostly out of time constraint.  While this wound up being 5 miles longer than any run I'd done this year, it felt great, but was likely good we turned when we did.

The trail was in great shape, and was a good one.  It's a lot of little up and down, various quick stream crossings, slightly rocky in some spots.  But, we ran a good pace, in the low 9 minute miles, which is good for both of us at that distance.  We normally run slightly hillier stuff, so it maybe was not too fast, but still felt great.  

It seemed to warm up nicely too, although I think was still in the mid-30's when we got back.  James actually ran the whole day in just a t-shirt, compared to me in a thin Pearli long sleeve base, and an Icebreaker GT180 top (I shed my jacket pretty quickly).  I wasn't sure but used my Mountain Hardware Momentum gloves, and that wound up being perfect.  I really love these gloves, they can handle quite a temperature range, and they breathe SO well!  Was also wearing Pearli knickers, and Inov-8 X-Talon 212 shoes (as usual these days).  

Finally, at about 8 or 9 mile mark, had a gel (Hammer banana), and that was a very smart choice.  I could tell just a short while later as it kicked in.  I finished quite strong, and James was bummin' he hadn't brought a gel (and that was the only one I had).  All in all, a really great day of running.  Total time was 1hr 52 mins, over 12 miles.  With such a big jump in mileage, I'm very excited that I'll be able to ramp up my mileage in time for the Peterson Ridge Rumble 20 miler in early April.

Filed under  //   running  
Posted February 19, 2011
 

4/5 Days of Trail Running

Yesterday completed three days in a row of trail running for me, something I haven't done this year, and in quite some time.  Even better is I'm left feeling really psyched, energized, and motivated!  And, in fact, I'd run 4 out of the last 5 days:

  • Tuesday I did a nice 5.8 miler, with some good climbs, with exactly a 10 min pace.  
  • Thursday, it was my closest-to-home shorty 3.6 miler on the Blanton section of Ridgeline.  What was cool about this, was that I nearly did a PR, and did it 2 minutes faster than I'd done this year.  At the end, I felt great, not tired.  Of course, later that night I crashed, being ready to go to sleep at 9pm, and I should have, but didn't.
  • Friday was the longest run I've done this year, at 7.4 miles on the Goodman Creek trail, with about 1600' of vert.  James ran this with me, and it was a great social, and quality run.  It was a bit warmer than I expected, as I'd overdressed slightly, but it didn't matter, and was great to run with James, as I rarely get to run with others, plus James and I are quite compatible pace wise.  He can fly on the descents though, wow.  Again I felt great after this, and had felt we should have gone faster, or not walked a few sections.  But, dang, again, later that night, boy I was done: after reading to & putting my daughter to bed, I returned to the couch, where I pretty quickly fell asleep.  I fought it for a few minutes, then realized I just needed it.  Didn't wake up until 2:30am (at which point I went to bed for real).
  • Saturday I expected to not run, but I got a bit antsy near the end of the day, so went out for a short, but solid run at Fox Hollow, doing the descent to Martin St and climb back up, then the regular loop.  3.6 miles again, but good.  A bone in my metatarsals of my right foot had been hurting to just walk around on - I think I bruised it on a previous run, but it didn't hurt to run on; happy about that.
Here it is Sunday, and dang if I don't wish I could be out running.  Probably good to take a day, given this was a bit of a ramp up for me.  But, I'm really psyched, as I feel like I've got my running "back".  I need to go sign up for the Peterson Ridge Rumble 20 miler.  I've been mountain biking on those trails, and they should be really sweet for a run!  It doesn't even seem like that big of a buildup to go from 7 miles up to say nearly 20 prior to then (I've got 7 weeks to do it).  Still, that'll definitely be into the long range territory for me, as I've only done over 15 miles a few times.  It will certainly be a lot harder than the Haulin Aspen half marathon - same altitudes and vert I think, but 7 miles longer, and on I think harder terrain.  Still, really looking forward to that.

As alluded to in my last post, I'm making some dietary changes, to work on some hormone issues I've got going on.  Ramping up essential fatty acids, eating grass-fed lean red meat (I rarely eat red meat), plus more fish than I eat now, and trying to go wheat/gluten free.  I'm excited to see how/if this affects my energy levels.  

James and I talked a lot about diet, as both of us are into food, and really more into food in relation to fitness and health.  He's trying a vegan route.  We'll both be using Udo's Oil too.  I'm a big believer that diet and exercise can solve a lot more health problems than the pharma co's say, or even as most doctors will prescribe, so I'm hoping that's the case for me.

Filed under  //   running  
Posted February 13, 2011
 

Dinner Feb 10, 2011

P38

Thinking about blogging all my meals to help track it as I start doing some new things to hopefully solve some medical issues. More on that in an upcoming post.

As for the actual meal: two smaller bugers with avocado, tomato, cheese.  Arugula salad with lemon juice and olive oil dressing.

Filed under  //   food  
Posted February 11, 2011
 

Clear Lake snowshoe Jan 2011

Some friends and I started out the new year (well, Jan 2nd), by snowshoeing around Clear Lake (off Hwy 126 here in Oregon).  We'd originally planned to summit Red Top, but there was so much snow, that even at 4000' when I went to play at a snow park with my kids, I was sinking in up to my waist in spots!  Mike has a good blog post with photos and some details of our trip.

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I think it was actually as low as 13 when we started, but maybe I'm not recalling correctly (Mike's post says 17).  Either way, it was cold when we started, but of course we warmed up quick, and it did too, hitting I think about 25 an hour in.  Took us about 4 hours.

I'm just logging my own gear here, for my sake:

  • Icebreaker 3/4 length wool long underwear (awesome)
  • Smartwool ski socks
  • REI E1 pants (thin, waterproofish, worked great)
  • Keen hiking boots
  • REI short gaiters - these worked fine for the day, but having a full length, real winter gaiter would have been best
  • Icebreaker 150 top
  • Icebreaker 220 GT top
  • Pearl Izumi fleece/windstop vest (hadn't originally planned to take this, but the cold and such had me add it, and it was an excellent choice - kept it on once I took my shell off after it warmed up).
  • Smartwool hat
  • Showers Pass eVent shell
  • Burton ski gloves - my hands were freezing early on, but warmed up quickly thanks to these, and then swapped to...
  • Outdoor Research Flurry wool gloves which were excellent for the day
  • Atlas 30" snowshoes
  • poles
I used my typical Camelbak pack, but only drank about 25oz (carried about 90).  Oatmeal and bit of cheese for breakfast, one bar, and a sandwich out on the trail.  All around good.

Posted January 10, 2011
 

Tough Mudder NorCal 2010

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Last weekend I joined two of my DealBase co-workers (Sam (CEO) and Ross (BizDev)) for the Tough Mudder event at Bear Valley in Northern California.  We arrived on Friday, ran Saturday, and drove/flew back on Sunday.  It was quick, but was a fun weekend.  Ross found us a good rental house, and we had dinners at two of the restaurants at the lodge.  Bear Valley is a small, classic CA ski place, and turned out to be a decent venue for the event.  There were some things that could have been improved, but overall it worked out well, given the 3500+ participants on Saturday.  They did it all over again on Sunday, but with fewer participants.

As for the event itself, it was 7 miles of running, and about 15 obstacles.  Some of the obstacles required crawling through pipes or under wire or netting on the ground, and thrashed your elbows (especially for us 6'+ height folks who really had to drag our bodies through it using hands and elbows - some of the shorter folks were able to crawl more on their knees in some cases).  There were some fun walls to scale too.  I had been pretty worried about these beforehand, thinking they'd be extremely tough, but with the help of teammates or other participants, they wound up being fun.  

First page of event photos
(I'm the guy in the greenish top, with super short hair; Ross was sporting the "fauxhawk" for the event :)

The two hardest obstacles both involved water.  The first was running uphill in the halfpipe while they blasted you with quite cold water from the snowmakers.  Initially it didn't look that hard, but with that cold water hosing you down and the steepness of the hill, you got quite winded.  However, that was kind of trivial in comparison to what we wound up nicknaming the "ballshrinker"...

The Ballshrinker, or proper name, "Underwater Tunnels", was brutal.  They'd created this big reservoir of seriously freezing cold water (I'd guess 40 degree range?).  You ran down into the water, which happened to smell like crap, and then you had to swim under some barrels.  That dive and underwater time completely knocked the wind out of you.  All of us were practically hyperventilating upon surfacing.  I felt stunned when I popped up after the first set of barrels, and just sat there for a bit, gathering myself to then have to go under the next set.  We did make it, up the other side, only to then have to slide back down into the water and swim a bit.  Upon emerging from that second dip, my entire body felt like it had been compressed and shrunk.  I was extremely cold.  The next bit involved carrying large tree rounds, and by the end of that, my fingers were numb.

Second page of event photos

After that we did some more running, climbing of fences, crawling, etc., to finish up running through fire. Now I can say I've run through fire!  It took us about 1 hour 50 minutes, one mouthful of nasty Ballshrinker water (Sam), some Clif Shot Blocks (thanks Ross!), and a few dixie cups of water. I'd have to say, I really did have fun, and especially some of the earlier terrain we were running was truly outstanding - I would LOVE to go back there and just do a bunch of trail running.  It's fairly remote terrain, lots of rock, super scenic, and just THE kind of trail running environment I love.  I will pass on the Ballshrinker though.  And who knows, maybe the DealBase Mutilators will do another one of these.

Filed under  //   race   running  
Posted October 15, 2010
 

Great Adventure in Bolivia: Climbing 3 ~20k Peaks

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A local Eugene friend, Jared, who is an excellent Adventure Racer, cyclist, and all around athlete, recently spent some time in Bolivia.  He had planned to be doing the Inca Run, but that was cancelled, yet he had non-refundable tickets.  So, he went anyway, by himself, with rusty Spanish, and clearly a sense of adventure.  He wound up doing some pretty epic mountaineering.  Check out the photos and great writeup of his amazing adventure in Bolivia.

Posted October 1, 2010
 

Mt. Bailey Hike/Climb

On Saturday, I hiked up Mt. Bailey with a friend, my brother-in-law, and a friend of bro-in-law's, as well as said friend's son.  It had originally sounded like this might have some climbing element, or at least a few tricky sections, but in reality it was just a pure walk-up, with only one tiny notch that required use of your hands.  About 6 miles round trip (we started from the upper trail-head, which cut out the flat hike in from the lower trailhead), and 2700-2800' of gain.  That is, after we messed up the start...

We'd all agreed to go for starting at the upper trailhead, which cuts out the flat hike in that sounded sort of pointless.  There wasn't very good beta on the upper trailhead, and I thought that I read it was at the end of Road 380.  So, I found that on Google Maps, got the GPS coords, put that in my GPS for our drive.  We knew it was a solid 4x4 road up there too.  We met up with Matt & his son who were in a pretty long Chevy truck, Paul, Ed, and I were in my Jeep.  We drove on that road until 3 larged downed trees blocked us going further.  According to the GPS, we only had half a mile left, so we just parked, and headed out to find the trailhead.  Well, after nearly a mile, and when the road ended, with no trailhead in sight, we knew we messed up.  Looking at a real map, we realized the trailhead was not at the end of the road, but a ways back.  Back to the cars, which we had to drive backwards a ways (nowhere to turn around), then found the trailhead easily, because it was right where a red SUV was parked that we'd seen on the way up, and all thought "sheesh, what'd that dork park here for?!" :-)

Anyway, from there on, it was pretty straight forward.  Steep hike in spots, but overall just a really nice one.  Amazing views of Mt. Thielsen which was across Diamond Lake from where we were, and is on the list of peaks to climb.  I also admit that I was thinking about how runnable this route would be, as a way to get in some serious run-climbing training.  It'd be a bit brutal for some of the lower sections that were quite steep, but the rest might work, aside from having a bit less air up in the 8000' range.  

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisrbailey/4983446320/in/set-72157624940348014/

The weather for the day couldn't have been better.  It started out seeming cold - saw 24 degrees on the car thermo on the way there, but it was about 40 by the time we started, and I think maybe in the mid-50's by the end.  Completely clear, only mild wind at the top, and just so nice.  We had a good lunch at the top, where we met Eric and his sons, who we were all super impressed by, given one was 4 years old!!! and the other was I think 6.  Nice work kids!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisrbailey/4982882517/in/set-72157624940348014/

This points out how workable this hike would be for a variety of folks.  It's not technical (in the summer/without snow), it's relatively short when parking at the upper trailhead, and while there are definitely some steep spots, it's still all walking/hiking.  There are also no crazy exposed sections where you could have a bad fall, etc.  There is a cat skiing operation in the winter (how they get the cats in there I have no idea), but the slope is mild enough that I'd be able to hike/skin up and then ski it (assuming I was with folks that had avy training and all that - Matt?).  Good peak to know about.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisrbailey/4982920415/in/set-72157624940348014/

Our hiking time was about 4.5 hours (about 2.5 up, and less than 2 down).  I'd say it was a solid pace, when we were hiking, but we also stopped a lot for photos, etc.  We hung out at the summit for nearly an hour.

For my own notes, I'm cataloging what I ate, wore, gear, etc...

Food

  • At piece of bread with peanut butter for breakfast before leaving house
  • Took moka pot of coffee on the road
  • Ate a Clif Mojo bar about 30 mins before started hiking
  • Consumed 80oz of liquid
  • 1 Gu chomps
  • 1 Gu gel
  • 1 Hammer gel
  • PB&J sandwich
  • some salted almonds
  • espresso beans

Gear

  • Camelbak Transalp
  • down jacket
  • food stuffs
  • mini first aid kit, space blanket, chem hand warmers, SPOT, handkerchiefs
  • iPhone - camera and video worked well, except for lack of zoom
  • wallet
  • poles
  • gaiters (didn't use)

Clothing - which worked perfect for the day

  • Icebreaker wool hat (wore this for only a short bit on first hiking part, then off when we returned to car)
  • Pearli cap (wore this for about 2/3rds of the day
  • REI Schoeller hiking pants
  • Smartwool Adrenaline lighter hiking socks
  • Keen boots
  • Mtn Hardware very Wicked Lite Double t-shirt
  • Icebrearker GT 180 zip long sleeve
  • Pearli vest (wore this off and on during the day)
  • REI shell (only wore this at the top, after lunch when got a bit cold due to wind)
  • sunglasses (Smiths)

Filed under  //   hiking  
Posted September 13, 2010
 

Running Brice Creek

Today I finally got to run at Brice Creek, a place I've wanted to run for a long time.  It is one of my favorite mtb trails, great scenery, and one of the more rocky trails I know of around here (which is still fairly tame compared to somewhere like Tahoe).  I was running by about 8:15am this morning, and in an unusual bit of August weather, it was 48 degrees!  I donned an Icebreaker GT t-shirt, and then some Pearli arm warmers, which turned out to be a perfect combo.  Temp I don't think got any warmer during the run, and I even got a bit cold towards the end.  


As I mentioned in my post yesterday, I did wind up running in the Inov8 shoes.  This was interesting, given how rocky the trail was, and how much more of the trail you feel with these shoes.  However, it was fine, and actually, turned out to be a great choice, given these shoes have excellent toe bumpers, and I needed them a half dozen times today!  Ugh, just nailed my toes into rocks several times, and in fact, on the last time, it tripped me up enough that I wound up having to put my right hand to the ground, but that bounced me back up.  The only other point of note was that these shoes are a bit roomy on me.  In the toe box that's great, but across the top of the foot they're a smidge sloppy at times.  I should probably try lacing up tighter, but so far this hasn't really seemed to be a problem, and I'm trying to work out if the sloppiness is bad, or just different.  Sometimes it seems a bit more forgiving when you get into tricky terrain, allowing you foot to move as needed.

The run was 5.5 miles one way, 11 miles round-trip according to their map.  Too bad my watch wasn't accurate, as it shows a perfect half marathon:

I did a really nice pace.  I was very safe in the rockier sections, really picking my way through, watching the foot work.  It's a bit of an isolated location, although there were A LOT of campers out in the area on this day, so if I had gotten injured, it probably wouldn't have been too big an issue to get help.  Still, I'd rather just take it a bit easier and enjoy the run, and stay injury free!  Took 2 hours to do the run, which is about what I'd been figuring.  I did not make it up to the waterfall, but hope to another time.  That adds a very solid climb and I think about 2+ miles to the total.  But overall, the mileage, conditions, etc. were just about perfect for me today.  I did have some light right knee pain, as I've been having lately, but just sort of kept ignoring it.

Finally, I really love when Matt Hart takes short bits of video during or of runs.  So, I gave it a shot using my iPhone today.  Pretty bad really - it's quite hard to keep your arm real steady while running, trying to keep the camera pointed at the trail, and also watch where you're running yourself!  Here are the two videos.  The second one is a bit less shaky, and also shows some of the rockiness of the trail (well, you can sort of make it out :) and I think I'll make them shorter next time, seems like maybe 15 seconds is better than 30...

Posted August 29, 2010
 

A great week

The last week has been great, running wise.  I had been down visiting my family in southern CA, and got my sister out for her first trail run (she's been running a fairly long time, but never on trails).  We did a nice 45 min run at Crystal Cove State Park.  Bit of hills, pretty warm (80?), but fun.  We talked the entire run, and she's in great shape, so I was actually a bit out of breath towards the end.  I headed back to Eugene the next day, and crammed in some overdue work.  Then, ran each day until today.  These local runs totalled 22 miles, and I intend to do about 10+ tomorrow, so it'll be a solid week.  Thursday was a really nice 9 mile effort as well.

I've been doing pretty much all my shorter runs now in the Inov8 Roclite 295 shoes.  I'm very much liking them.  At this moment, I plan to run in them tomorrow, but it'll be a last minute decision I think.  The shoes are different, especially when you just put them on and sit there in them.  The insole reminds me of my Specialized Body Geometry cycling shoes, especially the earlier generations where there was a pronounced bump under your metatarsal area.  But, as soon as you hit the trail, you don't notice it, and in fact, the shoes just seem to fit me really really well.  They are more minimalist compared to the Brooks Cascadia, but so far, all I've been able to notice is that I feel more of the trail under my foot - I haven't noticed any particular muscle pain or other side effects that you sometimes hear about with more minimal shoes.  This is partly why I'm ready to go try them on a longer run (longest in them to date has been 6 miles).  Should be interesting.  I will also be interested to see how my legs fare having done the 9 miler on Thursday.  

Filed under  //   running  
Posted August 28, 2010