Mountain Monkeys - Mountain and road biking, trail running, skiing, and whatever else I do, mostly in the mountains (or hills)
 

2010 Steep Hill Chase 5k race

Saturday Diana and I raced the Steep Hill Chase 5k trail run here in town.  Fun event.  The course was essentially flat, with exception to the "steep hill", which was only maybe 20 feet up, but steep and slippery with mud.  You really had to claw your way up, using hands and knees, etc.  The other fun bit of the course was an option about halfway through where you could either take a "short cut" through the water, or go around.  In the spirit of things, I went through the water, which turned out to be waist deep, and a bit of a slog.  It was maybe 30-40 feet across.  The water wasn't too cold.  Really, the worst aspect of this was after - your shoes are soaked, as are shorts, part of my shirt, etc.  The soaked shoes really weigh you down, and I think, if ultimate time was my goal, going around would have been a better choice, but the water cross was fun.  

As it turned out, I had quite a good race, with a time of 23 minutes 41 seconds, for a pace of 7:38.  This is far and away the fastest I've run.  I was quite happy, as I figured 25 minutes would be the absolutely fastest I'd do it.  Clearly, having a shorter, flat course made a huge difference.  Diana did great too, and beat her expected time, coming in at 32 minutes and change.

There was a bit of a scare at the end of the race, as a woman crossed the finish line and collapsed, losing conciousness for a few seconds, and shaking a bit, kind of looking a bit seizure like.  The sharking stopped shortly, one of the race folks called 911, I gave her my vest and jacket to help keep her warm, and in the end she was ok.  She opted not to ride with the paramedics back to the hospital, and we saw her walking around at the award's ceremony.  Hopefully it was just dehydration and exertion, etc.  Glad she seems to be ok.

Filed under  //   race   running  
Posted June 14, 2010
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Two Great Runs This Week - and a New Watch

I'm quite happy with the two runs I got in this week, following the Gorilla Thrilla, and I guess sort of in prep for the Steep Hill Chase this coming Saturday.  Tuesday's run was my usual out and back on the Blanton-Willamette section of Ridegline.  I was feeling pretty good after the Thrilla, and also the distance was close to Steep Hill, so I wanted to push it a bit.  It worked - I set a new PR, with 32 mins flat.  Very good for me. 

Today, Thursday, I did a run I've only done I think two or three other times, and have considered the hardest I've done aside from any races.  This is starting at Spencer Butte parking lot, running over to Fox Hollow, doing a loop in there, and then back.  The section of trail from Fox Hollow back to where it tops out when rejoining the main Spencer Butte trail to me is the hardest section on the Ridgeline trails.  Many steep sections along 1.5 miles of trail.  I usually have to walk a lot of it.  Today was no different.  But, overall, I set a new PR by a ways today, doing this in 61 minutes (previous times were 67+).  Weather was funky.  When I left my house, computer said it was 61.  But it had hailed only an hour before.  Arriving at the trailhead, thermometer said 49 degrees.  I started out, sort of idiotically, in hat, gloves, and jacket (short sleeve shirt under).  This actually felt good (my hands get very cold easily, and my head does a bit too (it's nearly shaved, which doesn't help :)  hat came off in the first mile, then at Fox Hollow the jacket (which was very wet inside, so much for breathability!) and gloves.  

What I liked about today's, was that I felt I started out at quite a nice, almost leisurely pace.  I did not want to go real hard today, and I felt dehydrated, had headache, etc.  I'm glad I carried a water bottle (something I almost never do, but with that dehydration feeling, figured I should).  Was a nice run.  Achilles and calves got a bit of strain in the first half, but I think I determined that I really need to take the bigger strides on the descents, as I can actually be a bit more light/graceful that way, vs. the short, choppier, seemingly harder hitting steps.  Not always possible if the descent is real steep, but this sure seemed to make a difference.  I prefer it anyway, but the terrain sometimes doesn't allow for it as much.  Just have to work on doing it more.

So, I'm headed in to the Steep Hill Chase 5k on Saturday feeling good.  I am confident I can do sub-30 minutes, and really, should be able to do closer to 25 mins if the course is mostly flat (sounds like the "steep hill" is just one hill at the end, but rest is flat-ish?).  We shall see.

I also have a new watch, a Tech4o Traileader One.  I'm hoping it does a good job of measuring distance, since GPS based items suck here in the dense woods of Oregon.  This sucks, becuase I really like using Runkeeper Pro on my iPhone, but there are many times it's just so far off (iPhone's/GPS' fault, not Runkeeper).  Anyway, the watch uses technology that measures your stride/rhythm as you run.  No foot pod or anything else, which is great.  It also does altitude, temperature, and so on.  I've only used it on Thursday's run so far, but it is looking like right out of the box it's pretty darn accurate.  I tallied the trail distance using the maps, and it's within 0.2 miles for the total run.  This is even better than say the trail running book I've used, which says this run is 7 miles, but the maps show more like 6 (the watch said 6.24).  I plan to head over to the track at some point and do an official calibration for my running, but even now it seems at least close enough to use until I get a chance to calibrate.  It's also super light and plenty comfy.  It's a bit big for my taste, but I didn't even notice it on my wrist, so that's about all that matters.

Filed under  //   running  
Posted June 10, 2010
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Gorilla Thrilla 8.5 mile race

On Sunday, June 6th, I ran the inaugural Gorilla Thrilla race here in Eugene, all of a 5 min drive from my house.  I did the 8.5 mile version (there was also a 4.25 mile, the 8.5 is just two laps of the course).  I was excited, but a bit nervous going in, as this would be the longest run I'd ever done.  Awoke that morning, and it had been raining during the night, and was before the race.  We heard reports that it was a real mud fest, with some non-trivial creek crossings, and slippery hills.  It stopped raining before the start.  Mike joined me for this race, Jake was there, running in some Vibram 5 Fingers shoes, and speedy James was there too.  The gun went off and the gorilla and banana guys jumped out and then started wrestling.  The rest of us had to go run...

The course was definitely tricky as they said.  Very muddy in spots, ankle deep at times, but also just a bunch of grass and other things that combined to make seeing some rocks underneath hard.  I immediately knew I needed to take it easy, as I was pretty worried about my ankle.  I settled in as the race progressed, and was feeling fine.  Approaching the completion of the first lap, there's a solid hill, which was tough.  I chowed a Hammer gel just before this, which I think wound up being very good.  At about this point I was sort of wondering why I'd signed up for the two laps, but knew I could do it.  Getting over that hill, and then through the finish was great.  Grabbed a small bit of water, kept going.  Did the first lap in 48 minutes.

About 1 hour 7 mins in, as I looked at my watch, I was feeling quite good actually.  Probably had just done some downhills.  A few minutes later the rain started, but the temps were in the 60's, and it really was no big deal.  It wasn't as if I wasn't pretty much wet anyway.  Soon after was the knee deep creek crossing, and then onwards to the crazy guys pretending to be hillbillies chasing us down, yelling at us, etc.  That was good for a big smile on each lap, and a fun aspect of the race.  

I was yo-yoing with a couple others near the finish.  Caught a guy who'd passed me before, and one woman was creeping up from behind.  I held her off on the last descent, which was pretty damn sketchy.  I was surfing down it, and heard her yelping behind me (I can only imagine how many people probably crashed on this descent, so slippery!).  Then I kind of ran across the finish in a daze.  My wife and kids were there and I almost didn't notice them, I truly was in a bit of a daze. 

Pretty darn happy with my result though.  I had revised my initial guess of 90 mins, after hearing the course conditions to 1 hour 40 mins.  Wound up at 1 hr 37 min.  As it turns out, this was actually good for 10th place in the 8.5 mile group (overall: men + women, all ages).  Of course there were only 28 finishers :)  The 16 year guy, Alex, who won it, just smoked everyone but one other guy (only one other guy was within 10 minutes of his time), running a 7:22 pace!  He finished in about 1hr 2mins.  To me that was seriously fast given that course.  He was on the 2nd place relay team at the Ridgeline, and ran 6-something minute pace there, so clearly he's fast, but damn.  My pace was 11:26 in comparison.  I'd like to see what I could have done if it weren't so muddy, but really, quite happy with my result, and stoked to finish that distance.  Turned out to not be too bad.  Knowing the course on the second lap wound up being excellent, made it easier to break it up into mini-milestones.  I also quite enjoyed the course.

The land that this was on was private, 300+ acres owned by a guy who just wants to turn it into a park, but is being fought by the city and his neighbors for some f'ed reason.  He has a non-profit called Trials Club that I need to look into.  Apparently you can get a card that lets you go run/use the area, just have to sign in, and obey some basic rules.  This is fantastic given it's all of 5 minutes from my house.  I may even be able to run via the powerline easement to get there, something I'm now a bit more motivated to explore...

Filed under  //   race   running  
Posted June 8, 2010
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Running Forest Park in Portland

This past week I was at a conference in Portland, so two mornings I got up early and hit the trails in their amazing Forest Park which is one of the largest municipal parks in the country. The Wildwood trail network alone has something like 40+ miles of trail!  On Tuesday I did Marquam Shelter to Council Crest (and back), which is a nice 5k, 600' of ascent, basically uphill to Council Crest, which gives you a killer view of the city, then back down, all singletrack.  Sweetness!  I nearly rolled my ankle a few times on some of the rocks/roots, but it's a great trail, really enjoyed this one.  Was about 2 mile drive from my downtown hotel.

Thursday I did Wildwood-Wild Cherry loop, also close, only about a 10 min drive, if that, from downtown.  This one was a bit longer at 4.8 miles, 570' of gain according to the book I have. I was feeling a bit tired this morning, and got blown by by someone as I started out :)  A nice trail loop again though. Had a bit of pavement on it at the end, which is not my thing, but was a small price to pay.  Eugene's Ridgeline system is excellent, and the particular trails are very much to my liking, but this place has A LOT more terrain.  The good part is I'm in Portland several times a year, and I think will have to make more attempts to get out on the trails while I'm there.

The book I used for trail beta is "Trail Running Oregon" by Lizann Dunegan (Amazon, or view it on Google Books).

Filed under  //   running  
Posted June 8, 2010
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2010 Ridgeline Ramble

Posting this a week late.  My wife, Diana, and I did the Ridgeline Ramble as a relay team (10k each).  Diana rocked it.  She beat her expected time by 20 mins.  She's only been running again for about two weeks, so this is pretty damn sweet.  I finished, and did ok.  But, I was sick, and knew it affected my time.  I ran a 1:06, which was 6 mins slower than I'd hoped for.  Hard to say how much the illness affected me, but I clearly felt low on energy.  I just don't know if that means it cost me 3 minutes, 5, or 10.  But really, this was my first trail race, and all that really mattered was finishing with a solid performance (for me).  That I did.

One thing that I'm finding interesting, is that within a few minutes of finishing, I felt fine, and was joking with a friend who ran with me, that I should go do the rest.  Couldn't have done that, but with running, I'm finding that, so far, I can recover pretty quick.  The only thing is that this also makes me feel like I didn't go hard enough, or certainly that I didn't finish as strong as I could have.  I'm used to coming home from what would be a "hard" mountain bike ride (say a 4+ hour solid ride) and wanting to just veg on the couch the rest of the day.  With running that's yet to happen.  They're different, and I probably have cycling to thank for some endurance, and am still getting used to the muscle and joint use in running.  The nice thing is that it makes me think that doing 20k/half marathon, or potentially a bit more is going to be possible this year.

What's also fun is to see how fast the top folks are.  Jenn Shelton from Ashland, who's a top trails racer, absolutely smoked the course at 1:28, taking 4th overall, and beating the women's record by 9 minutes.  Jeremy Tolman won the mens, and set a new mens record as well, at 1:21.  Heck, that's only 15 minutes longer than me for double the distance!  The notion of running a 6.5 minute mile on trails is in that unattainable category in my mind.  I'm shooting to be able to do 9 (which I've done just about for 5k distances, so I think it's an attainable goal).

Most of all though, I'm having fun with this, enjoying it.  I haven't raced (bikes, or anything) for many years now, and I'm just enjoying taking a very casual approach back to it.  Not completely ignorant of times or placings or whatever, but for now, just competing with myself, and happy not to be last :)

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Posted June 7, 2010
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More running, achilles issues, bionic ankle

Last week after some runs, I had some a pretty sore achilles in my left leg (same as broken ankle).  I had to walk the last nearly mile of our Dillard scouting run.  So, I decided to go see the physical therapist (Hannah) again.  She got to work on it, and then luckily I had two days of business travel with no running, followed by a weekend of no running, but a road ride and some PT, push-ups, etc.  That seems to have worked it out mostly.  I ran Monday, and only on the very last descent of the steep Willamette section of Ridgeline did it even vaguely start to re-occur (but very mildly).  

Today I went in for PT again, and after Hannah did some work on it, she then applied this, uh, well, bio-electric type of stimulator thing:
I've got bionic ankle today
That stayed on for about 6 hours, which is how long the battery in it lasts, at which time you simply take it off.  Here's hoping it helped.
At this point, the scouting we've done for Ridgeline Ramble is essentially complete.  I realized that the last segment or two of the first 10k is going to be brutal.  I haven't run it, but I believe it's essentially the full uphill from the bottom of the Fox Hollow Ridgeline chunk that is nearest Fox Hollow Road.  That is preceeded by a bunch of downhill on pavement.  Not going to be my favorite section, that's for sure, but oh well.  I'm still really looking forward to it.  I've never done a trail running race (and not really any running races, last one was back in college), so should be interesting.
Finally, I've really been getting the itch to do some truly longer runs, like 2+ hours.  I know I'm not supposed to just jump from having only done 1 hour runs up that much, but dang I'm interested to see how that'd be.  I really want to go down and run Brice Creek, but I want to run a long while given it's a good hour drive to get there.  I expect it's going to be tougher terrain than I think, as it's a fair bit of little ups and downs, some roots, etc.  I'd like to aim to do this in June, so we'll see.  I'll chill and of course not plan to go up to the waterfall, that'll have to wait until I can be doing 20k distances.  

Filed under  //   running  
Posted May 25, 2010
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Scouting Run for Ridgeline Ramble

My wife and I did a bit of a scouting run today, so she could see some of the 2nd half of the Ridgeline Ramble she'll be doing as part of our relay team.  We ran the Fox Hollow section out to Dillard, along Dillard to the Dillard West trail head, where we saw what looks like a fairly steep section of trail that heads up to the Baldy summit.  We ran out of time today, had to go pick up my son from school, so we'll hit that another day.  Decent run.  I did a bit of back and forth as my pace is a fair bit faster than hers, which is all good.  Going to be good to know the full course before hand.  On Wed we'll probably do the Dillard chunk.  That'll only leave doing the entire Willamette section (from 52nd to Fox Hollow) left to scout out, oh, and the paved part on Spring, etc.  I've done nearly all the Willamette part, but don't know about a half mile in the middle.

Felt good today, although I did get a bit of pain in the back of my left leg, sort of higher than the achilles, but along those lines.  Not happy about that.  Don't know if it was the brace, or just a bit of strain on my body after now having started to run again after so much time off, or what.  Hoping it's just a fluke and gone by Wednesday...

Filed under  //   running  
Posted May 17, 2010
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6 Mile Trail Run - prep for Ridgeline Ramble & Tough Mudder

It's been quite a while since I've posted.  My ankle is now recovered, and I've been trail running again for about a week or so (5 runs total this year, I think).  A couple weeks ago, the CEO at DealBase, where I work, found the Tough Mudder race, and now he, another co-worker, and I are signed up as a team for that, which occurs in October (great company eh?!).  I'm excited, although slightly nervous, some of the obstacles will probably be pretty tough.  Plus, running in a lot of mud is not ideal for my ankle, although hopefully by then it won't be an issue.

But, through that, I've been re-inspired on running, and am happy to be back to it.  I've done a few 3-4 mile runs on my usual favorite Ridgeline trails.  Then yesterday, via Twitter, got to talking to a local about the Ridgeline Ramble, which is a 10k or 20k mostly trail race here in town.  I got the bug, and was going to do the 10k until I found out it was 50% pavement, which I just don't do.  However, somehow I managed to rope my wife into doing it as a relay team, where I'd run the first 10k and she the second, which works well for both of us.  She hasn't been running, this morning being her first run in a long while, but she's done 10k's before.  

Finally, this morning, we set off from Blanton, with the goal of being out for an hour.  I ran Blanton to 52nd/Willamette, then continued on there, which is quite tough for a while, as it's some steep hills on that section of Ridgeline.  I had to walk a bunch of it, but that's fine.  At just over 30 mins, at a small bridge, I turned around.  Was feeling great (downhills help!).  Then about the 45 minute mark, at which point I'm into the return hills of Blanton, that hurt a bit, had to walk some good chunks of that.  I thought my time would be 5-10 mins past an hour, but forgot that I had walked some of the Willamette section, so that balanced out, and my total time was 1hr 2 mins!  I was pretty stoked on that actually.  I estimate I ran 6 miles, which is a pretty big run for me, but shows that the 10k ought to be no problem.

Here it is a few hours later, and honestly, I'm still on a runner's high from it.  I love that runner's high, it really does happen for me.  Even when my body is thrashed, I love it.  Very motivational too.  I'm excited to be getting back in shape and done with the ankle recovery!  

I've also started doing push ups again.  Started with the 100 Pushups program, but my wife is hot on the tabata stuff, so I may give that a shot as something different.

Filed under  //   running  
Posted May 14, 2010
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Ankle progressing, doing some road rides

At the 6 week mark, x-rays showed my fracture was only about halfway healed, unfortunately.  Here we are at nine weeks in.  In one week I go get more x-rays, and hopefully that shows it's healed, but who knows.  I still have occasional pain.  Ligaments are definitely not healed.  I've been doing physical therapy for a while, and have now been able to get on my road bike 3 times, with yesterday's ride being the first one to do any real climbing.  Climbs were very short, but steep (Chambers hits 17%, and McLean 12%).  But, it has felt very good to get out there.  I'm just frustrated things aren't healing faster.  

I'm now hoping that in about 5 weeks from now, I'll be good enough to be on the mountain bike, and be able to go to Barbie Camp.  Today I did some small work on my Reign, as I can see maybe taking that bike (or both bikes) as the full suspension may be appreciated :)  Plus, I'd wanted to get the broken seat post off there.  And, Lyric fork needs work, so Monday I've gotta get on that and get it sent back and fixed.  It's just the travel adjust that's broken, rest of fork seems ok.

Posted February 28, 2010
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Snapped Ligament and Severe Ankle Sprain

Saturday I went for a late afternoon run, starting from Spencer Butte parking lot over to the Willamette St trailhead and back.  With about 1/4 of a mile to go, while passing a hiker, I stepped on a branch and rolled my ankle quite badly.  How bad?  Well, I was wearing headphones and I could still hear the snap of my ligament (confirmed by the doctor who said that's how most people describe it - like the sound of a breaking tree branch).  Given the adrenaline and so on at the time, I was able to walk back to my car, but the thing swelled up almost instantly.  A short way into walking back I had to loosen up my shoe as the swelling was making it so tight.  I knew things were bad, but wasn't sure if it was broken or what.  It felt as if my ankle bone actually hit the ground when it rolled, but I'm sure that's exaggerating.

Upon arriving home, I iced it on the couch for a bit, then took a quick shower, as I was sort of shivering by that point.  Then of course our dinner guests showed up - yes, we were having a dinner party this same night.  They were great, and hung out with all the kids while my wife took me a few houses down the street to see a doctor friend to see what he thought.  He took one look at said to get in for x-rays, but that I could have dinner first :)  So after dinner Ed (dinner guest), his family, and myself drove to drop off the family, then to Urgent Care for some x-rays...

Once in to Urgent Care, which luckily was no wait at all, the doctor there recognized me, which was impressive. I'd taken my daughter in about two months ago. I was surprised he remembered, but hey. Anyway, they did x-rays as you can see, no fracture, but one or more snapped ligaments and "severe ankle sprain". They set me up with an "Aircast" boot thing, which I was able to walk on the foot a bit, and skip the crutches I'd been using. Anyway, rest, ice, elevation, etc. It's now Monday and I'm headed to see my doctor this afternoon to see what the prognosis is. It appears I may be in for a fairly long recovery time. At least in general it's not painful. Does throb when I stand up long enough, taking a shower is a pain, and so on - lots of hopping around. Ugh.

Posted December 28, 2009
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