In sickness and in health

I hardly ever get sick. In fact, I can't recall exactly the last time I came down with the flu, I just know it was awhile ago. A couple of months ago, everyone in my family came down with a stomach bug, but I emerged unscathed. Of course, I only mention this because this past weekend I did, in fact, get sick.

I woke up ridiculously early on a Saturday morning so I could get in a 20 miler. Nothing seemed all that amiss right after I woke up, but as I was eating a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast, I noticed my stomach felt a little off. I choked down the remainder of the oatmeal and parked myself on the recliner to watch Sportscenter for awhile, assuming things would settle down. After an hour or so, I didn't feel horrible, but I still didn't feel totally right either. I thought that if I went running, I would very likely end up puking, but I didn't really feel like puking right at that moment, so I decided the only way I was going to find out was if I actually did go running.

While I don't get sick often, this isn't the first time I've had this dilemma and, inevitably, the resulting run ends up going horribly and I ultimately end up slogging home after a mile or two cursing myself for being so damn stupid. About 1/4 mile into Saturday's run, I was fairly certain this was going to be another one of those runs. I definitely did feel like I was probably going to puke by that point, but stubbornly decided I was damn well going to forge ahead until I actually did throw up in some poor old lady's front yard. Amazingly, the feeling passed after a few good burps and while I didn't feel great, I also didn't feel so bad that I needed to abort the run. A persistent side stitch stayed with me for the first 5 or 6 miles, but eventually that went away and by the time I hit the 8 mile mark, I was actually feeling almost normal. While it wasn't my fastest 20 miler ever, it did end up being a 20 miler when all was said and done.

Right after I got done, I felt pretty much fine and even boasted on Facebook that I'd stared sickness right in the eye and emerged victorious. Jinx. It took a couple of hours, but eventually sickness won out and I found myself praying to the porcelain god. I am eternally amazed by how much liquid can fit in a human stomach. Judging by how much came out, I'm not sure a single drop of water I consumed during my run was actually absorbed by my body. After making my sacrificial deposit to said god, I felt much better, but I was then left with the dilemma of what to do for Sunday. I had just run 20 miles and then puked out pretty much all of the calories I had consumed for the day (or at least all of them that I hadn't burned off during the run). I had planned on going on an 18 mile snowshoe run (my first ever snowshoe run) with my friend Ryan and another guy on Sunday morning, but that didn't seem like all that great of an idea anymore.

Ultimately, I decided I would stick close to home and play it by ear. By Saturday night, I felt pretty much normal again, so in an attempt to make up for lost calories, I devoured an entire Tombstone pizza for dinner. You gotta do what you gotta do. It stayed down with no problems and when I awoke on Sunday I felt fine. So, back out onto the mean streets of Belle Fourche to attempt another 20. This run felt fine right from the beginning and I cranked out the full 20 with no problems. In fact, when I got done I certainly didn't feel like I'd just run 40 miles in the past 26 hours with a bout of puking in between. A good sign, I guess?

The only downside of the weekend (besides the whole puking thing) was that none of those 40 miles were on trails. Road miles are great and all, but not all that race specific for Bighorn. Hoping to remedy that this coming weekend.

February

Some random February stats:

Total Miles: 328.3
Total Runs: 36
Longest Run: 27.6 miles
Shortest Run: 3 miles (a short 5K race)
Lookout Summits: 9
Highest Weekly Mileage: 83.9
Lowest Weekly Mileage: 68.7

What does all of this mean? Hell, I don't know. I'm fairly happy with the 320+ miles for the month. Hoping to raise that a bit here in March and April. Also happy with 80+ miles in four out of the last five weeks (and on pace for five out of six). The only thing I'd like more of is trail miles. I've been hitting the Centennial at least every other weekend for one long run and Lookout twice a week for a shorter afternoon hill workout, but I'm hoping for warmer March weather and the opening of more trail opportunities (although we haven't had a ton of snow this winter, many of the trails deep within the Hills are still pretty well buried).

Slogging and sprinting

One of the benefits of being a government employee is that you are enlightened to the benefits of several holidays you normally wouldn't give a rat's ass about. Like Presidents Day, for example. It's one of those holidays that just seems like it's a federal holiday for the sake of having a holiday. I mean, unless you're in grade school and you get an extra lesson about Washington and Lincoln, does anyone really "celebrate" Presidents Day? I'm not complaining, by an means, as I'll take any excuse for a three day weekend I can get. And being the good government employee that I am, I will also find an excuse to take the previous Friday off and make it a four day weekend. Okay, so I didn't really have an excuse, but I do have annual leave, so a four day weekend it was.

The problem with taking Fridays off, though, is that my wife runs a home daycare and hanging out with a house full of small people bouncing off the walls isn't exactly relaxing. This is where being an ultrarunner comes in handy...you have a built in excuse to escape the house for 4-6 hours. So, Friday morning I was off to Sturgis with the intent of running 25-30 miles on the Centennial trail, depending on the snow situation. Based on my last run on the Centennial, a 24 miler on Super Bowl Sunday, I knew the trail was basically clear for the first 10 miles of the Black Hills 100 course and then the snow got progressively deeper as you delved further into the Hills. We'd had only a light snow and some fairly warm days since then, so I was hoping to be able to push through some deeper snow sections and make it a full 15 miles out and back. As expected, the snow cover was light and basically inconsequential for the first 11 miles or so. After that, as the trail starts ascending a big climb in a shaded drainage, the snow got more and more cumbersome until I was slogging along, post-holing up to my knees and beyond, at about 20:00 pace. I told myself I would stop when I got to 12.5 miles, giving me a nice round 25 for the day, but when I got to that point the snow thinned out considerably so I kept going. Of course, not much further on I was back to post-holing but by that time was getting near the top of the big climb. So, I told myself I would turn around at the top unless things improved again and when I topped out and looked ahead to see knee-deep drifts across the trail as far as I could see, I did just that. Ended up with 26.5 miles for the day in just under 5 hours of running.

With the goal of getting at least 40 miles in every weekend, I set out Saturday morning and bagged another 16 (on roads this time, since I didn't have time to hit trails as I had to be home to coach my son's basketball game at noon). The legs felt great early on and felt good up until about mile 13 before I started feeling the cumulative fatigue of the mileage. I wasn't totally wasted when I got done, I certainly could have run farther, especially if I hadn't been running at 8:00-8:15 pace for much of the way. While that's not a blazing fast pace, it is considerably faster than what I will ever run in an ultra.

So, what to do when Sunday rolls around and you've already gotten in your long runs for the weekend? Run a 5K, of course! My wife had already planned on running the Valentine's 5K in Rapid City on Sunday afternoon and somehow talked me into running too. I had zero expectations heading into it, but was pleasantly surprised by how unsore my legs felt that morning. Just before the race, I ran a couple of miles to warm up and the legs felt remarkably good. So, when the gun sounded I took off near the front, running in a small group (as in a group of 3) with two other guys, Jim and Kip, who are frequently just ahead of me at these local road races (I think I've beaten Kip once, and can't recall ever finishing ahead of Jim). I tucked in behind them early on, but eventually couldn't resist the urge to push ahead. Jim followed and we broke away from Kip for a bit (I think Kip actually dropped back to pace someone else for a little while). I could hear Jim right behind me right up to about the halfway point before he pulled ahead. At that point, I tucked in behind him and basically hung on for the ride. With about a quarter mile to go, it seemed like the pace was slowing a bit so I pushed forward, wondering if Jim was just setting me up for a big finishing move. Turns out he wasn't, as I was able to pull away and finish about 5 seconds ahead of him in 3rd place overall (the first two guys were way ahead of us). My time was 19:15, which would be a 5K PR except my Garmin measured the course at 3 miles exactly. Even accounting for Garmin error, I'm assuming the course was a little short. Still, a much stronger effort than I expected after 42 miles of weekend running. And now I've completed my semi-annual speedwork session.

All in all, not a bad weekend of running at all. Man, I love Presidents Day!

The greatest winter ever?

I know I'm flirting with disaster (in the form of a legendary blizzard) by posting this, but what the hell. Life's more fun if you live dangerously, right? So, here goes: this might be the greatest winter EVER.

Of course "greatest winter ever" means different things to different people. For example, if you're a skier or snowmobiler, then you probably think that this winter blows the big one. I've never skied and I'm not a fan of snowmobiling, so I'm of a different opinion. I judge the winter by two main factors: 1) how many times I have to resort to running on the indoor track because it's too dangerously cold to run outside and 2) how accessible the trails are. This winter is scoring high in both categories. I've run on an indoor track exactly one time, and that was an afternoon 4 miler a few weeks ago that I very well could have run outside (it was like 4 degrees, I've run in much colder), but I had a brain fart that morning and failed to properly pack my running gear for the conditions. For the 2nd category, I don't have any stats to back this up, but I'm fairly certain I've gotten in many more trail miles in the first month plus of this year than I have in the previous couple of winters. And not just short 5 or 6 milers covering the entire extent of runable trail, but bonafide long runs.

This weekend was a perfect example of this winter's awesomeness. On Saturday, my son had a basketball game at 9 AM, so I slept in, coached the game and then geared up and ran the 16 miles from our house to Walmart in Spearfish, where I met the family for a ride home. By "gear up" I mean that I put on shorts and a t-shirt. It was in the mid 40s with just the slightest breeze. On Sunday morning, I drove down to Sturgis for a run on the Centennial trail. Although I had to bundle up a little bit for the start (it was 20 degrees when I struck out), it warmed up significantly and was in the upper 40s by the time I finished, just over 4 hours and 24 miles later. I did encounter some snow on the trail about 10 miles in, but it was fairly well settled and frozen, allowing me to run on top of it instead of punching through. For the most part, the trail was totally clear and dry. And I had the whole thing to myself...I encountered exactly one other human (and her dog) during my run, at about mile 22.5.

Of course, as I write this it's grey outside and there's a light dusting of snow, but the forecast is calling for highs of 42 and 46 on Saturday and Sunday, respectively. That crazy damn groundhog in Pennsylvania says we've got 6 more weeks of winter coming. If that means 6 more weeks of the winter we've already had, then I say bring it on!

176.2

Geez, what's with all the numbers as post titles? Get original, why dontcha?

Okay, so 176.2 is the number of miles worth of racing I've registered for in the last week. That tally includes the Deadwood-Mickelson Trail Marathon, the Quad Rock 50 and the Bighorn 100. I won't bother to tally up the $$$ amount for all of those combined.

Just one more "big" race left to register for (that I know of); the Missoula Marathon in July. But Missoula's early registration doesn't end until May and there is little danger of it filling up, so that one can wait awhile.

Shit Ultrarunners Say

Funny because it's true:

20/40/80

Those numbers have nothing at all to do with temperature this time, although 80 degrees in January would be pretty damn impressive (and entirely unwelcome). It's all about miles this time as I try to remind my body what it's like to run for a lot of em. The highlights of the week were back to back 20 milers on Saturday and Sunday, giving me 40 miles for the weekend and 80 (82 and change, actually) for the week.

I hit up Lookout Mtn. a couple of more times during the week, giving me 8 summits so far for January, well beyond the pace necessary to get up there 50 times this year (like almost twice as many). Maybe 50 was a soft goal? After all, I didn't get my first summit last year until March probably, maybe April, so I've got a few months' head start this year. In any case, both runs up there this week were a chore in different ways. The first one was a slog through several inches of untouched snow, so I was breaking trail the whole way. Two days later, the snow had largely melted in some spots, or had gotten packed down and turned to ice in others, so there was either ice or mud to contend with the entire way. These aren't fast runs, by any means, but I'd rather slog slowly up Lookout than pound out a faster run on pavement (last I checked, Bighorn has a noticeable lack of pavement).

Having said that, though, there is also real life to contend with. Which is what led me to pounding out 20 miles, mostly on flat pavement, on Saturday morning. My son's basketball team, which I'm the coach of, had a game on Saturday, making it unrealistic for me to drive to a trail and get in a long run, so I hammered out some windy, cold miles around Belle. I balanced that out on Sunday, though, as Ryan and I ran the first 10 miles of the Black Hills 100 course. The trail was crazy icy in a few spots, especially in the first and last few miles around Fort Meade, but for the most part it was in incredibly decent shape for late January. The ice necessitated a slow pace in those sections, especially since I don't have micro-spikes nor have I made a pair of screw shoes yet this year, but overall the legs felt really good considering this is the first time I've put in 40 miles in a weekend for a very long time.

I registered for Deadwood-Mickelson last week, squeezing in before the price increase. Still need to get signed up for both Quad Rock and Bighorn. You'd think that, as a race director myself now, I'd stop procrastinating about this stuff and sign up for a race early, but I still find myself procrastinating until the last possible moment. Can't teach an old dog new tricks....or an ultrarunner to commit too soon.