Finished that's always a goal.
PR also almost always a goal
Time goal of 21:15. I didn't make this one. I had a nearly perfect run through mile 81. From there the wheels totally fell off. I was sick, I was basically asleep walking and jogging the trail and since I couldn't eat or drink I had zero energy to move down the trail.
The good news is the the extra 1:30 in the last ~17 miles didn't prevent my PR. My time 22:45. Twenty minute PR.
The winner of the hat is Adam who guessed 22:45, so he nailed it exactly. Adam send me a note.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Brooks Hat Giveaway
I'm giving away a new Brooks Hat (black with colored accents) to the person that comes the closest to guessing my Finishing time at Cascade Crest 100 miler.
This is an easy contest.
*Just guess my finishing time at Cascade Crest 100 Mile Endurance Run as a comment to this post.
*Last day to enter your guess is Friday August 28Th. My birthday encase you forgot ;*)
*Limit! Only one guess per person.
*If there is a tie, I'll flip a coin.
Hint: 2006 I finished in 30:22, 2007 I finished in 25:05, 2008 I finished in 23:05.
Hint: I’ll be shooting for another aggressive PR. (could backfire)
Hint: This year the course is a little longer with an extra climb or two. (No Ropes, No Tunnel)
Good Luck!
Guesses so far...
19:51 Shawn M.
20:18 Tim L.
20:35 Jon Y.
21:08:36 Jane H.
21:20 Jenny A.
21:30 Jenn M.
21:33:07 Alvin C.
21:45 Laura H.
21:57 Colin H.
22:05 Linda B.
22:15 Jonathon B.
22:20 Mike M.
22:40 Tony C.
22:45 Adam
22:48:24 Eric B.
22:52 Betsy
22:53 Gilles
22:57 Michelle B.
23:00 Shawna W.
24:00:01 Talldog "MC"
This is an easy contest.
*Just guess my finishing time at Cascade Crest 100 Mile Endurance Run as a comment to this post.
*Last day to enter your guess is Friday August 28Th. My birthday encase you forgot ;*)
*Limit! Only one guess per person.
*If there is a tie, I'll flip a coin.
Hint: 2006 I finished in 30:22, 2007 I finished in 25:05, 2008 I finished in 23:05.
Hint: I’ll be shooting for another aggressive PR. (could backfire)
Hint: This year the course is a little longer with an extra climb or two. (No Ropes, No Tunnel)
Good Luck!
Guesses so far...
19:51 Shawn M.
20:18 Tim L.
20:35 Jon Y.
21:08:36 Jane H.
21:20 Jenny A.
21:30 Jenn M.
21:33:07 Alvin C.
21:45 Laura H.
21:57 Colin H.
22:05 Linda B.
22:15 Jonathon B.
22:20 Mike M.
22:40 Tony C.
22:45 Adam
22:48:24 Eric B.
22:52 Betsy
22:53 Gilles
22:57 Michelle B.
23:00 Shawna W.
24:00:01 Talldog "MC"
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Uphill Challenge
After reading about the Uphill Challenge and watching the video a couple times, I decided to do my own Uphill Challenge at home. I figured shooting for 1.5 miles would be a good goal in the middle of a training week.
I set the treadmill to 10% and 6 mph and set the timer for 15 minutes. After about 5 minutes I figured I could go a bit faster so I went to 6.1, 6.2, 6.5, and finally 7 mph. I tried 8 mph toward the end but that was way too fast for me. I ended up with 1.647 miles which was a lot better than the 1.5 miles I was shooting for.
How far can you go?
I set the treadmill to 10% and 6 mph and set the timer for 15 minutes. After about 5 minutes I figured I could go a bit faster so I went to 6.1, 6.2, 6.5, and finally 7 mph. I tried 8 mph toward the end but that was way too fast for me. I ended up with 1.647 miles which was a lot better than the 1.5 miles I was shooting for.
How far can you go?
Monday, August 10, 2009
Whisky Dick Triathlon
I participated in my first ever triathlon this weekend. Well sort of... it was a relay team and I sprinted the 10k running leg.
It was a new and exciting experience for me. It's so different from the laid back ultras I'm used to running. The athletes are so serious about the race. There were a lot of bikes there that are worth more than my car.
The craziest and most amazing part is the transition areas. If you've never seen it in person, you should go watch one. They come running out of the water after a 20-40 minute swim while striping off their wetsuits. They change into biking clothes or already have them on under the wetsuit, add shoes, drink, and they are off to ride for over an hour. All of this done in about a minute. The bike to run was the same way except now they didn't know exactly where it go and after about 1/2 second of looking around some of them got this crazed look in their eyes like you just hid all their stuff so they would end up last.
Some of the people were amazing to watch. They came in calm and quickly changed and were gone in a flash. Some were in a frenzy trying to get it all done too fast and thrashing about which probably cost them more time in the next leg than they saved.
My race started by watching the cyclists come in from inside a little blue relay waiting area. After what seemed like forever (really only a few minutes), I spotted my biker coming down the road. He came running up with his bike and almost went right by me. He looked pretty spent so got down and took the ankle timing chip off him and put it on. I told him he did a good job and started jogging through the transition zone. Once I hit the timing mat I hit the gas and about 6 seconds later Jeff Hashimoto (a super fast ultra running, and also on a relay) goes flying past me doing 5 minute miles (he had the fastest run leg of the day, 33:18.7).
I'm not really very good at these short distances so I just put the hammer down and started passing people that had been out there competing in the hot sun for 2+ hours. I felt bad for some of them who were struggling and gave encouragement to nearly all that I passed. I wanted to start out with an easy 7 minute mile to warm up and then crank it up from there but with the tail wind I warmed up in about a minute and the first mile was 6:20. The John Wayne Trail made it harder to pass because of the soft loose gravel in the middle passing lane but that 14 mph head wind after the turn around felt pretty good.
I'm not sure how many people I passed maybe about 20-25. I was able to hold a good pace and effort the entire 10k. My slowest mile was 6:50. Part of that mile was the only hill on the course. My maximum speed was 15 mph, that was coming down the same hill. The 10k seemed even shorter than I thought it would be. I finished in 40:26.7 for an average of 6:31/m and the 8Th fastest run leg. I'm pretty happy with that.
The rest of the team did great.
Dave swam the 13th fastest swim leg in 24:09 and Colin finish the bike right in the middle of the 111 biker field in 50Th place with a time of 1:52:25 over a really tough bike leg that's into the wind and uphill.
Overall we finished 2nd in the Men's team division.
I'll post some pictures when I get them.
It was a new and exciting experience for me. It's so different from the laid back ultras I'm used to running. The athletes are so serious about the race. There were a lot of bikes there that are worth more than my car.
The craziest and most amazing part is the transition areas. If you've never seen it in person, you should go watch one. They come running out of the water after a 20-40 minute swim while striping off their wetsuits. They change into biking clothes or already have them on under the wetsuit, add shoes, drink, and they are off to ride for over an hour. All of this done in about a minute. The bike to run was the same way except now they didn't know exactly where it go and after about 1/2 second of looking around some of them got this crazed look in their eyes like you just hid all their stuff so they would end up last.
Some of the people were amazing to watch. They came in calm and quickly changed and were gone in a flash. Some were in a frenzy trying to get it all done too fast and thrashing about which probably cost them more time in the next leg than they saved.
My race started by watching the cyclists come in from inside a little blue relay waiting area. After what seemed like forever (really only a few minutes), I spotted my biker coming down the road. He came running up with his bike and almost went right by me. He looked pretty spent so got down and took the ankle timing chip off him and put it on. I told him he did a good job and started jogging through the transition zone. Once I hit the timing mat I hit the gas and about 6 seconds later Jeff Hashimoto (a super fast ultra running, and also on a relay) goes flying past me doing 5 minute miles (he had the fastest run leg of the day, 33:18.7).
I'm not really very good at these short distances so I just put the hammer down and started passing people that had been out there competing in the hot sun for 2+ hours. I felt bad for some of them who were struggling and gave encouragement to nearly all that I passed. I wanted to start out with an easy 7 minute mile to warm up and then crank it up from there but with the tail wind I warmed up in about a minute and the first mile was 6:20. The John Wayne Trail made it harder to pass because of the soft loose gravel in the middle passing lane but that 14 mph head wind after the turn around felt pretty good.
I'm not sure how many people I passed maybe about 20-25. I was able to hold a good pace and effort the entire 10k. My slowest mile was 6:50. Part of that mile was the only hill on the course. My maximum speed was 15 mph, that was coming down the same hill. The 10k seemed even shorter than I thought it would be. I finished in 40:26.7 for an average of 6:31/m and the 8Th fastest run leg. I'm pretty happy with that.
The rest of the team did great.
Dave swam the 13th fastest swim leg in 24:09 and Colin finish the bike right in the middle of the 111 biker field in 50Th place with a time of 1:52:25 over a really tough bike leg that's into the wind and uphill.
Overall we finished 2nd in the Men's team division.
I'll post some pictures when I get them.
Tuesday, August 04, 2009
CCC training
This is just a quick training note from this weekend. I spent the whole weekend away running parts of the CCC 100 course. Big thanks to Jeff and Mike for putting this event together.
Early on Saturday I drove up to Snoqualmie Pass and then about 22 of us carpooled to Tacoma Pass. Some opted to start 10 miles down the trail at Stampede pass. After an hour drive, most on very dusty fire roads we finally made it to the start. I started a couple minutes behind the group because I was talking with Jeff one of the coordinators of the race. I’ve run this section of the trail 3 times during the race so I know it pretty well. I would be putting down arrows in the dirt at the turns so I needed to be out front. I quickly passed all but a couple runners. I didn’t put an arrow at every non-turn and side trail that I passed (there are just too many). A couple of runners, after running in the hot sun for about 5 hours got a little off track and did some bonus miles.
It was nice to see this part of the trail while not racing and during a different part of the day with different shadows. I ran a bit faster than during the race but it was a comfortable pace. I ended up running with Matt from the water stop at Stampede Pass to the finish. We came in first at 6 hours and 10 minutes. That’s about 30 minutes less and 2-3 miles longer than on race day.
After a good nights sleep at the WAC I was up and ready to do it all over again.
Sunday we ran the last 1/3 of the course from Lake Kachess to Easton. This is the toughest part of the race not only because it comes at the end but because the climbs are so steep. I chatted with local runner Tim Stroh and we decided to run together. Tim’s a better runner than I am so this gave me a chance to push myself to try and keep up. He also knows the course better than anyone, having been involved with it since it started.
Even though there was a group ahead of us, we marked some tricky turns with extra arrows and even waist high branches across the wrong trail. By the time we got up to No Way Ridge (that’s really the name of it) at mile 13, we had caught up to all the early starters. I felt amazingly well having run 31 miles the day before. I probably talked Tim’s ear off I felt so good. We stopped at a water stop for what seemed like 20 minutes and then again at the top of Thorpe Mt. to enjoy the view and chat with the ranger.
Sometimes I felt like I was slowing Tim down on the climbs but I would always catch right up on the downhill. We stopped again for water and even cooled off in the stream for a while. With about 4 miles to go I could fell my feet starting to hurt but my legs still felt good. The last 3 miles are really exposed so we heated up nicely. Running on a hot road gets old really fast so I was glad to be done at the Café instead of the Firehouse. We finished ahead of everybody else in 7 hours and 6 minutes. I think that’s about an hour faster than I’ve ever run that part of the course during training.
This year I’ve run miles 0-11, 23-53, and 68-99. I think I’m ready.
Early on Saturday I drove up to Snoqualmie Pass and then about 22 of us carpooled to Tacoma Pass. Some opted to start 10 miles down the trail at Stampede pass. After an hour drive, most on very dusty fire roads we finally made it to the start. I started a couple minutes behind the group because I was talking with Jeff one of the coordinators of the race. I’ve run this section of the trail 3 times during the race so I know it pretty well. I would be putting down arrows in the dirt at the turns so I needed to be out front. I quickly passed all but a couple runners. I didn’t put an arrow at every non-turn and side trail that I passed (there are just too many). A couple of runners, after running in the hot sun for about 5 hours got a little off track and did some bonus miles.
It was nice to see this part of the trail while not racing and during a different part of the day with different shadows. I ran a bit faster than during the race but it was a comfortable pace. I ended up running with Matt from the water stop at Stampede Pass to the finish. We came in first at 6 hours and 10 minutes. That’s about 30 minutes less and 2-3 miles longer than on race day.
After a good nights sleep at the WAC I was up and ready to do it all over again.
Sunday we ran the last 1/3 of the course from Lake Kachess to Easton. This is the toughest part of the race not only because it comes at the end but because the climbs are so steep. I chatted with local runner Tim Stroh and we decided to run together. Tim’s a better runner than I am so this gave me a chance to push myself to try and keep up. He also knows the course better than anyone, having been involved with it since it started.
Even though there was a group ahead of us, we marked some tricky turns with extra arrows and even waist high branches across the wrong trail. By the time we got up to No Way Ridge (that’s really the name of it) at mile 13, we had caught up to all the early starters. I felt amazingly well having run 31 miles the day before. I probably talked Tim’s ear off I felt so good. We stopped at a water stop for what seemed like 20 minutes and then again at the top of Thorpe Mt. to enjoy the view and chat with the ranger.
Sometimes I felt like I was slowing Tim down on the climbs but I would always catch right up on the downhill. We stopped again for water and even cooled off in the stream for a while. With about 4 miles to go I could fell my feet starting to hurt but my legs still felt good. The last 3 miles are really exposed so we heated up nicely. Running on a hot road gets old really fast so I was glad to be done at the Café instead of the Firehouse. We finished ahead of everybody else in 7 hours and 6 minutes. I think that’s about an hour faster than I’ve ever run that part of the course during training.
This year I’ve run miles 0-11, 23-53, and 68-99. I think I’m ready.
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