Running at Sea Level

Today I flew to Columbia, MO for work. I feel so fast running at sea level on flat terrain. After checking into my hotel, I went to run on the MKT Trail. Before I knew it I had run 4 miles and I was not even breathing heavily. My stats for the run today:
Time: 59:44
Distance: 8.2 miles
Average Pace: 7:17 minutes/mile
Average HR: 159 bpm

Also, I had an awesome day on the ski hill on Wednesday after a slow day on Monday.
Wednesday stats:
Lap 1: 18:44 up and 8:30 down
Lap 2: 18:51 up and 9:29 down
Lap 3: 18:43 up and 8:58 down

Monday stats were all over 20 minutes up.

And the most random thing that happened to me today was running into Erik and Lucy at the MKT trail head after my run. Erik and Lucy lived in LA for a while but are currently on a multi year trip around the world climbing. Totally weird to run into them in Columbia, MO.

Bike Ride from LA to Nambe

Today was a perfect day for a bike ride. I meet up with Tim, Jason, Alan, and Claire for a group ride. We left LA around 9 and headed down to Pojoaque. We had a quick ride to Pojoaque making it there in under an hour. From there we rode into Nambe and went up to Nambe Reservoir. I had not been on this section of road and I enjoyed it, especially on the ride back to Pojoaque. Nice and fast with good pavement. From Pojoaque we worked well as a team and made quick work until the going got tough pedaling up the main hill road. All in all, thing worked out well as we got back into LA just before the afternoon showers started. Should be interesting to see how my legs feel for ski hill repeats tomorrow after a busy weekend.....

Elevation and Speed Profile

Stats from today's ride:
Distance: 61.13 miles
Time: 3:50:01
Stopped time: 22:29
Average speed: 15.9 mph
Moving speed: 17.6 mph
Average HR: 131 beats per minute
Elevation gained and lost: 2,200 feet (seems low, should be more like 3,000 feet)
Average cadence: 72.8

Santa Fe Baldy

Today I did a training run up Santa Fe Baldy with Jason, David, and Tom. The weather was perfect and this was a very enjoyable outing.

Self Portrait on Santa Fe Baldy

Stats from my GPS watch:
Distance: 13.81 miles
Time: 3:29:59
Pace: 15:12 per mile
Elevation climb: 3,453 feet
Calories: 1,593
Average HR: 136 beats per minute

Time to top: 1:58:01
Time on top: 11:49
Time on descent: 1:20:07
Pictures

Training for Hardrock

Time to start gearing up for Hardrock. In the middle of April I developed a case of planter fasciitis, so I decided to take it easy and let it heal. After a couple of weeks off, it felt better but not completely healed. But I needed to get some running in for the Jemez 50 mile race on May 16th. With limited training I went on and ran that race. My foot did not really bother me too much during the race and I ended up finishing about 30 minutes slower than last year in 22nd place with a time of 11:48:37. The amazing thing was that after the race my foot felt awesome. No pain at all. So after an easy week from the Jemez, it is time to start training for the Hardrock 100. The foot hurts a little on and off, but I have decided to just try to run through it and see what happens.

We ran the first hill repeats of the seaon at the Pajarito Ski Area on Wednesday morning. These consist of basically going straight up the Aspen Slope (elevation gain of ~1040 feet in 0.64 miles) and then running straight back down. I felt awesome on this first set of hill repeats and was able to improve my time on each repeat. Times up were 19:25, 19:18, and 19:06.

Tonight I had a good run with Jason. Up Pipeline road and then down Guaje Ridge to Mitchell and back home. With the exception of the emergancy growler, it was a nice evening run. 10.2 miles in 2 hours with 2,400 feet of climbing.

2009 Races

It looks like my 2009 race calendar is starting to shape up. The Hardrock 100 lottery was this past weekend and for the first time in 4 tries, I actually got selected to start with. So here are my races for this year so far....

• January 18, 2009: The Ghost Town 38.5 - I already did this one. Finished in 11th place in 6:23:29
• March 28, 2009: Antelope Island Buffalo Run, 50 miles.
• April 26, 2009: Atomic Man Duathlon, Fat Man.
• May 16, 2009: Jemez Mountain Trail Runs, 50 miles.
• June 20, 2009: San Juan Solstice 50 Mile Run.
• July 10-12, 2009: Hardrock Hundred Mile Endurance Run.
• August 15, 2009: Los Alamos Triathlon.
• November 22, 2009: Ironman Arizona.
  

This race also looks interesting: DRTE 100

Let me know if you will be at any of these.

Run Fast, Run Hard, Run Strong, but have fun!

Santa Fe Classic Snow Shoe 10k Race

This past weekend I ran in the Santa Fe Classic Snow Shoe 10k Race. I ended up in 3rd place. The race starts up a slight hill which makes it hard to get into a good running pace. One runner went out really strong and I was in second just hanging on him. There were two others behind me. After a little bit into the race, the guy in first place burned out and slowed way do. Somehow I ended up leading the pack. I did not want to do this as the snow was not fully consolidated and I was sinking into the snow several inches here and there. About halfway through the first 5k look, one of the races behind me just took off. My friend Sean stuck to him and before I knew it they had built a large gap from me. So I basically just continued to stumble around the first loop.

Photo credit: Sean Cunniff

The second loop was much better becuase the snow was now packed from all the other racers. The running was much easier becuase now I was warmed up. The major issue that I had on this lap was that my snowshoes were becoming loose and I did not want to spend time tightening them because I did not want to get passed. I ended up with a finishing time of 1:05:34. My second lap was faster than the first. All in all a fun event. Hats off to Sean for finishing second in 1:02:34.

Happy New Year!

People often ask me how much I run since I do those crazy ultramarathons. Actually I don't run a lot of miles. Last year I averaged around 25 miles a week and that includes the distance from the races that I did. Below is a week by week break down of my miles run per week.