The usual running update

So tonight I just wrapped up a big week of training. My biggest ever, in fact.

152.8 km over ~ 21 hours. A ton of running, to be sure. Last time I did 152.0 km, so I just eked out a new Personal Best. Certainly 21 hours is a new record, but that’s because training here is a lot slower paced, and a lot of hiking.

My week looked like this, if you’re curious:

Sat: 17.68 in 3:01:50 – Hike – Hope Pass 3 w/ Tona, walked around the lake.
Sun: 43.14 in 5:16:34 – Long – Halfmoon Road to Twin Lakes & back
Mon: 17.99 in 3:36:03 – Hike – Hope Pass 4 w/ Tona, felt incredibly hard.
Tue: 17.49 in 2:03:15 – Easy – 6th to Turquoise Lake & back w/ Matt
(pm) 6.64 in 0:53:31 – Easy – Dam to Tabor boat ramp w/ Matt & Tona
Wed: 14.68 in 1:19:32 – Tempo – Hard Miner’s Trail run
(pm) 9.67 in 1:06:34 – Easy – Dam to Tabor boat ramp w/ Tona
Thu: 18.02 in 2:36:30 – Easy – Powerline to Hagerman road w/ Matt & Tona
(pm) 7.50 in 1:00:00 – Easy – Dam to Tabor boat ramp w/ Matt & Tona
Fri: Rest

Pretty stoked. A huge week for Tona too: 77.5 km!

This week coming is a rest week (about 80 km maybe?) and then I’ll do one more hard week, in which I shall break 100 miles (160.93 km). Then 100, 60, 15, and race weekend is upon me.

My running was all great this week. My 43 km long run felt awesome. My Miner’s Trail run was my fastest run in Leadville to date, and despite constant gut issues this week, my body has been feeling basically 100%. I’m definitely ready for a rest week though.

I met an Australian dude running on Tuesday morning. He caught up with me as I was emerging from the woods from yet another impromptu bathroom break (I now carry TP with every time… I really need to sort out my diet…) and we ran to Turquoise Lake and back. Was good, I needed a little bit of extra motivation to help squeeze out those few extra km’s in the morning. The thin air makes it really, really easy to quit. The “out of breath” feeling is really awful.

In other news, I got myself some new running gear. A pair of Smith V90’s, as seen below:

I didn’t install the red lenses though. Mine are “dark gray”.

As well as a couple of Camelbak “Podium Chill” waterbottles (with handheld straps). I think I was recommended these bottles during the training camp, so I picked some up. They are 21 oz (621 mL) so should do me fine for the race, in addition to my Amphipod, Nathan and Ultimate Direction bottles. These ones are great though, and despite having not ran with them yet, I think they are the best of the bunch.

What else? Not much. I’ve been having ridiculous stomach problems this entire week, so I absolutely must get my nutrition back into shape. No more double breakfasts at The Golden Burro. The waitress was like “We have boxes in case you can’t eat it all. It’s a lot of food.” Me thinking: “Oh, don’t you worry. I’ll eat it all. I’ve done this twice before.”

Double the butter and triple the syrup and you’re getting close.

The funniest thing was after she warned me about my super-sized order, Matt (Aussie dude) ordered 2 orders of Waffles. She doesn’t say a word. When his food comes out, there are 2 giant slabs of 4 waffles that are each about 6 inches square by an inch thick. Hahah! He ate maybe 2? Maybe 2.5? We almost couldn’t fit the rest in the box she brought out. The hilarious thing was, all that waffle only cost $5 or something, which is why he ordered 2. They weren’t all that shit hot either, no fruit, whipped cream, nothin’. A container of syrup and a bill. Strange Americans. Anyway, he didn’t even like them, so I brought them home with me. I ate one. The rest are gonna get thrown out unfortunately. Matt was like “Does your dog eat waffles?” Answer: “My dog eats goose poop, seaweed, and wood, among other things. Given the opportunity, my guess is she would eat the waffles.”

To Tona, these are like living vending machines that turn grass into snacks.

Online Shopping

I don’t really have shit all to talk about.

Oh, I tried to order some Recoverite from Hammer Nutrition (no, I won’t link to them). I put my order in, filled in all the goddamn forms, checkout, blah blah, and placed my order. Great! I get an email like 3 hours later saying “Because of credit card fraud, we require that international orders be shipped to the billing address for the first order.” … and then they want me to fill out a form and fax it in! So not only do they want to ship my shit to Vancouver, they need me to fax them something. A fax? As in “a facsimile machine”? What am I, Doc Brown?!

Great Scott! It’s 1970 and Hammer Nutrition customer service sucks! Thanks for nothing, Crystal!

Anyway, I replied to Dear Crystal and said “I’m in Colorado, why the shit would I want my delicious strawberry Recoverite sent to Vancouver, you idiot?” so she cancelled my order. “Thanks!” I wrote, “Have a great weekend!”

I don’t know. I did a search for “Recoverite sucks” and this came up.

Morons. Sadly, their products are wonderful and I shall be forced to purchase them from a store. Which is a shame because shopping online in the US of A is awesome. Amazon has everything, and shipping is free! Is it like that in Canada? I honestly don’t know because I never spend any money at home. Here I’ve noticed no matter how many paychecks I get, my VISA balance doesn’t seem to go down at all. Weird.

Look at this guy’s shit-eating grin. You know why you’re a model in a visa ad, and not an actor, buddy? Because people don’t smile and look happy when they pay their goddamn bills. You’re a terrible actor.

Meb Tempo Run

I posted this on Facebook earlier, but it’s so awesome I can barely contain myself, and want to go running every time I watch it:

The best part is the music, which is from HBO 24/7 I think, and is arguably the most pump-up song every written in the last 5000 centuries. (Except maybe for this song.)

Don’t know who Meb Keflezighi is?

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meb_Keflezighi

Basically he is the fastest US marathoner right now, the first American to win the New York Marathon since 1982, and just placed first in the Olympic Trials. Oh, and he’s 36 years old! Hell, I’m almost 36 decrepit years old. You reckon I can get my marathon time down by 47 minutes in 3 years?

Hint: No. Not if all of your lives, collectively, depended on it.

Mitch out.

37 days to Leadville