This week we continue with The Year of Random Races That Are Not on Bikepaths.
Last year when they ran this race, Lance Armstrong showed up to test his trail legs. Since there was no guarantee that he would show again this year, I told Nancy that I would show up so that there would be at least one celebrity there (I do write a self-published blog, you know).
San Ysidro, Old Pueblo, Buena Vista, Mc Menemy, Hot Springs Fire Road, Cold Springs Fire Road. Those were all of the trails on this butterfly-from-hell shaped course
I included the elevation profile so you would think of how much of a bad-ass I was for running this course. There are no cameras on the trails that reveal that some runners had to walk up a lot of the hills because Saturday’s workout had kicked his butt
The dude running next to me…I have no idea who he is. But when I saw the camera I had to let the people know how much fun this race was. Then it was monkey see, monkey do.
I told him, “Dude, keep your arms up for the next picture”! Then at the last second, I switched to an even cooler move. He did not stand a chance. Arms raised in the air? Pfffft….so 10 steps ago…
In the what-went-right department, at least the fog hung around so the weather was good for running. Also the trails are in really nice shape and some of the views would have been amazing if it had not been for the aforementioned fog. Going up killed my calves, coming down killed my quads. In the end, I found myself running with Kent and Nash. Nash would go by us on the uphills talking trash and then Kent and I would run by him on the downhills. It was like a big game of chutes and ladders on the switchbacks except that if you took the chutes to try a shortcut you ran the risk of running off the side of the mountain. In the final sprint to the finish, Kent ran by us to finish in 9th place overall. Nash took 10th and I followed in 11th
Thanks to Nancy for putting this race together. They have one more trail run in the series at the end of May so maybe I’ll do that one too if they still need celebrities.
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So I’m running with an unnamed runner who had just raced the 10 miler and he is telling me about his race. Ok, it was Eric. So anyways, he tells me that at the beginning of the race a woman in front of him fell and he had to leap over her and he had to put his hand on the ground to catch himself. Unfortunately when he put his hand down it went directly into a pile of shit. The smell was so bad that he had to stop in the bathrooms to wash his hands but he rallied and was still able to come in 9th overall. I said, “Boy, you must have been pooped”.
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I know what you are thinking, “Oh great…another video. Does he do anything besides watch videos online”? Well look, most of the videos I watch could never be published in a family blog but this one happens to be intelligent. Have you ever watched one of the TED videos and not thought, “Well that was interesting”? This one is with the author of Born to Run. You may not agree with all of his philosophies but he is a good speaker
http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf
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Bonus Video
Lastly, this one you can skip unless you really like running. It’s for my dad. He lives in NJ and does not get to watch Col run so this is for him to see. Hi Dad. The first race is the 800 where he hangs on the dudes shoulder for the whole race but he can’t take him at the end. They run about 2:10. The second race is the 4×400 where he runs 3rd and has an awesome race. 55 seconds. If you look closely you can see Rusty & June cheering him on in the bleachers in the far straightaway.
Oh, sorry about the shake. It was windy out there. And I’m old.
Brizzle 