Training Log Archive: Ari-o

Went to run with the Forest Hills runners. Good hangover run. Ran pretty slowly with some stops for 4.5 miles, and felt okay—good after a few drinks the night before. Then we got to the Pond and I thought I might be able to make the 47 home, so laid down a 6-something. And then didn't make it, and ran slower home.

My foot hurt a little bit during the run but it might be due to tight muscles. Now, off to NH!

Headed back in to Zealand to fill in for the last night of spring care taking. Brought in whiskey and sourdough starter: the cornerstones of any good weekend. Baked bread, listened to the falls, checked out the hydro, talked to a bunch of nice guests. Good times!

First day since the marathon where I put weight on my right foot and didn't feel any pain. Cured!

Will be careful the next few days, then ramp things up for Greylock. Raining in the evening, didn't ride bikes. Oh well.

Ride to O. Some sort of cramps on the way up the hill to Menotomy.

Run around the pond to stretch out.

Ran a rusty O. Foot still hurting a little so I didn't go super hard, plus the pre-O cramps didn't help. Plus, I didn't run it that cleanly. Some overruns, some places where I just didn't see the flag, some places where the map could probably use some polishing (trail junctions which are very indistinct in open areas, etc).

But good fun.

Biking to Live Alive. One detour to yell at yet another taxicab who does not seem to understand what a turn signal is.

Menotomy - Splits

Oooh, today we biked on the hills. 400 feet up, 400 feet down (at just shy of 50 mph), then up and down and up and down. Yah, hills.

Recover weekend continued with a bike ride to breakfast. Bikes: how to not put a lot of pressure on your feet. Quite possible the next week will be riding bikes and rollerboard, which I can, thanks to rope, now fix!

Strava/Garmin didn't pick up a track, and had janky numbers. Perhaps I didn't pick up enough satellites? Learning the watch.

Some more Garmin/Strava weirdness.

I hiked out of Zealand and set off to find Melissa and Julia at Arethusa Falls, where they were hiking across. It was raining when I got out and poured when I was in the car, so I ran up to Arethusa with an umbrella, part of Confuse-a-Goofer Day. Smashed my arm in to an overhanging tree that I couldn't see, too. Oh well.

They weren't at the falls, so I set off on the Ripley-Arethusa trail to find them. When I didn't find them at the Frankenstein Cliffs Trail, I asked a guy if he'd seen two women going down, he said yes, and I figured it might be them, bailing early. (The only other party I saw said "did one of them look kind of Oriental?" and I tried to compute that. Oh, New Hampshire.)

I ran down the cliffs, which was a pretty good run down, and got to the parking lot where Julia was waiting, now in the sun. They'd gotten out to the parking lot, hitched to the next one, and waited for me, while Melissa ran up to find me on the trail. Had I turned around, I would have been better, but I had a nice trail run.

As for my foot, well, it didn't really need 8 miles of trail running, but so it goes.

Walking in to Zealand with about 40 pounds on my back. Legs still felt tired packing up the Doozy at the end.

I'm going to insufferably talk more about the marathon I just ran (mainly because I'm taking a few days off so I'm not really logging, although the rollerboard is beckoning) …

I think I ran a pretty damn good race. I loaded the whole thing in to Strava and segmented it out this morning. The first half I ran 6:53s. The second half? 6:53s. That's a) pretty fast and b) really friggin' consistent. Strava, in its infinite wisdom, finds other people I ran "with." The two I ran "with" both started out pretty much step for step with me. One was 1:30 behind me at mile 18, the other a couple minutes behind. Both gave back 15+ minutes over the rest of the course. I ran positive splits (on a downhill course, of course), but barely—I didn't top a 7:09 mile the whole of the race, and found something in my back pocket to duck back under 7 for the last 3 miles (although again, barely).

Strava says my grade adjusted pace did slack off, but only from mid-to-high 6s for the first 10 miles (a 7:19-adjusted-to-6:19 for the big climbing mile—and I barely felt the climb) to low 7s the downhill rest of the way in. So I pounded my legs something awful, but apparently not as awful as other people.

Yeah, maybe I'll train for running.

And I just broke my rollerboard.

Well, I broke one of the rollerboard ropes. This will necessitate a trip to the hardware store.

The Flying Spaghetti Monster is telling me not to train, I guess. I've been touched by his noodly appendage.

C • Blerch 4

Went for a stretch out ride and it felt so good. Didn't go fast. Didn't go hard. But I can come so much closer to approximating walking today. TBD whether I'll make O tomorrow. It may be a walking O.

Just say this, and their trail map uses a de-featured O map. Who is behind that? (Also, trail race in July = I'm going to fry.)

Also also: another rest day!

C • Blue Hills Skyline 3

Good god my legs hurt.

Not doing anything today. Usually soreness depletes after a second night, but this is ridiculous.

(I kind of want to do it again.)

C • Desire to do it again 2

So that happened.

If you've been following along, a month ago I decided to run a marathon. Because, uh, I'm not particularly bright. I ran 17.5 one weekend, 10 miles in 67 minutes and then 24 miles two days later the next, raced 25 trail miles the next weekend, signed up, ran the Billygoat last weekend, and then took some resting time this week in the lead up.

The race was Sugarloaf. The course: mostly downhill, with beautiful mountain views. The weather? Damn near perfect, dry, cool, a light breeze (mostly a tailwind) with temperatures starting around 45 and rising to around 60.

I'd convinced my friend George (FKT on the Hut Traverse, although it's not posted to the FKT boards) to come and pace me. His first marathon. My second, but my first was run in a 27 degrees and on packed snow in 3:16, so it doesn't really count. In 2009. I didn't specifically train for it. Da ladna.

Came up to Maine yesterday, and went up to get bibs. Probably could have saved the drive, but I wanted to get things squared away. However, it had poured rain earlier in the day and the Carrabassett River was 10 feet above normal flow, so it was pretty fun to watch. My sister was running the 15k and her boyfriend chauffered us to the start. Since it was a 7 a.m. start that saved us close to an hour of sleep. Still a 4:30 wake up, probably the earliest anyone has ever woken up at the camp here. We hit the road by 5, George having forgotten his bib (but they gave him a replacement) and had some time to warm up and eat goos.

The race started at 7. The weather, which had at times looked to be rainy, turned out to be nice. 45˚, high clouds, dry, cool, light breeze. The plan: 6:50s to the hills. Strong up the hills. Fast down the hills. And then, well, whatever the rest of the way. Goal of 3:05, reach of sub-3.

We started out well. We were in the second pack; there were a couple of rabbits off the front (who finished in 2:45) and we had a nice rhythm. George and I chatted, we saw a fellow NPer, we sang some songs (sorry, fellow runners) and ran the first eight miles between 6:45 and 6:58. The scenery was gorgeous. You're in a wide valley with Flagstaff Lake to your left and the Bigelows rising 3000 feet up in front of you. It's splendid.

From miles 7 to 10 there was a climb, broken in to five manageable sections. We slowed down a bit for them—running 9 and 10 about 7:18 and 7:05 up the climb (gaining a total of more than 300 feet, including 180 in a mile). It leveled off around mile 10. I had a goo here, and they had hydration every two miles so I made sure to keep drinking (I actually had to pee a bit, which is better than dehydration). Then it was a steep downhill (6:35, 6:26 mile) and then some appreciable downhills the rest of the way. (6:50s, with a 6:20 where the road follows the steeper part of the Carrabassett.)

According to my watch (Oh, I got a new Garmin, which was wicked helpful to keep me doing splits. I didn't use the HRM or any other fancy stuff, but will learn how to use it soon. Splits were fantastic, though), we ran the first half in 1:30. Could we hold it together? Well, around mile 16 George peeled off to pee in the woods, but caught back up. I was fueling well, and hydrating well, but my legs were taking a pounding.

At around mile 18, I went in to my first pain room. The grade slackened and we were running around 6:50s, but not below. We had a lot of BQ time banked, but not much sub-3 time. It wasn't too bad, but full body cramping. I could run through it, but we ran our first over-7 (7:01) mile since mile 10. I felt a bit better, but the gradual downhill meant that my legs were really getting hit hard—I actually liked the short uphills since they used different muscles. They were short, though. A guy and woman we were running with had a bicycle escort for the last few miles (not really allowed, but whatever) and that helped them along. They made sub-3, barely.

Around 22, my legs really started giving me trouble. There were two 7:09 miles in there, which put about a minute on sub-3 for me. George had dropped off a few seconds and I had a BQ in the bag: I needed to run 8:15s to make 3:05. Sub-3 was slipping away a bit, but I ran a couple 6:55s, but not quite enough (still, it felt good to run sub-7s after 25 miles). Plus, my watch was about 0.1 miles behind the signs, so I had an extra 30 seconds or so to run at the end—it's possible the course was 100 yards long (says my watch and Google Maps). I passed a few people, but even with a kick couldn't muster much speed. My endurance was fine, but my legs hurt something awful. I was saying to myself: "hold it together for 20 minutes. 15 minutes. 8 minutes." I made the turn to the end and sprinted in: 3:01:16. 20th overall.

Very happy with that. With one month of training, one 20 mile run, and two months removed from mostly skiing (and a pretty lazy March) it's really not bad. Oh, and it's a BQ. So next year, I'll have to ski the Birkie and pretty quickly transition in to running. My friend Jakob said that if I can run a 3:01 without training, I should be able to swing a sub-3 with some. So, hopefully Boston is cool next year.

Learned:

Marathons are fun. Perhaps more fun if you train for them.
Garmin watch = amazing. It's a good way to spend the money. (I'm doing a survey for a credit card and they're paying me $350. New Garmin!)
I don't know how to download my Garmin. Will figure that out when my head is working more. (update: synched with Strava!)
Sad to miss some O, and Porchfest, and the Urban Adventure Run. Alex: next year (or in the fall) we should push out the UAR to November Project people, that would be up their alley.
My legs hurt.
I want to run more. And I'm really excited for some trail running. My engine is there.

C • Most impressive 2

Ha. So, this happened. Took the train out to O with Brendan and someone else, talked about Tiomila all the way out, which was fun. Walked to O. I was planning not to go hard (marathon Sunday) but my head just wasn't screwed on straight. Forgot to start Strava. Missed the first control by a little, spiked the second, and then oy, #3.

First, I remembered that last year the marshes were pretty runnable. Of course, last year it hadn't rained for a month. This year the marshes were "crossable" but I didn't want to kill my feet. So I navigated to 3, got to the marsh, and turned to run around it, running straight in to a major league thorn bush.

I picked the thorns out of my pants and went around, right to 11. Whoops. Back to 3.

4-8 weren't bad, I goofed on one when I just messed up the scale (my brain still on Billygoat scale) and then went out for the second loop. Along this time I realized there was a thorn in my shoe, and it was beginning to migrate in to my toe. Normally this would be of no concern, but I am running this marathon thing on Sunday and don't really want a gaping hole in my foot. Also, normally, I would just take my shoe off and take the thorn out, but my shoes were covered in poison ivy. Covered. The fields were full of it about 3" high. So I took off my shirt and tried to take out my daisy-chained laces, swatted the swarming mosquitos, finally did get the shoe undone, worked the thorn out of my foot, put back my shoe (untied) and walked the rest of the course.

Yay, orienteering?

We'll see how I do with the poison ivy. I've now been doing O for three years and haven't gotten a lick of it. I hiked the AT in shorts and didn't get any. In fact, the only time I've ever had any poison ivy/oak/sumac was in California, and the rest of my family broke out while I had one little patch. So this will be a decent test; if I am immune it will probably show up.

Then I was all sweaty but didn't want to take off my pants and socks and such. So I went running down to catch the 70 bus. I had four minutes and spent that time in lush, landscaped grass, trying to wipe the urushiol off my shoes and legs. Or looking like a crazy person. Then a straight shot on the 70 home, which stops two blocks from my house. The operator had to wake some guy up in Waltham who had fallen asleep (I told her to let him sleep in to Cambridge) and then watched as she fell 2 minutes behind but made the time up and was a minute early rolling down River Street.

$1.50 is not a bad deal for that kind of entertainment.

Cat Rock - Splits

40 sections at Harvard. Trying not to go too hard.

Squeezing a quick tempo run in between things.

Event: 36th Annual Billygoat Run
 

Looking at Billygoat splits …

1. Lots of people missed splits at water stops.
2. Looks like control 1 was the control to skip. 8 minutes for me, 6+ even for Ethan.
3. Running with Adrian early on, I was in second/third place behind Ian. I guess that makes sense, but I didn't realize how good a skip 1 was.
4. Gained 3:00 on Adrian by not following him right to 6. So I was running in 2/3 with Ethan to 7-8-9 (although falling behind).
5. Hadn't realized that at the debacle that was 10, everyone bashing around in there was basically within a minute of the lead. Let me repeat that: halfway through the Billygoat, I was within a minute of the lead. Ran out of there with Wyatt who was in fourth place, but he put some time on me running through the woods.
6. I lost time to 12 mostly by being unsure of where I was going. Helped to have Balter catch me and lead towards the control. Fun running with the foursome from there.
7. Adrian's strategy on 17 was inspired. Lead everyone astray, bash through a marsh and back, and drop a couple people smart enough to not bash through the marsh. Leaving me to run and pant to keep up. Since we weren't going to make up 13 minutes at that point. (Impressive the top guys put 13 minutes between controls 10 and 17.)

C • missing punch at water stop 4

Quick run around some fields before the goat.

So this is my third Billygoat. The first (unlogged) I spiked the first control and then proceeded to wander around Moreau for a few hours. The second I also got lost a few times. I decided that I was orienteering too much and not following enough, so this year I was all about following, bashing, and orienteering, in that order. And it worked.

It was warm but dry, and I felt pretty good, and well hydrated. We were marched up to a sidewalk and they said go. I was near Ian, who I knew well enough to know I might be able to keep up with him, and we ran in the woods.

S-1: Followed Ian to a trail, not looking at my map. Last year I think they gave us 30 seconds; not this time. Lost time on the pack, but gained it back on the next climb. As we got to the trail to turn off of to go to 1, Ian and another guy ran past and punched 2, which was right off the trail. I did as well (I could always go punch 1 and come back) but then consulted my map: 1 was a pretty decent skip and had two additional plusses. First, it meant I wouldn't have to worry about which to skip the rest of the way. Second, it would mean that I'd have faster people coming by me the rest of the way if I got in to trouble. So it worked.

2-3: Ran the trail, then bashed on a compass through the woods. I lost Ian but kept Adrian in my sights, which was fine. Not too much orienteering to 3.

3-4: I started out from the control on a small hill, and then traded leading with Adrian. He led a bit to the left of the control but I saw the punch and scampered up to the top of the cliff/large boulder and punched, then let on that I'd found it (and caught my breath).

4-5: Running with Adrian. Kept to the right of a pond, then handrailed off some cliffs and a stone wall. We wound up one reentrant south, but pretty quickly found the control. I am still not sure of goat etiquette and whether you are supposed to talk to people you are running with.

5-6: Adrian led to a trail and then went right. Right? It seemed roundabout. I went left and shot down the trail, then found a crossing of the pretty good-sized stream there. I ran with a guy with a Norge jersey on, and we handrailed the wall up towards 6, then attacked off of the trail—a pretty easy find using terrain.

6-7: Not a bad attack off the trail.

7-8: Ran down the trail and stopped at a flat area and looked for rocks, then saw Norge coming out. Saw a lot of people going up in to 6, so figured even with the early skip I was doing okay.

8-9: 9 would have been a nice skip except it was a water/gatorade stop. These were important. I cut in one trail early so had to scamper down the scree to get to the tennis court.

9-10: Trail run was easy. Finding the control in the vague reentrant not so much. Looking at it now I was not really looking in the right place, but found it. Still was only a couple minutes behind Ian.

10-11: Followed someone up the hill, but he put some time on me once we got to the white runnable stuff. Still, I moved pretty well to the attack (stone wall, reentrant, left of rocks, find the hill) and spiked it. That feels good.

11-12: It took me some time to figure out the route. First I was going to take a compass bearing but there was so much vague. Then I followed a trail around a marsh. Finally I remembered Alex telling me to use contours. Contours! White running along a swamp at the base of a hill. I got caught by Balter and he led us to near the control (I was a ridge off), but a parallel error away. We met Adrian at the control.

12-13: East to a stream, down the stream bank.

13-14: Up a trail to a curve, left off of there (still with this group of 4).

14-15: Trail, green, white, reentrants.

15-16: Here I just followed Adrian mostly and my map a little. He did pretty well and led right to the control.

16-17: Here I followed Adrian and he (and the rest of us) went well north of the control. We got pulled a spur north and through some green; we should have descended through white. I correctly spotted the end of a stone wall and we reconnoitered. When we realized where we were he said "well, this is going to be the wet way." It wasn't too bad. But my feet did get a bit wet. Nothing like the mud last weekend.

17-18: Following Adrian, trying to keep up. It was getting pretty warm out (but I was glad to be wearing pants). Handrailed off the stone wall, then crossed reentrants. I grabbed water and forgot to punch—not realizing until a while later. A bunch of people did this, and with the temperatures they were giving people controls (Adrian vouched that I was there with him).

18-19: Long leg following Adrian. Never really lost contact, but didn't orienteer until the end. But then I led us to the control. He'd run most of the navigation, I'd run the circle. This would actually be a great Billygoat strategy, sort of a team memory-O. One person runs the long navigation, the second person figures out the attackpoint and finds the control.

19-20: Following little lakes.

20-21: Contouring up to a rock.

21-22: I let Adrian go ahead and he led off to this peninsular control which was easy to find across the fields.

22-23: I slowed down—I was hurting with the temperatures—and no one was nearby. Punched, then ran easily to the finish (it was flagged).

Finished, ate pickles and drank pickle juice, which was wonderful. Then put on a sweatshirt (sunblock) and waited for my t-shirt. 7th overall, which is about 25 places better than previous years. I orienteered some (3-4, 5-7, 10-12, some of 17 and 19) and followed quite a bit. That's what the Billygoat is all about. But I mostly kept contact with my map when following, which is good, and felt good, except for the heat.

Interesting, last year I ran 2:07 but was 37 minutes back; this year 20 minutes back. The year before I ran it in 2:30 and was 60 minutes back. At this rate I'll win next year. It's funny, this Billygoat didn't feel any harder than the others, even with the warm temperatures, but apparently it was—I just a) orienteered better and b) followed better.

Now to check for ticks!

(Look at all the controls I spiked—mostly following people to them.)

C • Very nice run 3

Billygoat - Splits

I was going to run today, but in the morning it was very humid and I woke up kind of stuffy. With the GOAT tomorrow, I decided to take it easy today, since there is some race I am doing next weekend (and the long range forecast is back to 40s with a tailwind, let's hope that stays).

Evening run in the cool but humid air. My body does not like humidity, especially early in the season. Still, it was nice to go out for a moderate jog and run 7s along the way. Bodes well for next weekend? Have to begin tapering.

It was the best of O, it was the worst of O. Yesterday was really good O. I figured out maybe this would carry in to today. But I wasn't thinking clearly, and I certainly wasn't used to the map scale. So I overran 1, but just by a little bit. Cleanly in to 2 and then poor route choices to 3; I should have used the cliffs rather than the vague trails.

Then to 4 I made one of my Big Mistakes. I'm capitalizing, because I can. I got caught left and wound up one big road above where I should have been. Or maybe I was just thinking about Frank Lloyd Wright's design too much. In any case, I cut back to 4, and then went from the worst of O to the best of O. I ran straight to 5 through 8, no mistakes, good route choices, and won all the splits.

I did okay to 9 and 10, well to 11 and 12, and then made another Big Mistake to 13, and I don't even know what it was, but I wound up well beyond and ran in to a catching feature (well, I looked up and said "I shouldn't be seeing you, big cliff") and turned back to find the control. I should have gone left, oh well.

Park-O - Splits

Hmm, it's almost like I ran a marathon last weekend. Oh, I did. On trails. My legs were still stretching out today on the stairs, so I took things easy. Lots and lots of people. Cool temperatures, but I only did one stadium (not 50 sections) and stayed over on the shady side of the street. Beautiful morning!

Ride with Alex up to the Fells. I was a little late getting out of work but we made it work. So many bikes on Hampshire/Beacon; kind of hard to ride. I kind of felt bad taking Alex that way and not, say, Broadway/Oxford, but she said "this was so much nicer than Route 99." Wait, that was her plan? Holy jesus.

Fun partner memory O with Alex. I think I am sort of picking up orienteering. A few highlights:

1. I orienteered pretty well to my first couple of controls.
2. At one point I overshot a trail and lost contact with the map. "Try to get there without the map," said an Alex. So I did. I went on a trail in the right direction, and where it bent, went bashing through the woods, came to a boulder and said "beep." Well, more, I jumped up and down and yelled "BOOM!" because I'd blindly navigated straight to the control. Alex—for perhaps the first time ever—was speechless.
3. I realized I didn't have my bike keys, and both our bikes were locked with my U lock, so I kind of skittered a bit on the last couple of controls.
4. On the last control I was navigating, I had to lead us on a bearing down a "sort of double hill" (Alex: "you mean, a saddle?" yeah that) and forgot both my attack point and feature. But I navigated us in to the correct reentant, anyway. Bring on woods where I am sure to get lost this weekend.

And then I averted the crisis I had created: my keys were in our (unstolen) bags! Well, my bag to be specific. We left them by a rootstock.

I also navigated better than Alex on the memory O. Well, she insisted on going right at Curtis and Powderhouse, and had to navigate a long block. I instead went left, took the first right, went through the school and right to Davis. Plus, if she'd done that she could have gone across Mass Ave, taken the Yerxa underpass and wound up going that way. I was in a bit of a rush or I would have shown the way. Oh, well, by her track it appears she got home.

Wanted to go out for 5-6 miles at a 7:00 pace. But my legs were still good and properly trashed. So I made do with 4 miles at 8s. And then went home and made and ate all the pizza.

So this past weekend I ran ~25 miles and climbed and descended ~2000m. It's almost as if I ran a marathon up and down a mountain. Oh, wait.

Taking a well-deserved rest day today, and probably hitting the hay before 10. Yum.

Seven Sisters! After getting deposited in Amherst for the evening, I got a ride down to Seven Sisters. What a great race. I got a bib, sorted out my stuff, left my bags in a field, and went towards the start. I didn't know what to expect from the course except that it would be "hard and rocky." I have a pretty special definition of "hard." Hard is Tucks, the Ammy, anything in the Great Gulf. Rocky is anything on the ridge (particularly Lakes to Madison), or the Galehead-Greenleaf sections, or the top of the OBP. I wasn't expecting anything that hard. I'd heard there was some hand-over-hand climbing. Except for pack trails, nearly everything in the whites has that. So I was ready to run, slightly stiff legs and all.

I was in the second wave, and I was fine with that, especially since my legs were tired. Nothing to prove out of the second wave. There were a few people with grassroots gear, and several hut kids and OH, and CSU people: worlds collide! The waves started two minutes apart (it had been advertised as 5, but given the general dysfunctionality of their website—guys, it's really not that hard to use Wordpress—I was not surprised) and I planted myself near the front of the second wave. The runners there didn't look that fast, but this is the first year of seeding for their waves (I think) so things were mixed up.

We went out and there was a bit of a hole shot on to a single track. I was in second for the climb. Within about 300m we caught the back of the first wave. The first climb wasn't too bad, some scree but I was able to run most of it and pass a lot of the first wave, then settle in to some wave 1 runners. I crested the top and there were some rolling hills before the first tricky downhill.

As usually, I gave back time on downhills. But gained on ups. I'd brought a water bottle along with gatorade—good idea—and took some swigs. The sun had hidden and it was cool and breezy, great running weather. A second decent climb, some mud, and then a bunch of rolls, some rather technical. This was where I began to trade off with a woman (first wave) who took me on every downhill, and who I passed on every up. We developed a rapport: she'd pass me on the downhill and say "see you on the uphill" and I'd pass her on the up and retort "see you in a minute" or something similar. After several iterations, it became more of just a giggle when we'd see each other again, and again, and again.

The last climb is up to the Summit House and terrific views—to Springfield, Hartford and beyond! I had a goo here, and then dropped my water bottle and goo packed for the run down to the turnaround. I chatted with a guy who knew Colin (he had a run reg shirt on) and he called when we'd see the returners coming back up. In third place was a woman (she'd finish fifth); it was a great female (low center of gravity) race.

I saw Alex during the run down, probably too far ahead to catch. And Deniz (NP). At the bottom I had a goo and two glasses of gatorade, and then threw the detritus in a well-placed garbage can. And then I began the uphill portion of the race. On the way up I saw two November Project people, and I was able to give both of them bear hugs, which was beyond awesome. The best part was that though it cost me some time, it was so great that I ran faster after each one.

I passed the woman I'd been hopscotching on the hill, and didn't see her again. And I started reeling in several others, including Giovanni, who'd passed me on the downhill from two minutes behind. (I stayed near him for a while.) I grabbed my goo and bottle at the summit again and kept up the pace.

I felt really quite good, all things considered (I'd run near even splits: I'm an uphill runner). I had enough liquid, and I had enough energy (I finished with a goo to spare). I mostly passed people the rest of the way on uphills, and mostly held them off on the downs. I dropped Giovanni as he was hurting on some uphills, and put some time on him. I'd catch others and if they were in the first wave didn't really care. On the little downhills, I'd pussyfoot the technical stuff and then let loose in to the flats of the saddle, using momentum. I felt strong.

Despite that, I was doing a lot of fast hiking. But that's okay! I ran the flats, and fast-hiked the not-so-flats. I got some more time on people on the last couple uphills, and came in to the last down. Here a couple of reckless guys passed me, but they were wave 1ers, and there was no way they'd put two minutes on me in half a mile (Alex was nowhere to be seen; she finished four minutes ahead of me, we think, the results were messy). I sprinted the flats to the end in case Giovanni was 1:50 behind me, but he'd dropped a lot. Then I wandered around for a while, barely walking, and ate all the food.

49thish, maybe 47thish, felt good at the end, even splits.

I thought about the trail for a bit and how it relates to various parts of the Whites. I decided that it's akin to the section of trail between Lakes and Mizpah. There are some scrambly sections, a bunch of rolls, and a few places where you can let loose and run. It's certainly easier than Lakes to Madison (all rock) or Greenleaf to Galehead (rock, water, cliffs, etc). Maybe also similar to, say, the Franconia Ridge Loop or Zealand to South Twin.

Then we went for ice cream, then we went to Newton to exchange Katia and Giovanni at Alex's house. The walk for hunger was going on so this caused some traffic. Alex had to go to Russo's and I said me too! So we went and bought all the vegetables (and cheese) and then chased down the 70 bus (this time we won once we passed it) and I got on with a backpack, and seven bags of groceries and stuff. (The driver? unfazed.)

By the time we got to Cambridge I had consolidated to four bags. What started with a dark morning Hubway ride ended with a Sunday afternoon ride on the 70 bus. With 25 miles of trail running in 24 hours in between.

So, this happened. About Wednesday I got a message from NP: do you want to come to Harvard Stadium at 4:30 on Saturday morning asking if I wanted to go to New York to run two legs of a marathon relay trail race?

Does the pope shit in the woods?

Logistically, it was going to be interesting, since I was running Seven Sisters the next day. But I could get a ride to Hartford, stay with a friend in Amherst (via bus/train to Springfield) and get a ride home with Alex. The bus/train failed schedulewise (people had to pee by the side of the road) so I got a ride to Springfield, but that was okay. Logistics: conquered.

So my day began with a 4:15 Hubway ride to Harvard stadium. Then a drive down to New York via a stop for breakfast at Denny's, then a free entry in to this marathon. Brogan had some deal with the people at the race, so that was a thing. I was paired with a guy, Kyle, who—it turns out—was 4th last year at Leadville. Well okay then!

Got there around 9, got ready for the 11 o'clock start. They spent a lot of time telling us about the chip exchange, but precious little about the course. So I was anchoring, and the teams went out. I went for a short run to recon the course. It was wet. Definitely a Raptor day.

Then went out on the first leg. See leg. Walked around between the exchange, drank a lot of liquid, but peed yellow. Grabbed a water bottle filled with drink for the ascent. Won race. See second leg.

Got a ride to Springfield via a missed bus connection. Met Ali for dinner and crash. Got a ride to the Seven Sisters. Ran that (see log). Got a ride home with Alex to Russos, then chased down the 70 bus and took that home with seventeen bags splayed out across the floor of the bus. Greatest success.

Quick run out the course to scout and warm up. Lots of water.

So we were waiting for everyone to come in. At 45:00, a guy Ian came in, not my guy. His partner went out and we marveled at how fast he'd run the course. Then Kyle came in. As I was grabbing the chip off his ankle he said "Did someone else come in? (yes) I think he cut the course." So I took off in second, but really in first. I saw several people who had also missed the cutoff, so something was wrong.

I was running alone to the first feed at the top of a hill. Not a huge climb or steep, runnable with some wet and muddy sections. A couple little climbs and then a gradual downhill which I didn't run very fast. Near the end of this I realized someone was behind me. He passed me on a technical downhill, after I led around a sharp right turn that was decently signed (I knew it was coming; I'd looked at the map) and down to the Hudson, before I took back the lead on a very muddy and then wet climb to the finish.

As I went in I saw several more teams which had missed the cutoff. Guys, part of trail running is to read the fucking map, and follow signs. Part of organizing a trail run, however, is to sign the course well (the signs were sort of confusing) and to have volunteers at confusing intersections, like, say, a downhill in to a sharp turn. So things went wrong.

I finshed with wet shoes. I stripped my socks and walked around in thick, dry socks to dry the shoes and keep my legs feeling ducky.

Kyle is a fucking beast, apparently. The whole fourth at Leadville. He reeled in everyone who had cut the course, and came in several minutes ahead of, well, anyone, right when I thought he would. I had been thirsty and decided to grab a disposable water bottle and fill it with feed. This was a good idea. I went out strong and steady, and drank most of it on the run up to the feed station (which only had water). I threw the mostly-empty bottle at them and, hydrated, attacked the next two little bumps.

Then, it was a nice run down, and I went faster this time. I wanted to keep a lot of time between whoever was chasing me down, and to not kill myself for the race tomorrow. (Also, to be able to go slowly and easily down the technical-y downhill so as to minimize ankle risks. Kyle has mostly run out west and referred to it as "very technical." Ha!) And this worked! I looked back where I'd been caught the lap before. No one (well, a bunch of marathoners and 50 milers). I looked back on the next chance: no one. I went in to the very muddy uphill thinking easy and steady.

I ran through the much and the wet rocks, passing a lot of slower people doing longer distances. I got to the finishing field and kicked—but not too hard—in to the finish.

Seven seconds later the next team (also November Project, we swept the podium) came in. So I almost got chased down. Had he passed me with a ways to go, I would have probably outsprinted him since my legs were relatively fresh. Had he timed it right, he possibly could have taken me depending on chip timing. The next team in was a minute behind. 3:22 for a trail marathon with 5000 feet of climb. Of course, we only did halves.

But we (mostly Kyle: he put 5 minutes on the field and I held them off) won.

Then we waited for Brogan to come in (6'6' and 220 is not a trail running build) and we put him on a chair and carried him across the finish, Jewish-wedding style. I told him he might get that again in a few weeks. He said his fiancee is "not really that Jewish." I told him that if there's one excitable uncle, he'll be up on a chair. Then I ate a lot of food, stood on top of a podium, and got a sweet bag of stuff. It was meant for four people (most teams were four people) so we gave away the large $100 North Face shells, and some other stuff. Not bad for a free entry!

C • Congrats!!! Amazing that y... 2

Five times up the November Project. I did not really feel great this morning, pretty humid and I was underfueled, so I lost a sprint at the top of the last one (but won an earlier one up the grass).

Running from the office over to O on the Common. Nice and cool out.

Oy. So, I ran fast to start, and was in second place. A couple of joggles. The first one I went to the wrong side of a fence. 10? A second one going down a hill and looking the wrong way. Another 10. And then I ran to the finish. There were 9 controls on the first leg, why wouldn't there be a total of 18? Right?

Wrong. 19. There were no printed splits, but Larry and Sara Mae also wondered why I had come from the direction I had. I looked at my map—I thought they were talking about the first lap—and said OH SHIT I FORGOT 19! Oh, well, 2nd to 6th.

Run back to the office.

BostonCommon - Splits