Training Log Archive: Swampfox

Weatherwise, today was a carbon copy of yesterday. Unlike yesterday, however, I was able to get out on my bike, and experience....graupel!

Actually, I got to experience it many times. Every time heavier clouds came over, they filled the air spaces below with graupel.

Given the choice between graupel and ice rain, graupel is mega better. If you're dressed right, it's even pretty fun, and the sound it makes as it bounces off your bike helmet and bike tubing is an added pleasure.

After biking, I changed over, and ran in more graupel up at Happy Jack. Once, for a moment, there was even some sunshine! For now, that will have to suffice. The next four days are looking like more winter. Someone, somewhere, must have been chanting: "Odin". And someone else, somewhere, must have been paying attention.

C • Cadets wanting to escape drill? 3

Happy I did an O' run yesterday, because today turned much chillier, with a good bit of wind and snow coming and going much of the day. Up top, the landscape had turned winter-like with snow plastering the trees, and the wind was shaping snow drifts wherever it could. Ran out to the eastern overlook at Happy Jack, with beautiful views late in the day. Saw a few fresh snow bike tracks, but none of the actual bike beasts.

Did a short run yesterday at something of a faster pace than anything I had done in the past week since hurting my rib(s). It felt better, so I planned to get back out for an O' run today, and see how things felt.

Getting ready, I used wretched ink jet printing technology on some crude material I ran through the printer (maybe printing paper?) and then stuffed the ensuing mess in some kind of yucky poly bag. Ugh. I stared at it. Such obsolete, stone age technology. It was almost embarrassing. But then I thought, hey, it's worked pretty well for 4 decades, it will probably be okay today, too. And of course it was quite fine. : )

And so with perfect weather in the afternoon (overcast with many little passing squalls of light rain/ice), I headed out to run 10 kms at Remarkable Flats. Today the goal *really* was to not fall--ha! I ran at a decent pace, though not race pace, and felt pretty good. I could feel the rib when my breathing was heaviest, but it wasn't bad. I was moving pretty well the whole time, though it's obvious I need more hill work after the winter--both running up and down any bigger hills. I felt a little under powered on the climbs, but the positive was that my recovery once I topped out on the climbs was very quick--so I think my base fitness at this point is decent.

The first squall didn't go through until I was already well warmed up, and it was just some light rain, and passed quickly. The next squall was also light rain, but this time it felt like some bits of ice were mixed in. All the subsequent squalls were ice/sleet and no rain. Despite that, I remained comfortable for the whole run, even with some breeze out there. There was still a fair bit of snow dappling the ground from last Thursday/Friday, but nowhere was it more than a few inches deep. And things weren't dry anymore--there was a nice spongy feel to the ground nearly everywhere.

I was completely by myself the whole time. I didn't see so much as a bird!

Back home, it rained some in the evening, and then switched to snow.

Must be spring because today the Wyoming Football Team had it's spring scrimmage game to end spring camp. In the days leading up to this, the coaching staff had been quite concerned, because around here--perhaps unlike in places such as Gainesville, Austin, Clemson, and Tuscaloosa--it isn't really spring football unless there is enough snow in the stadium for fans to sit on for the scrimmage.

Fortunately, Friday's ample snowfall took care of that concern.

With lots of new, heavy snow up in the hills, I opted to skip running and bike longer instead. The highlight of the ride was undoubtedly a very loud explosion which occurred just as I was biking past the south endzone while the scrimmage was underway. Were overzealous fans setting off fireworks? Had the field crew fired off the cannon used to mark scores? In town ranchers hunting urban coyotes? No. Upon inspection, it just turned out to be the tube in my rear tire blowing up.

While unfortunate, and a temporary interruption of the ride, the silver lining was that the chain needed cleaning anyway, and my chief chain cleaning method is to take off and put back on the rear wheel. Somehow in that process any excess grime and grease on the chain ends up on my hands, socks, shirt, and face--so really it all works out quite well.

Very sunny day, if cool, thanks to a steady, cool breeze out of the south all day long.

Heavy snow began in the early morning hours and continued until after midday. Very high water content. My guess is that Biggins and company, having surveyed the ever mounting California snowpack, have diverted as many storms as possible to the Colorado River Basin, figuring they have more than enough water for now, and that anything else is so surplus that it will do more good to end up in the Colorado River, where it eventually can reach Southern California. Today's snow here must have been one of those storms that missed the intended mark. But we could use it (April had been almost--and very unusually--entirely dry up until now, with barely a trace of measurable rain/snow), so very good! The flowers will be so happy, and, for a few days, the amount of fine materials blowing over to Nebraska will be reduced.

Started to bike a little bit, and almost as soon as I started, it started spitting rain. I wanted to bike, but not bad enough to want to bike in rain--leave that for the golfers, et al.

So transitioned (by which time it wasn't raining anymore) and headed up for the trails at Happy Jack, where almost as soon as I got started, it began snowing--big, heavy spring snowflakes. No worries though--as long as it wasn't raining, I was fine with it. I ended up running for a little over two hours, at a pace every so slightly above yesterday's--in other words, still really easy.

The last few times I've been up at Happy Jack running, I've looked at the forest and thought to wonder how it would look to anyone who ran on the old Happy Jack map when we first used it some years ago. It wasn't a *totally* open forest (nothing close to like TMFKABM, for example), but it was a mostly pretty nice lodgepole forest with some clearings and meadows mixed in.

Now it looks like it has been semi-tornadoed--and there are still way, way more beetle kill trees still standing than the number that have been blown down by the winds. You can still get through it, picking your way through the deadfall and looking ahead, but it would be nightmarish to re-map it now, and in another few years it will be nightmarish, period. Just flat out near impenetrable.