Updates

Running, as of late, has been a struggle. It's not an injury or sickness, I am just content with hitting 50 miles a week and feel that anything more would be a detriment to arriving at JFK perfectly healthy.

The last few months have been interesting. After World's I felt a huge weight lifted off of my shoulders. And although I was disappointed with the fact that I could have gone in the low 6:30's or high 6:20's that day (cramping issues), I am still extremely satisfied with my time as well as my placing in the first international race I've ever done. I am also ecstatic to be on the first USA team to win a gold medal in the 100K event. But after the glow of such a huge event, one that I trained a whole year for, I'm finding it difficult to get motivated.

There is also the question of health. After world's I felt extremely depleted. The same issue happened after the Point Defiance 50K. Although I feel healthy on nearly every run, I still feel that the hard efforts take a little something extra out of me. In summation, I'm glad JFK will be a last effort! It's time for a little R&R and I'd like to spend a few weeks working on a beer gut! Before that happens, some serious racing needs to be done.

JFK is a race I've always wanted to do. And this year, I think the field of elite runners are going to push the finishing times down to a course record. With 90% of Team USA toeing the line as well as a few other really fast guys, I think this is a year it could be done. Of course, someone has probably said that every year since 1996. The fact that a time could stand for that long means it is solid for sure. But I also have this nagging notion that it can be easily done. Without giving too much of my strategy away, I think going through the first 15.5 miles in under 2 hours is doable without a superhuman effort, and from there you should have enough in the tank to hit 6:40's the rest of the way. Granted I haven't seen the course and I've heard the first section is extremely technical. But after that I've heard the terrain is quite pleasant. Combined with a large pack of equally talented runners, it should be an interesting day. Enough talking about it for now, I guess we'll see!

Another interest that has grabbed my attention lately has been a local group called Dock Street Runners. It is a group started to give the homeless an outlet for exercise. With a large amount of free time and no outlet, it is easy to see why an overwhelming majority of the homeless are either drug/alcohol abusers or obese. This group with combat some of those issue. One guy has already lost 50 lbs in 8 months! Wenche (phonetically spelled Van-Kuh) Wahl is the leader of this group and she has 54 committed members running with her every wednesday at 10AM. After speaking with her I learned that she is in need of new/slightly worn shoes, tech running shirts, shorts, etc..... anything we need as runners. At the moment I am trying to find ways in which to procure some of these items, one way being to place a donation bin at my running store. Please let me know if you have any other ideas. If you'd like to contact Wenche directly or make a donation, here is her contact info and website.

wenche@dockstrunwalk.org

(253) 229-1654

http://dockstwalkrun.org/

3rd Place at Worlds!!!!!

That's right! My first event on an international level and I finished 3rd!

I haven't had a chance to write since I went back to work the next day after arriving back in the States. I'll have a very detailed write-up of the events in Winschoten soon.

For now, I'd like to say that I'm extremely happy about my race and being able to contribute as part of the first American team to win a Gold medal in the 100k World Championships.

I'd also like to say that Meghan Arbogast is a beast!!!!!!!! She now holds a world record at the event.

And lastly but not leastly, Montrail athletes did some serious work this weekend! Way to go guys

The Long, Slow Taper & two shoe reviews

World's is just about 1 month away! It's crazy to look back at the last 17 weeks since 100k Nationals and see the myriad changes that have occurred: fatigue, strength, sickness, various races that have either worried me or exactly the opposite. It's all gone by so quickly, yet so much has happened. Here is a look at the progression of mileage and some races I've done to prepare for the biggest race of my life....

Week 1: 18 miles

Week 2: 40

Week 3: 32

Week 4: 55 (Lost Lake 50k, 1st place)

Week 5: 62 (Capital City Marathon, 11th place)

Week 6: 52.5

Week 7: 77.5

Week 8: 101.5

Week 9: 92

Week 10: 81

Week 11: 98

Week 12: 110

Week 13: 103 (Four on the 4th four miler, 3rd place 19:54)

Week 14: 133 (3 X 8K @ 28:30 pace)

Week 15: 114

Week 16: 94 (White River 50 Mile, 4th place 7:15)

Week 17: 90

The increase in mileage was slow, but I think this was the best possible course of action I could have taken. Although I've raced far less this year than last, I think that has really paid huge dividends in health and recovery. At the end of last year I was so fatigued every day that I could barely run 3-4 miles without stopping to walk or double over. I had been overtraining and lacking in important recovery areas such as sleep, nutrition, and hydration. This year has been far different and I am 100% on track to meet and possibly even exceed my goals for worlds. That being said, I'd like to reveal a bit about what I had in mind.

Since the 100k National Championship I have had an idea that I could potentially put down a very serious time at Worlds. The course has everything a person is looking for in order to run a fast time. From what I'm told, this is one of the few places where the 100k world event is taken very seriously, and the event is done extremely well. The course is also extremely fast and below sea level. The last American Record was broken here (6:30:11) and I intend to make an attempt to better that record. Its a bold statement, but one must have goals in order to reach their full potential. I think the competition in this race will help me achieve this goal, since there are quite a few guys out there that have already run much faster this year. I can only hope that the weather will be kind, and I can avoid completely wasting myself in the first half of the race.

There are still a few workouts I need to do before the race and I will update very soon on my progress towards the World 100K.

In other news, I have received two pairs of shoes from Montrail as well as some pretty gnarly gear from Mountain Hardwear to test for the Spring 2012 line.

Montrail Badwater - This is by far the best shoe I have placed on my foot from Montrail. I think the company is headed in a much better direction with the Spring 2012 line! So to give a full review I'll split the shoe into 3 parts: the upper, midsole, and outsole.

Upper - The upper material wraps the foot extremely well. Montrail has taken great care in cleaning up the stitching on the upper and has instead used mostly welded overlays to create structure in the upper. This means it has a nice, smooth feeling on the inside of the shoe and less irritation where stitching can sometimes create hotspots. Although a bit rigid at first, the upper material gives after about 20 miles and to a certain extent creates a custom fit for the person's foot. Combined with a subtle appearance I was pretty happy about the aesthetics and comfort of this shoe's upper.

Midsole - The midsole of this shoe is fairly simple. Since it is a hybrid road/trail shoe (thus the name "badwater") they have added certain elements to make the ride a bit smoother than a normal trail shoe. The foam is a bit softer than the average trail shoe, which makes it extremely comfortable from the moment you slide your foot it. However, they have used a unique styling of the midsole to create something that transitions smoothly but still performs well when moving laterally. It is extremely difficult to get the best of both worlds, but with Montrail's geometric design on the midsole, they have gotten about as close as one could get to creating a true road/trail hybrid.

Outsole - The outsole of the Badwater is about the only area where I would make complaints, and that is only because I am a true shoe nerd. The medial side of the shoe is beautifully done, and the micro-lug design is another feat of engineering that make this shoe responsive on the roads, and rugged on the trails. The one complaint I have for the shoe is that the heel area is not decoupled enough and the lateral side of the heel actually built about 1 to 2 millimeters higher than the medial side. This is something that is common in most shoe companies (to name a few, Adidas, New Balance, Saucony) and it doesn't necessarily hinder the shoe too much it just creates a bit stiffer ride. If the rubber outsole could be decoupled just a bit more on the lateral side I think this shoe could be mechanically sound for just about anyone who placed in on their foot.

Montrail Rogue Fly - All I have for this one is an iPhone photograph!

For those of you who have seen or worn the Rogue Racer, this is the exact same tooling (outsole and midsole) as the Rogue Racer. The only thing that has changed on the shoe is the upper. In my opinion it is a much better fit and it actually feels like a competitive shoe. Coming in at a scant 7.5 ounces, it knocked off about 1.3 ounces just in the upper material! I think this shoe is going to be able to rival any other minimal trail racing flat out there once again due to the 3-point microlug system that allows for smooth transition on the road (felt great at the 100K) but also for great grip on rugged terrain (felt even better at White River). This is, without a doubt, going to be my shoe for the World 100K!!!

its been forever

its been quite a while since ive posted anything on here. i'd have to say for the most part its because i really haven't been doing anything exciting. mostly just running, working, eating, running, and sleeping. to give you an idea of my day ill map it out for you.

7:30 am - wake up, eat, drink coffee

8:00 am - get dressed and get out of the door to run between 6 and 10 miles

9:00 am - get home, run inside and shower, pack lunch

9:30 am - drive to work

10 am- 7 pm - work

7:30 pm - get home, put on running clothes and run between 6 and 10 miles

8:30-9:30 pm - cook dinner, shower, etc

10- 10:30 pm - decompress, sleep

I've found a pretty good system and I've been getting in some really good mileage, but there's not a lot of time to be inspired to write.... Sorry!

Anyway over the last few weeks I've really gotten back into great shape. The last 5 weeks have been: 103, 110, 133, 141, and 124. During one 8 day stretch from friday to friday, i racked up 187 miles. that is by far a record for me and now I am beginning the long and slow taper toward the World Championship 100k in September.

This weekend I will be racing the White River 50 miler. I'm excited to see how the two climbs go, and to see how I feel after pounding my legs for 50 trail miles.

Also, recently I've received a few new pairs of Montrail shoes to test out for the Springs 2012 season. One is called the Badwater, a hybrid shoe made for both road and trail. The other shoe is called the Rogue Fly. For those of you who liked the Rogue Racer, get ready for a massive improvement in fit! I'll be giving a detailed report of both shoes soon.

For now, I'm off to sleep, and ready to start another "above-mentioned" day.

Regaining form

It's been 3 weeks now since I race and only now am I feeling healthy and ready to start building up my mileage again. The first week was a combination of working toward walking correctly again and trying to consume a healthy amount of calories. The muscle soreness and fatigue are something I am quite familiar with, but the aversion to food was something that has never happened to me before. After about 5 days this passed and I was left craving red meat and fresh vegetables (my guess is iron deficiency). So, I obliged. It certainly isn't a chore eating a large steak with an even larger salad.

The second week was spent trying to regain my running form. There were a few things impeding this process. Firstly, my legs were still very rigid and stiff from the race. Secondly, I simply felt like I was working at 80-90% running at 7:30 pace. Not only was this very frustrating but also left me with a lot of concerns. Ever since I burned myself out last year I've been extremely cautious not to overtrain. For races you can't really hold anything back, and I thought maybe I had blown a fuse. However, at the end of the second week I made my way out to a favorite trail of mine (Tiger Mtn.)with a few work friends and ran close to 14 miles. The uphills were difficult but the rest of the time I felt very comfortable.

This week has been more of a transition back into training mode. I haven't been able to wake up early under my own willpower so far, but I have been logging some solid miles in the evenings. Its nice to have the sun stay in the sky until around 9 o'clock. Score one for living in the North! This weeks total should be around 50 miles, and then I'll just be doing maintenance runs until Lost Lake 50K.

This race won't be a massive effort on my part. I am doing this race to gauge how physically ready my body is to start seriously training again. But I do have the course record on my mind. The hill climb should be treacherous but the views will be worth it! If you'd like to view race photos please click the link below.

http://www.skagitrunners.org/lostlake.shtml

Mad City 100K

So I've had plenty of time to digest the events of this weekend....

About 4 days prior to the race I was intensely worried that I was going to perform terribly at this race. I had a pretty amazing weekend the week before watching my good friend Brooks Williams compete at the Brew to Brew 44 mile race from Kansas City to Lawrence. Brooks was running this race because it is sponsored by the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Brooks is affected by this illness and wanted to show his support by running the race. Not only did he win, but he demolished the competition by over 40 minutes.... Often times this happens in ultras. The longer the distance, the more of a gap there will be between finishers. But to win by 40 minutes is just amazing and I was speechless as he crossed the finish line.

After the weekend I was feeling slightly fatigued. Crewing is a tough sport in its own right. To be honest, I find it a good bit more exhausting than running the race. And day after day I woke up feeling a bit tired... not my usual feeling the week of the race. Needless to say, I was a bit apprehensive having my parents, girlfriend and friend/#1 crew member Shelley travel all the way to Madison to watch me fail miserably. Great thoughts before a race.

The day before I took a red-eye from Seattle to Minneapolis, then on to Madison, sleeping every chance I could. Once I got the hotel, I slept more. Then I ran for 20 minutes just to shake out the legs and get the blood flowing. I took a healthy dose of Emergen-C just to make sure I kept my antioxidant levels elevated, then ate a pasta dinner. Sleep that night was restless but I got in a full 8 hours.

Apart from my mother telling the entire crew that the race started at 6 am, there weren't really any hold-ups, and now that I think about it I am glad we got there early. I had some time to just relax and mentally prepare for the day. About 10 minutes before the race started, I stripped down and began to wait by the start line.

When the gun went off, I was expecting at least one person to dart out to a 5 minute first mile, the way most races do. Interestingly enough, everyone went out way slower than I had imagined. The first loop we pulled through in a modest 42 minutes, a bit slower than the pace I'd wanted to run for the first 50k. After lap one I pulled ahead of the pack a bit and caught the lone front-runner. After some brief chatter I learned that this was THE Zach Gingerich. In my mind he was the person I was going to need to beat in this race. But even though his list of accomplishments is certainly intimidating, he is a really nice guy. For the next lap he told me about the night he had spent staring at the ceiling as a high school party was in full swing in the hotel room next door. And even though he says sleeping is overrated the night before a race, I can't think that it helped him too much.

After lap two, Zach slowed a bit to grab some stuff from his fiancee and I gradually gained a gap on him. From that point on I was alone, and spent a large part of the time just focusing on my tangents to not only increase the lead, but to spend the least amount of energy on wasted footsteps.

Other than tangents and occasional random thoughts, the rest of the race was putting one foot in front of the other, focusing on form, length of stride, etc. Here is a list of the splits for the race....

1st Loop - 10 Km	6.214	42:11.0	6:47.3
2nd Loop - 20 Km	12.427	1:21:41.7	6:34.4	6.21	39:30.7	6:21.6
3rd Loop - 30 Km	18.641	2:00:00.2	6:26.3	6.21	38:18.6	6:09.9
4th Loop - 40 Km	24.855	2:38:08.6	6:21.8	6.21	38:08.4	6:08.3
5th Loop - 50 Km	31.069	3:16:02.9	6:18.6	6.21	37:54.3	6:06.0
6th Loop - 60 Km	37.282	3:54:46.7	6:17.8	6.21	38:43.8	6:14.0
7th Loop - 70 Km	43.496	4:34:32.2	6:18.7	6.21	39:45.5	6:23.9
8th Loop - 80 Km	49.710	5:17:14.8	6:22.9	6.21	42:42.6	6:52.4
9th Loop - 90 Km	55.923	6:02:31.1	6:28.9	6.21	45:16.3	7:17.2
10th Loop - 100 Km	62.137	6:47:34.0	6:33.5	6.21	45:02.9	7:15

As the race progressed, the lactic acid build-up and overall fatigue became a bit too much to maintain a solid rhythm, and the hills were primarily the area where I began to be more cautious. Rather than going into oxygen debt, I decided to lay off the pace a bit and just run comfortably up the hill. This paid huge dividends in the later laps! By the last 2 laps though, it was the downhills that were wrenching my quads and hamstrings. Each step felt like I might have an entire body cramp.

As the last lap came around, I learned that my original theory that the CR was 6:46:00 was way off, and all I had to do was run consistently for the next 6 miles and I'd have it for sure. So I dropped my bottle and gave it my all. I took one more gel at the 1.5 mile aid station and began to press harder. With a mile to go I let my legs relax and dropped my shoulders, and let the adrenaline surge as I knew I'd only have to run for another 7 to 8 minutes. Half mile to go, I saw my dad waiting on the corner of the final stretch. I smiled so hard my face cramped up, and just started laughing. The last 200 meters was exhilarating. Crossing the finish line, I felt an extreme weight lift off of my shoulders. I had been wanting to join the world team for USA for about 2 years. It was nice to know I'd be representing my country internationally!

On a side note, during the worst race of my life (WESTERN STATES), I came by a woman who was having an equally bad day. After a while of chatting while laboring up the hill to our eventual drop-out point at mile 55, I learned she was Devon Crosby-Helms. We talked for almost an hour about other races, why we were feeling terrible that day, how much it sucked walking up a hill since we both knew we were just going to drop anyway.... When I saw her cross the finish line on Saturday, she looked so strong. I approached her at her car and we hugged. Apparently both of us were feeling much better since then. Congrats to her and her 14 minute CR!!!!!!!!! What an amazing athlete!

I'd also like to give a shout out to Nick Clark and Ryan Burch for their impressive finishes at American River. I know they are both mountain specialists and those times are pretty gnarly for the course not being their preferred style. Congrats to you both as well!

Finally!

I'll be writing more in a bit, I just wanted to write that I've finally achieved what I'd set out to do last year!

1st Place at the Mad City 100k National Championships, earning a spot on Team USA. I'm so excited to be traveling to the Netherlands this fall!