2018 3:20 (and beyond) (Read 582 times)

Sitting in Ouray CO, waiting for my race to start in... oh... 41 hours, with very little to do.  Especially since I failed to connect with Ilana when I was closer to Durango.  So I might as well catch up on 15 pages of the 320 thread.

 

Brew: Ditto to what Matt said about putting NeRP in a trailer behind your bike.  What could go wrong?  I raised a Hardrock Strawberry Rhubarb Gose in your honor at Avalanche Brewing in Silverton.  Darkwave could have put a tiny umbrella in it.

Jim's Kat: Cool encounter with CBBPTR (Certain Boulder-Based etc...).  Haven't scratched "going out for beers" off my fan-boy list yet.

Jack Daniels Plans: Buried in the second edition of his book is a sentence or two saying that for the harder workouts, mortal runners should run by time not distance.  E.g. instead of running 1 mile at T pace, run 5-6 minutes at T pace.  That makes the workout/rest combo much more do-able.

 

Hardrock: Since I was here to acclimate, I went to Silverton last weekend, volunteered, and did one "run".  The run was the first leg of the John Cappis 50k Fat Ass course - basically up an avalanche gully from Silverton to the top of Kendall Benchmark (which you can see from Silverton) and then a ridge run over Kendall Mountain (which you can't see) and back down to Silverton.  The first uphill was something like 3500 feet up in 1.5 miles, and ended with a scramble up very loose sketchy scree.  It felt like the mountain was going to slide out from under me and I did a lot of slow 4-point subtle weight shifts to get past a 20 foot bulge.  I talked to James Varner (John Cappis RD, DNF'd at Hardrock this year due to lightning) afterwards - he said they are going to change that bit.  It's ok when there's snow there but it's "scary as $hit" (his words) without snow.

I did data entry for about 6 hours - if you were following the tracking on Friday, that was me - and volunteered at the finish line "aid station" from 3am Saturday to 1pm Saturday.  I was there when the RD came in and announced that the first runner would be even later because Xavier had just been disqualified.  I heard he was photographed sitting in a car getting water and ice just two miles out of the Ouray aid station.  Dumb and pretty weird.  The funny thing is that I noticed his tracker basically stop right there on the map for a while.  It took them about 8 hours of meetings to make the DQ call - really trying to make sure they knew exactly what had happened.

 

Lots of trail runner celebrities were there running, watching, and/or helping - both Western States winners, other top 10 WS finishers from previous years, a bunch of Hardrock old-timers.  It was cool to see Michael Wardian put in a long volunteer shift at the finish line aid-station after he finished.   The 3rd finisher in the Barkley movie - John Fegyverisi - also ran and finished.  He was on a ridge during a big lightning storm that hit Saturday evening and said that was also SaS.

 

Ouray 100: And my race, the Ouray 100, starts Friday morning.  If lightning and fatigue don't get me, I expect to finish Sunday morning after the sun comes up the second time.   Tracking and other info here, for those who enjoy watching paint dry.

So what you're saying is if I keep TRAINING like an elite (miles not time) I'll PERFORM like an elite? If it makes you feel better I actually made it through the (stupid) workout in the heat with only my last 1,000m repeat "bringing the suck" and having to slow down to T heart rate. The 400s were over before I could realize they suck too. Oh and I got some more "running at night with a headlamp" experience for whenever you need another pacer, but I'll train more this time.

Side Track: did you know Catra Corbet (dirt deva) ran Tahoe 200 the same year as you? Have you met her?

This is the first I've heard (didn't do any searching) of how it was proven and WHAT kind of aid was provided. All I read was people were a little upset with how long it took to announce the DQ, Hardrock wanted an America to win (since apparently Killian is never returning), and the RD wanted to make absolutely 100% sure exactly what happened which took time. Then there are the logistics of making the announcement on THAT course. Apparently in France they can do what they want and Killian was once DQ'd in America for cutting switchbacks. He even said "American rules are different." and the general consensus was the manual was clear on allowable aid. Jam Jam said he once accepted a beer and asked if he should have been DQ'd. He received mixed reactions apparently.

I guess I should look at LetsRun to find out. You're going to KILL Ouray 100 this weekend. If that pass is the one I heard about from IRunFar interviews it's as wicked as you describe it. Watching paint dry sounds like my kind of hobby. Right up there with not drinking beer (i need to start that again) and annoying (level 10 crying) an (almost) 8 month old by laughing too hard.

Brew - My DD3 was the December baby. I thought the baby order was Brew, Ace (or Ace, Brew), Keen, Pesto.
The HM I'm running is too small for pacers. I don't think there has ever been more than 90-100 people run it either year.
What are you feeling nervous about? Your workouts have looked pretty solid, especially considering the altitute/heat/humidity trifecta you're living in. And 73 days is still a ton of time.
Oh, and good job on that 1k+400m workout.

E11 - I've come to believe more and more in that "6-8 hard weeks" theory myself. And it especially hit home since for some reason I decided to look over all of my plan again to make sure it's correct in my Garmin calendar - scary stuff!
I wouldn't worry too much about the packed dirt trail. I figure something like that would be very similar to the dirt roads I frequent. It's not quite as fast as asphault or cement, but it is easier on the legs as well to offset that.
I'm completely with you on "coldness" being a major factor in race selection.

Max - I had wondered why it took so long to DQ Xavier. We have those moths in OK, but I haven't seen one for quite a while. I may end up switching to time vs distance for my T runs - especially if the weather is similar to what it was this morning.
Best of luck with the race!

max! good luck, have fun, and stay positive!

Brew - Now that you're putting in months, I'm thinking Ace, Brew (December), Keen (later December), Pesto (January). Or we could just do some searching through the thread, but what fun would that be?

Looks like Max is at ~mile 9, 11.5k elevation and on about an 11% grade downhill. Wow, that's steep!

Here's another question for the class: What are everyone's thoughts on moving a few easy miles to the beginning and/or end of workouts, or getting in an extra 2-3 (very) easy miles via doubles and cutting down miles on easy run days? Workouts themselves would remain unchanged. So about ~16 miles on workout days and ~8 miles on easy/recovery days.

Right now there's not a lot of (mileage) difference between workout and non-workout days. Doing this I'd keep the same overall MPW, but make the harder days harder and the easy days easier. Or is keeping the relatively even mileage per day more beneficial for endurance?
Now that I've typed this out the proposed mileage on workout days seems more intimidating than it did in my head...

Good luck Max!

Ace: If you like mysteries Anthony Horowitz has a new one out, but his last one, The Magpie Murders, was awesome.  I want to read Endure.

Keen:  That seems like a lot of miles on workout days in terms of your overage mileage, but I don't really the know the answer.

It's supposed to be 92 degrees at 7 pm tomorrow night for the 5k I'm running -- any advice? I don't run well in heat.

Ace - The idea of moving miles around just popped into my head this morning - I really don't know why. Only the timing of a few miles would change - workout paces would stay the same, and easy miles would either be the same or slower.
Have you read any of the Sherlock Holmes books/stories? I've been meaning to read Finding Ultra myself. My wife actually finished the series for the first time within the last month.

Oregon - I don't think any of us run well in heat! A couple years ago I did a 5k series during the summer (all evening races). I think the average temp was ~95*. Yuck. If you're running it just to run it, I'd start 20-30 sec/mi slower than usual and you can always speed up later. You probably won't need much of a warm-up, either. Be careful with what you eat in the couple hours before the race.

Brew - I don't think moving the miles around would impact time with the family - I'd just get up extra early on those days, or I'd end up with an easy double during lunch at work. I might actually get some more time with them in the mornings on easy days if I get up at my usual time and run fewer miles.
4.05/gal??? Man, I love Oklahoma.
Hadn't heard of Stapleton, but a quick google says I might be interested. I'm pretty much a purist when it comes to my country music, though.

It's storming like a storming thing out there, or at least over my house.  Radar is showing the whole region under a lot of convection.  I hope Smax is okay - at 12,500 he's above treeline, could be, um, exciting.

What are everyone's thoughts on moving a few easy miles to the beginning and/or end of workouts, or getting in an extra 2-3 (very) easy miles via doubles and cutting down miles on easy run days? Workouts themselves would remain unchanged. So about ~16 miles on workout days and ~8 miles on easy/recovery days.

I'm not in a position to speak about this with any authority right now, but back in the day, I found adding miles to workout runs (and reducing miles on the recovery days) to be beneficial.  I think it depends on the goal.

Go max!