Ran 4 or so above 10,000 feet today, then ran a little 1 mile path up over 12k. I went and did it this time, I signed up with Colorado Mountain School to do Longs Peak on friday with a prep half day thursday to get comfortable in a climbing harness on a rope even though it shouldn't be necesary. Its a pretty serious hike esp for a scared of hts wuss like myself, I bailed on it last year just over 13k. http://www.totalclimbing.com/page.php?pname=guided/fixed http://www.14ers.com/routemain.php?route=long1&peak=Longs Peak We are gonna have to buzz home and reset the farm tomorrow about 5 hrs ea way. Salty glad the surg went well. Joe you'd be suprised what grows in them ditches but I never inhale when I run by. Arla hope school is going well for ya, good article back page of running times about running, eating and treating yourself etc as u mentioned being able to splurge just abit. You would smoke in your home town race. Kelly thanks for starting us off, good luck with the job hunt, u did the right thing.(not that u need me to say it) Hope Cindy had a safe trip, couldn't have been a good trip. Leslie hope that back straightens up!! Sounds like the conference went well. Carol nice splits on the progression run!

r2 - wow, running over 10,000ft! Just, wow! I just slog along on hikes at that elevation. Around 11,000 I get that funny, "hey, there's no blood in my legs" feeling. Leslie - take care of that back! I had back issues years ago, it took years to completely resolve, which it finally did by being really diligent about taking care of it. I can't do the local race because I'll soon be starting training for my January marathon in Florida. No way would I be ready by November ...not to mention ready to do another in January! The good news is that I can go out and spectate, there's nothing like seeing the leaders fly by just a couple feet away from you - soooo much more impressive than seeing it on TV. Speaking of TV, I finally got around to watching the Olympic men's marathon...un-freakin'-believable that they kept that 2:06 pace in those conditions. Poor Ryan Hall looked pretty wilted, very different from how he looked at the trials. Arla

Evening all..... I've been so totally bad with running. The groin thing really thru me for a loop. I need to get my butt in gear. I've come to far to give it up now. Besides I like my virtual friends that I've made and love hearing about everyone's adventures. I just read everyone's posts so a big shout out to everyone and keep up the great work. Just got home from school, taking 3 classes this fall and I'm wooped. P.S. I've got my running clothes layed out so.......no excuses! Jewels (Libra)

Watch out!....Here comes Ultrachick!....She's poised to reach the 1900 mile mark for the year as well as accomplish a monthly mileage PR of 300 miles by Aug 31!! Hi Everyone! I'm still around. Finishing up my job, kids are back in school and football has started, soccer tryouts for the school team are today and tomorrow-he's already made the private club team he was on last year, last night was the last mtn bike race night, the 5k trail race goes through September. And oh yeah...I'm flying to Utah on the 3rd! Too much to do in too little time-if I could just be done with my job now! Glad to see everyone is doing well-keep up the good work! Take care and I'll check in later! Kelly

Watch out!....Here comes Ultrachick!....She's poised to reach the 1900 mile mark for the year as well as accomplish a monthly mileage PR of 300 miles by Aug 31!!

My heroine! You and Joe amaze the heck outta me. And here I was admiring my measly 610 miles for the year. Someday . . . . . Jewels - Glad the run went well for you. Isn't it amazing how exercise makes us feel so much better? 1 hour strength/core with 1/2 hour of stationary bike. The back is feeling better, but still just a tad tight. I've contacted someone where my friend, Karen, works to get a MAT appointment (muscle activitation technique). She swears by it, so I figured it can't hurt. Maybe it'll cure my right knee, right hip flexor, right low back! Bonkos tonight at my house. Wish me luck! I could use the $60 the winner gets. Or the $30 for second. Or $150 for third. Or even getting my $10 back as a loser. The only game I've ever played where the loser actually comes out a winner, sort of. Who's fired up about college football starting tonight?!? The Hub is on Cloud 9.

Bonkos (also known as Bunko among the "out" crowd is a dice game. ) 12 women. 3 tables. 3 sets of 3 die. Buy In: $10 ea. Winner: $60, 2nd: $30; 3rd: $20, Loser: Gets their $10 back. One table is the Bonkos table. They have a bell, they control the game. Everyone takes a seat. Each player has a score card with 4 sections of lines numbered 1-6. You're playing in pairs, so there are two teams at each table. One person keeps score for both teams. Round One: The bell rings. Each person, one at a time, is rolling for 1's or 3 of a kind of anything. As long as you are rolling 1's or 3 of a kind, you keep going. As soon as you don't get a 1 or 3 of a kind, you hand the dice over to the next person. 1's are worth one point each; 3 of a kind are worth 5 points; 3 of a kind of what you are rolling for (i.e. 1's) is worth 21 points. That's a Bonkos. The scorekeeper adds the points up as the round goes along. As soon as a team at the Bonkos table reaches 21 points, the bell rings and everything stops. The score keeper writes down each team member's score on their individual cards, the losers move to the next table and the winners stay, but you change partners at the next table. You don't keep the same partner the whole night. Round Two: The bell rings and now you're rolling for 2's. Your score from each round is added to the previous one. You continue through six rounds then start all over. At the end of four rounds or six, the person with the highest score wins. I did so well one night (a looong time ago), I had well over 600 points at the end of the night. Unfortunately, that was when the buy-in was $5. The main rules: No men, no children, there must be alcohol, there must be chocolate. There's a lot of screaming, yelling, and laughing. We play the 3rd Thursday of each months, except for June and December, rotate houses, and everyone chips in on bring munchies and drinks. We have a blast. It's at my house tonight, so last night was the mad dash to clean up. A couple of years ago, a candy fight ensued. I spent the next few weeks finding pieces of candy under and in my furniture. This is probably A LOT more information than you anticipated receiving, but hey, you asked!

Farmer Jim - Are you actually doing rock climbing? If so, absolutely would not be my cup of tea. . . . although I have wanted to try the rock climbing wall at the local university. Bonkos last night - Jim, tell Lynda she's welcome to join us anytime. Next game - Thursday, September 25 at Raquels' house. I am soooooooooooo tired today! But we had so much fun, it should be illegal. Three of the ladies stuck around and us chatting until almost 11:00! Needless to say, I was a bit wired and consequently didn't get to sleep until sometime after 1:00. Ugh! And then it was the sleep a little, wake up. Sleep a little, wake up. Have weird dreams about needing everyone to get out of my house so I can sleep! I have to run in the morning!! So no run this a.m. Just couldn't do it on 3 or 4 hours of sleep. I can hardly function right now. Will see how I feel at the end of the day as I am scheduled for 1.5 hours today. It's . . . gonna . . . be . . . a . . . long . . . day . . . . .