Getting Rid of Bush

No, not that one. I'm talking about the bushes that run along the front of my house.  We decided a few days ago to take them out and use the space to plant a vegetable and herb garden instead.  I have visions of rows of golden peppers, juicy tomatoes and fragrant cilantro all swaying majestically in the breeze, and regularly finding their way into my cooking pot.

So this morning I skipped my run, grabbed my shovel and loppers, cranked up the ipod and got to it.

And after 6 hours of digging, chopping, wrestling, pulling, and a little bit of swearing, our bushes are no more.  Well, that's technically not true - they are chopped up and stacked (not so) neatly on our front lawn.  I am one tired puppy, and I bet you anything I am going to be really sore in the morning.

Yesterday I ran 10 miles up at Brushy Creek with my friends Alan and Caroline.  It was a great social run and a chance to catch up with friends I don't see often enough.  We celebrated afterward with breakfast and Irish coffee at Alan's house.

There wasn't very much coffee involved :-)

Certifiable

So the big news in the running world this week is the tweaking of the Boston marathon qualifiers.  The good news is that I still make the cut, the bad news is that it's now tiered and will likely be sold out by the time I get to register.  The reality is that I really couldn't care less.

Sure it was a wonderful thrill to have qualified for Boston, but I don't know that I ever really had any intention of running it.  Qualifying was never ever a life goal for me - it was just nice to know that I had.

So I "consoled" myself by signing up for an RRCA coaching certification class.  The last time that class came through Austin I ummed and aaahed and it was sold out by the time I decided to register.  This time I made sure to get in good and early.

I'll probably never really use it, but it'll be useful to have, and no doubt a fun experience.  Maybe it'll even help me fine tune preparations for my fall race goals.

And I've been enjoying some down time this week - I haven't run since Sunday.  I've enjoyed eating all the wrong things, and sleeping through my early morning alarm calls.  It's been the running break I've needed for a while.

Though I'd better get back to it before all this wonderful weather passes me by.

Dreaming of Numbers

It's over a week now since Rocky Raccoon, and already it seems an age ago.  This is usually about the time that I start revisiting promises to never run that distance again, but not this time.  I think my days of running 100 milers really are done.

Or maybe it's just because I've been going non-stop since I got back.  All the usual stuff is still going on - father-in-law mean as ever, still fighting school closures, still under the threat of layoffs.  Oh, and let's add a new one - we appear to have a massive water leak somewhere under the house.

Whoop whoop.

So no, I'm not really thinking about running.

Well, not much.

Well, maybe just a little.

Well, actually there is a little number that has started floating around my head - 6:52.

Why 6:52?  Well if you multiply that by 26.2, it translates to a very ambitious goal for next fall.

Hey, I can dream right?

Maybe I'll take that number and dream all the way to San Antonio or White Rock.

Adventures in Bread

Regular readers will know that I enjoy making bread - I have even grown my own sourdough starter "pet", which lives in the fridge and comes out to be fed and made into rustic Italian breads and pancakes most weekends.

Now this requires planning as most of my favorite breads need at least a day to make, and include some kind of overnight rise or soak.  And while I love putting the effort and planning into these creations (and my forearms benefit from all that kneading), there are also times when I just come home from work and wish I could have some freshly baked homemade bread right then.  So while browsing at the library the other night, I came across a book I'd been interesting in reading for a while - Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day.  I've been devouring it for the past few evenings, and hopefully tomorrow I'll be devouring some of the bread made from it.

The premise stems from the school of no-knead bread baking (stop cheering forearms) and use of a wet dough.  The book lists several master recipes, of which you mix up a big batch of dough and then store in the refrigerator, tearing off enough to make whatever you require (the dough will last for 14 days in the fridge).

So this morning I got a 2.5 gallon container and made up a batch of the wholewheat master dough.  It rose nicely on the counter, and is now sitting happily in the fridge, probably being given the evil eye by my sourdough starter (I put them on separate shelves in case they decided to get into it).

I plan on using the first part of it to complement tomorrow night's valentines dinner.

Faces in a Crowd

Five friends smiling for the camera just before the start of the Rocky Raccoon 100 miler.  Between the five of us, that day we collected:

- two falls on icy bridges
- one broken leg
- one IT band injury
- one cure for a long-running hip injury
- one case of hypothermia
- one of us registered under a false name
- not a single finish between us

What stories we could tell :-)

Best Beloved

I was lying down with Gavin last night, reading a bedtime story - Rudyard Kipling's "The Elephant's Child" - when it hit me.  Between tales of the great, gray-green, greasy Limpopo River, I realized that Gavin didn't care whether or not his dad could run 100 miles.  He couldn't give two hoots if I qualified for Boston, how long I could hold sub-7 pace, or any of that stuff.  All he cared about was that his daddy was there, laughing, teasing, and enjoying spending time with him.

Because being a runner is not what defines me.  Outside of that rather strange pastime and back in the real world, I'm a good husband, a good dad, and I make outstanding efforts to do the voice of the elephant with his nose in the crocodile's mouth.

On the banks of the great, gray-green, greasy Limpopo River no less.

This morning I considered going out for a run, but quickly thought better of it.  My quads and hamstrings are still screaming at me, my ankle is still threatening to drop me at a minute's notice, and I'm just about getting over this annoying cough.  But here's the really strange thing - for the first time in about a month I have absolutely no pain in my hip.

Yeah, completely gone.  Earlier tonight I put my left leg over the right, pushed my knee down, and tied and untied my shoes about five times.  It's been a while since I was able to do that.  I was so chuffed I even told Nancy "look what I can do".

She rolled her eyes.

So the next time it hits, I'll know exactly what to do - beat the hell out of it with some ice and then pound it into submission with another 30 or so miles.

Then again, maybe I'll just hope it doesn't come back.

Three Letters

D. N. F.

Yeah, my race at the Rocky Raccoon 100 didn't turn out as I would have hoped, and ended up handing me my first DNF.  It's all good though - I knew that I was carrying an injury going in, and I woke up on race morning with my throat burning, coughing up junk and favoring my sore hip.  But I decided I was going to go for it and see what happened.  If it didn't work out, at least I would know that I gave it a try.

No regrets.

And that's how it turned out.  I ran the first 20 mile loop bang on pace in 3:04, but that came at a price.  Around 5 miles in I skidded and fell on a frozen bridge and jammed the bad hip.  It tightened up almost immediately but I kept on going thinking I would run it off.  What happened is that I started compensating for it, which resulted in both hips and quads tightening up as well.  A sprained ankle courtesy of another fall on the roots at about mile 13 didn't help.

Second loop I was still running for about 10 miles, but my hips and quads continued to stiffen up to the point where it became a real effort to raise my legs to run.  That reduced me to a walk, and although I finished out the loop in 4 hours I knew I was done.

In fact, I was surprised I made it 40 miles.

Could I have carried on and finished?  Probably.  Could I have finished without injuring myself?  Probably not.  A few years ago I would have sucked it up and done it anyway, but maybe I'm a little older and wiser.  Or maybe it just doesn't mean as much any more.

Do I regret dropping?  No, last night I got to cuddle up at home with the Gavster instead of limping around the woods coughing up a lung.

On the plus side, I did get to see firsthand some of the superstar athletes of the ultra world - Scott Jurek, Anton Krupicka, Hal Koerner, Karl Meltzer, Liza Howard.  And best of all, a Brit - Ian Sharman - smash the course record by running 100 miles in 12:44:53.  It was very cool running around the trails with these guys saying "good job" to you.

And whatever happened in this race, I always had it in my mind that this was going to be my last 100 miler.  I have good finishes at both Rocky Raccoon and Cactus Rose, and to be honest I found it really hard to motivate myself to get up for this one - it's like I've got nothing left to prove to myself.  Maybe it's time to close the book on this chapter of my life.

Besides, I seem to have made the transition back from a trail runner to a road runner.  That's not to say I won't run any more ultras, but probably not 100 milers.  I suspect my next race will be Ryan's El Scorcho 50k this summer.

Until then, I'm just going to enjoy meeting up with my friends for long runs on the weekend, and run for fun.


PS. huge congratulations to my friend Karen F.  It was great to see you out there yesterday.  I've been following the live feed, and I see you just finished your first 100 miler.  Sweet - you deserve it, and I'm so happy for you.

Cool and Cold

Ok, first with the cool. The clip above is a pretty impressive free running montage video from one of my fellow Brits.  I love the message behind it, the way it all flows together, and especially the way he gets through that window.

And secondly the cold, namely the Arctic blast that hit Texas a few days ago.  I ventured out for a run with Clea early this morning, and it was brutal - 15F with icy cold winds that numbed our faces and made us wonder what the heck we were doing.

We didn't see any other joggers.  I'm sure motorists thought we were crazy.

The hip is still not right, but it's better than it was.  And after thinking long and hard about it I'm going to head up to Huntsville to pit my wits and my will against the 100 miler anyway.  In a perverse way, it's just another challenge and I know I'd kick myself and regret it if I didn't go.

Because I do love challenges, even though I know that one day they will catch up with me.

Hopefully it won't be this weekend.

Stay warm everyone.

Big Dogs, Porches and Puppies

There's a saying that goes something like this - if you can't run with the big dogs, get up on the porch with the puppies.  Well it's been a tough old week of porch dwelling for me - the hip has flared up again, and quite honestly I'm struggling to make the start line of the Rocky Raccoon 100.  If the race had been this past weekend I would not have made it.

I'm not even going to start on the other crazy stuff that's been going on here, other than to wonder whether you can store stress in your hips????!!!