Wassuuuuuup! Moab and other wanderings.

Oh yeah, I have a blog! Totally forgot!

I've been nursing my right foot. Its as if the cartilage between the metatarsals was wearing off. Now after a month, its recovering. Maybe it was from the steep angle-of-attack when I ran with my Five Fingers and my heels way up in the air?

I have managed to run ~25M/wk for the past four weeks. This has been a little luxurious, being able to count on this minimal amount, but my plantar still isn't healed. I won't ever increase my mileage until it's ready, so I've been stuck at 25M. It feels like it might be un-sticking, though. Both feet are starting to feel like their old selves. I haven't been setting mileage targets - just running what felt okay and recording it in my spreadsheet. But soon, I think I might shoot for a 50k week!

Meanwhile, I've been spending more time with my son.
We went to Moab for a long weekend. On the way there, we were stuck in a jam because I-70 was icy. It was so icy, the car next to me was going downhill off Vail Pass the same speed I was - but his tires weren't turning. That's why I still had my studded snow-tires on.
The Moab 100 is a loop course with one full aid station. The only other aid is a couple of camper chairs and a couple of 3-gallon jugs of water out on the slickrock.
Before sundown, I paced a random guy for one lap. I got a GPS track with my new Garmin Colorado 400t (they're practically giving these away now).
Then I took my son and a wad of glow-sticks and headed for the tiny, remote water-stop. We hiked a couple miles under a full moon through a small canyon and up onto the slickrock. Then we unloaded our sleeping bag and down coats. Pretty much all we did was cheer people on. If we had done too much, it would have tampered with the historical difficulty of the race, making this one year too easy. But also there's the possibility of giving people another reason to stop or slow down. That wouldn't be any help at all. So we cheered them through, badgered a couple, and generally kept people awake through the night. I like saying things that makes groggy runners think, like "Merry Christmas!" Anything to stimulate the noggin.

My son made it almost all night, but finally crashed for 90 minutes of sleep. As soon as the sun came up, we packed up and hiked out.
When we got back to the main aid, we were going to check out and get breakfast, but my teenager said, "No! I need more sleep!" So we crashed for 4 hours of sleep in the back of my CR-V.
We ate lunch in Moab and then headed to Arches N.P. This is my son's favorite park, and arches have become one of his passions. So we drove straight to the northern end of the park and started hiking. We hiked the rest of the day and made it to the visitor center with only several minutes to spare.
We slept the night in the back of the CR-V next to the burned-down Dewey Bridge.

The next weekend, I drove to Salida to run with Tom Sobol and friends.
The first thing I did when getting to town was get supper at the local Italian brewpub. I just happened to meet a woman named Cara and her 7y.o. daughter. We ate dinner together. What a riot! Cara had lived in Texas, so she knew about Kerrville where I lived for years, she had just come from visiting friends in Wichita, where I graduated H.S., she lives across the street from Tom S., and she's a runner! We had so much to talk about. We ended up finishing over cheesecake.
And I never saw her again. Two ships passing.
The run was 17.5 miles! This was a major jump in miles for a single run since the LT100, but I hadn't been running in days, so it hadn't up'd my miles for the week. It was only about 2.5 miles of running. The rest was hiking through snow, post-holing badly in spots. It was beautiful and totally fun! That's the most snow Tom S. has ever seen in the area this time of year! I fell on ice several times, but was so used to it I wouldn't miss a syllable through a fall.

I've been moderating for Denver Trail Runners, some months (we trade-off). So I've stayed "in it", if only barely.

On the side, I've been doing WAAAY more computer jobs than usual. Which I have to get back to this instant.

Happy running!