Cazadero "Highway"

While not the most ideal running terrain, I opted to do the 8 mile tempo right out the front door of Trestle Cabin on Cazadero Highway. I put the highway in quotations above because I wouldn't necessarily classify the road as a highway. As I was running, I contemplated what the AAA people use as their basis for putting a road on a map. My reasoning brought me to the conclusion that it has something to do with the post offices. If a town is large enough to have a post office, a road must go to it. That is the case with Cazadero Highway - not a major road at all, but there is a post office at the end of it. The cabin is 6 miles up the road and the post office is about 6.5, so I first ran to the post office and then came back in front of the cabin and did 3.5 miles before I turned around and came back. While the cars go fairly quickly (speed limit is 35, but I don't think most follow that) my best estimate is that there was an average of less than 5 cars per mile that actually passed me, so all in all a successful run in not getting hit by a car, which leads me to my next comment:

I want to state for the record that I do not believe it is a good idea for either of you (especially Amber might get the itch for this dream) to have the goal of cycling on Highway 1. It seems to be somewhat of a pilgrimage for some people, as we saw many cyclists loaded down with gear for a long trek. Its not that I don't think you could do it from a physcial perspective - I'm quite sure you could. But from a getting hit by a car perspective, I am not so confident. We almost wiped out at least a dozen cyclists. The road is just not made for two cars and one bicycle at the same time. In many places it is, in fact, barely made for two cars. So, that's my thoughts on that.

PS - Crosstraining this week consisted of canoeing, hiking and golfing. Not extremely cardivascular, but hey, I was on vacation.

Fall is here.

After running in Cancun proved difficult (90 degrees and severe humidity even at 8am) and resulted in a little more cross training than running I set out last night back at home for the 8 mile tempo. Even though it was 77 degrees it felt much cooler as the humidity was down near 40%. It is very obvious that fall has arrived very very quickly. The run started out slow and stiff but somehow the half bag of snickers I devoured during the hellish afternoon of tax returns gave me extra energy as I began running unofficial negative splits. Even though I finished my distance at the gas station, I opted to run up Braddock to my house (needless to say I slowed down a little).

The weather looks promising for our 20 miler on Sunday: Sunny, low humidity and 50-70 degrees depending on time of run. I would be ok with either morning or afternoon - although we do have a Steeler game at 1:00. If we do have a themed meal, it'd be very easy this time with some buffalo chicken wings....

Also, terrible breaking news: the Pittsburgh Marathon has been postponed to 2009 due to lack of time to plan appropriately. I had trouble finding a news article link to post here but several people have seen it on various news venues.

New Look for Crazy Daisies

Nathan was tired of the old dots template and requested an upgrade. Stay tuned for other updates that tech-savy husand wants me to implement!

Pacific Mist

I haven't quite figured out the climate here. The weatherman has been way off on his weather predictions. Its been cold where he told me it would be warm and its been warm where he told me it would be cold. This morning I headed out for the speed workout (luckily it was 2 minutes fast, 2 minutes recovery, so no track needed) and after only 5 minutes of running I was soaked from sweat? mist? seaspray? Who knows...

The Mendocino Headlands State Park was only a 3 minute jog from our bed & breakfast and virtually my whole planned route had a good view of the Pacific since we are somewhat on a peninsula that juts out into the ocean. There was less than a mile that could be run in the park, but the small town streets of Mendocino were just as fun to run on. Mendocino is an interesting place - a mix of modern and olde time. They call it a New England style village, which makes me feel more like I'm in Maine than Northern California. The town does not have a water system, so each house has to have its own water tank. Many sit above the house, I presume so they can use gravity to get some kind of pressure? While its quaint and well-maintained (and, of course, an upscale touristy spot...) there are still the standard hippie/homeless wanderers that populate all of California.

On my second loop I must have transformed into someone who looked like a knowledgable local and another runner asked me for directions back to town. It would be really hard to get lost here, but I was happy to oblige and told him "turn right on Lansing." All in all, a fantastic run!

Big Sun Rising

Today was an early morning run on the bike trail that runs behind our apartment. It is kind of sketchy to go by myself when it's dark outside, so Ryan went with me. We ran 4 miles at tempo pace...meaning I wanted to cut my arms off because it was slightly painful. Thanks Ryan for the push...yuck. We separated ways after 4 and I did the last 2 on my own, which required a down and back sort of loop. On the way back, I looked up in the sky and there was this beautiful, gynormous sun! It was crazy! And huge and beautiful burnt orange. It was beautiful. All in all, the run was ok. Lis, you know how when we did tempos, one of us may get annoyed because we're not feeling too good but we rarely speak it out loud. When I run fast with Ryan, I start to complain and he's like, isn't this supposed to be your tempo? Yikes...um, yes...but it's not comfortable. The moral of the story, I complain more when I run with Ryan than I would with either of you two. I don't know how that makes sense, or if it only makes sense to me. Whatever. :) It is sunny and warm outside right now and I'm about to venture out to Safeway to get some ingredients for dinner. Megan, I'm thinking I might make those yummy chocolate truffle cookies that Tressa made. They look yummy! I miss you both. :)

Running Under the Redwoods

Nathan came into town with me this morning and camped out at a coffee shop with wifi and I headed up a nice road with a bike path berm to the Armstrong Redwood Preserve. I was on the road for about 2.5 miles and then in the preserve itself for about 5 miles. When I started at about 8 am it was only 47 degrees! The thing about the redwoods is that they are so tall and suck up all of the sunlight way at the top, so that even in midday you're running underneath them and it feels like dawn or dusk. It really only gets "warm" here from about noon - 3 pm.

Breaking in the new shoes

I broke down and got a new pair of shoes before the marathon. Today was the day to break them in. I was planning on doing my normal tempo route, but I saw what looked like a fire that was probably burning down all of Neville Island and I swore I heard firetrucks way off in the distance. As I headed down to 65, I saw a very bright flickering light and lots of smoke. By the time I got down there, I realized that it was just the normal eternal flame at the upstream side of the island...maybe a bit higher than normal and the smoke was nothing too abnormal either. I guess it was just a typical day for Neville Island. I was then punished for my curiousity by having to run back UP from 65.

Running at the Shore

Since I did my 18 miles before the weekend, I got to enjoy a short 6 mile tempo run while I was at the Shore. I figured I'd get it out of the way first thing Saturday morning so I didn't have to worry about it the rest of the week. I headed out before most people were out of bed in the morning and it was still cool enough to be an enjoyable temperature. I headed towards the beach and then ran along the boardwalk until it ended and then ran on the street. As I was coming back, the rest of the clan was just headed to WaWa to get coffee, so I cut my run a bit short to join them. I then guzzled a bottle of water and then enjoyed cooling off on the beach with a coffee! Ah...the life.

Jessie was disappointed that I didn't wake her up to run on Saturday, so the next morning I ended up doing a little more with her as well. She was supposed to do 12, so I just did the first 4 with her and then headed home. She is training for the Frankfurt, Germany marathon which is at the end of October. She also has a really cool GPS watch which tells you exactly how far you run and the average pace you run at. You can even upload it on the computer to have it map out what you ran, but Jessie has not done that yet.

Spinning again

So after the crappy workout last night I set my alarm hoping that I could crawl out of bed... Fortunately, Geoff had to get up at 4:30 for a fire drill for the nightshift so I was somewhat awake when the alarm went off. Emery, of course, was shocked to see me for the second time in two weeks. And I have to say that he has improved immensely. He still doesn't have rythym on the jumps but he has a much better concept of working out TO the music and it not just being background noise. Gerry (Jerry???) was shocked and excited to see me for the first time in months but did ask where Amber was. I didn't have the heart to tell him that you had moved to CA permanently - he did premise it that you just might stay!

Track workout?

Well tonight was supposed to be 10x400 so I headed up to Schenley for the first time. I love the trail (approx 3/4 mile) around the fields that allowed me to loop it twice for my warmup. My actual workout didn't go nearly as well as my leg was entirely too tight to do very many laps. I guess I needed to stretch a whole lot more than I did in the last few days. I came home and did about 40 minutes of stretching and am going to bed early so I actually get up for spinning in the am.

ADJ's last run in the Burgh

Amber and I set out for the Montour Trail this morning, getting there just as the sun was splattering the horizen with color. It was a chilly morning, in the low 50s. We could actually see our breath. Shockingly, we kept our t-shirts on - for the first 1 1/2 miles. The 18 miles was good and strong. We got a little out of hand clocking some of the later miles with 8:10 or 8:16 but were able to finish in 2:37.09 (including stops), crushing our expected time of 2:45. There is absolutely nothing wrong with negative splits! The people on the trail were super friendly, only a few ignored us, oblivious to the world. Looking forward to Oct 7th when we can all be reunited again!

14 + 4 = 18

The plan was to do a solo 18 miler on Thursday night since I'm headed out of town for the Labor Day weekend. Nathan graciously volunteered to ride a bike alongside me. Since we didn't get started until about 6:45, I knew that we were going to quickly approach darkness...and we did. As I was running, I was formulating a plan for how to get this all done and wondering how late into the night I was really going to have to run. We ended up finding the 7-mile marker (there's no 7 on it, just a post, but timing was about right so I'm almost sure that its correct) which is right before the train tunnel. We ran through the train tunnel and then headed back. It was dusk at this point and the last 4 miles were in pitch black. At first, I think this makes you run faster, as you race to try to make it back before dark. But then it settles in that that is not possible and its a little disheartening. Also, the bug population decides to have a party right around dusk...the frogs also like to come out then. After we plunged into complete darkness they kind of went away, but that was after I had already had a full dinner of them, consumed both through my mouth and nose. Nathan decided the evening was "fun, except for the pain in the ass." I chugged a Gatorade back at the car and then we headed back to Ben Avon where Nathan prepped dinner and I did another 4 miles under the streetlights of town. The good thing about going late at night is that you get to go to bed when you're done!

Transferable Skills

I always knew that running had many life benefits that could be seen and used for other aspects of life. For example - time management, tenacity, mental toughness. Never did I think that my inability to maintain coordination (i.e. staying on my feet when I run) would reveal that child birth might not at all be so bad for me since I have developed a strong pain tolerance. (Thanks for that observation Megan!). I was proud that I was tearless after tripping on about a two inch raise in the sidewalk after trying to scare away the pigeon in my way while still sprinting after Amber. No clothes were damaged but I did survive with only three major strawberry wounds and a very stiff shoulder. Thankfully it was right around mile twelve of thirteen so Megan and I called it quits! Perfect for picture day of our last group run!

RATSq

http://www.runhigh.com/2007%20Results/2007%20Results%20A/R082507AB.html

After approximately a 7 minute, 10 minute, 7 minute split, I crossed the finish line and enjoyed the loads of goodies (or at least free trials...some were not so good) that were waiting for us. Beautiful day and a fun race in good company!

BYOT (Bring Your Own Towel)

Had a great afternoon swimming experience at the Baierl Y, except for the fact that I did not bring my own towel. Ended up using 6 washcloth-sized workout rags. They did offer me a towel from the lost and found, but I figured that the chances that it was clean were probably .1-.5%. I will know for next time!

Montour Trail

I didn't realize this, but the Montour Trail actually starts in Corapolis...not too far from my house. Would you guys want to start there and head to about the Imperial point and then turnaround and come back? Any of the access points seem fairly easy to get to, so if there was a particular section you wanted to do, I'm fine with that. I'd even be willing to push back the start time till 6 am, if you wanted to.

http://www.montourtrail.org/maps/access.html#Coraopolis

We'll pass four water fountains and toilets (really 8 since we're doing out and back)!

Pgh Trib article and random chatter

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/cityregion/s_521085.html

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=2058267

Trashcan Hurdles

Thursday mornings I meet up with the trashmen in Avalon and they have always left a string of trashcans in the middle of the sidewalks, so typically the 4th mile (or so) of my tempo run has some hurdles thrown into it...quite fun...I wonder if anyone is ever watching?

[Wish those big thunderstorms would have come through while I was running. They started right when I was ready to head out the door to work, so I decided to wait it out and get some things done from home instead of getting soaked on my way in. Alright...its off to the office now.]

100 Degree Range at the CMU Track: Running Hot & Cold

During yesterday's track workout (2 x (4 x 400)), I was pondering the fact that I may have now run on the CMU track in a whole range of 100 degrees. I looked back in the archives of the Crazy Daisies to see if I could find the temps for some of our frigid runs when we were training for the Nashville Marathon. If yesterday was 97 (which I don't think it actually was) and if January of 2005 was -3, I have it in the bag. I don't know that I really have the 100 degree range if you go by actual temps, but if you go with the "feels like temp" (ie windchill or taking humidity into consideration), I most definitely have it!

Here is a fun photo of a guy who ran barefoot on flowing lava...luckily he also had snow right next to him! This is on Mount Etna, Europe's largest active volcano located on the Italian island of Sicily.

PITTSBURGH MARATHON

I think I've found the two most important guys involved with the Pgh marathon and I've corresponded with BOTH of them over the past two days. They are just as excited about a potential marathon as we are.

I originally e-mailed Tom Rooney who has historically been responsive to any of my inquiries. He passed along Kevin Smith's contact info, who is the owner of Elite Runners in Robinson and said he would probably be able to fill me in.

I just got off the phone with Kevin and he is pumped up. There was just a meeting with the city this morning and he said he spoke with "the most credible person in the city" who said, "if he was a betting man (which he's not), he would bet on a spring 2008 Pittsburgh marathon."

At this point, the conversation is still very high level, though things will have to move quickly to happen in time. Kevin has begun initial planning for the course and he indicated that they will need 2,600 volunteers for water stops alone, with probably 4,000 total volunteers needed. He will be planning the expo beforehand and they are also trying to get approval for a half marathon leading up to the event. Tom's group is more in charge of lining up the sponsors for the event; he is a Rooney after all, so he knows the important people.

The best thing for us to do is sign up for Kevin's newsletter at eliterunners.com. He promised that he will send out an e-mail to everyone and then be screaming the news all over the city the moment he finds out its official.

I also know that I called at the right time on the right day because he warned me that if I attempted to print any of this he would deny that he spoke with me since its not official yet. Maybe I should make our blog non-public until its official...