I'm retired from racing. Really.

PM- Paris Mtn.  See if you can follow this, Barry- Lake Placid to Mountain Creek to Sulphur Springs to Brissy Ridge (hiker only) to Kanuga (upper) to Kanuga (lower) to North Lake (short) to Pipsissewa to Brissy Ridge to Sulphur Springs to Mountain Creek to Turtle Trail.  I wasn't feeling too spunky, but all the mountain bikers gave plenty of opportunity to chase and be chased.  The slow Brissy Ridge and doing most the miles after dark resulted in a very slow run- 12 miles in 1:57 with 2000 ft climb/loss.  Always enjoyable to run the trails, and the pleasant temps (58 at start, 50 at end) just topped it off.

AM- 6

Lunch- 6.5 more 

AM- Had a bit of trouble getting out of bed, but still got in a good workout before work, and even did 1 more mile of tempo than planned.  2 miles warmup, 10 miles tinman tempo (avg 6:07 pace), 1 mile cooldown.  Total 13 miles in 1:24 (6:27 avg).  I felt great during the workout, though my generally-improving PF has been hurting all day, which hasn't happened in a long time.  Hmm.

Lunch 8- the biggest race of the year in Greenville is tomorrow (Reedy River 10k), so no one wanted to run with me.

PM- Today was one of those run.  You know- the kind that are very memorable, but not particularly fun.  Occasionally enjoyable, but kind of miserable at the same time.  Running in bad weather on wet trails is more enjoyable when you have someone to commiserate with.

I had to run in the afternoon, so drove to Jones Gap State Park, my first run there.  It is right at the base of the Blue Ridge Escarpment, and the first decent mountains in SC.  The temp was 50 deg and it was raining.  Not drizzling- a steady, hard rain the whole time.  I had planned on a 20-22 mile run, and wanted to run downhill hard enough to make my legs sore.  I set off and discovered that the trail had transformed.  Instead of running on a trail, I spent the whole time running either in a stream, a pond, or a lake, or so it seemed thanks to all the water.  And that doesn't count the numerous official stream and river crossings, sometimes 10 per mile, and up to 25 feet wide and shin deep.  Yup, very wet.  The trail was very technical (mainly rocky) in places, but actually runnable for the most part- it was better than I expected.  I discovered that I could go faster up than down, due to concerns about footing on the moss-covered rocks and roots as I descended.  I was warm for a few minutes, but then started putting all my clothes on (2 shirts, fleece gloves, and ear warmers), and it still wasn't enough- definitely cold most of the run.  I was very grateful to have my visor, though, to keep rain and the abundant foilage out of my eyes. 

For some reason, I felt like I was moving moderately fast, but wasn't.  I think it was mainly due to the climbing, technicality, and especially the water.  I only ran 14.5 in 2:49 before the trails closed and I had to leave.  My average pace was a whopping 11:38, and only 2 miles were faster than 10 min pace.  Yup, one of those days.  The rangers even talked to me at both trailheads I passed, and made sure I got out ok given the solo run in treacherous conditions.  4500 ft climbing, equal descending in 14.5 miles, which is actually quite a bit.  Some steep stuff, even climbing up built-in stairs.  I guess some of the other trails climb 1600 ft in 1 mile- I wasn't crazy enough to try any of those today.

Good points- I had the whole place to myself, and it was gorgeous mountains.  Tons of waterfalls- the area is known for them.  Probably the most waterfalls I have seen since Milford Track in New Zealand (my most favorite place on earth, by the way).  And I got in a nice run on trails.  I'm sure I'll be back often... just not during a rainstorm.

One question- does running in the rain make anyone else have to stop and pee every 20 minutes? 

Lots of climbing- a few very steep ones.

I'll make sure to hit the 80 miles next week that I wanted this week.   

6+4

Lunch- 10 in about 70 min with Jim and Dan.

PM- 7 more by myself after a long day at work. 

Lunch- It rained the entire run today, with a fairly steady wind and chilly 45 deg temps- kind of like Saturday.  Jim, Todd, Jason and I headed out to the lake, where I learned they were all doing a workout (4 tempo laps of the slightly rolling, .85 mile lake).  I hadn't planned on it, but joined so I wouldn't have to run by myself.  First lap was 4:49, with Jim, Todd and I in a pack.  Jim sped up drastically at the start of lap 2 while Todd fell back.  Lap 2 was another 4:49, then lap 3 was 4:54 (the wind picked up noticeably on the backstretch of this lap, and I was rather cold and soaking wet).  I pushed lap 4 and finished in a 4:47.  Avg was 4:50 (5:40) pace for the workout- my first sub-6 workout this year.  Felt good, esp. given the less-than-ideal conditions.  Finished the run with a very wet 10 miles total.  

PM- Marci and I had our new home walkthrough today, so I had to run by myself.  I'm not much fun to talk to.

AM- 8 while watching the news on the earthquake.

Lunch- 7 more with Jim and Jason. 

70 degree highs expected this weekend- should be beautiful for a long run tomorrow.  Best of all, no rain expected (knock on wood)- we already have 2.6 inches this week.

AM- Today was an absolutely splendid run.  Runs like today really make me enjoy living in SC, at least this time of year.  I headed out to Dupont State Forest in NC, the site of 100 miles of trail bliss, with streams and waterfalls interspersed throughout (250 waterfalls in the county).  The International Mountain Biking Assoc. has awarded 52 areas its Epic Ride designation, meaning a trail/area is, basically, awesome.  Utah's only Epic is Mid Mountain trail.  Well, all of Dupont is an Epic area.  

After my hour drive (I've decided all the good trails are 60-90 min from Greenville), I got a late start at 8:30.  Temps were 35 at the start and 65 at the finish.  I was worried the trails wouldn't be very technical, but the very first 2 miles allayed my fears- there was plenty here to keep my happy.  One of my first trails was even Moab-ish, with long stretches over solid rock, the trail marked with cairns.  I worked my way to Burnt Mountain, with a steep climb and then a glorious, buffed singletrack descent.  In fact, the entire next 8 miles was all buffed singletrack- amazing, and every step of the entire run was runnable.  The views were great, too, since the leaves are not yet out.  The most exciting part was the river I had to cross twice- mid-thigh deep in a strong current over solid, moss-covered rock- very tenuous, that almost resulted in me going down more than a few times.  Probably not the smartest thing to do alone.  And during the entire run, I only saw 5 bikers, plus some people in/near the parking lot.

I felt great the whole run and thoroughly enjoyed the entire morning.  I hardly ever traversed the same trail twice and still saw only a small portion of the forest and trails.  My pace was strong, too- last week I averaged 11:38 miles and my fastest mile was 9:45, while today I averaged 8:22 and had NO miles slower than 9:41.  Finished with 20 miles on the dot in 2:47:14 and 3800 ft climb/loss.  I will definitely be back.  

Highest mileage week of the year so far.  Other than some PF in my right foot, I feel great.  And I am loving being able to run trails in the winter/spring.  Next week is a 5k race, then I may make my first excursion onto the 77 miles FHT, my next long distance adventure.

Not much flat stuff today. 

Long lunch run- 12.

AM- 10

PM- I had planned to go to Paris Mtn, but was expecting nice weather and did not have proper clothes for 40 deg with rain (nor did I have a desire, after my long run a few weeks ago).  So I did 7+3 in the gym. 

AM- BW time.  My first 14-15 mile BW of the year.  Fortunately, my legs felt fresh for the first time this week, despite hints of a cold with sore throat and soreness.  3 miles warmup, then 10 miles tinman tempo.  Slowest mile was 6:11, with somewhat regular increasing pace.  Last mile was 5:25, and the total tempo was 60:56 (6:06 pace).  2 miles cooldown, then rushed off to work.  15 miles total in 98:35 (6:34 avg)

Lunch- 7 very sluggish miles more.  My legs felt dead the first few miles, as expected, then perked up a bit.

Question- have any of you ever had success with any of those "Anti-stink sport clothes washes"?  If so, which ones?  I think I'm going to try that before a few of my shirts kill me- they are pretty rank.  The other option is to throw them away.

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AM- 10, PM- 6.  That makes 58 miles in 3 days.

We closed on our house today, so we are now homeowners again.  Move in tomorrow and Monday, then start all the home improvement projects Marci wants. 

AM- 5+2.  Then followed that up by a pre-race taper of moving into my new house.  I was on my feet all day and hardly ate anything, and the movers finally finished at 8:30 pm.  I don't recommend this as a pre-race taper strategy- I was exhausted by the end.  And now I have hundreds of boxes to unpack.

AM- Today was the second in the Greenville Corporate Shield races- the Milliken Earth Run 5k.  I was looking forward to this one because it is a cross-country race, run around the grass/fields of their campus.

I felt my training had been going well but was worried because of my very long, tiring day yesterday, combined with only a few hours sleep (I love it when you are exhausted but still wake up at 4 am).  Plus I had to dig around tons of boxes to find my racing gear.  I never found my race shoes, so made due with a trail pair.  Ran 3 miles warmup.  The course looked great, to me.  It was rolling hills over mowed fields/weeds/grass.  Very lumpy, bumpy, and rooty- not a fast course.  The course had lots of small rollers with lots of twists and turns.  My legs unsurprisingly felt dead during the warmup.  Temps were a bit warm, in the low 60's, with a high later that day of 84.

Lined up with the ~500 competitors near some of my coworkers- it was a true cross-country style start, with the runners lined up all along a 100-yard starting line, then funneling down to a 10 ft wide mowed section a few hundred yards later.  I found myself in 4th place by the half mile mark after having to pass the typical people who started way too fast (maybe I'm biased, but I automatically assume I will beat anyone wearing an iPod on an armband who is ahead of my 50 yards into the race- anyone else feel that way?).  The course was definitely slow due to very uneven footing throughout, though I always think those rough courses work to my strengths.

Mile 1 was 5:24- I was 15 sec back from the 2 leaders and 4 sec back from 3rd place, with someone 4 sec back from me (it's easy to tell when the RD reading times only calls out numbers when people go by).  My initial energy/adrenaline from the start was gone, and I started to draw on my training miles to sustain and push myself.  I caught up to 3rd place (who ended up being a co-worker Tim Hawkins, though he wasn't wearing a GE shirt) and put in a mini-surge to put a few seconds on him around the halfway mark.  He surged back a minute later, but then I passed him again just after mile 2, which was a 5:55 (note- mile 2 was about the same difficulty as the rest, but all the runners had it 30-40 seconds slower... so we are calling it long).  I pushed harder and harder to put some distance on him, especially up the biggest hill of the race leading up to mile 3.  Mile 3 was a 5:25, which was great considering the climb.  Finished the .1 in 36 sec for a total time of 17:22.  Winning time was 16:49, second place was Jim Harper, my coworker who recently ran a sub-34 10k.  Tim finished 15 seconds behind me (he beat me by 18 sec in the Jan 5k).  I would say the race went well, despite tired legs, and was satisfied.  The general consensus was that the course was ~30 seconds long in mile 2, plus slow.  I'm guessing I could set my road 5k PR right now, if I wanted.

At the finish, my old running teammate from college cross country at Mines, Grant Scott, recognized me and we spent quite a while talking and catching up.  It was great to see him, and very surprising- he is here on short-term assignment from St. Louis, but will likely be back occasionally.  That was a nice surprise.  Finished with 2 miles cooldown, watched the awards ceremony (GE swept top 3 team places in the open division), then spent the rest of the day unpacking boxes and fighting with AT&T to figure out why my DSL is not on- despite ~8 phone calls and many hours on hold as I got tossed between sales, technical support, and service, it appears last night that they somehow completed my transfer of service to NO new address.  In other words, no internet and no timeline for when I will get it (hence this late post).  Grrr- I definitely have not been impressed with AT&T's ability to properly turn on or transfer service and would not recommend them.

High mileage week for the year so far, with plans to continue building.  Next week features the unofficial Bad Creek 50k (a race that didn't get approved for environmental reasons) with ~15 other runners in the remote mountains between NC and SC.  Having a long Sat run of 33 miles will make it much easier to get my mileage than this week when I crammed 70 miles into 4 days.  Now I better head home- I posted this sitting in a parking lot, using the wi-fi of a nearby coffee shop!  I definitely hate not having internet and not knowing what is happening in the world (i.e. apparently BYU won, Pitt lost, we are now bombing Libya, and I have dozens of waiting emails).

Lunch- 10 with Jason and Jim in 71 min.  Jason is a product-tester for Reebok and has been wearing a bright-orange vest recently, for which he receives an appropriate amount of grief.  

PM- Paris Mtn.  84 deg and sunny at the start, and I hadn't drunk enough all day.  Barry ran the first 4 with me, which was nice, then I did the death slog for the next 8 miles- it was one of those days where you feel like crap and can't run fast.  Very dehydrated.  Still, a nice trail run.  12.5 miles in 1:55 (see, I said I was slow), with 1800 ft elevation.

Somehow my Quantcast number has been skyrocketing- it jumped from low 100's to over 500 in one day.  I figure something is wrong with the counter, cause I did not suddenly become 5 times more interesting. 

AM- 5.5

PM- 6.5 more with Jim.  Warm and sunny out.  The GE employees at our location were doing the Alan Jackson "Good Time" line dance, like on the GE commercial.  They had professional cameras recording and even a local news helicopter.   

AM- 8

Lunch- and again, with anywhere from 1-4 guys.  Lunch runs are not far enough from morning runs to give full recovery, but they are still nice.  Plus I usually don't do any real long/hard runs at lunch. 

They had a team challenge obstacle course at work, so I did it during lunch.  Now my arms and shoulders are sore!  But it was a lot of fun.  Then some running.

Tomorrow is the Bad Creek 50k unofficial race.  I think 8 or 9 of us are running it.  I have to leave my house at 4:45 am- ugh.  And the weather predictions have gotten worse all week- now they are predicting a high around 45-50 deg and rain all day.  Should be fun and muddy. 

Today was the unofficial Bad Creek 50k- 9 people were running the Foothills trail from Bad Creek to Oconee, a 33 mile distance running mainly along the Chattooga River (where Deliverance was filmed) in the most mountainous part of the NC/SC border.  Dan Hartley wanted to put together the race, but couldn't get government permission so did a group training run.  It was my first time on the FHT.

The weather forecast deteriorated all week, and it ended up 45 deg and steady rain the whole time.  We started off and I found myself running near Dan, Doug, and Victor (a crazy Siberian who literally wore only shorts).  Is started raining as we left the cars, and never stopped.  I lent my jacket to someone, so wore a trashbag.  The first few miles were very slow as we climbed wood steps and steep mountain to the Whitewater Falls overlook (the tallest waterfall east of the Mississippi).  I carried a backpack full of clothes, food, water filter, etc, and kept stopping to put on more layers.  The rest of the way was generally nice trail, almost all runnable, though I decided to stick with the other guys since I was so cold and new to the trail.  However, my shirts were soaked and I was freezing.  I generally enjoyed the run, though there were many vistas I couldn't see due to the clouds.  I ended up dropping at mile 15- continuing on while freezing cold and wet just didn't seem smart.  Too many bad memories for Poky, and from 3 weeks ago.  3 guys dropped with/before me, 3 continued on, and 2 more were MIA.

I will definitely return to the trail, hopefully often.  Seemed very nice, and I'm sure I would enjoy it more without cold rain.  I kept a running time- 15 miles in 3:22 (probably 2:50 actually running) with 4000 climb/3700 descent.   My 88 miles planned this week obviously ended up as 70, but I'll just up it a bit next week.

 3 guys rock scrambling near some falls (you can see shirtless Victor)

Whitewater Falls 

Lunch- 9.5 with the guys.  I scrubbed my morning run cause I was up past midnight finishing The Hunger Games.  Very enjoyable read.

AM- 7.5

PM- Paris Mtn with Barry.  Good run, perfect 60 deg weather.  12 miles with 2000 ft climb/2000 descent in 1:54. 

PM- 7.5 + 2.5.  Cold and rainy out, so I stayed in.  I got my fill of those on Saturday.

AM- 3 warmup, 10 tinman tempo (avg 6:06 pace for the tempo), 3 cooldown.  First 16 mile BW in a while.  Felt ok, not great, but much less sluggish than the rest of this week.  Total of 16 miles in just over 1:46.