I'm retired from racing. Really.

AM 9 ez around home before heading to the mtns.

PM- Interesting run.  Staying for 2 days at Camp Daniel Boone Boy Scout Camp, which happens to sit right next to Shining Rock Wilderness.  The famous Art Loeb trail finishes in camp.  I decided to save it for tomorrow so ran what I expected to be a more tame creek trail that appeared to be similar to Jardine Juniper, 2000 ft climb and 10 miles RT.  You would think after 3 years in the South I would stop underestimating the technicality of these trails, but you'd be wrong.

The trail started with a very steady climb for 3 miles along Little East Fork river.  The trail was all runnable but definately much rocker than expected.  Then it crossed the river and started a climb up to Art Loeb.  The trail was still a runnable grade, but much of it was very, very overgrown with plants from shin to above head height.  For much of it, I just ducked my head, put my arms over my face, and pushed through.  My shins got absolutely shredded, bloody and raw.  Not fun at all- I really don't recommend the upper part of this trail at all.  Finally reached a junction, but they don't mark trails in the Wilderness area.  Wanted to do a loop with Art Loeb rather than descend the overgrown trail so spent a while trying to figure out which trail was correct.  After many dead ends in 8 foot high raspberry bushes, I finally turned around to retrace my steps.  It was miserable till the river crossing.  Then, what seemed very rocky on the way up was actually quite nice on the way down and my tired legs carried me over the technical terrain with ease.  Finished with 12 miles and 2600 ft climbing in 2:43 (yes, 13+ min miles).  Very tired and thirsty, as my one bottle was inadequate for a 3 hr summer run.  It was a sign for things to come tomorrow.

AM- Epic run on the Art Loeb trail.  This was, without a doubt, one of the most brutal, slow, painful, epic, and (at least once it was over) enjoyable training runs ever.  I mean, 6 hrs for 19 miles with half the water I needed for a hot summer run- and that doesn't start to describe it.  Anyways, started in camp and ran/hiked 3.7 miles up the start of AL.  I had been warned about some hornets/yellow jackets at one spot and thought I avoided it, but they still found me.  2 quick, very painful stings later, I moved on.  Met some campers at the saddle and we conferred on which path went where (again, I'm really not a fan of "keep the wilderness pure with no trail signs").  I ran/hiked the 1.3 miles up to the top of the famous Cold Mountain (namesake for a book and movie).  The first half was too steep to run, the second half was extremely overgrown, worse than yesterday's run.  2/3 mile pushing through bushes is just slow.  The reward was 2 overlooks that made the climb worth it.  Returned back to the saddle.  To give you an idea on how technical and slow it had been so far, I reached the saddle at 2:35 into the run.  And it was only 7 miles.  I've run marathons faster than that, y'all.

I had hoped the next section of the Art Loeb would be fast running as the trail appears to follow a ridge, but a backpacker told me it was the most technical section of all.  He was right.  Just a brutal trail following a ridge, sometimes dropping off the sides almost vertically.  I got lost and had to do some backtracking.  The section is called the Narrows and it's some of the slowest trail I've ever been on.  After about 3 miles of slow trail and over an hour later, I finally hit the only smooth, runnable trail of the day.  I cruised along, passing the confusing intersection from Thursday where I got lost (very easy to do on the unmarked trails) and pushed on till an open meadow, about 11 miles and just over 4 hrs into the run.  Time to go back.

One thing I should mention.  For summer runs, I usually plan on 25-30 oz of water an hour.  For this trip, I only took 110 total ounces.  I had really been rationing and started to notice on the way back.  At first, my hands and wrists got really puffy, then my feet swelled up.  Finally, I stopped sweating.  Yeah, that's really not a good sign.  I begged 10 oz water from some backpackers and pushed on.  The narrows was again confusing, with a couple wrong turns and even some significant backtracking when I thought I was off-course but wasn't.  I was very relieved to finally reach the saddle, 3.7 miles from the end, as I figured I could make the downhill even feeling poorly.  The downhill was again very rocky and slow and I walked some of it, partially due to technicality and partially due to how I felt.  It took me 70 minutes to get down!  I ran into a scout troop hiking up that had about 20 wasp stings between them.  When I reached the nest, I took a few extra minutes to circle way around the mean buggers.  I finally pulled into the trailhead 6.5 hrs after starting.  My watch ran for 5:56, and my "running time" was 5:25.  19 miles and 5000 ft climbing or so (garmin connect said 7000+ ft).  What a run.  I was pooped and jumped into a river, laying in the cold water and earning some stares from boy scouts.  I had missed breakfast and lunch, so had to drive 30 minutes into town for a wonderful Waffle House meal.  Great Southern run all around.

Past 2 days, 10 hours running.  Wow- pretty wiped out.  This run was perhaps my longest training run ever time-wise.  I wasn't exhausted from running fast, but it was very rough terrain and I got way too dehydrated.  Hope this will help and not hurt for my race next week.  It's interesting my race will be almost twice the distance but hopefully the same time.

A nice stream near the start.  You can tell cause my shoes are clean and dry, my legs aren't bloody, and my shorts aren't torn and wet 

View towards the Smokies from Cold Mountain 

Looking towards Asheville.  Pretty country. 

This is the trail, climbing over the rock.  See the almost sheer wall above and below the trail?  Terrain like this = 3 mph pace. 

Typical trail.  Yeah, not much of a trail. 

The only fast running of the day. 

View from the Bald at the turnaround.  Glad I made it all the way to this point.  You can see why they call these the Blue Ridge Mtns. 

AM- Pretty early run to get in a few miles before cleaning camp and heading home.  Ankles and achilles were sore from yesterday's adventure and I kept turning my left ankle today.  Lower legs are pretty swollen.  Did an easy run- 3 laps of the scout swimming lake waiting for the sun to come up, then 4.5 miles out and back on the Little East Fork River trail again.  Shoes were still wet from Thur so I was squishy the whole time.  Finished with 7.5 miles in 1:13 and 1300 ft climbing.

Almost 18 hrs running this week.  Plus highest mileage week of the year, which easily could have been 20 miles higher if I didn't have 2 super-slow runs.  Going to do very easy Mon-Fri next week, then race Laurel Valley on Saturday.  35 miles across South Carolina in the middle of August with no aid stations.  Genius. 

Took a 2 hr nap today. That was much needed, especially after Friday's crazy run.

Should be some good competition for the race Saturday.  I'm expecting to be duking it out with Jason all day.  I plan to draft off him as far as I can.  Not cause I like drafting- especially on trail runs, I prefer to be in front for better trail visibility.  But, I'll make an exception for Laurel Valley.  It's worth it to let someone else go in front and sweep the thousands (literally) of spider webs.

Lunch- 8 ez miles.  Right Achilles hurt pretty bad during and after run.  Hope I didn't overdo it last week.  Good thing this is taper week. 

0.  Resting the Achilles.  Still hurts like H-E-Double Hockey Stick.

It rained again today.  Of course it did.  It's rained about 6 inches in the past 3 days.  According to the newspaper weatherman, we are now above 50 inches of rain this year and well above the average annual total, even though we're just over halfway through the year.  Wet, wet, wet, all the time.  Green, green, green.

Lunch- 6 miles xt.  Achilles is feeling a bit better, so I'll give it a bit of a run tomorrow.  For today, though, just wanted to get some blood flowing.  Stationary bike worked well for that. 

Lunch- 6 ez.  Very humid today.  Leg was ok, about as well as expected.  Didn't feel worse post-run, so that's good.  It feels ok on flats, mainly hurts on uphills and downhills and especially on stairs.  Good thing Laurel Valley only has 7000 ft climbing, 6000 ft descent, and 4000+ stairs...

Lunch- 4 ez.  Achilles isn't perfect, but it's good enough.  Wake up at 3 am tomorrow for a 5 am start.  Last time I ran 6:05, so we'll see what happens tomorrow.  It's more humid today than ever this year (that was the consensus during the lunch run), so that might affect the race.  And, I've heard a large number of thunderstorms this week has blown down a lot of trees, which would really slow us down.  Plus the wooden bridges and steps will be wet, which makes them slick.  Should be fun.

Managed to win Laurel Valley today.  What a race.  Missed out on the 6 hr mark again, unfortunately.  Hopefully I'll have time to write more tomorrow after church. A few numbers: thanks to my usual no sleep pre-race, I have been awake 40 hrs straight, ran 37 miles, and ran through at least 500 spider webs, though it may have been 1000 (sadly, not exaggerating). What a day. Well, two days.

Update- wrote up a few thoughts on my recent races.  You can read it on my blogspot page. 

Lunch- ran 3 miles with Todd, then xt 5 more.  I felt better than expected.  Don't get me wrong- my legs felt very tired and rather sore, especially my balky Achilles which is swollen, discolored, and achy.  But I felt better than expected given the race on Saturday.

Lunch- 9 with the crew. Felt pretty good, with minimal soreness or fatigue.

AM- 3 with Dan and Jim, then 5 by myself.

Lunch- 8 more.  I felt pretty good yesterday but real tired at the start today.  Fortunately, it seemed to lessen as I kept going and I felt ok. 

Lunch 6

PM- PM with Merle and Barry. Legs were absolute poop. Barry and Merle were running away from me the whole time. Easily. Except when they were standing around waiting for me to catch up. Slow. 11.5 miles in 1:53. We do have a cold front right now, so the high was 75. It felt so wonderful. Next two days are even cooler.

Lunch 8+7 on a cold day. 62 deg and rainy when we ran.

AM- 62 deg and drizzly- this is the coldest weather we've had since April or May.  Wow.  Easy 6.5 miles, felt good and relaxed.  We have tickets for baseball tonight, so hopefully the rain stops.

AM- 4+4

Lunch- 10 on another drizzly day.  I've decided it's never going to stop raining. 

AM- BW with Dan. 2 miles warmup, then did ladder interval of the .68 mile track. 1-2-3-2-1 laps with 60 to 90 sec rest. Times were ok, not great. 4:02, 7:50, 11:49, 7:48, 3:42 (pace 5:55 to 5:26). Long 7 mile cool down. Saw a hawk 5 feet off the track. Achilles hurt the whole time.  15 miles total in 1:50.

Lunch- Achilles wouldn't let me run, so 8 xt

AM- 9

Lunch- 9 more.  Rather tired.  Ok, very tired.  60 miles in 3 days will do that to you, especially when you barely sleep 5 hrs a night and don't eat enough.

I'm really not liking this LinkedIn "Share" button.  If you agree with me, please comment on Sasha's blog to get it off. 

AM- Little workout with Dan and Jim.  Tempo run at Icar over rolling hills.  Started at 5:30 am, and I was very tired right away from my mileage and lack of sleep.  2 miles warmup, 6 miles tempo ranged from 6:01-6:19, then 2.5 cooldown.  10.5 total in 1:16.  

Lunch- 7 with Paul and Roush.  Warmish.  Tiredish.  Not hungry, thanks to 2 donuts pre-run.  My mileage has ramped up but I haven't been eating enough, so tried to fix that today. 

PM- no time for a run tomorrow, so Merle and I headed up to Dupont State forest after work for a long trail run.  There was rumbling thunder, sometimes continuous, most of the run, though it only sprinkled on us an hour or so.  Legs felt ok given the weekly mileage.  Finished with 20 miles even and 2300 ft climbing in 3:04.  Got home from the run for the first time today at 9:30 pm just in time to tuck the kids in bed.  Now I'm going to shower and sleep.

AM- man, was I sore and tired when I got out of bed. No alarm (thankfully) but still awake by 6:30. But I threw on the Hokas and felt surprisingly good once I got going. Ran my usual home loop to the soccer complex. 6 miles in 45 min. Now I have a Boy Scouts activity, then cheer on my oldest daughter at her first-ever soccer game. I'm officially a soccer dad now, I guess.

AM- 7.5 miles with Dan on the track, then the trails behind GE for 4 more.  Saw 5 deer.  It was a splendidly cool morning, only 60 deg.  Perfect temperatures- quite nice to not sweat buckets in the early morning runs.

Lunch- 10.5 with the guys.  Lake.  Typical.  It's amazing the variety of topics we discuss.  We had to accuse Jim of becoming like me today, as he was ranting about the obvious lies the press and government are telling in trying to join the Iraq war part II, The Syrian Chapter.  Made me laugh.  If only it weren't so sad.

AM- BW.  Felt terrible at the start so did a 4 mile warmup, then decided to go ahead with the workout.  Felt fine once I actually started moving fast.  10 miles in under 61 min for a tempo.  15 miles total.

Lunch- Typical lunch run 6.  Warm out today.

Had a friend say he felt he was turning into me, cause he's been surprisingly agreeing with Rand Paul recently.  Ha.

AM- 8 before my feet really started hurting.  Shoes just rolled over 500 miles, so time to retire them.  Then XT.  It's the end of an era with retiring these shoes.  They are the last pair of my inital Pearl Izumi's.  I owned 2 pairs of Pace (wore them for my first 100), a road Fuel, a float, and 3 identical pair of the red trail Fuel XC.  With the retiring of this last Fuel XC today, all those shoes are now gone.  They were good shoes, but I definitely like the new PI shoes better.

PM- mid-afternoon runs are pretty miserable when you're very hungry, it's hot, running alone, have done tons of miles, tired, etc.  Very slow 7 miles or so that included some walking, sitting, and stopping.  Finished with a bit of biking.  Just one of those runs.  I guess it's training myself to run on tired legs.

Lunch- 10 miles at lunch.  Last 3 by myself behind GE.  Egads, it was hot and humid today.  In the 90's with a heat index even higher.

PM- 9 more near the soccer fields while my eldest had practice.  Still hot and humid.  Blah.  Ready for 70 deg highs.

PM- These Friday evening trail long runs are tough, especially when it's hot, humid, and at the end of a high-mileage week.  Went to Croft State park- it was 85 deg and humid when I started.  Did a 5 mile loop then changed shoes cause my arch was hurting and I wanted more support.  Then did 14 more miles.  There is a variety of trails here- some very flat and smooth, some very technical and twisty.  I forgot how many spider webs there would be, though, so wasn't mentally prepared, which meant they annoyed me.  Especially the ones right in the mouth.  I felt pretty bad and had a few walking breaks around 90 min, but then felt better by the end.  Saw 1 person on the trails the entire time and two dozen or more white tail deer- they were everywhere.  Didn't take my headlamp and got caught in the dark, which is always an ankle-twisting adventure.  But there were a number of lightning bugs out, a neat experience.  Finished with a slow 19 miles and 1600 ft climbing in 3:17.

Finished with a burger and ice cream at Culvers.  Tomorrow morning, I will be a moderator for iRunFar's race coverage of UTMB, a first for me.  Follow us at this link: http://www.irunfar.com/2013/08/2013-the-north-face-ultra-trail-du-mont-blanc-utmb-live-coverage.html.  After the race, I have to help someone move all their boxes that have been filling my garage for the last 6 weeks.  It will be a busy day.