The last month in review

If 1 post per month becomes the pattern, I might just end this blog. It has been low priority on a list that has become challenging.

It has been a challenging month in my work life, so I have been able to put my ultra skills to work. What I am going through now is a lot like the second half of an ultra, minus the death march (I hope). If you know who I work for, Google news them and you will get it.

On the good side, I am back to a consistent schedule of 8M/day 5-6 times per week. Nice and easy.

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I was back in Wisconsin last week, and ended up participating in Jeff's "Funk Road 50". Celebrate someone's birthday by running a 50k on a week night. File it under "Sounded like a good idea at the time".

Somehow, I ended up running the first 8 miles or so with the fast boys and got pounded by them. On one of the out and backs, I decided to ease off and run with 2 women who started earlier and were running slower. They were Cathy Drexler and Christine Crawford.

Cathy is a hardcore volunteer at Superior, so it was to actually talk to her. Christine is a fellow beer snob, so she gets props for that. I don't know if she has a reputation as a sandbagger, but when we were finally about 2 miles from the 25k turnaround, she kept saying we were 6 miles out. I kept thinking, "Wow, I have really lost my conditioning and sense distance". She is recovering from an injury, and is used to running about 5 minutes faster for pace.

The two of them saved me from missing a turn (the whole race was in the dark, and well marked, but I missed a small arrow on a road).

At the turnaround I figured 25k was enough on a school night, and I got the "awww, come on"s. Sorry. Ron Bero had a similar case of the "I don't want tos".

Todd E and I raided Jeff's fridge back at his house looking for beer. Never found it. I find out later it was on the porch in a cooler.

Thanks Lapham gang.

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I spent some time in Kansas City and ran a short route with a few KC Trail Nerds. I don't think they were ready to go hammer out 3 hours of hills as I was that night. So we did about an hour at the Psycho Wyco Course. I also got a run in at Shawnee Mission Park.

I did get out to St. Louis, and Travis suggested I hit "Chubb". I got there 15 minutes before the sun went down, and got kind of lost. Luckily, I kept it close. It is one of those parks which closes "1/2 hour after sunset". I never know when that actually is. That is a bad ass course.

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More to come