Saturday was a run day for me. I planned to revisit a route I hadn't done in a while, going solo this time. The plan was to drive up the along the east side of McTarnahan from Brunswick Canyon and do 16 - 20K from there. I should have known, what with all the authors I twitterfy these days, that the conditions of my access route should have provided some foreshadowing of what was to come.

Once there, the routes in the area looked... reasonable. Snow is to be expected in the area in January, despite temperatures finally breaking through to the positive side of average, and shorts being the de rigueur attire for the day.

In the photo to the left (click here to see location on map), I was going to make an immediate left, head south for a bit then wind my way via trail back to the road heading straight ahead, then follow the ridge line to the peak to the right and the high point in the run: McTarnahan Hill (route shown at the bottom of the post).

I figured the snow would either be significantly melt-compressed on the trail parts and provide decent footing. On the roads, I'd run the middles with the same conditions or in the drive-ruts for even more compression. Not the best, but not bad either. Wrong.

After tiptoeing along the smoothly polished ice ruts, I finally got to where I turned off onto the trail and headed southwest toward the trees. I stopped to snap the shot there on the right. It was a beautiful day, and an untracked trail beckoned. Then I got to the trees.

Under the trees, the snow conditions were... challenging. Due to shadows, it hadn't compressed down. It simply had formed a crust. Not just any crust, but a Jesus Fucking Crust. Or so I thought after what seemed hours of it. The crust was just thick enough that it would support my walking weight. Approximately 15% of the time. The rest of the time, it would support me momentarily, then I'd break through. Since I was trying to run (ha!) I'd consistently break through and the front edge would then grab my foot in a really good try at tripping me. Every. Single. Time. Needless to say, it was difficult and demoralizing. I was looking forward to hitting the tracked dirt road again. Even the ice in the ruts was better than this. 

When I finally did (not telling how long it took to get there, neener neener!) I opened my stride for about a minute. Then I hit some mud and slowed. Not bad, doable. Carry on. A few strides further, and it's looking suspicious. Hmm. Snow, but discolored like dirty snow. Could be ice under there, go easy. 

I move out of the rut to the middle, and hit the snow. Foot goes easily through the top crust, and submerges in the water underneath. Swell. Now I have a soaked foot. Try to leap out of the danger zone. Fail. Other foot hits the disguised puddle and also goes ankle deep. Now I have two soaked feet, conditions are NOT improving and 16K yet to go. Really?

I kept slogging and hit the ridge. Nobody had been there, so it was melt-compressed snow on the south faces, deeper crusted powder on the north. Ugh. This SUCKS!

I finally made the top. It was difficult, my feet were numb and the wind had picked up. No surprise there, it's usually breezy on top. I decided to snap a couple pics, and head back by the most direct route, cutting the run nearly in half to 11K. 

I'm not sure for how long my Inov8s and Dirty Girl Gaiters had been planning the photo bomb above, but it worked out well for them. What was going to be a stellar view shot became a color-riot. Oh well. I shot a couple others while keeping a close eye on the photobombers.

About that foreshadowing? Yeah, well driving to the river, I had noticed the road was mostly mud with ice interspersed. At the time, I thought it might be a bit of a challenge to come back out. Even with the 4Runner's hubs locked and in 4-Low, I was sashaying all over the place climbing back out. Truck is a mess now. It's OK, though. I use it mostly for getting to places like this. :-)

I think I'll stay low this weekend. I'm not positive I'll feel the same next week, but right now, I think I'd prefer an overly sandy route.

I started to use twitter a bit more in the last month or so (OK, a lot more) and I have really surprised myself with the connections I have been making with people all over the world. The interconnections between followers is as intricate as the tendrils of a slime mold searching for food (BTW, modeling the tendril-paths of these creatures reveals network optimizations, but I digress.)

Because of Twitter, I now am regularly apprised on Australian politics and weather (especially Melbourne), activities in the Philosophy department at Leeds University, Preston weather, the late-night Stockholm bar scene, running and science teaching in Britain and the latest research in exercise physiology. And, of course, running shoes and other gear. 

The process of connecting to people on Twitter is weird. It's kind of like playing the telephone game, but able to see the route the conversation takes and how it morphs along the way. 

Here's an example of how I connected with an author (who's book I am currently reading). I follow @fxdgear. The dude is a goof-extraordinaire  and has a curious affinity to facial hair and beer. Regardless, I'm related, so I kind have to, ya know?  He is connected to @MeghanHicks, I liked her comments on his timeline and posts about ultra running (something I wish I could do), so I followed her. She tweeted a link to a blog post. It looked interesting, so I read it. Inside, I noticed a photo credit for a name I recognized. I asked her  - via Twitter - if it was the person I knew (it was a possibility, but a slim one). 

Turns out it wasn't, but in the exchange, she involved that person in our conversation. A few glances down his timeline, and a few 140-character convos between us later, I'm following @anaginghipster. We chat, I read, and discover he is involved with an author. I figure, what the heck, I'll give the book a read. Sure enough, I'm enjoying the crap out of the book and have since been in Twitter-contact with the author, @TammySalyer.  Between reading her book(s) and tweets, and Brent Weeks' tweets and books, I'm getting the urge to write again - something that I've successfully repressed for a couple of decades.

I am really enjoying the interactions I have with the ever-expanding group of people in my slime-mold pathways. I don't know if it would be as intimate-feeling with follower/following lists in the thousands - or even hundreds. But at this point, the sense of community I get from people across the globe is warm and fuzzy. A nice contrast to the cold, dark, pricklies of the winter weather.

… and bid you goodbye.

It's been a great run (pun intended) since Fleet Feet in Carson closed and we forged our own running group. It was great discovering new trails together, training and running in some of the most spectacular scenery around over the last five years or so and thousands of miles.

Unfortunately, I must leave you all behind. I simply can no longer associate with a group that runs  marathon distances as training runs. One that runs 50K as training for 50+ mile races. One that routinely cranks out a sub nine minute/mile pace on 10+ mile trail runs and laughs and chats while doing it. Yes, I must leave you all behind, because  you've left me behind. 

You've all gotten stronger, faster and better. And, for what it's worth, I brag all of you up every chance I get. Unfortunately, I've gotten older. Slower. And injured. I'm unable to keep up, and I am unwilling to ask you to wait. Forcing you to wait twenty minutes in sub freezing temperatures (as I recently did on a six-mile run, since I had the keys) is selfish and wrong. I'll not make that mistake again.

However, I'm not ready to hang up the Inov8s just yet, I just need to be realistic about my ability, and need to align myself with people who are my likely running peers now, not the peers of my past. Any eleven to twelve minute trail mile pace folks out there who want to run in this area, give me a rattle. 

I'll still see y'all in street clothes and occasionally I'm sure I'll meet you at a trailhead. When that happens, you can be sure I'll bust my ass trying to keep up with you. Who knows, maybe y'all will have an off day, and I'll have a good one, and I'll finish a ten mile run only ten or so minutes back. 

I say all this now in the warm afterglow of a truly horrific string of group-run debacles. Who knows, maybe I'll get myself all trained up solo, and come out at some race/run in the future and shock everyone, just like Daniel-san in the Karate Kid. Maybe. But despite the commonness of the feel-good comeback in movies, I find it rarely exists in the real world. We'll see, but I'm not terribly confident of the odds.

So to all my former peer-peeps here is a heartfelt poetic message: 

Here's to trails and here's to you. 
If you keep running, I will too. 
If you stop, I'll catch up,
Can't pass you by, though I might try.

Run and laugh, and sweat and smile,
Always look ahead to that next mile.
Keep up the pace, cross the scree,
Don't look behind, for there I'll be...

STALKING YOUR ASS.

This weekend was less an adventure in adrenaline-pumping activity than a smorgasbord of activities both solo and with others. Starting Friday night, the weather played a big role in the weekend, as the temperature dropped into the single digits Fahrenheit and promised to stay below freezing for the duration.

Saturday was originally going to be a race morning for me. I had signed up for a race series of which my second event was to be Saturday. I don’t know what came over me (OK, I do, but don’t want to talk about it), but the thought of racing didn’t appeal. Instead of running with a bunch of others, I headed out for a solo jaunt out east at the Iron Mountain area. If you’re keeping geographic track, I started here.

The run was really rather good overall. Cold (started at -17° C) but sunny, so the thermometer wasn’t a factor, really, especially as there was no wind and the dew point was low. The only creature I saw spotted me first and kept his distance. He was probably wondering "WTF are you doing out here, moron? At least I have a thick fur coat!"

I hit the low energy wall at 12 K, but I finished up the planned 16 K distance, and headed home both as victor and DFL in my own personal race. 

I tried another short 5 K jaunt on Sunday closer to home. It was a tricky footing challenge with lumpy ground and ice covered over with a 4 cm skin of snow. The wind was up a bit, as well as the humidity, making it feel a LOT colder than Saturday, even though the temperature was higher.

The definite highlight was watching the two golden eagles soaring and stooping overhead. Awesome.

The rest of the weekend was taken up with playing with Subaru (the Guide Dog puppy we are raising) and forcing exercise on my son, who seems to play online games 20 hours a day. I know the games are very social (and that’s good) but they do nothing for him physically. I made him a deal though: he now has to crank out 50 push-ups and 100 sit-ups before playing.

I am going to amend that to be on a per-time basis, though. Each set of exercises will buy him a few hours of game time. To keep playing, he needs to crank out another set. He’ll be less pleased, but stronger in the long run. Just wait until I start tossing in the cardio as well. :-)

Did some kitchen time as well, whipping up a batch of no-cook protein bars and enough Green Chile for the week’s lunches. I altered the chile recipe a bit to make it with beef instead of pork. I was tagged as having low ferritin levels a month or so ago (< 8), and have been working to get it back up. I figured substituting beef for pork in a recipe would be an easy assist. Oh, and if anyone wants either recipe, let me know. If I can accomplish it, you know it's easy. 

Between cooking, monitoring exercise, dog play and my jaunts, I did get a bit of reading in. I was able to finish Pat Conroy's South of Broad. I enjoyed it and gave it 4 of 5 stars on goodreads.com.

Oh, and my nephew was on the television during the Broncos vs. Ravens football game. I didn't do the capture, but that's the goofball in the sunglasses and dork-hat on the TV.

Weekend report complete. Carry on with your week.

Better late than never is how the adage goes. I'm not entirely convinced, but here are my top events of 2012. I'm lazy, they're mostly links to the blog pages for the events only.

1. Bye Dad  Number one for obvious reasons.
2. Bike Crash Would have been number one, but no.
3. The -st Run Of course a run would be top three, right?
4. Finishing the entire Tahoe Rim Trail Two in the top four?
5. First post-crash real "run" Three in the top five?
6. Job change: I went from a traveling consultant to a stable, office job. Some trade-offs, but overall, much better to be home.
7. Hosting an exchange student for 4 months. It was funny when Brando first arrived in August, and we met him at the airport. He approached me first, all smiles and wanted to greet me the Italian way: embrace. I was only two weeks away from my crash, and backed away as fast as I could with eyes wide. Good thing Risa speaks Italian and could quickly explain why. :-)