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Showing posts from 2011

game on

My dad called me yesterday morning to tell me that he ran a half marathon in Dallas in 2 hours. I had no idea he was running one, nor did he know that I was running one the next day. If he had realized I was running one he probably would of egged me on about beating him, and the fact that I am 31 years younger than him and I should really be running 1:35 or something crazy. Of course the first thing I tell Susan when I see her is about the conversation with my dad, and I said, "It's game on!" Susan's brother Ted, who flew in for the run had told her months ago that we have to run the half in less than 2 hours if he was going to run with us. I hadn't given much thought to actually trying to run the race in less than 2 hours until I talked to my dad. My half marathon pr is 2:05 and we ran the same race last year in ~2:11. They changed the start location this year for the Columbia Gorge Half Marathon and we had to wait 45 minutes for a shuttle to take us to the

Wildwood

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Highlights: seeing a Pacific giant salamander, giving directions to two Irish runners, running through two patches of sun.

Neahkahnie Mountain

2 hours

runner's high

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Today Susan and I ran 17 miles on Wildwood, via the Hardesty trail (Springville trailhead). I wasn't really into the run when we first started out, it probably was a combination of not sleeping well because of Hood to Coast anxiety, more wine than water from the night before and running the day before. Luckily Bob ran the first 6 miles with us and kept us entertained with his stories, so I could just concentrate on running and waking up. By the time Bob left us I was feeling great, the feeling remained for the rest of the run. Somewhere around mile 11-12 we started talking about how we really wanted OJ and plotting on how we were going to get it and get Susan home in time for her appointment. Unfortunately by the time we made it to the car we didn't have time to stop for OJ, after I dropped her off I headed straight to New Seasons for the coveted juice. When I was checking out at New Seasons' the cashier asked me how I was doing and I said, "good, no I am doing gr

another 30 mile weekend

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Susan and I ran 12.5 miles on Friday in Forest Park. Our route was Leif Erikson - Alder - Wild Wood - Maple - Leif Erikson. The last 4.25 miles was on Leif and that about killed my feet, I much prefer ending our runs on the soft trails than the rocky old fire lines / forest roads. Being Friday morning there were barley any people out there, it was very peaceful. I wish I could figure out a way for us to be able to do all our long runs on Friday mornings. Saturday John and I took off for a quick one night backpacking trip. At the last minute we chose to do Badger Creek Wilderness due to the low snow level everywhere else. I gave John 2 options: hard and not as hard, of course he picked hard (yay!). We started at the Gumjuwac trail head and climbed about 3000 feet to Lookout Mountain. We had amazing view of Hood, Jefferson. Rainier, Adams, and Mt St. Helens, but the horseflies were bugging John so we didn't stick around long. We did hit a few patches of snow but nothing that kept

3 girls, 3 days, 31 miles (and 1 dog)

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Thanks to only having to work a half day on Friday and Susan's mother-in-law baby sitting, we were able to get our long run in for the week before I took off on my backpacking trip. We did ~11.25 miles in Forest Park. We started out at the Leif Erikson trail head, ran to ~4.25 mile to where Leif connects with Maple. We took a left on Maple and ran to Wildwood, which puts you at mile marker 12.75. We ran Wildwood to Wild Cherry which is between mile maker 8 and 7.75. We headed down on Wild Cherry to connect back with Leif and back to the car. We celebrated with very late lunch at our favorite food cart, Kitchen Dances. Saturday morning Karrla and I headed out towards Bull of the Woods wilderness for our first backpacking trip of the summer. We weren't quite sure which trail we wanted to do, but we were pretty sure we wanted to end up at Twin Lakes. We had originally thought we were going to start at the Whetstone tail head then after some debating we decided that we wanted to

marathon training started today

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Today we started our training for the crazy Lithia Loop trail marathon, there is something like 4000+ feet of elevation gain. I have been a little anxious this week about the whole thing, I wasn't sure how I was going to be able to fit all long training runs in with everything else I am doing this summer and fall, backpacking, climbing South Sister, Bail, etc. I also want to be able to do the majority of my long runs with Susan, who is a new mom and has her own summer plans. I finally decided I am going to take this one run at a time, and I know we are both dedicated to doing the marathon even if we have to walk it, and despite our busy lives we will find a way to fit in our runs. Our run today was 9.10 miles and 1400 feet of elevation gain. We started on the Wildwoood trail at the Pittock Masion, ran to the Dogwood trail to connect with Leif Ekikson. From Leif we ran to Aspen to connect back to Wildwood and back to the car. The cruel part of this loop is the last 2 miles is an

50+ mile week

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I set a crazy (for me) running goal this week, because for some reason I am obsessed with out doing my dad. I totally blame him for this, every time I talk to him he is one upping me. I decided I would run a total of 50 miles this week. Even when Susan and I were marathon training last year we never had a 50+ mile week. To obtain 50 miles I had several days of running before work, at work, and after work. Tuesday I was a little tired and a bit cranky at work, and not sure I would be able to make it, but I had a goal and I couldn't back down. I accomplished my goal, with the help of Susan and Oscar. Total for the week 51 miles. Wonder how my dad is going one up this, but I am waiting for his next challenge.

getting muddy

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I haven't done a good job of keeping up with our Forest Park runs, but if I don't start documenting them we might end up doing the All Trail Challenge twice. Though that might not be a bad thing. After several months of long runs in Forest Park we have determined it is much nicer to start on rocky Leif and end on softer Wildwood, trust me your feet will thank you for it. Run for 1/20/2011 start at newton road firelane 10 - leif 1m leif to cleator (mile markers 11 - 5.25) 5.75 m cleator to wildwood .1m wildwood to firelane 7a/gasline (mile makers 14.75 - 20) 5.25m firelane 7a to ridgetrail .5m ridgetrail to wildwood .5m ww to newton (mile markers 21-25.5) 4.5m total: 17.60 Trail Notes: The Cleator trail is actually at mile marker 5.75 on Leif, so we added on a half a mile or so. It was pretty steep and muddy, we ended up walking it. Firelane 10 was a pretty steep down and up, one hell of a way to start 17+ mile run. Run for 2/5/2011 Start at 53rd trailhea