Wow, trips over but we've just entered the halfway mark in the last push of the race calendar before the big month off from running. Now comes the hard part. I've got a 50 miler next weekend that I decided it would be a good idea to do the week after worlds. Of course this was before I knew if I'd made it to worlds. Honestly, I'm really looking forward to it. Scared to death, but looking forward to it. Why? I'm not sure. It's something new, I've never done something like this before. I like the unknown. People have been asking me why I'm doing that and I haven't come up with a good answer but I think that's what it is. It's a new adventure. I'm bored with what I know. I've done the roads, track, xc and now I'd like to take my running to another realm that I haven't had the pleasure of experiencing. And it is pleasure, I truly enjoy the run, the journey, as much as I do the competition. The 50 miler's a whole new ball game. Could go well, could go up in flames or maybe not so dramatic. Either way, I'm afraid of it. It's going to hurt and that's forced me to plan more than I've had to for a race in awhile. That planning forces me to be more invested in it too. It's a good feeling. I like a good adventure. I need to do this more often.  So, on to something new. 

April 11th is Pear Blossom 10 miler in Medford. If I can walk then that's the plan.  Most of you that read this may know what Pear is but it's a special race for me. The hometown race. I've been doing this race since high school. Several of my old teachers from middle and high school still put the race on and it has become a tradition for me and a connection to where I've come from. It's one of my favorites in my race calendar and if at all possible won't miss it for anything. It's not your typical weekend annual Fourth of July 5k that a few people come out for. The Pear is the largest running (possibly just the largest sporting event but I don't want to label it falsely) event in the Rogue Valley and is an integral part of the Pear Blossom Festival with Parade, Pageants, and other events. It attracts over 1000 people to the 10 mile run plus another 500 or so for the 5k and 1 mile walk. It gets coverage on the front page of the newspaper sports section for two days in a row and all the local news channels as well. How many local races can claim the kind of community intimacy that the Pear attracts? That's why I love it and look forward to it every year. I don't know if this is common in the ranks of the elite but this is how I stay grounded and connected. It's important for me to have something to come back to. Part of my past, call me sentimental. There are other reasons to run races than competition and prize money. I feel like it's something we've gotten away from. The 70's and 80's when runners like Bill Rogers and Frank Shorter would show up to small town road races. Maybe they were there for the prize money but I'd like to think it was more than that, just the thrill of a race and the joy of camaraderie. In 1980, Frank Shorter won the Pear. There's still no prize money. 

I'm considering trying to drive like a Jordanian for a few days when I get home. I'm kind of wondering how many fingers I would get. They aren't bad drivers but they drive very different than in the US. The best way to merge into traffic is just to give your horn a quick blast and nose your way on out. Drivers will just continue to go around you until you get too far out for them to get around and then you're in. And nobody has road rage, incredible.

Anyway, whirlwind day. Of course it was pretty uneventful for the morning. Sitting around the hotel, breakfast, light 10min run, movie, lunch, load up to the course. That's when the fun started. The next 48hrs will be non-stop. By now you've most likely seen results of the races. We've been without internet or any way to communicate since before we left for the race course (so it's not my fault this is late). I have to say, the course was pretty unbelievable, and if anyone will believe me, it was a lot of fun. Up, down, up down,... And it lived up to it's pre-race synopsis as brutal. The race went out moderately fast for the first uphill 200m, then settled in for the 600m downhill. I continued to weave my way from mid pack at the top of the hill to the top 10 by the bottom and settled in for the short flat section before the climb. Ran my own race up the climb letting the main pack gain some ground on me before catching back up on the downhill again. The pack slowed on the flat section and I was able to relax and just settle in to my own rhythm. Everyone was being pretty conservative knowing that that 5th and 6th laps were going to be pretty grueling if the race was pushed from the start. I knew I had to run my own race if I were going to run my best so I let the pack run away from me as they ratcheted up the pace going up the hill for the second time. This was about the time Bobby passed me and held on to the USA lead for a couple laps. By the end of lap 5 I was able to reel Bobby in and Ryan had caught up to us. With a hilly race like this strengths and weaknesses become very obvious. My weakness is definitely the uphills but I can make up for that on the downhill. Too bad we finished on the uphill. Ryan crushed the last two laps and especially the last climb up to the finish, as did Bobby while I held my own, even passing a few people on climb, and was third for the US and 40th overall. Ryan was 33rd and Bobby 37th. Ed Torres (my roomie) was right behind me in 58th an Ed Moran was just behind him in 68th with some nasty blisters. And Bret was 75th. The US ran smart, pacing was even and we put everything we had out there. It was an eighth place showing behind teams that couldn't be caught YET even on our best days (top 6) and Spain who had a very strong team. I'm happy with my race. It is definitely the best of my three World XC events yet. Hopefully that trend will continue. The course played to my strengths sure, but my mind was in the right place, fitness was good and I learn a little more every year about how to run in the middle pack.

We were eighth but one thing I see every year is how lucky we are as Americans and the opportunities that are just given to us, not without putting in the work, but I know other people around the world also put in the effort to be the best runners and they don't have the opportunities we have. Our federation, the sponsors on our backs, and the staff that supports us does a phenomenal job every year to get us here, give us the best support so that we are physically and mentally ready to race, and the best equipment on earth. It just reminds me that with the support system surrounding us, the runners, we certainly can't take anything for granted. It doesn't have to be like that and I hope we remember that during our last interval in the freezing rain, or the last climb in our third workout of the week, or the reason we've been in the pool for an hour and a half on saturday morning with a stress fracture, We have support because we work for it and I'm thankful for it..

How many people do you think have had the chance to cut a rug with Doug Logan, the CEO of USATF. That's right, Logan actually got out on the dance floor with the USA team and the rest of the mob. This was by far the best after party I've been to. Amazing full buffet, with beer and wine, decor and lighting that would be more than you could ask for at a formal wedding, and club dj's mixing tracks like it was the hottest nightclub in town. The Jordanians pulled out all the stops to put on an excellent event. And Doug Logan was on the dance floor, I've got pictures, as was the rest of the USA. Whether it was the foreign country, the seclusion of the USA team at the hotel, or whatever reason, this team has meshed better than any other team I've had the chance to run on. On previous trips I've barely gotten to know the juniors or the women's team but this trip has been quite the opposite. It was a pleasure to get to know the other athletes I run with and against better and I know that our relationships will last long after the trip is over.

Last Leg:

Up at 5:45 after going to bed at 2:15am doesn't feel good. We headed to Petra, one of the new 7 wonders of the world. It was awesome. Petra is in Indiana Jones and I can't remember which one. It's the big temple carved into the rock as they ride horses down a slot canyon. Kind of reminded me of Red Rocks in Las Vegas but 10,000 times bigger and with stuff carved in the rock. Is it bad I think I liked the rocks better than the spectacular carved buildings. The rocks are so cool and great for climbing. I just wanted to scramble up everything. And we all rode camels down the canyon. Pretty sweet day. Check out the pictures.

As I type, the bus is quiet. Heads are back and eyes are shut from exhaustion. The late afternoon sun shines horizontally though the bus windows as we rattle down the road. I think the feeling is one of satisfaction from a long week on the other side of the world, edging out of our comfort zones and a race well run.

That feeling of exhaustion is only half over as we're in the middle of the marathon travel adventure that will take us from Amman to Petra for a little end of the the trip sightseeing, back to Amman's Queen Alia Airport and on to home, a >24hr trip to the other side of the world. Yeah, bet my ankles won't be swollen after this trip. Right. Cankles!

The trip was a lot of fun

Friday March 27th - Jim Estes promised me mud. For a few days I had faith and believed him but my hopes and dreams were crushed today at the course preview. No mud, and what little there had been they were covering it with rock and dirt and rolling it out. What a disappointment. On the flip side this is probably about the toughest course I've ever seen. Turns out that a 20m hill is a pretty big hill. I guess it just doesn't register until you see the hill. The start is not a gradual uphill into a sharp left hand turn then a plummet to the bottom of a 600m long hill, then a short section of flat before the climb back to the top of the course. After 6 laps of that the finish comes right off the top of the course and continues a steep climb up. That should take any kind of sprint out of anyone trying to finish fast. So yeah, it's tough. Guess I should have been running more hills. We'll see what happens.

Other than that it was an uneventful day of sitting in the hotel like usual before a race. Pretty boring. We did play a heated game of Rummy in the evening of which I lost...badly. Hope that isn't indicative of tomorrow.

Well, here we go. Tomorrow is what we came here to do.

Thursday March 26th - Well no Govornator last night, just Antonio Banderas. What a day. 4am prayer, practice, roman ruins, downtown, mosques, taken by a cabbie, cabbie redeemed, now here. Here I am. Typing my day. Lets do it backwards. Not an hour ago I was frantically searching through my room for my camera I'd managed to hang onto all day. I had it when I got out of the cab right? Not right? Went downstairs to see if it was at the front desk and who do I see but the cabbie that had just sort of hustled us out of a bit more than we should have paid (our attache, Adam, said we were "very generous" when we explained it to him) with my camera. I quickly decided that he was a great guy and I was more than willing to pay him more. Adam even professed how surprised he was. So turns out that the cabbie was a pretty good guy and after all the cab ride home with the tour of King Abdullah Mosque was worth something a little extra. We, (Ryan, Bobbie, and I) had picked him up at the top of the Roman ruins and he had volunteered to take us to the mosque and show us around. He actually gave us a decent tour, took us inside showed us around and talked to the guards and stuff. Coming from downtown Amman the mosque was the last sight we needed to check off. The ruins we had come from had the best view of the city so we took the 10 min walk up the stairs from downtown and the old Roman Amphitheater. They just don't make them like they used to. 

After almost 2000 years a concert or play in this amphitheater would be quite a sight and an experience you wouldn't soon forget. It's steep enough that you wouldn't want to be inebriated in the cheap seats and "uncoordinated" people would be better off closer to the stage. 

A tour of downtown gave us the real flavor of Amman. A window shopping, souvenir shopping, turkish coffee drinking, dining on hummus and pita,  being mobbed by 10 yr olds cultural experience like no other. And that was just the afternoon. 

The morning was spent under more mundane activities. I got my morning run of 50min with strides in and I think my legs are back under me although it's hard to tell with just an easier run. We'll just have to wait until Saturday to find out. Had a beautiful sunny but crisp day for running and some field lounging. 

To finish off the morning we had a round of drug testing and I was lucky to escape this year, although it's not that bad since all the pre-race tests are blood tests. 

For those of you who think these trips aren't taken seriously and they're all just fun and playing in mud, well that's for tomorrow and Saturday. Gotta have a little fun while you're waiting for your legs to come around.  Time now to get down to bidness though, going to sleep, tomorrow is the course preview and rest and focus. Ayna ajedu al merhaad!

Wednesday March 25th - Spa day! Much needed too. Trip to the Dead Sea today after practice. Dude, I float. I've never floated, I sink like a rock usually. It was awesome, well novel anyway. And the mud there is heavenly. Greatest mud pit I've been in ever, at least since I used to play in the mud with the neighbor kid down the road.  The Dead Sea was pretty interesting. There's salt deposits on the edge of the sea, like big chunks, weird. The water's about 33% salt, 8.6 times saltier than the ocean. If you stick your finger in the water and then stick it on your tongue it's like a toxic chemical salt taste...maybe I shouldn't have done that. We stopped and took some pictures with a camel too. Interesting day. 

Anyway, back to training. Did a 70min mud run yesterday. Oh it finally stopped raining today too. But the run yesterday was capped off with 10 wet strides. I think that mud run was a bit more than I bargained for, I was pretty tied up, either from the mud run or just the plane trip. The workout today was 10 X 1min w/ 1min rest. Felt ok but had no endurance and legs just felt tight going up hill. I'm hoping I got it out and it'll be better tomorrow. Everybody felt that way so I feel a bit better. Did another short run around town in the pm to shake out. So that's that. 

Tomorrow it's "downtown" with Neil Young and right now we're vegging out to the Fox movie channel and the Govornator in Collateral Damage. Araka. Tosbeho. 

Jordan Tuesday March 24th - So we're here, in Amman, Jordan. As it happens, Jordan is almost halfway around the world and takes a long time to get to. Who would've thought? For me it was about 25hrs of travel. Really not that bad overall, everything on time and no problems, although I think the Royal Jordanian A320-200 was the oldest plane I've ever been on. And dude, I know Jordan has a young population but this plane trip was ridiculous. The average age on the plane must have been about 5 years old. I might as well have been at a day care center. And full of screamers. I don't know what's going on, what's with all the little kids and babies. I never see that many in the US in one place. Amman, JordanA little report: Jordan's definitely a desert. Nothing grows here and what little does I wonder how, it's just a rock garden. Not that there's no water, so far it's been raining all day.

Went for a short shake out run around town last night when we got in, I won't bore you with details except to say if you ran around here you'd get pretty agile, nothings flat, there's plants and trees and drop offs in the middle of the side walks and cars honking at you in the road. Not exactly runner friendly.

Amman is just like any other city for the most part. Everything here looks exactly the same, white washed limestone buildings are everywhere and I'm sure I'll get lost eventually on a run. I'll get a picture. We're staying at a questionably four star hotel, it's nice though, and the food is great. Mostly typical mid eastern food, hummus, pita, and a lot of fresh veggies (lots of peppers and cucumbers), and some international food like pancakes. But if you're in a foreign country ya gotta try everything otherwise you might as well stay home, right? So we're planning a trip to the Dead Sea tomorrow, a trip downtown on Thursday, and a trip to Petra on Sunday after the race.

One thing that's been a little disappointing is that we aren't at a hotel with any of the other teams except the UK team. Usually we've been able to eat and hang out with the rest of the competitors but I'm guessing there isn't a hotel or venue big enough for everybody. It's always been interesting to be able to eat with everyone from around the world in Edinburgh last year and Japan a few years ago. But so it goes, I'll get a lot of culture just being around the city of Amman. Oh and being next to a mosque has definite disadvantages at 4am and 6am as I am currently listening to the blaring 3pm prayer quite clearly from inside my hotel room with the windows closed...and I've smoked two packs of Marlboro's today already.

Amman, Jordan

XC

Anybody ever say to you “So you’re a runner, huh? How much do you run?”

            You say, “Oh, I’m at about 70-80miles a week right now”.

And their incredulous response comes back. “Whoa, I get tired driving my car that far.”

Your answer, if you had the balls, would be a punch in the face.

Well, that doesn’t bother me. However, my conversation that gets me so pissed off I’d like to punch some high ranking official of the IOC in the face goes like this:

            “So you’re a runner huh? Are you going to the Olympics?”

I invariably have to respond with “Well, I’m running the Trials in the Steeplechase because they don’t have Cross Country, the one event that would give me the best chance at being an Olympian. SO PROBABLY NOT NOW!!!” Then I would punch Jacque Rogge in the face if he were standing there. 

Do I sound bitter? I hope so, because I am. How do you not have the one event that is so primitive, so natural and pure, that humans need only their natural beautiful body and a swath of Earth to crown a victor. Cross Country running has been contested for thousands of years prior to the advent of any modern Olympic sporting event. It is so ingrained in what the human race is that we evolved in order to be the best endurance runners on the planet. Peoples from every culture around the world have running, long distance endurance running, cross country, written into their histories whether for competition or, more likely, out of necessity, to carry news, to hunt, to gather, etc.

Yeah, that type of running relates more to ultra-running as a sport than cross country but don’t you think that we should have one of those disciplines in the modern Olympics?  Sure, I have a personal agenda but doesn’t it just make sense on so many levels? We’ve been doing it for thousands of years, it’s a sport that equates man to man, taking out all other factors like equipment, and something the IOC might be interested in, it’s cheap. No stadium, find a field, draw a starting line, draw a finish line, throw the gun up and say GO! Seems pretty simple.

Ok off on a tangent, have you ever thought about how inferior we are to other animals, especially in track and field events? I get that we aren’t competing against the rest of the animal kingdom, so you can save the comments. But even so, isn’t cool to compare, I mean after all, we are athletes and that’s why we train, to compete against others.  The others are usually people, but why not expand our horizons.  What’s the one thing we can do really well, I’m sure by the blog you’ve figured it out but humor me. Dude, Usain Bolt is soooo fast, did you see that? It was like a lightning…Bolt. Ha. How fast did he run? Like 27-28mph. Not bad but a bear, yeah a bear, can run 30mph, a giraffe 32mph, a pronghorn antelope 61mph, and a cheetah 70mph. Umm, an elephant can run almost as fast as a human, a fast human. See the list below. Jumping, same story (although it’s a bit more complicated with some physics in there). As far as animals go, we’re really pretty fragile creatures. One thing we are built for though is running, and doing it for a long time. It’s pretty intriguing to think that we can out last most other land animals in a cross country run. I, for one, plan to test that theory. I’ll let you know how that goes. If you want an interesting book to read, check this out: Why We Run: A Natural History by Bernd Heinrich.

I seem to be at a crossroads in my running as of late.  It’s that awkward period after you put forth a huge effort to maximize your potential and nothing is the same as it was before. I’ve tried to put last year behind me, my failure (I know others don’t see it that way but I do) at the Trials, working toward for 3 years, sacrificing 1 year (really much more than that, but who’s counting). I’m certainly not trying to forget it, that’s not what I mean. That was awesome, running as a full time job, a great team, great coaches, a truly memorable experience. I wouldn’t trade it for anything (I would trade the outcome), but it is nice to be back to the way things were before. Or at least that’s what I was hoping. But it’s not. I’m just trying to adjust to how running fit in with the rest of my life before I made the move to Eugene. Work, wife, dog, training, coaching, not in any particular order.

The drive just isn’t there, the motivation to train. That’s the weird thing, I love running, I love racing, I want to keep doing it, I just don’t want to train. They are two totally different things altogether, running and training (yeah, got that from “Once a Runner”). Different mental states, different sacrifices, different sensation of fulfillment… different sensation of pain, training hurts. Right now everything hurts. I just want to stop and rest… but I don’t.

I went through a similar transition right after college. That time I was actually so jaded by running it took a whole year to start running again and two years until I missed it enough to start racing again. That’s a whole other story for a whole other blog. The moral of the story is that I’ve been here before, I did what I needed to do or what my body told me I had to do, and I came through on the other end at another level of running than what I went in at.

Training for the trials last year was hell on my body, as it is for anyone. But I had such a great summer planned that I neglected taking that much needed rest. I ran a ton but it was fun, it wasn’t training. Three and four hour runs in the mountains, running camps, stage races, mountain races, and ultras, oh my! It was one of those rare amazing summers that make much of what comes after a disappointment. It was awesome. Anyway, lately I’ve started to pay for it. October was pretty rough, my feet have PF and some other tendonitis, I was getting dull nerve pain in my glute and hip area pretty bad, and mentally I was pretty worn down.  A great ART (Active Release Techniques) specialist salvaged that part of the year by healing me with miraculous hands (actually I think he has tendonitis in his arm now from working on me, but hey, I’m feeling better). But now that feeling of fatigue is creeping back in, my body is calling for a reprieve. With my site set on XC this year and making the world team I put my head down and dug in to get through the winter. Almost like an experiment, I’ve been training pretty hard but doing the minimum amount I felt like I could get away with but still enough to make the Team. Come to find out I was pretty close, a little too close since I was the last one selected and needed someone else to opt out of the trip to Jordan. By the way, thanks Tim.  The fine line I was sitting on didn’t have a lot to do with my fitness though either, as I do believe I’m in better shape than my races have shown, but mostly my state of mind toward training and racing. It just isn’t there. That fire. The will to hang on to someone during a race way past your comfort zone. Not there at all. If a runner relies on their fitness their whole career they’ll never have a name worth remembering. Anyone reading this knows, running’s a mental game.

It’s been four years since I’ve taken more than five consecutive days off from training. So now I’ve got 6 weeks and a couple races to go, then I’m taking a break. Worlds, American River 50 miler, and my hometown favorite the Pear Blossom 10 miler.  In the meantime, I’m looking forward to the break and the races, hoping to regain some of that youthful exuberance toward racing these last few competitions by approaching them as what they should be and will be…fun.

It was about this time last year, mid spring when the mountains are still under feet of snow and summer seems like it should be just around the corner but it’s actually still so far off that you’re trying not to think about it. Thinking about it just makes you anxious to put in some miles on the high mountain trails. That’s about how it felt last year when the three of us hatched a brilliant, so it seemed at the time, plan to cover 37 miles and 18,000ft of elevation and enough desolate landscape to feel like a lunar rover as fast as we could. This is how it works: you throw Dave Clark, Mitch Thompson, and Max King five mountain peaks (four over 9,000ft) near by, an affinity for truly masochistic feats of endurance and punishment, a lot of Hammer Gel packs, together with a bit of spare time they should be relaxing with family, and suddenly you hear a conversation like “Hey I’ve got an idea. I’ve always wanted to climb the Three Sisters, Broken Top, and Bachelor…in a day.” “Ok, I’m in” “I’m in too, when” Five peaks, fast. This is what I like do in my spare time when I’m not running.

So we planned one day late summer to attempt all five peaks. We didn’t feel particularly challenged by any of the peaks, especially since between the three of us we had all summitted them before. The challenge was going to come from the unknown of stringing five of the tallest mountains in Oregon together…on foot. We’ve even had experience in that department as well; Dave has done the Three Sisters in a day, I’ve also done the Three Sisters in a day that my climbing partner claimed was a record 8hrs from trailhead to trailhead, and Mitch did an incredible marathon of 9 cascade peaks (with no assistance between) over 48 hrs. Despite all that experience this was still going to be different. Anytime you attempt something like this, even if you’ve done it before, it’s always going to test you physically and mentally, there are always unexpected variables that come up no matter how many times it’s been done, events that you just can’t plan for.

There was some argument as to how long it would take, though none of us knew for sure we had a pretty good idea of what our pace should be without any unforeseen events that would hamper our adventure, like Dave falling off the peak of Broken Top (it didn’t happen luckily but that is definitely something that would slow us down a bit). I thought about 14 hrs, Dave and Mitch were thinking a bit longer but not much. One thing we were pretty certain about was that no one had done it under 24hrs. I thought that was definitely doable and I really didn’t want to spend the night hiking.

The day before Mitch and I drove up to Todd Lake to stash a little extra food for the next day as we were trudging from Broken Top to Bachelor. I had the brilliant idea of getting a ride up to Todd Lake and biking back to town, Mitch said no (more on why I’m glad I listened to him later). Our route we decided on that night was to park at Pole Creek trailhead, traverse the peaks from north to south and ending at the Mt. Bachelor parking lot where we had left a car.

We were on our way out to Pole Creek about 4:30am the next morning. For some reason waking up at such an hour only seems unbearable when you have to catch a flight. Looking forward to getting our adventure started it really didn’t seem that bad. Our gear, what little we had, was pared down to only what we needed to make it through the day. We really didn’t plan to spend the night out and if we had to we would hopefully be moving. This is the part where we’re supposed to say: “We’re professionals, do not attempt to try what you read here on your own.”We packed enough food to get us through about 10hrs to Todd Lake, we each had a few liters of water since there were multiple places we could refill easily with good clean water and Mitch had a Miox water purifier that is about the size of a large pen. That came in handy. The only extra clothing we carried was a lightweight wind jacket for the peaks, other than that is was the clothes we were wearing, shorts (long tights in my case), a long sleeve and a short sleeve shirt, some sturdy trail running shoes, and a climbing helmet we each had to bring or Mitch wasn’t going with us. Oh, we did have a small first aid kit. Some people may be wondering where we put the ropes and climbing gear. Did I mention we packed light?

Looking back on it, I wouldn’t say we were unsafe or over our head at any point but there is always a scenario on a trip like this that would make the evening news if anything had gone wrong.

We took off from the trailhead at 5:45am just as the horizon was turning a pale blue. We still needed our headlamps for a good 20-30min so we just jogged down the trail slowly to get our legs warmed up and ready for the climb ahead. About 3 miles down the trail we passed a small creek and decided that we probably blew right by where we wanted to head right through the forest and up the southeast ridge of North Sister. About midway up we watched the sun rise and as we rested from our legs burning with lactic acid we knew this would be a long day. We felt good at this point though so it was important to hold back the reigns a bit and not burn ourselves out early.

We reached the summit of North at 8:45 in 3hrs. The climb across the scree field and up the bowling alley went smoothly and was relatively easy, even though climbing on stuff like that still gives me the heebee geebees. We snapped a couple pics and headed back down, one down, four to go. Still feeling strong we skied down the scree to the snow field between North and Middle and cruised right on up the Middle Sister by 10am in 4:15 total time. Middle is a good place for a little food break before tackling the most difficult section down the baby-head boulder field and up the loose North face of South Sister that I think I’ll rename “Suicide by Mitch” Ridge. I don’t recommend doing this climb in the first place and I definitely don’t recommend doing it with Mitch. I know there is an easier way up the North Face. With Mitch leading the way we picked and clawed our way up the North Face through the channels of loose volcanic cinders over hard basalt that acts like marbles on a smooth vinyl floor. Dave was in the middle with Mitch above coaxing him along and me behind saying things like “Yeah, this is how I went last time,” and “You’re fine, I feel great, we’re not in any danger at all” while I’m actually about ready to soil myself and can’t believe I ever agreed to do this climb again. I’m gripping the rock with my fingers and toes as firm as I can and I can look down the cliff behind me and know that if I slip, well, that’s it for me. I’m feeling a bit out of my comfort zone right now, but I guess that’s part of the objective, right?

We did make it, as you can tell. We summitted South at 1pm in 7 hrs 15 min and I vowed never to do that again...at least for two years at which time I’ll have forgotten about and I’ll agree to do it with some other sucker. It was a relief to be on South and know that the hardest climbing was out of the way and we were over half done. We were all feeling a bit of relief actually. It was now onto Broken Top. We cruised down South to Green Lakes pretty quickly. At some point going up North I came down with a painful case of tendonitis right on the top of my ankle that was especially painful going down hill so cruising down became more of a hobble for me. We connected with the climbers trail up Broken Top, scrambled over and around a shear drop that was pretty hairy at the peak, and summitted at 4pm. Seeing Bachelor in the distance and knowing that we still had all that distance to traverse, time became more of a focus at this point so we tagged the top and were up and down as quickly as we could climb. Coming down Broken Top there are two options: go back down the way you came on the trail, or jump off the edge and post-hole down the scree. Dave was all for post-holing but Mitch thought it would be faster just to take the trail. This is still up for debate since we all decided to take the trail since we knew where that went and to save the post-holing for another day. It had potential.

We’ve been going hard now for about 10hrs and it was obvious we were slowing a bit. I’ve been feeling pretty good, eating and drinking, so is Mitch, but Dave was starting to noticeably struggle. Now Dave has got endurance like no body else. He can just go and go and go. I think it started on about Middle when we stopped for food. Dave didn’t eat much when Mitch and I did but I figured he would eat when he got hungry and it would be fine, but when you’re exerting yourself and you’re hot, it is sometimes very difficult to eat anything, let alone another cardboard energy bar or sticky sugary gu packet. Dave was having some trouble running across the flats down to Todd Lake and Mitch and I started to piece together exactly why Dave started to struggle. Dave hadn’t eaten anything in the past couple of hours and was starting to pay the price. When we stopped for our stash at Todd Lake he managed to force some food down which helped, but once you’ve gone past that point of no return, getting your energy back can be very difficult. The three of us power hiked at a good clip without losing much, if any, time over to Bachelor and took the West Village Getback trail up to the Summit Lift where we caught the trail up to the top of the last peak. We summitted Bachelor in 15hrs just in time to catch the beautiful sunset at 8:45pm. The cool breeze starting to blow started to bite at our damp clothes so we didn’t hang around long but looking North over what we crossed during the day we could all appreciate the journey that we took and what we learned about ourselves and each other. I certainly feel like the whole journey was the reward, the time spent on each peak just a waypoint or rest stop on a much greater mission.

We were off the mountain and back in the car by 9:20, on our way to a juicy hamburger and huge milkshake. Ohhh, that was good.

Sidenote on biking: The next day I was pretty sore but ok, so I thought it would be a good idea to bike to get the car at Pole Creek Trailhead. Bad idea. By the end of yesterday I was glad I had taken Mitch’s advise and hadn’t biked to town from Bachelor. I should have taken his advice again but I didn’t. I got to Sisters no problem but then struggled and cursed myself for attempting the ride up Pole Creek Rd. It’s washboarded and I swear it climbs 10,000ft in a couple miles. Now I’m cooked, and I have Hood to Coast tomorrow. I love what I do.

It's pissing rain outside on the eve of one of the best experiences one can have as a long distance runner. Unfortunately it hasn't been pissing enough. The WXC course, while tough, it's not all that muddy. The locals that I've been coaxing to get out there tonight with hoses or turn the sprinklers on says that there is still a chance the weather could turn and I might not have to go home disappointed. Well, I hope they're right. We'll see. It's still a good course. The grass is a bit soft and the footing is uneven. The hill is great, a rocky section on the upside, a quick turn and a leg burning 15ft section at the top, and thick uneven grass down the backside. I'm definitely looking forward to it and hoping that I will do well.

Enough about that. Edinburgh is a beautiful city. Walking through old town takes you back to midevel times, the uneven cobbles, narrow pathways between buildings, the patchwork of various masons leaving their mark through time. One building might be from the 1300s and another from the 1600s. Its amazing. The only thing that might be a bit out of place are the dance clubs that fill in the darkest corners of some of these streets, I was going to say bars but that probably wasn't out of place 400 years ago. I'm saving most of my tourist stuff for next week since I'm staying an extra three days but I am in the market for a kilt. Hopefully I can find one cheap enough. I've seen some for as much as £599. Whoa. That would break the bank faster than two shakes of a sheep's tail. (heard that from a local earlier today)

Edinburgh would also be a great place to train, that is if you don't mind training in Eugene weather. The weather sucks but it's an awesome place to run with multiple parks and grassy areas that would be great for workouts. I'll get some video out next week of where we've been running to give you a feel for it.

So I'm also a moron and packed my computer all this way only to forget the power cable. Doh! So no pictures or video from this side of the world until I get back. So long for now. I'll try to get something down after that race tomorrow.