Jinx...

I told him that a player on a streak has to respect the streak. ~ Crash Davis

Wed: 1:27, 10.55 miles, Gunbarrel tempo

Never mess with a streak. Don't call it out. Don't switch things up. If it ain't broke, fix it and it soon will be.

I opted for a double dose of stupid and actually paid attention to my form while running on the treadmill. Bad idea #1. I have a bit of a loop in the pick up phase of my left-foot stride. Gotta fix that nonsense, right? Also, I have a bit of a chicken wing effect going on with my left arm so I dedicated a solid 15 minutes to trying to get that straightened out. These adjustments (which were quickly abandoned, I'm sure), coupled with idiot maneuver #2, did me in.

For my second dose of dipshittery, I decided to test drive some Pear Izumi Peak XC shoes I wore a few times last spring to see if the changes I have made in my stride over the past months made them worthy of a second look. Though I am sure these are awesome shoes for the right person, I just need more stability and volume than they seem to provide and this, along with my self-diagnosed changes to my wacky stride made my right glute extremely unhappy – with a vengeance. Seriously though, if you are in the market for a super light trail flat, these are quite nice. (I'll sell you a pair of lightly used size 10s super cheap. Hell, if you want them, drop a note in the comments and I'll give them to you.) And from now on, I am calling any inefficiencies in my stride "style" unless someone who knows better tells me they need to be fixed.

In any event, my hamstring and glute started getting cranky towards the end of my surges yesterday and by the evening, I was paying dearly for my misguided experiments. Nothing lots of stretching and a good night's sleep couldn't cure, right? Guess again. Woke up with some serious cranky butt and stiffness down to my mid hamstring.

What goes well with impeded range of motion? Tempo work, of course. I jammed down to Boulder to meet up with the crew for the standard Wednesday Tempo run. I gave myself 25 minutes to make it to 63rd/Jay where we were to meet up for the start and was spinning easy, albeit hobbled 9:30s then I took a wrong turn. Bonus. So I started my tempo solo and managed to get back on the right track. Made it to the start with seconds to spare and actually was feeling better (this isn't saying much) when we started the "real" tempo. Spun mid to high 7s to start then worked down to low 7s. Actually, ended up feeling pretty good about the effort given the complications. I figured out a couple of techniques to lessen the ouchiness and learned a valuable lesson about change. Resist it at all costs.

~stubert.

Trigger pulled...

Got my hand in my pocket and my finger's on the trigger. ~ Beastie Boys

Wed: 1:30, 10.5 miles, Boulder tempo on snow

Just signed up for the Moab Red Hot 50K event February 13th. Pretty excited, to be honest. Looking forward to getting back out there and doing an early season event.

Yesterday, I headed down to Boulder and did a run on mostly snowpacked and icy roads. Warmed up for 30 minutes then did 1 hour of tempo. Didn't feel like it but I churned out 10.5 miles total. Pretty sweet effort for a Stu. Janet worked on a couple things with me to try to get me to ground my left side a bit more to open up my right hip and, though it felt a bit wonky and ended up affecting other parts of my bod, did seem to make everything feel "easier". Easier is good, for sure.

Was going to head up to Eldora for a few turns today but the schedule booked up and we lost water in the kitchen (stove went out last night, ugh). So I'll stick around the house, get some work done, try to get the water back up and running and then head to the gym later for a quick run (most likely). It's 5° out right now and my screw shoes are frozen so I'm guessing I'll opt for the wuss route today.

~stubert.

Docs...

RIP.

They need dip-tet boosters yearly or they develop lockjaw and night vision. ~ Dot

1:30, 11 miles, tempo

Got my run on this morning then went to the doc for a check-up and tetanus shot. All appears to be doing well with the bod and I didn't even feel the shot. That nurse was a magician, I tell ya. Either that or she faked the whole thing and is selling my tetanus medication on the black market.

Ran tempo this morning and almost missed the train. Started at around 75th and Jay in Boulder and leisurely ran up to the starting point only to remember that I forgot to slather on the Body Glide. This... ladies and gentlemen, is a problem. So I started my tempo early and jammed back to the car then pushed the pace up Jay to meet with the Wednesday tempo crew. I made it with seconds to spare (well, or a few late) and ran a progressively faster tempo for just under 5 miles at which point I shut 'er down and jogged back to the car. Good, solid run for me and I really felt great throughout.

Took Beep-kitty to the vet this morning as she had some follow-up surgery from a lump we discovered last week that proved to be cancerous. Dr. Bock felt like the procedure went really well and that he got good margins. The lab results should be back in a day or two then we'll know for sure but she seems to be recovering nicely at this point.

I also got my old G4 desktop back from the shop and it is in need of a power supply. That's $400 so the old girl may get repurposed as a liquor cabinet or a planter or something since that is about $100 more than the stupid thing is worth. (Purchased in '03 for ~$3000 - lovely.)

Tomorrow work and a quick, easy run.

~stubert.

Tempotastic...

We have the technology. ~ Narrator

1:28, 10.77, 55 minutes tempo

Tempo runs can get a little interesting. Today's was mellow at the start, then smooth and awesome, then pretty miserable. Typical, really - but the wheels really came off about 45-50 minutes in. Especially when I tried to keep up with Art who was spinning 6:40s. Not pretty.

I parked just over 2.5 miles from the start and warmed up on the paths and roads of east Boulder. Then we did a few strides and queued up for tempo - splitting into about 3 groups. This is the third week I have come out to run with this group and it is a lot of fun to get in some good miles with other runners. My group started second to last with Art chasing and moved along at a pretty steady 7:30ish pace. Fairly sustainable from my perspective. About mile 3 I was feeling solid and kicked it up a notch to about 7:15s.

Overall, I wasn't feeling super red hot today. I was still wearing the effects of Sunday's long run and yesterday's massage left me feeling a bit clunky. I ran alone for the next couple of miles then heard Art rapidly approaching so I slowed a bit to let him catch then tried to keep up as we ran past my starting point and across Valmont. He actually toned it down a bit from his standard 6:40 pace (I think) but I was unable to match that for long and soon turned back around to finish up my scheduled 55 minutes (poorly) then run some semblance of cool down.

All in all it was a great run. I was able to push myself and run very relaxed, just wasn't quite able to keep up with someone faster and vastly more experienced than I. Nothing to be worried about for sure. Just part of what one has to experience to get better, stronger, faster.

~stubert.

Get off the couch...

These boots aren't made for walkin'.

Hit 'im with your purse, you pussy! ~ Fan

First big storm of the year rolled in yesterday and deposited (as of last viewing) a foot and a half of fluffiness at our casa. Good stuff. Got up super early (after a pretty crappy night's sleep for whatever reason) to mow the driveway and jam down to Boulder to get in a run. Met up with a cool crew of people and we spun laps at IBM.

Slushy goodness and driving snow throughout but that didn't seem to get in the way too much of doing about 40 minutes of tempo. Ended up with over 10 miles for the day, which was pretty sweet. Seriously, running in the snow is just awesome. You stay totally warm. You don't eat shit every three minutes. And you don't have that stripe of frozen road grime and slush up your butt all day long. Beats riding for sure.

Had to drop the car off for some work and walked from there to try to get some food. First attempt (Noodles) aborted due to a power outage so I ended up at Pei Wei. Good eats, though I was really more in the mood for Noodles. Wandered over to the Mac Store to find it closed for rennovations so have parked it for now at Barnes & Noble. Going to try to get some work done and hopefully the car will be done before all the bozos head back up the canyon. There was a bus stuck in the narrows this morning and one of the guys driving in front of me thought 20 was the appropriate speed all the way down. It's all good, however. Just the standard wackiness.

More to come...

~stubert.