Ilanarama!

Happy housiversary to us! Yep, one year ago today we moved into our Rim Drive house, and I have to say that considering we have been "forced" to spend a lot of time here lately, it was an excellent decision.



Tuesday was our wedding anniversary, too; I joked on Facebook that the 28th was houses, and the 29th facemasks and toilet paper. Who knows what our 30th (!!) will bring next year?



Of course the Covid-19 pandemic has affected our lives, but we are fortunate enough in our situation that it has not been terrible or terrifying. I work at home anyway, so the only difference is that my cow-orkers (yes, that's deliberate, a habit from my old talk.bizarre days) are also online during our meetings - and actually, this has caused us to switch from a voice-only plus screencast type of meeting to Google Meet and Zoom, where we all see each other, and I think it has made me feel a bit more part of the group. Britt is mostly retired and so things aren't all that different for him, either; he still spends a lot of time on the phone, no change there! Our ski areas never reopened, but after a month of closure and putting new systems in place, the golf course did, so Britt has started playing again.

I'm still running, even though the other race I'd registered for, the Steamworks Half Marathon in early June, just canceled. (In addition to Canyonlands, which was supposed to be mid-March, and canceled the previous week.) I like running, though, so even without a race I'm happy to get out and enjoy the world. Our White Rim bike trip, which would have been next weekend, was also canceled, but we're still hoping that the hut trip in late June will be allowed to proceed (though I'm dubious it will). I feel bad for people who are truly stuck at home, or in tiny apartments in cities (like our Barcelona friends, who can only go out for grocery trips), but our governor recognizes the importance Coloradans place on outdoor recreation, and it's considered the necessity it is - provided, of course, that one practices proper social distancing:



So we have gotten out for longish rides on the mountain bikes a few times, which has been a lot of fun, and I'm running around the neighborhood most days. I haven't ridden my e-bike that much because when I've gone shopping (twice in the past four weeks, go me!) I want to get more stuff than will fit in my panniers. But I did ride down to a quiet country road to do a run last week, locking my bike by my favorite bakery, and then bought bread there. (They only let one person in at a time now, but it was a nice day, and nobody really minded standing in a sparse 6-foot-apart line.) I also rode over to the college (a mile and a half) to pick up some eggs, greens, and bacon from the college-associated farm collective which does my CSA, though that won't start until next month. I'll be getting more eggs from them, as well as honey, on Tuesday.

We've done a few social distancing happy hours over Zoom and Hangouts and WhatsApp, and a friend had a Zoom birthday party for her 40th, but really, I think we're just antisocial people who are happy to spend time together in our wonderful house.

I hope all of you are healthy and happy and doing well! In conclusion:

My new electric vehicle: a Priority Embark e-bike!

When we first told our friends we were building a new house, most of them said, with dismay, "But your current house is so nice!" And yeah, there's a lot I loved about it, but when I thought about it I realized there was only one thing I was going to really miss when we moved: being able to walk or bike everywhere. Living right smack downtown we were about half a mile from the big grocery store and about a mile from the natural foods coop; half a mile from the library and a mile and a half from the rec center. We put around 5000 miles a year on our pickup truck. It was not uncommon for us to not get in the truck for days, or even a week or more.

Our new house is not that far from town (technically we're still in city limits) and we're easily within cycling distance of all the places we used to walk, but the mesa-top location that gives us those awesome views also gives us a 300-foot climb to get back home. It's doable - and we've done it - but not carrying 40 pounds of groceries or after a track workout with the running club. I'd long felt I really wanted a utility bike for just riding around town; I felt kind of silly doing errands on my fancy mountain bike, and it can't take a rack so I always had to wear a backpack for grocery runs. With our planned move, it made even more sense to get an e-bike! So last fall I started researching.

( Choosing an e-bike )

( Actually buying an e-bike )

It's interesting, actually. Riding the e-bike is like...riding a bike. It's not a motorcycle; it doesn't have a throttle. I don't really notice the boost except for starting from a dead stop, and going up hills. And it's not like I'm not riding up the hill - it's just that the hill doesn't seem nearly as steep as it does on my other bike. Which is exactly what I want!

I'm still getting used to the continuously variable transmission, which operates by twisting a ring on the handgrip (sort of throttle-like) but I keep forgetting which direction makes it a higher gear vs a lower gear. And we need to get mirrors, I think, and I want to figure out a grocery-carrying method. But so far, so good. I am looking forward to using our new electric vehicles all summer (and hopefully sometimes in the winter, too)!

A couple of years ago, Britt and I found out about an older couple who had bought ten acres of land forty years ago, on the mesa above downtown where Fort Lewis College is; they'd built their house on a prime spot right on the rim, but were now looking to sell off most of the land to help fund their retirement. The catch was that in order to build another house, it would need to be formally subdivided and brought into compliance with city codes, and that would be expensive enough that it really only made sense if the buyer subdivided into a small development and sold lots. After much discussion we went for it, and Britt started yet another "career" as a developer, creating this small subdivision which I named Arrowhead Ridge. (Ours is Lot 1. It's not as big as it looks; everything "above" the old driveway that goes to the existing house is a steep slope down the edge of the mesa. We are not making money on the development, just offsetting the cost of our own lot a little.)

Why "Arrowhead Ridge"? And why the large area designated Open Space in the lower left corner of the development? Well, the city of Durango requested that we do an archaeological survey before digging. And oh my goodness, the things the archaeologist found! Bone needles, potsherds, and yes, arrowheads. The whole mesa-top had been a Basketmaker III/Pueblo I period site, but since nearly all of the modern development had been done without such surveys, there's little surviving evidence of the early inhabitants. We decided it was important to preserve what we found, and protect it, and to cover it in such a way that if we ever get the funds, we can uncover and stabilize the ruins we found.

And because of this, our development was nominated for and won an award for "outstanding achievement in historic preservation" from History Colorado! This short video shows the site, and some of the finds, and has interviews with Britt and the archaeologist he worked with. I'm super proud even though all I did was come up with the name. :-)

It's been six weeks since I posted about my slow increase of running mileage and my upcoming racing plans, and (knock wood) things are going pretty well. From 118 running and 41 cycling miles in March, I managed 157 running and 135 cycling miles in April, and if I can stay healthy, I may get to the vicinity of 200 running miles this month. My paces are still fairly slow, but improving relative to my heart rate, and last week I hit 46 (running) miles for the week with a 12-mile long run, both of these high points since last October.

I've started joining our running club for Tuesday night track workouts, which I haven't done in a few years. Usually when I do speedwork I just program a workout into my Garmin and run intervals on the rec path, but I have to admit that I work harder in a group, with other runners around me, and of course tracks are flat and have measured distances that don't depend on the vagaries of GPS. So far I've gone twice, and enjoyed myself both times (for values of 'enjoyment' that include 'finishing an interval feeling like I might throw up'). I'm about mid-pack out of the dozen or so club members who have shown up at these, as far as speed goes, so I don't feel too bad about my ability level. In only two sessions my short-distance speed has improved, which is encouraging!

I've also started doing tempo runs, which I do at half marathon pace and so are a key training run for me. These have been going well also, though I have to remember not to compare myself with my 2013-self - my expected HMP right now is slower than my marathon pace was that year, sigh. But the real test will come in (gulp) just under four weeks, when I will be running the Steamworks Half Marathon for the, hmm. Sixth time? Wow.

I also have a race on the calendar in July: The Kendall Mountain Run, which is six miles and 3200' vertical up a jeep road, and then a 300 foot scramble to the 13,066 foot summit - and then back down again. A non-running friend won a free entry in a raffle and gave it to me, and I gladly accepted. It's going to be tough, but I am hoping I can do it in under 3 hours. (The course record is just under 1:35; for a woman, a bit more than 1:55.) To train for this, I'm going to do more of my runs on trails (right now I run once or twice a week on trails) and do a lot of hills.

After that, my plan is to cut back on running slightly and ramp up the mountain biking in preparation for our mid-September Telluride-to-Moab ride. We'll probably be doing some backpacking as well, so I expect my weekly mileage will vary wildly, but as long as I can maintain fitness and get a few long uphills on the bike, I will be happy.

I have vague ideas for running another half marathon or two in the fall - maybe the Other Half, which I always enjoy, maybe something else instead or in addition. And if things are going well, I may try to schedule a marathon in the late fall or early winter. But that's so far off it's not even worth thinking about yet!

I, um, haven't posted for two months. How did that happen?

Just a quick update on things. My back issues have continued to bother me, so a few weeks ago I got a second MRI. It showed that my herniated disk is in fact healing just fine, so my spine doc suggested another injection in a different spot, which seems to have helped a lot though not entirely banished the pain. But things are definitely improving. Next step will be a massage therapist who specializes in recovery and rehab.

I've been running a pretty solid 30-35mpw and have recently stepped it up to 40-ish. We're supposed to have an El Niño-fueled snowy winter, so I will be happy if I can maintain that throughout the winter - supplemented with skiing, of course! We have weekday passes to Purgatory, as usual, and I hope to do a lot of skiing this year. Britt's company is sponsoring a weekend at Telluride in early December, and I'm excited about that as I've never skied there before. And I hope to get the older of my two brothers, who lives in California, out here for some skiing this winter.

Britt and I will be running the local Turkey Trot on Thursday morning, which is a five-mile mixed trail and road race. It's not a competitive race in the sense that the only prizes are supermarket pumpkin pies for the top man and woman finisher, but after the race there are always incredible random draw prizes. I've won hiking socks, a pound of coffee from a local roaster, and a $50 gift certificate to a really nice restaurant in previous years.

But my next real race won't be until March. I hope to run the Canyonlands Half again, though I don't hold out hope for any great time. If I can improve over the summer I might target some fall races as goals.

After a long hiatus I have been updating my Canadian vacation reports. Four sections are done, two to go!

Speaking of vacations, Britt had a couple of meetings in California and so I flew out to Palm Springs after the first of them. We spent the weekend in Palm Springs, hiking up Mt. San Jacinto on Saturday and visiting the Living Desert museum on Sunday, and then he attended his conference at the hotel and I worked from the hotel room and wandered around the resort. It was fun! And I've booked our next major vacation, a trip to New York City timed to coincide with our (gulp) 25th anniversary. We'll be seeing Hamilton (YAY!) and Book of Mormon, doing a little museum-ing, and then flying down to visit with my aged parents in Maryland for a few days before flying back home.

So, uh, hi, Dreamwidth! Long time no see! I will try not to be a stranger! (Well, not any stranger than usual...)

As some of you know, after my glorious victory at the Canyonlands 5-mile I had a relapse of the lung rot that had plagued me since the first week of March. When it just seemed to be getting worse I went to the clinic and was diagnosed with bronchitis and prescribed a number of things, including an antibiotic "to take if you don't get better in a couple of days," because apparently these viruses often mask bacterial infections. I got worse and began taking the antibiotic a week ago, and things turned the corner pretty quickly after that, and today I went for a run for the first time in ten days.

It was extremely slow. I coughed every so often. But those problems, I know, are temporary. What may not be temporary is that my gluteus medius ached - not horribly, but enough to concern me. I had noticed the butt-pain starting to return last week, in fact, which dismayed me since I wasn't doing any physical activity at all.

The spine guy had said that it often takes more than one shot to fix the kind of problem I had. I hope I don't have to do it again - it's expensive (I've maxed out my deductible, but I still have a co-pay which comes out to about $500, and even though it's not a problem for me financially it freaks me out a bit - and my insurance company is beginning to get nervous, which makes ME nervous) and it's a bit of a hassle/pain.

I am going to try to work on those core exercises, keep running, and see what happens. I guess if things get worse (or don't get better) I will have to get a second cortisone shot. I hope I don't have to. I also hope I'm smart enough to see if I DO have to, and do it.

( Some weight and bodyfat talk )

( Boston plans )

( Other running plans )

( Other non-running plans )

With the start of the new year, there is a sense of beginning anew, of starting over, even though all we've marked is an arbitrary spot on the calendar. Even so, for me things feel like I'm starting from scratch again - actually, like I'm preparing to begin to start from scratch, because I'm not even there yet!

In the fall I was looking forward to taking a short break from running during the second half of October, then ramping up my training for the Boston marathon. Well, you know what they say about best-laid plans. At this point, not only am I not running, I'm unable to do any exercise at all. I'm fat and cranky and hurting. While I have not yet ruled out going to Boston to cheer on my friends, the marathon is out of the question.

( The story thus far )

When I told Mike (my PT) that I thought it was getting worse rather than better, he suggested that I see a back specialist; he says my lower back is really tight, and he suspects the source of the problem is there, not in my glutes. This is a reasonable possibility, as I've periodically had back issues. So I made an appointment for this Thursday.

And then, on Friday, Britt and I went skiing. This was our first time up to the mountain this season, and we didn't know how his knee or my butt/hip/leg would do, so we planned a relatively short day on easier terrain.

The first couple of runs I felt great. I didn't even notice my usual low-level pain. Plus, I just got new skis this year, longer and smoother and lighter than my old ones, and so it was a real delight to be making turns on the lovely new snow we got on Thursday! Or at least it was for just short of three runs, because I was nearly down to the lift on the third run when suddenly, for no apparent reason, something went SPROING in my back. I came to a screeching halt and tried to put myself into the least painful position while I waited for Britt to realize that I was waving and screaming for a reason :-(

Fortunately, we were not far from the lift that ended at the restaurant, where we'd been planning to stop for lunch anyway at that point. Between the slow lift and the slow service, we took a two-hour break, and I had a pint and a half of muscle relaxant, so our return to the base (which requires two runs with a lift in the middle, taking the easiest path and going slow) was not as miserable as I had feared.

So there you have it. I'm even more crippled up than I was before; I'm sprawled in a recliner, downing copious amounts of Aleve and carefully doing my old McKenzie Method back exercises several times a day. But in a way this is confirmation that the trouble is in my spine, after all. So I'm hopeful that Thursday's appointment will bring some answers, or at least put me on that road.

I'm running the Steamworks Half Marathon on Saturday, which was actually the first half marathon I ever ran (back in 2004); since then, I've run it three more times and volunteered at it twice (when I was injured and couldn't run). The course is rolling, generally downhill but with an uphill finish (grr). My best time was 1:38:10, the last time I ran it, which was two years ago.

( Key workouts and numbers )

So, that's the plan. My A goal is a PR, or sub-1:35:55. My fallback goal is to beat my 1:38:10 from two years ago. My super-stretch goal is sub-1:35, which would be a 7:15 pace and is probably out of reach on this course at this time.

My year can mostly be summed up in this image:



Left to right, that's my Canyonlands Half 3rd AG medal, my The Other Half female masters' trophy, and my CIM 3rd AG plaque. I didn't get an award for coming in second in the Journey of Hope 5K, and the bottle of wine I got for winning my AG in the Run for the Wine has already been consumed. :-)

It was a good year awards-wise, and also PR-wise, as I FINALLY broke my 2010 half marathon PR, and set a new personal best in the marathon which is now my best age-graded race. Mileage-wise, it was also a personal best with 2080 miles in the year - and one more run planned for tomorrow.

I didn't write down my goals for the year anywhere, but I mentioned here that I wanted to run a sub-1:36 half, which I did, and a sub-21 5K, which I did not. I also mentioned wanting to run a 50K, which I did not.

So, what's planned for this year? I've already registered for the Canyonlands half (I got a free entry along with the trophy!) and I would like to get under 1:35 - if not then, then at the Steamworks half in June. I'll be going to a conference in Chicago in April coincidentally timed just before the Lakefront 10-miler there, which will certainly be a PR if I can do it, since I've only run massively hilly 10-milers, and nothing recently. I'd like to beat my 3:35 from two years ago at the Imogene Pass Run. And I would really like to run a sub-45 10K that's not downhill (as is my PR) and break 21 minutes in the 5K.

I don't actually have any marathon plans before Boston 2015, but I'm not ruling one out. And I'm still toying with the idea of a 50K. Finally, as usual, my major goal is to remain uninjured.

I hope the rest of you had good years, too!

The California International Marathon (CIM) is five weeks away now, so it's time I start thinking about a marathon goal. I'm not a fan of starting out with a goal (other than a vague one like 'New PR', which coincidentally has been my vague goal from the beginning) but I like to start running some goal marathon pace (GMP) miles as the race approaches, and I want to have a pace plan heading into the race.

A little under two years ago, I ran the Houston Marathon in 3:29:13 on about 49mpw. Six weeks before, I ran the Winter Sun 10K in 43:06, which sounds really fast except that it's a downhill course, with 58ft gain and 375ft elevation loss. Converting to a flat course (using the Runworks calculator) suggests that without the downhill advantage, I would have run about 44:02. (The Winter Sun is also at a lower elevation than here - and at a higher elevation than Houston, which is at sea level, but I'm discounting altitude effects because both this race and my recent half marathon, which I'm using as a tune-up, were in Moab at roughly the same altitude; and CIM is only a few hundred feet above sea level.)

Runworks will calculate a predicted marathon finish time based on a shorter race, but I don't like most online calculators for this as they tend to be quite optimistic. (When I was a newer runner, I matched these calculators pretty well, but I think that has changed now that I've become better at running faster - and running shorter races. Just by way of example, plugging 44:02 back into the calculator suggests I should have run Houston at 3:23. Which - I might have been capable of a slightly faster finish than I ran, but not that much faster!)

I prefer the calculator spreadsheet made by Greg Maclin (who incidentally is the guy I ran most of Houston with) that can be downloaded from his website at http://mymarathonpace.com. This has a tweakable setting for 'aggressiveness', and by putting in the 44:02 and selecting the 'Moderate' setting, I get a 3:29:47 prediction - just a tad slower than what I actually ran. (If I don't tweak for the downhill and just put in my time directly, my time comes in about 80% of the way to 'Fairly Conservative'. But I believe that the downhill-corrected time more accurately represents my ability at that distance, at the time.)

So, that was not quite two years ago. Now I'm running about 60mpw, and I ran a half marathon at 1:35:55. Plugging that into Maclin's calculator, on the 'Moderate' setting, I get just under 3:25. On the 'Fairly Aggressive' setting, I get just under 3:22. If my endurance has improved (and it should have, with the additional mileage) maybe I can split the difference here and make 3:23.

But wait, there's more! The Other Half was kinda hilly, right? In fact it climbed about 350 feet and descended about 450 feet. Runworks tells me I would have run a 1:35:07 on a flat course, which, maybe. When I plug that in to Maclin's calculator, I get 3:20:15 to 3:23:15 depending on setting.

My 'BQ Babes' - the virtual running partners I've had since I first signed up on the Runner's World Online forum back in 2008, who I now mostly interact with on Facebook, tell me I should go for sub-3:20. I...don't think so. It would be awesome, but I think it would be a stretch. But I do think 3:23 is a reasonable goal. (At least I think so until I do the math and realize that's 7:45 pace! Yikes!)

Today's workout was a bit of a test of that goal: 12 miles with 7 miles at GMP. And it wasn't bad, despite the rather hilly route (I don't have much of a choice on this unless I want to do short laps on the river rec path) and the gusty wind: my first 5 GMP miles averaged 7:43 pace, and even with two more slower miles (due to hills and wind, not due to me being tired, I think) my overall average was 7:46, perfectly acceptable as a test. My HR was pretty stable, around where it belonged. So a 3:23-ish is feasible.

So. A goal is sub-3:23, B goal is sub-3:25, C goal is a PR (sub-3:29:13). Now I just have to get to the start line uninjured and in the best running shape I can be.