~31.35 miles, 7:43:05, 14:46 pace, Sapper Joe 50K

~4.01 miles, 35:14, 8:48 pace, Provo River Trail

26.4 miles, 4:17:36, 9:45 pace, Ogden Marathon

Mountain Bike - Spring is in the air...

*

So I've got this old GT Aggressor 1.0 that I've had for years--and loved. I've been upgrading the components on it for some time--I've documented some of that here on this blog.

I love my triple triangle--I really do! I don't know that you could damage the frame if you wanted to. We've been through a lot, that bike and I.

But it's old.

And it doesn't have the disc brake mounts for the rear wheel.

And that's pretty much the deal right there.

And, since I upgraded the fork, it's a bit tall for my liking.

I don't know though...

Is a disc brake setup on the back-end all that important to me?

One thing's for sure: I worry too much about stupid stuff.

It sure would be nice though.

Rainy Day Ruminations...

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Two nights ago, before heading to bed, I turned on the TV and flipped over to the Universal Sports channel. There were re-broadcasting Monday's Boston Marathon. I had a bunch of friends running that race and while I was at work I kept up on their progress via the World Wide Web. Later, when I had gotten home and had more time, I learned that both Ryan Hall and Kara Goucher had placed 3rd overall in their respective genders.

I wasn't really surprised with that--an American hasn't won Boston for quite some time--1983 for the men with Greg Meyer and 1985 for the women with Lisa Larsen-Weidenbach.

Still, Ryan and Kara were big-time contenders to finish first at Boston this year. Even more amazing, in my mind anyways, was the fact that this was Kara Goucher's second marathon. Ever. Her first was the New York City Marathon back in November of last year where she also finished 3rd.

While Ryan Hall dropped back from the leader somewhere in the Newton Hills, Kara Goucher maintained her position in the lead pack until the very end. Only in the last mile did she drop back, and even then it was only a few feet. Ultimately she finished 9 seconds behind the winner. Ryan Hall finished 58 seconds back of the men's winner.

Both performances were amazing. Ryan's average pace for the full 26.2 miles was 4:57! Kara's was 5:49! I couldn't go a single mile at that pace without keeling over and throwing up a lung, a kidney, and my liver. 4:57!

I've got 4 kids--3 of which ask me occasionally when I'm going to BQ so that we can go to Boston. Yes, they've all assumed I'm going to drag them right along with me. And I will. Many of the stories I've heard from my friends who have been highlight what an incredible experience it was having their family there with them. I couldn't imagine going out there alone.

But I'm getting old and I'm not as motivated as I ought to be. I really need to be able to run 7:30's (26 of them) to qualify and I'm not there.

Running is a metaphor for life. I'm sure there's a metaphor out there somewhere that I ought to apply to running. Between the two metaphor's, maybe I'll get it right. Someday.

My Disneyland essay...

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or, How I spent Spring Break…

or, What I did on my first vacation in who knows how long…

First things first. Single fathers should never—ever—take 600+ mile trips with their 18 and 21 year old daughters. You will say things that you’ll wish you never had. And even if you don’t, they’ll hear something and turn it into something you’ll wish you never said—even though you really never said it.

Kidding...!

Still, it was fun. I wouldn’t change it for anything.

The last time I was at Disneyland was 10 years ago when we were in California for my great-grandmother’s 100th birthday. My baby girl was somewhere around a month or two old. That’s all I’ve allowed myself to remember. She was due to go back. I was due to go back. We were all due to go back as a family. Well, mostly.

The oldest and her baby (my grandkid) ended up coming with us at the last minute and I’m so so so so so so glad they did. We had a ball. And that grandkid of mine is so so so so so so stinking cute! She looks just like me!

We drove down to St. George Friday night and spent about 6 or so hours napping in my brother’s in-law’s house. It’s good to have family who have family who have a house you can crash in once in a while. Up and on the road by 5:00 so we could be in Henderson, NV by 7:00 for breakfast at the in-law’s of my sister. It’s good to have family who have family that will feed you breakfast!

From Henderson we drove to Corona, CA where we stopped for lunch. Some of us ate at a Taco Bell, some at a Subway, and some at the Mad Greek. Some may have gone somewhere else, but I don’t know for sure. We had about 3 hours to kill until our hotel rooms in Anaheim would be available—what can you do in Corona for an hour or three? Fortunately, we didn’t really have to find out. A quick call to the hotel revealed that one of the four rooms was ready. And off we went.

I don’t recall much more than that about our first day there. I think we ran over to a In and Out Burger joint for dinner and then later we had a family meeting to discuss the next morning’s events and schedule.

The next 3 days were spent inside Disneyland and California Adventure wandering around, riding rides, chasing kids, and getting sore and tired feet. Seriously, walking around Disneyland for one day hurt my feet and legs more than the 50k I ran on Antelope Island 3 weeks ago!

I enjoyed Star Tours. Got wet on Splash Mountain. Experienced whiplash on the Indiana Jones ride. Was impressed with changes on Space Mountain. Heard more than my fair share of It’s A Small World. Loved Pirates of the Caribbean. Screamed on Screamin’. Felt totally cool on Soarin’ over California. Got a little claustrophobic on the Nemo Subs. And a bunch of other stuff too. All right along with the best company a guy could ask for.

I haven’t done anything with the pictures yet but I will. There’s about 100 of them I need to sort through.

The baby was a perfect angel the whole time. Most of the time. She was jabbering quite a bit on this trip! She met goofy and one of the Fairy God-Mothers.

Wednesday dawned and we headed home. This time I had the two older girls, the grand kid, and the boy. If traveling 600+ miles with your older daughters is a bad idea, traveling with them and your teenaged son is even worse! We had a blast even if our patience was running a bit thin.

The snow really started to fly as we left Beaver, UT. Had to stop at the gas station at Cove Fort to clean the ice off the headlights. Ended up staying there for a bit while the weather let up. Don’t know that it actually did, but we took off anyways and found the weather greatly improved up the road a bit. Ran into more snow at Nephi, UT and drove through near white-out conditions from there all the way home. 30 to 40 miles an hour and the snow just kept coming. Woke up Thursday morning to find about 5 inches outside and many trees and branches in the area had broken or fallen under the weight of the snow.

It was good to be home though. Really good. Still, I wouldn’t have minded staying in CA a few more days—soaking up the sun, hitting the beach, visiting good friends…

Oh well. There’s always August.

I so love my kids!

2009 Buffalo Run

Tomorrow morning, at 3:00 a.m., I'll be waking up and driving up to Antelope Island for the 2009 Buffalo Run. I'm participating in the 50k race that begins at 8:00 a.m. I'm hoping to finish in under 8 hours. That puts me finishing at 4:00, right?

I should be sleeping.

I've put together two drop bags as there are only two aid stations I'll be running through--the start/finish area which I'll go through to start and finish (duh!) and at mile 15.5, and a station called Elephant Head at about mile 5.2 and 10.5 and then again on the second loop around the course. It's a two lap deal.

My longest run this month has been just over 7 miles. I think I'm in trouble.

I'm a bit anxious.

But not nearly as anxious as I am about Finley's baby blessing on Sunday. It's at the ex-MIL's place and a whole slew of the ex-IL's are going to be there. Don't know why I'm fretting over it so. It's not like they're going to ostracize me--that's already happened. Still, all the worrying I've been doing over it the last few days is giving me an ulcer.

I thought I was done with the baby blessing thing 10 years ago.

Ten years ago I thought a lot of things...

I need to go to bed. Three o'clock is going to come way too early. I wonder if I could wait til 4...

I brought the mountain bike down from the cabin last weekend. It's set up on the work stand back in the TV room. I really need to upgrade the shifters, chain, and the rear cassette. $180 bucks just for those three items IF the derailleurs are compatible. If they're not, add another $120 or so. More if I have to pay to have someone install the stuff. I'd like to think I'll be fine doing it myself though. I think I'll need to buy a chain whip tool thing though...

OK, I'm going to bed.

Well, I'm gonna try to go to bed...

Awkward Silence...

Haven't blogged in a while cause I really haven't had much to say. Of course by saying that I'm implying that I've had something to say before when we all know that's preposterous. My blog, to date, has been mindless drivel that has, more or less, leaked out of my left ear and made its way onto my blog by way of my finners.

The whole blog thing... Don't know exactly where it started (lie) or why I thought it would be a good idea (true), but here it is. I know it started as a place to bemoan and whine about how unfair life has been. I've thrown in a few posts about my running aspirations, car repairs, bike upgrades, and exploits with the children; but this just hasn't ever really been what I thought it would be.

I think it's my computer's fault. If I had a better computer, maybe the blog thing would be better. Maybe I'd be more inspired.

Maybe.

Back to the bike upgrades, I'd like about $400 to upgrade a few more things on my mountain bike for the 2009 season.

Car repairs? Been busy there too. Thanks to You Tube I've completely cleaned the throttle body and replaced the upper motor mount on my Saturn. It's amazing how much better the car seems to run with just the replacement of the motor mount. One of these days I'm going to actually find out how much money I saved doing that myself.

I've registered to run the Buffalo Run 50K next month. March 28th. Antelope Island. I'm excited although you wouldn't know it by the amount of training I put in today. Zero. Had numerous opportunities too. Let 'em all slide right on by. It's my computer's fault. I bet if I had a better computer I'd be more motivated.

A garden snake snuck into the house recently. I'm thinking February is a bit on the cold side of the year to be finding snakes around; but I guess if they're going to be around, inside the house would be where they'd be. It was kind of funny though. Mom wanted to find an old scrap book and went into the bedroom in which they were stored. As she opened the door, this thing fell from the top of the door frame and bounced off her landing on the floor. Turned out it was a decent sized garden snake. It's a good thing mom didn't realize at first what it was or I may have had to call 911. It all makes me a bit nervous... How many more snakes are calling the inside of this house home?

Went snowshoeing again today.

Alone.

Dad said he was a bit worried about me on account of a mountain lion sighting he and mom had a while back.

He didn't tell me he was worried about that until I got back though.

Lost my camera in the snow.

Found it.

Didn't make it up to the Timpooneke Road as I had planned due to exhaustion, but I was close. Real close.

The snow was so deep where I turned around that, even with snowshoes on, my feet were sinking in the snow up to my knees!


I enjoyed being the first one to traipse through the freshly fallen snow, but it sure was a workout. My legs are going to hurt tomorrow.

I almost didn't go. Glad I did. Probably should have gone to work though. At least for half a day.

Oh well.

Good times.

I need some good pants to wear snowshoeing...

Snowshoeing

I've been wanting to go snowshoeing with the boy for a while but things have just never come together. The weekend rolls around and he's off snowboarding or hanging with his buds, or I've got something going on--there's always something.

So earlier in the week I mentioned to the boy my intent to go snowshoeing on Saturday, and he said OK. So Friday night when I picked him up he had two of his buddies in tow--left me thinking, "so much for snowshoeing...".

Well, we didn't go as early as I had planned, but we did make it up to the canyon sometime around 2 or 3. The drive up the canyon had rain falling on the windshield pretty much the whole way, but as soon as we pulled into the Dell the rain turned to snow. We checked in with my folks, donned the snowshoes, and headed up the Bear Canyon trail.

About 3/4ths of the first mile was fairly well traveled with packed snow--could have done without the snowshoes, but the remainder of the trail was mostly unspoilt snow. We got to the fork in the trail, about a 1/4 mile from the Timpooneke Road when the boy had had enough.

On the way down, the boy wanted to go off trail and down the side of the mountain. We did. (Note to self: don't forget to put in the contact lenses and to empty your pockets next time. I didn't lose anything, but I was worried about it the whole time and my glasses were constantly fogged or fogging up. What a pain!) Anyways, we rolled, slid, crashed our way down the side of the mountain to where the trail switched back and then went back to the cabin.

We had a good time. I want to go back and do it again! I'd like some better pants though--denim jeans don't quite cut it. And I can't forget to ditch the glasses and put in the contacts next time either! And empty the pockets!

We saw no wildlife, but we did pass a couple of guys from the granola crowd as they were heading down the trail. They had gone up sans snow shoes and I noticed from their tracks that they both had little feet. Smaller than mine even.

I wonder if people following my footsteps stop and think, "Man! That dude has averaged sized feet!"

Would it be bad for me to go back up there this afternoon by my lonesome and go for a hike?