Looking foward to Sunday

Sunday will be a special day for me. It for one is my birthday. I have always been a big fan of birthdays for as long as I can remember. I find them extra special now with my kids since I guess I see them and that helps me remember to always try to be kid like no matter how old I am getting. My mom and dad always made my birthdays so special and I thank them.

Sunday is also London marathon day !!! Man year after year this race is so great. They hands down have the best pro fields. One thing that is great is that you can watch it live ( if you get up early ) on Universal sports. I for one will be up once more this year to watch to go. What a way to kick off my birthday I guess. Click on my link on the side bar to watch the race.

Lastly I will leave you today with a video from my all time favorite band. They have been the main soundtrack in my life since 1986. I have seen every show in MN since 1988 and each one has been great. The last one in 2008 was maybe the best ever. Thanks R.E.M for always being there for me.

Trail Running Camp

Ok this might be the funniest running ad I have seen in some time. Leave it to the Nike people to come up with it. Where you like there shoes or not you have to say they have the best ad's.


Nothing new to report with me. I have been taking it easy after last weekend. I just do not have much mojo going now ?

Two for two in a bad way

The title says it all. Man what a shitty end to this years Trail Mix 50k. I was pretty happy with how the first 2 1/2 laps went but man the last 1 1/2 laps sucked big time.

The weather was great and the footing dry for this years race. I was unsure how the race would go as I felt I did not get in enough longer runs coming into it. I like to have about 2-3 25+ mile runs before running a ultra. Now I did have many quality 20-21 mile runs but I knew a 10 mile increase would be tuff on me. I wore my heart monitor so I could keep myself in check as I wanted to get a solid run in but not one that was to hard on me. I did good with this aspect of my race as my average heart rate was 144 with a high of 164. My laps where 1:00:39, 1:00:00, 1:04:54, and 1:20:04. My pace slowed a bit about half way through the 3rd lap. It was also at this point that I could feel my growing start to hurt some. Now as a guy who has hernia surgery 2 years in a row I was not happy about this. I figured back off and get to the finish line without killing myself to much. Now the overall time and place was not what I was hoping for but it is what it is. I just need to stay positive and keep training hard up till Grandma's marathon in 9 weeks. I might cut the next 50k in May down to the 25k but we will have to see on that after some time passes. I will say I am not to happy that I have run personal worst at both races so far this year. I guess it is what it is.

You can find lots of good pictures from the race at skinny ski.com

Trail Mix 50k week

Man it is race week already. I would tell you I am fired up but if I did that I would be lying. I am excited to go out to the race but do feel pretty worried at times about how it will go. I guess that is just the side of me that wants to perform at a top level at all times and know that this needs to be a race that I train on thru to a certain degree.

To fill in last weekend I did get a good 11+ mile run in after work and felt real good !! I took Sunday off with all the craziness of Easter and all. We had a nice day with the kids. So at the end of the week I had 50 miles on 5 runs so a 10 mile ave. Not bad, could be better.

This week so far has been the week of baby jogger runs with Evan. What fun is it to be with my boy. Each run has been what Evan calls a lake park run. We run for 5 or so miles then play at the park by the lake then run some more. Everyone has fun huh. I will say that each year this pushing stuff does get harder. I feel like I am super tired after 3 days in a row of this. I am thinking I better lay off the jogger the next few days before the 50k.

Lastly I need to do my Trail Mix mens race preview. It looks to be a stacked race this year on the mens side. Plus with the full course open this year it should be great. I know of a few guys I train some with that are ready to roll. Joe Z, Tony Kocanda, and Nick Eugster. Plus I have heard that Wynn Davis is running as is John Storkamp I guess. Should be a barn burner to watch.

WOW What A Animal

So if you do not know by now I am a very big Ryan Hall fan. I think he is such a great marathon runner who has not even come close to what his best is. In my mind he has the ablility to someday run sub 2:05. I love the passion he seems to train with and the single focus he has when getting ready for the marathon.



Now sometime as you will see in this video he tends to talk alot about God and his views on God. I am for one not a big time church guy who goes week in week out. But I do respect people and their views on faith and figure we all can have our views at each of our own levals. To me Ryan is not over the top with his faith views. I do not feel like he is shoving it down on people. That's cool with me. I think we all need to have our own leval of faith, I know I have mine. Good luck to Ryan and all who run Boston this comming Monday !!!

Weekend Bound

TGIF I say. My week of training has been trying at times and I am very happy to be heading into the weekend. Unfortunately I have to report I did get a goose egg day after having a good 2+ week streak going. It was just one of those days where you just "run" out of time I guess. I am still sitting in a spot where I can still get my goal miles for the week. Coming into the week I was shooting for somewhere in the area of 65-70 miles. I think if I get in a solid long run and a easy medium day I will be right on. With Trail Mix 50k just about 1 week away I still want to get in good runs but not kill myself to bad. I am happy to report that the trails at Hyland are looking great and should be fun and fast for Trail Mix !! Ran there this morning with Paul, Joe Z and the boys. Man Joe and Nick are looking good and ready to roll in a week.

This week I have tried to run on trails as much as possible. I have had a few good runs at Hyland and the MN river bottoms. It has been a great week of seeing wildlife on the runs. I have seen tons of turkeys and deer. I even saw a HUGE beaver the other day which was way cool. One thing I have also seen durning these runs is that I do not have good trail legs. I feel like I am having to work to hard at times to climb. Plus when I climb my dam right knee is not pulling its weight as well. I had some problems with this last year as well. I know I need lots more time on the trails before I can maybe get back to the days of ripping them up. I think at this time I will just be happy to get thru Trail Mix and keep training. I know it sounds stupid but man I just want to feel even half of how I used to feel running. Maybe those are days of the past but I will die trying to get back there.

Lastly here is a very good video on Lopez Lomong I just saw on Flotrack. Check it out. He is one of the lost boys of Sudan. It is worth your 13 min's.

Boston is just days away.......

So one of the best races I have ever run and a day I look forward to each year is so so close. The Boston race is so special to me and I know everyone who has ever run it most likely feels the same. Here is a fun Ryan Hall video from Flotrack. Man I hope he lights it up.

What a weekend

Man I had a pretty good running weekend. After a nice run Friday with Evan and Sonya I met up Saturday with Paul and Nick at Tierneys woods for some hilly trail loops. Like I said it is just under 2 miles a loop but there is great single track trails and like 150 feet of climbing per loop so 75 feet per mile give or take. Does not sound like much but after many loops it does add up. By the time we got done we ended up with 9 miles of running then it was off to work for me. A nice way to start the day.

Today, Sunday I had a very good run with Paul out at Hyland Park. Man with the snow we got last night it made it very pretty but I will say that when running long that extra 3 inch's of snow does kick you in the ass some. We ended up with what I am saying was 21 miles in 2:47. This makes the 5th or 6 th 20+ mile run of this training cycle. I am very happy about that and looking to keep building on that.

I ended the week with 70 miles. That is back to back 70 miles weeks for me. Yea !! One more week of good training then a rest week leading into Trail Mix 50k.

For a good watch check out the Rotterdam Marathon which was run today. The 1st and 2nd guys both ran 2:04:24 !!! You can watch it here.

Keeping one foot in front

Man so have you or anyone you know had this crappy cough stuff ? We have had it at our house for like 2 weeks now. Sonya and I have seem to be hit the hardest. I will say it makes it very hard to get out the door for the run when your body feels that way. I have always wondered what is better, to run or to take time off ? Well I decided to keep running. So far I think I have my longest streak of days running going in sometime, a whopping 13 days ! I know that is not much but I am happy with it. So far I have had a pretty good week. Coming off my big week last week I am shooting for 70 miles. So far I am on pace for it.

This week has been highlighted by two good workouts. On Monday I did a good 6x 600 meter hill run. I did this run on the 50th street bridge by my house. I felt pretty good and strong for most of the hills. It was a nice night to run this and I was proud I did it even after all the people I thought I was going to run with did not come. My other good workout was last night. Now I figured this was going to be a big goose egg but Sonya bailed me out and shoved me out the door. After a 20 min warm up I did 4x 5 min @10k pace with 2 min rest. I was very happy with how smooth I felt.

After a nice easy recovery run today with Sonya and Evan it is on to the weekend. I am hoping for some good trail runs !!