From Ultra to Ultra

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After not doing a running race for two years, I was fortunate to ‘PR’ a half marathon (that I rode my bike to!) and even improved on my best marathon time during Vineman this year. Yay! It’s a amazing what a little extra effort and some speed work will do, isn’t it?

In an attempt to keep some momentum from this year through the winter (and not gain a ton of weight!) I’m signed up for my first ultra run the High Desert 50k in Ridgecrest, CA. As of now, our Swarm! crew of cyclists turned runners is heading out there 5 deep. It’s fitting because it is not far from Death Valley and the Furnace Creek 508 course, which is the last event most of us have done.

Ultra-running is appealing for a number of reasons. The most obvious is that it parallels the type of cycling I do. Not just in distance or time, but in the philosophy that the journey is as, or more important, than the destination. Sure, people run in circles in ultra-runs (A 3-mile loop 33 times? No thank you.), but many of them are point to point. Oh, and almost all of them are on trails. In beautiful places. With only hundreds of people. Much, much different than, say, the Los Angeles marathon with its 40,000 people pounding the pavement.

The question is, can I still get away with only running three times a week? I think I can. Will I have to do really long, slow runs that take all day? As of now, I don’t think I will. The idea is to use long races to build up to even longer ones. I’m already eying the Avalon 50 miler that takes place on Catalina island in January. Is the goal to run a 100-miler? Yes, it is. More on that in another post.

If anyone else is with me here, I’ve compiled some resources (with daylight savings time making it dark before 5pm I’m having trouble leaving the house so this is what I do). First is No Meat Athlete’s 63 Ways to Shake Up Your Running Routine. Got to keep it fun. There are a few magazines like Ultrarunning and Trail Running to keep the stokedtivity levels high. Ultrunr.com has the most information for training for longer runs and this NY Times article discusses ‘pushing past the pain’.

Are you ready to sign up for a long run? The best listing of ultras I’ve found is at ultrasignup.com. I especially appreciate that they show the logo for each race. Maybe it’s the punk in me who loves show fliers! It says so much about what the race is like. Also ultrarunning.com has a calendar with a bunch of races.

I’ll be sure to post updates about my training, though it’s getting down to the wire. I had some trouble getting out to run in Boston (rain) and New York (got tattooed), but am still feeling confident. Safe riding and running! See you out there. And don’t forget to sign up for my twitter if you haven’t already done so.

Los Angeles stuff this weekend

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I’m a little late on this as some it starts in fewer than 12 hours, but hey, that’s how I roll. The first is Saturday morning’s LA premiere of Ride the Divide, a documentary about the Tour Divide mountain bike race 2700 miles, mostly off-road, from Banff, Canada to the Mexican border. Through the Rockies. Unsupported. Awesome. I’ve ridden most of the route as a bike tour from the Canadian border to Silver City, NM. Like the ride, my my blog posts about it are unfinished. Here’s the trailer:

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=9654326&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=1&color=&fullscreen=1&autoplay=0&loop=0

Ride The Divide Movie Trailer from Ride The Divide on Vimeo.

Later on Saturday is the Tour De Fat in the Not A Cornfield state park in Chinatown/downtown. I’m not exactly sure what it is. Sort of a ride maybe, but mostly a beer party? Biking In LA does the best job of explaining what happens that I’ve read. Check it out.

There’s also a half-marathon on Sunday right here in LA. I normally wouldn’t promote such a corporate event, but the site says, ‘Take a Running Tour of the Real LA!’, which I appreciate. A lot! It hits the eastside of the city which is near where I live and it starts in Griffith Park, my favorite place to run.

Now if I can get over the Yankees losing and actually leave the house maybe I’ll see you at one of these events. Ride safe this weekend!

Badwater Ultra-marathon

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I’m here helping with the Badwater 135-mile Ultra-marathon and the top runners are finishing- just over 24 hours after they started. I’m updating regularly on the Swarm! twittersphere and there’s always the AdventureCORPS webcast (run from where I’m sitting right now).


The distances these runners cover and the landscape they cross…there really are few words to describe it. Driving the course at 4am and seeing folks running up hill, so touching! I get all choked up seeing people look confident and smiling after running 100 plus miles. In Death Valley. In the summer.

Yep, a pink tutu. He rules. Pennsylvania native and past finisher!

Los Angeles native and past champion Jorge Pacheco running up Townes Pass

Last years champion Farinazzo getting the full pit crew treatment on Townes Pass
Jorge descending Townes pass

A top five racer gets an ice bath before taking on the last 13 miles to Whitney Portal


Sauvie Island half marathon

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I can’t remember the last time I did a running event! At least two years. When I was mapping out my training for Vineman I thought it’d be a good idea to run a half marathon in late June or early July. And what better place than near Portland, Oregon? The Foot Traffic Flat takes place on Sauvie Island (Sauvie means delicious berries) 15 miles north of Portland.


So we, as in famous artist Lacy J. Davis and I, decided to ride our bikes there, duh. Yes, I love to ride bikes and I’m an environmentalist blah blah blah…but there’s only one bridge onto the island. Lots of cars. It just made sense to ride! The last 3 miles we rolled past bumper to bumper traffic. AND it was a great ride and a good way to warm up. I suggested this to the race organizer but he didn’t think it likely anyone else would ride…

The blue behind us is part of the un-ironic background but the blue behind that is real sky blue.

After locking our bikes to a barn and eating some fruit, the half was ready to start. I started with my friend Eben, who works at the 7th Friendliest Store in Portland, who just ran a fast half the weekend before. Needless to say I let him go after the first mile. By mile two I realized that the majority of my running races have been the LA marathon and this race is the exact opposite, in a good way! Since I don’t have a watch and only recently began pacing at a track I was nervous about my time. Was I going too fast? Too slow? I set the timer on my iPhone and checked it at mile 3 and mile 6. Turns out I was running just about 7.5 minute miles, as I hoped.

St. John’s bridge, looking south.


There’s no coasting in running! I’d find myself lost in my thoughts and my pace slowing…and I’d have to catch myself and see where I was. Runners may be worse than cyclists in avoiding hills, but the monotony of the flat course was getting to me. I like hills! I felt good at mile 10 so I picked it up and finished in the punk rock time of 1hr 38min. Eben finished about 4 minutes ahead for 107th place overall. If he knew, he probably would of let that one person pass so his time could be punk and 108. Lacy finished the 5k, her first running race, in 28min30sec, not to mention the 30+ miles of riding. Awesome!

After some lounging and watching the fast marathoners come in we headed back toward Portland, but took a detour over the St. John’s bridge to eat at Proper Eats, which is basically a restaurant in a health food store. The service and smell are like you’d expect from a restaurant inside a health food store, but the food was terrific. Tempeh breakfast scramble!

Books!

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Recently I was in Powell’s ‘City of Books’ in Portland and while perusing the Food/Sustainability section I finally got to see in person, my good friend Temra Costa’s book about women in the sustainable food movement. Temra rules. We met, obviously enough, at a conference on food justice. She lived in Davis at the time I was traveling for work to Sacramento every few months or so and we’d hang out. She’s a super hard worker and very busy, so that often meant I was tagging along in what she was already doing- like scavengering the city for figs. Have you ever ate a fresh fig straight from the tree? She’d climb the tree, pick one and eat it, pass one down, which I would eat and then every third one would actually make it into the bike basket.


Also in this section was my friend Erik Knutzen’s book that he co-wrote with his wife, The Urban Homestead.


I ran into him last at the Echo Park Farmers Market (duh, right?) and they are working on a new book right now. I’ve been on a tour of his house during the 2009 Big Parade Staircase Walk and it is super amazing. A small farm right in the city!

Now any of you vegans out there know that the sustainable food movement not only includes animal products, but actively promotes them and are often anti-vegetarian. It’s very frustrating. Sustainability aside, it is still an ethical issue. As if eating local makes a difference to the animals raised and killed! I don’t want to be the militant vegan that no doubt has fueled the fire for localvores, in fact, I want to do the opposite. Vegans need to be more in touch with these folks and understand this movement, because it is a very important part of the puzzle.

The book I was looking for was On A Dollar A Day. I knew about the blog and hadn’t realized it was a book until a friend in Portland recommended it. Turns out that the authors are not only vegan, but old hardcore kids! (Out of context ‘hardcore’ kids sounds funny, it’s a sub-genre of punk rock that was very influential to me as a youth, and today).


Can someone eat on a dollar a day? What about on Food Stamp allocations? I love books where the authors are actively figuring something out as they write. You feel their struggle in trying to not only create meals from the resources they are limited to, but also to vegan-ize them. I’m most of the way through it and I highly recommend it.

The next day I was in the Powell’s that’s in the airport (Portland, I love you!) and what do I see? My friend Kalee Thompson’s book Deadliest Sea. Full circle, as she’s the partner of the guy who organizes the Big Parade Staircase Walk! On last year’s walk I had just started the book I am working on and I bugged her with a million questions about the process. I haven’t read this yet, but she’s a former editor of National Geographic Adventure (RIP!) and an awesome person so I know it’ll be good.

So stoked on my friends! And I can’t write a post about books and not mention Born To Run. I could not put this book down, except to go running. It’s about more than running and ultra-running, it’s anthropological in his look at the Tarahumara, but also about us, Western Culture. The author looks at the shoe industry and is not afraid to name names. It all comes together when a mysterious desert dweller organizes an ultra-run in Copper Canyon. So rad.


This book takes running out of the athletic realm. I see it now like back-packing or bike touring. We are born to run and to move, so get out and do it. I can’t wait to run an ultra-marathon, which I guess is obvious to anyone who knows me…

Ultra-ing

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I’m a regular reader of Jill Homer’s blog, http://arcticglass.blogspot.com. Who isn’t, really? She mentioned that her close friend Geoff (who makes an appearance in her book) ran the Western States 100 and since I just finished Born To Run and am all stoked on running I thought I’d read up on it. The dude set a course record besting Scott Jurek’s fastest time! When asked about it, Geoff had this to say, 

“Somewhere around mile 70 or 75, it started to feel good. I finally got warmed up, I guess.”


Awesome. Some lessons in that statement for amateurs such as myself. I recommend the entire article: http://rosevillept.com/detail/153188.html

Avoiding Overexposure

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Today was overcast and unseasonably not warm; a great day for a 2.5
hour run in Griffith Park. It's no secret that I live in LA primarily
for the sun, but I miss weather changes. Too much sun is monotonous!
I'm sure those of you in less awesome climates (anywhere not here I
imagine) have no pity for 'too much sun'. It's like photography,
everything gets washed out.
Anyway, this is a sketchy ladder that leads to a technical scrammble
on one of my favorite routes in the park. This still counts as
running, right?

Scott Jurek

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In case you have not seen it, ‘the Times’ has an article up about vegan ultra-runner Scott Jurek called, Diet and Exercise to the Extremes.

I met Scott Jurek in 2006 when I was helping at the 135-mile Badwater Ultramarathon, which he won. A super nice guy, I chatted with him and his crew about his vegan diet and his training. I wanted to get an interview, but it just didn’t work out.

The article mentions the 24 hour championships in France and I’ve found the live feed showing results. Looks to finish up at 1am, California time. Running in circles sounds absolutely miserable to me, but I imagine it is meditative in its repetitiveness. And it’s not like he only does these races; quite the opposite. The Western States 100 and other 100 milers are trail runs, getting out in nature way more than most runners ever do.

In this terrific ESPN article he says, in regards to coming across a bear during a race,

“That was scary, but it’s also part of why I prefer trail running…nature reminds us that there’s a greater force out there, and you have to respect that. It makes you feel pretty small.”

Awesome. I agree.

Thus Climbed Zarathustra

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From our good friend Stephen, the organizer of this and previous versions:

An urban cyclocross ride/race through the Eastside of Los Angeles where participants pedal to stairways, portage their bike and climb ’em, before heading to the next one. It’s fun, challenging (but do-able) and eye-opening: you’ll probably see parts of LA you haven’t. And if you don’t want to race, no problem. During the inaugural event a few folks stopped at a garage sale and picked up a messenger bag for cheap!

Fast folks should finish in 60 to 75 minutes and more leisurely riders can complete it in about 90 minutes or so. I think. Haven’t nailed down the course yet.

This is a Swarm! event.
The name? The first event was held on Nietzsche’s b-day.
The flier? Courtesy of Chris. He rules.

On the facebook at bit.ly/thusclimbed

History:
2008
2006