Uber me, take 2!

Hmmm, last post on Sept 13, 2012.

Now it's March 13, 2014. So I've been busy and stuff.

Update on the last year and a half. I was running strong into the winter of 2012 – 2013. Then I managed to blow out my left ankle about as badly as possible. At one of my physical therapy sessions I was doing lunges in front of my therapist. She casually remarked, “If you were anyone else in the world you would be spraining your ankle on every step but it doesn't seem to bother you.” Yeah, that bad.

So after over a year with no exercise, heck I could barely walk on gravel last summer, I'm baaaaack. I had made the decision to have surgery on the ankle but now I'm not so sure. So I'm trying to see just how much I can do and how much I need to do.

How to start...again....hmmm.

Biking, of course. That's a no brainer.

Running. Chi running. Slowly but I have to do it. I can't do without. Hell, I dream about it.

Focus T25 by Beachbody. Gotta love some Shaun T yelling at you about your core at 530 am.

So, there you have it. Here we go again.

SUAR 10 Questions

One of my favorite blogs is Shut Up and Run. It's irreverent, full of great information, funny, and frequently about farts so the 10 year old in me thinks its awesome from that point alone.
In her post yesterday she answered the 10 questions below and asked folks to answer them in their next post so here goes:

Best run ever? Geez, that changes every few days! My current answer is my run in Kanawha State Forest a few days ago. On the trail section I felt like Daniel Day-Lewis in Last of the Mohicans and I ate up the climb with a huge grin on my face.

Three words that describe your running? Easy, light, and smooth. OK, that's actually three words I hope will someday describe my running.

Your go-to running outfit? Asics shorts, and a NorthFace shirt. Add a bandana and I'm ready to head out.

Quirky habit while running? Singing while I run on my recovery runs. It helps me make sure I'm running at the right pace.

Morning, midday, evening? Usually midday or evening. I'm am definitely not a morning person. Nothing against morning, it just comes too early in the day. If morning started around noon, I'd totally be a morning person.

I won’t run outside when it’s ____________No answer here. I don't care what it's doing out there or what time it is. I'll run whenever I have to.

Worst injury—and how you got over it. Messed up left knee from my coach changing my stride. I got over it by waiting for years and years while it healed.

I felt most like a badass mother runner when _________ I can pass my dog. Just read the title of the blog and you'll understand this.

Next race is __________The Canary in the Cave 25K in November. Never ran anything close to this distance in a race so it ought to be interesting.

Potential running goal for 2013? Run a ½ marathon and a marathon (or longer). The trail running thing is keeping me going!

Review: Asics Gel Fuji Racer

First of hopefully many gear reviews! I paid for these shoes with my own hard earned money and am in no way affiliated with the Asics shoe company. The review is my personal opinion and if you buy a pair of these shoes, this review may or may not be consistent with your own experience.

Back into the world of running I go. So, I needed a pair of shoes. Now there's a huge outlay of cash no matter what you do. Even with all the info from Born To Run about how cheap shoes are actually better than the mega high dollar, pronation control, cyber chip implanted, spring loaded wunderkin shoes so readily available today I still went online shoe shopping for a “real” pair of trail shoes. Old habits die hard!

My usual online favorite for running shoes is Runners Warehouse. They have a large selection, tend to have good prices, and ship overnight. That last part is just the little kid in me wanting it NOW! I just plain think it's cool that I can order from California and get it delivered to me on the dirt road I live on in West Virginia the next day.

When I last ran I was generally a fan of Asics so I was psyched when I read in Runner's World Trail magazine that Asics had a new light, low drop trail shoe that was highly reviewed. Being a big boy, most of the time anyway, I know that good reviews from willowy, lightweight, high level runners don't always translate to real world Clydesdales like me. I decided to give a pair of Fuji Gel Racers a go anyway, plus they came in purple which, as we all know, is the color of royalty. When the royal running shoes came I anxiously pulled them from the box and had a holy shit kind of moment. I wear a size 13 or 14 shoe and I gotta say, a size 14 in purple makes a statement!

Gel Fuji Upper

If you've ever worn a pair of Asics these shoes will feel like old friends. It has perfectly snug fit in the heel and is fairly roomy in the toe box. The material is very breathable and drains well in wet conditions. I sweat a lot and my feet tend to stay moist from sweat draining down my legs and my feet doing their own impression of a trickle sprinkler system. The front and sides of the toe box are coated with a thin layer of plastic to protect the shoe and provide a slight amount of protection from kicking random rocks along the way. They also have a cool little pouch at the top of the tongue to hold your laces after you get them tied up which is a great feature for the more technical trails so the laces don't catch on sticks and brush as I run by.

Gel Fuji Midsole

The Gel Fuji has very minimal cushioning with a forefoot rock plate but the amount of cushioning seem minimal on moderately rocky trails. They don't provide a tremendous amount of stabilization and can feel a little loose when it comes to technical trails. 

 

Gel Fuji Sole

The lugs on the sole do a great job of gripping the trail and the shoe rides very well in all conditions. The purple insets in the sole help to drain, aerate, and dry the shoe. A great feature given my swamp foot condition. On the flip side in very wet conditions or standing water they can also let water in. The heel to toe drop is 6mm giving the shoe a fairly flat feel.

Nitty Gritty

Even though the sole can feel a little thin on rocky trails I really like this shoe as I always have with the Asics line. They are extremely comfortable in all the conditions I wore them in are and are very durable. They don't have any apparent wear and other than being a little dirty. The sole looks like new even after 100 miles.

I don't run any significant distance at this point so I can't truly report on the Gel Fujis ability to endure epic distances. The longest run I've done it these is 10 miles so take that into account if you're considering a pair of Gel Fujis, but that aside I would definitely buy another pair of these for shorter training runs. I mean, when you find a comfortable, durable pair of shoes that come in purple you just gotta jump on it, right?

Veggie roadkill

This road trip to my wife's alma mater has driven home the point of having to really mean it to be vegetarian. I didn't really want to carry a cooler around during the trip to keep food in so I was gonna be going wild and crazy from a dietary standpoint.

I do eat fish so if pressed I can always roll through a fast food drive-thru and pretend I'm eating a decent meal. Yes, I know they have salads. Most of them are...well, just not too good. I'm sure they're better than the processed fish thing on a bun but some times you just have to damage your body for the sake of keeping the damn car moving down the highway. Luckily, my wife is pretty understanding about my strange eating habits so we compromise on Subway whenever possible. At least when I order a veggie sandwich they know what to put on it.

Pit stop on the road. Twizzlers are a vegetable, right?

 The most interesting part of this weekend should be the various get togethers, especially the Chili dinner at one of the coaches houses. I don't expect folks to go out of their way to accommodate my veggieness, especially folks I don't know who I'll probably never see again. There was no box to check on the are you coming form for, “my spouse is a veghead”. I've already lost the ability to process animal proteins so I'm not just gonna plunge in hoping for the best (that was not a pleasant experience when I discovered that little tidbit of knowledge). Anyone who's been vegetarian for a while knows what I'm talking about. You find yourself wishing you had more reading material in the bathroom.

The first time I was vegetarian I went to a family gathering at my Grandmother's house. Now, my Grandmother was an old school central Ohio granny who didn't do vegetarian. Salad was what your dinner ate. PETA stood for People Eating Tasty Animals. After a long discussion, actually more of a negotiation, about what exactly I could eat during the visit without having to live in that little bathroom by the backdoor of her house for a day or two, we settled on spaghetti. Now that should be fairly harmless, right? Grandma was known for her delicious meat sauce so that was her go to option. I had to explain to her that no matter how little meat she put in it (“Grandpa will raise a stink if I don't put enough in,” she said)I would still get sick. I finally, convinced her to just make a small pot of plain sauce for me.

I'll never forget coming into the kitchen through the back door and smelling that awesome aroma that only your Grandmother's cooking can generate. I can still flashback to that moment in my mind the smell was so incredible. My aunt gave me a big hug and showed me to the stove when the sauce was bubbling away like some magic pot of goodness. She pointed out my small pot of veggie sauce and the massive cauldron of the “real sauce”. The cauldron had an inch or so of fat from the pork and beef that was simmering away in the depths of the sauce. As I turned away my aunt tasted my pot and said it needed, “something to pep it up”.

The next few seconds were something like the slow motion beginning of an action movie where the hero is helpless to stop his best friend/wife/child/parent from being killed by the bad guy who gets it in the final scenes. As I turned to greet the rest of my extended family I saw my aunt grab a coffee mug and scoop just the fat from the cauldron and pour it into the pot of veggie sauce. “There,” she said, “that should pep it up.” When my anguished cry stopped she asked as innocence as a babe, “What's the matter? I didn't add any of the meat.” So, instead of awesome sauce sans meat it was plain spaghetti with butter and garlic for me.

Let's hope things go a little better for me the next couple of days. At least there's always a Subway nearby in big cities.

Do you have strange eating habits that make travel more interesting?

Are Twizzlers a vegetable? 

On the road again

My wife and I are on a 3 day road trip to her college reunion so I find myself running in new and unique places. My last post discussed my sheer dumb luck at living in a place that is so trail dense. This little session of on the road again will have me running in new and distinctly non-trail areas.

After a delightful miscommunication that led to several more hours of late, late night driving through the beautiful remote farmland of Ohio, by remote I mean no hotels, not the middle of nowhere where I live in West Virginia, we got to the hotel around 130 AM. So, there goes the whole athlete's need eight hours of sleep crap. I managed to sleep about five-and-a-half hours and popped out the door of the hotel a little after 7 AM to get in some miles.

Now, at 130 AM I'm not always at my best so I missed that fact that the hotel was in one of those charming light industrial parks that are so ubiquitous in major cities. I trotted off after crossing six lanes of distinctly runner unfriendly traffic and into the industrial wasteland. We also happened to be near the airport which just added to the ambiance of the whole experience. The best part of my surrounding was the fact that most of the industrial park was deserted so I didn't have to worry about those pesky cars trying to get in my way.

Where I actually was...

Where I wish I was...

Being a birdwatcher amongst my many other geeky habits, and believe me that is a long list, I frequently bird by ear as I run. Through my descent into the wacky, weird world of serious birdwatching I learned to identify the common birds of my area just by their calls. The strange part of my run was the complete lack of bird calls. Even early in the morning in an area that Mother Nature was doing her damnedest to reclaim there were apparently no birds awake yet. All I had to keep me company were crickets and cicadas. Finally, after a couple of miles I heard, “the distinctive descending whinny of the Downy Woodpecker.” That's one of the first calls I ever learned and that description from Birding by Ear, Vol 1 (yes, there is more than one volume) is forever burned into my brain. Later, I did hear a Starling doing an imitation of a Red-shouldered Hawk but I think he just had visions of grandeur.

I suppose I could have driven to a nearby park to run but I really wanted that authentic urban running experience. Well, not really. I just didn't want to wake my wife and explain why I was taking the car. She didn't get her eight hours of sleep either. While any run is a great experience, there are always some that are better than others. Today really drove home the point of how lucky I am to live where I do. The next time you head out on your favorite trail for a romp through the woods remember to thank the fates that you can!

Do you run on trails or roads?

What's your favorite urban running experience?

On the trail again!

Besides the book Born To Run that brought me back to running, it was also the idea of trail running. I'm not much of a hiker, just ask my wife, but the thought of busting down a trail is a totally different mental concept to me. It's more than just a faster version of hiking. It's becoming one with the trail, taking what it gives you, and blending in a way that is incredibly spiritual.

Today I had a chance encounter with a trucker passing through my home town. I was coming out of Walmart and saw him stretching after a run next to his rig. I walked over just to comment to him on how I didn't think I'd ever seen a trucker running anywhere in all my travels around the country. He admitted he was one of a very small minority but it helped to break up the tedium of his day and he needed the exercise after hours behind the wheel. He said he ran mostly along highways and back roads since he couldn't take too much time to look for a perfect place to run.

It got me to thinking about exactly how lucky I am to have a wealth of trails to run on near my home. I have definitely taken for granted the fact that I live adjacent to a national park, a national recreation area, and countless state parks all of which have a plenitude of trails for my happy little feet to run on. I can run on flat trails, steep hilly trails, technical trails, rails-to-trails, I mean you name it I have it nearby.

One of my favorite local trails.

 All of this got me to thinking...would I be running again if I didn't have so much trail access? As you know from the title of the blog and my previous posts, running with my dog Skye is a big part of my running experience. I have to believe that if I was running in an urban environment I probably wouldn't run with Skye nearly as often as I do. There is also that sense of discovery that comes with trail running. I'm an avid birdwatcher and I keep track of the birds I hear as I run. The other wildlife I catch a glimpse of as I cruise through the woods brings an even bigger smile to my face than I already have. I run along rivers I've been rafting and kayaking for years. Their rapids are like old friends I greet as I run past. Having lived in this area for more that 30 years the area itself has become a part of me. The mountains of the Appalachians speak to me like a neighbor I pass on the streets of Fayetteville.

I like to think I probably would still be a runner without trails at my very doorstep but it's the trails that keep me lacing up my shoes every day to get out the door and try to keep up with the dog.

What's your favorite trail you've ever experienced?

Have you ever seen a trucker running?

Running with the not so big dog, Part 1

As you should be able to garner from the name of my blog, my dog plays a large part in my journey back. Skye is my first animal shelter dog and definitely won't be my last. When my sons and I went to the pound to look for a new dog the pens were filled with yapping, howling maniacs that must have known what waited for them if they didn't get a pardon. We walked down a long row of pens without spotting a dog that had that special something that you just know when you see it. I've found that I make snap judgments about people and animals that usually are correct. Job interviews with me are a real hoot. “Hello, my name is Bob”, they'll say, obviously lacking that special it. “Thanks for coming”, I say. 

The catdog on guard.

Down the far side of the pens we walked discussing the various dogs we passed. As we came to the end of the row, there she was. Sitting quietly and watching us. When we paused she put her paws up on the pen door and stretched, wagging her tail. “This is the one”, I told the boys and they agreed. As it turned out she was a recent arrival and we had to wait a day to make sure her MIA owner didn't come looking for her. When we came to pick her up she quietly sat as I put the leash on her and took her to the car.

Once we got her home we discovered a few things about her that weren't outwardly obvious. One was that she was quite proficient at barking...at almost anything that came down our road, and other dogs, and sirens, and well you get the idea. Another odd thing about her is that she is a cat dog. She may look like a dog but in many ways acts like a cat. For instance, she likes to look out windows and will lay anywhere that allows her to accomplish that goal. The back of the couch, the bedside table, etc. I've never had a smallish dog before so this may just be a factor due to her size. Our Golden Retriever and Lab wouldn't have fit on either of those two options so I guess they just never thought of it. 

Trying to guilt me into a run

Ultimately, the best thing about her is she loves to get out and run! I've never really run with a dog on a regular basis. The Golden Retrievers we've had were interested in running as long as there was something to retrieve at the end of the sprint. The Lab was kind of the same way but she tended to lose interest mid run and just look at you. “What was I doing out here in the yard?”, her expression would seem to say. Skye is another matter completely. She isn't much of a retriever although she will play the game for a brief time. She absolutely goes crazy when I put on a pair of running shorts. She begins to jump vertically, bouncing her way around me. Normally I put her on a leash when we go outside so she doesn't run next door and visit with the cows and George the guard donkey (she and George have a thing going on, but that's another story). When we're going running she goes straight to the car and waits for me to open a door so she can take her position in the passenger seat.

Do you run with a dog?

Who is the leader on the run, you or the dog?

Leashed or unleashed?