Recovery and Alternate Transportation

Recovery from last weekend's Pineland Farms Trail Challenge 50-miler could not have gone better. I was back running painlessly by Wednesday (two days rest) and also threw in quite a bit of cycling to keep the legs moving. I find it hilarious each year as I come of a pretty good spring of running (by this point I would have already run a couple marathons and the Pineland 50K) how poorly running fitness translates to cycling fitness. I feel like I might as well sat on the couch all winter and spring. (This works also going from cycling to running). My legs are definitely not in cycling shape (yes, running 50 miles Sunday did not help, but that can not be my entire excuse.) I did use the bike for a couple commutes into work totaling roughly 62 miles on the bike in addition to 5-6 mile runs each day. It was good to get a couple hours of fitness in out doors during such a beautiful week.

I will be doing more of this alternate commuting over the summer as I not only try to get in better shape but to beat the man. You can complain all you want about high gas prices but if you keep driving your car to work and filling up the tank, the man is just laughing all the way to the bank. So find another way to get to work! L.L.Bean has partnered with GoMaine and in the month of June is offering employee incentives for alternative commuting, so I am planning on getting into that big time. Last week my bike in to work, run at lunch, and bike home left me with plenty of room for food, and I love food. This week I will get more into my usual routine of driving the bike into work, cycling home, and then running to work the next morning. This enables me to have ultimate flexibility in case I get stuck late at work or Kelly needs me to get the kids early.

Saturday I met Jamie at 6 AM for a run around Bradbury park. Our conversation centered mostly around our trip to the Western States 100, Jamie to run and me to pace him. I am really looking forward to seeing Jamie rock this course. He is so prepared, both mentally and physically. He should do really well out there! As always, running with Jamie is a blast and brings with it some peace as we tend to run together well and complement each other's ability. There isn't much guessing about pace or bio breaks. At 7 AM we met a larger group of Trail Monsters, including James from Massanutten Mountain 100 fame, Ian and Emma, and Jim. This group is a blast and we had an excellent time cruising around the course for the upcoming Bradbury Scuffle 6-Mile Trail Race. This is the first race in the three part Bradbury Race Series to be held this summer. The course is fun and fast and is a great introduction to what single track trail racing is all about. If you are around Father's Day weekend (June 15th) do this race! Our pace for the run was pretty easy as all of us were either recovering from 50 or 100 milers, but the camaraderie was high. This upcoming weekend the plan is to run a night run at Pineland, Friday night from 8 PM to Midnight. The more headlamps the merrier so hope to see you there.

Some other fun running stuff I came across last night while buying supplies for my pacing duty at Western States 100 and my own attempt at the Vermont 100...J.B. Benna's documentary on Dean Karnazes's 50 Marathons, 50 States, 50 Days was premiered out in CA, and while there is no future showing or DVD release dates, it is good to see it is ready...there is a cool looking documentary on Anton Krupicka, the winner of the Leadville 100 the past couple years, that I didn't know about, so if anyone has seen it I would love to hear about it...and I found a neat website that tracks running films that have been recently completed, in production, or recently abandoned, so check it out if you are looking for a flick about our sport.