Gold Mint trail

On Saturday, I needed a place to do a midlength run, and I wanted to take Daisy with me, since she hasn't had a chance to run with me very much. The sun was shining and it was pretty warm out (about 63 degrees), so I decided that we needed to do some trail running. Hatcher Pass is always beautiful, but winter comes early up there. I figured there would not be too many more opportunities to run up there before the snow fell, so that's where we went. 

I decided to do the Gold Mint trail for several reasons. Its beautiful and the first several miles are very runnable, with lots of water for the dog. Also, it isn't very far up into the mountains, so I figured it would still be pretty warm. I was right about that, it was 61 degrees at the trailhead, only a couple degrees cooler than the valley below us. Perfect running weather.

Lots of other people clearly had the same idea I did, as the parking lot at the trailhead was packed and we saw lots of people (and lots of other dogs) on the trail. Daisy had to stop and socialize with every dog we saw, and play in every puddle and stream and beaver pond, so we stopped a lot. 

My original plan was to run to the 4 mile marker and back. We were doing pretty good, but just before the 3 mile marker I stopped and bent over a little to untangle Daisy's leash, which had become wrapped around her leg. (Warning: TMI) Anyway, as I bent over, my mouth suddenly was filled with stomach acid, and I felt like I was going to vomit. Ewww. I hate throwing up worse than almost anything, and I will do just about anything to avoid it. Anyway, I didn't know why I suddenly felt like that, since my bending over wasn't really that dramatic, I started to worry that maybe I was getting sick, and there is no cell phone service out there, and you know, I started being a worrywart. I decided to turn around at the 3 mile marker instead, just in case. 

We made it back to the trailhead without incident, or further stomach issues, though. 

I love this trail.  Like I said earlier, the first 4 miles or so are very runnable. The first mile is wide and gravelled, and then it narrows gradually to single track. 

The scenery is always beautiful, regardless of the season, with lots of mountains, and the trail pretty much follows the river.

There are a few bridges, and some boardwalk:

This run was a lot of fun for both of us, and only a half hour drive from my house. Daisy was a dirty, tired pup at the end of it. Proof positive that it was a good run.

Not quite where I wanted to be... but I have a plan

This summer, I ran several races, and had expectations of my performance for each one. All summer long, I ran, and for each race, my evaluation of my performance was "did not meet expectations". I thought I had set reasonable goals, but was not able to meet any of them except the Trent/Waldrun half marathon in May. On that race, I wanted to be faster than 2:20, and my time was 2:18:18. That was awesome.

In June, I ran the Anchorage Mayor's Marathon, and wanted to be faster than 5:00. My time was 5:26:43. That was a miserable race for me.

In July, I ran the Angel Creek 50, and DNF'd at mile 30.

In August, I ran the Anchorage Runfest 49k, and wanted to beat 6:00. My time was 6:24:01.

In September, I ran A Day at the Beach, a 12 hour race, and I really wanted to get 50 miles, but I knew that everything would have to go perfectly for that to happen. My B goal was to do at least 10 laps, or 43 miles. I ran 41.7.

I didn't have a terrible summer. I did work A LOT, which not only made me fall really behind on blogging, but was part of the performance problem, I think. Other than that, though, it was actually a really good summer and I had a lot of fun. My mom came to visit:

And so did my 21 year old son:

I did a lot of running (I only missed 4 days),  and some backpacking:

I had a lot of fun this summer. And even during my races, I was having fun. Well, with the notable exception of the Mayor's Marathon in June. (You can read about that here).  I think there were a few things going on this summer though, that negatively affected my performance.

Maybe one of the biggest factors was work. I worked A LOT of overtime this summer. There were so many day where my training plan called for, say, an 8 mile run, and I was lucky to get 1 or 2 miles after a late day at work. My job is also super high stress, because the decisions I make have huge impacts on peoples' lives, It is really difficult for me, sometimes impossible, to not work the long hours. And both my family and my running suffer when I do.

Another factor was my diet. As many of you know, I lost a significant amount of weight a few years ago, and I've mostly kept it off, by becoming active, and mostly staying away from fast food and junk food. In the last year or so, though, I've let that slip a lot, and I've put on 10 to 15 pounds. Hauling the extra weight around has to affect my speed.

The other factor, that really is probably a big one, and that I let myself forget when I get frustrated with my performance is that I am really new to running. I ran some the summer of 2014, but 2015 is when I really started getting serious about it. I ran my first marathon just a year ago. And 3 of the races where I didn't do as well as I wanted this summer were firsts in terms of distance for me.

When I ran the Angel Creek 50, I'd never run further than 28 miles. That day, I ran 30 or 31 miles, and DNF'd because I got lost in the fog, and then slowed down so much I could not meet the cutoff.

When I ran the Runfest 49k, that was the first ultramarathon I had ever completed, and the furthest I'd ever run on pavement. I also ran the last 10 miles of that race with excruciating foot pain, and still was less than a minute per mile off my goal time.

When I ran the 12 hour race, that was the first time I had run further than 31 miles, and the first time I had ever run a race for time, and the setup was completely different than I had experienced before. Like really, I should be freaking proud of myself for running over 40 miles. Not beating myself up because I missed 43 miles by less than a mile and a half.

SO, I have a plan. It's sort of got 3 parts.

1. Manage my nutrition and training better. Get more strength workouts in, make time for longer runs, get enough sleep, and get back in control of my diet. That's the physical aspect, and one I can take total control of.

2. Manage my time better. Work smarter, not harder. Find ways to get things done faster, so I have to work less overtime. And sometimes, even if I don't get everything done, leave work anyway. It will still be there tomorrow, most of the time. I've been doing this long enough to know when it is really important enough to stay late for.  This not only gives me more time for my fitness, and for my family, but it will also reduce my stress.

3. Give myself a break. At mile 37 of the race this weekend, I was feeling all disappointed in myself, because I knew I wouldn't have time for another lap. I decided I wasn't going to run any more races until I got stronger and faster. But you know what? Instead of feeling disappointed, I should have been so amazed at myself. I was running MILE 37 of a race, and I was STILL RUNNING. I was still smiling, and I was still enjoying the run. At that point I had run 7 miles more than I'd ever run before, and way farther than most people ever will or could run. Why I let that negative self talk in, I don't know. I have to learn to be kind to myself.

And really, when all is said and done, I had a great summer. I spent time with family, I spent time outdoors in this beautiful Alaskan summer, and I did a whole lot of running. I just haven't had time to blog about it all yet, but I will. I'm grateful for all that I was able to do this summer, and I'm already planning next summer's adventures...

Oh, and there's a trail marathon coming up...

The Long Run

So, as I said in my last post, I had a really hard time with the Midnight Sun marathon. This really worried me because I have a 50 mile race coming up, and if I have trouble running 26.2, how am I going to run 50? The marathon was supposed to be the next to longest training run for the 50 miler, and it didn’t seem to bode well that I struggled so much.

The following weekend, my plan was to do a 31 mile trail run. I really had a hard time deciding where to do it. I thought the ideal thing would be a 10-15 mile loop, so I could have my own aid station at my car, but I couldn’t think of anything that was a long loop like that. I wound up deciding to do the Gold Mint trail in Hatcher’s Pass. The Gold Mint trail is about 8 miles long, and it goes gradually uphill, to the end where it suddenly goes up the side of a mountain to a bowl on the other side. I thought I could do the first 7 miles or so, then repeat.  I knew from a previous run that the first 4 miles are very runnable and I *assumed* that most of the rest was too. Hmm.

I just never get tired of this view.

I wound up going about 6 miles up the trail, which was a mistake. In the current, fairly wet conditions, a short way past the mile 4 marker, the trail becomes very muddy with large puddles to navigate. In addition there were lots of very rocky areas, streams to cross, and beaver dams to navigate around. I really wasted a lot of time between mile 4 and mile 6, and back to mile 4, hiking instead of running because of the terrain. It wouldn’t have been too much of a problem, except that I had told my hubby how long I thought I would be based on thinking I would be able to run most of it.

By turning around at mile 6, I only got 12 miles of trail, and I wanted 16. On the way back to the car, I  decided to turn around again at the 1 mile marker, run to the 3 mile marker, then turn  around again and head back to the car. That worked out great to get me 16 miles. I was going to then run from  the trailhead to the mile 4 marker and back twice, giving me the next 16 miles, but the last couple miles, it stared raining and didn’t look like it was going to stop. I knew the weather was better down in  the valley, so I decided to leave Hatcher’s Pass and go to the Matanuska Greenbelt, which has 33 miles of really nice trail, but virtually no elevation gain, which is why I didn’t just go there to start with.

I wasn’t planning to take Daisy on this run, because it was going to be such a long run, but she figured out I was going and got all excited,  so I relented. By about mile 2 I regretted this.  Running with her on the leash on the bike path works great. Running with her on leash on a trail, not so much. On a narrow trail, she is right in front of me instead of beside me and her body blocks my view of the trail ahead of me, making it necessary to go much slower, so I can avoid rocks and roots. If I let her off the leash, she is still distractable enough to jump on people we pass and take off into the brush and let us get separated. When I got to the 3 mile mark, I let her off leash, and spent way too much time calling her, looking for her, or waiting for her. I also at one point had to stop her from stealing a sandwich from  someone sitting right on the trail eating his lunch. She really had a good time on this run, and she was a dirty, wet, happy dog by the time we were done.

Daisy

As I was heading out of Hatcher’s Pass, as soon as I got cell phone service, I called my hubby and made arrangements for him to meet me and get the dog so I could finish the run on my own. All in all, I spent maybe an hour and a half or two hours driving  between spots and waiting for him,  which cut into my running time. I was pretty sure the parking lot at the Matanuska Lake trailhead closed at 10, which only left me a little over 3 hours by the time I got there.

As I was getting ready to run, I ran into a running friend and his wife, and chatted with them for a little while. Turns out he is going to let me use his satellite tracker for the 50 miler, which is awesome. By the time I was actually running it was a few minutes after 7, so I knew I wouldn’t get the 16 miles I had planned. But I took advantage of all the time I had, and got back to my car with just a few minutes to spare,  after running almost 12.5 miles. I forgot to reapply DEET, though, which was a huge mistake. Every time I slowed to a walk, like to go up a hill, the damn mosquitos caught up to me. Those little suckers even bit me through my compression socks. I had huge welts on the back of my calves when I was done.

At one point, I twisted my ankle, and in catching myself from falling, I somehow stubbed my toe or something.  It immediately felt like I had ripped a toenail off. I sat down in the trail and took my shoe and sock off to investigate,  and wound up using my sock to swat the stupid mosquitos away. I hadn’t ripped off my toenail, and there was no visible damage, so I carefully put my sock and shoe back on and continued. For the first minute or so it hurt really bad and I thought I might have to limp back or call for a ride from the nearest trailhead,  but within a few minutes, the pain gradually disappeared and I was fine.

Although there were several things that happened to make this run complicated, from the weather, to the dog, to almost injuries,  I felt really good the whole time. I would up running almost exactly 28 miles, which isn’t the 31 I hoped  but was all I had time for. I stopped because I ran  out of time, not because I was too tired. I totally could have kept running.  My legs were a little sore the next day, but by evening, they were fine and I had no lingering soreness the second day.

I had a 1.5 liter Camelbak with me, and I put 6 scoops of Tailwind in it, learning from my marathon mistakes. I refilled it between runs, and it really hit the spot. I also ate a 200 calorie nutrition bar as soon as I got back in the car at Hatcher’s Pass, to give it as much time to digest before I started running again as possible. The combination seems to have been perfect.

I also changed my socks and shoes between runs. My socks and shoes had gotten soaked at Hatcher’s, and I wanted to experiment with changing halfway through anyway, to see if that was something I would want to do during  my 50 miler. I was barefoot from  the time I got into the car at Hatcher’s until I got to Matanuska Lake, and I think my feet really benefited from the breathing time, and from  the fresh shoes and socks. I will definitely be putting a change in my mile 30 drop bag.

I felt like I learned a lot from this run, and it really increased my confidence in my ability to finish the 50 miler. I think I’m about as ready as I can be. 

Anchorage Mayors Midnight Sun Marathon

It’s all in your head.

First, let me tell you about the course. Except for the first few miles, it’s beautiful. The first few miles, you are running along a bike path along the Glenn Highway, heading out of Anchorage. The bike path is maybe 20 feet or so off the highway, goes gradually but steadily uphill, and it’s probably the least pleasant part of the course. Once you leave the bike path, you run along a street crossing the highway, and continuing for another couple miles towards the foothills flanking the west side of Anchorage. From there you transition to tank trails used by the military. The tank trails are very hard packed gravel.




 You then traverse a very short (less than half a mile) single track trail through the woods, and emerge onto the Chester Creek bike path that meanders through town in an elongated greenbelt, which you follow until you reach Westchester Lagoon. From Westchester, you wind through neighborhood streets up some fairly steep hills, to the finish on the Park Strip in downtown  Anchorage. As an aside, it seems like sheer torture to make you run up steep hills at mile 25 of a marathon, but by that time you know you’re almost done and just want to get to the finish anyway.




I really, really struggled with this race. It was way harder than it should have been. Part of it is my own fault. I was very tired. I stayed up late, then had trouble sleeping. At some point, with all my tossing and turning, I worried about sleeping through my alarm, which made it even harder to sleep. Never mind that I never manage to sleep through my alarm on work days. I’m not sure why I so often think I will on race day. My alarm went off, and I did wake up, a couple hours earlier than normal. With the late, restless night, and early morning, I was exhausted before I even started. The other major physical issue was my stomach. For whatever reason, I struggled with an upset stomach for the first half of this race, and spent an inordinate amount of time in port-a-johns along the course. (TMI, I know. You’re welcome.)

But I think that what really did me in was my own mind. From when we first got out on the bike path along the highway, my brain was stuck being Negative Nelly and I could not shake it. I probably spent 25 of the 26.2 miles thinking about how hard this run was, how running along the highway sucked, how hot I was, how my new hydration pack was too loose and moving around too much, how crappy my stomach felt, and later, how much my feet hurt, etc.
 I do remember having a couple of minutes on the single track trail enjoying running through the woods. And there was a spot around mile 15 that I remember being glad that my stomach had settled down and that I was starting to feel ok. Of course that thought was promptly followed up by “yeah, now that the race is more than half over.” I also spent way more time than I should have telling myself that I didn’t really care that I wasn’t going to meet my time goal, because after all, this is really just a training run. I kept trying to shrug it off and just enjoy the run, but I couldn’t. And by the time I got to the hills at the end of the course, they were just one more thing to get through before the finish and I could stop running.

This was a really weird experience for me, because I generally really enjoy running. If I had the thoughts on every run that I had all through this race, I would hate running!
I really don’t think any of this was due to the race itself. The course really was beautiful,  and aid stations and port-a-potties were every 2 or 3 miles. And once I passed the halfway point, all of the aid stations had orange wedges. I have to say, those orange wedges were little slices of heaven!

I put Tailwind in my hydration pack, and as I have done successfully before,  I made it about half the recommended strength, and planned on supplementing with typical running fuel; gels, sports beans, or honey stingers.  The Tailwind was fine, but with my stomach acting up, I couldn’t manage the other fuel. Even M&M’s they were handing out at about mile 12 did not go down well. I definitely would have been better off this day with the Tailwind at full strength, and only using that. Like I said, though, the orange wedges were wonderful, juicy and sweet, and they didn’t upset my stomach at all.

By about mile 20, my feet were getting very sore, but once I realized that they hurt less when I was running than when I was walking, I just kept running. I eventually crossed the finish line, for which I was thankful.

There was a first aid tent with ice baths for your feet, and I took advantage of that. The ice water hurt and felt good at the same time. After that, since once I was done running, my stomach felt a little better.  I had some cinnamon bread from Great Harvest Bread Company, and half a grilled cheese sandwich from Franz Bread, which went a long ways to restoring me. I was in a much better mood after that.

Lazy Moose

On Memorial Day, I wanted to get some elevation in with my run, and decided to tackle Lazy Mountain. I have intended sometime during the training for my 50 miler to do Lazy Mountain twice in one day. This did not turn out to be that day.

Since it was a holiday, I had the day off work, and really didn’t want to spend it by myself training, even if it was in the woods. Becky had other stuff going on, but I talked Steven into trying Lazy Mountain with me. I knew he couldn’t do it twice, but I thought we could at least summit once, since he had already done it a few years ago. This did not turn out to be that day either.

Lazy Mountain is not a huge mountain, but its name is deceiving. I think it is called Lazy Mountain because when you look at it from a distance, it seems like it is leaning backwards, almost like it is reclining or laying down. In actuality, however, it is pretty steep. From the parking lot, the elevation gain climbing Lazy is 2,977 feet. There are two paths up the mountain. The first is the old trail, that is 2.1 miles long, and goes straight up the side of the mountain. That trail is brutal. It starts climbing immediately, and is very steep. It also can be muddy, and if it is muddy, it is extremely slippery. The first several times I climbed that route, I did not make it to the top.

There is another, newer, trail, the Lazy Moose trail, that is 3 miles long, and winds back and forth across the lower slopes of Lazy Mountain, with lots of switchbacks, climbing much more gradually. The Lazy Moose trail meets up with the old trail probably about 2/3 of the way up, leaving you with still quite a climb to the summit.

(looking up towards the summit from the junction - that's not the summit, its just in that direction. Just further.)

I had high hopes of summiting, but Steven hadn’t done any other hiking this summer, and just wasn’t ready for this climb. I made sure we both had plenty of water and snacks, and that Daisy had water in her backpack, and that we put on sunscreen and DEET, and off we went.

The Lazy Moose trail has trail markers every 200 feet (distance travelled, not elevation), which is really nice. The trail was clear and well maintained, and easy going. A good bit of it was runnable even on the way up, but Steven wasn’t running. We stopped 3 or 4 times on the way up the Lazy Moose trail, taking 2 hours to travel the 3 miles to where the Lazy Moose meets the old trail.

(Steven taking a break)

I kept a careful eye on Steven, because his cheeks got pretty red, and towards the end, he started saying his stomach wasn’t feeling good. He said it hadn’t been feeling good earlier either (which he hadn’t told me before), so I wasn’t too worried about him, but I didn’t push him either. I made sure he knew we could turn around at any time, but he kept going until the trail junction.

When the Lazy Moose trail joins the old trail, it immediately becomes much steeper, and remains fairly steep the rest of the way to the summit. My legs were still feeling pretty fresh, but I run all the time. Steven took one look at that climb, and decided he was done. He’s 12 years old, and there aren’t too many bear encounters on the trail, probably because it is so heavily travelled, so I *could* have let him go back to the car by himself, and kept going. I just wasn’t comfortable with that, so we headed back.

On the way down, he seemed to be feeling much better (after all, downhill is much easier than uphill, even if you are going fast), and he thought running downhill was fun, so we ran most of the way back down. By this time, we had taken Daisy off her leash, and she had a great time. She would run ahead of us, then turn around and wait for us with this expression on her face that was clearly asking what was taking so long.

The views on this hike are amazing, and the forest that the Lazy Moose trail winds through is beautiful. 

All told, we hiked/ran 6 miles, and had a good afternoon together. We need to do stuff like this more often.

I'm behind a week

So, I am behind a week. Not in my training, but in talking about my training, LOL.  Last week (May 23-29), my mileage was supposed to look like this:

Monday: rest
Tuesday: rest
Wednesday: 8 miles
Thursday: 6 miles
Friday: rest
Saturday: 12 miles
Sunday: 10 miles

Total mileage: 36 miles

My training schedule generally has me in a cycle where I am working hard for 3 weeks, then having a recovery week with lower mileage. That recovery week was that week. Even with lighter mileage, I still had trouble following the plan, LOL. I totally feel like Captain Barbosa in Pirates of the Carribbean. The plan is more like guidelines than actual rules.

Gotta watch it.

OK, I got distracted. Sorry about that.

Here's what my week actually looked like:

Monday: Happy Run, with my friend Brooke. We did the short route, since my legs were tired from my 25 mile run the day before. 2.57 easy miles.

Tuesday: 1.25 easy miles in my neighborhood, with Daisy.

Wednesday: I was actually planning on getting my miles in this evening, but then had to go to Anchorage for work unexpectedly. I did squeeze in a quick run on the coastal trail, 3.39 miles.

Thursday: Knoya Ridge run. 8.51 miles.

Friday: 1.02 easy miles, again in my neighborhood with Daisy.

Saturday: Trent/Waldron half marathon 13.1 miles.

Sunday: 3.23 miles at Matanuska Lake.

Total mileage: 33.07 miles. 

Although my mileage was split up differently than prescribed by my plan, I got pretty close to the mileage goal this week. Much better than last week.

On Tired Legs (Trent/Waldron half marathon race recap)

Last Saturday, I ran the Trent/Waldron half marathon in Anchorage. This is the second year I have run it, and I suspect this is one I will continue to run on a regular basis. I’m 46 years old, and I expect that at some point, my running will naturally slow down. The interesting thing about the Trent/Waldron is that the results are age graded.

So, when I ran it last year, my time was 2:20:40. I was 45 years old. There are statistics that predict how much you will slow down as you age, and so when you run the race on subsequent years, they give you an age adjusted goal time. The goal time is supposed to be an equivalent level of performance to your performance when you were however much younger in a previous race. I’m not sure if my explanation is really clear, but there you go. If you beat your goal time, you get a mug.

Anyway, my time last year was 2:20:40. I was surprised when I got to bib pickup to find that my time had been adjusted by an entire two minutes, with the passage of just one year. My goal time was 2:22:18.

I wasn’t sure how I was going to do in this race. I had done the Knoya Ridge run less than 48 hours before this race, and my quads were really sore. I hadn’t done a lot of elevation work recently up until that climb and I was feeling it for sure. Plus, the night before the race it was really hot in my house, and I didn’t sleep well at all, tossing and turning until at least 3 am. I had to get up at 6:30 am to make it to bib pickup on time, and I was really tired. So, I was not in the best of conditions for racing, and I was really unsure how I would do.

The first 2 or 3 miles were really brutal, because my legs were letting me know that they were Not. Happy.  However, once I got warmed up, things got better, and I found myself moving along pretty well. I had figured out ahead of time what time I needed to hit the halfway point if I was going to beat my goal, and I hit that easily.

The course for this race is really nice. You start at Westchester Lagoon, and run up the Chester Creek trail for 6.65 miles, then turn around and head back. The course is mostly through woods, with lots of little bridges to go over and tunnels under roads to go through. I think the bridges and tunnels add interest and make it fun. The outward portion of the course is very gradually uphill, and on the way back, obviously it’s gradually downhill. So on the way back, you feel really fast, which is awesome. I didn’t stop to take any pictures along the way, because I was really focused on beating my goal.

I have been using Map My Run to track my runs for quite some time, but this race was one of the last straws, I think. I have been pretty frustrated with the GPS tracking on Map My Run, and the distance tracking for this race was off by more than half a mile from the very beginning. I don’t think it started tracking my running until 6 or 7 minutes into the run. And it just got worse from there. After crossing the finish line (of a half marathon, 13.1 miles), Map My Run said I had run 9.64 miles. Nope. Not even close. Luckily, the race crew had put mileage signs each mile of the course, and I had my Garmin Vivosmart HR on.  Although it doesn’t have GPS, I was keeping track of my time with it, and watching the mile marker signs, so I had a pretty good idea of how I was doing.

I was still feeling pretty good as I got close to the finish, so I *think* I picked up my pace the last couple miles. As I approached the finish line, there were a few people in front of me, and I all of a sudden got competitive, and had to sprint past them. One of them, an older man, was very encouraging, yelling at me to “dig deep” as I ran by him. I think my breathing was pretty hard and audible by that point, so I think he knew I was working hard. Whoever he was, I appreciated the encouragement. It took a few minutes after crossing the finish to get my breath back.

I was thrilled when I got over to the tent with the results computers and saw that my time was 2:18:18. Not only did I beat my age graded goal, I beat my time from last year by more than 2 minutes. On tired legs.

(post race, with my hard earned mug)