Thanksgiving weekend - Quad Dipsea

Super fun weekend! Spent a little bit of time in Seattle with friends for the holiday, and then flew to California with Dagan on Friday for the Quad Dipsea. This race has easily earned the status of cult classic in my book. John Medinger celebrated 25 years of the race this year and most in attendance have been along for many of those races; I counted at least three that completed their 10th Quad Dipsea.

The race is a double out and back over the 7.1 mile Dipsea trail. In the 28.4 miles my Suunto T6 register about 8300 feet of climbing. With roughly 250 runners gunning for that first flight of stairs I'm sure mine was not the only elevated heart rate. The first out and back went well, quick bottle swaps in the aid stations thanks to Dagan and iPod shuffle kept me entertained along the way. I really enjoyed the views of Stinson Beach and ocean as well as the stairs, trees and traversing. A highlight was getting to see the entire field of runners multiple times. In 7 miles there is a ton of varying terrain to keep one entertained.

Heading out for the second out and back I counted myself in 5th woman. Feeling good I decided to see what I might be able to do and tempted myself with the promise of taking the next month off. I have needed some down time from running for a while and have decided to take all of December off. So in that last out and back I worked my way up through the field, and in spite of the comments from other runners that I would catch her, the first place woman continued to run strong and keep a solid lead. At the finish Beth beat me by 13 minutes; a minute for every year older than me she is. John informed me as he handed me my age group winner's sweatshirt that I won my age group, but got beat by an old lady. I hope I am beating 30 year old butts and setting course records when I'm in my 40s!!! Congrats Beth - awesome race!

Eric Skaggs had a phenominal run and missed the mens course record by a mere 38 seconds. I heard different chatter about this course being a bit slower than the one the record was set on. The results are posted and there is a bunch of information about the race on their website.

Super fun event, highly recommended! Just don't eat too much on Thanksgiving :)

NW Running Calendar

Following is an announcement for the sale of a great calendar that supports the WTA. I've had this calendar the last two years and look forward to the next installment.

The 3rd edition of the "Tribute to the Trails" wall calendar are on their way to the stores and they should receive them sometime thisweek! Here's a peek at what the calendar looks like:www.pbase.com/gtach/calendar08

As always, this is a fundraiser and all proceeds from the sales will be directly donated to Washington Trails Association www.wta.org ,the wonderful people who create, repair and maintain the trails we love to play on. Printing costs are the major obstacle for a project like this, and we'd like to thank Dirty Girl Gaiters www.dirtygirlgaiters.com and Pacific Coast Trail Runs www.pctrailruns.com for their generous sponsorship. Gratitude also goes out to ZombieRunner www.zombierunner.com for their online services and the stores who are donating their time to sell the calendars, the races who made additional monetary contributions, and the athletes who permitted us the use of their images. The price of the calendar is $18 and here's where you can purchase them:

ONLINE: ZombieRunner: www.zombierunner.com

AT THEIR RACES AND ONLINE: Pacific Coast Trail Runs: www.pctrailruns.com

STORES:
The Balanced Athlete (Kent, WA): www.thebalancedathlete.com
Everyday Athlete (Kirkland, WA): www.everydayathlete.us
FootZone Bend (Bend, OR): www.footzonebend.com
Patagonia by Pandora's Backpack (Bend, OR): www.pandorasbackpack.com
Rogue Valley Runners (Ashland, OR): www.roguevalleyrunners.com
Runners Soul (Spokane, WA): www.runnersoul.com
Seattle Running Company (Seattle, WA): www.seattlerunningcompany.com
Sport Town: 131 Parkade Plz / Spokane, WA 99201 / 509.838.4232

Hanging on

Do you ever feel like life is going so fast that you are just hanging on for the ride? The last month... 6 weeks or more have felt that way to me. It is all exciting and enjoyable, in fact I'm basically loving every minute of the craziness and finally feel like I found a few moments to reflect a bit (sitting in the Atlanta airport on a long layover).

(if you click on any of these pictures you will be taken to flickr photo albums that have a bunch more to look at!)

Yosemite 10/14-22/07

Dagan and I loaded up his truck and headed straight for Yosemite on October 14. Not that I need tons of reasons to take a road trip, but to justify this one… 1) I am a firm believer in a definite break between jobs 2) I had not seen this beautiful National Park before and 3) my special someone wanted to share a week there with me.

We had a great time in all aspects of the trip. We headed straight there, broke up the driving with Frisbee breaks
and slept in the back of the truck near a river in Grants Pass on the way down. In Yosemite we got to visit with Patti Haskins on Monday night and then headed out into the back country with heavily loaded packs. We camped Tuesday night at Quarter Dome, just below Clouds Rest and woke up to snow.



Wednesday we found a warmer spot along the Merced River. We squeezed in a few runs amongst hammock reading time, picture taking and eating creative camp food.



Thursday and Friday we camped in the well-known and used Camp 4 amongst many climbers. Friday we did a few routes on the west apron of El Cap and finally showered (after ice cream from the store) in Curry Village. Saturday morning we got out for one more run up to Glacier Point which provided a great view of the valley and we could see the various places we’d been in the previous days. That afternoon we headed out of the park through Tuolumne Meadows so I could at least capture a glimpse of the rest of what the park has to offer. I can’t wait to return!

Birthday weekend
October 28 I turned 30 years old and decided to spend the weekend celebrating. Roch and Catherine and my sister and brother-in-law flew in to help me celebrate joining a new age group.


On Saturday we met at the Clayton Beach parking lot to run what I hope to be next year’s Chuckanut 50k course. Four of us ran the full distance and Dagan joined us for the tough section from aid station 2 to 3. Doug, Brie and Catherine drove from aid station to aid station providing us with water, eats and extended stops.

The loop starts and finishes at Clayton Beach and measures 28.4 miles with 7k feet of gain. I will add on a few miles to make it the true 50k distance for the March 15 race (assuming I get the permits for the new course).

To make it 30 for my 30th Devon humored me by running around the reservoir.


After a fun run we returned to Moehl Manor and were greeted by an amazing feast prepared by Ma. Seafood stew, vegetarian chili, salad, bread, pumpkin pies, baked potatoes, it was an endless feast. There was so much food that Dagan and I packed up and fed many more people at the Seattle party the following evening. Friends from all walks of life stopped by both parties to say hi, happy birthday and bye. These parties were not only birthday celebrations, but also my moving on parties.

Moving days
Monday morning I’d scheduled movers to come pack up my belongings from my Pa’s condo. They were late then weren’t prepared to do the job…and now I was supposed to trust them with my things for a month? I sent them away and called in the troops. Dagan showed up with boxes, packing materials, tape and amazing support… friends George and Elizabeth, Portia and Devon showed up and were amazing in helping me pack my stuff and store the rest around the condo on shelves and in closets.

Tuesday I had a few things to wrap up around condo and had a couple of stops to make, including a ping pong match, before finally driving a fully loaded Ms. Alice south on I5 and on to Bend.

Landing pad

Kindly greeted by Ani and Logan (standard poodle) at my late arrival, we unloaded the car and I was hit by the emotional and physical exhaustion of the move. I slept 10 hours solid and after breakfast with Ani I unpacked and settled into my blue room. Emotion overwhelmed me as the reality of where I was and what I was doing set in. I found my computer and put on music to help fill the space and after unpacking took pen to paper (a great way to process). I took Logan for a run to get a feel for my new surroundings, and then hurried home to head to Portland for dinner with friends and an early flight Thursday morning.

A Masochistic weekend
This past weekend celebrated 25 years of David Horton Masochism. Horton has been directing the race since 1982 and once again pulled off a full weekend event. I was greeted at the Raleigh Durham Airport by Clark (new RD for 2008 Masochist), a friend and runner I haven’t seen in over two years. We filled to 2 ½ hour drive to Lynchburg with chatter and catching up; always great to reconnect. We stopped by for dinner with his family and then on to Horton’s where I stayed the next couple of days and helped a bit behind the scenes of this special event.

With all of the life changes and admittedly a lack of motivation to seriously train, I went into this race knowing it wasn’t a day to race, but instead looked at it as supporting a good friend in his 25 years of accomplishment and, for me, a great day of running and time to process the last couple of weeks. It is hard when the gun goes off and the ponytails quickly move away to let them go, but with over 250 runners I found chatter, we sung happy birthday to Meredith and made our way to the trail from the Blue Ridge Parkway.

It was a clear, cool day and with trail chatter and the music from my shuffle the miles went by pretty quickly (uncomfortably but quickly) and I found myself surprised as the familiar places along the course passed by. With a silly goal of breaking 9 hours (because all of my other finishes there are under 9) I finally started to feel good with about 10 miles to go. Enhanced that with a Clif silver bullet (espresso shot) and made it to the finish line in 8:56. The Masochist results show the stacked field for both men and women, and the pictures show the fun those 50 Horton miles bring on an early November weekend.

A new home
I am now flying in to Portland and driving back to Bend. It was a reality check looking at my boarding passes and checking the flight screens as I automatically looked for Seattle.

I start my new job with the Conservation Alliance tomorrow 11/5! I’m looking forward to this next phase of life; learning, exploring and sharing. I’ve definitely had some reservations and moments of “wait a second” and even tears as I think about leaving Seattle. But I am an extremely lucky girl with amazing friends and family that love and support me as I continue to challenge myself in life.