As the Ascent is now just a week away, CJ and I decided to get some more high altitude training in before the big day.

CJ heard the Rocky Mountain Mennonite Camp offered an A-frame you could rent near the Crags.  He booked us a night there last night.  It was rustic but nicer than we…

It feels like I have been training for the Pikes Peak Ascent since last Fall.  

Oh...it's because I have. :)

First, I had to qualify by running a half marathon.  I trained last fall and ran the Denver Rock 'n' Roll Half Marathon last October.  

From there, I have had my eyes fixed on one main goal....finishing the Pikes Peak Ascent August 16, 2014.  I can't believe race day is just a week from tomorrow!  Wow!

When training for a big…

This year marks the fifth 200-mile relay team I have organized in the last six years. Typically funded by our generous supporters at the Schriever Air Force Base Fitness Center, we’ve only had to take one year off due to last year’s budget cuts, which was actually a blessing in disguise because the organization of such an event can sometimes be very frustrating and…

The last couple of weeks I really wanted to pick up my training.  I wanted to increase my mileage and continue getting some altitude training in.  Mission accomplished!

Three of my training runs went something like this:  I took the cog to Mountain View and ran to the summit.  It was a first for me as I have never rode the cog and ran from there.  As I started running I was thinking this is a small trail.  Then suddenly there was no trail.  I stopped looked around and luckily there…

Relays are increasingly popular and interesting beasts. Last weekend I ran the Wild West Relay which covered 200 miles from Fort Collins to Steamboat Springs. This was my first relay so had no idea what to expect. Vanessa, purple and gold alum, was our fearless team captain and did a great job organizing 10 friends and a couple strangers to run 36 legs. The legs varied from easy to "very hard". I'm not really sure how the…

I’ve always had lousy posture, even standing still. Jogging up hills I find myself really leaning into the hill, bent at the hips. Not good. So I work on this constantly.

I work on keeping my head up. It only makes sense to keep your airway as open as possible right?   I also try to throw my shoulders back, push them back, whatever it takes. I’m not a physiologist but it only makes sense that you give your lungs as much room to work efficiently as…

Pikes Peak is a happenin' place right now. For myself and I'm sure many others, the last four-ish weeks have been largely comprised of adventures on Pikes Peak, prepping for the WMRA Long Distance Challenge, which this year will coincide with the Pikes Peak Ascent, so it'll be cool to have an international race in there too, I'm guessing this will be a pretty deep year.

In previous years, the Long Distance Challenge has been featured in other way cool places like Switzerland…

Yesterday morning brought us under the two weeks till Ascent day marker.  At 13 days away (less than 312 hours for anyone who's interested), I decided to spend some time pushing hard at altitude.  With running still out of the equation this left me with only one option - biking to the summit.  Sounds like misery, right?  Not really.  There were some seriously steep…

I started hearing it a few weeks ago. An incessant, gradual, then rapidly accelerating ticking. Worse than Captain Hook’s croc tracking him. That nagging, nauseating feeling that time was slipping away. Like many things in life you can’t expect to put off training for a long run until the last few ticks of the clock and expect to get the job done. So July 22 I drove to the summit of Pikes with teammate Shelley Hitz. We jogged down to the A Frame at treeline and back up, a six…

Victory is so much easier to write about than defeat.  But it's from defeat where we learn to appreciate victory.  I can only hope my last outing to the Weminuche Wilderness teaches me something.  It has nothing to do with Pikes and little to do with Ascent training, but it is a window into what this whole pseudomountaineering thing is all about.

Jagged…

We visited family back east this week. The theme in my life most recently has been to expect the unexpected. The day before we flew out, I had planned to get up early and get in one last fairly long run on dirt before heading to the land of road running. The roads are not kind to my bones.

The countdown is on for the Wild West Relay which runs from Ft. Collins to Steamboat Springs starting at the butt-crack of dawn (actually, before that) tomorrow. I'm proud to be running with the Schriever Striders which is coordinated by the one and only Pikes Peak Sports Triple Crown of Running alum, Vanessa Shawver. I'm so grateful to have the opportunity to run with this fun group. The total mileage for my 3 legs is around 20 miles but I may jump in on some other legs to get a 50k in…

I've dealt with the past week and a half of this whole "not-running-on-an-injury" thing pretty well.  Now, my resolve is wearing thin.  I know, I know, runners are not like sharks - we don't die if we stop moving.  That may be true in the most literal sense, but the similarities ends there.  There is a emotional and social death that occurs when a runner is not running for more than a few consecutive days.  Dramatic? Yes, but hear me out.  When you run, you have lots of friends who run.…

Are we saying goodbye to the Ascent Cycling Series for the year or forever tomorrow night? Who knows at this point - but regardless, it's the finale of the 2014 racing. Race Number 5 for the 2014 Ascent Cycling Series and lucky 101 for Andy. We are returning to the familiar trails at Bear Creek for the second time this year - how many miles have I raced there over the years? Too many to count, yet each race is different. Back to the traditional Ascent race style after the length of the CMPS…

The last race of the Ascent Cycling Series looms on the horizon. Race 5 of 5 will go down at Bear Creek Park this Wednesday night. It has been a great season and there are a lot of classes battling it out for the final podium positions that will not be decided until the dust settles Wednesday. 

One more race means one more chance for me to experience entering in to race trance mode. That is what I have…

"The world is big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark.” 

― John Muir

I'm finally back to having cell-phone signal and reliable access to the interwebs after my last 9 days of travel. I've calculated that I've slept in a tent almost 1/3…

By: MtnMama of UpaDowna.org

A few months ago, I started hearing buzz from our local trail and open space advocacy groups about a new trail that was going to be built. The mountain this trail will be built on has a lot of controversy surrounding it, and has always been known as a…

We all know when training is involved there are so many sacrifices that are made.  The event really dictates the sacrifices involved.  5k’s are different from 10k’s, from half marathons and even more different than the Pikes Peak Ascent.  This particular event is the sacrifices while training for the Pikes Peak Ascent.

The training for the PPA really began back in March when some runs went to North Cheyenne Canyon and the Chutes. From there it was Section 16, Garden of the Gods, Barr…