Double Chubb 50K and Richie Chiropractic

I'm pretty sure I did not deserve the beautiful weather, awesome volunteers and RDs, and outstanding course conditions at the 2010 Double Chubb 50K. I do know that Bill Richie at Richie Chiropractic does deserve my endless thanks and admiration for taking me from being unable to stand up straight to running a 50K trail race nearly ONE HOUR FASTER than I had run it previously!! Holy smokes.


I got into St. Louis early Friday and spent a leisurely day napping and studying at the Hampton Inn just one exit east of the race venue. I met Rudy Schwarz and his friend Joan at the wonderful Stellina Pasta Cafe for a little pre-race chow then stopped at the Pear Tree Inn to hug Victoria and get my race packet.

Raceday morning Rudy met me at the hotel and we rode to the race together. It was quite chilly at the start and I ended up wearing a long sleeve shirt and a light beanie from the start to the railroad tracks aid station. The course was completely dry and mud-free except for maybe a total of 100 feet. I made good time on all four legs, average 1:20 each with aid station and some GI-issue time included, I ended up finishing around 5:43 (unofficial). I was extremely happy with the time, my back felt great all day and the course and fellow runners were amazing beyond description!

If you want to see some photos or video of the course and some of the runners (but sadly none of me), check out Shannon Drohan's pictures, or Lee Hess' videos.

Can't wait for the Berryman 50 Mile trail run next month!!

Sea World and My Aching Back

So since my post 2 weeks ago, the day after the glorious Clinton Lake 30 Mile Trail Run much has occurred.


Firstly, I took some time off and headed down to Orlando where I accompanied my nephew Dakota and my parents to SeaWorld. We had a great time at the park and hanging around the hotel pool. Dakota and I got a little one-on-one time with a trip to Wonderworks for some Laser Tag. SeaWorld was extremely clean, well ran and staffed by lots of helpful, pleasant people. It was a little bittersweet of course with the recent death of Dawn, a good friend of Jill's. Like the friends and acquaintances I've lost to Naval Aviation, she died doing what she loved. I did not know her personally but still feel a loss and hurt for Jill.

I returned to St. Louis on Friday the 2nd and spent the night at the lovely (not) Pear Tree Inn and had dinner with dear friends Jim and Judy Stroup. The next morning I got in 16 miles on the awesome Chubb Trail with 3 other SLUGs before returning home to Springfield.

All was well until Tuesday morning when, on my first of what was to be many box jumps, I pulled something in my lower back. So the rest of my "vacation" week was spent alternately in front of my computer studying and squeezing dollars from the stock market, and lying in bed on a heating pad.

As of today my back seems a little better, but I'm only cautiously optimistic I'll be up to running the Double Chubb 50K trail race next Saturday. I'm going to try to weasel into an appointment with a chiropractor friend on Monday and see if he can "snap" me back into shape. At this point I'm willing to try anything to get back on those wonderful trails!