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!

Clinton Lake 30 Mile Trail Run

Doug and I ran the Clinton Lake 30 Mile Trail Run yesterday and to say it was an awesome day is a gross understatement! The weather was 40's-50's, some sun but mostly cloudy. The wind was whipping on the ridge on the southeast side of the lake but otherwise not an issue. The course was in fine shape with minimal shoe-sucking mud. The aid station and volunteers were world class!

Ella provided a good luck duck and it definitely helped. Doug finished in 5:33, 38th overall, and I ran a 6:07, 50th overall.

I felt strong most of the day and ran a little easy on my sore left calf until about 22 miles when it seemed like it really was not an issue and I stopped trying to favor it.


After the race the Fat Tire Doug brought really hit the spot as did the Domino's pizza.

Overall a great day, a great course and a great race! Kudos to Chris for his swan song event. He's leaving big shoes to fill.

Next event for me is the Double Chubb 50K. Next event for Doug is the birth of he and Leslie's baby! Wish us both lots of luck!

One Week Until Clinton Lake 30 Mile Trail Run

So I've been crappy again about staying up to date on the blog. I'm not going to apologize anymore because we're at the point now where it would probably seem insincere anyway!

So I've been laying off a bit due to a sore left calf muscle or perhaps an aggravation of an old Achilles's tendonitis. Anyhow I'm going to take it easy this week and concentrate on getting plenty of rest and eating well going into the race.

Chia and the others have been hitting the Crossfit pretty hard, with a "bridal shower" 21-15-9/burpee extravaganza in my absence yesterday. Today she and Doug ran in the early morning drizzle for a little 10-miler.

Yesterday my dad cranked out a nice 10K time in the Bayou Hills Run down in Pensacola, FL. Finishing in 1:02 for about a 10 minute-mile pace. Strong work, Dad! He's plotting the Kennekuk Road Runners Mountain Goat, I think, and it sounds like the hills around the Bayou were a good training opportunity.

Check back for more. I can't promise it will be more exciting posting, but I will honestly make an effort to be more consistent!

030610 and 030710

So I took off Wed-Fri last week partially due to the need for rest but secondarily to my OR schedule.

Saturday Chia and I headed over to Clinton Lake to run the 10-mile loop course that the Clinton Lake 30-Mile is run on. Unfortunately, Chia was feeling under the weather and we turned around about 2.5 miles into the run, for a total of 5-miles of trail running.

Sunday I got up really early (didn't I Chia?) and did a 500 Workout in the garage by myself then did the 5-mile park/Tophill loop with Steve Depooter.

My nutrition has been kind of all over the place as has my chewing, but I feel like as of right now I'm getting it dialed-in. So we'll see about that as the week plays out.

WOD 030210

Once through for time:

50 pushups
5 burpees
50 upright plate rows 25#
5 burpees
50 plate thrusters 25#
5 burpees
50 DB skull crushers
5 burpees
50 cross-leg crunches
5 burpees
50 Supermans
5 burpees
50 lunges
5 burpees

Steve, John Michael, I cranked it out in less than 10 minutes then I ran to work, after cleaning the litter boxes.

WOD 030110

1 minute each, 3 rounds total:
kettlebell swings
leg lifts
DB squats
DB push presses
box jumps

Hats off to the Possum Corner crew who turned out in force this morning. The only regular who was missing was her-honor! Steve, Janet, Mary, John Michael, Doug, Chia and Joe packed the place. I think we probably violated the occupancy limit for the fire code!

Nice work everybody. Happy to be back at it with all of you!