Not often I register race-week & NEVER EVER a double. Until now.
Plan A. Motor after-work, mountain hotel, Saturday marathon, interstate-commute to Wyoming. Reality. Room-search in Colorado ski country proved crazy expensive (even in September). Plan B? 3am alarm. Road-trip! Run shorts, hydration vest, layers & a V8. Who doesn’t dig early morning tomato? LOL>
I-70 West. Denver ⇨ Continental Divide ⇨ Breckenridge. Same east-west where all the great hikes happen. Same Silverthorne exit where Ash & Tom married two years prior. Notta lotta snow on the peaks this late in summer – but WOW, whatta sunrise! Nothing/nowhere/anywhere, our Rockies. Stunning. Always.
South Gondola parking. 20-minute bus ride. Start temp just above freezing. Race elevation 10,000ft. Lodgepole pines, thin air, sun now a-blazing. First couple miles like a REVEL event – straight DOWN. But unlike REVEL, whole lotta climb thereafter. UP 800ft, down next mile. Another push UP, lungs burning/O2 searching. Colorado-native no big deal, right? Reality. BIG elevation jump – my backyard @ 5500ft vs today’s 8800ft average. Past month of flat-world running also done me no favours.
High-altitude sunshine. Muy bueno scenery. Hills? Oh mama. That last climb at mile 22? Mountain folks are crazy tough. No crocodile tears, no regret. 5-hour finish, all FIGHT, NO FAIL 💪
Gas station cola & a bag of salty chips. Journey on. Day One.
Texted a friend – please find/contact the Race Director in Cheyenne, gonna miss bib pick-up. Burning trailer near Georgetown. Highway accident. Need a Plan B. 6pm Wyoming arrival (thanks Larry).
Hotel, shower, sleeps. Sunday 5am at the Depot (RD bib meetup). Body tight/achy after Saturday’s all-day hill repeats, skin still radiating sunshine. But — I’m here. Wyoming. THIRD time this year. Cap off, National Anthem. Cowboy country & I LOVE it 😊
Day strategy. Hit it hard first Half. Walk/run after mile 15. Elevation similar to home, easy comfortable course. Tunes early. Notta lotta runners. Several miles on an empty military base. Hill at marker 9 or 10…but not Breckenridge hilly, just an incline. Day 2. Perspective. Push, push, push. 2:05 first Half. Sun high, getting warm. Legs like lead.
Walked mile 14. Called it two miles later. Sorry Cheyenne – ya deserved better. Mentally not plugged-in for a March-of-Dimes walk. Montréal next week, Europe week after.
17 miles. Check, done. Colorado HOME by noon.
Lick my wounds, run another day. Well maybe…in two or three other days. LOL>
BRECKENRIDGE ROAD MARATHON
SEPTEMBER 14, 2019
35 K R HAGA 05:23:41 M Louisville
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- Colorado road-trip
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- pine, thin air & elevation
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- all FIGHT, NO FAIL 💪
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- Saturday all-day hill repeats
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- Day 2 DNF
Cornfields, wide open prairies & the CFL Rough Riders. Friday nite travel to Regina – Saskatchewan’s provincial capital. Geographically above North Dakota; skies that stretch forever. Great Plains SMILE 🙂
Nothing direct to Regina. Nada. Calgary on the way out, Vancouver on my return. Little dot on the prairie. Clean, tidy landscape. Neat yards, one large university, provincial dome mile from my hotel digs. Expo Saturday at the Conexus Arts Centre, early sleeps, chilly 39 degrees marathon morn. YES!
Redemption search. Huge mental fail last Saturday in Ohio. Air thick/humid/oven hot & an evening race (excuses come easy) – it’s the mental collapse, that’s always hardest to bounce back/recover from.
Hitched a ride with another runner to Sunday’s Start. Our far North cousins – super friendly. Lake along Lakeshore Drive completely masked in fog. [Wascana Lake] Near perfect run conditions.
Queued back-of-the-pack. Cap off, soaked up the country’s anthem. Almost 8000 of us. Held back first mile, steady even pace. 10K thick with Halfers. No tunes/earbuds quiet ‘til after the split. Easy, flat, forgiving course. Just enjoying the day. Museum, capitol dome. Lotta bike path, lotta parks.
Shed a layer, carried my gloves. Douglas Park, Rambler Park, Wilson Park.
Folks should give ‘the Queen City’ a little more love (Pile-of-Bones renamed in 1897, after Queen Victoria). Beautiful day, happy town. And my finish? Back on track. Completion 161, Canada medal #8.
Newfoundland to BC, Toronto to the Yukon. 2020: every Province, every Territory 🍁
Montréal in 2 short weeks. Parlez-vous français, eh?
GMS Queen City Marathon
2019-09-08 • GMS 42.2K Run
BIB 101 K R Haga 04:34:31.0
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- crop circles & prairie
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- Expo Saturday
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- Royal Canadian Mounted Police
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- lotta bike path, lotta parks
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- layered up & ready
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- O’ Canada ♫ ♬ ♭
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- SASKATCHEWAN
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- Canada #8 🍁
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- weird yet satisfying 🍕
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- every Province, every Territory
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- Colorado HOME ❤️
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- Sunday, September 8
Queen City Marathon, SK
Vanish when you can, it’s good for the soul. ~ Dean Karnazes
Mountain hike always cures whatever’s ailing. Mental fix, physical reset.
Hour drive thru Boulder Canyon, trailhead parking in Nederland center. Backpack, snacks & my best pal Ro. Super cool [that] Ned provides a free shuttle to Hesse Trailhead (dogs allowed onboard) – no chance of parking my super-sized Ford, even if I did show early. HA!
Late day start after morning’s a.m. return from Cincy. Whole lotta folks with the same idea. Labour Day weekend, elevation/thin air, Colorado sunshine. Dig our outdoor community. Busy trail.
Easy 4 miles. Kicked back at Lost Lake; shared a sandwich with Pup. Waterfall stop on the hike return. Water still flowing high late in the season. Fingers crossed, heavy snow again this year.
One more run-free day, then back at it. Saskatchewan this weekend.
LOVE LOVE my Colorado life (kinda crushin’ on Canada too 🍁).
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- Hesse Trailhead
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- off-leash adventure
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- cures whatever’s ailing
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- Indian Peaks Wilderness
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- thin air & sunshine 🌞
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- Lost Lake
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- waterfall slip-n-slide
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- dog SMILE ❤️
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- Labor Day reset
So You Had A Crappy Race … Now What?
DAVID ROCHE SEPTEMBER 3rd, 2019
If I’m asked what the most important attribute is for an athlete, I have a simple answer: “Belief.” You put it all on a start line, and you proceed to crash and burn. Your time sucks. Maybe you have to DNF.
- Accept uncertainty.
Races aren’t tests, they’re celebrations. They are celebrations of life, existence, and yes…uncertainty itself. So give yourself permission to celebrate no matter how the day actually unfolds.
- It’s OK to grieve.
You can know all of that celebration stuff intuitively, but it still stings when a day doesn’t turn out how you had hoped. It’s healthy to let yourself feel your emotions, even the bad ones. You aren’t being dramatic when you get a little depressed after races. Give yourself time to get to acceptance. And it’s no rush either.
- Your fitness is your best day, not your worst.
There’s a temptation to use bad races to judge your fitness, thinking that the day gives you a benchmark from which you can evaluate your progress. Bad race? Bad athlete. Bad training. That’s not how the body works, though.
- Bad races can be good training days.
The physiological reason why so many breakthrough races follow poor ones is uncertain. It could be neuromuscular. Whatever it is, you can use that race stress to get stronger and faster.
- You are heroic.
…the bad races are where the magic happens, where you learn and grow and get the resolve to make a courageous leap of self belief. So if you can, try to celebrate bad races most of all. That is when you become a hero in your own story.
