K-SPoT's Adventure Racing Blog

Masi Speciale Premio Road Bike For Sale

2012-01-03T12:00:00.000-06:00

Okay, Baby Blue needs to go to make room for my new love, Oren Ishii (aka Cervelo S5)! I'm asking $900 and this post will remain up until sold or I decided to make it a wall ornament. I'll put up as much specs a possible, but contact me if you have any other questions. Click the photo to email me. LOCAL INQUIRIES ONLY (Austin/San Antonio/Dallas/Houston).

MSRP (new): $2,100
Color: Cyan
Frame: Steel
Size: 53cm
Fork: Reynolds Ouzo Comp (Carbon Fiber)
Derailleurs: Shimano Ultegra (Front and Rear)
Crank: Shimano Ultegra or Ritchey Compact
Cogset: Shimano Ultegra (9-speed)
Chain: Shimano CN-HG93, 1/2 x 3/32"
Shifters: Shimano Ultegra
Brakes: Shimano Ultegra
Hubs: Mavic Cosmos
Rims: Mavic Cosmos
Tires: 700 x 23c Hutchinson Carbon Comp
Saddle: Selle Italia Genuine Gel or Serfas
Seat post: Carbon Fiber
Stem: Thomson Deda Zero
Handle bar: Deda 250
Grips: Stock
Pedals: Shimano SPD
Headset: 1 1/8" integrated Cane Creek S-2
Includes Shimano Flightdeck Computer (speedometer, distance, and cadence meter, controls integrated in shifter hoods)

Castellano Fango Softail Mountain Bike For Sale

2012-01-03T06:33:00.000-06:00

Alright guys, make me an offer! This post will stay up as long as the bike is available. Asking $900. LOCAL INQUIRIES ONLY (Austin/San Antonio/Dallas/Houston). Started singlespeed conversion and last thing to do is paint, so only contact me if you're really serious.

Click on photo to contact me.

Designer: John Castellano
Color: Black with Speckled Silver (custom)
Head angle: 71.5deg
Seat angle: 74deg
Top tube length: 23.5”
Standover: 31.3”
Seat tube: 16.5”
Bottom bracket height: 11.75”
Wheelbase: 41.5”
Frame: Aluminum
Fork: Manitou Black Elite, 100mm travel
Rear shock: Critically Damped Elastomer Shock (softtail) with Flat-Plate Chainstays, 1.25” travel
Derailleurs: Shimano Deore LX (front), Shimano Deore XT (rear)
Crank: Shimano LX
Cogset: Shimano XT (9-speed)
Chain: Shimano DuraAce HG
Shifters: Shimano LX
Brakes: Avid
Hubs: Shimano LX
Rims: Mavic X221
Tires: Ritchey ZMAX World Championship Series (front), Continental Explorer Pro (rear)
Seat: WTB Speed V
Seat post: Thomson Elite
Stem: Thomson Elite with Carbon Shims
Handle bar: Profile Design Bar None
Grips: Stock
Pedals: Shimano SPD
Headset: Aheadset

Houston Adventure Racing Team 2011 in Video Form

2012-01-02T11:44:00.000-06:00

Houston Nav 2011 Results

2011-12-29T14:21:00.001-06:00

Thanks for all the hardcore racers who came out on Monday! Congrats to Ken and Brian on taking the top spot in the full course and Elaine for leading the Robertson Clan to an undisputed victory in the family course! I hope you enjoyed the event despite the cold, windy conditions--These parks are beautiful and I look forward to putting up another event there in the near future!

Houston Navigation Meet 2011!

2011-12-22T07:07:00.000-06:00

If you're in town and have nothing to do the day after Christmas, spend part of the day running around the park like a little kid doing a scavenger hunt! Here is the fun info on the when and where:

Date: Monday, December 26, 2011
Alexander Deussen Park (12303 Sonnier Street, Houston, Texas 77044)
Check-in: 7:30am
Navigation Questions: 8:00am
Pre-race meeting: 8:30am
Start Time: 9am
Duration: 1st team should be in at around 2-3hrs
Cost: $20 for solo, $30 for 2 person. Payment due at check-in (cash or check)
Maps: 1:24000 scale

PLEASE RSVP AND LET ME KNOW WHICH COURSE AND HOW MANY ON YOUR TEAM SO I CAN PLAN ACCORDINGLY WITH MAPS, CLUESHEETS, PASSPORTS, ETC.

CLICK HERE for more detailed information and to RSVP!

See you there!

You Have a Buckle!

2011-08-15T11:28:00.000-05:00

You Are An IRONMAN!

2011-05-23T12:00:00.001-05:00

Come and Get It! IMTX this Weekend!

2011-05-16T06:05:00.002-05:00

Alright, this is it--race week! Make sure to head over to www.ironman.com for live coverage of Ironman Texas! You should be able to track my progress on race day. Wish me luck!!!

2011 Eco-Lonestar 12hr AR Time Tracks

2011-03-07T16:31:00.002-06:00

Before I forget all about this, I wanted to post an always fun graph of time elapsed for each of the teams (instead of time splits--if you like that format better, go to www.terrafirmapromo.com). This one is a bit odd because a couple of teams skipped CPs on the VERY windy paddle leg, in anticipation of getting CPs later on that other teams (including us) would most likely not have time to get to.

Needless to say, as the graph shows, this was a pretty close race to the end, with all 5 teams finishing in a tight bunch, which seems pretty unusual to me for a 12hr. And it was a full 12hr--usually the winning team finishes several hours before the cutoff.

Anyway, as usual, there will be Monday morning QB-ing about this one...nevertheless, it was fun! And the hills/wind on the bike were great for training! Ugh. :)

Follow SuperMonkey's New Challenge

2011-01-20T07:02:00.000-06:00

Although not an AR challenge, this is more than worthy to be my first blog of the new year (and the first blog in almost a year)! Follow SuperMonkey's journey to defeat Cancer!

On to the Next One

2010-02-11T06:23:00.001-06:00

So the new year started with a fizzle for me. Not saying that it was bad, but in racing-terms it was DOA. Work had unexpectedly ramped up and I totally buckled down for the upcoming PE-Structural I exam. So in a nutshell, the only active stuff I'm currently able to do is swim during lunch (that has improved--swimming 1 mile straight each session) and occasionally get a quick training ride with the CVX crew on weekends (even if the cold and wind try to conspire against us).

Boo hoo. Okay, I guess since my life is boring I should talk about other people for a change. Before that, lets cry for me some more--I didnt get picked in the Leadville 100 lottery...could be that everyone else also saw "Race Across the Sky!" But good news is that a few friends of ours did: The Cajun, Iron Will, and Cyn. That will be an awesome experience! Iron Will already got his buckle, so he's just there to show off now.

Since the last time I blogged, I have done some fun stuff. West End occasionally does a "Crappy Road Ride" and it is as it sounds. Raymund and I decided to go and do the 01-01-10 edition the day after New Years. Amazingly, a good number showed...and some on road bikes?!? Apparently they didnt see the photos. Anyway, we roll out bright and early, not before I have to ride all the way back home because I forgot my HELMET!! Wow, was I ridin dirteh or what.

It was a really good ride with a lot of ninja routes--I just wondered how he knew about all of those short cuts! Now, if I could only find a similar route to work I would do it everyday! We actually started off near my house, then on White Oak Bayou, Heights, Downtown, East Side, Downtown, Heights, and back to West End. Good times! I cant wait to do that ride again!

In AR news, apparently they keep on racing without me. Big Chill was a couple of weeks ago--this was the 2nd year in a row that I missed...after not missing it for 4 straight years! Dang work...jk, work is really good to have these days! It sounded like the weather was relatively warm for a change. Final standings were Vignette, iMOAT, HFAR, Steelsports, then two HART teams for the 24hr. Our shirtless friends, the Flying Monkeys won the 12hr male div (and overall), while two HART teams got 4th and 5th coed.

Warda was this past weekend, but I havent seen any race reports and I'm not about to bushwhack through that mess of results! One final note: the new HART website is up and running! Its still in its infancy, so bear with us as we fine tune it. But if you want to come out and train, it has all the info you need to meet up with us!

Okay, time to duck down back into work. Until next time, mash hard!

Houston Navigation Meet 09 Results

2009-12-27T19:03:00.003-06:00

Congrats to Nathan and Jason Winklemann, who finished 1st and 2nd, respectively, while Helena Finley and Bobby Kitchen secured 3rd place at the H-NAV 09! Full results provided below. Thanks again for all those who came out and navigated their way through the forest and making the event a success! I hope you all enjoyed it--make sure to send me comments if there are things you think I can improve upon. Until next year, have a great remainder of 09!!

Cheers,

Kenny

Houston Navigation Meet 09

2009-12-21T06:52:00.002-06:00

NOTE CHANGE IN LOCATION!: WG JONES STATE FOREST (30min from Houston, directions to HQ provided below)
Date: Saturday, December 26, 2009
Check-in: 7:30am
Navigation Questions: 8:00am
Pre-race meeting: 8:30am
Start Time: 9am
Duration: 1st team should be in at around 2-3hrs
Cost: $20 for solo, $30 for 2 person. Payment due at check-in (cash or check)
Maps: 1:24000 scale

Mandatory Gear:
Compass
UTM Plotter
Pen or pencil
Bug spray
Working cell phone—provide number to check-in person
Food and water for duration of event

Recommended Gear:
Gaiters or Long pants
Map case
Eye protection

Object of Meet:
To keep this meet simple, for the second year in a row, H-NAV will be on foot. This training event should be a nice and fun course to jump-start your recovery from the holiday binge. If you have any questions about navigation in general, just ask. Help is allowed for all parties prior to the start and between teams during the meet. Payment will not be due until check-in that Saturday, but please email me if you plan to attend so that I can print off enough maps, passports, etc.

Rules:

You must sign a waiver before competing.

Please, NO pre-scouting the week before the meet.

NO outside maps!

If you are unfamiliar with topo maps or general navigation, there will be a QA session at 8am on meet day.

Boundaries are clearly marked on the map. You must obey them or be disqualified.

Safety Briefing (including hazards, safety bearing, etc.) will be provided at pre-race meeting.

You can obtain points in any order.

Teams of 1 or 2 are allowed.

There will be two courses: family and full. If you havent told me which course you would like to do yet, please email me ASAP.

You must record your visit to each point by punching your passport in the correct box. Some CPs may not have punches and require you to write down a code of some sort. Bring a pen!

The team with all CPs and the fastest time wins.

There is no official cutoff time, but everyone is highly encouraged to be back within 5 hours. Please let us know if you abandon the course before you leave for home or if you expect to be out longer than 5 hours.

Prizes will be awarded to the top three teams. Top prize includes free entry to the TooCool Lonestar Rogaine 6hr Race!

DIRECTIONS:

- From I-10/I-45 interchange in Houston, take I-45 north for about 32 miles.

- Take Exit 81 and take FM 1488 West (entrance to cloverleaf is on right)

- Go about 1.5 miles and take left of Peoples Rd. BE CAREFUL--there is construction on 1488, so the entrance to the road is a bit hidden!

- Road will curve to right and then to the left. As it straightens out again, look for a sign for the Horse Trailer parking, turn right.

- Go about half a mile down this dirt road and HQ will be to the right. Turn to the right and park along the side of the dirt road--dont go left as this is where the horse trailers will park.

- Please try to carpool as parking space is limited.

Please contact me if you have any questions.

Kenny
713.253.1041
kennyar@gmail.com

Dave Boyd XPD Suunto T6 Log

2009-12-15T06:09:00.000-06:00

* merged T6 data with Smartbelt data
** see SPOTventures page for tracking data
*** due to weather variability, altitude reading is erratic
**** HR trace erratic towards end--need new T6c!!!

Dave Boyd XPD 09 - Team TooCool/HART/PB - Adventure Racing - Spot

2009-12-14T12:18:00.004-06:00

Dave Boyd XPD 09 - Team TooCool/HART/PB at SpotAdventures

Map created by SpotAdventures:GPS Geotagging

SPOT Tracking at Dave Boyd XPD

2009-12-10T12:03:00.002-06:00

Click this link to follow us starting at 7pm Friday night:

TooCool/HART @ Dave Boyd XPD

For more information on the race, click this link:

Dave Boyd XPD @ Checkpointtracker

COOOLLLDDDD!!!

Deconstructing RBP #2

2009-11-24T06:45:00.003-06:00

So, its been a while since I've done these nerdy time split analyses, so here you go. I just put up the top 5 because the results were in graphic form (couldnt copy and paste). The top chart of course shows how Arild had full control of the race until the last leg with the passport issue. But what's interesting is that after having a good 1st leg coming in 2nd, Shake and Bake started losing ground and were fighting for 2nd 2-male for most of the race until Semper Fi (Jim Kronaeger and Son) blew it open on the last bike leg.

The splits chart shows pretty much the same thing, but it gives a better picture of each of the leg times. Arild controlled the run and paddles, while I kept it nice and close with good bike times. Shake and Bake actually had a really good 2nd paddle, keeping them neck and neck with Semper Fi. Negative splits on the paddle, as should be expected (downstream instead of upstream) and a couple of us were able to have negative splits on the bike!

Fun with graphs...yay!

RunBikePaddle Sprint AR #2 Suunto T6 Log

2009-11-23T06:22:00.001-06:00

* 3mi run
1mi paddle
1mi run
9mi bike
1mi run
1mi paddle
9mi bike

** pods not used

*** start altitude about 30ft below actual

USARA Nationals 2009 Suunto Logs

2009-10-28T06:51:00.000-05:00

Smartbelt Log

T6 Log* (includes altitude data**)

* pods not used due to race rigors
** T6 log stopped early due to full memory

Back on the Horse: Glen Rose Recap

2009-10-27T12:15:00.001-05:00

I guess that now that all the insanity of the wedding has died down and racing season is pretty much coming to a slow close, I can get back to blogging. Then again, I doubt anyone really missed my entries—didn’t hear a peep from anyone during the past 3 or so months regarding it! Either way, I will try to keep this bad boy going for at least a little longer, but I would like a bit of input to know if anyone even reads this garbage!

So, lets see. I pretty much stopped communication right before the final sprint of the season—I’ll try to recap what I remember from the race. It was hot…again. We had to drive all the way out to Glen Rose, which was basically west and south of Dallas. Scottie was already there, so I met up with her and then did a preride of the course by myself since she had already previewed it. After a bit of screwing around at the race site, we retired to the hotel with Dave P.

Race was brutal because of the nasty climbs and the temps. It started off with a run with an immediate hill climb. It went alright and we were keeping a good pace and were still in the top pack by the time we got back to transition. We had to ride to the boat put in where we ran head on, literally, with a bad omen. I was towing Scottie on the bike down this jeep trail when all the sudden a cow starts barreling down at us! At first I figured it would see us and get out of the way…nope! It kept running towards us until, at the last second, we both veered away from each other! Damn cow was playing chicken! I escaped harm, but Scottie lost control and crashed. We collected ourselves, still wondering if that really happened, then continued to the boat drop.

We started off rough on the paddle as SOMEONE forgot their seat. :) Oh well, we would manage. We actually were paddling really strong; I seem to remember us being in the top 10 or something like that. We consistently started passing teams. We got back to the boat drop and had to lug that rubber duckie up the steep dropoff. We were back on our bikes and had to head back to transition—it was mandatory as a precaution against the heat, to give teams a chance to take on more water.

We start off on the bike and realize we are in front of iMOAT for probably the first time in the series! We tried to keep our lead, but the heat and hilly terrain was just too much for us. We had to actually turn it back a notch so that we didn’t blow a gasket. This was probably our slowest race. Somehow we make it through the course and get back to TA. We have one final leg, a special test. It was kinda wimpy as we had to put on and take off jerseys successively and that was it. We sprinted to the finish with all kinds of anguish showing on our faces. We finished 4th in the race and 4th overall for the entire season, which are both good considering the competition.

I stayed for the awards ceremony then left to Dallas to get Mo’s wedding band…and that was it. Drove back home from there and was back in time for dinner. The sprint series was over and I was pretty happy about it. So, I will stop there and start on the No Sweat race for the next entry. Whew, that was exhausting!

Glacier Backpack Rewind

2009-07-29T12:04:00.006-05:00

K-SPoT's Bachelor Week Backpacking Adventure in Glacier at SpotAdventures

Map created by SpotAdventures:GPS Geotagging

I'm still working on uploading all the photos and the videos from my bachelor party week, but I did get a chance to use the Spot Adventures website to put together an interactive summary of our backpacking trip! Even cooler is that you can download a KML file and open it up in Google Earth and watch a playback of the tracks in 3D mode! Amazing! CLICK ON THE LINK ABOVE THE MAP WIDGET TO CHECK IT OUT!

Glacier Backpacking Days 2 and 4 Suunto T6 Logs

2009-07-28T06:02:00.001-05:00

Day 2: Triple Divide Pass Ascent:

Day 4: Pitamakan Pass Ascent:

Spokane Wedding Planning, Tele-CUS-ference, Glacier Triple Divide Pass and more...

2009-07-17T12:08:00.002-05:00

Alright, Glen Rose blog will just have to wait until after I get back from my trip to the Pacific Northwest--just did not have enough time to put it together! In the meantime, here's a map of our itinerary through Glacier, and, more importantly, starting on Wednesday, July 22, you can track us using THIS LINK.

Glen Rose Sprint AR Suunto T6 Log

2009-07-13T06:10:00.003-05:00

* events:

- 3.08mi run
- 0.72mi bike
- 1.64mi paddle
- 8.82mi bike
- special test

total = 14.26mi

** altitude about 160ft below actual
*** drops in HR reading possibly due to my heart giving out momentarily or strap slippage

Hot at Huntsville

2009-06-30T12:08:00.002-05:00

Well, we knew this was the weather we would get on race day since its been like this for about the past month! Hot and humid! At least at Muleshoe it wasnt humid. It would be different at Huntsville, so we trained in the nastiness as much as possible to try and get acclimated to it...but who can really get totally acclimated to this damn weather?! So we started off the week after Muleshoe with HART training on Monday and Tuesday, I took the next couple of days off for no explainable reason, swim on Friday, trail bike on Saturday, and then another recon at Huntsville on Sunday. Dave P, Monica K, and Dennis P were there as well. I could stay for only one lap, so I tried to make the most of it and pushed the pace. I was sopping wet with sweat at the end. With that, I left them with the rest of their training session while I zipped back to the H to move stuff into my office in the new building.

Race week started with HART training on Tuesday and Thursday and I swam on Friday to keep the muscles loose. It was nice not having to drive on Friday and sleep in my own bed...but the risk was that it was a different routine. I was starting to get used to the leave work in the early afternoon, drive to race site, pre-ride, dinner, sleep routine. Oh well, my body would just have to deal with the increase in rest. I did go over to Whit and Aaron's to meet his parents, but we were back home by around 9 or so. The big "L" he signed over his forehead said it all, but I had to race early in the morning! I left with no remorse.

We got up early and made the drive north to exit 109. We were one of the first racers there, so I was able to save a good spot for all the HART teams--there would be a lot of us this time because it was so close to Houston. I think there were 17 or so teams from HART alone. Scottie went off to do her registration volunteer thing while I set up TA and re-rigged her bike...long story short, after borrowing Mo's bike after running over hers, she got hers back in time from the shop, just after wrecking Mo's and sending it to the shop. By the time I was all set up, TA was full with racers and pretty much all the HART teams were there.

After all the pre-race rituals, we were there at the starting line, in the front row again. I wanted to keep pace as long as possible with the top teams. With no fanfare, we were off! Pace was fast, but I was still feeling good. We again let the super fast go and kept a pretty good clip still, faster than the past races. We were actually in front of Keith and Bobby's team and the first place coed team in the series for once! But I knew with the heat my pace would most likely slow down a bit and it did. Scottie egged me on to tow faster, but I was going as fast as my legs would go--brain said, "go faster!", legs said, "hell no!" So we kept a steady, somewhat slower pace for the last portion of the run.

We made it back to TA still in front of a few of the fast teams and transitioned to the boat. This is where the real hell happened. We got in the boat relatively fast, but then I noticed something a bit different this time. There was a small amount of water in the boat. At first I figured that we must have just brought it in with our soaked shoes when getting in, but at the first turn at the observation stand, we were swamped with water! WTF?!? The boat wasnt going flat, so it wasnt that--I just couldnt figure out where the water was coming from! It eventually got up past my knees! I guess we could have stopped and bailed, but without knowing where it was coming from, I figured it would just fill up again. So we were paddling very hard just to keep us and our swamped rubber duckie moving forward. Normally we would be passing or keeping pace with the teams around us, but we were continuously getting passed like we were standing still! Frick! I was distraught, but with no other option I went into overdrive to no avail. We eventually made it back to shore, but not before being passed by almost 10 teams!

At this point I was spent from muscling that extra water around the lake. Still, I tried to mash on the bike to catch up to the other coed teams. We were still catching up to teams, but not at the furious pace that we usually do. Frank, on a coed masters team, for some reason called us out before the race even though we werent in the same category, so we kinda wanted to at least beat them this race as a goal since our primary one was out the door after that paddle. Scottie was doing great on the tow until one bumpy section dislodged the T.O.W. This wasnt a problem, but when she tried to reconnect, we hit a sandy spot and she was down. It was at this point that Raymund and Ferley passed us and spit on us as we lay in the dirt...okay, so they didnt spit on us and they did check to make sure we were okay.

We eventually got hooked back up and were moving, fast enough to catch Frank and Helena. I got ahead of myself and thought we needed to pass them as soon as possible so that we dont get caught behind them if they happen to crash. So, of course, instead, as we tried to pass we crashed and broke the tow. We tried to quickly get reattached, but the first crash had partly damaged the retracting device and as I started to roll on, the tow wire got tangled in my wheel and ripped the T.O.W. clean off my bike! Double Frick! Complete systems failure--that was it for towing that day. But it didnt seem to matter to Scottie--the whole incident seemed to spark a flame under her! She had had enough it seemed and she motored out of there with me keeping pace! We quickly caught back up with Frank and Helena and Scottie made the move and passed. There was no slowing her down now! We made it back to the finish straight and now it was down to the final special test.

My legs were just jello at this point. We had to run over to the swimming area, but before we could get into the water we had to scale this mountainous slide and slide down...okay, it just felt mountainous. We then waded through the lukewarm lake water which did not refresh us at all, but it did mean our race was soon over so I tried to trudge through it as fast as I could. We made it back to shore and it was back over the slide, backwards, and then a sprint to the finish. With that we were done.

We finished in just under 2hrs and got 4th place. Good, but we were hoping for better for sure! We had a great run and good bike...that damn boat! Oh well. We are now tied for 2nd place in the series. We now have one last race if we ever want to make a dramatic move up in the standings. Its highly unlikely, but we are still gonna give it our best shot. Glen Rose, feel our vengeance!

Huntsville Sprint AR Suunto T6 Log

2009-06-29T06:38:00.000-05:00

* events:

- 3.17mi run
- 1.52mi paddle
- 9.18mi bike
- 0.43mi special test

total = 14.37mi

** altitude about 350ft above actual
*** first TE=5.0 of series! This was a tough one (boat filling up with water didnt help)!

Mooshoo, err, Muleshoe is the Best I Ever Had

2009-06-17T06:06:00.010-05:00

So after the good race we had up in Dallas, it was back to work because we knew the next sprint race over in Austin would be our toughest yet with the bike being almost all singletrack. All of the top competition had really good biking skills and the twistiness of the sweet trails would most likely negate our towing option, but we still pushed at training to give it our best. The week following the race was HART training on Monday and Tuesday, lunch swim on Tuesday, brick workout with Scottie on Thursday, and then we had weekend training up at Huntsville on Sunday.

Training at Huntsville was a bit more relaxed than usual. We started off with a pseudo classroom session where Rick gave us advice for sprint racing, then he gave us a little time to set up TA before starting the sprint mock race. We started off with a 2+ mile run from the water to the nature center and back. We led the pack and transitioned pretty well to the bike. One problem--Scottie's front tire was flat! Was it because of her preride this morning? No, Rick decides to "randomly" let air out of tires as a special test. Hmm, funny he didnt let air out of either Ray-Ray or EMo's tires, who were the next to come in on the run. Regardless, we tried to pump the tire back up as fast as possible and hop back on the bikes.

We head up the main park road, which has a pretty nice climb to the trailhead. We grinded up to the top. Then it was into the singletrack. The weather has been so dry that the normally sandy trails were super sandy! We had to concentrate on being "light" on the bikes and surf through the stuff. We did really well through the trails and stayed with Ray-Ray and EMo. Once we got back to the pavement, we mashed back to TA where we proceeded to air up the boat. We quickly get in and start practicing our paddle strokes. Rick comes over to help and tells us to "reach out and grab us some!" We stay out there for about an hour just working on technique then mosey on back to TA for some picnicing fun. Another great day at Huntsville!

The next week was pretty much the same, except a bit easier since it was race week. HART on Monday and Tuesday, spin class on Wednesday, swim on Thursday, and pre-ride on Friday. Scottie got to the race site way before me to help with the race, so she had already pre-ridden the bike course. I hit the trail as soon as Mo and I arrived. It has been so long since I've been to Muleshoe, probably 2 years, but now I remember why I love this trail so much! Plus, the area had a bit of rain the night before so the sand was knocked down a bit, making the turns a bit more sticky and fun! After I get back from my preride, we pack up and head over to Marble Falls for dinner and lodgings.

Saturday morning, race day. The temps are already in the 80s at around 8am, but thankfully there is a bit of a hazy cloud cover to protect us...but not for long! We get set up pretty quickly, so Mo and I had a bit of dead time before race start. As soon as Scottie is done helping with registration, she gets the rest of her gear together and we listen to pre-race. Scott makes it sweet and simple and in no time we are at the line...we decide to go straight to the front to see what it feels like. We are in front of the iMOAT teams for a moment...it feels great! After a less than stellar Star Spangled Banner by the racers, we are off!

We are busting our butt on the run as we know that the bike will give us trouble. With that in mind, we are staying with the lead pack, which is pretty big at the moment. But we know that some teams will blow out in a second...and they do. Slowly we pass team after team, but the strongest stay constant or even start pulling away. We catch up to this male team that is visibly having team bonding issues. One guy is berating his teammate, yelling at him, telling him to run faster, while at the same time not slowing down to offer a tow. Obviously his teammate did not appreciate this abuse. When the stronger runner did slow down and let him tow, he immediately speeds off in a fury and the towee has finally had enough and pushes his teammate. Hilarious! I'm so glad that we are A LOT better with our communication!

So we finish the run, in front of the squabbling male team, and transition to boats. The AAR masters male team is so eager to smoke everyone on the bike that they forget that the paddle is next and are running their bikes out of TA...we nicely ask, "you guys arent done with the paddle already, are you?!?" They change course. We get in the paddle and are doing well. We round the first buoy neck and neck with a couple of teams. We slowly pass 2 or 3 and are now in the top 10 overall, 5th coed. We are paddling pretty well, but cannot gain much ground on the rest of the leaders. Still, we do as much as we can and finish the 2 mile paddle alongside a couple of male teams.

Here comes the painful leg. We start off nicely with some flat trail, so we mash hard here. But as the singletrack comes, we slow down noticeably. Teams are now passing us, which is completely opposite from the Dallas race where we were passing teams violently! Thankfully the teams passing us were in other categories, but it was still a bit disheartening. Finally, as we crossed the main road into the park, we decide to tow. This actually works for the most part, but I am sure Scottie doesnt like it as much, not having full control on the technical singletrack. Still, she is a super-trooper and we get through the trail system and actually make time on the teams that had just passed us.

Final leg is the special test, where we have to wade through the lake about waist high along a rope. Not too hard, but the muddy bottom definitely slows us down. Once we get out, we agree to sprint as hard as we can. In the process, we pass one team and almost pass another two. Done in just over 2 hours in the blazing heat! As we recoup under some other team's ez-up, we find out that we are 5th coed--not bad considering our not so stellar bike performance. I am happy because we kept pushing regardless. Plus, this put us in 2nd for the series in the coed div...I'll cherish it for these next couple of weeks! After awards, we head back into Austin and have lunch at El Arroyo and then back home to H-town. We have another 2-week break before the next race, so we have time to work on our strategy for Huntsville. So that's what we'll be doing. Until then, mash hard!

Muleshoe Bend Sprint AR Suunto T6 Log

2009-06-15T06:46:00.002-05:00

* events:
- 3mi trail run
- 2mi paddle
- 8mi trail bike
- special test

total = 13mi

** speed not recorded due to battery death (need to remember to replace before every race!)
*** altitude ~400ft above actual
**** erratic HR recording possibly due to strap slippage

Dashing Through Big D

2009-06-10T06:25:00.005-05:00

With the Combat Tri done, it was time to focus on the White Rock Lake sprint in Dallas. This race would be the one for the true flatlanders who loved to mash! We started the week of training with a paddle-run-bike training session at Sabine on Monday, went to HART on Tuesday, swam on Wednesday and then took it easy until after the drive up on Friday. When I got there, we mounted up and did a pre-ride of the course. Afterwards it was time for dinner (Chili's) and then we headed over to our Super 8 motel off of I-30 and that concluded the uneventful night.

We got up bright and early the next day to get some Starbucks before heading to the race site. I also wanted to drop off the seats at the boat drop, so I did that right afterward. Once I got back, I immediately set up TA and got registration out of the way. It was another good turnout--about 100 teams I think. It was in the heart of Dallas, so if you were from here you had no excuse. With TA set up we went for a warmup run and this sat and listened to pre-race.

Within a few minutes we were toeing the line for the start. Once everyone was over there, I could barely make out Kathy's muffled voice, but I could tell the jist of it...3, 2, 1...GO! So we were off on our first 1.5 mile run to the boats. Nothing special here--just a bunch of running on grass and some pavement, just trying to keep up with the gazelles. We got to the boats with big lead pack and transitioned well into our boats. Now came the headache of not being the fastest on the run...we tried to get our rhythm down but I quickly saw that it wasnt going to happen--we were heading straight into a couple of guys spinning in their boat! I tried to evade, but got pinned between them and another boat. That direction was obviously not working, so I then tried a hard right, but of course thats when the guys decided to spin in that direction! Frack! I finally yelled for them to get out of the way and somehow got away from that mess. What a waste of valuable time and energy!

We eventually got our stroke and were slowly picking off people along the way. As we were approaching the turnaround I could see about 10 or so boats ahead of us, so that was pretty good! On the way back we were probably going about 4+mph and still passing teams. We got out of the water, dropped off the boats and were back on the run back to TA. I wasnt as fresh this time around, so towing was probably at an easier pace. Still, I think we were doing alright and staying with the lead teams.

Next was the bike--the part I was totally drueling over! We got on our bikes pretty quickly, hitched up the tow, and mashed! Right away we passed about 3 teams. Then we hit a pack of roadies doing an easy ride...did I say this lake was packed?! This lake was packed! We were constantly dodging runners and bikers and I was thankful that I decided to buy a little bell--I used it generously! We drafted behind the roadies for a while but they were going at erratic speeds, so when it finally opened up, we passed them and mashed on. The paved trail was easy to get to top speed on and we were passing teams pretty consistently. We then entered the short singletrack section, which we still kept hooked on since it wasnt very technical. The only issue we had was the course didnt flow well and there were two three spots where it just abruptly turned back on itself. I braced for impact, but thankfully Scottie never really slammed into me even though we were still towing. After that, it was back to the pavement and the short little section back home.

We pushed really hard on the home stretch of the bike because we knew that it was the last event before the special test. We jogged into TA, dropped our bikes and helmets and proceeded to a cargo net that we had to crawl under. No issues here and just like that we were done! I really felt good about our performance and it was justified as we got 3rd place! Not bad considering the tough competition! We hung out a bit, Bobby and I got a bite to eat while Scottie finished up helping with Scott and Kathy, and then I ended up just jetting back to Htown because I couldnt get a hold of my friends in Plano. That was it. 2 down, 3 to go...and the next one should be pretty tough! Muleshoe has some sweet singletrack that I love, but may give our team fits. We'll see...

Not Quite SEALS, But it was COMBAT

2009-06-04T06:09:00.008-05:00

So I was coming off of the XTERRA high the weekend before and was actually really relaxed about the upcoming Combat Tri down in Texas City...perhaps too relaxed. I figured if I can do a crazy open water swim, a simple 300yd pool swim would be cake--I do this all the time during lunch! So I stayed with my regular training and went to HART on Tuesday and Thursday, did some short interval swims on Tuesday and Thursday, and rode my tri bike on Wednesday since it had been about 3 weeks since I've been on it.

The race would prove to be fun like XTERRA since both the Warship and Emoe were racing as well. Since it was practically in town, I took my sweet time that morning and did my usual ritual of mocha, muffin, and banana right before heading down. Once I got there it was already chaos at around 6am! By that time Warship and Emoe were all set in TA already and we laughing at me for arriving so late. It was thankfully okay since we all had assigned spots on the bike racks and I had already picked up my packet on Thursday, so I actually didnt have to rush around. Emoe had the sweet bonus of his daughter racing as well--the Moore Triathlon Team!

So after waiting a while in transition and the prerace briefing, we ambled over to the pool to line up. I was number 200-something, so I had quite a bit of time to wait since we were going in numerical order and 10 second increments. I actually didnt like the 10-second increment--the first tri I did gave us a full 25m head start before letting the next swimmer start. But that was a much smaller race, so I understood the 10 seconds--otherwise we would be there all day! So Warship, Emo, and I just stood by the edge of the pool and watched the chaos ensue. People were trying to pass, people were blocking, people were diving under and over people...nuts!

It eventually was close to my time, so I filed in and slowly marched over to the start. I just didnt want to get passed! So in I jumped...1, 2, 3, GO! I tried to get into rhythm and it did work for a short while. I made the first turn and it looked like I was keeping my 10 sec lead over the next guy, so I kept going strong. I actually caught up with the woman ahead of me! She didnt let me pass at first, but at the next turn she let me go. I quickly caught up to the next guy, but he was a jerk! I obviously was trying to pass him, but he was so huge and there always seemed to be a swimmer coming the other way on the right side that I wasnt able to pass! The lady I had just passed actually caught back up with me and we were now involved in a 3-way scrum! I was so pissed, but I couldnt do anything other than punch the guy in the gut. So I just swam on his side for the rest of the way, trying to draft and rest so that I could smoke his ass on the bike.

We got out of the water and I sped pass the lumbering oaf and tried to quickly transition on to the bike. The girl was right next to me and she actually was on a relay team, so I didnt feel so bad that she was right there with me. I still dont have my swim to bike transition down--it was one of the slowest transitions in my age group!! I finally got on the bike and went straight to work. I actually felt really comfy on the bike despite not spending too much time on that particular machine. When I turned NW on I-45 I started picking off people one by one in pretty quick fashion. I was feeling really good and this was even in a slight headwind. Going up the overpass and now going SE on I-45 I was now a freight train with the tailwind! At times I got up to 26mph or so on the flat course. I never got passed by one person. Turning back to TA, I passed one more woman who looked pretty serious and didnt want me to pass her (she was working really hard to keep up). I ended up with almost a 24mph average--my quickest ever on the bike (even compared with all the Duathlons)!

So now to the dreaded run, 2nd dreaded after the swim. It started off similar to the XTERRA bike-run transition where I had just passed a pro-looking woman at the end of the bike only to get smoked by her near the start of the run. It happened again here, but this time instead of her being the only female to beat me at XTERRA, three women beat me at Combat...which I understood--these women are fast! Anyway, I just tried to keep my run around a 7 to 7:30 pace, which I eventually did. I actually passed people on the run too! Woohoo! It seemed like forever, but eventually the finish straight came and I hammered in around 1hr 7mins.

I actually felt really good and felt like I could go longer, which is a good sign. Results were up really quickly and my heart just dropped--I missed 3rd place by 24 seconds!! That was that horrible T1! Grrrr! Oh well, now I know what I need to improve on for real...other than swimming! I still felt good since I was able to finish top 5 in a sport I just started in, this being my 3rd ever tri, 2nd if you dont count XTERRA. The rest of the crew had a good outing too, with Warship and Emoe putting out swim times a lot better than what they predicted and Emoe's daughter getting 3rd place!

So that was pretty much it for Combat. I of course immediately started looking for the next tri...unfortunately all the Ironmans are booked until next year. ;)

White Rock Lake Sprint AR Suunto T6 Log

2009-06-01T06:37:00.002-05:00

* events:
- 1.5mi run
- 1.4mi paddle
- 1.5mi run
- 13.5mi bike

Total = 17.9mi

** loss in speed signal due to battery depletion
*** altitude reading about 200ft above actual

Combat Triathlon Suunto T6 Log

2009-05-26T06:36:00.000-05:00

* Pods not used due to race rigors
** Altitude readings about 400ft above actual
*** Erratic signal due to swim

XTERRA: The Transformation

2009-05-22T06:39:00.001-05:00

Sweet--looks like I'm finally going to be caught up to realtime after this blog! So now starting with the week of May 11th. I had one final ows training session with Ray-Ray and Warship on Monday at Twin Lakes. This time we did 3 loops continuous to simulate race distance. I felt just fine and now felt pretty confident for XTERRA. Only thing missing was the chaos of 100 other racers splashing around in the water. Oh well--would just have to deal with that on the fly.

Tuesday and Thursday was HART training and then one final lunch swim on Friday before the weekend. Since it was on Sunday, we didnt have to leave until Saturday, but I still wanted to leave relatively early that day to get packet pickup out of the way and not have to deal with that on race day. So we drove to Austin Saturday morning and the skies looked threatening. Just great--what we need for my first XTERRA--a downpour! Since reports from Raymund indicated that the Madrone Trail at Canyon Lake was pretty technical with rocks everywhere, I wanted to preride that day, but it wasnt looking very good once we got into Austin. The skies abruptly opened up and there was no visibility! We were driving through virtual rivers just to get Pure Fitness. We eventually got there, but it really was nasty out.

We went in to get our packets, but neither Elena or Scottie were there, just random volunteers. Im sure they were busy with the course set up. So we quickly left and scavenged for lunch. We ended up at the Hula Hut. Not necessarily a good place for food...more of a place to drink, but we figured we would try their fish tacos. It was still pouring out and there was a huge crowd--apparently this is the place to go on the weekend for lunch! We didnt have to wait too long as there was a shorter demand for the outside deck seating, considering the gloomy conditions outside. Nothing spectacular happened until Mo noticed that someone at another table looked pretty familiar...it looked like Sheila. It definitely looked like her, but we never got a good glimpse of her face. So finally I just took a stalker-ish photo of her, sent it to Facebook and tagged her, asking "is this you, sheila?!" Just as I was joking it would be hilarious if she started looking up around, thinking, "WTF?!", there she was doing that exact thing! It was friggin hilarious! She saw us giggling like schoolgirls and walked over and said hello. We shortly parted ways and that is how my stalker career started...

After lunch, we decided to drive over to Canyon Lake just in case the rains subsided and we would be able to preride. No such luck--still pouring buckets. We got there and there were just two other cars, possibly contemplating the same thing. We bailed on the preride, but since we were already there I wanted to scout out the TA. I ran out in the rain and checked it out. Buoys werent out yet, but TA was set up already. With all this rain, I'm sure it was playing havoc on the race director! So, thwarted by mother nature, we tucked our tails between our legs and retreated back to San Marcos where we had booked a hotel. We then headed out to scavenge for more food, this time at Carinos. Food was so-so, but the bread pudding was amazing! Afterwards, we stocked up on some Starbucks coffee for the morning and headed back to the Super 8 and called it a night.

Next morning we got up bright and early for the drive back to Canyon Lake. We were one of the first ones to set up our TAs. As I figured, packet pickup that morning was ridiculous and it actually would have delayed start if it wasnt for other distractions delaying the start. Yes, the buoys. Elena, Scottie, and Bobby were out there frantically setting up the swim course and just when they thought it was set up, one buoy decided to make the course a bit longer for us. They spent over an hour trying to set that buoy, but it wouldnt cooperate. So finally, Elena decided to modify the course to a straightline out and back, one loop. Now, we all were thinking to ourselves, "that's way shorter than 1500m!" But we didnt complain too much. I think everyone was just very ready to get it started after waiting for an hour and cutting our feet on beer cans in the surf--seriously, you would not believe how many cans we dredged from the shore!

Just as we thought it was finally going to be a reality, Elena yells out that we now had to do two laps of the modified course. Okay, resetting brain...ready! You could tell now that everyone just wanted to start the swim and get it over with. Just a few moments later, the horn goes off! Raymund and I stay away from the initial chaos and slowly start our swim. Amazingly I was doing alright with the initial thrashing about by everyone around me...for a moment there was even a zen-like calmness to it. Then came the first turn--chaos! Everyone was pawing and kicking at each other and rather than getting scared, I was getting pissed! I kicked back--get off my feet! Thankfully that only lasted a moment, but still I wasted a lot of energy just trying to get away from that mess.

We finished the first loop and walked around the buoy to start the 2nd. I was feeling fine, but my goggles were all fogged up and mud was kicked up from the lake bottom, so visibility was a lot worse this time around. I am sure I zigzagged alot the 2nd time around. Nothing different this time, though--more relaxed as I knew what to expect and like that the swim was done. Exiting the water, I slowly peeled off my wetsuit. My legs were not tired, just felt weird. That was one of my longest transitions and I was barking to myself, "get out of there already!" Finally I get all my bike gear on and head out for the treacherous bike. Since I was a slow swimmer I got caught behind these not so seasoned mountain bikers. I knew I had to get in front or risk some kind of injury caused by them. Right off the bat, people were stopping abruptly and blocking the trail. I just was done with all that, so I just hopped off and started running around them. I didnt get back on until I had cleared most of the barney train.

Finally I got a little respite and my legs had warmed up properly--I was now cruising pretty well. I was still passing riders and never got passed up. We were about to finish up the first loop when disaster struck. I was riding up on this one guy and was about to pass when he just stopped and blocked any of the semi-good lines (I say semi because every line had a slippery boulder or two that you had to negotiate). So I took a terrible line and thats when it happened. I started rolling away from the chaos when I heard "hissssssss"! No! I got off to inspect the leak and I thought it was a slow one so I tried to keep going. No go. Tire was too flat to ride through that crap. So I tried for a quick tube change. No go either. Of course this is the one time the tire will not easily come off the rim. It was so caked with mud it was hard for me to get a good grip. Finally I get it off, switch the tube and start airing up with the CO2. Unfortunately, Ive been having problems with this particular CO2 gun and it would continue that day. Not all the CO2 was going in the tube for some reason and after two cartridges the tire was still barely inflated. Frick!

Funny how the first several good riders who just passed me asked if I needed anything and at that time I didnt. Now I did and I was now asking the sprint coursers for CO2 (mind you, they were pretty much done with their bike) and amazingly none of them had anything to spare. Assholes. So I just ran the bike out there, hoping I would find something at the road. It was about another half mile until I got to the road and thankfully I was able to get some air. I was so pissed at this time that I went balls out on the 2nd lap. I knew Id be able to make up some time, but I would then suffer on the run. Didnt matter--had to try anyway. So I zoomed pass about 5 or 10 riders along the way. This time I was not so nice. I just took the track. Then, again, just as I was about to finish the bike leg, a girl just stops in the middle of the trail! WTF?! She admitted her fault, so it was okay, I guess. I tried to mash hard along the road back to TA, but my legs were now toast from the catching up.

I transitioned quickly and actually I think I was 2nd fastest in my age group for T2. I was running pretty well at first--I think my legs were glad to be off those rocks. But I started to tighten up a bit. That girl who just stopped in front of me just breezed by--obviously she was a runner! I slowed down a little to get my legs back. The first part of the trail was flat, but once we got to the hills my legs were screaming for mercy. I gave them none--I knew I couldnt stop now. I was getting passed by two or so runners, but I knew if I could just keep a steady pace I would still have a good time. My second run lap was definitely slower than the first, but I kept moving, never stopping once. Then I could hear the finish coming up, so I put out whatever I had left, which wasnt much. It was a sufferfest the last 10th of a mile, but I knew I would be happy that I did push it. Up the hill and there was the finishing straight! I was so relieved that I put my hands up and actually smiled for once. Done.

I think I wasted a whole 10mins with the tire incident and probably wouldnt have slowed down so much on the run if I wasnt playing catchup, but still I felt good to finish my first open water swim tri! Woohoo! Me and my bike were battered and bruised, but I was so happy. Raymund had a little incident with some cacti on the bike, so that slowed him down quite a bit, but still he stuck with it too and finished what he started. Considering a month ago XTERRA was not even a smidgen of thought in my mind, to have now completed it has transformed my thought process. I'm about to do the Combat Triathlon this coming weekend and now I think a pool swim just wont cut it for me. Amazingly, now I'm seeking out open water swims...well, with wetsuits allowed, that is...for now.

We stayed a bit for the post-race festivities, but I was ready to go after I had finished my celebratory beer. We headed back to Houston through Luling, hoping to get some barbecue, but apparently all stores are closed on Sundays there--it was 3pm in the afternoon! So we settled on a DQ on the way, which was still good since we were able to have blizzards. Yum! So that was my XTERRA experience...so who's up for an Ironman?! ;)

Going to Camp and Going Stag

2009-05-20T06:02:00.015-05:00

Alright, now with the first Terra Firma sprint of the season. I headed out to Camp Longhorn that Friday right from work. I must have hit all possible tollways on the way there: BW8, Katy, 130, 45, 183...you're welcome, state of Texas. I shouldnt complain too much because I made great time and got to the camp at about 6pm and was able to catch Scottie and Bobby right before they were planning to preride the bike course. As soon as I got there, I changed into shorts and we were off.

The first section of trail wasnt too bad, pretty straight, just very gravelly. There were sharp corners that I knew we would need to be careful with during the race. Then came the enormous downhill on the way to Inks Lake! I got up to about 40 and could have gone even faster! Apparently the county sheriffs are generous with tickets down this hill, even for bikers, so we had to check our speed, even during the race! At the bottom of the hill came the technical part.

It really wasnt that technical, but I knew that once you added about 100 other racers, progress would slow to a crawl. Since it was a preride we took it easy and walked many of the sections. In reality, we would probably walk as much during the race because of traffic jams and just plain ol playing safe. We eventually made it down to the water where the sevys were already staged. After hanging for a few minutes, we headed back and humped it back up that monstrous hill. I knew this would be a good attack point during the race...

After changing back into civilian clothes, we had dinner with the race staff at the Maxican in Burnet. This was a nice, quaint restaurant inside an actual house. The staff was really nice, especially this one elderly lady that gave everyone backrubs! She was hilarious--I thought I was special when she gave me 2 backrubs...then she went over to Bobby too...grrr. JK. Anyway, the food was pretty good. We then headed back to the camp where we bunked up summer camp style and went to bed pretty early. Except my race partner had volunteer duties with TF, so she had to stay up a bit later. I didnt mind since I knew this was her commitment. I just tried to sleep, but as people may know, I rarely get good sleep the day before a race, especially in a bunkbed.

Alarm goes off at 5am. The race support staff tells us to go back to bed, but I like getting up early to get a head start since I always am rushing last minute...ok, I dont LIKE getting up early, I HAVE TO get up early. I have my quick breakfast, get dressed, and then head over to set up TA. It has been so long since I have set up a sprint TA. It was coming back to me slowly. We saw a lot of familiar faces and that made it a lot more fun and relaxing for me. Scottie, on the other hand, was still helping with registration and rushing all over the place, so I'm sure she was a bundle of nerves that morning. It would be my job to be the voice of reason and calm, which I tried to be. TA was set up in no time and from the recon the day before, I set up a bike tow last minute for the monster hill. Also, we were told that we would need to bike to the boat put in with our sevy seats, so I rigged up slings for those too. I was suprisingly ready ahead of time!

We had the usual prerace meeting and then was told to be ready in 15min for the first run. It was supposed to be just a half mile run before hitting the bikes, but we still opted to use running shoes. Shaun Bain went for the super quick transition route and already had bike helmets and shoes on. I just didnt want to risk it. So we lined up near transition and after a few minutes of standing around, the cannon abruptly fires and we're off! Everyone was out of their minds--they were off to sub 6-minute miles! Okay, so they say its about a half of a mile, but I figure it will probably be a bit longer, so we stay at a slower pace (in fact it was about .7 miles). I could see that Scottie had done an energy dump by being so nervous at the start, so I gave her a tow just to keep us in the pack. We were doing fine as we started to pass all the teams that had already gone out too fast, in the first half mile of the race. In no time we were back to transition for the bikes.

This is where it would have been good to be in our bike gear already--teams were flying out of there before us as we put on shoes, helmets, and backpacks. This got us caught behind the barneys and I knew we needed to get in front of them before the singletrack. We were doing alright, but we still needed to pass some of these yahoos washing out on the gravel on the staightaways--one girl bit it really hard and had bloody knees and had broken something...she was in real bad shape. So I decided to put on a tow just to move a bit faster. We of course unclipped as soon as we hit the downhill--only 37mph as I didnt want to get a ticket! We were now to the singletrack and it was a total clusterf*@$ of a bottleneck. We slowly worked our way past some teams. I was getting frustrated as people were going 3mph on easy track, so I started barking at them for encouragement. After this excruciating section, we finally make it to the water to transition to boats.

We quickly get in the sevy and start paddling. We were passing teams and keeping up with the strong male teams, so I felt confident. As we rounded a buoy and headed to the other side for the trail run, I saw Jason and Tara and knew then that we were indeed doing pretty well. Slow and steady. As we got close to beaching the boats, we caught up with the only other HART team at the race, Clark Ferley and Geoff. We started off the run with a mandatory walk across the boat docks and then off to singletrack. It was fine for the first half mile but then the trail pitched up. I had started towing at this point to keep Scottie fresh for the finish. We were still doing really well despite the towing--we were still passing up teams and even keeping up with Clark and Geoff!

More trails and more uphills, then the turnaround point where we had to pick up a poker chip to assure that we completed the full course. At this point, apparently other teams were shortcutting and taking the road instead of the marked trail--shame on them. Regardless, we chugged along to our first special test, identify what's in the cage. Mr. Ali Gator (get it--haha!) and we dropped our poker chip here. Next special test was an under and over bar obstacle. Third was a wheelbarrel through sand. Then the next was the test I was expecting from studying race reports--the rings above water. I knew not to waste energy trying to take all the rings to the other side, so I touched the mandatory 2 rings then dropped straight down into the water. I didnt think I was going to resurface--I went really deep! To make it worse, we were wearing those crappy life vests and my pack had filled with water, so swimming was a chore. We eventually made it to the other side and it was back to the sevys for the paddle back straight to the other side.

The paddle back was uneventful as it was a straight shot back to our bikes. We beached, transitioned to bikes and mashed back through the technical trail. We were still having to work our way through teams even though we have been spread out by now. Scottie had a nasty crash along the way, so we had to play it safe until we got back to the straight section. Then came the monster hill climb. We latched up the tow and I mashed as hard as I could. We passed about 3 or 4 teams here which was critical! I was still feeling pretty good, so I didnt mind towing all the way back. But before we could head back to TA, there was a detour to yet another special test. We had to get off our bikes and do a short trail run to recover a poker chip. The downhill was fine, but hiking back up started to burn the hammies and calves! We made it back to the bikes and it was time to mash back to TA.

We passed another 2 or 3 teams here and then hit TA. We were not done yet. We had to run to a little fun lap pool and wade our way around and then finish. Not bad--it actually felt really nice to take a dip in the cold water. We treaded through, climbed out and sprinted to the finish. Done! We were just 2 minutes behind Tara and Jason and missed the top 5 by that much as well. That was slightly disappointing, but still considering we had never raced together and didnt know how we would do and Scottie not feeling well due to her prior sickness, I think we did great! We stayed a little while for lunch and awards, but I had to leave quickly after to join the boys in Austin for Jonathan's stag party.

Jason wanted to tag along, but could only stay long enough to say hi and had to head back to Houston right after that. We drove down to Austin to the lake house they rented. It was a bit hard to find because the directions from Google sucked, but we eventually found it. The house was deserted as they were out on the boat and Eric, Tucker, and Tommy were at a lacrosse game. This house was amazing! It was huge and right off the water--it even had another separate boat house that was literally on the water. They had obviously partied it up the night before just from the random alcoholic paraphanalia strewn about. It would be a while before Jonathan and the rest of the crew would make it back off the water, so Jason had to leave.

They eventually made it back, so we caught up, got dressed and took a hired van back into town to spend the evening causing mayhem. It was a really fun time. There were whale tails, Jonathan's date with Leslie, the "champagne room", and the hiphophippopotamus...good times! We got back to the lake house at a reasonable time and most of us just crashed right away. I had to get back to Houston to get some chores finished up so I left early next morning. Still, good times, good times. Just remember not to "poke the sleeping bear" --Rex the Wonderhorse.

So back to reality and Houston. I was pretty spent so I was glad to be back home to recoup. Heck, XTERRA was coming up the next weekend, so I had a short window of recovery. That report is next...until then, beer pong like a champion today!

Open Water Swim

2009-05-19T06:32:00.000-05:00

So continuing on with the week of April 27th, it was HART training on Tuesday and Thursday, lunch swim on Friday, and biking the f-loop on Wednesday. I had planned to ride my tri bike that day, but some really horrible sound was coming from my front derailleur and I ended up riding back home and taking the Masi out. But that meant switching out pedals, seat packs, bottle cages, etc. Lets just say I really needed a bike ride after all that!

While all this training was going on, in the background noise was a nagging voice called Ray-Ray. For the past couple of years now he has been hounding me about doing half irons and xterras. But I was so afraid of drowning that I always backed out of any flaky commitments I gave him. Finally, the biggest opening for me came that week, 2 weeks before XTERRA Dirty at Canyon Lake. Scottie has been volunteering for Elena (the race director) and had race credits piled up. So she agreed to give me her credit so I could race. No excuse now. So I told Raymund that I would race, but I would need to do an open water swim before I decided if I would do the half or full XTERRA. He agreed and we headed off to Twin Lakes that Sunday.

To make it a full outing, Scottie also came so that we could get some sevy training before Camp Longhorn next weekend. My other stipulation was that the Warship would need to be there too with his kayak to make sure I didn't drown. He actually brought a friend with him who was a strong swimmer too. I was very apprehensive at first and wanted to just swim to the first buoy and back (probably just 100m), but Raymund gave me that disappointed look that he’s good at and said we needed at least to do the whole loop (probably around 400m). Since Warship was there, I said what the heck. Raymund had already started and I finally took the plunge.

The first 100m was fine and I felt like I was gliding like a fish! Then came the longer stretch to the next buoy and for some reason I lost my rhythm and started to breathe abnormally. I was panicking. I luckily regained composure and continued on. No other incidents occurred after that and I finished one lap. Raymund was still going as he was doing 2. I recapped the experience with the Warship and actually felt a rush! I was actually somewhat excited to take another loop, so I did. This time I followed right behind Raymund to try drafting. Obviously I wasn't comfortable with that yet, with all the bubbles in my face, so that lasted about 100m or so, then I just went off on my own. 2nd lap was a lot more relaxed and I felt really good! That’s when I decided that I would do the full. Yes, this was momentous!

We followed the swim practice with some sevy time. Scottie and I headed out in the yellow rubber duckie and did a few laps while Warship was barking orders from the bank. Obviously we still needed to get used to each other in the boat, but I felt like we were doing alright—no spinning at all! So we did about 3 or 4 loops and then I had to call it because Mo and I were going to a crawfish boil at UH. This was my first crawfish boil in a LONG time…in fact, I think the last one I went to was actually at Notre Dame for the LSU game! It was a definite hoot watching everyone put down tons of mudbugs! We eventually found out that SES had a tent, so we went over and mingled for a bit and then called it a day. It was a very productive weekend…we even got some invite construction knocked out!

I wanted to get more practice in before XTERRA so we agreed to hit Twin Lakes a few more times. The next week was HART on Monday and Tuesday (no Thursday because of the sprint race on Saturday), lunch swim on Tuesday, and Twin Lakes swim on Wednesday. This time it was just Raymund, Warship, and me. Figuring I needed to get used to longer stretches of swimming, we decided to do two loops continuous this time. I also tried to track the distance of the loop using my GPS and tips from DC Rainmaker’s blog. Again, I felt relaxed and the two loops weren't that bad at all! Unfortunately, the GPS didn't pick up a signal while swimming, probably because I roll to breathe every cycle. I wanted to try one more time, this time putting the GPS underneath my swim cap, exactly how DC Rainmaker suggested. It read the first 100m, but then cut out again. I’ll just have to head out with the kayak next time and measure it for sure.

Alright, I will stop here and leave Camp Longhorn for the next blog. Until then, kick hard!

XTERRA Dirty Suunto T6 Log

2009-05-18T05:58:00.001-05:00

* PODS not used due to race rigors
** Memory Belt data used due to water activities
*** Actual race start at around 2:13 in log
**** ~6-10min loss due to flat at end of first lap (dip in signal at about 3:20)

Let the Races Begin

2009-05-14T06:05:00.001-05:00

So continuing on with my recap, the week after the training camp was swims on Tuesday and Friday, HART on Tuesday and Thursday, a trail run on Saturday, and then a road bike on Sunday with the Warship and Frank the Tank. It was MS-150 weekend and with the torrential downpour on Friday and Saturday, they actually had to cancel day 1 of the event! I dont think they ever had to do that, but it was a wise decision. Before all the rain, I was planning to join Rick et al up at Rocky Hill Ranch for some trail running, but the place was so flooded that they had to cancel the race. So instead I just ran in town for 12 miles. The park was deserted and was actually enjoyable to run without having to dodge other runners.

Sunday we decided to ride the usual Terry Hershey route, maybe ending up with 50-60 miles. But the rains had even affected the paved route. I took my tri bike to get more saddle time in it, but it definitely was not the right weapon for this fight. Right from the start, we had to tread lightly through nasty mud on the pavement and this was pretty much the experience all through the ride over to the reservoir. Once we got to the reservoir, we were able to let loose a bit and mash around the levy. But once we were to the other side, we were hindered again, this time with actuall flooding. Its a reservoir...what was I expecting? So the two backed off and let me explore the deepening water (how do I always get volunteered?!) At first it was fine, but the water was getting up to our bottom brackets. I saw a few water moccasins, which made me extra careful not to fall of my bike! Finally, the water just was too deep, so we had to turn around. Nature wins again! No matter, we were still able to get 35 miles in despite the crappy conditions.

The week after that was HART on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, and swimming on Tuesday. We had lighter training this week because the Lake Georgetown Sprint was this weekend. I was racing with Caroline, but we were in essence racing as a 4 person team, staying with Rick and Eric during the race. We drove off west Friday afternoon and were very fortunate to be able to stay at the Tuckers house in Marble Falls. Still, it was a long drive, so we had to entertain ourselves somehow. This manifested itself as trying to figure out the right pronunciation of "Bealls". Ive never been to a Bealls or know what they sell, but I was pretty sure it was pronounced like Ally McBeal. While Caroline agreed, Eric was positive it was like "bells." We went back and forth until we just started calling all the Bealls stores across the country...yes, country. The funniest part was that since we were in the middle of nowhere cell reception was horrible and whenever the salesperson would pick up on the other side, right as they were saying Bealls, the voice would cut out, without fail! We called about 10 or so stores and finally we were getting mostly "bells" pronounciation. We did call Nevada and they pronounced it my way, so we started hypothesising a North vs. South pronunciation. Regardless, we gave it Eric.

Later that night we went to Bella Serra, a little authentic italian restaurant. As we were walking in, Eric looks at his phone to check messages and sees all these strange phone numbers...then he quickly remembers the Bealls incident. Caroline and I look at his phone and just crack up! Hilarious! So we sit down and eat and the service is really good and they were really friendly. We then head back to the Tucker house and get some shut eye.

Next morning was the drive to Russell Park. Despite being tailed through Liberty Hill by a cop, we get to the park without incident. We quickly set up transition and start pumping up our inflatable tubes...for some special test to come. Raymund and Tommy and Monica and Vera were the only other HART teams there. After prerace briefing, we donned our inflatable tubes ready to run for the first leg. Our sealed instructions were handed to us and a few seconds later we started the race. The first leg was a series of special tests at 3 CPs. You could get them in any order, but pretty much everyone got them in numerical order. CP1 was a short jaunt down near the entrance of the bike trail. Here we had to balance a golf ball with a contraption made out of string and paper. Caroline busted this one out quickly, but we had to wait a bit for Rick and Eric.

Next was a run down to the water where we were going to use our tubes. Basically, we had to swim out to a kayak and retrieve a poker chip in able to punch CP2. We basically just dragged the tube with us. Pretty uneventful, but the cold water was sure nice! Last CP of the leg was a easter egg hunt. After a short scurry we found a littered mess of eggs and quickly handed it in for the CP3 punch. We now just bushwhacked back to TA for our next set of instructions.

Next was the paddle, again in any order. We again went in order. CP4 was the furthest in a little cove. We were paddling fine despite a slight sidewind. As we were entering the cove, we saw the front teams Vignette et al coming back from the point. The clue was tree in water, so we scanned all the submerged trees. We saw nothing. After wasting precious minutes, we realize that the CP is also submerged, underwater! Uggh. WTF. I really hope this was an accidental break of the branch--how are you supposed to know that the CP is under water?!? Anyway, that royally pissed me off. After regaining my composure, we paddled back around to get the next batch of CPs. Earlier, we saw Tommy and Raymund portaging over a huge hill and thought that was kinda crazy. It didnt quite work out for them--as we got to the other side, we saw them putting back into the water and now they were behind us.

We speedily paddled to the next cover where CP5 was right on the water. Punched. CP6 was next to a pond up the hill. Punched. CP7 was on the other side of the hill, down a draw. This one was a bit farther than I thought and slowed us down a bit, but we eventually found it. I didnt realize it, but the trail right above us could take us pretty much straight back to the boats, but we instead bushwhacked back. Raymund and Tommy took the trail and made some time on us, but we were still relatively in a dead heat. Back at the put in, we had to drag our boats back up the hill--we had Weihan's tandem, so that was no easy feat. Somehow we got it back up the jagged hillside and were ready for the next leg.

This would turn out to be our last leg. We had to bike to CP8 all the way to the western edge of the lake. The first part of this trail was a big jagged, so we took our time as not to lose any skin or break any bones. Not all of us were feeling strong on this leg, so despite the chance to mash it on the relatively flat jeep road on the way to CP8, we took an easier pace. Once we got to CP8, it was another special test. Here we had to fill a bucket of water with a pvc pipe with no caps on the end and two holes drilled in the side, so teamwork was important here. We did it in quick fashion and were handed another set of instructions and another map. We had a short trek to finish before biking back to TA. Unfortunately, despite Rick's recommendation of bringing shoes with, we had to run in our bike shoes. This was a bit uncomfortable, but I had done this a couple times before so it didnt bother me much.

CP9 was between two lakes, no prob. CP10 was down a draw a bit. Punched. The only thing about this leg was the scale of the map was different (1:10,000) and I didnt realize it until heading to CP10 and getting there a lot quicker than I thought. After readjusting to the new scale, we set off to the final CP11. I did a pace count and it seemed to match the terrain quite well, so we cut in to find a draw and fenceline. As I walked closer to the hillside I was quickly cut down by something. I swear I had no time to react--I was instantly on my face! I look back and it was barbed wire. Thankfully I wasnt hurt, just stunned. This must have knocked all the navigation sense out of me as we proceeded to scurry all over the place without a definite plan. Sadly, we were right there at the correct draw, but we drifted further east, too far. We had caught up to Tommy and Raymund here and while examining the maps, we realized we were too far. Thats when I knew where the CP was and that we had made a huge mistake. Sure enough, as we were heading back to where we started, we saw a bunch of teams flooding out of the draw. Ugh. We had wasted so much time now that I knew we were out of all contention. Oh well, thats what you get when you dont race for months.

We ride back, pretty uneventfully. Caroline was feeling extra strong by the time we got back to Russell Park and while I was willing to wait for Rick and Eric, she said that they knew how to find their way back. So we mashed the final stretch of pavement back to the finish, going almost 30mph! It was a pretty anticlimactic finish as we knew we could have done a lot better. Still it was a great day for a race and I had a lot of fun hanging with the gang. Not racing since the Dave Boyd AR has definitely rejuvinated my excitement for racing. On a brighter note, Vera and Monica captured the womens division for the series! Woohoo!

So we hung out a bit longer, went over to Dos Salsas (spanish for Two Salsas) for lunch and then sped back to Houston to enjoy the rest of the weekend weather. Alright, thats going to be it for now as I dont want to risk this entry to be of epic proportions. I promise, next blog will be about my first open water swim experience and my first true sprint race in about 2 years! Until then, mash it if you got it!

Camp Longhorn Sprint AR Suunto T6 Log

2009-05-11T06:31:00.001-05:00

* events:
- 0.68mi run
- 5.05mi bike
- 0.88mi paddle
- 3.07mi run
- 0.38mi paddle
- 3.92mi bike
- 0.24mi run
- 1.59mi bike
- 0.22mi run

Total = 16.03mi

** Interestingly, did not hit TE of 4 in sprint conditions, despite towing duties

Domers and HART Training Camp

2009-05-06T06:08:00.000-05:00

So its been yet another while since I’ve posted a blog, so I thought I’d take this opportunity to catch up. Also, I’m trying to use Windows Live Writer to see if it makes blogging a bit more easier and fun.

The week after TdH was pretty pedestrian. HART training on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, swimming on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, trail run on Saturday, and mountain biking on Sunday. I had packed in a full week because Amy, fellow Domer, was coming into town next week and I would not get any exercise in. I was mostly right—I got to sneak a work out in here and there. That week I went to HART training on Tuesday, swam on Wednesday and Thursday, and rode my bike on Friday and Sunday.

Amy came in that Thursday and it was great seeing her. We quickly caught up and Mo couldn't wait to bounce wedding ideas off of her. She got into town late that evening, so we let he get to bed relatively early to rest up. Next day was a whirlwind of a time as I barely remember any of it. I remember Taco Milagro, margaritas, dancing the merengue and salsa, Whitney’s flurry of punches and me having to go home before another round of clubs. Needless to say, nothing got done on Saturday.

The next few days were similar, going out for drinks and entertaining, until she left on Tuesday. Thankfully we both survived the visit—it was certainly tame compared to our days at ND! So it was back to business with HART training on Tuesday and Thursday, swimming on Monday and Wednesday, track intervals on Wednesday, biking on Friday and Sunday.

That Saturday was the HART Sprint AR training camp up at Lake Livingston SP. I had agreed to help Rick, so I headed up that morning and quickly he told me and Tommy to set up a Tyrolean traverse somewhere in the park. Uh, ok. I had no idea how to set one of those up, but I figured Tommy did and I would be able to help him out. After the camp had started and Rick led them off for a warm up run, we rolled out on our bikes to find a spot. It wasn't that hard as we already had a place in mind. When we arrived, there were kids trying to ride up the hill in they bmx bikes, but we didn't pay them much attention and went ahead with the setup.

Tommy had set up a great pulley system to get the lines really taut. After about a half hour of set up, it was time to test the rig. I of course deferred to Tommy to have first crack at it since he set up the rope. There were no issues and I followed him down the rope—it was perfect. Eventually, after they paddled the sevys, Rick and the campers made it over to the set up and one by one they traverse the draw and it was a lot of fun.

They ran back to TA a for some navigation training which I was supposed to help out with, so I quickly helped out Tommy and then rode back. It was a pretty laid back nav session and we followed it up with a practical field exercise to find 3 or 4 checkpoints. I rode along on bike to make sure no one got too far off course.

After that, they did a mock sprint race while the rest of us started cooking the hot dogs. It was certainly a great day to have a training camp—heck the usually choppy Lake Livingston was eerily calm for the whole session! After all teams finished up, we sat for lunch and then passed out certificates of completion—no one quit, which is great! It was a good experience to interact with the newbies and feel their fresh enthusiasm for AR.

Since I didnt get to train with the group that day, I went on a long bike ride the next day in town. With that, I’m gonna stop this blog and continue later with the next 3 or 4 weeks. I still have to recap Lake Georgetown, my first open water swim, and the first sprint race of the TerraFirma series coming up this weekend…and its Jonathan’s stag party weekend over in Austin too! Busy, busy! Until then, mash hard!

Ladies Only Adventure Race

2009-04-28T06:07:00.001-05:00

May 2, 2009 - Lake Livingston State Park

A ladies only adventure race great for beginners. Teams of two will complete a race course that includes 2 to 3 miles running, approximately 5 to 7 miles biking, 1 mile paddling, and some team challenges. The race should last 2 to 4 hours.

Start time 9 AM Race day registration from 7:30 AM to 8:00 AM Awards for the top three teams. Finishing medals for everyone who completes the race. Mandatory gear: mountain bike, helmet, running shoes, and water.

REGISTER HERE!

Lake Georgetown Sprint AR Suunto T6 Log

2009-04-27T06:46:00.000-05:00

* Pods not used due to race restrictions

Yard Sale This Weekend

2009-04-15T06:24:00.002-05:00

What: Yard Sale
When: April 25, 9am
Where: 4419 Blossom St.

Stop by and at least say hi. To see some of the stuff I'm selling, go to the following link. There will be more household stuff, but this is what I found foraging through the garagenous zone. Happy hunting!

HART Sprint Adventure Race Training Camp Testimonial

2009-04-13T06:55:00.001-05:00

The camp this past Saturday was a great success--we even put up a tyrolean traverse that was pretty fun! Everyone graduated, meaning no one quit. Here is a testimonial:

"I just want to give a shout out to Rick Sanders and his crew. Kenny thanks for showing me how to use a compass. This was definetly a strong team of people. I knew nothing about adventure racing and what all was involved. I did not even know how to use my bike :). But after 8 hours with Rick, I had a good sense of what I was getting into. Also when I attended this training camp, the team of HART members were so helpful and took care of me inspite of my falls and slides; they were there to see me to the end. It was definetly an intense training; but I enjoyed every bit of it. This is a camp that I would recommend to anyone that wishes to get started with adventure racing. I thought I would be too tired to drive home. But actually I was so wired up from the training, I reflected on everything we did all the way home. I did not have a sleepy bone in my body; I was sore and had a bruised ankle and a few cuts, but that was it. I told my husband that I will be signing him up for this training. I want him to share in the intensity of what was involved during this training that words can't describe. I am looking forward to my first race. Rick thank you so much for your military style teaching; it is what I needed. I look forward to more trainings and races with HART. God Bless you Rick and all the HART members that helped me yesterday"

-Felicia

Tour de Houston 09, etc.

2009-03-24T06:37:00.004-05:00

The last several weeks have been very productive for me. I've gotten back to a regular 6-day a week workout schedule that seems to be working. The week after Stubblefield, it was 3 days of HART training, 2 days of swimming, basketball with the SES folk, and then running with the Warship during the Texas Independence Relay. I did the 5.6 mile section from downtown to Mason Park on the east side. It was a bit tougher running back (I did a trail ride beforehand and rode downtown, so I had to run back to get my bike) as the temps were a bit warmer. It was really good training tho. It was funny because some of the runners thought they were going the wrong way once they saw me backtracking. I reassured them...or did I?

Next week was more HART training and swimming and an hour session in the sevy with Scottie. It started off as a nice leisurely paddle down the Bayou until we had to turn around and paddle upstream. The current was kickin and then, just minutes away from our takeout, the skies opened! Thats when I said, "now, this is adventure racing!" It got cold quick, so we tried to get out as quickly as possible. I say "tried" because our legs no longer worked due to the fact that we were sitting in a cramped sevy for over an hour! That training session reminded me why I HATE SPRINTS! Anyway, we got out of the deluge and retreated home. Mo and I were able to inject a little fun that week by seeing a preview screening of "The Last House on the Left" and then my first Houston Rodeo. I really don't know why its taken me this long to actually go to the rodeo--that was tons o fun!

Last week was much of the same with HART training and swimming. Sunday was the Tour de Houston, where the HART team rode as a team. It was a bit foggy at first, but the day turned out spectacular after a while. I had ridden from home at about 5:30am, so that would make it a 80 miler day for me. For the most part it was a great ride, except for the road rash that EMo had to endure because of poor planning by the organizers. Right by White Oak Bayou, at a blind turn, there was a small median that had no orange cones or signage to warn anyone about it. We were in a line and Frank had ridden over it and I barely missed it. EMo was not so lucky as he hit it square and seconds later hit the deck. I heard the carnage and knew it was nothing good. Thankfully he only got road rash--nothing was broken. The best part was when we were tending to his wounds and he said, "lets get to ridin!" Awesome.

The rest of the ride was pretty uneventful, but the route was a lot better than the first year. We got to ride through the Heights, along TC Jester, down to Rice, along Brays Bayou, and then back downtown to Discovery Green. It was a huge turnout! At the end, we all regrouped and rode in as a team and the announcer got all excited, "ah, a racing team, now that's cool!" We then just chilled on a patch of grass and ate our lunch. After a while longer, we all parted ways and I rode back home. It was a good day.

So, we're caught up to this week. Nothing special this week, except I think Mo and I will be heading to the Miller Outdoor Theatre on Saturday and cleaning the house all weekend to get ready for Amy's arrival--next week is gonna be crazy! Until then, mash hard!

Trash the Dress: Adventure Racing

2009-03-19T07:12:00.002-05:00

Here is the first session with Weihan Lin. Photos were taken at Huntsville State Park. NOTE: THESE ARE ENGAGEMENT PHOTOS--NO, WE AREN'T MARRIED YET!

Spokane Expedition Wedding

2009-03-09T11:28:00.000-05:00

Not at all AR related, but indeed K-SPoT related. Click on the photo for the wedding announcement.

Orienteering Month

2009-03-05T06:15:00.001-06:00

Okay, looks like its time to recap on the past month. Training has been going well ever since the win at WG Jones. During the week, been regularly attending HART practice and swims are progressing nicely--just hit the 1.2 mile mark on one of my lunch sessions. I'm starting to run out of time during lunch...might have to rethink swimming after work or something.

First weekend of the month I was able to sneak in a basketball game with the SES cadre. Second weekend, V-day weekend, I snuck in a 8 mile trail run Saturday morning which was really nice. That night we went to Benihana's, which has history between Mo and I...if you search my blog you might find a reference to the first debacle. This time there was no debacle and we enjoyed a good evening with Whit and Aaron. The next day, I got up pretty early to participate in one of the Warship's sufferfest bike rides at Terry Hershey. Of course, it had been raining recently and it was all damp that morning, so we couldnt ride any of the trails...which meant even more suffering on the pavement! Guh. Frank the Tank, Dennis, Jeff, and Ray-Ray were the other masochists. It began nice and peaceful, riding from the beltway to the reservoir. But that's when the fun ended, or began, depending on your perspective.

Its always windy out there and the wind would not take that day off. Right off the bat we had a headwind which the Warship seemed to just plow through. He eventually cycled to the back of the echelon and we tried our best to keep the standard. We would soon splinter, which told us that we needed to slow down. Of course, as we made the turn south, Frank made full use of the tailwind and did not give up the pull until we had to turn west again for the final stretch towards Fry Rd. Thanks, Frank. We took it pretty easy along this stretch as we knew we had to head back into the jaws of the wind later on. We took a quick break and that's when I realized I had popped another spoke! WTFFFFF! And we were on pavement the whole time! Then I remembered the last time I had jammed my derailleur and it hit my spokes, so that spoke might have been already compromised. Oh well, there's another 20+ bucks going to West End.

On the way back, we saw Ms. Vera and Team Tommy. We waited a bit for them to loop back around, but they might have taken a break at Fry Rd, so we soldiered on. As we approached the turn north, the group parted like the Red Sea and I was all the sudden at the front. Nice. I guess I will pull into the wind, guys. Blustery was an understatement. I pulled until we hit the bayou then dropped back. Not all of us were at 100% so we had to take it easy the rest of the way back. Still, Warship wanted to have one last burst of fun. He rode up beside me and asked, "are you ready?" I just smirked and replied, "here we go." A moment later, Warship lights the nitrous and heads off at about 30mph. I'm able to chase him down and I think, "thank goodness that's over." Nope. Dennis wanted to participate in the fun and was bearing down on us like a sidewinder. I told Warship to watch his left or be run over. I was able to match his speed, but we were running out of track, so we turned off the jets.

To finish off this section we did some hill repeats up the levy. Good times. Then we had a pretty leisurely ride back to the beltway. A bit less than 40 miles altogether. The next weekend was the USOF coaches certification course. I had planned to just attend, but I was informed on class day that I would be an assistant instructor. Cool. The first two days were classroom-based and not that much fun, but neccessary. The fun part was on Sunday when we went out to Stubblefield to practice field exercises. Everyone had 30 mins to present an exercise and have the other participants do the exercise and comment on its effectiveness. I tried out the "map sketch" exercise and everyone seemed to like it. I totally enjoyed it because I was able to check on them and give pointers along the way. The course ended with the final exam, bbq, and awards.

This past weekend was the actual Stubblefield 2-day O. I had hoped to do both days, but apparently I had agreed to go to Crate and Barrel for some registry event...lovely. So I was only able to do the Saturday course. I also volunteered to do the beginner's tutorial. Didnt see very many adventure racers, except for iMOAT (Shaun, Nathan, and Ric Tinney), who were there mainly to work on the Eco Lonestar course. I amazingly had a relatively early start, only one hour later. Right before my start, I got up there and immediately the kids were chatting it up.

There was one guy in front of me on the Red Course--I wish I caught his name. He took off and I picked up my map and Shaun was there to remind me not to look before starting. After chatting a bit, the whistle blew and I was off. As usual, I had trouble orienting the map for the first point, but I just stopped and took my time. I locked on to my position and bolted for the first point that looked to be on a foliage boundary. I had caught up to the kid in front of me and we shot for the next point. He was obviously a lot faster than me, so I let him go and just concentrated on my navigating. Control 2 looked to be in a gully and as I reached a bend in the gully, I ran into a control. It didnt feel right, so I looked at the number. Sure enough, it wasnt the right one. I would experience this quite a bit along the course. A few meters further was the control, and the kid in front.

Next control was across the paved road next to a patch of green. Again he did his gazelle thing and was off in the distance in no time. I just plodded along, collecting features. We basically hit the control at the same time and he commented, "man, you're fast." I said, "no, man, I'm slow." Control 3 was a repeat as he bolted off again. This time he was able to get away before I reached the control in a gully. Control 4 was at a rootstock on the side of a hill. Again, there was a "decoy" point along the way, so I quickly checked the code and moved along. A few meters further was the correct rootstock. He was just leaving as I punched my card. Control 5 was down a ways, in a gully. Again, he was just leaving when I got there. I used another gully system as a handrail to get to control 6. I knew how many gully intersections to collect along the way, so I just kept chugging along and was able to catch up to the kid again. He then explained that he couldnt shake me. I told him to maybe try zigzagging and he retorted, "like go the opposite way." I said that would probably be bad for both of us.

Joking aside, we continued on to control 7. Going up the hill, I was looking for the dirt bike trail, which I found pretty easily. The not so easy part was finding the nondistinct trail that was supposed to connect to the bike trail. Both the kid and I couldnt find it, so I reoriented and headed back to the bike trail. We navigated to the same spot as before, but this time I realized we had drifted too far right. I found the nondistinct trail and was able to punch the control first. We shook it off and went on to the next control, which I now remember was control 10, so I must have skipped two in remembering my course (I dont have the map with me). Oh well. Anyway, next control was pretty straightforward--used another gully as a rail and headed west to the point. He seemed to be at the point, waiting.

No, he wasnt waiting, he was trying to figure out the best route for the longest leg of the course. He decided to take the easy, faster, longer route around the green stuff, while I took a gamble and headed straight for the green stuff. At first, it was good, not slowing me down that much. Then I got into the heart of the nasty, thorny stuff and started to rethink my decision. I was thinking, "he must have knew this crap was here!" Too late now, so I just bulled through, occasionally letting out a girlish yelp due to the thorn farm. As I started emerging from the hell, I saw him on the trail--that's when I knew my path was faster since he was most likely burning rubber on the trail. I got to the cleared path and was able to get to the control before him. As I headed past him for the next control, he congratulated me on the route choice. I thought, no matter, you'll be coming up on my heels soon.

This was the only section where I was ahead of him, so it was a bit different. Next control was over a small hill, to a minor gully. I had to make sure I hit the gully correctly because it split into two and I had to find the smaller one. Got it. Next was at a rootstock next to a dirt road. I just followed the dirt road to the control. Next was at a hunter's stand. It was around this point I caught up with two other Red course'ers. After punching, I bolted east to a control I thought would be pretty difficult because it was in the middle of nowhere. I was cruising along and right when I thought my pacecount told me to look around, there it was. As I moved on after punching, there was the kid, with the two others I had recently passed. I knew he would pass me again, just a matter of time.

Little did I know, the time would be at the next control as I had a bit of trouble with this one. It was in a small gully next to a bunch of other ones and I had overshot it. The kid had already punched it and hinted that I did in fact overshoot. I went back and there it was--I had probably just walked past it! Grrr. All three of them were in front of me, but I was faster than the other two, so I was able to pass them with relative ease. Next control was at a gully intersection. There was another decoy control but I didnt stop this time while the kid did. I told him, "that's not the right one, right?", as my ambled on. A few seconds later, he gazelled past me and there was the control. Punched.

We had 3 controls left, the last one being the "GO" control right before the finish. I knew I wouldnt catch him now as they were all really easy and right off trails. I did see him briefly at the next control, but that would be the last time. I punched the last three with no problems and ran through the chute. Time was about 1hr 15mins, which I think put me 3rd for the day. I was just happy that I was able to keep up with the young buck--since he started a minute ahead of me and finished about a minute ahead, I think we had the same time. After waiting a brief minute for Mo to pick me up, we were off to Huntsville for a "trash the dress" photoshoot. More on that later when we get some sample pics...

Sunday was Crate and Barrel (uggh), then I went on a 30 mile trail ride. That gets us to this week. The past few weeks I have been working with Scottie on her navigation and somehow talked her into going to HART training (actually, I think it was her who asked me). So that was fun having new people--Rick always turns it up a notch just to see if the newbies break. She did really well despite just doing Will's Hills and a cornucopia of other workouts. So that's pretty much the month of February in review. We did have a going away get-together for Ali, so that was a bit sad. Dont have much planned for March, but we'll see what actually happens.

Navigation Clinic This Weekend

2009-02-25T06:13:00.000-06:00

For those who aren't racing this weekend, I'll be holding a map reading and navigation clinic at Stubblefield Campground at around 9:15am. Afterwards, you can apply what you've learned at the orienteering meet, which starts at 10am. It is a 2-day meet, so you can actually camp out and work on your navigation skills all weekend long! For information on the meet and how to get to meet headquarters (where the clinic will be held), please go to HOC's website and look at the entry form.

Navigation/Orienteering Instruction

2009-02-18T06:19:00.001-06:00

By the way, as a Level I USOF-certified coach, I do offer navigation and orienteering instruction for foot and on-bike cross-country travel. Check my qualifications, and if you're interested, just drop me a line.

Please Dont Push

2009-01-31T18:43:00.004-06:00

So, some have you have known or have figured out by now that I'm trying to take a break from Adventure Racing to concentrate on the upcoming nuptials. I have been so engulfed that I almost went a whole month without blogging! I know! So, this will be a brief post in the 11th hour to prevent that from happening. Thankfully I have something to talk about.

So much has happened since the H-NAV back in December, so I will just concentrate on the race I did this weekend. I decided to sharpen up my navigational skills and do the Team Texas Score O up at WG Jones State Park. It was only 10 bucks, which is nothing compared to an easy 70-100 coin you would put down for an adventure race, so I had no excuse. Plus, start time was at 10am--I love orienteering! Finally, all you need is a compass and you're set!

I leisurely got up at 7am and eventually made it to the meet at around 9am. Signed in and looked around to see if anyone else from the AR world decided to show. I only saw the usual 20+ crew and the sea of ROTC and boy scout cadres. After staying in the car as long as possible, I braved the brisk morning chill and walked to the start point. Along the way, I got caught up with a chatty couple asking what all the hubub was about. They were funny so I just strolled with them to the start point.

By the time I got there, the team competition had started already. Typical--whistle would blow and kids would be sprinting in every which way without even knowing where they were on the map yet. I just stood there with the other 20+'ers, waiting for our turn. I had seen on the prereg list that a couple Romanians were racing--WTF?!? I figured I was going to get blown out of the water again, a-la Stubblefield last year. Oh well, this was just a training session anyway, right?

We eventually lined up, and there were the Romanians, in their cool-looking official orienteering suits. Ugh. I was in the first wave to go for the individuals. 10 seconds...3-2-1-tweeeet!! I jog and pull off one of the maps from the clothesline. I headed northeast first, at a steady clip. It didnt take long for the 2nd wave to catch up with me, along with one of the Romanians, grrr! I figured they'll just burn themselves out. In the score o format, checkpoints are worth different points based on their difficulty and distance from the finish line. Controls 701-710 are 1 pt, 711-720 are 2 pts, and 721-730 are 3 pts.

720 was down a powerline easement. Done. 727 seemed to be at the end of a dirt road. I just took a straight bearing from 720. Done. I was feeling really good because at this point I had caught up with those rabbits by just keeping steady and dead on. I decided to do another straight bearing to 726 because there were no real features to use out here--no mans land! 300 meters and all I can see is thicket in my video. Crap. I had troubles last time I was out in this area, so after 10 minutes I just let it go. I went north, found a rough trail heading west and hit 725 right on the mound.

At this point, I saw no one, so I was thinking I was still doing ok. Straight west, bushwhack, use creek as catch, and there was 724. Followed the creek further west, headed up northwesterly at a minor creek junction, and there was 723 in the dry creek. South back to that major creek, west some more, and 722 was right there off of the creek. West even more on the creek until it turned south and then caught a trail heading off west--there was 721. I followed that trail west until I hit a slight trail and then it was the heaviest bushwhack for the day. Two kids had gone in right before me, but then they slowed down considerably, crying that it was hurting. I gave one of them an encouraging "lift" and he complained and asked me not to push. I laughed and thought, stop being a girl. I went off on my own path and found 712 quickly after that.

I followed a creek south to one of the major roads and had to decide whether to knock it out of the park and risk being over time, or just play it safe. I didnt want to lose because of penalties, so I went the safe way. I headed back east on the road, turned south and then picked off 719 on the east end of a clearing. Back south on the road until a pond, circumnavigated the pond and there was 708. I got tricked into trying to run over a muddy portion of the pond and I almost lost a shoe. Trudged through, headed south on the road, turned east and found the grown-over trails leading to 707.

The final stretch--I had about 15 mins left. Ran west to a clearing just south of the finish chute and there was 709. Bushwhacked a few meters west (of course I had to trudge through a nasty wet spot) and quickly snagged 701. West some more and there was 703 at the road intersection. This was the final decision point--I had 10 mins left and there was 1 control I could still try for. I figured I could get it in 6 mins, so I headed south on the road, turned left and there it was at a trail head. I used that trail, albeit crappy, to get back to finish. I had tons of time now, so I just jogged it in. Finished in 54mins 34secs.

Now the waiting. Awards was supposed to start at 2pm (it was around 1130 when I finished), but because of a system I couldnt understand, it took a lot longer than that. To make it worse, my control card was pretty much one of the last to be entered into their fancy computer--I had already figured out that I had to beat 30 points to win. In fact, it wasnt even one of the Romanians taking top spot--one of them had 2nd and 1st was held by a HOC member. They finally posted my score and I couldnt believe it--30 points! So it came down to time now. I was so happy now that I came in a bit early at 54+ mins--he came in at 59mins! I won the advanced div, with the most points overall!

It made waiting all that time worth it. But of course, I would not get off that easily. I was talking to Nancy about helping out with future meets when they announced the results for Advanced Male 20+. Im sure my jaw dropped when SFC Duane Adams announced I was 2nd! WTF?! I just calmly waited until he finished with all awards and pointed out their "oversight." One of the scorers admitted that they didnt pay attention to the times. Whew, crisis averted.

Beside that, one of the more funnier moments of the day was when I saw Monty laid back munching on a chili dog and slowly crept up on him. I sat down on a log next to him, which was holding his chili. As I nearly tipped his chili, I could tell he was a bit perturbed, but he didnt even look up--he didnt realize it was me! I just sat there another minute to give him a chance to cuss me out about disturbing his lunch, but nothing. So finally I asked him, "so, how long have you been here?" He looked over and we both laughed. Good times. Next time I'm just going to smack his chili off the log--that would have been HILARIOUS! He and Jackie were there doing the map hike.

Anyway, that's all I got. Sorry for the radio silence once again. I got something planned in Feb, so I should have at least that to blog on. Until then, race on and stay found!

Team Texas Score O Suunto T6 Report

2009-01-31T17:15:00.000-06:00

* pods not used due to race restrictions
** altitude not calibrated

H-NAV 08 Photos

2008-12-30T06:54:00.000-06:00

Alright, photos are up! Click on the photo below to see them:

H-NAV 08: Expert Course

2008-12-29T11:36:00.000-06:00

CP List

Map with CPs

* course distance approximately 20k ("blue" orienteering level)

H-NAV 08 RESULTS

2008-12-29T06:11:00.001-06:00

* 5CPs for Novice, 15CPs for Expert
** Special Award to Kyle Hensley and Jeff Jeansonne for retrieving my keys

Stay tuned for photos, race analysis and reports in a few days.

Huntsville Navigation Meet 08

2008-12-17T11:00:00.000-06:00

Huntsville Navigation Meet

PLEASE SEND ME AN EMAIL AT KENNYAR@GMAIL.COM IF YOU PLAN TO ATTEND SO THAT I CAN MAKE SURE TO HAVE ENOUGH MAPS!

Location: Huntsville State Park (1hr from Houston, directions provided at the end of this letter)

Date: Saturday, December 27, 2008
Navigation Tutorial: 8:00am
Pre-race meeting: 8:30am
Start Time: 9am
Duration: 1st team should be in at around 2-3hrs
Cost: $20 for solo, $30 for 2 person
Maps: 1:24000 scale

Mandatory Gear:
- Compass
- UTM Plotter
- Pen or pencil
- Bug spray
- Food and water for duration of event

Recommended Gear:
- Gaiters or Long pants
- Map case
- Eye protection

Object of Meet:
To slow you speedsters down this year, the Bike-O has been changed to an on-foot affair and you have to plot your own points. This should be a nice and fun course to jump-start your recovery from the holiday binge. If you have any questions about navigation in general, just ask. Help is allowed for all parties prior to the start and between teams during the meet. If needed, starting intervals will be 3 to 5 minutes to spread the group out.

Rules:
- You must sign a waiver before competing.
- Please, NO pre-scouting the week before the meet.
- If you are unfamiliar with topo maps or general navigation, there will be a tutorial at 8am on meet day.
- Boundaries are clearly marked on the map. You must obey them or be disqualified.
- You can obtain points in any order. Identifier numbers are provided at CPs to confirm your location.
- Teams of 1 or 2 are allowed.
- You must record your visit to each point by punching your passport in the correct order. Some CPs do not have punches and require you to write down a code of some sort. Bring a pen!
- The team with all CPs and the fastest time wins.
- There is no official cutoff time, but everyone should be back within 5 hours. Please let us know if you abandon the course before you leave for home.
- Prizes will be awarded to the top three teams.

Directions:
From I-45/I-10 interchange in Houston, go North on I-45 for 62 miles
Take Exit 109 toward Park Road 40
Take left on Park Road 40
As you enter the park, follow the main road all the way to the end, near the lodge. This is where check-in will take place.

Please contact me if you have any questions.

Kenny
kennyar@gmail.com

Dave Boyd 12hr AR Suunto T6 Log

2008-12-15T06:11:00.000-06:00

* pods not used due to race restrictions
** altitude off by about -130ft at beginning

Pre-Turkey Day Post

2008-11-25T11:51:00.010-06:00

Whoa, its been a while since I posted a real blog, huh? Well, figured I have some time during lunch to catch up on this, so here it goes. In reality, nothing much has gone on with regards to adventure racing with me, so thats partly the reason for the radio silence.

Last time I posted, I left off with the Race for the Cure, but didnt put up any pics, so here's a couple. Again, despite the cooler weather than last year, I had a crappier run. I of course blame it on external things like Hurricane Ike or my surgery...in reality I had dropped into shut-down mode. I've been trying to turn the switch back on, but without a big goal right now its been very hard.

So after the Race for the Cure, I attended HART training, off and on, then decided to enter the 24hrs of Rocky Hill on a whim. Boy, was that a mistake. I figured, hey, just do it for fun, but my back had different plans for me. Mo, Rock, and I drove up with all kinds of gear, planning for fun weekend outing. Rick and his team was there and Cynthia, Will, Nick, Jaunda, and Frank Arriola were there too. I'm so out of the loop that I only found out that they were racing when I got there and saw them setting up. Nice. So I got ready and Mo watched Rock while I trotted over to the start.

There's not much to say about my race, so I will be brief. My back acted up early in the first loop, so I knew this was going to be a horrible ride. That's what I get for slacking on the training mileage. I soldiered on for two more laps and took an extended break for my back. Wow, this was horrible. I now thought that I would just go lap by lap, seeing if I could go on. The next lap exacerbated things as one of my rear spokes popped and must have poked a small hole in my tube as I was slowly losing air. It was fine at first and so was my back, but it started to fall apart on the return. There was barely any air in my rear tire, but I still rode it, making sure not to make sharp turns. It was so bad that as I waved a guy to pass me because of my dilemna, he asked, "do you normally run your tires that low?!" I chuckled and said, no. I amazingly made it back to transition with air to spare, but my back was trashed again.

I luckily was able to get Nick to work on replacing the tube, but I was pretty wary about riding the bike with one spoke missing. With much contemplation, I figured I would try one more lap. It had turned dark by this time, so I put on Warship's MOAB and zoomed off into the moonlit trails. No real problems, except one skid out. Again, my back was fine for the first half, but was painful on the 2nd half. I told myself that this had ceased to be fun a long time ago, so I figured this would be my last lap. I came in and told Mo the news and she was fine with it. She actually wanted to head out right then, but I wanted to stay a bit, thinking I might feel a bit better in the morning and would be able to put in more laps. But Mo was driven and packed the car up in mere seconds...so I guess we're leaving, I thought. And that was it. Good training, but it was at the expense of my back.

I took a couple days off and then went to HART practice. My back seemed to be healed, so I of course tempted fate and drove over to Warda to do some laps. Again, I was having trouble rallying anyone to train with me, so I said to heck with it and went by myself. Apparently I'm persona non grata or something. Anyway, it was a great day to ride and hardly anyone was there--perfect...except that I think my bike has it in for me. Towards the end of my 2nd lap, I landed akwardly after a jump and noticed my front tire was a bit flat. Great. Thankfully I was able to limp back to the car. First, I tried pumping it up to see if it was just the akward landing that forced some air out of the tube and maybe it was still ok to ride on. Big mistake. As I was pumping and talking to a guy parked next to me, BANG! I thought I lost an eardrum! The tube must have been pooly seated because it just popped as I was pumping it up. We proceeded to laugh while we slowly regained our hearing.

One new tube later, I had time for one more lap. I said goodbye to the Houstonites as they were done for the day and finished my final lap with no incidents. I then quickly drove back because Tina and Lisa were having their Halloween party that night. It was an Asian theme, so I went as Sho Nuff from "The Last Dragon" (see photo). If you havent seen this awesome B film, you NEED to! Anyway, Mo wasnt feeling too well, so we didnt stay out too long. The best part of the party was the MMA action on the back lawn. Someone at the party had boxing gloves in his trunk, so of course, they had to be used. Hilarious! I just kept yelling, "punch her in the ovary!" Tastefully done.

Next week was more HART practice, then we headed into Spokane to attend Chad's wedding as well as do some wedding planning ourselves. The wedding was actually in Couer d' Alene at a quaint, small church. Nice and quick. It was good to see everyone again. Along the way, we looked at a couple candidate reception halls and visited the flower lady. To finish off the quick trip, we met up with Fr. Ken and BM, Danny. It was a quick brunch as Mo and I had to catch a flight early that day, but it was good for Mo to meet the padre. Other than spending some time with the fam, that was it.

Another week, another HART practice...except this time it was my birfday week! I had planned to do 35 miles at Rocky Hill to celebrate, but AGAIN, people were lame and didnt want to come with. So, instead I stayed in town and did my 35 miles solo through town. It actually turned out to be a great ride! I did all the Memorial trails, rode downtown and back to the Memorial Starbucks and got a free birthday mocha! Sweet! It was a great day again to be outside. Later that evening Mo planned a small dinner at Osaka. Warship said he was going to come, but then bailed because no HART people would be there. Wow, if he wasnt our wedding photographer I'd smack him. No worries. Whit, Aaron, Zain, and Lauren showed and then we were paid a suprise visit by the Hyperturtles. Take that, Warship. It was good eats, even if the waitress waited way too long to serve me a Saporro. To finish off the night, Mo bought us tickets to see Kathy Griffin. She was funny. Mo was still feeling under the weather, so we called it a night after that.

The following week I went to training on Tuesday, rode my bike on Thursday, and then played basketball on Saturday. We played a good 3 hours. Week after that, went to HART training bothe Tuesday and Thursday, played basketball on Saturday, and then rode Rocky Hill on Sunday with Dave P and Alex. The Dirty Du was going on at the same time, so we were able to cheer HART people on. Quite a bit more people that I expected were racing from HART. We got our big loop in and then I had to head out to meet up with a guy about a bike. Yes, I am sad. I haven't sold the Castellano yet and I'm already eyeing another bike...make that eyed. Yes, it is mine. A Trek Equinox 7. I figured if I planned to do more triathlons next year I need a proper bike. We'll see how that goes.

That should bring me up to date now. This week is T-day, so I'll be doing a Turkey Trot and then heading into Fredericksburg to do some stuff with the Mo. I guess I better bring my running shoes to run off the turducken--yes, last year was fried turkey and this year is my first turducken...you gotta love the south!

WWDBD?

2008-11-19T11:25:00.005-06:00

He would do this race for sure! DARE and click on the graphic--sign up now!

24hrs of Rocky Hill Suunto T6 Report

2008-10-21T05:59:00.000-05:00

* speed pods not used due to race rigors
** stopped due to back injury

Back on the Grid

2008-10-06T06:00:00.008-05:00

Its so crazy how dependent we are on electricity and other modern conveniences. We got our power back the Saturday before last, while we were in Austin. I was so happy that all I wanted to do is zoom back into town and see it for my own eyes! We got our cable and internet back a few days later and oddly enough just yesterday I was skimming along and saw the True Life show on MTV. It was focused on Living Off the Grid. In their case it was really off the grid as they had to shun ALL modern conveniences. We still had a gas stove, hot water, clean running water...they went totally off all that. It made me think again how this was hardly a desperate situation, comparatively, yet all of us treated it as such.

So back to life as usual. But before that, let me recap. Dave Boyd's memorial was rescheduled a week later. It was a nice ceremony. Sad. I swear they wanted to make sure everyone had a moist eye in the church--they placed Dave's Salsa Dos Niner bike up front with a lot of his gear. Just seeing it there without him was rough. It was a huge turnout--a testament to Dave's far-reaching touch. The announcement of Team iMOAT was made...in Memory Of A Teammate--Dave Boyd. I was quite amazed that none of the HART group organized anything afterwards. Mo and I just went back home to our power-less house.

The next day I decided to get out of the house and ride around town. The trails around town were trashed--the Tuesday before I decided to do a brick and couldn't even go a couple hundred meters until I had to bushwhack! Good thing I knew the park so well, otherwise I'm sure I would have been lost after a while. So instead I rode downtown to check out the building damage. They had cleaned up most of the mess already, but you could still see the remnants of Ike. I also got a chance to check out the new Discovery Green--pretty cool! Will have to come back here again sometime on foot.

Another week started and still no power. Everytime I drove back home from work and saw that downed transformer in the ditch still, I died a little inside. I felt especially bad for Rock who was visibly panting more because of the absence of AC. I ran the Memorial Loop a couple times during the week--was more fun now without lights. It seemed to disorient the normal users of the trail, but I instead bobbed and weaved through everyone. That Saturday was supposed to be our engagement party, but we still had no power, so we cancelled. Still dont know when we can have it. Anyway, instead I went for a morning bike ride to clear my head. Took the TC Jester trail. This was the first time I had ridden it entirely. I chuckled when it just abrubtly ended right before Tidwell--I was on my road bike so I had to be careful through the rough. I rode to Jaunda and Nick's but it didnt look like anyone was stirring, so I continued on. It was a nice, cool morning. Finished my ride by stopping by Starbucks for a sip of jo, then headed back to tinker in the garage.

Mo was getting antsy in the pantsy again, so I agreed to head to Austin. I also had sold one of our Eliminators to Deb, so we went and delivered that to her. That same day we for the first time saw some utility workers in our neighborhood, so I was thinking this would probably be the day. The USCA Championships were going on in Bastrop that same weekend, so we stopped by along the way to see Deb and Mike--she was racing all weekend so it would be doubtful we would get a chance to hang out for long. After saying hi, we drove into Austin and crashed at her place. That's when we heard that our power was back on--I then only had one thing on my mind. We had a simple dinner at a local mexican cantina then headed to bed early.

Next morning we went for coffee and breakfast and then took Rock to Redbud Island. Boy, did he love it! I was amazed that he actually came back after he ran off chasing other dogs. We spent about an hour or so there and then I decided we should just head back home. We were going to say goodbye to Deb when we drove through Bastrop, but she was already done with her race and was heading back to Austin--she saw us on the way back. As we creeped back through our neighborhood, I cringed to look and see if that damn transformer was still there...it wasnt! As we pulled up to the house and I got out, I heard our alarm beeping, so I knew we had power! Yippee! I proceeded to plug everything back in. Good times again.

Went for another run that week and the lights were still out on half of the Memorial trail--made adjusting to the darkness a bit interesting. Saturday was the Race for the Cure 5k. Weather was a bit better than last year, but I ran a worse time. I'm definitely out of racing shape. Oh well. Good thing I'm retired. LOL. Hung out a bit then headed home so that I could catch up on my tv shows--yes, cable was finally back on as well. Later that night we went over to Whit and Aarons for a grill out. Was good for the most part.

Next morning was our photoshoot with the Warship. It was a bit warm, but it was still fun. Such a professional! Can't wait to see the finish product! Nothing much else happened that day except taking Rock to the dog park and then cleaning up the house. Things are pretty much back to normal. Gotta figure out the next goal. Suggestions? And don't say PQ!!

PQ Badlands?!

2008-09-26T11:48:00.001-05:00

Oh, Primal Quest, you have betrayed me yet again. You told me you were going international in 2009, giving me a good excuse for not subjecting myself to your pain and suffering. Now you say you are heading to South Dakota! WTF. Need to find a good excuse, soon!

Excerpt Read at Dave Boyd's Memorial

2008-09-22T06:35:00.001-05:00

...
It was then that the fox appeared.
"Good morning," said the fox.
"Good morning," the little prince responded politely, although when he turned around he saw nothing.
"I am right here," the voice said, "under the apple tree."
"Who are you?" asked the little prince, and added, "You are very pretty to look at."
"I am a fox," the fox said.
"Come and play with me," proposed the little prince. "I am so unhappy."
"I cannot play with you," the fox said. "I am not tamed."
"Ah! Please excuse me," said the little prince.
But, after some thought, he added:
"What does that mean--'tame'?"
"You do not live here," said the fox. "What is it that you are looking for?"
"I am looking for men," said the little prince. "What does that mean--'tame'?"
"Men," said the fox. "They have guns, and they hunt. It is very disturbing. They also raise chickens. These are their only interests. Are you looking for chickens?"
"No," said the little prince. "I am looking for friends. What does that mean--'tame'?"
"It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. "It means to establish ties."
"'To establish ties'?"
"Just that," said the fox. "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world . . ."
"I am beginning to understand," said the little prince. "There is a flower . . . I think that she has tamed me . . ."
"It is possible," said the fox. "On the Earth one sees all sorts of things."
"Oh, but this is not on the Earth!" said the little prince.
The fox seemed perplexed, and very curious.
"On another planet?"
"Yes."
"Are there hunters on that planet?"
"No."
"Ah, that is interesting! Are there chickens?"
"No."
"Nothing is perfect," sighed the fox.
But he came back to his idea.
"My life is very monotonous," the fox said. "I hunt chickens; men hunt me. All the chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And, in consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat . . ."
The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time.
"Please--tame me!" he said.
"I want to, very much," the little prince replied. "But I have not much time. I have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand."
"One only understands the things that one tames," said the fox. "Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends any more. If you want a friend, tame me . . ."
"What must I do, to tame you?" asked the little prince.
"You must be very patient," replied the fox. "First you will sit down at a little distance from me--like that--in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day . . ."
The next day the little prince came back.
"It would have been better to come back at the same hour," said the fox. "If, for example, you come at four o'clock in the afternoon, then at three o'clock I shall begin to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances. At four o'clock, I shall already be worrying and jumping about. I shall show you how happy I am! But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at what hour my heart is to be ready to greet you . . . One must observe the proper rites . . ."
"What is a rite?" asked the little prince.
"Those also are actions too often neglected," said the fox. "They are what make one day different from other days, one hour from other hours. There is a rite, for example, among my hunters. Every Thursday they dance with the village girls. So Thursday is a wonderful day for me! I can take a walk as far as the vineyards. But if the hunters danced at just any time, every day would be like every other day, and I should never have any vacation at all."

So the little prince tamed the fox. And when the hour of his departure drew near--
"Ah," said the fox, "I shall cry."
"It is your own fault," said the little prince. "I never wished you any sort of harm; but you wanted me to tame you . . ."
"Yes, that is so," said the fox.
"But now you are going to cry!" said the little prince.
"Yes, that is so," said the fox.
"Then it has done you no good at all!"
"It has done me good," said the fox, "because of the color of the wheat fields."
...

--Antoine de Saint Exupéry

Assault and Battery Charges on Ike (the Hurricane, that is)

2008-09-18T06:58:00.001-05:00

So its almost a week since Ike hit the Houston area and caused widespread distruction and chaos. This was the scariest weather event I have ever sat through, and this is coming from a kid from the Philippines, which always experiences some type of monsoon or typhoon activity. It didnt help that the neighbors tree slammed into the house everytime a huge gust came through. I doubt I slept a wink Friday night/Saturday morning. Trees are down everywhere and signs certainly didnt fare well in the high winds.

To keep us occupied, we have been mostly hanging out at Aaron and Whit's house, sitting on the porch with drinks, harrassing the passers-by. The rub of it all is that their neighbors right accross the street have power while they dont--so we curse them daily. In reality, it isnt that bad for us since we have hot water, a gas stove, and an intact house, which is a lot better than those who live in or near Galveston. We just cant store any fresh food at the house or wash our clothes--we had to visit Caroline last night to get that done!

The latest news for our zipcode, 77007, is wonderful: "[these] zip codes have sustained extensive damage, and will therefore have a restoration timeline that extends beyond Monday, September 22." Yipee. It really bites because the houses just a block away have power and we have to drive by their electricity using arses everytime we head in or out of the neighborhood! For those who know me, they know that I like making charts...its the enginerd in me. So here's one of the history of outages for our neighborhood. Notice that the trend looked wonderful for the first half, but then has worsened and stalled for the most part. Does not look good for us.

Since Dave Boyd's memorial service has been moved to this Saturday, I wont be racing Terrafirma. It was a mutual decision by the whole team since the hurricane has disrupted all of our lives. So I plan to do that and then just clean around the house a bit. I'm sure we will be well past stir-crazy by then, so we probably will have to do another day trip like we did last weekend. The only issue is what to do with our dog, Rock. He's still a puppy, so he is a bit unruly around new surroundings.

Nothing much else to report. Have been intermittently heading to the park for brick workouts. Planning to head downtown on my bike to take pics of the blown out windows of the skyscrapers. Hopefully life returns to normal soon, for all of us.

UPDATE: Memorial Service for Dave Boyd

2008-09-17T10:36:00.001-05:00

David Boyd's Obituary

There will be a memorial service this Saturday the 20th @ 2 pm.
Emerson Unitarian Church, 1900 Bering between Westheimer and San Felipe.

There are several articles, blogs, and slideshows about Dave popping up on the web, so I will not add to the cacophany. Merely do a search and you'll find it.

Dave Boyd's Memorial Service is POSTPONED

2008-09-11T12:00:00.002-05:00

Due to Ike's insistance on paying his respects, the memorial service will postponed to a later date. I will post the new date once I hear of more information.

Dave Boyd: Amazing Adventure Racer, Even Better Friend

2008-09-06T12:45:00.004-05:00

It is with an extremely heavy heart that I post this blog. Dr. Dave Boyd, the captain of Team MOAT and Houston native, has passed away. His body was found early Friday morning in the Lake Como area in Colorado, after he had summited Blanca, Ellingwood, and Little Bear, all on Sept 3rd. Initial reports from the search and rescue team relayed that it had appeared that Dave fell 150-200 ft before succumbing to his injuries.

All of us in the adventure racing community are in utter disbelief. I had just visited Dave a couple of weeks ago at his house, where he helped me with the lymphatic issue in my neck. He had mentioned he was going to climb the 14'ers and then later meet up with his girlfriend and her kids. I just have no words...only denial, hoping, wishing that this has been just a very bad, cruel joke.

As I have only known him for a couple of years, I can only imagine how his family and closest of friends are dealing with this. But I feel so cheated because I was just only recently starting to get to really know him--I had just got a taste of his loving heart. He was always positive, helpful, and genuinely interested in what you had to say. For a while, I so wanted to hate him because he seemed to effortlessly win all those races. But you could not hate the man--he was just too nice.

Now, I am just so happy that I had the chance to meet Dave. He has touched so many lives. I only hope that God took care of him in those last minutes as that was the least he deserved. In truth, he deserved a lot more than this. We Love You, Dave.

Please Support Us for the Race for the Cure

2008-09-04T11:44:00.001-05:00

I'll be running with the Stress Team in October. Click on the logo below to donate for a very worthy cause! Thanks a ton for your support!

I am a Slug

2008-09-04T06:47:00.003-05:00

So its been over a week since my surgery and I'm slowly getting back to normal. My jaw still hurts a bit and the muscle that they cut through is still a bit tight. Saw the doc--Doc Olson this time since Parke was on vaca--and got the stitches pulled. Scar didn't look as bad as I thought it would, but I'm supposed to keep it out of direct sunlight or risk it getting darker. Well, I should be okay there because I'm on orders to stay away from exercising for about another week. Man I feel like a slob. I'm just dreading that first day of training back--it is going to be painful!

So to pass the time I've been doing more work around the house, prepping for our engagement party. If you didnt get the invite for some reason, drop me a line and I'll send you the details. Should be fun--its been a while since the last party. Before I knew I wasn't suppose to engage in exercise, I went out with the crew last Saturday to celebrate Lauren's birfday. It started off at Ziggy's, which was odd, and ended up at IHOP. Yes, it was a late night. In between, we were at Uropa for some dancing. I did my best Jabbawokeez impression. I was so out of shape, that the next day my hammies were sore! Nice. It was good to get out tho--I had been cooped up in the house for almost a week and the Home and Garden Network can be entertaining for only so long.

Unfortunately, that's all I have to report. Sadly, I will miss Run Bike Paddle next weekend...I was looking forward to doing that one. If you have any AR news that you'd like to report, send me a note and I will post.

What a Difference a Couple of Days Make

2008-08-28T06:53:00.000-05:00

A few days ago I was on a high--winning the 12hr race and feeling pretty good about our performance. I mean I was obviously pretty rusty at navving as we started off badly by following all the 24hr teams to THEIR first checkpoint, a checkpoint we didn't have to visit. Even with the ~1hr handicap, we rallied in the following bike section to be 2nd only to Run Amok. But since they were a 2-person team, we were 1st in the 4-coed division. I did have a really good nav day--I just wished I hadn't broken the #1 rule of navigation--never follow anyone.

Fast forward to Monday, I'm laying in the bed, delerious and in pain, just wishing to be in my own bed. From pushing the limits in a 12hr race to being bed-ridden for the next 24+ hours. Nice. It was pretty similar to my previous surgery experience: waking up disoriented and in pain. Thankfully Mo was there to reassure me and take care of my every need. She hates hospitals so it was a definite sacrifice for her. Although she wasn't able to be support crew for our race, she was super-support crew for my post-op. Thankfully, she kept my supply of flavored ice moving--that was the only thing I could fully enjoy since my throat was sore from the intubation.

So I'm slowly getting back to normal, trying to get used to my steri-strip necktie. Thanks for everyone who sent well-wishes--they definitely helped keep me cheery while in the hospital.

Team houstonadventureracing.com Wins 12hr Course

2008-08-24T10:51:00.002-05:00

I wanted to get this blog out quick before my surgery since I might be out of commision for a short while. So our team of Me, Raymund, Lisa, and Kyle took the 12hr race in 12hrs and 12mins despite a nav blunder by me right out of the gates! This race was especially fruitful for us as HART made a clean sweep with HART Masters (Dave and Monica Ferley, Dave Tucker, and Eric Moore) taking 2nd spot and HART to Handle (Dave Peth, Danielle Trettin, Alex Joseph, and John Landram) finishing up in 3rd. I felt great throughout the race, even with the oppressive Texas heat beating down on us. As soon as I'm back up to blogging strength, I'll let you know how everything went.

No Sweat 12hr AR Suunto T6 Report

2008-08-24T10:47:00.001-05:00

* pods not used due to race conditions

Olympics-Smolympics

2008-08-21T11:44:00.004-05:00

Okay, just kidding! I LOVE the olympics! Especially women's beach volleyball...or is it just the uniforms Walsh and May wear...what was I talking about? Anyway, this weekend should be pretty interesting. No Sweat race is this Saturday and my surgery is on Monday. I just had my pre-op this morning and I LOVE how they try to get as much money from you beforehand--what are they implying?!? Anyway, got stuck by another needle, but this time I barely noticed it. I actually saw the magnanimous Dave Boyd last week and he aspirated the lymphatic fluid to relieve some of the pressure while I waited for Monday to come. Such a generous spirit--one of the people that you treasure to have met. Anyway, I just ask to keep me in your prayers.

Training was good this past couple of weeks. I went for a ride on my road bike a couple of times, logging about 30 miles each time. Hit training and got to see a noob almost lose his lunch this past Tuesday--good times, good times. Then I got to do a run around Memorial loop with Whit, Lauren, Mike, and Laura. Planning to hit training tonight and that will be it until race time. We had a slight change in lineup with Rick subbing in Kyle for himself. We should be fine--we will just have to convince Kyle not to go too fast too early...unless he would like to carry my lifeless body for most of the race course.

Finally, this is my dog, Rockne. Actually, Rockne Defies Gravity officially with AKC. Granted, he is a dog so he is bound to have little quirks here and there, but I'm quite perplexed by this one and it is especially frustrating at times. When it rains he doesn't like to go outside because apparently he doesn't want to get his paws wet. WTF?!? This from the dog who LOVES baths and usually can't wait to rush outside to do random laps around our tiny patch of grass (aka, backyard). I can only summize that he hates it when he gets back in and is slipping and sliding all over the wood floors because of his wet paws. So basically I have to take him out by leash and even then he only puts two paws down on the grass, just enough to pee off of the back porch stairs. Hilarious...well, not so hilarious at 6am in the morning. Needless to say, he has a bit more work before auditioning for Greatest American Dog.

I keep forgetting, but I'll put up some MRI's of my neck...you can tell me if they're useful at all. Yes, there is a back-story to this--next time.

HART/Marmot in Trail Runner Mag!

2008-08-19T06:11:00.001-05:00

This epic photo of us on Lone Mountain by Will Ramos makes it onto another publication! Maybe this will make us look legit. :) I'm heading out right now to buy out the stands!

Double Lake, Lake Livingston, et al.

2008-08-11T06:39:00.004-05:00

Well its about time I caught up again. The last couple weeks were pretty good, training-wise...they were exeptional Cus, XBOX 360 and Wii-wise as well, but I digress. I made it to both HART training sesssions a couple of weeks ago, but last week I had skipped both. Tuesday was skipped due to my doctors appointment (more on that later) and Thursday due to an art exhibit at which Weihan was to be the photographer. We didn't make it to the exhibit because Audi decided to lose another ignition coil--she's falling apart. I love Audi, but I think its time for her to move on and "explore other opportunities."

Swimming has been a once a week affair. Since I haven't been going as frequently as before, I've been trying to go for longer sets. That's when I realized my endurance is a bit better than I thought it was...but not by much. I'm not setting any speed records (e.g., the olympians are done with their 100m by the time I make it half way!), but I'm feeling a lot more comfortable going longer distances. I took Rockne on another run. Since it wasn't as hot, we went a little further, about 3 miles. Again, he would plop down as soon as we stopped for a break, but when we got back to the house he was still full of energy--bastard! Apparently he's sandbagging while running with me.

This past Sunday was HART training at Double Lake. It was in preparation for No Sweat, and boy conditions were just right--heat index was over 100 degrees! I trained with my team: Rick, Lisa, and Raymund. We started out with a short orienteering section inside of Double Lake Rec Area and then a hike over to the Ferley's lakehouse. Once we got out of the park and on the bare roads of Coldspring, the tarmac was just blazing! We kept an honest pace and we at the Ferleys in about 2hrs. Next was paddling Lake Livingston to the island and back. This lake is always choppy and yesterday was no different. Of course no one brought a bilge in their boat. It was a pretty good paddle despite taking on some water on the way back into the wind.

Finally, it was on the bike back to Double Lake. Once we got to Lake Lake, we hit the trails. They had added on a few more miles, so I was a bit disoriented at times. Still, the trails were perfect and we did one loop and decided to end training there since it was about 8hrs at that point. Jackie's team had made the smart move of heading to the lake to take a little swim and cool off, so we rode over to join them. So that was pretty much it--we headed back to the Ferleys to pack up and we were outta there--I was sooo hungry! After experiencing that furnace, I'm not looking forward to midday during No Sweat. Hopefully we visit the water holes frequently!

So, for those who don't know yet, I'm planning to have neck surgery...the Monday after No Sweat, nonetheless. Apparently I have some kind of "lymphatic malformation" that is causing lyphatic fluid to build in my neck and I have to get it excised. As you can guess, I'm not too excited about going under the knife, but after draining it a couple times now, it keeps coming back. I've actually been dealing with it since before Primal Quest because I didn't want it to affect the race, but now its just getting huge. On a lighter note, I just got an email from Phil saying that our GoPro video is on YouTube! Okay, so its not so exciting unless you enjoy staring at the back of Wendy's head, but if you guys watch it enough times we can win something from GoPro, so check it out!

Sleepy in Houston

2008-07-28T06:56:00.002-05:00

So the process of recovery seems to still be ongoing. When I first got back from PQ, I was sleeping a lot...I mean all the time. Its getting better, but there are still times when I just need to stop and take a quick 15min nap...I guess I'm still in expedition mode! LOL. Anyway, I'm also starting to get back into regular workouts, irregularly. The first full week that I was back, I simply made an appearance at HART practice the Thursday before the Houston Urban--the traditional ride downtown to scope out the streets for the race. It was so good to see everyone again...it had been almost a month since I had seen some of these people! We hung out at BW-3's and waited for them to finish up their bike ride.

I had planned to go and watch the team race on Saturday, but I remembered telling a couple guys at Stress that I would show up for the weekly Saturday morning basketball game. So I did. I was horrible, but I felt like I could play for days despite the oppressive heat. It was now getting unbearable to play at 8am in the morning! WTF?! We definitely need to find an indoor court.

The next week was pretty much the same--me sitting my lazy ass at home. But I did get a 20 mile bike ride in on Wednesday. Felt pretty good and it was nice to be on my road bike--felt so nimble and quick compared to the MTB. I finally made it back to training the following week, hitting both Tuesday and Thursday practices. Again, it was nice to hang out with the crew again. I took it easy and didn't try to bust it out during my first days back.

I went out again on Sunday for a morning ride. I always love these outings--not that many cars on the roads and just seems so relaxing. I stopped by Starbucks along the way to say "hi" to Mo and then rode down to the Fruit Loop and around the neighborhood for about 30 miles. Later in the day, I was actually feeling a bit angsty for once and decided to take Rock out for a run. 2 miles. This would be our longest run together, but also I didn't want to go much further as it was close to 100 degrees out. I could tell he was ready to be done at around 2 miles--every time I stopped in the shade for him, he just plopped down on the grass. I gave him several laps of HEED from my bottle and then we were off, with little resistance from him. He is going to be great exercise partner, I can already tell.

Yes, I know, pretty boring stuff. As you can see, I'm on sabbatical, but if anyone out there needs someone to fill in I probably will say yes. If anything else comes in interesting on the PQ front, I'll post it for y'all. Until then, happy racing!

P.S. HART captured the Texas Cup Title once again! Great job, team!

Kenny Makes it on the Wall Street Journal!

2008-07-25T05:56:00.000-05:00

...or at least his picture does...:)

Wall Street Journal: Primal Quest Montana

HART/Marmot Reports Spotty at PQ

2008-07-15T06:32:00.002-05:00

We didn't get much coverage at the race, but we did get a few mentions on the PQ website. Yes, I already did the searching for you (what else did you think I did the last couple of weeks after getting back from Montana?!):

Mind Quest Ultra Marathon, Day 1

Overnight at TA8

Finish Line

I'm still trying to get our official PQ team photo...not sure when that will be distributed.

Back to Mortal Musings

2008-07-10T06:06:00.000-05:00

So, we're all back from Montana and things just seem a bit boring now. The one thing that has been keeping me busy is the aftermath of the lightning strike that hit the house the day before I left for PQ. Great timing huh? I basically had no time to fix anything, so I was freaking out. Here's the current tally of the things taken out by the lightning:

- HVAC (control boards and thermostats)
- Security system (control board and wiring)
- Printer
- Internet (cable modem and wireless router)

Thankfully, Aaron and his cousin Mike did us a HUGE solid and went over and fixed the HVAC while we were gone...so our kitty's didn't fry in the 90+ deg heat! I have a pic of the Brinks control panel, but I couldn't get my iPhone to focus correctly. Anyway, you can kind of see where one of the chips (or whatever--I'm not an electrical!) melted through.

Nothing much else going on--planning to hit the Houston Urban sprint this weekend and cheer everyone on and then head over to Boyd's to pick up all my gear that they lugged back. I thought I would be burnt out after this race, but oddly enough I've been surfing around (once our internet was back up), searching for what was next. Scary, huh?

Primal Quest Montana Suunto T6 Log

2008-07-07T12:30:00.004-05:00

*Smartbelt used due to race length

PRIMAL QUEST Team #81 - HART/Marmot Blog

2008-05-27T12:05:00.004-05:00

GO TO TEAM HART/MARMOT'S PQ SITE:

Spread Your Wings 18hr AR Suunto T6 Log

2008-05-27T06:50:00.000-05:00

* Pods not used due to race rigors
** log stopped due to full memory
*** dips in altitude due to water activities

Spread Your Wings 2008 Race Vid

2008-05-26T18:59:00.003-05:00

Another HOT race, but it was tons of fun! MOAT picks up 1st and 2nd place. Pay close attention to the paddle technique of the 4 person canoe...that's HART/Marmot!

HART/Marmot's Motto for PQ

2008-03-27T06:01:00.000-05:00

Texas Independence Relay Worm

2008-03-26T06:44:00.000-05:00

This is an example of the crazy fun we had at the relay. Thanks Melissa for the bonus entertainment!!!

Team HART/Marmot Goes to Camp!

2008-03-18T12:01:00.001-05:00

So HART/Marmot finally met up as a team in Moab for Camp Xstream to get all of our Primal Quest certifications out of the way. In the process, we were treated to wonderful scenery, awesome riding at Slickrock, interesting paddling training on the Colorado, and dramatic ascending, rappelling, traversing, and self-rescue activities near Porcupine Rim! As I always say, I will report more later, but we all know how well I've been at doing that lately...I have a queue the size of Texas! Anyway, I'll certainly try to catch up, but the housewarming party this weekend will most likely take my full attention.

Again, MANY thanks to our sponsors:

- HART
- Marmot
- Petzl
- Hammer Nutrition

Texas Independence Relay: 203 Miles Later and We Want More!!

2008-03-07T06:15:00.001-06:00

This was an awesome event! I can't believe we ran all the way from Gonzales to La Porte--truly amazing! And our team was truly amazing as well--great job to everyone! For now, here is the unofficial times for our team. Come and Take It!

UPDATE: Go HERE for official results!

Texas Independence Relay Suunto Smartbelt Log

2008-03-04T12:01:00.000-06:00

*T6 not used due to leg timing responsibilities
**1.5 hr gap in heartrate data due to removal during shower and nap

Texas Independence Relay Rotation

2008-02-28T06:11:00.004-06:00

Here's our rotation order, along with estimated times and locations just in case you want to meet up with us along the way:

For more detailed route info, check out the TIR ROUTE MAPS.

See ya on the road!

H-Town Marathon: Another Painfest

2008-01-30T12:30:00.000-06:00

So it was actually going to happen. I was going to run the Houston Marathon. A few years back I had run my first Half and I had ankle issues towards the end. But still, I was close to my target time. Two years later I tried to run my first marathon, but my IT band had other plans for me. I would sit that one out. After taking another year off, I figured this was the year to do it. It still needed to be cleared off my list.

I promised myself to be careful and not injure myself. And for the most part I did--I was injury-free coming into the Marathon. Problem was that I had skipped some major long runs during the training period. But when I ran our longest run, a 21 miler, I felt really good and did it at about 9:30 pace. I was confident. Too confident. Since my training had been spotty I had kept my goal pretty nebulous. Until race day when all reason got shot out of a cannon and I went and looked for the 3:40 pace group. WTF? I don't know where my head was, but it wasnt with me that morning--I just kept thinking back to that 21 miler and how I felt like I had the legs to go faster. So I had set my fate.

I was diligent in my hydration, so, on cue, I had to use the port-a-potty minutes away from the start. I kid you not, the gun sounded merely a minute after I got out of the stall! So that was perfect timing so far. Now, our pacer was named Carlos...thankfully, not Carlos Ibarra or I'd be in BIG trouble, but still almost as bad. There were a few women in the group that were trying to qualify for Boston and they were close to throwing a fit when our pacer was a bit ahead of the pace so early at the beginning. I too was wondering what he was doing. But I felt good so I didn't mind too much. All was going great, even past the half-marathon mark--I had PR'd at that point. Along the way there was a priest blessing runners with holy water--I made a b-line to him thinking I would need all the help I could get. And it was so true.

Mo was such a great support crew--she was at every point she said she would be. The first two times I saw her, I didn't need anything. But at the 25k point, things had turned for the worse. My legs and, more worrying, my feet were crying out all of the sudden. I don't understand why because I ran in the same shoes I had been training in and never once had foot problems. It must have been those skipped long runs--my legs and feet were not used to the long distance pounding yet. I couldn't wait to get to Mo at San Felipe and Post Oak--maybe an injection of fluids would change everything. Nope. Thats started the cycle of walking...and at that point everyone started to pass me by. That really didn't bother me--I was more worried about just finishing now. Its just crazy how things can just turn on a dime like that.

So I reverted to the 9-1: 9 minutes running, 1 minute walking. My pace had dramatically dropped from about 8:24 to just about 10min or more. I didn't feel so bad because there were other people going through the same hell as I was. I just told myself to keep moving forward. I was hoping there would be more HART people out there to run/walk me in, but no one was there to help. I saw Weihan a couple of times (he took my thumbs up and thumbs down pics) but he was injured and could only cheer me on. Then came the undulation of Allen Parkway. I then reverted to AR-style trekking: run the flats and downhills, walk the uphills. I would make it, it was just a matter of "when."

The most depressing part was whenever a pacer would run past me. It was like that goal slowly slipping out of my hand. 3:50. 4:00. 4:10. Man, I had fallen back so far that everyone, and I mean everyone was passing me. I was hoping to make it under 4:20 now, but even that was slipping away. Then came the final stretch where you could see the finish line all the way in the distance. It was a nice carrot to have in front of you, but it was still a LONG way away! I did speed up a bit and hobbled the last 100m in full unmasked pain. 4:21. I was done, that's all that mattered. Shortly after going into the GRB center, Ashley asked if I was going to run another one and I replied, "NEVER!" But that's how I reply when people ask me about adventure races. Anyway, the next 2-3 days I really had a hard time on my feet. Thankfully nothing was broken. So that was it, I had done it. And I had thought before that I wanted to do a 50k or even a 100k...HA!

SES Race for the Cure

2008-01-30T12:00:00.000-06:00

This is why I love this company. Once in a while we get together and support a good cause and at the same time get some outdoor exercise in the process! This time it was the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure. We have at least two cancer survivors at Stress, so this had special meaning for us. Of course, you can't expect cool October weather here in Houston. It was muggy and warm that morning--I was already sweating just walking from the car to the SES tent! I knew I wasn't going to set a PR today.

We were one of the first ones there, with Alan being the only one to beat us. We hung out for a bit while the rest of the crew trickled in. I decided to go on a warm up run...wtf was I thinking?!? Good thing I brought an extra shirt to sweat into. About an hour later it was time for photos and I was just hoping that I wouldn't sweat through our cool blue shirts. Start time was soon approaching so I changed into my race shirt and made my war to the line.

It was at this time that it started to drizzle...it was nice and cool so I welcomed it at first. But I knew it would prey havoc on us at the finish since the steam would rise and make it just unbearable. It was a full on downpour during the opening ceremonies and then it stopped right before the gun went off. Nice. I started off with a conservative pace knowing the humidity would give me fits. I was feeling good up until the final stretch on Allen Parkway. This is where I was just fully drenched in the thick air and my own sweat. I tried to push, but it wasn't going to happen. I took it easy up until the final 100m where I sprinted in with one other guy--he thanked me for egging him on. So, as I expected, no PR...a few seconds slower. I didn't mind since I haven't "raced" this short of a distance in about 2 years now.

So I tried to quickly dry off and enjoy the post-run festivities at the SES tent. Seemed like all were having a good time. Mo and I stayed for a bit and then had to leave at about noon. In all, a good fun time with the company!

Note: this blog will be moved back to October after this week.

Gone Paddlin'

2008-01-28T19:42:00.000-06:00

While you wait for the Big Chill 24hr race report (hopefully not that long), go to Checkpoint Tracker. I'm pretty sure the final standings for the 24hr are the same as what the leaderboard shows right now.

photo courtesy of Bryan McKenney

Big Chill 24hr AR Suunto Smartbelt Log

2008-01-28T06:47:00.000-06:00

Year End Reviews

2008-01-23T06:30:00.000-06:00

So it has been a silent winter for me. With the new house, new puppy, travel up to Washington, and, yes, the engagement, I have been somewhat preoccupied. But fear not, we are about to start up a new, exciting year of racing! In fact, once its up and running, I will start blogging on the Primal Quest site to keep you all up to date on our team's training up until our voyage into Big Sky Country (pronounced "kun-trehh")!

But to continue forward, occasionally you need to research the past. Here's the logs of the past 2 years. I've accumulated about 6k miles in total! More interesting is to study the cyclic nature of my activity level. You can see the distinct lulls and I made notes at these points to explain the "why." If its not very interesting to you, then maybe its a bit pretty?

Alright, finally, I know I have been slacking on the race reports, but here is a list of what I need to catch up on:

- Spread Your Wings 18hr (can't believe no one reminded me of this one!!)
- Race for the Cure 5k
- USARA Nationals 30hr
- Lone Star Rogaine Championships 24hr
- Texas Dare 12hr
- Houston Marathon

Wow, now that I list it out, I can't believe it! Yes, I'll get to it!! Until then, race on!

Team HART/Marmot Set to Invade Big Sky Country

2007-12-18T05:14:00.000-06:00

When I heard rumors of Montana, I was so stoked! I have visited Montana, specifically Glacier, several times in the past 10 years and I never got tired of the place. I still haven't fully explored that part of Montana--I can't wait to see what they have in store for us! Regardless, the scenerey will be breathtaking no doubt! For some info on the site selection go to Primal Quest's Website.

Texas Dare 12hr Suunto T6 Log

2007-12-10T06:58:00.000-06:00

* pods not used due to race restrictions
** altitude shift of approx 50ft due to weather conditions

H-BOM 07 Results

2007-12-02T21:26:00.001-06:00

Thanks to everyone who came out and supported this event! I really enjoyed it and you all made it worthwhile. Please thank Mo again for the awesome work she did while I was out resetting the checkpoints this morning!

Tommy retains top spot, and in a faster time! I definitely need to make it a bit tougher for him next year. Here's a couple photos from the course.

One of the checkpoints

1st Place Trophy (crank+compass+whistle+thermometer)

Kenny

Houston Bike Orienteering Meet: Pre-Meet Letter

2007-11-26T06:55:00.000-06:00

Location: W.G. Jones State Park (30mins from Houston, directions provided at the end of this letter)
Date: Sunday, December 2nd, 2007
Orienteering Tutorial: 8:00am
Pre-Meet Info Session: 8:30am
Start Time: 9am (depending on attendance, may be a staggered start. If so, starting times will be emailed before Sunday)
Duration: 1st orienteer should be in at around 1.5-2hrs
Cost: $5 per person (1 or 2 person teams)
Maps: 1:10000 scale, pre-plotted points

Mandatory Gear:
• Bike
• Helmet
• Compass
• Pen or pencil
• Bug spray
• Food and water for duration of event

Recommended Gear:
• Bike shoes
• Bike gloves
• Gaiters or Long pants
• Map case
• Eye protection

Object of Meet:
This should be a nice, fast, and fun course with minimal difficulty. If you have any questions about orienteering on a bike or just orienteering in general, just ask. Help is allowed for all parties prior to the start. If needed, starting intervals will be 3 to 5 minutes to spread the group out.

Rules:
1. You must sign a waiver before competing.
2. Please, NO pre-scouting this week.
3. If you are unfamiliar with orienteering maps or control descriptions, please view the IOF control description sheet and a sample map HERE. Also, there will be a tutorial at 8am on meet day.
4. Boundaries are clearly marked on the map. You must obey them or be disqualified.
5. You have to obtain the points in order. Identifier numbers are provided at CPs to confirm your location.
6. No help is allowed from outside parties or other teams after the race begins, except in the event of an emergency.
7. Teams of 1 or 2 are allowed.
8. You must record your visit to each point by punching your passport in the correct order. Some CPs do not have punches and require you to write down a code of some sort. Bring a pen!
9. Some points will be 50-100m off of main roads or trails. This is the only time you are allowed to drop your bike. You can only be 50-100m away from your bike. Penalty is disqualification.
10. In order to qualify for prizes, teams must visit all CPs in the correct order. The team with all CPs and the fastest time wins. Teams are considered unofficial if not all points are visited.
11. There is no official cutoff time, but everyone should be back within 4 hours. Please let us know if you abandon the course before you leave for home.
12. Prizes will be awarded to the top three teams.

Directions:
• From I-45/I-10 interchange in Houston, go North on I-45 for 33 miles
• Take Exit 81 toward FM-1488
• Take FM-1488 W ramp to Hempstead/Magnolia (on right side of feeder)
• Take FM-1488 west for 2.5 miles
• Turn left into park (there should be a sign for W.G. Jones State Park. Be careful as traffic is fast and the turnoff is a bit hidden)
• As you enter the park, take the first left and park where there is space. This is where check-in will take place.

Finally, this bike orienteering course is for fun and is NOT officially sanctioned by any organization. You must let me know by Wednesday if you plan to race so I know how many maps to make.

Please contact me if you have any questions.

Kenny
kennyar(at)gmail(dot)com

Orienteering Map Descriptions

2007-11-26T06:33:00.000-06:00

IOF Symbols and Control Descriptions

Sample Orienteering Map (partial of Bastrop map)

Houston Bike Orienteering Meet Back On for 07!

2007-11-21T07:00:00.000-06:00

Houston Bike Orienteering Meet

Location: exact location to be announced (within 1hr drive of Houston)
Date: SUNDAY, DECEMBER 2ND, 2007 (note date change)
Start Time: 9am (pre-race meeting at 8:30am)
Duration: 2-4hrs
Cost: $5 per person (1 or 2 person teams, fee goes to production of 1:10000 scale orienteering maps)

Mandatory Gear:
• Bike
• Helmet
• Compass
• Bug spray
• Food and Water for duration of race

Recommended Gear:
• Bike shoes
• Bike gloves
• Gaiters or Long pants
• Map case
• Eye protection

This bike orienteering course is for fun and is NOT an official sanctioned event by any organization.

Final details will be provided the Monday before race weekend (November 26th).

Please let me know if you plan to race so I know how many maps to make.

Race Director: Kenny Farrow, kennyar(at)gmail(dot)com

AquaTerra EXPedition = AustinTown EXPosed, Day 2

2007-11-20T12:11:00.000-06:00

The next day started bright and early...a bit colder for some. Particularly, for Caroline, who had put on her rain jacket and cinched up her hood so tightly that I could only see her nose. I got up, tried to gently nudge her awake when Raymund marched over and commanded her, military-style, to get up. That worked. We quickly packed up our site and loaded up the Ruahine for our final day of racing. We had to get our boats over to the swimming area of Emma Long by 5:45 to be properly staged before the 6am start.

We eventually got there and dropped our boats in the water, trying to maneuver our boat so that we didn't cross the start line, unlike Raymund and Eric, who seemed to be trying to get an edge on us. Then Chad Holman cleverly told us that it was shallow enough to stick our paddles in the mud to stop us from drifting. Duh. With a few good morning words from our race directors, we were off again, in a sprinting frenzy. For some unexplainable reason, Raymund and Eric were taking a wide turn, taking many boats with them in the process. We were barely able to sneak underneath them and take a sharper route down Lake Austin. It was dark, so we couldn't really see where we were going--just the glowsticks in front of us bobbing up and down, side to side. We didn't get caught up in the sprint and just started out steadily, slowly picking off boats as we went. The first CP of the day was at the 360 bridge. It was such a large catch, we were on autopilot for most of this leg.

As we made the bend and saw the bridge, it was hard to spot where exactly the boat landing was, until right as we hit the beach we saw Drost directing traffic. We got on shore and were handed our CPs for the final day. This time we decided to plot all points at once since we didn't know if we would have favorable conditions to plot in later on. As we plotted, the sun started to peek over the horizon and as we went on to take out CP23, it was clear enough to see it from the road. We continued on, making a loop, back to the 360 bridge and over it to get CP22, on a high ridge. No problems here, except for a short, steep climb. On the way back we saw Ray Ray, Emo, Nikki, Cynthia, and whole gaggle of other racers just behind us. We quickly transitioned back into our boat for a short paddle to our next boat landing.

It would be a bit different here as we would have to portage a bit to the next TA after reaching the boat landing. First we had to negotiate a spillway underneath the 2222 bridge. Not too bad--we actually did pretty nicely here. Then as we came over to the other side of the bridge, we saw a bit of rocky formation that we were supposed to portage over to get to the road. Nice. For some reason, the boat felt a lot heavier than before. Thankfully, a male team came over to help us with our boat and we did the same for them. We put on the wheels and continued north along the road to TA3. From there we continued on foot without our boat to pick off 6 CPs in the Bull Creek Park area. CP24 was in a draw and I thought I would have a bit of trouble with this one, but somehow I hit the right one dead on. I was feeling confident...a bit too confident. I tried dead reckoning to CP25, and it seemed to be working as the trail system was taking us in the direction we wanted to go. But when we got close to the CP it went all to heck. We spent possibly an hour or two here looking for the point. Sneakily, the Holmanators were there too and had found the point and got away before I could notice--I was standing less than 5m away from it and couldn't see it! Again, hidden in brush. I was so pissed. Thankfully, Cynthia had caught up to us and ended up in the same vicinity but had better eyes than I did and we picked it off at the same time. I was fuming.

Although distraught, we continued on down Bull Creek, seeing Werewolves already on their return trip to their boat. Again, for some reason, I couldn't spot CP26, which should have been right off of the trail, so I decided not to waste any time again and suggested we just get it on the way back. We got a slight break with CP27 as Caroline knew exactly where to look to find it. But, what she didn't know is that as she went to stuff the passport in her pocket when she left the CP, it had fallen out. We didn't realize this until we arrived at CP28 and she went to punch the passport. She had lost it, literally and figuratively. She was so horrified that she shot out in a frenzy back to the bridge where CP27 was to go find it. I was a bit more calm because I knew we couldn't do much about it except retrace our steps. Thankfully, Cynthia and Nikki were there again to save our bacon and had picked up our passport. Crisis averted. More teams were already heading the other way as we went to get the furthermost point, CP29. This was not a problem at all, and in no time we were heading back to pick up CP26 then back to the boats. This section was just determined to give me fits as we still couldn't spot it. Finally, by grace from up high, Caroline found it and we could return. I had figured we had lost tons of spots, but was puzzled to hear we had picked one spot up...same as the Commons Ford Park debacle the day before. Oh well, at least we weren't the only ones.

We headed back to the rocky launch point and this time decided to take all of our gear out of the boat before trying to lift it over. This was a very smart move, but I still managed to make it a difficult portage. As I was backing up into the creek, my heel caught a root and there I went. The whole time I was falling, I tried to keep the Ruahine from crashing into the rocks. Yes, I sacrificed my body and used it as a soft landing pad for the boat. Caroline thought I was dead as I didn't move for a few moments. I did a physical check and nothing was broke, on either of us. Thank goodness. I think it helped that I already had my PFD on. So we carefully portaged back over to the other side of 2222 and continued on paddling. The next boat landing was near Mt. Bonnel. Again, Oasis crushed along and eventually passed us on the way to the boat landing. The wind was picking up and stifling us both. In the distance we could see the sneaky Holmanators and we knew we were catching up. We took a left into a cove, shielded from the wind and beached at Mayfield Park.

As we got out, there was Iron Will again--he was just at the portage at 2222 helping us out! Man, that is one fast dude! The other volunteers at the boat landing were nice too, giving us encouragement to catch up to the Holmanators and Oasis. So we tried just that. I had a little confusion with CP30 because I had unwittingly written over the road we would need to use to get to it, but we figured it out pretty quickly. On our way up to Mt. Bonnel and CP31, we saw the Holmanators on their way back, but never did see Oasis. That was a bit puzzling, but I didn't dwell too much on that. We got atop Mt. Bonnel pretty quickly and had to read off the date on the monument. The last number was weathered so we guessed "8" and went on our way. We jogged the whole way down back to the boat launch and were pleasantly suprised to hear that we indeed had made up some time on the two teams--we actually could see the Holmanators in the water closeup and Oasis wasn't that far ahead.

We dug hard, trying to catch up to them, but I think they were also as determined to keep their leads. We were making headway, but not at the rate that I thought we should. Then Caroline commented that she was seeing rooster-tailing up in the front where we had smacked the boat into a rock--that could be the reason we were seemingly going slower. As we went to cross Lake Austin to an inlet to pick up the final boat CP, we saw Raymund and Eric on their way back to the final boat landing at Tom Walsh. Were they skipping that point? We later found out that Eric had to get back home for a prior engagement. So we continued on, and as we turned the final bend in the inlet heading for CP32, the Holmanators were still there--they had gotten caught up on a rock. So we kept on, especially since we knew we had a slight lead on Oasis coming into the day. We pushed hard and arrived at the final boat landing almost simultaneously with the Holmanators. When they docked, Ashley helped them drag their boat out of the water and onto the grass. Dejectedly, I was thinking, that would be nice! Right as I finished thinking that and had started to get out of the boat, Jason Mittman did the same for us! Nice! Any little help at that time would make a huge difference.

Oasis was already on foot, so we needed to limit our losses. Holmanators paused a bit, fumbling with gear while we kept on without changing a thing. We headed for the CPs at Red Bud Isles Park first. As we crossed the bridge to the island, I saw CP33 on its own lonely island. I wasn't quite sure how to get to it yet, so I decided we should get CP34 first. This one was a code affixed to one of the doggy bag dispensers at this dog park. It took us a short while, but we finally found it and headed back to CP33. I figured the water would be shallow enough to wade at some point, so we just dove in. We both sank a bit before figuring out where the water wasn't as deep. Done. Two more CPs in Reed park and we would be totally done! This leg seemed to take forever as we had to run/walk up and down hilly roads through a subdivision. As we were about to cross a bridge over a creek that went through Reed Park, I looked over to my right and there was CP36! Nice! From there, it was an easy trail jog to a monument at CP35 to read off the date. We were done! Now we just had to book it back as quickly as possible, hoping that our Day 1 lead was enough to keep us in 3rd. As we jogged into the finish, they were cheering us and Debbie congratulated us! We had did it--we only lost 4mins that day, keeping us in 3rd by 10mins!

Man, that was definitely too close. I was so happy to be done--it was a tough yet fun race! It definitely was a good primer for USARA Nationals, which was coming up in a few weeks...

thanks again to Bryan McKenney for these awesome pics!