Free State Trail Marathon

Posted on April 24, 2012 by Ed

This weekend I had the pleasure of running at the Free State Ultras. The event is part of the Run Nerds races down in Kansas. There was 100k, 40 mile, marathon, and half-marathon. I planned to run my first trail marathon. I took off Friday and Monday for the event. We recently bought a new tent so we planned to make the 4 hour drive from West Des Moines to Lawrence, KS and make it a camping weekend.


Roadtrip!
ROADTRIP!

My wife drove down early Friday morning to see her family and take care of a few things non-race related. By 5:00 PM or so we were all together with the tent setup, my race swag picked up, and relaxing at our camping stop in Clinton Lake State Park.

It turned out that my son picked the stop and it was less than 30 yards from the race trail. We found this out by accident while looking for some fire wood. Here are a few photos of the trail that was next to our camping spot and the swag from the race packet pickup.

Read more »

Categories: Race | Tags: , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Understandig my water & GU intake

Posted on April 11, 2012 by Ed

Since I have been running with water bottles the past few weeks I have really started to dial in my water intake. The one thing with a pack that I don’t like is not really knowing how much water you are taking in until it is too late . The other benefit of the water bottle is that they provide a little arm/shoulder/chest workout. I have noticed that my chest is losing more fat that normal.

Right now I am consuming about 22 oz or water over 8-10 miles. Temps are between 60-80 right now. Maybe I’ll need more come full summer temps or 70-90′s.

At the end of my 9 mile Tuesday trail runs I have little or no water left in my two bottles. I am not sure at this point if I will race with both bottles or just one. One bottle should be enough water to get me through each aid station in my ultra races. But the though of running with only one bottle bugs me due to the shift in weight. I find myself fidgeting and switching hands too much with just one bottle. Read more »

Categories: Nutrition, Training | Tags: , , , | 5 Comments

Photo of the day: Start of something good

Posted on April 11, 2012 by Ed

20120411-102547.jpg

This is usually were I start my Tuesday trail runs. I can park less than ten feet from this spot.

Categories: Photo of the Day | Tags: , | 2 Comments

Photo of the Day: Into the Wild

Posted on April 4, 2012 by Ed

20120404-093309.jpg

I was able to finally get in a trail run here in Des Moines, IA. The trails are in great shape. I only stopped for one photo the entire 10 miles. I was just having too much fun I guess.

Categories: Photo of the Day | Tags: , | 1 Comment

Feet are toast

Posted on April 3, 2012 by Ed

I have no clue what happened tonight. 10 miles in my New Balance MT110s and all hell broke loose. Four blisters. One of them bloody. Ouch.

My speed took a dip after mile 6. Up until then feet were fine. Then things fell apart with little hot spots. I did not know the blister on my Achilles was that bad until I stopped.

20120403-201710.jpg

Categories: Injury | Tags: , | 4 Comments

Photo of the Day: Father and Son

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Ed

Here is a nice photo of me and my son from the last 50k race. My wife took this one with her iPhone. This was mile 27 and I was hurting at that point. Moments earlier I had just climbed a hill and I think he could tell I was spent. I remember him putting his hand on my should as if to tell me I could do this. Good memory!

Categories: Photo of the Day | Tags: , , | 2 Comments

Altra’s ALTRAMANIACS – The Lone Peak Hunter

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Ed

Your favorite super hero’s are back it again. This time the ALTRAMANIACS are out in the wild looking stalking the Lone Peak.

Categories: Video | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Nathan QuickDraw Plus Bottles

Posted on March 21, 2012 by Ed


I recently picked up two Nathan QuickDraw bottles. I currently have an IronMan water belt that has two 10 oz. bottles with a small pouch. I also have a Nathan Endurance pack. I picked up two of the Nathan bottles to have a third option.

After wearing my Nathan Endurance vest in my recent 50k race I wanted to try handheld bottles. The well supported 50k race might be too short to warrant the Nathan Endurance vest. Mike over at Wasatch Runner pointed out that a 1.5 liter bladder weighs about 3.5 pounds. Ouch! With an aid station every 5-7 miles that is a lot of extra weight. The bottles are a nice option to have for the shorter races.

I have struggled to carry a bottle when running in the past. At the time I only carried a single bottle. I think it was the difference in weight between hands that bugged me. For that reason I picked up two Nathan QuickDraw Plus bottle to even things out. Maybe I will get used to the bottles and be able to carry just one when I am trying to run as light as possible and still need to hydrate. Read more »

Categories: Gear, Reviews | Tags: , | 1 Comment

First 50k Lessons Learned

Posted on March 21, 2012 by Ed

Here are just a few things I have been thinking about the last few days after my first 50k. I wanted to get these written down so I could read them again before my next race.  Some of these are pretty basic stuff that I have already known but never paid  much attention to. Others are new things that were a revelation to me during or after the event.

Food & Water Intake
I thought I had the food intake down after a few recent long runs. I was wrong. Before the race I bought 30 gels. I wanted to take about 2-3 per hour plus what food I could pick up off the aid stations. Even after the race I though I had the food part or running licked. But in looking back I now don’t think I did very well. I ended up only taking 8 GUs the entire 6+ hours. One of them I took right before we started. So that means I really only had 7 gels. I almost need another watch that buzzes me every 20 minutes to take a gel.

Read more »

Categories: Nutrition, Questions, Race, Training | Tags: , , , , , | 9 Comments

Hawkeye 50k Photos Set #2

Posted on March 19, 2012 by Ed

My wife took a few photos of people coming out of the woods at the Hawkeye 50k this weekend. She was the one with the cow bells along with my kids. This is the second set of photos. You can see the first set here. Due to the limitation of the plugin I am using to display them I had to add them to two different blog posts.

Read more »

Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: , | 1 Comment