The Rally 'Stache

After our run over Hope Pass on Friday, Matt and I drove back to Fort Collins to spend the weekend at my house and hang out with my daughter Michal, who hadn't seen Matt since she was a little girl in Alaska.  Because it had been over a decade, Michal had only the vaguest recollection of Matt, his wife Shannon and the late, great Jake, their old dog, but to be fair to Michal, Matt currently looks a lot different from his usual self.

You see, Matt has grown what he calls a "rally 'stache" to get us fired up for the upcoming race.  This is no ordinary mustache -- this is a thick, multi-colored 70's fu that makes you swear you can hear a bow-chicka-wow-wow soundtrack in the background.   It's the kind of mustache that scares old ladies, prompts cashiers to check IDs and immediately takes 50 points off of the wearer's IQ.  It's the kind of 'stache that most women denounce as repugnant even as they are being irresistibly drawn to it like bugs to a zapper; and most men dismiss as low-rent, while secretly imagining how they'd look with one and privately coveting their own.  If the mustaches of Tom Selleck, Burt Reynolds and Chuck Norris created a love child, and that love child took steroids, it would be this mustache.  See for yourself:


The Rally 'Stache

 To get in a little more training while in Fort Collins, Matt, his mustache and I did a night run along the trails through Soderberg and Lory Parks out by Horsetooth Reservoir.  Matt's quads were pretty sore from all the vertical (~7,000') we ran the day before, and he's not accustomed to back-to-back long runs, so we did a relatively flat ten-mile run under a beautiful half moon.  Because Matt will be pacing me all throughout the night during the race, this was a great opportunity for him to get accustomed to the weirdness of night running.  He also got to test out his headlamp (verdict:  he's exchanging it for one with more lumens, whatever those are).

The night run was great, other than our being constantly assaulted by a horde of Angry Birds.

Every five minutes or so, some crazy birds would flit about our heads then land on the trail directly in front of us.  In the dark, all I could see was the eery orange glow of their beady eyes reflecting my headlamp up ahead in the darkness. The spooky little buggers would refuse to move until I was inches away and about to step on them.  As we got closer, I could make out that they were dark little round birds, about the size of a tennis ball, faintly whispering, "Nevermore."

At first I thought these birds were Darwinian abberations -- choosing to land on the exposed trail versus any of the ten thousand bushes or trees all around us -- but after the behavior revealed a consistent pattern, Matt hypothesized that they were protecting their nests by acting as distractions and attempting to entice us to chase them, presumably in the opposite direction from their nests.

Obviously, Matt was wrong -- clearly the birds were instinctively attracted to the bushy magnificence under his nose in the hopes of finding a safe nesting place for their entire flock.

The run was great.  The pace was controlled so it was not physically taxing, but because night running requires a fair amount of concentration to keep from face-planting, it was still mentally tiring.  After a couple hours of running we both were happy to get back to the car and the four-pack of Guinness that awaited us.

Which reminds me, I apparently have been neglecting an important part of my training/nutrition regimen:  Guinness and Jameson.  Matt informed me that all the top ultra-runners back home in Memphis regularly drink both of these beverages to hydrate or carb-load or something.  So, not wanting to miss out on any cutting edge nutritional advances, I modified my diet accordingly.  Over the course of the weekend hanging out with Matt, I drank more of both than I've had in the entire past year.  If he's right, I'll be in great shape for the race.

To cap off the training weekend, on Sunday night Matt, Molly and I went to the Botanical Gardens to see Keb' Mo'.  As usual, the show was great, especially from our vantage point standing right in front of the stage.

Keb' Mo'

Matt and I in the Mosh Pit

Afterwards, we pit-stopped at Sancho's on Colfax to "hydrate" and "carb-load" then came back to my condo, where Matt and I took turns playing guitar and forgetting song lyrics and chords until after one in the morning, just like the old days.

Training with the crew at Sancho's
(note Jameson hiding behind water)

It was an all-around great whirlwind weekend, and I'm definitely starting to get fired up for the race -- the rally 'stache seems to be doing its job.

Leadville Training Camp -- Night Run

Driving back into Leadville yesterday (Monday) evening as the sun was setting with the top down and singing along to Thunder Road (RIP Big Man), I knew I'd made the right decision to head back up for the last event of the training camp -- the night run from Twin Lakes to the Tree Line crewing area. 

The night was sublime.  Even though there were dozens of runners participating, we spread out quickly, and I spent almost the entire run utterly by myself on that mountain trail.  It was definitely a new and memorable experience for me:  the quiet of the night, the explosion of stars and visible bands of the Milky Way, the crisp air, the dancing shadows, the peaceful solitude...  I'm actually looking forward to running that section of the trail again during the race itself, even though that will happen around mile 60.

Before last night, the only other night run I'd ever done was a few months ago when Tim was visiting Fort Collins with his kids over their spring break. 

Side note:  I live in both Fort Collins and Denver, and I split my time between the two.  I'm up in Fort Collins every weekend, from Friday until Monday morning (or Sunday night), where I live with my kids (my 18-yr-old daughter Savannah is currently in Melbourne, Australia for a few months enjoying Australia's liberal drinking age (18), and my 17-yr-old daughter Michal is a senior at Ft. Collins HS and just informed me that "blogging is for narcissistic d-bags") and my ex-wife (no, it's not weird; we've been sharing the house for four years, but we've been divorced for 13 years, and it works great).  During the weekdays, I stay in a small apartment in downtown Denver because I work downtown, and there are few things more frustrating to me than the I-25 commute.

Anyway, when Tim was visiting back in April, the only time we could sneak in a long run was after he put his kids to bed.  So, we took off one night around 10pm and ran through the night along the trails between Fort Collins and Loveland (Blue Sky, Indian Summer, Devil's Backbone, Rimrock and the aptly named Coyote Ridge, on which we actually heard coyotes on the ridge howling back and forth).  That run was a milestone for me not just because it was my first night run, but also because it was pretty long (seven hours or so).  Back in April, I'd only just become somewhat accustomed to 20+ mile runs, so I was glad I was physically able to put in the distance that night with Tim.  Now, fortunately I'm able to get in a couple 20 to 30 mile runs almost every week, usually up in Fort Collins (or Rocky Mountain Nat'l Park) back-to-back on Saturday and Sunday. 

The best part of my weekend runs is the moral support I get from my kids.  Typically, when I return home after a long run -- dirty, sweaty, salt-stained and completely exhausted, but feeling a sense of accomplishment that occasionally, I'm sorry to admit, swells into self-satisfaction -- Savannah will immediately burst my pride-bubble by sarcastically congratulating me, "Wow, Dad, you ran almost one quarter of the actual distance you'll need to cover in your race!  Great job!"  Then, Michal will scrutinize my haggardness and earnestly encourage me to increase my life insurance before August. 

Actually, that may not be a bad idea.