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 The final steps. Click any pics to enlarge. This just doesn’t seem to get any easier.
When it was all said and done, I kissed the Hardrock on Saturday, 31 hours and 55 minutes after starting the morning before, for 9th place. It was the 4th time in as many attempts to do so, yet despite the experience I’ve accumulated through those years, this time around seemed harder than usual.
I think it goes without saying it’s never easy. With all the time it takes to cover so many miles across such challenging terrain, there are countless things that can go wrong. It’s not just a test of who’s fastest on their feet through the mountains, but also, who can best manage all the issues that arise, because it throws a lot at you.
A couple days after it was done, while I was letting the post-run soreness and swelling run its course, I did an interview with Jon Maletz which I thought summed up the day well, so I figured I’d share it here. read more>>>
 Well, it's not my lucky number, but it'll do. It’s time for another lap. Hardrock starts tomorrow at six.
It’ll be my 4th time participating, and my 3rd trip in the counter-clockwise direction. That is, the race heads towards Lake City, then over Handies Peak, to Ouray, then Telluride, Ophir, and back to Silverton. Familiar as it has become, like a lot of Colorado, the San Juans are still buried in snow up high, so it makes it tough to predict how things will go. Snowy passes can be slow post-holing in the daytime heat, yet those same passes might be firm, slippery, and dangerous in the middle of the night. Of course it can also makes things faster.
Also on the “news” front, a reroute out of Telluride is reportedly adding a few miles to the course, and apparently they aren’t compensating for it by shortening the course elsewhere. I guess the thinking is that after 100 miles, what’s another three? read more>>>
 Nice work, Christy. If you do this stuff long enough, at some point you’re going to make a wrong turn.
That said, I’m sure some watching thought it was cute that Christy and I finished together at the San Juan Solstice 50 miler last Saturday. If they only knew what different days we had out there.
Due to excessive snow, an alternate course had to be put together for the race this year. The creek crossings through Alpine Gulch were dangerously high (more-so than the high water year of 2008), and the middle section of course that runs along the Continental Divide hadn’t melted enough and would have been miles of tedious post-holing, with the potential for some pretty serious sliding falls.
While the organizers did a great job putting a different course together with little time– one that seemed at least as difficult, if not more, than the original– some deficient trail marking in one particular spot sent whole packs of runners off course. read more>>>
Spring snows and June skiing aside, the summer running season is here.
Jumping right into things, Christy and I ran the Dirty 30 last Saturday, a 50K course run along the trails of Golden Gate State Park, located northeast of Blackhawk, CO. Now in its 3rd year, the event hosts three races– a 7, 12, and 31 miler (50K)– and in addition to being really scenic, very hilly and just a whole lot of fun, it was a perfect way to log miles early in the season. That is, early, for a couple of people who usually don’t get going until around Memorial Day.
 The course elevation profile. Click to enlarge but disregard the heart rate/ pace stuff. read more>>>
 Lo Semple, rocking the fanny pack, on the second climb up to Burnt Mtn. after skiing the Hanging Valley Wall in the background. Click any image to enlarge. That was fun. At least in a sort of now-that-it’s-done kind of way.
Seriously though, despite the sore feet and added challenge of having to finish on a broken ski, Christy and I both felt that it was one of the coolest things we’ve been a part of this season.
Kudos to the Aspen Skiing Company, who saw past the obvious logistical hurdles of an event such as this, and ultimately gave the green light to send 150 or so people on this huge tour of the four mountains on a busy weekend day. Between getting gated terrain open early, to allowing uphill traffic on Highlands on an already crowded Saturday, to OK’ing a race course that regularly hopped in and out of the ski area boundaries which would have burdened the ski patrol in the event of a rescue– there were likely a dozen reasons why they might have considered saying no to the whole idea, but they didn’t, and everyone had a blast. Hopefully this was just the first of a new annual event. read more>>>
So it’s all set. The new Power of Four race is officially “sold out” with 75 teams of two registered to start in the morning. I was out yesterday with Dirk and Pete Swenson, helping with the course marking between Snowmass and Buttermilk.
About 11,000 feet of vertical gain with ski descents of [...]
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