JOURNEYS-1973

My parents were either insane or perfect normal and had an insane moment. Either way, they let me live by myself 130 miles away from home for my senior of high school. Looking back, this wasn't the beginning of my travels, just the first of my prolonged journeys. This bout of insanity wasn't the first time my parents went off the deep end. In my sophmore year of high school, they let a friend and I use their car to drive up to their cabin. That ended when I let my friend drive even though he didn't have a license. I looked up from my book to see a wall of redwood trees in front of us as we drove off a cliff. My parent's car was severely damaged, but repairable. When my parents again went insane, letting that same friend and I take the same car on a roadtrip to Northern California and Southern Oregon, I made sure to finish the job on the car by playing pinball at 90 miles an hour on the steel girders bordering a southern Oregon highway. My parents were apparently slow learners.

Growing Old with You

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CYI5bKZMes

Yes, it's an awwwwwwwwwwwwwwww moment. That is, if this link works!

Life in the Slow Lane

In a moment of insanity. my wife agreed to go camping on Mt. Diablo this weekend.  What's not to like? 90 degree heat and very long and steep hike to the summit. RV's full of over indulged, overfed and over beered morons at the campsite up the hill?

Well, Here's something to like. Sunset at Juniper Campground. Pretty sweet, hey? 

More signs................

This from MAB

….”that you dated someone who worked for Mountain Hardware wayyyyyyy longer than you should have because the thought of having to give up free outdoor performance wear and spontaneous camping trips was too much to bear”

Signs that you were destined to live your life in the outdoors

1) When you were a toddler and your Mom said it was time to go inside, you wailed so loud dogs and cats hid from your voice.

2) That you weren't running away from home, you were just going for a long hike.

3) When you were a kid on a tour of Alcatrez, visions of your school flashed in your head.

4) When you served in the Navy, you thought it was a great idea to go for a run at 2am on a greasy steel flight deck that was pitching 10-30 degreess from side to side.

5) When your buddies invited you to go on a pub crawl and you tell them that you have to hit the sack early to get a good start on a hiking/biking/fishing trip to the mountains.

6) That all of your work clothes are made by The North Face.

7) That your favorite artist is Ansel Adams, followed closely by Jimmy Chin. and that you even know who these people are.

8) That your apartment and later your house contains the following toys, kayak, hiking/camping gear, mountain bike, road bike, fishing gear, climbing gear,surfboard and trail/road running shoes. Also known as having your own personal sports basement.

9) That when you walk by a building, you think, "hey, that might be fun to climb."

10) That you believe that skateboarders are kindred spirits and highly talented and dedicated athletes and not obnoxious punks destroying perfectly good concrete.

11) That your favorite tv channels are Universal Sports, Versus, Discovery and National Geographic.

12) That you believe that Jacque Cousteau is the world's greatest Frenchman and one of the world's greatest explorers and should be ordained to be the patron saint of the ocean.

13) That if you had a choice, the new national anthem would be written and sung by Jack Johnson.

14) That you think women with skinned knees and hands from climbing or mountain biking are a lot sexier than some bimbette in LA.

15) That you think that men wearing suits, except on formal occasions like weddings and funerals are woosies.

16) That men should never wear purses or use briefcases. Backpacks only please.

17) That you have a 6 foot high stack of old Outside Magazines in your home.

18) That you have only read GQ magazine when visiting the doctor and even that, you were only reading it for laughs.

19) That you hate all Tom Cruise movies except the beginning of Mission Impossible 2 when he is doing some climbing.

20) That you try not to laugh when some overfed frat boy with cheeto and beer stains on his "No Fear" tee shirt tells you about how much he loves sports.  

Okay, that's enough from me feel free to add more!

Born to Run 2

If you've read my post about the book Born to Run, you'll know how much I loved it. Now, thanks to Outside Magazine (my favorite magazine of all time), you can look at photos of the great race. See Jurek, Micah True aka Caballo, the local runners and the beautiful country that is Copper Canyon.

http://outsideonline.com/travel/travel-gd-running-mexicos-copper-canyon-photos-photo-gallery-sidwcmdev_123105.html

A Hot Day On Mt. Diablo

Going into this 25K race, my goals were to find out what kind of shape I was in and to get in some solid training miles. It's a good thing my goals were modest because the course the race directors chose resulted in all but the very best runners walking large portions of the uphill trails to the summit. Oh and throw in a 90 degree day and it could have been a grim tale indeed for yours truly. But, since I was treating it like a training run and not a race, I wore my hydration pack. Talk about your life saver!!! I emptied it about 2/3 of the way, filled it up at the aid station and then refilled it at the summit. Sport Jellies by Jelly belly, loads of salty potato chips and a granola bar were enough food to get me through the race. I am glad I did this race, but have to admit that I much prefer the trails on the north side where I live, more interesting, hardly any walking and MORE SHADE!! haha

Stats  3:32, 47th place overall, 3rd place in my age group.

I was more nervous about how a runner I've been coaching did in her trail half marathon. Finally, she called and gave me her race report and it was a good one! 3:02 and a solid placing. WAY TO GO ROBIN!!!

First Race of the Year

On Saturday, June 5th, I'll be doing the Diablo 25K on Mt. (you guessed it!) Diablo. I haven't been doing much serious training, so, I'm pretty nervous. I try to tell myself this is just for training, but I haven't convinced myself. We'll see!

Get This Book

 
Here is the Barnes & Noble review of "Born to Run."



Filled with unforgettable characters who go fully against the cultural grain (a mysterious Mexican tribe of cliff dwellers who run hundreds of miles with ease, a cerebral former prizefighter who's become a hermit in the Mexican hills, a vegan ultra-serene ultramarathoner, two Beat-loving young guns who drink as hard as they run, a hilarious, Kramer-like renegade barefoot runner with logorrhea), Christopher McDougall's first book, Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen, ostensibly tells the tale of the seriously socially challenged and self-named Caballo Blanco (White Horse) and his attempts to put together a 50-mile running race between the elite members of the dwindling Taruhumara tribe and some of the best American practitioners of ultrarunning, a sport for those who for some reason want to go farther than the standard 26.2-mile marathon distance. But McDougall, a contributing editor for Men's Health and a writer-at-large for Runner's World, as well as an ultrarunner who competes in the eventual race, uses the occasion to convincingly overturn standard running ideas (you don't need those super-expensive, mega-cushioned shoes!), figure out just why our ancestors picked up their hands from the ground and started running upright, and back up the concept that Nike is to blame for every running injury in existence for the past two decades. Along the way, he shares the stories of his characters and the history of ultrarunning in such an entertaining and engaging fashion that at times you want to put the book down, kick off your shoes, head out the door, and just simply run. --Mark J. Miller


It's all true. Also, Scott Jurek and Ann Trason, two premier trail runners participated in the race with the Tarahumara Indians. http://www.scottjurek.com/ had their hands full with men in their 50's!  One Tarahumara man in his late 50's won the Leadville 100 trail race. http://www.leadvilletrail100.com/ 

El Blanco Cabballo, one of the heroes of Born to Run.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o375sYfPC3w

Keep Dreaming says the White Horse.

Read this book!!!