Update

I'm going to try some light jogging on the treadmill after work today. Fingers crossed, toes crossed, eyes crossed, etc. that my tendon cooperates. I'm actually quite nervous. I've been RICE-ing the thing religiously and haven't run in nine days. (ACK!) If it isn't feeling better today it will definitely be time to visit Dr. Awesome, aka my chiropractor. I emailed my GP (aka Dr. Useless) last week and he was (one guess) useless. I'm trying very hard to keep perspective and not freak out about skipping all these runs, but man it's hard.

I had been semi-planning on doing the Autumn Leaves 50k after Timberline. If I can start running easy again after today I might stick to that plan. But if not it seems wise to take it off the table. In any case I'll be planning a hiatus from racing for a while after this fall. (Famous last words, right?) I enjoy running, but I hate feeling nervous and fail-y when I have to skip runs, even for a good reason. It's extra stress I really don't need in my life. It's nice to have a running goal, but when it starts causing more misery than motivation its time to reevaluate.

Catch ya later

Hard to be upset when the forecast looks like that. I'm off to have fun!

GODDAMIT

I have some mild tendonitis in my right Achilles. Sigh. Whatever was bothering my calf has migrated south. I have a feeling it was the addition of speedwork into my routine, but regardless of the reason it both sucks and blows. God bless the internets for allowing me to do some dubious scientific research and figure out that the worst thing to do would be to run on it. So I gritted my teeth and skipped yesterday's run. Instead I rode the stationary bike at the gym for an hour and was rewarded with a terribly sore ass this morning.

Now I have to figure out what to do with myself tomorrow. Here’s the thing:
I need I'm supposed to run 20 this weekend. I know that it won't kill me to not run twenty. In fact, in the grand scheme of things I know that never being able to run again wouldn’t kill me (though it might make me get fat, which is, of course, a fate worse than death). I know that I have to be smart here, and not aggravate the tendonitis and make it a true problem. I'd like to try running, but I'm afraid I'd have to stop right away, meaning I don't want to drive all the way down to Champoeg only to turn right around. But I don't want to try and run on like, asphalt either – not real forgiving. I could always run on the track, but can you imagine? 80 laps?? Good lord. But sadly, that might be the best option. It's close to home, flat, and forgiving. Of course, really…really I should probably not run at all. (AAAAARRRRRGGGHHHHNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOO) The tendon is feeling a lot better, a lot less tender to the pinch test. But still tender. Really, I should take the weekend off. I should. Really. Just not run this weekend. Just not run. I shouldn't run.


...My god, I'm a total addict.

Zigzag Mountain trail run

Another gorgeous trail run. I headed due east out of town this time, heading straight toward the mountain. About a mile off Highway 26 I found the trailhead and got started. I had planned a 20-mile loop, and was carrying LOTS of water and food in my pack. I didn't know how far I would actually get, though, since I had 4th of July plans and needed to get back to my car by three-ish.

The trail started with an extended series of switchbacks - snooze. Also, wheeze. The first five miles (all switchbacks) gained about 4500' in elevation. I ran about 40% of this section. After the switchbacks the trail opened up a little bit. I was still in the trees, crossing back and forth over the top of the ridge. Above about 3000' the rhododendrons were still blooming:

I finally cleared the trees and got a great view to the southwest. There were all sorts of wildflowers out once the trees thinned. I also got to the top of a ridge and saw this great rock formation. It's hard to tell from this angle, but if you were to get closer to the edge you could look straight down several thousand feet - the area I was standing on was an overhang. Needless to say, I stayed well back. I crossed around to the north side again and got a great view of three other Cascade peaks. They don't show well in the photo, but L-R it's St. Helens, Rainier, and Adams. At this point I knew that I must be getting pretty close to Mt. Hood and would have an amazing view. But the trail was basically pointing right at the summit, so as long as I was climbing and crossing the ridge I wouldn't get a view. Ho hum. I kept running, dropping down a bit along the north side. Finally I could see a break in the trees up ahead:

Hello there! Let's go in the for the close-up.

Ahhh. Pay dirt. I kept going another couple of miles, until it was time to turn around. Didn't make it to the loop, so I made it an out-and-back, taking a few more pictures of wildflowers on the way.

I had about five and a half hours to spend trail running. The switchbacks had eaten up a lot of time heading up, but I hoped to make it up going back down. I started running at 9:15, turned around at noon, and made it back to the car at 2:03. So what took me 2:45 to climb up, took 2:03 to climb down (and that included two potty breaks - I was well-hydrated this time). I could've continued running for another few miles and still made it back by 3. Good to know - next time I'll have a better understanding of how much faster the downhills can be. Oh, and just because trail running is easier on the body doesn't mean that 5 miles of downhill switchbacks are "easy". My quads were cooperative but unhappy. Good practice, though, since Timberline loses 3000' of elevation along the course.

Of course, the requisite dirty foot shot:

Rockin'.

*

Despite last weekend's near-tragedy, I've been having a lot of fun with this training. It's really nice to look forward to a long run itself - not "getting it done" or putting in the distance, but the actual experience of running. And since trail running forces you to use all sorts of different muscles and take breaks for downed trees, bad footing, steep bits, etc., I haven't been nearly as sore. I've kind of fallen back in love with running, after being totally sick of it near the end of training for Newport. Hurrah!

Twin Lakes: Interrupted; or How I Nearly Became a Darwin-Award Nominee

Yeah. The scoreboard of Saturday's trail run would read: Trails 1, Becca 0 (although I didn't actually die, so maybe it would be a tie instead). Basically, through my own stupidity I almost got in real trouble. And I didn't even get to see a single lake, let alone Twins! Here's what happened:
Good friend and running buddy Tina got to my house around 7:45. We took off south toward Bull of the Woods wilderness area in Mt. Hood National Forest. I will definitely be heading back there this summer – the drive from my house to the ranger station was easy and gorgeous. Classic Oregon brochure scenery: the rushing, rocky Clackamas river surrounded by steep, green mountain walls; and every time we crested a ridge there were views of dozens of green foothills fading into the horizon. And that was just the drive! I was excited.

Trying to find the Whetstone Mountain trailhead (above) was an adventure. We got on unpaved FR 7020 and drove….and drove…and drove. At one point we saw relatively fresh horse manure and figured we must be close to the trail, only to turn a corner and see a wild horse – seriously! It was a bit creepy really, and I kept expecting it to crash out of the brush in front of my car. Mount Hood isn't know for its wild horses, so we asked the rangers on the way out what the scoop was. Apparently, horses escape from local towns every now and then and make their way up into the mountains. They were very interested in our report and had us locate on the map approximately where we saw it.

Rhododendrons

Eventually we found the trailhead, about half an hour later than planned. Tina is a bit slower than I am, and she was only planning on 12 miles while I wanted to make 16, so I got started before her. At first I tried to jog up at least part of the uphills, knowing full well I wouldn't be running up all of them at 4500'-6000' of elevation. I ran all the flats and downhills unless the footing was uncertain. I'd guesstimate that I ran about 75% of the length of the trail, which translated to about 60% of the time I spent on the trail, as the lengths I had to walk obviously took a lot longer to get through.

The trail was overgrown in parts

The weather was perfect, although I was surprised how hot it was given our elevation. High seventies or 80 degrees, I'd guess. I was drinking water responsibly, and was thirstier than I'd expected. That, unfortunately, was the problem. Normally when I'm running 16 miles I would fill all four bottles of my fuel belt, totaling 32 ounces, and that would be sufficient. But if I was planning to hike 16 miles, I would have brought at least 64 ounces of water. I don't know why I thought the lesser amount would suffice, but I left the car with only about 40 ounces of water. And I didn't pay close attention to how much water I had left until I turned around and realized that I had to run all the way back with about 12 ounces of water. I immediately realized what a stupid decision I had made and hurried to try and catch up with Tina, who had turned around earlier than me.

Lots of nice views of the lumpy, slightly homlier side of Mt. Hood

Well, long story short(er), I managed to crawl back to the car, but only because I swallowed my pride (or it evaporated out of me) and begged water off another lady on the trail. If I hadn't passed her, I am sure that I would have either given in and drunk from the next stream I passed (in which case I'd probably still be huddled close to a toilet somewhere) or lost my mind and done something dangerous.

The sky was so blue it seemed almost purple - the camera didn't get it

Could I have died? Hiking or trail running always carries risks, of course. Probably not of dehydration in this case, as Tina would have come to find me eventually. But I had gotten to the point that I wasn't thinking clearly, increasing the likelihood that I would do something terminally dumb. Plus, I spent the entire second half of the run preoccupied with how dehydrated I was getting, rather than enjoying being out in nature. I'm just very angry at myself – I like to think I'm a pretty smart cookie but you wouldn't know it from this. Anyway, I made it back to the car, slowly drank a ton of water, and went to bed at 7:30. I could not make myself eat that night, so I was famished the next morning and promptly ate everything in site, washed down with about 100 ounces of Propel. After that I felt pretty much fine. I consider it a lesson very well learned.

Dirty and scratched up and happy to be alive!

Oh, and why didn't I see the Twin Lakes? I missed the marker. Tina did too, so I don't feel bad about it. :-)