Moving into day 2- a day off

To finish up yesterday's story, I made it to Atlantic, but only with a bunch of stops. Late in the day, I started to realize a few things:

• I had consumed a lot of liquids. If I am recalling correctly, I count up 8 20-ounce bottles of Gatorade, and 5 20-ounce bottles of water, as well as a few uncounted fill-ups of my 24-ounce water bottle.
  
• Despite this, I wasn't finding the need for bathroom stops. Not a good sign.
  

I considered waiting for the RAGBRAI sag bus to come by, and stopping for the day, but... I thought I was OK with frequent stops to cool down. During my stop at the library, when I wrote up that last post on the day, I did finally have some "output", so I decided that I just needed to be careful. I did quite a few stops the last few miles and finally arrived in camp. Grabbed a cold drink, got my bags, found a place to set up my tent, and got that all taken care of. This let me get out the stuff I needed and head for a shower- which helped tremendously. By the end of that shower, I actually had an appetite again. And it was just time for supper to be served. I felt like I was radiating heat standing in the sun for the food line. Pork Belly had this meal included with week-long service, and it was basic picnic fare- hamburgers, potato salad, cheesy potatoes, and mixed veg salad. Some decent lemonade topped it off, and I guzzled several glasses of that. As soon as I was done, I walked over to the information building and sat in the air conditioning for a while. I decided that I needed to take a day off- so I reserved my seat on the pork belly SAG bus. Eventually, I felt a little bit cooled off, and headed back to camp. Took the bike over to get it loaded for the SAG ride, and I headed to bed even before it was dark, and slept fairly well.
Up early, packed everything up, and got it all loaded onto the bus. I sat and watched the riders go by, beginning their day. The temperature had dropped and it was expected to be about 10 degrees cooler than the day before. I found myself both regretting my choice to ride and still knowing that it was the right thing to do. My body was pretty exhausted from yesterday's ride, and it was time to listen to it. The bus ride was nice and comfortable, and we arrived at our Caroll, Iowa campsite- at Swan Lake. It was a nice wooded area, and I got the tent set up and unpacked, then rode the bike about 7 miles into town. I'm thinking I'll head to a movie this afternoon. Relax. Keep cool. The right choice for now. Tomorrow, a much flatter route and more liquid earlier in the day. I'm getting excited already.

RAGBRAI Day 1- Glenwood to Atlantic

This year's route had two rough days at the start- both with over 4000 feet of climb. I wasn't sure how bad it would be, but it's been quite challenging so far. There is no flat ground. I'm about 46 miles into the day as I write this, and the whole day has been down a hill, then up another. None of the uphills are so short as to allow you to use your momentum. They are all long, grinding uphills. Had a nice breakfast at Chris Cakes, and kept stopping to grab more liquid, as the temperatures climbed past 100. I've found I've had to stop and rest several times, and with the stop for Mr. Pork Chop and Kelly's Pie, that means my overall average speed is well below 10 MPH- making it a long day. All those 4-5 MPH uphills in granny gear certainly slow things down. I'm in the library posting this for a little cool-down time in air conditioning. Nothing too terrible so far, just definitely much harder than any previous ride has been- just a long, slow grind. More later...

Arriving at RAGBRAI 2011

Arriving at RAGBRAI 2011
After a nice visit with my sister, who lives close to the start of RAGBRAI 2011, we headed on over to get checked in. I planned to go ahead and get set up and camp the night before, so I could work out all of my packing, get the bike ready, and get all of the week's options scheduled with Pork Belly Ventures, my charter service. That way, I get up the next morning, throw the bags on the baggage truck, get on the bike, and I'm off. It was a good plan.
Of course, the timing of our arrival at camp was just a little later than ideal. The buses bringing people from the Omaha airport, and from across the state, had just arrived ahead of us. That meant we had to unload at the bottom of the hill and carry everything up the hill to the tent area- and there were a bunch of people ahead of me in line for check-in. I got everything put down up in the general area, and then but it's still a pain to get through check-in.
After check-in, it started to look like a storm was going to blow in. I started working on getting the tent up, in a race with the nasty-looking weather blowing in from the west. Partially through with putting the tent up, I discovered that I had all of the tent- except the rain fly. Which, of course, means that all rain would go straight into the tent. I asked the Pork Belly people if they had anything that would help, and they rounded up a tarp and some rope. Of course, the tarp turned out to be a bit too small for the area that needed to be covered, and they didn't have a bigger one. I felt like I was attempting to solve an interesting 3-D geometry problem as I tried to cover the entire tent with a too-small tarp by turning it different ways, staking it different ways, aiming the coverage more towards the direction that the storm was coming from, etc. I once again appreciated my cub/boy scout experience that taught me several useful things- including the most useful knot I know, which allowed me to make adjustable tie-downs and tweak the tarp. Finally, I decided it wasn't perfect, but was the best I could do. I rearranged the luggage in the tent, to put it in the corners less likely to get wet, and waited for the storm. Then the sirens went off.
After a few moments of thinking, "well, that did a lot of good", I went and checked around. Apparently, an alarm that we didn't need to worry about- not the tornado siren I thought it was. The storm blew in, a very small amount of water got in the tent, and it blew right out again. No longer looked like a storm. All that trouble for a half-hour storm with not that much rain, though some impressive winds.
I debated about what to do to solve the problem long-term. In fact, I hadn't wanted to bring this tent, but the replacement I ordered for it didn't arrive at my house until after I had to leave. So, I could call and have my wife ship that to me- probably at about the cost of the tent. I could try to find a larger tarp, and just get by with that. Those seemed like the only viable options. So, off I went on my bike to explore town in search of tent repair materials.
First stop, the bike expo- not for the tenr, but just to see what was up. Most of the normal, expected stuff there, but it was good to see. Bought some gatorade from the local wrestling team booth, and asked them where I might buy a tarp. The hardware store, a short distance away downtown seemed viable- but turned out to have closed up. The other options was a bit farther, on the other side of town. A local discount store chain, Pamida, was the place. They had bigger tarps- much bigger. Those seemed too expensive and too big. They also turned out, however, to have a smaller version of the same tent I had ordered- the 2-person version, where I had ordered the 3-person one for more room. It even was on sale. About $20 more than the tarp- but a way better option. So, new tent it is- carried slung over one shoulder across town. It wasn't too bad- and it was every bit as good a tent as I hoped. I put it up, tore the other one down, and settled in for the night. It was very hot, and the sound from the downtown concert carried quite well out to the park that was our campsite. Somebody kept setting off fireworks. But, eventually,things settled down and I got off to sleep. Slept pretty well, and it didn't get around to raining though there was lightning in the sky every time I looked out. It seemed to pass to our north.
I did wake up about 5:30, and decided to go ahead and get going rather than try to get that last half hour before the 6:00 AM alarm I had set. Packing back up went quickly, and soon I was stocking up on Gatorade and starting out on day 1.

Here we go again

It's another year, and, as it turns out, another RAGBRAI. I really hadn't planned to do it again, but it turned out to be a route that was close to a tour of everywhere in Iowa that I know someone. So, you know, I had to ride this year. So, here I am on the way. This year has been a bit more rough than some times last year. I've had more of a struggle doing my training, either for the marathon or RAGBRAI. Last year, I set a goal of 1000 miles on the bike before RAGBRAI, and I came very close to that. This year, I was willing to go a little less in combination with the marathon training- but I went way less. I'm not sure I quite made it 400 miles. And, as I've previously mentioned, I haven't done as much marathon training as I had planned. Then, last weekend, the Tour De Burg came up, with the annual 25-50-75 mile bike tour routes. A couple of years ago, while I was still getting in shape, I went to do the 25-mile ride - and had a hard time making it. Last year, I had hoped to do the 75-mile ride but other events had me out of town that weekend. So, I really looked forward to doing the 75-mile ride this year. Took the bike out to IPro to get a few little things taken care of and have it ready for RAGBRAI as well. Got it back on Saturday, then rode down to the ride registration on Sunday. The chain started coming off, and jumping on every rotation. Upon inspection, I discovered that the front chain ring was missing several bolts, and so it hard warped when I pulled hard around a corner. After almost 1.5 hours, I finally moved a bolt from the inner chain ring to the outer, and off we went (without a working inner ring). I held up fine for the first 20 miles or so, until the hills came along. Not having the small ring in the front wore me out quite quickly, and I branched off to make the planned 75-mile ride into a 50-miler. I was worn out.
The next day, I went to play my weekly softball game. It went fairly easy for me, as I was involved in very few plays. I felt fine, but began to notice a little trouble near my right knee after the game. I iced it down, but it continued to get worse through the evening. It kept me up much of the night, and I worried that RAGBRAI was dead this year. However, it rapidly got better the next day. Tonight, Wednesday night, I can barely find where that sore spot is. It should be in good shape by Sunday. I'll force myself to take it easy the first two days of RAGBRAI, which both have most of a mile of vertical climb. Hopefully, that will be enough to keep it from becoming a big problem. We'll see.
I'm hoping to get a real-time map system going, with my phone's GPS posting tracking updates. I've got two possible ways to do it that I've tested- and neither is exactly what I wanted. As always, with another few weeks, I could have finished customizing it to be exactly what I want, but I ran out of time. Maybe I can get a little more done before the ride starts, but I'll mostly be visiting at my sister's.

So- Here's to having a good ride in a few days, staying healthy, and getting in better shape as I ride across Iowa.

One more down

Not a bad day, or a bad race- but not quite as good as I hoped. It was way too hot, even at 9AM, and that certainly didn't help. I had hoped to manage something very close to a flat 8-minute mile pace. I didn't really think I had any chance at the prize money, but basing the prizes on gun time instead of chip time was a little more motivation to start up front. I still got a little caught in the crowd behind some slower runners, but not nearly as badly as I had in a number of other races. The start went fairly well, and having Edwin C Moses Blvd to spread out across definitely helped ease the start-up crunch.
The first mile went well, and I managed the a reasonable pace- 8:39 or so. I had expected to go a little faster than that, but it was about what I could do just then. I was trying to hold back just a bit, and expected to pick up the pace each mile along the way. As it turned out, the best I could do was maintain about that pace. I kept playing games with the plan- where, exactly, would I start my "kick"? In the end, I couldn't really have done better. I worried if I was going to throw up most of the last quarter mile or so. Seems like I probably couldn't have done much more there, though I did manage a slight kick in the last 200m or so to the finish. My time put me in 21st place for my age division- out of 45 in my age bracket. On the other hand, to make top 5, I'd have to take 2.5 min/mile off my mile pace. Not sure that's doable- though that's about the pace I hit in the kick section.
So, end result- I'm pretty happy about this. I'd love to have had a little faster time, but I pulled off a time at approximately my personal 5K record, in the heat. It clearly wasn't my best day, and I still managed this time. Now, on to the marathon training... I'm behind, but I need to work on catching up.

New Challenges

edited a bit tonight, to fix all the typos, etc- from posting on the phone.
Well, here we go. Another summer season, and I have to figure out what to work on.
Running a marathon-check. I'm signed up for the Air Force Marathon in September. Already struggling with doing the training- I'm behind. RAGBRAI- little training done for this or anything, with all the rain and work and family stuff. But today, I can do one thing:run. The Lou Cox 5k, and try for a personal record. It's a fast field, with actual prize money to draw the best runners. Hope they can drag me to my best time. I just really want to feel like I've left it all out there. We'll see in about half an hour.
I'll let you know how it turns out. Here goes everything.

The plans for the summer...

So, activities for the summer:

• Train with my wife and run at least one 5K with her- preferably 3 or 4
• Ride RAGBRAI again- this year's route is like a tour of the towns that I have a connection to in Iowa, so it seems like I have to do it again
• I'm tired of thinking about running a Full Marathon and letting the "You're crazy" comments keep me from doing it. I'm registered for the Air Force marathon this coming September. Guess I better get started training for that
• Proving the "You're crazy" people's point, I'm toying with the idea that I might just barely be able to hit a Boston Qualifying time in that marathon. Since Boston is scheduled to keep getting harder to qualify for each year, I feel like it's now or never. Just not sure yet that I want it bad enough to work as hard as I would need to for that one- and not sure I can even manage it. Looks like I'd need to run the whole thing at an average pace just above 8 minutes/mile- which is currently slightly better than my 5K mile pace. Definitely not easy.
• Try out some other fitness options around- I'm somewhat interested in seeing if I'd like everything from Zumba to Kettlebell workout classes to some other Yoga classes.
• Maybe lose another 10-15 pounds (which will be difficult at this point, but should probably help with the Boston Qualifier craziness
• Make a road race plan for the summer with 5K and trail races to keep up the variety and see what's fun
• Really work on improving my sleep- that's the one part of overall fitness that I'm still not doing very well at. I know this is an important piece to making any of the rest of this work.
• And, oh, yes- update this blog much more often. At least every other week seems reasonable, and I think it will help me work out the issues that remain and keep on top of what I'm doing with this active, fit life.

We'll see how that shakes out, but that's the basic plan. That, along with personal life stuff and work stuff, sounds like an extremely busy summer. hope I can make it all work.