Crewing and Pacing at Leaville 100

Last year when my friend, Margaret, said she put her name on the napkin to run the Leadville 100 mile race I immediately asked her if I could crew or pace her. As an endurance junkie I have done some crazy things but never have I considered doing a 100 mile run, and a hard 100 mile run to boot. So, it sounded like it was going to be a lot of fun.
During the last year I’ve watched her preparing for the run, we’ve done several Ironman races together but her eye has always been on the prize, Leadville. Her runs have been totally outrageous; back to back long runs, runs up and down mountains, high mileage weeks and just plain hard runs, sometimes hitting 90 miles per week. I just can’t imagine doing some of the stuff she’s done, she’s totally hardcore.
During the course of the year I found out another friend, Brian, was also doing Leadville and I volunteered to help pace him. What the heck, I was going to be up there anyway! Brian is another one that has kept is eye on the prize and has done some outrageous amounts of running.

I arrived early at Leadville to help acclimate myself to the high altitude, the hotel is at over 10k feet and the race goes well above 12k feet. I decided to hike around Independence pass to speed up the acclimation process. It was gorgeous up there. I’ll be pacing “my runners” ( I love saying that) along the two highest passes, Hope and Sugarloaf passes, so hiking around Independence seemed like a really good idea. The first few miles were tough, the air is thin and the hills felt steep, but amazingly after a few miles I felt pretty normal.

Margaret threw a party at the Leadhouse (the Leadville version of the Ironhouse) she rented for her family and college friends. I got to meet a bunch of the Albuquerque runners that were running Leadville, some extremely experienced and some first timers. Lot’s of pasta and a lot of energy, two of my favorite things!

I had two 10ish mile legs to pace over plus what ever happened during the day. I was more nervous about pacing than I am about racing. Go figure. The night before the race I just couldn’t sleep and ended up taking an antihistamine around 12:30 to knock me out. I decided to sleep in and miss the start of the race because I wouldn’t be any good to anyone if I didn’t at least get some sleep. I’m still bummed that I missed the start of the race.
To be continued. ..

Ironman St George

Ironman St George is coming up fast, only about 18 days left! Training for this IM has been pretty tough. The weather hasn’t cooperated and my mental state just hasn’t put in the right frame of mind to train hard. But now that the tough training is done I’m getting excited for the race, go figure.

This IM I tried something a little different; Dread Pirate talked me into taking the spin class from hell, taught by Satan himself, not some underling demon, nope, the big wig. Actually Roy, the instructor, isn’t that bad but the class is pure torture. It’s a 2 hour time trial class where you are at maximum sustainable effort for the entire time, that is, when you aren’t at interval pace or taking a “pull” at the front. Zero recovery time. I’m totally drained after the class. It’s going to be interesting to see how things turn out. Oh, and set a new HR max the second week of the class.

I’m a bit concerned about my training because I’ve only done one 100 mile bike but a bunch of 75-85 mile rides with a run after the bike. I’m really hoping the monster spin class will make up for my lack of real riding.

My running has been “okay” nothing great, I’m hoping that I can ride the ultra marathon run fitness level through to IM. I’ve been getting in some decent running but nothing outstanding. I have been doing a good 3-4k swim before each run so hopefully that’s also going to help come race day.

I’ve really had to start swimming again and it’s felt pretty good, that is, until I tried on the wet suit, wow has it always been that tight? Guess I’ll be swimming in the wet suit from now until the race so I can get my shoulders and lungs used to the constriction.

I’ve decided to use my Road bike and put some aerobars on it. At first I was really skeptical about the set up but now that I’ve been riding it for a month or so it’s pretty nice, very stable and I feel good on it. The other big change to the bike is the addition of a compact crank, it should make spinning up the hills much easier. For a normal “ride” I wouldn’t need a compact crank but let’s not forget about the hilly marathon after the hilly ride.

Overall I don’t have any time goals for the race, just finish healthy and have a good time.

The things we do for fashion

Green dress run –the things we do for fashion:

Okay, I have to admit that I’ve been looking forward to the return of the Albuquerque Road runners Green dress run since the Outlaws were invited back in January, it sounded like a lot of fun.

It’s been a long time since I’ve run with the Roadrunners and I forgot how friendly and supportive they are, plus they put on a great handicap series. Many thanks for inviting us to run!


The course is a tough 4 miles in the foothills of Albuquerque, with a shot of Bailey’s Irish Cream just a little after mile marker 2 – at the top of a one mile assent. The shot, the race and the good time’s were all for free. The catch is that you have to run in a Green dress, and the dresses are free.

I arrived a bit late for the run so the selection of dresses was a bit short. Luckily the Dread Pirate was there to help & found a nice “flirty” dress for me. It kinda looked like a large Girl Scout uniform and the GeekGirl started making girlscout cookie jokes. Funny.

When I tried on the dress, to say it was snug would be an understatement, I could barely breath. DP said don’t worry you’ll be fine it’s just a sacrifice you’ll have to make for fashion- great.


Ready to go and I get hooked up with two really fast looking girls, they were down from Colorado to run in the USA indoor track & field championships and decided to do the race for fun. I managed to keep up with one of the girls but other one just took off like a bat out of hell, she put about a quarter mile on me by the 1 mile marker. Wow is she fast – must be nice to be 20 and in great shape! The other girl that I was able to keep up with was having wardrobe problems. Okay, keeping up really means I was following her, and I might throw in that there is something strangely alluring about running after a girl in dress, very distracting.

Before hitting mile two some of the other Colorado runners came zipping by me like I was standing still – wow those guys were good!

The run was really hard, not just because I couldn’t breathe (because the dress was so tight), but racing in the foot hills with the ups and downs, the loose gravel and the big assents is just plain hard.

Misty striking a great pose