Listen To Your Body

Listen to your body, lesson learned. After my rough falls at the Nueces 50 mile I didn't want to loose my fitness, I felt I was still in great shape. I took five days off from running but when I headed out to get in some easy runs I still felt banged up. I chalked it up to just being sore. I jumped right back into training and put in a 95 mile week one week out. I struggled with several of the runs but wanted to be ready for the Indiana 100 mile. All this did is aggravate my IT band and force me to drop from Indiana 100, booo. I took an easy week of cross training, foam roller, and rest. I am running again this week but easing back into the mileage. I've had some pretty good runs but am keeping them short(4-10 miles) for the next week or so. I've been stretching and introduced strength training into my routine. I believe I got caught up in the mileage game and wasn't focusing on quality and listening to my body. I believe for me if I stay around 80 miles per week and focus on quality workouts I stay injury free and feel faster. Thanks to Fluid I have hydration and recovery mixes that I believe really work. UltrAspire allows me to have great products for my training and racing. I am also teaming up with Team RWB to help support out veteran's. My new focus will be the USATF 100 National Championship July 27th, Burning River 100. I'm going to do several local races in my build up to the 100. I had to learn the hard way to listen to my body but I feel I will be a stronger faster runner because now that I have refocused my training.

Nueces Race report

Driving from San Antonio to Camp Eagle it was hard not to notice the hills in "Hill Country". I knew before heading to Texas that I was going to be on bigger hills than anything we have in Michigan. What I wasn't prepared for was the rocky footing there. Camp Eagle is on a 1400 acre reserve miles from any city. The area was absolutely beautiful! We arrived Friday night with the race starting Saturday morning at 6am. I had the opportunity to mingle a little and chat with Paul Terranova, cool dude. We started the race in the dark and at a quick pace considering the terrain. At around the 3 mile mark I tripped and fell on my hands and elbows, I blamed it on the dark. The sun came up after about an hour and I thought I'd be fine with the footing in the sun. I was running with Jason Bryant, Cody Moat, David Brown, and at about 10 miles Brian Rusiecki caught up with us, I fell again shortly after. Paul went off by himself from the gun and was moving at a good pace. Brain dropped back a little and Jason, Cody, Brian and I came through the first lap in 2:05, the course record was 6:28. A quick refuel and we were off  on the second loop. I fell...again, and it was starting to take a toll on my right knee and hip. The four of us stayed fairly close on this lap as well still running strong. I felt like I could keep moving pretty strong but wanted to take it a little easier on the big hills this lap. My final fall I didn't catch myself at all landing on my right knee and hip and doing a full summer salt on the rocks, ouch. I came through the second lap in 4:19 with Brian, Jason and Cody had 3 minutes on us. My knee and hip were hurting but I was still on a great pace. I started the third loop and got to a smaller climb and my hip just wouldn't let me climb. It was a tough decision but I decided to pack it in. That is my first ever DNF and it was bitter sweet. I had a great experience and ran great for a 50k. I feel I was/am in great shape but wasn't prepared for how technical the course was. My Garmin had about 3000 ft of gain and loss in the 34 miles I covered. I feel like I could have easily set a PR (6:24) on a less technical course. I'm happy I had the opportunity to race with some great guys and roll over my fitness for the Indiana Trail 100 in about six weeks. During the race I wore my Montrail Mountain Masocist which worked very well on the rocks. I also wore my UltrAspire Cell and Twitch combination. I was very comfortable and I think the Cell is the perfect amount of storage for a long race. Thanks UltrAspire. I ran this morning and will again this afternoon, eager to redeem myself. See ya on the trails!