dirt dash

the dirt dash at hagg lake was the first bf race i did last year. so when registration opened for this year i had to sign up. since i saw some people with their dogs last year i decided to take mury with me. he could handle running 5.3 miles no problem. he's a tough little bastard. well, at least he can run a lot for such a little dog.

i got there a little later than i had wanted. i screwed around too much in the morning and decided i needed to clean my bathroom before i left. it did need it but i could have done it another time. so no warm up run and another pre race poop was in order. horrible thing was the toilet didn't flush. gross.

we lined up in the back. some guy asked me why i was running bf. i told him because it's fun and easier. then i noticed i didn't have my hr monitor on. crap. i though i packed it. i ran and checked my bag but i looked in the wrong pocket. i had it but didn't see it.

some other girls ran with a black lab. i passed them slowly on the start. i didn't mind starting so far back. last year when it broke onto the trail there was a pile up and we just walked the first little section downhill, too many people to run. this year way less people and way more mud. it was the wettest march in history.

mury struggled right away to keep up with me. the mud was deep. i watched him jumping through it. it came to his belly. he was not happy at all about running this. the previous saturday was his first race. he wasn't happy with either so i won't make him do anymore. he likes to run free and in this race he did. maybe it was the mud or the people, either way it was his last race.

i passed a lot of people and don't remember anyone passing me. last year i fell twice. this year i set an unbreakable record of six falls. yup. mud. this one guy i passed in vff's told me he fell twice. i told him i was at 4. he said i have to catch up. i told him he doesn't want my record and he agreed.

no other great moments here. just was a fun race to be back at. when it was over i went in the lake to rinse off and tried to get mury to follow. he got stuck in the grass and water. he wasn't happy about that. i wasn't too happy that after i got in the lake i noticed a water hose next to the bathroom where everyone was rinsing off. i took mury there. poor guy was shaking and cold. since they only had horribly cheap beer there we took off and spent the day with my mom.

there are some pics of us online on the xdog website but i'm to broke to buy those and post them here so see if you can find us if you're curious.

after the beginning. mury chasing me in the background.

he was even madder than this at the end.

i'm on that page and mury is on the following. if you look closely yo can see him far behind me. i went alone this year. had some fun but not an epic day.

foot traffic 5k

so this running shoe store opened up next to my work. cassie told me she was going to run the 5k so i thought i would join her. she didn't make it but mury and i did. i didn't get there as early as i hoped, i know it's a recurring theme with me.

i talked to the owner for a bit while mury followed his dog around. i was trying to walk around and warm up when the chef called me to come move my car. another person parked in the back wanted to leave. crap. i didn't think anyone would want to leave before all the festivities. i told him to grab my keys inside the pocket and move it. he did.

mury and i got near the starting line. i didn't really notice it was on the sidewalk. we were in the street and this pretty woman came over and started talking to me. i quickly checked. yup, huge rock on her hand. oh well. she wanted to know if i was running in my sandals and i told her i''m not sure. which i wasn't. it would be my third day in a row bf.

the owner started the race and called for all the fast people. he said basically if you're going to run 9m/m or below to go now so you don't run anyone over. i lined up. sadly we were behind a buch of young girls who weren't starting. i had to bust through them. i heard quite a few people yelling out that i was bf.

i stopped once to let mury do his thing. he kept up with me but i had to tugg can call him to keep him going. i saw the same woman passing me on the way back and she smiled. sadly i didn't see her at the store. when we finished mury refused to move. i let him off leash and started walking away. he followed me then but was just done with the leash.

we went to the store to check out the unveiling of big foot. the named him something like furberto salasquatch. don't quote me on that. i'm sure i got the first name right, not sure about the last name. it was a fun little race and i got faster. 2.5 minutes faster than the jingle bell 5k in december. that's quite and improvement. this maf training is paying off.

shamrock run

no more free home internet. that's right. i had free internet. no, i wasn't stealing. in order to steal you have to sneak and not want to be seen what you're taking. this was more of a gift. they had no lock on their wifi so i used it. was it nice? nah but it's over.

i ran the shamrock 15k with nick. we kept an easy pace going from the back. we got passed by everyone who was even further behind us. sad but i was trying to keep an easy pace and steadily speed up. nick was in some pain and didn't want to hurt himself more. we were fine with our slow pace. i wanted to start out well below my maf pace and just be over it into nearly race pace by the end. didn't work that way. i was in my maf zone when we crossed the starting line. nervous energy.

some guy at the start came behind me and said "dude, you're insane!". i just looked at him with a big smile and said "no, i'm crazy, you and everyone else here is insane running in those high heels." he got a confused look on his face. kind of like he didn't know if i was joking or he should punch me. lucky for both he just took off running faster. don't make smart ass comments if you can't play.

maybe about mile two nick had to stop for a business call. he didn't take them all before the race so we stopped at some coffee shop on Broadway. we weren't the only ones either. we ran through the pearl district before that and some bystander yelled at me " you're going to catch a cold!" i yelled back "so because you wear shoes you don't get sick?" he just laughed.

as we left the coffee shop the road had some incline. i told nick he sped up. he looked at me confused and said "no, you slowed down." damn. my ruse didn't work. i am slow uphill. very slow. since we kept a slow pace i decided to keep up with him. it paid off.

we went into the hills and were passing everyone. we passed a girl who sped up to talk to us. she told us she just spent $150 on some new shoes and here we were passing her bf and in huaraches. she wasn't happy. stupid us didn't give her details to join the brs.

nick had told me he had planned to speed up on the downhill and leave me behind. i just smiled. when we started downhill he couldn't keep up with me. i called for him to speed up and he just smiled. i love running downhill. it's the only time i can truly run fast. i let go a bit. my hr never got above 180. i could've gone faster a few times. i passed MANY people. one girl had a nice ass. i almost slowed down just to watch but kept on going. i gave one girl the thumbs up who was wearing some vff's. she was struggling. i hope my little bit of encouragement helped her.

at the finish line was the same thing. everyone standing right there instead of getting the hell out of the way. why is that? don't you know people are coming in and some are coming in fast? move. i did see Jesus at the finish. i asked him why was he wearing some Nike's. disappointing.

i waited on the side for nick. we never met up with Cassie, Dan, Jen, and Kevin. nick got to my place a little late and i parked too far away. i thought i picked a good meeting spot but where nick and i came from it was closer to the start then the other peeps were. i called them to meet us there but with 32,000 people we never met until the end. we saw Dan at the bag drop just freezing. it had rained lightly and Jen had dropped his clothes. bad move. i make sure to drop mine since everyone comes in at different times. i barely recognized Dan until he stared at me and smiled. see.

post race with fellow brs'ers

 OK, i can't rotate that pic. sorry but i'm just not that tech savvy. i painted my toenails green for this race. Jen made us tutu's but we didn't meet her so sadly i didn't get to race in a gloriously ridiculous outfit.

after drinking countless beers, they always find a way into my hands from strangers and me just grabbing them. we took off for some lunch. one reason i like to park far from the race is to have time to sober up while walking. it helps. what didn't help this time was seeing these two girls telling us this story that they got robbed while looking for a place to park before the race. some bum reached into the car. he was moving around so much they didn't notice him reach in to the back and take their purses. no racing, no purse, no charges. they had such a fun morning. i pet the girls dog in the beer garden because he was big with a Mohawk. I've never seen that before. i offered to buy them lunch. of course nothing came of it but a good conversation. well, at least i had some fun.

crunch time

i have two finals next week with two research papers due. so of course it's more important for me to surf and blog. :) i will be studying my o chem here in a little bit and hopefully do some practice writing for my world religions class. thankfully o chem test is tuesday and WR on wednesday.

i have a list from o chem on what i should be studying. it's helping. what is harder is the research i need to do for my lab report due wednesday. anyone want to look up stuff on sunscreen for me? OMC if that helps.

for WR she gave us a list of questions that we will have to answer during class in essay form. not too hard as  we can use our book and notes. i need to do some practice writing, which i can bring but have to turn in something i've written during class. i have to clean up a research paper i wrote and write another 2-3 pages on a religion my group made up during class last week. not too difficult for me. if you didn't notice i can write a lot of BS.

RACE DAY tomorrow. first race of the year!!! yeah! get some!

i'm getting excited if you couldn't tell. i'm doing the shamrock run with my friends, both shoddies and bfr's. well, one will be in huaraches and a girl i work with will be in shoes. pearl izumis i believe. pretty but too stiff for my tastes. this girl is faster than me. lets see what happens tomorrow though. my friend in huaraches is only wearing them because of some strange heel pain he's going through. he can't figure it out and wants to play it safe. he signed up for this race last year and had to miss it. both of them haven't been running well lately and plan to keep at my slow pace.

so my plan to race is to start out slow. do the first mile well below my maf pace and pick it up every mile. this course has 5 miles uphill followed by 3 down. i should be at the peak of my maf pace for the last uphill mile which is great. i love to let loose downhill and with 3 miles i should be passing everyone who passed me.

i picked up Maffetone's new book from the library the other day, "The big book of and fitness". i've only read a little as i've been trying to study more. from what i quickly gleaned, i need to start running harder at least once a week. it's time. so tomorrow i will finish the race above my maf pace and we'll see how hard i actually go.

a few other friends will be there and i know a few will be bf. at least two are doing the 8k and i know one is doing the 15k. i'm assuming another will do the 15k as he says he running to the race from his house, which isn't too far from the uphill portion of the course! must be doing some marathon training. dan, i won't be able to keep up with, still. pretty sure of that. maybe another year or two and i'll get closer to him but it's still too soon. jen has made some green tutus for everyone to wear. she's doing the 8k bf. proud of her. she's getting faster.

i just wish i could bring my dog mury. i can hear the little bastard snoring away right now on his favorite chair. he and the little girl are always fighting over it. he either jumps on her to sit on the back or sits next to her. kids.

so for today's agenda is get to some homework. take mury to the park while i work out, come home and hit the heavy bag. it's 7am now so i should be courteous and wait til 8am at least. more homework. lunch with friends. packet pick up, more homework and then off to work. the good thing about lunch is i will be with two of my best friends. the bad is they want to go to claim jumper. crap. i don't like corporate food. frozen and packaged crap so it tastes them same at every location. corporations are worried about making money, not quality. oh well, i'll live.

then tomorrow, race baby where i can freak out some 32,000 people in the rain/snow and some sun followed by at least one free beer, ha, free.

teenagers and sports

i now have a teenage girl living with me. this girl is not my biological offspring but she does have my heart and i have raised her since she was a baby. by all means to me she is my child. my daughter is her older sister. they share the same blood, come from the same mother, and are only a year and a half apart. my brother and i are two years apart. he was the most important person to me growing up. we have drifted apart over the years. he won't talk on the phone. when i visited him in september we talked a little but he didn't want to hang out and do things. it saddens me but that's how life is working out. i don't want these girls to grow apart so i treat this one as my own and will even watch their little sisters from time to time. that and i was raised by someone who wasn't my biological father who still considers me his son is the reason i'm passing on love to these girls. it takes little time and money but the rewards i've gotten are huge.

if you like kids you know what i mean. that is until those girls grow up to be teenagers. oh my god. i knew women were hard to handle but raising a teenage girl, crap. you guys who don't have girls have no idea how much easier it is with boys. they say you have a boy you worry about that one boy. you have a girl you worry about all the boys.

that's not what this post is about. this one moved in with me three weeks ago now. she agreed to my terms about chores before moving in. now when i tell her to do something i get a lot of lip. expected, then she does it, somewhat. she hasn't done a good job cleaning. i can handle that. i wouldn't have done a good job at that age either.

she wanted to go to this school that i live next to. she went there last year and had lots of friends. her family moved sometime last year so her mother would drop them off here and i would take them home so they could finish out the year. she started the new school and had no problems. then dun dun dun! problem. she was getting bullied by the popular girl who wrote her a horrible note threatening her and even stole her ipod.

she seems to be much happier here. she has her own room and can freely move around the place without one of two of her little sisters following her. her mother tells me she seems a bit different. i thought she would as being a middle child she hasn't had much one on one time with her parents. yes, her father is around but like a lot of people he got himself in trouble and he has two other kids with two women, one of whom he lives with. he stretched himself without being prepared and hasn't given this one the time a child requires.

i'm enjoying the company. yes, she can be a bit of a pain in the ass. thats a teenager. her mom questioned my sanity for taking her blaming her for most of her fights with her husband. he won't discipline or she won't listen to him. she goes home three nights a week while i work. on sunday i took my oldest and her younger sister out and this one didn't want to come along. she stayed with her mom and baby sister instead. i hope i'm not confusing anyone too much as i don't really want to name the girls now aside from my oldest, this one, the younger one, and the baby.

now to sports. the girls, the older ones, are both talented athletically. this one was in dance class last year and did really good. she was pulled out because of her bad attitude and grades i believe. i want to put her back in. she want's to go do gymnastics now at the rec center close by. i keep forgetting to take her.

the oldest is a fast runner. i mean fast. she is incredible. i never knew to run on your forefoot until i saw her run. she looks like haile gebrselassie. her arms pump in front with her legs turning like wheels with her feet flying up to her butt. she is amazing to watch. a few years ago she wanted to do track because she lost a race to a boy at school. prior she was the fastest kid, always. this boy did track and beat her. so the following spring i went to go sign her up and she changed her mind.

this winter she tells me her friend wants to sign up and i am extremely excited. she doesn't do it. we talked about it sunday and she said next year. i'm trying to tell her do it now, don't wait. she doesn't live with me so i can't push her into it. her mom doesn't care much if she does or doesn't. i do.

my daughter keeps throwing up excuses about time, money, and whatever else to stop her from doing it. she sounds as negative as her mom. i wish she would live with me so i could try to open her up. i tried to take the girls shopping last year to get some shoes for hiking or running. they didn't like the options i gave them. new balance or merrell. well now merrell is giving away these women's pace glove and i want an extra entry. you too can get one by posting in your blog, if your lame enough to have one, or posting on facebook and by commenting on this blog. http://www.runningandrambling.com/2012/03/merrell-barefoot-pace-glove-review-and.html


good luck and thanks for reading.

third maf test

yesterday, saturday 3/3, i went out for my third maf test. i took a water bottle and mury's make shift water bowl. last time we went to the track he followed me around and around. i saw him looking for water and with it being winter they had the fountains off. i had tied him up so he wouldn't chase me anymore. all that did was drive him crazy and bark every time i got far away. i didn't want to go through either event this time.

 after the thursday night run with Jason Robillard i thought i blew my maf training. so i was surprised that i saw a drop in my times. a big drop. i ran 4 miles in 48 minutes compared to 52 last time. and average pace of 12:05 compared to 12:30. that's a big drop in a month! i saw the drop come a week ago. the day i went to the dentist for an emergency exam i went for a run and noticed my time dropped even with me hurting my achilles. i will blame that on the nsaids i was on.

mury the little shiznit head, was harassing the three other runners out there. one guy complained and i told him to just give him a little kick. the dog wants to play but when he gets that close just take a little swing towards him and he'll run away. i was almost done by then so i just kept going. no stopping this time. i felt good and my foot didn't go numb. only my mind did. i don't know how people can get excited to go run on a track. at least those three didn't look excited to be there.

with this progress i'm definitely going to run the shamrock 15k at my maf pace. i'll still blow away close to half the competition.

i met Jason Robillard

who the hell is that, right? well i take it if you're reading this blog then you know. it's not like this is a popular blog where some joe six pack will stop by for a read of the bf idiot's blog. just in case a little back ground.

i first found bf ted's forum through google. they had a few guys there who dominate every thread. some good guys who are well educated that seek and share all relevant information to running and being bf. Jason was one of those guys. i later found the BRS where he was a founding member. he was a high school teacher at the time.

he wrote a book about how to run bf. sells it on amazon. he later made a second edition and gave it away as a digital copy. i have one. good read. he was now sold the rights to a big publisher and is working on a rewrite. in this time he also got a gig to make a video and work with merrell in the production of their new "barefoot shoe" line. ya, i know, it's an oxymoron but if you're like i was as a newbie you didn't know what else to call them but bf shoes. now i know.

anyway after producing some videos he went and did clinics. from there he and his wife shelly,http://shoelessshelbell.blogspot.com/, sold everything and now live on the road with their kids and niece. you can read about their adventures here, http://robillardadventures.com/. he previously started this little blog where you can read more about him through his own words. http://barefootrunninguniversity.com/

ok that's more than enough background. he's a very small time running celebrity. he just did a tour of the NW so i went out to meet and run with him. met him at the awesome store foot traffic. ofhttp://www.foottraffic.us/about_us.php. nice people there who put on a run every thursday followed by some beer drinking in store. if that's not enough everyone goes to rogue brewery for guess what? more beer drinking.

i walked in with nick, both of us in our luna sandals. i introduced myself to Jason right away. we corresponded a little on FB. i told him there would be a few hundred people there. i think i stressed him out over nothing because i was thinking of some other stores first thursday run. woops. anyways there were two other guys there in huaraches and one more showed up. Jason was wishing he brought his but he didn't and was wearing flip flops. perhaps he doesn't know podiatrists warn against those things.

one guy Chris is a lurker on the BRS. another guy is lomad on forums, Tim in real life. the third guy makes and sells his own huaraches. Brancas, http://www.runbranca.com/. his name is Brant. we talked a little and he left before i got his contact info. he's at the Chiro school where i'll be going next year so i hope to track him down here soon. i may have to get some of his sandals next as i tried his on and they were comfy.

Daniel showed up with his huaraches in his hand. i stored them in my bag in the back room and after a quick ABC tutorial we were off. A is for alignment, B is for balance, and C is for cadence. well i tried to set my watch as i wanted to stick to my maf pace. we got to the waterfront and everyone was already going up the bridge before my watch got satellite reception. there were us bf'rs and minimalists as well as a few shoddies who ran. i took off at a 180 bpm, slightly above my maf. when i got on the bridge i could see almost everyone running down the path. i picked up my pace and kept it up until i caught up to Tim. we ran together a few hundred yards before he turned around. he's having some trouble lately.

when i got on the path i saw Jason coming back with Nick, Dan, Chris, and Brant. i stuck out my thumb to hitch a ride back with them. talked with Jason and the other guys as i led them back. Jason says my stride is a little long. hmm. i thought it was supposed to open up as you go faster. he takes really short quick steps. i was surprised. i should've said something. maybe that's why my feet have been hurting me more and more lately. he's also not as big as his pics made him look. i wonder if he lost some weight from his earlier pics. they made him look taller and bigger .

so back at the store we drink, talk, and get free water bottles from merrell. thanks guys. there's talk of going to rogue brewery for some more beer. Nick has time so we go. i was wanting a burger. we got there and found everyone in the back of the bar occupying three tables. Nick and i sat in the back table that was full of everyone's crap. Jason was seated with the others but joined us. it was cool. i enjoyed our conversation until some of the young girls joined us. i had to talk to them especially since i like Kelly. she's a cute little thing that works at the store. Laura had her bday, she's six, legally that is. 24 in real time. ya, leap year baby. i think i met another girl but i don't remember her name and then another cute little girl sat with us but i didn't ask her name.

at 9:15 i pointed the time to Nick. he felt he should be home by 9:30 to not get the boss mad. i didn't want him in trouble but he was having a good time and like any kid he pushed his luck because understandably he didn't want to leave. neither did i but i had to get home and get the little girl to bed since she had school in the morning. she kept texting me to pick her up later and later. i showed up by ten to get her.

here are some pics from Nick's wonderful phone. his is printed without his written consent. hey, you sent them to me so too bad. these just prove my point i need to get my own real camera as the quality sucks. especially the ones Nick took.

 me n Jason

Nick with Jason

one day i may learn how to put captions to each photo. Jason is a cool guy and i'm glad i was able to meet him. i overheard him talking with the merrell rep about bringing him back out here perhaps in october or november. that'd be cool.