Battle of Fort Langley

Quick trip out to Fort Langley this morning for one of the Fraser Valley trail series xc runs put on by Peninsula Road Runners.

This one was at Derby Reach park....photo at left except gray and rainy'ish and a bit chilly.

We were a little close to the start arriving in a packed parking lot with 10 minutes to spare ...luckily a lot of other non-punctual types like me so we were good for about another 10 minutes ... enough to register and then run to the start about a km away ... weird..

I ran with DK ... think a really fast Pippy Longstocking (she even had pink knee-highs) and you've got it .... pic isn't real but pretty close! Nearly got my ass kicked by her ... only 1 minute behind and first girl overall.

The course was mostly flat and fast (not great for hill runners like me) but nice trails. Guy at the start mentioned a hill we were to run up twice, called the "Big Nasty." Every little rise we came to i'd blurt out to the runners around me ... "is this it? is this Big Nasty?!" No takers ... very serious runners... Anyway, Big Nasty was a bit nasty but i was glad to have it so i could stay up ahead of some of the flatlander runners.

Last 2k was just holding on and hoping not to get passed by anyone ...especially Pippi. 10k is far for an xc and i'd put an hour twenty on my legs the day before... (nice... snuck in my sandbagging comment...). Ended up 5th though i think .... overall! :) ..Correction....3rd!!!! see results!

Although I'm not so sure about the current shake-out on the list because they have Pippi as being 75th in the 5k race =D ... when i'm sure she was about a minute back of me in 4th or 5th place in the 10k and 1st chick overall =D ...hmmm...

Barely had my breath back before Pippi crossed the line. We got our massive, crinkly, shiny scotiabank space blankets, a couple of miniature peanut butter ritzes and then made a dash for great little coffee shop/bakery in Fort Langley for the really important part of why we were out there.

Nice that i get to be one up on mr Tom for a race effort since he was away skiing, sitting on chairlifts, gorging himself on fatty resort food and generally loafing about ;)

Not secret training though! It's out in the open. Thanks for the push Pippi ... I only beat you because I was trying to get away from those shocking shoes!

Nice out..

So nice to step off the plane this morning into this gorgeous day. After the brown/white treeless sprawl of Calgary's suburban nightmare, I felt like I had been granted a pass from Erebus (the not so nice part of Hades) to the Elysian fields. Frosty air, the colour green and clear, white peaks. I sat on the Canada line and just took it all in.

By 11:30 I was on the trails in Lynn Valley. Amazing what a few days away will do for your appreciation of this place. I forgot to take my gloves so my fingers were a little numb trying to snap pics of things I wouldn't normally bother with. I just felt so invigorated! I snap my fingers at the cold! ...er..ok well I would if I could feel them that is..

Perfect trail running weather. You can't beat it. I was running with a smile much of the way and a nod from the old man with white beard and red flannel shirt, hiking in the opposite direction, told me he was having the same experience. Yah, you know what I'm talkin' about Santa! Come to think of it, he did have a bit of a twinkle in his eye...

Good to be back. Looking forward to more of this weather for the Crescent Park xc run on New Year's day. Hope to see some of you out there. Since you're up in the Arm of the Salmon, Tom, can I have your post race pizza slice?

Not expecting miracles against the trackies and a little sore anyway from following Curb's gym program he put together for me. Thankfully it gets me in and out of there pretty quick. Pretty soon I'll just need a hat and a pipe and I'll be lookin' like Popeye! :p

On a side note... I often get asked what I looked like with hair. So, since I was visiting family, I dug up some photos. Had to go a loooong way back to the days of film! Here I am circa 20 years ago. Oh, to have back our youth, non?! ; )

Hare and Hounds #2

Date: Saturday, December 11th
Time: 9:15am
Place: Starts by John Henry Bike store on East 5th Ave, North Van. Turn north onto Brooksbank Avenue and go to E 5th St and turn right. You're there. (It's basically opposite to the Park and Tilford shopping area. You can park your car in there or try on E 5th if there's room). See map.

Distance of the Chase: just over 11.5km
Course: See maps below in the description section
To Bring: 3 quarters (I'll explain at the start. No, it isn't coffee money for me)

This will be a fast out and back course with a little loop at the top. Most of the trail follows Lynn Canyon from John Henry to the Gazebo at the top of Lilloet Rd and back. Start/Finish is also a short walk to JJ Bean for coffee after!

The mostly out and back means there is less risk of people going off course and the opportunity to perhaps see your pursuers/quarry to keep the excitement level up. (Thanks to Tom for that idea.)

For a description of what a Hare and Hounds run is look at the posting on my blog about the first Hare and Hounds (basically below this one).

Course Description:
There is a gravel path by the river just east of John Henry Bike store. The start and finish is there.

Starting out you run north along this gravel path following the river underneath Hwy 1 and continue for another kilometre up to a footbridge over the river. Turning right, you cross this bridge and turn immediately left after crossing, onto a broad gravel path.

You continue north on this along the river bank. After about 800m the path narrows into a dirt trail that takes you into the forest and the start of a long steady climb through the canyon. Just stay on the trail. There is nowhere to go wrong ... (Princess...!).

About 3.5km out from the start this trail then meets the Baden Powell trail at a junction. Stay left and descend down a steep, technical hill (Girl Hill) to a boardwalk at the bottom. It's flat for a bit then climbs some stairs again and goes to a bridge (not suspension bridge). Stay right and follow the trail on the East side of the Canyon (which you have been on since crossing the footbridge near the start). The trail goes up more stairs and little climbs and takes you to the junction for the Suspension Bridge. Turn left and go towards the Suspension bridge but don't cross it (....Princess!..). Stay right at the Suspension Bridge and this will take you down to the Ten Foot pool and the start of a big stair climb. At the top of the stairs stay left and follow the gravel trail out to the pipe bridge. Don't cross this bridge. Instead turn right and go up the gravel path until you can see the Gazebo structure. Turn hard right again though before you get to it, onto another gravel trail that loops you back to the Suspension Bridge junction.

Once there you now just return by the same route you came out on. Easy! Then it's coffee time! :)

So far (Wed night) I have 7 or 8 other people and myself ready to go. Feel free to join us. You can indicate on the comment section on this blog posting if you want to come or have some questions, or just show up.

The important thing to do now is to try to guess as close as you can the time you think it will take you to cover the course. This determines the order people set off, who the hares are, who the hounds are and also a couple of other things. If you want to post your estimate on this blog you can, or just hold on to it until start time.

I'll start things off and say It's going to take me an hour.

Hares and Hounds Kick-off

Note: No animals were harmed in the running of this event...mostly because treadmill runner Brad wasn't there ... We'll let you bring your hamster ball next time if you want Brad..

The idea for this (may or may not be original i have no idea, but it was original to me) came out of an email from Craiky. He wanted me to run from the Headwaters to Deep Cove with him ... with "no messing about" in his words. "What? Me mess about?" I wondered incredulously. "When do i ever mess about. I'm not the messing about kind am i ....?" ;-p

...Moving right along.... I knew he meant "run hard with no breaks, no shootin' the proverbial waste products." This is hard for many of us to do, and I wondered if there might be a way to make it a bit more interesting than just going out there, putting your head down and trying to hang on 'til the misery is over.Basically we're trying to re-create the racing effect without the $50 entry fee.

I have no idea how the electrical path was suddenly forged between my contemplation of that current problem, to an experience that occurred 29 years earlier on a snowy country lane on the Yorkshire moors in England. Crouched behind a dry stone wall, my friend and I waited for the sound of a car... any car ... it didn't matter. Darkness was settling across the moors with just a rose coloured strip across the far horizon and the white snowy fields for light. As the car came around the blind corner we stood up and hammered it with dense, heavy snowballs that thudded into the driver's windows. The brake lights lit up and the car came to an abrupt halt. An instant shot of adrenaline had us on our feet, stumbling into a sprint as the angry driver peeled out of his car and raged across the soft, silent fields in pursuit of us. Fear from the chase kept us moving long past the point where we would normally have given in to the protestation of aching legs and lungs. We kept going until we realized we had far out-distanced our pursuer, then collapsed against a wooden gate laughing and gasping for air. It was exhilarating.

"That's what we need to create," I thought! The exhilaration of pursuit by a monster or something. Ok.. maybe not a monster... we don't want people dying of fright. What about those greyhounds that chase the rabbit around the track to try and catch it? (It's a fake rabbit folks .. or at least it is these days). The feeling of being chased would keep people honest .. it would keep them pushing from start to finish.

A little more brain ache and the idea was formed for the Hare and Hounds run. We managed to gather six people for the first test run. The idea is you give an honest appraisal of the time you think you are able to cover the course in. Others can vet your time and harangue you if they think you aren't being realistic. Then you order yourself in reverse order. The slowest time goes first and then the next and so on. The last person to go is the hound ... the chaser. If you are passed by the hound you're "dead" ... or buying coffee or whatever punishment you choose ... UNLESS you can beat your own forecasted time by at least 30 seconds. This part is important because it prevents the "dead" hare from giving up. He/she still has a second chance at "life" but it requires him/her to keep pushing hard to the end.

That's basically it. Our first one seemed to go well and we all enjoyed it. We all experienced a nervousness waiting inside the End of the Line store for our start time. Once on the trail you know when the hound will start, and when you look at your watch and realize he is now coming out of the door and you're only across the bridge, the exhilaration is there... you really feel it! Tom and I ran pretty much the same pace and we were constantly looking back to see if the hound was coming. But we were also looking forward and trying to catch those ahead of us .. not because we could "kill" them but just because it feels good to see people ahead of you and chase them down; and also to put a buffer between you and the hound.

Stefan .. the hound... had given a time estimate 2 minutes faster than mine and tom's so he was the hound. In the end we were 6 or so minutes ahead of the hound and within 1 minute of our time estimate.

Kevin and Linda were also within a minute or two of theirs and the Pink Princess..? ..... well..... let's just say there was some "hare loss" happening that day ... ;)

But the whole thing was a lot of fun. It was fun to feel you were being chased and also to be trying to chase down those in front. Everyone pushed themselves from start to finish and got in a great speed workout. Perhaps just as important was the exercise in getting to know your own pace and estimating how quickly you can cover certain distances.

Thank you to the other 5 runners who agreed to submit themselves to this experiment (Tom, Linda, Kevin, Stefan and the Pink Princess).

Design Modifications:

The first iteration of anything is rarely perfect and this was no exception. It can get better and Craiky and I were already coming up with ideas for round two as we sped through the forest.

1) Money -- people could start off with 5 loonies or something and if you are passed then you hand over one loonie to the person passing you. If you re-pass them you get it back. The idea is to come out with more money than you went in with ... or at least to break even.

2) If you are 10% or more faster than your time estimate then you have to take your original time estimate and figure out if you would have been passed if you had run that time. If so then you hand over the appropriate amount of loonies, coffee, donuts or whatever currency you have decided on for your hare and hounds run. You can modify the percentage to whatever you think is fair for your group. Doing this forces people to (A) be honest with their estimates and/or (B) really start to begin thinking about their pace.

If everyone is quite accurate with their time estimates then all of the passing should only occur in the last kilometre or so of your run course. This keeps it exciting ... keeps everyone pushing to the end.

A group of ten or twenty would make for a lot of fun. So stay tuned for Hare and Hounds #2 and come and join us! Feel free to make any other suggestions for modifications. Happy hunting .... (no guns please).

November Snow

Beautiful run on the trails this morning with the Pink Princess and three of her friends.

It's an odd feeling being the only guy on a group run. What would we talk about I wondered as I waited awkwardly in the parking lot for our start.....? Shopping? Spa treatments? Tea parties? Colours I have never heard of? Oh god.... feminine health topics?! Ew!

Just when real worry began to set in, someone mentioned yak trax. Yes! Thank you! I know something about those! And we were off...

Luckily, the girls kept to safe topics and ones I could participate in (at least when I was around). So thanks for that.

Run was really nice. Love running when there is a dusting of snow but the trails aren't covered and you get that mix of colours ... green, brown, white, gray (...see.. i can talk about colours after all).

Anyway.. thanks for the invite Princess. Fun morning. Nice diversion from report cards..

Don't Go into the Light!

...or is it "Do not go gentle into that good night" ?

Whichever it is we did not lose Kevin today and managed to coax him back with a trail of harvest crunch crumbs. Although i swear i heard a voice, not unlike my own, screaming hysterically "go! go! i'll look after Linda!" followed by a mysterious figure, again, not unlike my own, scrabbling around in the dirt with a straw (insert sucking noises) in the vicinity of the harvest crumbs....

Our two hour jaunt up and down a large hill on a certain quiet trail captured the beauty of fall with its vibrant colour, soft light, cool temperatures and earthy smells from the decay of summer. A ghost or goblin would not have been out of place in this silent forest.

Anyway... it was a perfect morning with perfect friends followed by perfect coffee. I'll leave it at that and let the pictures tell the rest..




Happy Halloween...

Rocky Mountain High

Well ... we're off to see the Wizard folks! Driving down the yellow brick road to Colorado this morning and taking our sweet time about it so we can enjoy the scenery, get some runs in and because we can!

Trans Rockies starts Aug 22nd and you can follow it through the website and through their tweety bird thingie @TransRockiesRun ...and.... through Craiky's tweety bird thingie on his blog site...

chowder!