colorado

we arrived safely in colorado last night. when fred, tom and i got out to fred's car at the airport however, we had a momentary set back...flat #1.

our first flat

once we got the tire fixed, we headed to fred's house in boulder and met up with dan, jack and joseph. we spent last night in boulder, and then after a quick breakfast this morning, dan, jack, joseph, tom and i piled into car and started driving to leadville.

we rented a little victorian house in downtown leadville that sleeps 10 and is right down the street from the morning meeting point for training camp. after changing, we drove down to winfield, a little ghost town about 40 minutes from leadville, which is also home to the 50-mile turn around point for the race, so we could do a training run.

jack, me, joseph and dan pre-run

today i put in about 13 miles or so. we started at winfield and ran along the road to the trail head, and then started the climb up to hope pass. the top of the pass is at 12,600ft elevation, and the climb to get up there is something to be reckoned with. the trail is great, but it is steep enough that i probably wouldn't want to be running up it even if i weren't at altitude!

joseph and tom on the road to the trailhead (jack in the background)

we got up to the top of the pass in about an hour. the view from the top was pretty amazing. it was so nice to be out on the trail. you could here water rushing by in the stream...and thunder echoing in the background as a storm rolled in.

me at the top of hope pass. in the background is (are?) twin lakes and are the first and last 45 miles of the leadville course.

we didn't stay up at the top too long because it was getting cold, but i definitely got a good taste of what our sunday run at camp will be like. by the time i got back down the mountain it was raining a bit harder. joseph and i ran up the road for 15 minutes in the direction opposite of the parking lot, and then turned around and started heading back to the car...although we didn't have to run up a very steep incline, we got on a little hill and i had to start walking. at this point i realized that aside from the pancakes i'd had for breakfast, all i had to eat today was one gel. we started our run a little before 1p and hadn't eaten lunch, so the lack of food just hit me. i could mostly run back, but whenever we started to go up an incline, i started hiking. on the one hand this could be demoralizing (i was bonking afterall), but i think it was actually just good practice to start walking and start booking it! in ultras, ultimately, you have to cover the distance. you'll probably be walking at some point.

about a mile before we were to arrive back at the parking lot, dan, jack and tom pulled up. joseph and i happily piled in as we'd already done extra mileage for the day anyways and it was starting to rain harder.

i should say at this point that to get to the parking lot, we'd had to turn off the main road and drive on an unpaved road for 9.5 miles. well, we got back onto the main road, and dan made a comment about how the car was handling oddly. we pulled over and you could hear the hiss as the air escaped out of the tire. awesome. fortunately we made it back to leadville and were able to get to a garage and have them fix the tire.

flat #2

when we got back to the house, donna and dave had arrived...and were making dinner for everyone! mmmm. well timed guys! fred arrived at the house after dinner, so now there are 8 of us here. we're only waiting on cindy to be complete.