The Marathon Box is Checked

Hello all,

It is The Shepherd here with an exciting post for you.  I figure since it has been forever since my last one, I should make it something good.  After training for the last 3-4 months, I completed my first marathon this past weekend.

I will say all in all it was quite an experience that I won't forget.  It was harder than I expected, mostly in ways that I did not expect it to be.  Oddly enough, the hardest part has been the recovery; but I'll spare you those details.

My partner and I were fairly ready for training.  We had done the Tough Mudder a few months earlier and had kept our miles up from training for that event.  We started our official training at the beginning of the new year.  

Training for the marathon this year was in many ways easier than last year when we were training for the Derby Mini.  We had many more injuries to battle through last year than this one.  Don't get me wrong, there were plenty of niggles to work through this time as well, but nothing like last year when I was sidelined for a bit with some nasty foot pain.

There were some bad runs for each of us.  One of my worst ones was an 8 miler that I didn't think I was going to finish because my shin muscle was so tight.  I worked through it with some stretching and focusing on keeping my feet relaxed on the backswing.

Jimmy had a bad run towards the end as we were tapering on a 12 miler where his knee was bothering him pretty bad.  This was a bad time, since it was so close to the end and messed with his head more than his body.  But he rested up, got out the good old sports tape, and was as good as new.

So after months of training and goodness knows how many amended fuel plans, we were ready to go.  We spent the night in a hotel the night before the race just a few blocks from the starting line. After waking up at 3:30 am to eat / drink our shakes (much to dismay of the girls) and again at 5:30 am to get ready, we headed out.

We got to the starting area, found our starting gate (sort of), and got in line.  I say sort of because we were supposed to be in corral D, but couldn't get that far because of all the people.  So we jumped in somewhere around corral C.  This ended up being for the best anyway because we ended up still passing many more people than we were passed by.  It certainly minimized the zigging and zagging we had to do. 

The sea of humanity aside, we were still able to spot our cheerleaders and give them a wave as we ran by at the start.  Notice we were so fast it is blurry...either that or somebody forgot to bring their camera (inside joke).

 

 

The first 6 miles or so were nice.  The crowd, assorted dj stands, and initial adrenaline are always enough to get you through the first part of the race.  After mile 6, my bowels that had mysteriously been locked up in the hotel decided they were ready to be evacuated.  Anyone who knows me knows that this is not out of the ordinary for me.  My bowels have a history of acting up at the right time, wrong time...come to think of it, pretty much anytime.  So we spent the next several miles looking for a nice place to take care of business.  Side note about the race.  It is always well planned and executed but if I were to have one request, it would be to have more facilities along the way.

After missing out on going as we passed through Churchill Downs (not a stitch of paper in any of the stalls or hand towel machines) we finally found a cozy green hut to lighten the load.

Funny story about this port a potty picture.  I did a google search for it and found another runners blog featuring this picture.  So as a shout out to her, here is her post.  Not exactly the same issue as I had, but small world nonetheless. 

Ok, so now I'm light on my feet again and Jimmy has had time to limber up.  We are back on the trail and hit "the hill".  It wasn't that we were not prepared for it.  We had been staring at it on our race map for months.  One hundred and twenty feet up in less than 2 miles.  Now to many standards, that is probably not that much, but to us it seemed like a mountain.  I even made a special playlist for it.  So we plugged in and headed up.  Oddly enough the major uphill was not so bad.  There was a nasty little rise at the end of the downhill that caught us both off guard.  I think this was the beginning of what was to come later.  By my estimation it was mile 15 or so.  We unplugged and kept right on trucking.

At mile 18 Jimmy started having a little more knee and quad trouble so we slowed a bit to make sure we didn't burn out.  At this point we were still several minutes ahead of our goal time so it was no big deal. 

As the miles piled on over 20 (which was also our longest training run distance), the fact this was a marathon and we were going to be in for some pain started to settle in.  I remember my quads both cramping around mile 22 on an uphill portion and thinking this was really going to be tricky.  We were losing time, but worse yet, we were losing gusto.

Every water station was a welcome site if not for the water, but simply just knowing we made it to one more checkpoint between mile markers.  And for the simple fact they also were giving out gels at some of them.  I had burned through the 7 GU's I packed on my waist belt and picked up a gel and a bottle of water from the last water station.  Bottles of water are GENIUS at that point in the race because you can really control the water and keep it with you without spilling for long periods of time.  It is certainly better than the cups of water at that point.

At mile 23 or 24 neither of us were talking much any longer and decided to just go ahead and plug back in for the push to the finish.  We finished just as we had trained for months.  Together.

We missed our goal time of 4 hours by just over a minute.  I blame that on the tunnels under Churchill Downs where you lose reception on your watch.  My pace actually read under where we needed to be, but who cares.  After 4 hours of running, I am happy to have survived.

A big shout out to my oldest sister for completing the marathon as well.  I know she trained hard and was pretty nervous about it but she completed it and seemed like she was in great spirits at the end.

Also a shout out to my brother in law (different sister) for finishing the mini in under 2 hours.  He was at home with his feet up by the time we got done.

Now that box is checked, I had planned on starting on training for triathlon.  What do you think?

The Shepherd

The Shepherd tackles Tough Mudder

Hello all,

It has been a while since I've made any posts and I guess you can blame it on my Mom.  I just haven't had anything good to say, so I haven't said anything at all.  But after completing the Kentucky Tough Mudder, I've got a few things to talk about.

For those of you not familiar with Tough Mudder, just click on the link.  Then sign up for the one closest to you and get to training!

The Kentucky Mudder was held on October 20th.  We set out at 8:20, which was the second group of the day.  Our thinking here was that the obstacles would not be too worked over and thus easier to navigate.  This was our thinking 9 months ago when we signed up and were not thinking of October weather in Kentucky.  I have seen it snow on Halloween and handed out candy in shorts as well.  It is a crap shoot for sure.  Mr. cold weather decided to show up this year and we took off running with the temperature a balmy 42 degrees.  The sunrise was at 7:49.  Brr.

Normally 40 something degrees is great running weather.  You can start off cool but your body heat makes it perfect after a mile or so.  The main difference here is that I don't usually, and by usually I mean never, run while soaking wet after being dumped in ice water.

But I'll get to that in a minute.  First let's cover the course.

Our course was roughly 10 miles through some pretty hilly terrain.  The terrain actually turned out to be the second most difficult obstacle.  I took this map and zoomed in on MapMyRun just to see what the elevation changes were.  You can see that here.  It is not a perfect representation of every nook and cranny on the course, but it serves its purpose.  We were hosted by the Big Rock Off-Road Park near Maysville, KY. 

Maysville was a nice town with friendly people, the park was a great place to have it, and most of all the event was planned and executed wonderfully.  From the shuttles to the ample supply of toilets, it was great.

I was part of a team of Mudders from Elizabethtown, KY.  We were supported by Sheepleg (of course) and Hardin Memorial Health, who supplied us with our team shirts.

Enough of the setup.  Let's get to running.

Before you can even get to the start line you have to scale a 10 foot wall.  As pumped up as you are at this point, this wall is easy.  I felt like a ninja hopping over this one.

We all gathered at the start line and listened to the MC.  We gave the Tough Mudder pledge and listened to the National Anthem.  The MC did his thing and got us all even more amped up before turning us loose on the course...or did he turn the course loose on us?

Stay tuned for a recap of each obstacle and everything in between.  You didn't really think I would give it all up at once did you?

Up Next:  The start and Kiss of Mud.

Until then,

The Shepherd.

GSI Microdualist: The Perfect Cookset for Couples

Hello all,

Sheepish preaches more truth.

GSI Microdualist: The Perfect Cookset for Couples 

 

For many, a camping cookset conjures images of a cast iron pan, a dutch oven, or a footlong steel fork, and while few can argue with the great taste of confections that come from these implements, they aren’t very practical for the backpacker that has to carry all of his or her gear into the backcountry while hiking or camping. New lightweight pots made of anodized aluminum or titanium shave pounds off your load in your pack and are compact enough to minimize bulk, but most of these solutions are aimed at the solo hiker. Being married with a young son, I recently decided to supplement my old trusty titanium ‘bachelor’ mug with a new GSI Microdualist.

The GSI Microdualist is a very cleverly designed kit with components that nest perfectly together to provide a glamping-style outdoor culinary experience for two at thru-hiker weights. At the core, there’s the 1.4L Microdualist pot made of a proprietary GSI hard anodized aluminum alloy called Halulite, which means there’s no coating to scratch off- you can even clean it with sand and a clean cloth. The lid of the pot has strainer holes for draining water from cooked pasta or vegetables, and incorporates a high-vis heat-resistant handle. Nesting inside the pot are two nesting sets of cup and bowl, one set orange, one set blue, with heat-insulated sleeves on the cups and sip-lids to keep you from spilling your Swiss Miss all over your self. Included are two color-coordinated telescopic “foons”. A stove sack is included in the set to keep your stove and fuel canister from rattling in your pack. Even the outer stuff sack pulls double duty, with a welded, waterproof interior you can use as a sink for washing or for carrying water.

The entire set weighs 17oz, but you can leave behind any pieces to fit the needs of the trip you’re planning to save weight. On our recent trip to Cumberland Island, Georgia, I lamented not having a small bowl to mix food in and eat from since I only use my titanium mug to boil water in; this kit will serve me well when my family comes along with me on adventures. Check out the Microdualist at Sheepleg today.

The Shepherd does the Warrior Dash

Hello All,

I am a bit behind on this, but better late than never right?

So as I ride the wave of my potential midlife crisis, I completed another physical challenge this on June 23rd.  The Warrior Dash in Lebanon, KY.

I had a great time, but that was mostly due to having great company.

I was a little disappointed in the execution of the actual event.  I find it hard to believe it was planned poorly given how many of these things they do every year.  I think they were just a bit off on putting their plan into action and/or being quick to respond to anything that went wrong.  But I'll get to that in a minute.  Let's start off with a positive.

As it turns out, all the running, Tough Mudder workouts, and P90X routines are really paying off.  The most difficult part of the course was weaving in and out of the folks on the course who were clearly not there to break any land speed records.  The course was so narrow at times we could only go two or three wide and of course we would get bogged down by walkers.  But I kept trying to tell myself it was for fun and don't get frustrated.

Funny how my brain says that, but my legs went off to the side and through branches sticking out in order to pass the slower folks.  There must have been something lost in the translation there.  Oh well.

The first obstacle (after a mile of running/weaving around people) was an easy run through some tires.  Smooth sailing so far.  It was the second one that was the hardest physical obstacle of the day.  They call it "Deadweight Drifter" and you are supposed to "trudge through waist deep water and over the logs".  Yeah, waist deep after the first step in, then swimming after that.  After being kicked in the head a few times by the lady in front of me and returning the favor to the guy behind me, I made it across.  Once I got over the initial funky smell of the pond we jumped in and catching my breath from swimming, we started jogging again.  The wet clothes were a welcome addition to the jog, as it was fairly warm the day of the race and running soaking wet didn't seem to bother me all that much.  Of course it is not like I have not run in the rain before.



That was short lived though.  At some point in the next 2 miles I made the comment to my friend that I could not understand how the water in my shirt could feel hot.



Of course I have to throw a plug in here for my favorite shoes, the Vibram Five Fingers Bikilas.  While most people had wet socks and heavy shoes, I had a nice foot glove on that didn't slow me down and also seemed to help on the traction once we were all muddy.  Even though I soaked and washed them...then soaked and washed them again they are still a bit stained from the mud/red clay.  But that is fine by me.  I figure it is their badge of honor. 


Back to the race.  All the obstacles after the swim were a breeze.  Perhaps it was because we had been training for them for months as part of our Tough Mudder training or maybe they just were not tough.  It is hard to say for sure, but they were still fun to navigate over, under, but never around.

As we rounded the final turn and saw the fire, we knew it was the end so as our standing racing agreement goes, the training partner mentality went out the door and we took off running to see who could finish first.  We jumped the fire together and hit the mud pit at the same time.  Lucky for me, my buddy got a face full of mud that also went in his contacts and he had to swim / run the last 50 yards or so half blind.  So I won this one.


We took a few minutes to clean up and waited for the rest of our group to finish.


After taking some pictures of them crossing the finish line we all wandered around a bit to take it all in, had our free beer, and left. 


Now for the bad.  Because the event had been moved (it was scheduled to be just 3 miles from my house originally) fairly last minute because they did not realize we were not a full wet county and our illustrious city personnel were too lazy to give it the old college try to speed the liquor license process up.  I assume that the change of location must have caused some sort of calamity of errors afterwards because the shuttles that were to take us to the event were few and far between.  Since there was no on site parking, we had to park 20 minutes away (for the low low price of $20 per car) and take a shuttle.  Ok, I can get over the $20 just because that money goes to St. Jude, but asking people to show up at the event 90 minutes before their heat and making them wait for an hour for the shuttles is a bit frustrating.

So we got to the actual course about 5 minutes before we were supposed to run greeted by signs stating you HAD to run in your allotted heat with no exceptions.  That seems like plenty of time until you have to get your race packet, pin your number on, take a whiz, check your bag, and forget about stretching.  So much for the mental preparation.  We rushed to the gate just a minute or two late and proceeded to just stand there for about 15 minutes or so just waiting.  Talk about a dump of energy. 


When we got finished everything seemed fine until we wanted to get in line for the showers.  Holy crap that line was long.  I truly think they only had one shower going.  Keep in mind we ran at 10:00.  Only 2 heats before us, a maximum of 1000 people.  And given the number of people we passed on the way and there being no way our heat was full there was no reason for the bottleneck at the rinse station.  We said screw it and left.


Little did we know that we would be sitting on a gravel road waiting on our shuttles to arrive for over a half hour.  As it turns out, there were so many people desperately trying to get to the event on time since the shuttles were not adequate that people were riding in on hay wagons, in the backs of pickup trucks and some even tried to walk.  With all the additional traffic on the lane and a half country road, of course there was an accident, thus causing the road to be closed.


As we sat there knotting up and bleeding energy by the minute nobody came along to offer water.  The event staff just sat under their tent and chilled while hundreds of just ran in the 90 degree heat participants sat on the road and waited.


We watched a couple of injured Warriors get carted down the path on golf carts.  It really sucked to get hurt that day.  We later found out that a lady we knew was hurt pretty bad later in the day and since they had no ambulances on site, she had to wait for her parents to go through the long bus line, get their car, drive back to the course, pick her up and then drive her an hour to the hospital.  I can't imagine having to sit there with everything below one knee broken and having to wait that long for some medical attention.


We also learned later that they ran out of water for finishing participants and were left only with beer.  I can neither confirm nor deny this, but given the shenanigans I personally witnessed; I can believe it.


Rather than leave on a negative note, I will still like to say that it was fun.  Any time I get to be outside challenging my brain and/or body there is a certain level of enjoyment that even poorly executed events can't take away.  I would not discourage anyone from doing the Warrior Dash if for no other reason than it supports St. Jude.  I also have to imagine our event was an anomaly rather than the rule or else they would not be nearly as successful as they are.  Most of all, the day left me with more eager anticipation of the upcoming Tough Mudder, where simply finishing is the goal...and getting that headband.

Anyone have any tips for training?  We have constant debates now on how to do it.  Gloves or no gloves?  Are the monkey bars greased?  How far do you have to carry the log and do you get to pick your own log?  Any other thoughts are welcomed to helping Sheepleg become One Tough Mutton.



The Shepherd.

Geocaching

Hello All,

So I went out for a little geocaching this past weekend and had a pretty good time.  We didn't have much time to spend because it was so hot outside, but at least we were outside.

I have to admit, I am not the best hunter in the world when it comes to geocaching, but I do find it fun.  I felt a bit like Mantracker at times looking more for smashed leaves where other people may have been looking for the same thing and found it.  Oddly enough, in doing this I found a ladies wallet that had obviously been stolen and tossed off to the side.  I could tell it hadn't been there too long as it wasn't waterlogged and there were only 2 roly polys living in the pocket.  There was no money in it (shocker), but there were ID cards and all sorts of other stuff you would hate to lose.  So I plopped it in my pocket and decided to drop it off at the police station on the way home.  More on that in a minute.

Back to the caching.  After striking out on our first one because you had to cross a creek to get to it and then getting distracted by the wallet, we found a good one.  It was in a graveyard which normally would be weird, but it was more like a scavenger hunt than a cache.

After finding and logging that one on my newly downloaded free app (which stunk I might add), we were on to the next one.  As the sun began to melt our skin off on our way to this cache it was growing obvious that this would be the last one of the day.  It was nowhere near any shade and by the time we walked to it (only a half mile) I could tell my caching partner was pretty much done.  So we didn't look too hard and started back to the truck and some air conditioning.

On the way home, we stopped by the police station to drop off the wallet and were told by the officer that he thought it was probably the wallet stolen by the guy who was involved in a homicide a day or two prior.  Creepy.  But we were alive and on the way to grab a cold beverage and watch a Duck Dynasty marathon in the cool confines of the casa.

Now, here are some notes I have learned on just my third trip geocaching.  First, make sure your GPS is charged and is one that works pretty well under trees.  I have an old model that works great in the open, but under any sort of shade it is as lost as a duck in the ocean (see the tick fiasco blog).

My second tip would be to actually know how to use whatever gear you are taking on your adventure.  I had downloaded several GPS and geocaching apps to try.  The only problem was that we stood in the parking lot trying to figure out how to get them to work.  Whether it was registering them by logging on with Facebook, figuring out how to switch from map to compass, or just the frustrating part of having to key in the points you want to find it was something that was better done at home on the couch.

My third tip is to take some gloves (gardening gloves would do the trick), a flashlight, and some bite / sting treatment.  Luckily I was not bit or stung on this trip, but blindly sticking my hand under foot bridges or in stumps I have resigned myself to the fact that at some point I will.  This is also where the gloves would have come in handy.  I am not a huge fan of sticking my hands anywhere they can't be seen.  This is probably some sort of survival mechanism built in to help me keep the other 9.75 digits attached.  So gloves are a must.  A flashlight will also help put some light in areas so you may not even have to put your hand in them.  This could also be handy since many of the caches are black 35mm canisters or something covered in duct tape, which collects leaves like a ghillie suit.

Maybe in the next few weeks it will cool off a bit to where I can do some more caching and will be able to give more tips.

Does anyone have any tips for me on geocaching?  Favorite sites, gear to take, apps to use, etc.

Until next time...

The Shepherd.

Cover your wood

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Hello all,

I just spent the night camping with some good friends for anight and thought I would share a valuable lesson learned.

We took a trip to Mammoth Cave National Park for some fun times not just for us, but also for their 5 year old son.  We did not do any hiking, instead we spent most of out time at the Kentucky Action Park for some bumper cars, bumper boats, alpine slide, mini golf, and video games.

Fun times for sure.

Back at the camp site we got the fire going...after some coercing.  As it turns out, the wood we bought was a bit on the green side.  Here is a side note.  We were going to bring our own wood, but since the park is having some issues with non indigenous bugs invading, they have instituted a ban on all firewood not cut within 10 miles of the park.  So like good little scouts we bought ours from the store located in the park.  For only $4 a bundle, it is the least we could do to support our national parks.

If only we could have supported this poor deer.  It was friendly enough, coming right up to us almost close enough to pet, but could have used a hamburger or two.

So we get the fire going and started to make dinner.  While doing this, we also decided on taking some of the wood we were going to use in the morning for breakfast and dry it out a little next to the fire pit.  Pretty smart, right.  Sure was, but in true Shepherd fashion we put everything up when we were ready for bed but neglected to cover the wood we just dried out.

You want to guess what happened at about 3 am?  You got it.  Rain.

We thought we were smart little campers by waterproofing our tents the afternoon before and that was a great idea.  We didn't get wet sleeping, but our fire wood sure did.

Fast forward to 5 am with birds sounding off like little monsters at a Lady Gaga concert and I couldn't sleep any longer.  So I thought I would be nice and get the fire going for everyone and we could get the breakfast party started right after they got up.

No dice.  I spend the next hour whittling little shavings off the fire wood and breaking the bark off of it so I could get a mini fire hot enough to even get the bigger logs to think about burning.

While the fire never got super hot and we probably set a world record for the longest time took to make scrambled eggs, we got full and nobody got food poisoning.  Those were also the smokiest eggs I've ever had.  :)

In the end it all turned out fine.  Surprisingly I do not have another "I cut the end of my finger off" or an "I accidentally stabbed myself in the gut" story.  As much as I would love to write a post on how great my first aid kit is, I will just keep appreciating the fact I have never needed it...knock on wet wood.

'Til next time,

Happy Hiking

The Shepherd.

Hello all,

 Hello all,

Sheepish speaks the truth.  This is our best selling stove for a reason.

The Trangia Alcohol Stove: My Trusty Old Friend 

We’ve recently added the venerable Trangia alcohol stoves to Sheepleg and I have to admit my heart skipped a beat seeing my old friend again. For those of you who remember geeking out to games of Zork, the Trangia stove belongs right there with your trusty lantern and your glowing, grue-killing sword. Indiana Jones would go back into the Temple of Doom if he’d accidentally left it behind warming up some noodles.  It’s the simplest, most reliable, tough as nails piece of backpacking gear ever.  It’s a brass can with a screw-top lid with a rubber o-ring to seal in the alcohol goodness. The inside rim has tiny jet holes for the burner flame to shoot from. There’s absolutely no moving parts to fail.

To use a trangia stove, you place the burner can inside the windscreen/pot support and pour methyl alcohol (Denatured alcohol, YELLOW bottle HEET, or Everclear are the best) inside and light, the stove does the rest, automagically. First you’ll see a faint blue flame (be careful during the day, you won’t see a flame in sunlight) emit from the big hole in the center, and then, once the pressure is sufficient, the flame will come through the burner jets in a ring of water-boiling, noodle-cooking goodness. The Trangia comes with a simmer ring with an adjustable cover plate that allows you to bring the burner down to a simmer for gourmet cooking or snuff the flame completely when you’re done cooking. One thing that it has over ever other alcohol stove on the market is the leak-proof screw cap: you don’t have to deal with unburned alcohol left in the stove, just put the cap on and save it for later. If you’re planning a solo weekend or overnighter, just fill up the stove and you’ll likely have enough fuel for your water-boiling and cooking needs, no need to carry extra fuel.

The best thing about Trangia burners is they are tough and durable enough to be the only stove you need for life; the other is, since you’re only burning alcohol (not fossil-fuels) and not using disposable butane fuel canisters, it’s one of the best environmentally friendly choices you can make as a backpacker or outdoors enthusiast. The Trangia stove is available in several packages, including the relatively light mini-trangia set that comes with a windscreen/pot support, a pot, a pot handler, and a lid that doubles as a nonstick frying pan. The burner is available alone as a part replacement, but keep in mind that the burner can’t be used without a pot support. If you want to make a friend for life, check out the Trangia on Sheepleg.