the insanity continues

I know...I know I know I know. where the hell has she been and how come she never writes anymore?

I'm sure I could come up with a number of reasons as to why the blog has gathered dust, but I won't. I'll just pick up where I left off and pretend nothing has happened.

There was that Quad Weekend...

I had no trouble this year pulling a team together for the Quad. The same guys I had last year were easy to convince to do it again this year. I'm not sure how I got so lucky with my team. There's the Biker, who is good friends with the Skier, who is a good cycling buddy of mine, and the Runner, who happens to be my spouse, and me, the humble snowshoer. Usually spouse is not so interested in team things - but the Quad is a special kind of insanity. I'm not sure how I talk him into it every year, but it's not hard. The manliness factor is probably a big piece of it. He remembers how crazy-hard it is, and he's game. Also, I think he likes the rest of the team, because they're all good people.

This is the second year we've had the same Quad Team, which means that I'm dealing with seasoned pros, so to speak. All of us tend to train year-round for one or another thing. The only thing we needed to do was train for this thing, since skiing and snowshoeing are the only weather-sensitives sports, it's really down to the shoer and the skiier to be in reasonable form for our specialties. The Quad is just a fun weekend in the snow.

The Quad, this year, fell on Valentine's day. This year also, it fell on a weird weather weekend. It had to happen sometime, that the weather would be less than perfect. The last few years we've had glorious sunshine and fabulous perfectness.

This year it was cold and windy.

Seriously. Cold. And windy.

I know. I've been having trouble writing some seriously inspiring stuff here. We came, we saw, we quadded, the end. There are so many things I love about that race - the location, the people, the obscene difficulty of it.

This year it was also seriously hard, mentally. As in years past, I always forget just how frickin hard it is to make it to the bloody start of the snowshoe leg. It's not like other races where you can just take a taxi, or have someone drop you off at the start of your leg, no. We take a bus from the town of Grants to the start of the run/end of the bike (T1). From there, we get in a truck to go to the end of the run/start of the ski (T2). Each and every one of the relayers gets in a truck and gets hauled to T2. It's a big undertaking, getting racers onto the mountain - and it seems like the entire town of Grants volunteers for this race. Grants is not a big town, so it's pretty cool that they pull this off.

From T2, it's up to the snowshoers to haul their own butts up to the end of the ski/start of the shoe (T3). On our own.

For emphasis, I'll spell it out -- that's 2 mile snowshoe from T2 to T3 - before we get to race. Bleah. Every year I tell myself 'oh it's just 2 miles' and every year I am swearing, cursing, sweating and freezing my arse off hiking those two uphill miles before I even get to start the race. This year was no different than previous years - except for the wind. And the cold.

On the plus side, they did change the course slightly from last year - the uphill was the same 1 mile with 800 feet of elevation gain (and most of that gain feels like it's in the last 1/2 mile, topping out at over 11,000 ft). In previous years the downhill is the same as the uphill, but this year the downhill went down a more sheltered route, which meant the snow was less frozen, and more fluffier. For me, this meant I could descend a little more fearlessly.

cutting to the chase,
2008 Quad Shoe Up: 26:05, Shoe Down: 15:40
2009 Quad Shoe Up: 24:51, Shoe Down: 13:10

I think my improved time is down to more than just the changed course, and I'm very pleased about that.

As with last year, we came in first in our age group. We were trying hard to improve our overall team position, but it was not meant to be. A crack team of suspiciously fast sub-pro types came in first, and a team of males consisting of really fast guys (some of whom I know) came in 2nd. One of these yearsI just know that we'll break our position and move up the ranks...

But that was February! What the hell else have you been doing with yourself?

Well. Since the Quad I've
a) Signed up for Satan's Spin Class. Again. I came out of last year's hellfire 10 week course feeling pretty strong, and all indications so far are that Uncle Roy's magic is working again.

b) Signed up for Ironman St. George Ho. Lee. Shit. IMSG (or IMUT?) will be a second iron distance race within 6 months, since I'll be doing Beach to Battleship in November. It will also mean maintaining iron-style fitness through the winter (ulp). Given how strong I've felt recently, I feel good that I'll be able to pull off an iron distance race if I can train like this next year. I'm excited about that, and I'm also excited about shaking up my season next year. Getting an iron distance done early in the year will mean that I can do different things later in the year. On the downside, it will mean some hard, long miles in some cold parts of the year. Luckily, I live in a part of the country where this will be possible.

Having said that, we did get snow last week. And we usually get one more snow for Easter.

For posterity, I'll record that Mo and Spouse are responsible for talking me into that one. Mainly spouse. He sealed the deal by enthusing about making a family holiday in Utah, visiting the local beauty spots.

Mo and I helped each other fill out the registration forms. It's so good to have a partner in crime - I'd never have figured out what to say on some of that stuff.

c) completed the Napa Valley Trail Half Marathon. We'll refer to this race in the future as, 'the race in which spouse lied to me.'

I'll save that for the next post.

Ok, I'm caught up now...