Oh The Places You'll Go

It's a Challenge, not a Race

As some of you know, back in October I took part in "The North Face Endurance Challenge". Now, some call it a run, some call it a race, some call it trail running, some call it ultra running, and some call it hiking with style, but no matter what you call it - it was both a physical and mental challenge, and one of the hardest things I've done in my life (and one of the most fun - strange, I know).

As for the specs, I chose the 50km/31mile option. It took place on Cougar and Squak Mountains in Issaquah, just outside of Seattle. This was definitely a trail run, with all of the miles on hiking trails throughout the parks. And if the thought of 31 miles on trail isn't enough to get your blood moving, then how about some elevation? For my money, the elevation is what breaks you on this course. The funny part is, I can't get any consensus on how much elevation there was! If you just look at the rough numbers on the guidebooks, it looks like about 6000-7000' of total elevation gain and loss for the course. You run around on Cougar mountain for 6 miles, then head up Squak (~2000'), down Squak, back up Squak (~1800') then back down Squak, then over to Cougar for another 11 miles or so, including a trip up something called the "DeLeo Wall" - easily worth another 1000'. But the difference between the guidebook and the trail itself is marked. See, the guidebooks look at the elevation at the base, and the elevation at the top, and subtract. But in reality the trail doesn't just go straight up, it goes up a little, down a little, up for a while, then another little dip. Net net, when I set my watch to record samples every 5 seconds, it said that we gained about 12000' of elevation throughout the trip. Which I strangely believe.

So what does this combination of elevation, trail, and distance due to your running speed? Well, let's see - I ran a marathon last year at about a 10min mile pace, and I can run sub 8min miles for a 5K. For this run, I was shooting to run 15min miles. Yup. The "Elite" athletes that run these things are men and women that can run crazy speeds - like 6min miles over a marathon. The winners of this race ran 9-10min miles. It's just that crazy.

In any case, how did race day go - well, it went really really well. We started around 7:00am. It was still pretty dark out, and there was a mist in the sky - OK, maybe it was still raining a little. But the temperature was good - I'm always happier when it is cooler out for running, and temps were probably around 45-50F. We started out at a nice easy pace. A pack of 12 or so of us had formed, and there was no room for people to pass for the first 4 miles around Anti-Aircraft Peak, so we pretty much hung together. At mile 4 (about an hour in) there was a small aid station, and the pack thinned out. I was running with my friend Danika - we had done some of the training runs together, and it turned out she was friends with my friends Lynn and David Treadwell. Now normally Danika (who is running the Seattle Marathon Sunday) smokes me out on the course. She is about 1min per mile faster than me on the flats, so I was expecting to run alone most of the day. Unfortunately, she had pulled her back earlier in the week, and she started the race worried that she wouldn't even make it 13 miles, let alone finishing. I encouraged her to just take a slower pace and hang with me, and we'd see how it goes.

At mile 7ish (just under 2 hours in) is when the course gets tough - the "run" up Squak Mountain. For me this is a power walk, but it's nice enough. The real issue on Squak is the top, where you actually go over 3 separate peaks at the top - each of them about 200-300' high, with some really steep sections. After that, it was a quick run down to the Equestrian Crossing and the mile 13 checkpoint (about 3 hours in), where my wife was supposed to be waiting at the first spectator checkpoint. We actually came into the checkpoint a little early, and coupling that with the fact that the checkpoint was A) further from the parking lot and B) significantly more uphill than expected - we got there before L. Fortunately L showed up just as we were leaving, and she was able to get some good shots of us running through the forest. From there it was back up Squak again, and then another downhill to the crossover at Cougar. It was on this uphill that Danika and I started passing some folks - we knew that our training had paid off, since we had run all of these trails many times already, and had a good idea how to pace ourselves.

Once we hit the aid station at Cougar Danika was still doing OK, and we had "The Talk" - for those of you that are runners, and who run with other people, this is the talk that you have when paces don't line up. It's when one person convinces the other person that they should run together, and that times don't matter. The thing that is funny with us, is that she is faster than me uphill, even with a bad back, and I'm faster than her downhill. But we decided that finishing together was going to be more rewarding than whatever time either of us could have achieved on our own, and we didn't worry any more about one of us holding back the other or vice versa. After going back up the connector, we hit the part of the course that hurt me the most. I think it's called Deceiver, but I just called it hell. It was about 20 miles (just around 5 hours) in, and it is just a relentless uphill, exacerbated by the fact that it doesn't even have a cool name or a recognizable summit - it just goes up and up and up.

After that a nice downhill took us to the base of the DeLeo Wall trail. Which is supposedly the toughest part of Cougar, but we nailed it. Part of the goodness there was that I knew that L was waiting for me at the Aid Station at the top of DeLeo wall - knowing I was about to see her put an extra spring in my step! I was singing and cheering as I came into the aid station - which was about 22 miles (5 and a half hours) in and feeling groovy. After cramming in some food (I don't recommend the ham and cheese, but the PB&J are awesome, as are the boiled potatoes), and getting a replacement for my fuel belt (more gu, more cliff shots etc.) it was back to the trail. Downhill for a while, followed by the toughest hill on Cougar - the "Marshall Wall" which was as hard as always (note, we went back to Cougar a few weeks ago, and hitting this wall after only 6 miles of running is much, much easier than after 23 miles). Just after the wall I got passed by Uli Steidl - an elite marathon runner, and the guy who ultimately went on to win the 50 mile race that day! A few more uphills, and we were back to the start line. Unfortunately, this was only 25 miles (6 and a half hours) in, and we had to go back out and do another 6 miles to finish our race.

I honestly thought that it would be hard to run past the car and keep going, but at that point it was only 6 more miles right? The adrenaline was starting to kick in, and I could taste the finish, only an hour and a half more to go! At mile 27 we did a little jig, to celebrate the first time that either of us had ever run more than a marathon, and celebrate our official status as "Ultra Runners!" then we knocked off another 4 miles, and sprinted to the finish! We crossed together, just under 8 hours from when we started! It was actually colder at the finish than it was at the start. Net net our times were just over 15min per mile - with better coordination, better planning, and better health we definitely could have broken the 15min mark, but my first goal was to finish, my "thrilled goal" was to finish in under 8 hours, and my beyond expectations goal was to finish under 7:45 (15min pace) so I was pretty damn happy!

I can't quite describe all of the feelings I went through on the run, or through the next couple of days. It was really hard. It was fun. I was fortunate to have the support of my wife, both through the summer of training and losing weekends to that, as well as on the course. It was nice having Danika to run with the whole time. It was great to be done. I felt pretty OK afterwards, other than fighting to get enough calories in me throughout the night so as not to get sick (as a reference, I burned around 5000 calories during the run alone - and even with as much food as I ate, I only took in about 2000 calories during the race - plus about 2 gallons of water - good thing it wasn't hot out...)

I know the next thing that people always ask me is "What's Next?" - honestly, I don't know - I'm pretty happy that ski season has started, and I'm going to spend most of my time focused on that. I'll start running again next week I think - just 2-3 times a week to keep in rough shape. Come early next year I'll set my next goal, and we'll see what happens!

Technorati Tags: 2007, Endurance Challenge, North Face, Ultra Running

The Fisher Queens

As mentioned in the new house post - L and I took Cole to Mexico for a quick trip in the middle of August. What a great time. We went to a small town called Loreto - it's on the Baja Peninsula, a few hours north of Cabo. Alaska has direct flights in from LA, so it was a reasonably quick trip down. We stayed at Hotel CoCo Cabanas - highly recommended for a getaway - it's a very small place, with about 8 cabanas centered around a pool. There aren't very many things to do in Loreto - you can fish, kayak, fish, snorkel, fish, or scuba dive. We spent 2 days just chilling around the hotel, and one day fishing.

Now, we should make one thing clear - we are not fisher-people. L and I went fishing in Cabo when we were there a couple of years ago, and that is pretty much the extent of my fishing experience (other than catching a dead carp as a kid and showing it to my dad, and falling in the river). Anyway, we thought it would be fun, man were we right! After a rather early wakeup call (exacerbated by the fact that the airline told us the wrong time when we got off the plane, so we were still asleep when our captain Francisco knocked on our door) we headed out to the docks and we were off.

First order of business was to catch our bait. L was the queen of catching mackerel - hauling in about 20 in 15 minutes. I was on giant squid duty. Whoa. I guess they cut up the squid into small chunks to use as bait. The squid itself was like 40lbs, and huge. I learned to pull up with the rod, rather than the reel, and after about 10 minutes we had our bait and we headed out to the open sea.

Along the way, came the highlight of the day - we had put in the big lures - hoping to catch the big one. Like my cool fishing terminology? Anyway, it was chaos. Francisco set the hook, and handed the pole over to L - and the fight was on. We could see the marlin jumping out of the water - it was beautiful. L fought that sucker for like 20 minutes. She'd reel reel reel, and then have to let it run. It put up a hell of a fight. But, 20min later, there it was, easily an 80lb marlin, longer from tip to tail than I am tall - she did a great job!

After that things mellowed out. We headed a little further out to sea, to search for Dorado (mahi mahi). On the way we saw whales, dolphins - what a trip. Once there, we put the mackerel on the hooks and started fishing. Now it was time for Cole to come into her own, even with a broken wrist she managed to land about 3 fish - maybe 30lbs each. She was grinning from ear to ear.

After the trip it was time to get back to the hotel, where our captain took care of filleting the Dorado, and taking the marlin to the smokehouse. That night, we took a bunch of the fish into a restaurant in town and had them prepare it for us 3 ways - what a great way to enjoy some of the freshest fish we ever had. The next day we picked up the marlin from the smokehouse (an interesting experience, given I don't speak so much Spanish, and the folks at the "smokehouse" didn't really recognize me). That night we enjoyed another chunk of the fish at a cookout around the pool at the hotel! As for the rest of the fish, well, we gave about half of it to the captain, his brother, and the hotel manager, and the rest we packing in our new cooler and brought it home.

All in all, a great trip!

Technorati Tags: 2007, Fishing, Loreto

The Tour of London

Actually, it's the Tour De France, but this year, the prologue was in London. As mentioned in a previous post L and I spent the 4th of July holiday in London, where we were lucky enough to see the prologue of this year's Tour De France. If any of you are bike fans, this year's competition was again full of controversy, with Rasmussen kicked out, Vinokourov & Team Astana dropping out due to doping allegations, and Team Cofidis dropping as well. In the end, a relatively new spanish rider by the name of Alberto Contador of Team Discovery stood atop the podium, along with Cadell Evans (Predictor Lotto) and Levi Leipheimer (Discovery) alongside him.

No matter how you feel about the doping, the reality is watching this sport is a very unique and cool experience. We arrived at London's Hyde park around 12:00, in time to get ourselves a great spot to watch the riders come by, and to setup for a picnic. Thanks to Sean & Stef's friends Keith and Erica, we had a ton of food and wine to keep us nourished throughout the day. Frankly, the beginning of the race was probably the most exciting part of the day, watching the parade, and seeing the riders warm up in their various groups. It was particularly fun to watch guys like Robbie McEwan come through alongside Leipheimer, and to see one of our favourites, Big George Hincappie cruising through without the helmet on - still at incredible speeds.

One of the best things about the tour is the people watching. Can you guess which of these folks were with our group?

The thing I like best about time trials is that you get to see each rider individually, rather than just having a clump of 200 riders come zooming through - here are some of the favourites - Levi, Rasmussen, Vino, and Thor Husholvd

So there you go - yet another great adventure.

FYI - going forward, I'm going to be posting less photos here directly on my blog, and more on Facebook. If you aren't on Facebook yet, I encourage you to join - it's a fun place to connect with friends, old and new. If you are there, just search for Cameron Ferroni and add me to your friends list.

Technorati Tags: 2007, London, Tour De France

She's A Brick, House

She's mighty mighty... Yup, as many of you know, L and I bought a new house a couple of months back. In the vein of catching up with posts, I figured it was time to officially let folks know, and give some commentary. First off, why did we do it? Well, a couple of reasons, as most of you know L is a food photographer, and she was really starting to outgrow the old place. The kitchen was literally bursting with props and equipment, and something had to be done. We had gone down the path of doing a remodel, but by the time you ripped apart the kitchen, moved a flight of stairs, brought the other stairs up to spec, redid the backyard, since all of the machines had to come through there, then added a room upstairs, redid the bathroom, - well you get the idea - the slippery slope was going to end up with us reinvesting half the value of the house which seemed a little questionable. Just as we were close to pulling the trigger, we found out that our neighbor down the street was about to put her house on the market. 7 days later we made an offer, and 21 days after that, we closed and took possession of our new house. Wow, that was quick (and it made for a busy few weeks).

The first couple weeks were all about the old house - we got almost all of it packed up and put into the living room and dining room. It was a little cramped in there, but we had work to do - specifically we had a guy coming in to rip out the carpet in the upstairs and restore the original fir floors, and he was going to refinish the floors in the kitchen while he was at it. So now, here we were, living out of boxes in our basement - at least it was cool down there. Then we took a break and went to mexico for a couple of days (watch for a post from that trip coming soon to a blog near you). One more weekend of crazy packing and moving day was upon us!

L got the keys around 2:30 in the afternoon, and started wheeling boxes down on a hand cart (did I mention that the new place is 5 doors down, and downhill?). I rented a small truck for the big stuff, and got home at around 5:30 and started shuttling. It was quite the night - we had a bunch of neighbors helping us out - at one point we had about 10 people shuttling art by hand 2 pieces at a time down the street. And yes, all of the requisite bucket brigade jokes were made. By 10:00 that night half the keg was gone, all of the pizza was consumed, and everything was into the new house!

Over the next couple of weeks we got everything unpacked, and I ran my first ultramarathon, and just 3 weeks after moving in we had our housewarming party - all rooms unpacked, all art hung, and everything in it's place. Obviously we still have things to do - replacing the oil furnace with gas, getting rid of the hedge that is 10' wide and taking up about 1/3 of our property area, finishing building a new bed, and many more that I can't even remember right now, but we are definitely well settled in, and we are loving it.

Our favorite room is the living room, which is much bigger and more comfortable than our old place. We've got a great new leather sectional to curl up in, and a new turntable to listen to, with a great fireplace for those cold winter nights. L has a bedroom dedicated to being her studio, with a small walkin closet full of props, Cole has a bedroom on the top floor, with room for her own TV, we have the world's largest laundry room, perfect for both laundry and roller skating, I have my own bathroom so I don't have to share with a teenage girl any more, there's a great deck with a decent sized yard and basketball court (soon to be overrun with my workshop I hope) and we've got a guest bedroom just waiting for visitors.

We love it so much that we are going to have Christmas there this year - my parents are coming out, and this will be the first time in my 15 years of living in Seattle that I will actually be in Seattle for the holidays!

Kicking Arse Mountain Resort

I know it seems like we dropped off the face of the earth, but in reality, we've had a pretty cool, busy summer. But now, it's the shoulder season - summer is over, trail running is slowing down, and ski season doesn't start until November. So, it seemed like a good time to catch up on some blog posts. First up - back in April we took a trip to Kicking Horse Mountain Resort. It's a pretty sweet spot, although as you can tell from my title, it wasn't the easiest place we'd ever skied. We had it all planned out - a free weekend, with no direction - we waited until the last minute to try to find somewhere, anywhere that was going to get some snow. And Kicking Horse was a good deal, since A. We could drive there (a 10 hour trip, up to Golden - passing the "Golden Rim, Motor Inn - Soft Water and a Color TV" (that's a Tragically Hip reference for those of you who care)) B. It was reasonably priced, and C. it's somewhere I've always wanted to go.

We stayed at the Vagabond Lodge, which was a great bed and breakfast right at the base of the mountain. It was fairly new, I think only 1-2 years old, built and run by a couple from Edmonton that had always dreamed of living in the mountains. We were walking distance to the lifts, and the scottish pub down the road. Add to that a comfortable TV room (for watching the final four), a BYO bar, fireplace, great breakfast and lunch, and I couldn't recommend the place more.

As for the skiing - well, it was the worst I have skied in about 8 years. Not entirely because of the mountain, but a little. Here's the deal - this is the hardest mountain I've ever found myself on - lots of steeps, lots of chutes, narrow trees - you name it, it has it. Most of the black diamonds were comparable to the double blacks I've seen in Whistler. Now, there are some moderate runs as well, but the bulk of those are on the lower part of the mountain, where the snow wasn't quite as good, and frankly, there wasn't much in between. Some good stuff for beginners to get their feet wet, and a ton of expert terrain. The part of the bowl I ended up liking best was actually a double black diamond area, but it was wide open, so I didn't need to worry about drops & chutes on entry, or narrow trees at the bottom. That said, the few runs I had on great snow were excellent. From what I could tell, the best part of the mountain is the open access to the backcountry - but without the necessary equipment or friends, I didn't actually check it out. It also has a bit of a weird lift setup that says if you want to do laps on the main ridge, you have to go all the way back to the base and take the gondola back up. I did first tracks one day - that was a great idea - as you can see from the photo there were only like 20 people that did it - which meant that you had a lot to choose from - a great powder run down through the trees ensued! But to top it all off, on the last day there I had probably my 2nd worst wipeout ever. I was flying down a blue run called "Show Off" when it got just a little steeper and just a little icier. Oops. I slide about 800' feet down the hill, lost both skis, broke the boot warmer off of my boot, just about took out 3-4 people in a ski lesson, and finally stopped myself in the mogul field beside the run. The bruises were legend - waitforit - ary.

One of the highlights of the trip, beyond the humbling skiing, was dinner at the Eagle's Eye restaurant - the highest restaurant in Canada. The food was good (I liked it more than L) - but the experience was what really made it. You take the gondola up to the top of the mountain at night, they give you blankets to keep you warm, and then you take it back down after dinner, with a great view of the valley below.

All in all it was a fun trip - the skiing was tough, but gave me some perspective, and the company, the drive, and the experience were all great...

Technorati Tags: 2007, Kicking Horse, Skiing