I’ve really fallen in love with trail running in the last several months. It’s the perfect break from the humdrum of road running. If road running is a measure of efficiency then trail running is an expression of creativity.

Chickasaw Trace down in Columbia is my favorite place to run trails. It’s an 8 mile loop that gains nearly 1700 feet of elevation. Most of the trail is densly forrested and runs along the Duck River. It’s pretty technical with lots of ups and downs, twists and turns, etc.

I ran 10 miles on the trail this past Saturday. Unfortunately, my achilles tendon started bothering me 3 or 4 miles into the trail. I think I started favoring that leg, because around mile 5 I twisted my ankle badly. It hit the muddy trail spewing expletives – no one around to hear them except for the many deer you see there. I thought “Oh no, a broken ankle 5 miles deep into this trail.” I had my phone, but knew it would be a real chore for anyone to come and get me. Eventually I stood, putting more and more weight on the foot, I began to  hop on one foot, eventually limped, tried to walk normally, and finally started a slow jog. I had to get off the trail somehow. Honestly, this is what I love about trail running – the adventure. This kind of thing won’t happen on my normal road training loop. And what’s the fun in that? I prefer the unknown at this point honestly after many years of running in circles seeing the same old stuff over and over.

The ankle is still a little sore – as is the achilles, so I took it easy the rest of the weekend. I got my 10 miles in though.

Here are some pictures I’ve taken of Chickasaw over the last few weeks:

cabin near the trailhead

the Duck River

the beginning of a pretty dangerous descent – on a muddy morning

She’s growing up so fast!

Here’s my boy!

…and of course, Baby Kate:

Tomorrow marks the 1 year anniversary of a day that changed my life forever. Karen had already been on home bed rest for a few weeks at the time. She was still only 20 weeks pregnant and we were scared to death.
We went in for a routine checkup on Friday morning, the 29th of August 2008. Making a long story short, it becamse evident very soon that it wasn’t going to be a routine checkup at all. The Dr. checked Karen out and left the room. Through the closed door we heard her say to a nurse down the hall “we’re going to need a wheel chair in there.” Mine and Karen’s eyes met. A tear rolled from hers. 8 months before we had lost a child to miscarriage. We were devastated.
I’m skipping the real miracle of the story by skipping ahead to this day in August. In between God answered the prayers of a broken hearted mother and a 4 year old little girl.
Karen was immediately admitted to Williamson Medical Center in preterm labor, transferred a few hours later to Centennial Women’s Center, and a few days later to Baptist Hospital. That was the beginning of the longest year of our lives. She stayed there for 10 weeks protecting Max and Kate. The doctors destroyed her body with medications to halt the pregnancy. We knew what we were doing – and begged the doctors to do whatever they had to to protect our babies.
Izzy and I lived as a single father and daughter for those 10 weeks. It wasn’t easy for either of us. Karen eventually grew very ill with a mysterious infection and Max and Kate were taken by C-section 10 weeks early. They spent the next two months in hospitals.
Long story shorted again: they’re fine now. There were long months when we weren’t sure though. No one will ever understand the agony we endured as we watched over them during their illnesses – machines breathing for their tiny premature bodies. We were helpless, but God was there.
They’re perfect little babies now. Izzy started kindergarten and is loving it. The damage that was done to her has faded. Karen is struggling to recover still. Seems like she should have bounced back by now, right? It’s not that simple. As I said, we made decisions that we knew would harm her long term. I say “we”, but I mean “she” made decisions. She was brave and strong beyond measure and put the lives of her unborn children before her own.
Karen badly wanted to do the McMinnville City Triathlon tomorrow to honor the anniversary of when our long year began. It wasn’t meant to be though. She became ill again and that halted her training. Just when she recovered Max and Kate got sick again. So instead of her honoring the day, I’ll take her place tomorrow morning.
Lately I’ve been racing with others in mind. I did the Old Hickory Lake last year thinking of Karen, Max, Kate and Izzy. I did that race this year thinking of my mom’s struggle with cancer. While they will all be on my mind again tomorrow, this one is for me. I’ve had a trying year. My body has tried to shut down on me, but I won’t let it, not yet. Tomorrow I’m going to make it hurt. I’m going to enjoy the pain, like the pain through my whole body, it’s going to feel like home.

Today was a big day for us. Izzy started her staggered days at Kindergarten. I was definately harder on Karen and me than on Izzy. She was ready. Here are some pics:



That’s Izzy’s teacher, Miss Ramsey, in the green sweater comforting one of Izzy’s nervous classmates.

Several of us have decided to go back to the Tour de Nantahala on October 24th. I’m beyond excited!

For old time’s sake, here’s the blog post I wrote about our first trip:

The Nantahala Nightmare

I know I’m a few days late on this, but cut me some slack. I did post my top 3 prediction on twitter a few days ago. Here’s the short of it….I’ll believe Lance can be beaten when I see it.

3. Andy Schleck – the younger Schleck brother is a born climbing machine. After the stage 1 time trial, in which he finished 17th,  it seems he’s improved his time trialing enough to be a legit contender this year. Young Andy will have the help of his equally talented climbing specialist brother Frank once the road tilts upward.

2. Alberto Contador – Yeah yeah…he won the Tour in 07, the Giro, the Vuelta…yadda yadda. And Andy Roddick would have won Wimbledon if not for Federer. Lefty would have won (name the tournament) if not for Tiger. Lance is back! Alberto has added time trialing (2nd on stage 1 time trial) to his repotoire to go along with his freakish climbing ability, but ultimately his lack of savvy will not allow him to match “Mellow Johnny”.

1. Lance Armstrong – Gasp…he was only 10th in the opening time trial?! Yes – and he’s been retired for 3 years. He beat many of the GC contenders. He also went early in the day and admits “I went out a little too conservatively.” Lance’s savvy allowed him to latch onto the stage 3 breakaway with his old buddy Hincapie and the Columbia crew. He’s now sitting 3rd on GC. After tomorrow’s team time trial he’ll be back in yellow. With his own team mates nipping at his heels he may hold onto it most of the way. I can see him letting it go at some point before an epic race up Mont Ventoux on stage 20 against both Schleck and Contador.

Others:

Levi Leipheimer – he’ll have one mediocre day in the mountains and then be content to help Lance/Contador.

Andreas Kloden – see “Levi Leipheimer”

Cadel Evans – the team time trial will dash his hopes. He’ll hang tough (sort of) in the mountains, pull slightly closer on the final ITT, but it won’t be enough.

Denis Menchov – his legs are toast after his Giro d’ Italia win. He’ll pull himself back into the top 10 before reaching Paris though.

Kim Kirchen – nope.

Carlos Sastre - last years champ’s improved time trialing still isn’t good enough to beat Lance or Contador or the new TT ability of Schleck. He’ll win a mountain top finish and finish top 10.

Roman Kreuzinger – the 2008 Tour of Switzerland winner is a future great, but not experienced enough this year.

Nibali/Pellizotti/name another Italian – great riders, but overcook themselves at the Giro.

Izzy recently went on her first fishing trip with Nana, Papaw, and Aunt Lora. Here she is with one of her many fish.

Here’s Izzy’s first official swim team picture. The little fish swam 500 yards this morning during their swim-a-thon. That’s a long way for a 5 year old!

I realized on Monday morning what a great father’s day weekend I had. I spent Friday night at Daniel Tardy’s house, because we had to get up at 5:00am on Sat. morning to drive to Bell Buckle, TN for the RC Cola and Moonpie 10 mile run. We met Bill Hampton down there and enjoyed the run – keeping the pace nice and easy instead of racing it like I’ve done in the past.

Saturday when I got home Karen gave me my Father’s Day present; an old fashioned wooden homemade ice cream maker. I’ve been wanting one for years, but have always been too cheap to buy it. That night we had her mom and dad, brother, and two nephews over for a cookout. The first batch of homemade ice cream turned out great! Afterwards we enjoyed watching Izzy, Max, Kate, Thomas, and Alan all splash in the little pool in the backyard.

Sunday after church we went up to Hendersonville to have Father’s Day with my parents. Same deal…cookout…icecream…kids playing. Another great day to wrap up the holiday weekend.  Here’s a pic of “Papaw” with Izzy and Kate:

It’s race week this week. I have the Old Hickory Triathlon coming up on Saturday. As some of you know, that’s my top priority race of every season. It’s normally early in September, but this year they moved up to late June. That prospect makes me a little nervous as it usually takes me until mid August to get in top shape. Last year, I finally won my age group out of 40 something guys despite a challenging year (to say the least). The crowd is fast this year, so I’m hoping for a top 3 finish this go around.

I have lots of motivators these days: the strength of my wife who endured so much more pain and suffering than anyone will ever realize – she took 3 solid months of Magnesium straight to the vein. Research that – you’ll find out that most women can’t bear it for longer than 24 hours. I have Max and Kate who have both been through so much in 8 months of life. We almost lost them multiple times, but they have shown the strenght of God and are now strong and healthy. I have my mom – who just had breast cancer surgery last month and beat it! And as always I have my angel, Izzy. She found some of my old race medals last night and asked if she could wear them. Later we found her like this:

Karen has always said that I’m Izzy’s hero. I know it’s true, but the truth is she doesn’t really know when I win and when I lose. She’s just proud that I’m out there. She does know that my medals mean something. Glad she likes them. I want to win more for her.

My results will be a bit of mystery this Saturday. I haven’t raced since last September. so I don’t know where my lungs are. My legs are leaning out though, because they are starting to look gross:

Izzy won her first race yesterday at her 2nd swim meet of the season. She won the 1st heat of the 6 and under girls 25 yard freestyle. Here she is looking cute with her heat winners ribbon:

I’m still keeping up my training. I got in an early morning bike ride yesterday. This morning I ran 4.5 miles and included a mile of lactate threshold work. I have another indoor bike session on tap for lunchtime today. Tomorrow is a rest day…a short swim on Friday…and the RC and Moonpie Festival 10 mile run on Saturday morning.

Izzy and daddy at Tardy’s cookout

Daddy and little Kate

Mommy and big Max

Decent workout this morning. I swam a mile and then immediately headed for an easy 3 mile run. On the heels of yesterday’s lactate threshold workout today’s swim and easy run felt great.

Map My Ride is offering a cool program during this year’s Tour De France that I’m going to participate in. I’ll ride every day along with the Tour riders, while Map My Ride’s GPS tracks me through my iphone. Somehow they’ll compare my results to the tour riders and show me where I’m placed each day among the peloton. Sounds interesting. For more click HERE

I squeezed in a 1:40 ride yesterday morning with Tardy and the Verner brothers before the final day of the June Counselor Training. We climbed the front side of Lynewood Way (the mountain) on the way out and the backside on the way back. My heart rate hit 179 on the front side and 185 on the back as Stewart Verner drug me up the climb – and eventually dropped me. Been awhile since that’s happened on a big climb. The guy can climb.

I did a 40 minute run this morning that included a 20 minute lactate threshold field test inbetween  a 10 minute warmup up (156hr) and a 10 minute cooldown (158hr). I ran the 20 minute segment at a 6:55 pace that yielded an average HR of 179. For now, I’ll use that number as my lactate/anaerobic threshold. That means I can train up to that number and remain aerobic. I’ve tested my LT as high as 183, so I have some room for improvement this summer.

The Dauphine Libere ended today. Spaniard Alejandro Valverde defended his title. Cadel Evans was second and tour de france favorite Alberto Contador was 3rd. I’m still counting on a Lance to win the tour though. Just a few more weeks of waiting.

Valverde in yellow with Evans on his wheel at a last years Dauphine

The final Tour de France tuneup, the Criterium du Dauphine Libere, is in full swing after 5 stages. Last year’s winner Alejandro Valverde of Spain took command today on the climb of le Mont Ventuox – a climb that Lance Armstrong called the hardest climb in France. Valverde, currently under suspicion in the same doping scandal that earned Ivan Basso a suspension, flexed his climbing prowess on the lunar landscape to the summitt finishing right behind Sylvester Szmyd. Valverde won’t participate in the Tour de France this year, so the Dauphine Libere is his chance to show the cycling world what he’s got. He attacked the leaders, namely Cadel Evans (2nd at the 08 TDF) and Alberto Contador (1st at the 07 TDF and 09 favorite). Neither had an answer for the Spaniards acceleration to the summitt. Those men now sit 1,2, and 3 on the general classification.

Evans, who is a capable but not a pure climber, could not respond to Valverde finishing 6th on the stage. Contador, who is a superb climber, seemed content to hold onto Evans wheel for dear life and finished 8th. Perhaps both spent too much on yesterday’s time trial. There are still plenty of big climbs to go though, so at :18 seconds ahead its far from over.

Izzy had her first official swim meet this morning. She’s swimming for the Spring Hill Sea Dragons! She had a blast. Check her out:

Max and Kate really enjoyed it too:

Yep, that’s my girl.

I had a nice training weekend. Daniel Tardy, Branden Verner, and I rode 25 miles at a decent clip covering a few big climbs on Saturday morning.  I’m trying to push the pace a little to prep for race season. We did a 2.5 mile BRICK run immediately following the ride. It was Branden’s first experience running right off of the bike. He did great, but asked “is it normal for your feet to tingle?”. Yes, it is.

Sunday morning I ran 9 miles at a very easy pace keeping my heart rate under 160. It’s amazing how easy running can seem when you keep your heart rate in check. My average HR for the run was 155. I’m thinking I’ll run the RC Cola and Moonpie 10 miler aerobic as well. My PR there is 1:14, but considering the year I’ve had I don’t think this is the time to go for a new “personal record”. I’ll probably just run with Tardy and Hampton nice and easy and consider it a training run. I got another 2 mile run in late yesterday afternoon making the daily total 11 miles. Been awhile since I’ve logged that many miles in a day.

Still thinking about the San Antonio Marathon in mid November.

Izzy’s first swim meet is tomorrow! I can’t wait! She’s so excited. She’ll swim 25 freestyle, 25 backstroke, and the freestyle relay.

I promise I’ll start posting again soon! For now, I’ll just give you a quick update on the album that’s getting the most play in the car and on the ipod these days. I’m loving the new one from Grizzly Bear “Veckatimest”. It reminds a great deal of Midlakes “The Trials of Van Occupanther” album. There’s something 60’s about the sound…an AM Gold feel. Open the car windows and soak it in.

3 answers (pictured below).  Perhaps I’ll start posting again soon.

Today marks the release of the 5th full lenght release by one of my favorite bands The Decemberists.
Here’s an email I wrote to some of my music lovin’ buddies a few days ago with regard to the new album:

Understand, this opinion is totally biased as I consider myself a HUGE Decemberists fan: THIS ALBUM IS OFF THE CHARTS GOOD.

Now, before you pop it in the player/computer you must be prepared – I was not. If you’re expecting stand alone songs with sing along choruses, etc. you might be frustrated by this work of genius. It’s at once as daring as it is brilliant. My feel for it is that it’s a play/musical written by Colin Meloy and recorded as an album (I haven’t read such anywhere, but that’s the feeling I get). Each song runs together and shifts perspective between the male, female, and child characters. Bizarre and haunting.

As for how it sounds – wow…I hear this: Arcade Fire, Modest Mouse, Heartless Bastards, and of course classic Decemberists 1900 story telling. It rocks a little harder in spots than we’re used to, but it always quiets back down. There is a singular thread of a song that runs throughout the album…if you’ve seen a broadway musical then you know how they bring a song back throughout to keep the show tied together.

I’ll telling you, I laughed, teared up, got chills all over, and yelled “YES!!!!!” at the top of my lungs while driving because I was so thrilled with some of the moments on this “album”. When you get ready to listen to it, carve out enough time to listen to the whole thing all the way through or it might lose it’s effect. When track 15 hits, you’re gonna freak.

OH “The Hazards of Love”!!!!!!!!!!!

So now after reading actual reviews of the album, it turns out I was right in alot of ways. Very interesting stuff.

Quick training update: I’m plugging away at my training. I did a bike time trial last weekend and finally averaged over 20mph again. I’m prepping now to run a 15k (9 mile) trail race on the 28th.

HAPPY 5TH BIRTHDAY TO THE JOY OF MY LIFE ISABELLA HOPE NIKAZY (fyi, the others are “the joy of my life” too. too)!