Whoops. Guess the whole writing thing got away from me a bit. I can justify my silence here by pointing out we’ve been involved in this new church thing, and I’ve been writing about those experiences here (should you feel inclined to read about such things). The Fall passed mostly without incident, and with only a small amount of rock climbing. We managed to get to Coopers Rock a few times, but it seemed when we had the time, the weather didn’t cooperate, and when the weather cooperated, our schedules didn’t. Admittedly, I was a bit listless with climbing this fall–I didn’t really train consistently, and I didn’t really have any specific goals, especially at Coopers. That isn’t to say I didn’t have fun (I did!), but I didn’t have the motivation to regularly train.

Apparently the lack of real climbing goals has done something to my brain, and I decided to join Jen in running the Glacier Ridge Ultra 30k in April (for you Americans, that means a little over 18 miles). This is likely triple the distance of my longest run (including my halcyon days as a high school cross country runner), so I reckon I have a goal and some motivation for the next few months. My goal is rather simple: finish the race without permanent injury. Running has been generally enjoyable over the last few weeks, and it’s good to have a goal dangling out there. I’ve shelved climbing, at least ’til the system board is built in the basement, and that’s okay, too, given that honest-to-goodness winter has settled here. It’s neat to be learning a new thing. You might say “how does one learn running?” but like most things, there are little details that might not be obvious the outsider (such as, what sort of things can my stomach tolerate during a 30k run or how do I deal with the inevitable mental valley during the race when I’d much rather be at home on the couch instead of halfway through a race on some obscure bit of singletrack trail on the distance shores of Lake Arthur?). I enjoy these sorts of learning experiences, and I suspect this race (and the lead-up to it), will provide plenty of opportunities to learn both about running and myself.

Don’t worry, the space won’t become a training (today I ran twelve miles and only felt like dying twice!), but I may document some of the more interesting moments, particularly when we go off for long runs in the woods.

Posted on 6 January 2013