With a long weekend a head of me, I woke up Saturday morning with a 3 hour run on my breakfast plate. I headed out the door into the sweltering heat. Not too bad, though, as I headed down the street towards the park. Even though the temperature jumps about 10 degrees once you hit the trails, it still wasn't awful. After climbing more than 1400 feet, I was headed down the backside of the mountain when things started to unravel.
I typically carry a single water bottle...today was no exception. As I'm heading down, I came across a woman sitting under the only tree around for miles (literally). I stopped and asked if she was okay. She wasn't and was suffering from the heat...severely! I gave her my gatorade and waited with her till the rescue team arrived. Once the first paramedic showed up roughly 10-15 minutes later, I continued on my run with a bone-dry water bottle.
I made it to the parking lot at the bottom of the hill still feeling fine and chatted with the rescue team who had pulled 4 people out of the park so far that day. I'm 5 miles from my front door and it's roughly 115 outside at this point and I have nothing to drink. No worries, right?...
Well, that's what I thought, but less than a mile later my thought process drastically changed. I completely bonked! My legs slowed, lungs burned, breathing became harder, stomach started aching, and I was getting dizzy. I made it to the canal before my body completely decided that running any further wasn't going to happen. I walked to the park just off the canal and refilled my water bottle which re-engized me for about a 1/2 mile. I ended up having to walk the last 2.5 of 3 miles because that's all I could do as I continued getting dizzier. By the time I got home, I had died twice, was dizzy and suffering from a mild heat stroke. It took a couple of hours of Kerry taking care of me, but I finally pulled out of it. Needless to say Sunday was spent swimming laps and inside on the treadmill.
I'm just not a HOT weather kind of guy! Till next time...
New Commuter
Pic by K. McDaniel
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Monday, July 4, 2011
San Diego/New Mexico
You just can't beat the short 5 hour drive to San Diego for running. If it was up in elevation say around 8-9,000 feet...it would be perfect. With the 65-70 degrees and endless rolling hills, one can run all day. Granted, Kerry & I had other things on the agenda (Museum Cafe and the Zoo) and I couldn't run for 4 or 5 hours, but I sure wish I could have! Now I'm back in Hell and the temperature topped out at 110+ today.
As I had mentioned previously, I was planning on heading to Los Alamos for the 4th of July, for some good running and climbing on the Jemez trail. Unfortunately, the wildfires burning in and around Los Alamos put the kibosh on that idea. Especially when the person I was hoping to run with had to evacuate! Plus, my long time friend who recently moved to the area still has not received his furniture from the movers. Bummers all around. Glad everyone is fire free now though.
Here it is, the beginning of July, and I'm almost drooling over the idea of heading back to Pagosa Springs, Colorado on October 1st for the Devils Mountain 50 miler or 50K ultra. I'm not sure yet which one I might be running, but either one is sure to be a challenge in elevation alone. We'll have to see how the training goes this month. Considering we're going to be close to record highs this weekend (near 120 degrees) my outlook on training over the next two months is bleak at best. Needless to say, running in Colorado sounds really good right about now.
I'm open to ideas (if you have any) on how to not die, while out running in the next month or two! I'm going to continue swimming to help with my overall fitness and endurance, plus I still have ironman in the back of my mind. The 2010 Devils Mountain 50 miler only had 2 finishers with a time just under 12 hours. Meaning...the race is either brutally hard or it's just not that popular. I have been to Pagosa many of times, so I'm going with brutally hard! The 50K had considerably more runners and the marathon even more than that though.
....If any of you are interested in meeting me in Pagosa on October 1st, let me know!
As I had mentioned previously, I was planning on heading to Los Alamos for the 4th of July, for some good running and climbing on the Jemez trail. Unfortunately, the wildfires burning in and around Los Alamos put the kibosh on that idea. Especially when the person I was hoping to run with had to evacuate! Plus, my long time friend who recently moved to the area still has not received his furniture from the movers. Bummers all around. Glad everyone is fire free now though.
Here it is, the beginning of July, and I'm almost drooling over the idea of heading back to Pagosa Springs, Colorado on October 1st for the Devils Mountain 50 miler or 50K ultra. I'm not sure yet which one I might be running, but either one is sure to be a challenge in elevation alone. We'll have to see how the training goes this month. Considering we're going to be close to record highs this weekend (near 120 degrees) my outlook on training over the next two months is bleak at best. Needless to say, running in Colorado sounds really good right about now.
I'm open to ideas (if you have any) on how to not die, while out running in the next month or two! I'm going to continue swimming to help with my overall fitness and endurance, plus I still have ironman in the back of my mind. The 2010 Devils Mountain 50 miler only had 2 finishers with a time just under 12 hours. Meaning...the race is either brutally hard or it's just not that popular. I have been to Pagosa many of times, so I'm going with brutally hard! The 50K had considerably more runners and the marathon even more than that though.
....If any of you are interested in meeting me in Pagosa on October 1st, let me know!
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