You're hot then you're cold. You're yes you're no.

Basically my life is being turned upside down. Very confusing last couple weeks. As you may have read I was considering becoming a Rally Car driver. This dream of mine has been put on the back burner for now, for the most part I have bigger things ahead of me before i get behind the wheel of a ker. I guess we will start from the beginning and say my attempt to go to Jr Nationals are over... Well they were over a couple weeks ago, just didn't wanna face it. It tears me apart that I won't be beside my main man DC next weekend, but it is all for the best I guess. I guess I'll bore you will the greasy details of my early retirement. Basically was, and still am, working 40 hours a week on a farm, and trying to run over 100km a week, as well as do huge workouts, and last but not least have a social life. Not the best way to train properly. Oh well, lesson learned. So the plan was to either quit my job, give up my friends, or hang up the spikes for good. All of which I wasn't super keen on doing. So I compromised by doing a bit of all three. Lowered my hours at work, lowered the mileage to a tolerable volume, kept the workouts pretty intense but with the lower mileage its easier to handle, as for my social life, well.... I'll tell more on this if you keep reading.

Alright so after my decision to not head over to Winnipeg for Jr Nats, took a couple days off, recuperate a bit, fix up all the little tweaks, and then jumped back into the training. But whats summer training without summer racing? And now without further ado, the first official race report NPS has ever given...

The Grind 2nd Annual 1/2 MARATHON

This year is the 2nd year for the event, the 1st year was last year. Wow, that was kinda awkward sounding, I don't know how to make it sound less weird and still make the point I'm trying to make... Anyways, Myself and DC raced it last year with SM, not the point though, the first 15km were in 63 minutes, and last 6km were in 21minutes. Overall a 1:24, not to shabby considering the 1st 3/4 was pretty pedestrian, and for our first 1/2 ever.

This year the plan was slightly different from last year, as last year we jogged the first 15km. Now we had a time goal. One hour twenty minutes. Pretty reasonable, but all we had was DC who would only pace us for 15km as a long tempo to prepare for Jr Nats and Benabus a nordic skier who kinda runs... Finally there was me, not very fit white guy, well kinda fit, just a tad burnt for the above reasons. either way, we took off like rockets. Literally! 2:55 first kilometer. Actually I'm just f***ing with you. It was probably a 4min kilometer. Either pretty slow start again as we needed 3:48's or something. But I mean it was plus 40 (kinda hot)! So seen my pops out on the course watching, yelled at him asking to become the pace car and give us water in between water stops, which turned out to be super clutch! Now 15km in DC drops back. Lets me go solo as we dropped Benabus on the Heartbreak Hill of this half. Solo for 6km. I can do this. But wait... Am I on pace. I have no idea, I dont wear a watch. I just cant stand watches (future post). So all I can do is push on and hope I'm rolling. And then... it hits me. I need to find a place to drop the kids off at the pool (if you catch my drift). I then remembered a similar situation happened to someone... Reid Coolsaet. Yepp, in the biggest race of his career he hasta take a pit spot.

Funny story about Reid, I met him once. Well it was kinda funny. So here we are at CIS, the StFX XC team chilling in this fancy hotel lobby, next thing we know there he is! All of us are s***y our pants, I mean to us he is cooler than Robert Pattinson or Tom Cruise. Basically we just starred. It was weird. But we then got up and went to dinner. Then of course the main event "The Dance" aka the race. Then the after event. Was being my drunk loner self walking around this hotel and then boom. I see him. And boom, there is my buddy GQ, perfect now I have a wingman. Lets go. Walked right up to him shook him on the hand, Gave him a beer and played flip cup with him. BAD ASS! That might be the first time i have used language that foul on this blog without staring it out.

Back to the race, looked for a porta-potty for about a kilometer then noticed I was entering a area with homes and stuff... S*** S***... Quickly seen this driveway without a home on it, went up the driveway, grabbed a leaf, took care of business and back on the road, only took 25 seconds. Pretty pumped about the success of my trip i didn't notice that Benabus caught up. Looked at him and said "dude i just took a s***". Then surged away. Now 4 kilometers later, flying down the home stretch not knowing if I broke 1:20, I see the director he looks at me and said you are breaking the course record by 7 minutes! I was soo pumped but had another 200m to go, so I enjoyed every minute of the win and crossed the line at 1:17. BOOM!

Pretty long... sorry.
anyways, I pulled a Reid Coolsaet.

rj

You Can't Trust The System, Man!

Never thought I'd post this one, but I'm not saving it for a rainy day. Yes, it's Part 1 of my List of Dirty Secrets and Things I Think About While Running.

1. Every time I run past road kill, I just gotta hold my breath. I'm convinced that the disease brewing inside the dead animal could somehow infect me if I breath it in.

2. At every culvert that I pass, I wonder to myself whether I fit inside it, which inevitably leads to wondering if I could live in it for several days if I needed to hide from the police. But what if the cops had dogs to sniff you out? I'd stuff each end with road kill.

3. It's possible that I speed up a tiny amount when I run past someone on the street.

4. I feel bad doing a workout on the track when the guy in the wheelchair is there...


More to come!

Cheap Zoo

Today was a kinda interesting day. Not any less exciting than a normal day, if anything, more exciting. The details are the most important part.

1. Ker. Or as normal people say car.

2. Parents Debit card. Free money for life!

Pretty much all you need for a good time. Once in possession of said items, the next thought was... What am I to do with all these items. Could do anything. I could be writing this from a plane over China right now. I'm not. But I could be.

Now for what I actually did. Firstly filled the ker up with gas. It aint cheap either, $1.20 per litre. Thats crazy! I remember when gas was 80 cents! Aww... The good ol'days. Moving on. once the tank was filled my mission started. It was to go fast. Go fast and not get caught. Yeah, thats right, I was driving 10 over the speed limit. Ended up at the Cheap Zoo.

Looked at all the Lizards and snakes, the rabbits and ferrets, then finally ended up at the fish! Oh boy oh boy, I love looking at the fish in the Cheap Zoo. I was later informed that I was not at a Cheap Zoo, that it was a pet store. And that the animals were all for sale! Great news!

Three new family members were brought back to the rj residence. Fred, Pip and Bee. 3 beautiful gold fish.

What all this hasta do with running... dunno. Just a exciting part of my life.

rj

Give It Up?

Close your eyes, here my voice, go to the place the words take you...

Oh s***. This blog doesn't talk out loud. Too bad. Lets see now how good my describing skills are, I'll try to give you an image of what is going on, not sure how this is gunna work.

Sitting on the start line, your partner next to you, the engine roars as your foot eases onto the gas pedal. Waiting patiently for the green light so you can tear down the dirt road...

You are in it now, in it to win it, the car pushes around corners with ease, flies over humps. Your partner looks over at you and says, "it gets a bit tricky up here, sharp corners up ahead". The course has a S shape bend followed by a jump that leads into a sharp left. You slam the pedal to the floor, drifted around the first half of the S, ease up on the gas a bit to gain control just to slam it down again to get around the other half. You come out of the S with a little to much speed, hit the jump, and over shot the corner. BOOM! Car ended up in the trees.

Story over.

Was out driving the other night, just fooling around a bit, taking some fast sharp corners and stuff, being foolish being the young boy that I am. and it kinda got me thinking, Give it up? give up jogging for Rally Car racing... Sounds pretty fun. Then as I kept thinking about it, I realized that DEATH is a big part of that sport. I mean sure its fun to go fast, and stuff, but I think I can get the same satisfaction from my two feet than 4 wheels. When I'm driving, I don't feel in control, think about it, all the get in the gas and the steering. everything else is pre determined gas, road, weight, etc, etc. But when running, everything is under your control, think about it, your gas tank isn't 60L it doesn't run off a fuel that will run out, your gas tank runs on guts. You know like that Pre quote. And as for a road? there doesn't need to be one, every run could be an adventure, one where you find yourself on top of a mountain, or along side the ocean where the waves get your feet wet every step. Amazing things the human body. So much more than metal, plastic, and rubber. I'm not telling anybody to run or to stop driving or whatever, just think about how amazing you every day vehicle is.

all you need is legs.

rj