Ohio Cycling Disorder (OCD)

    The race season of 2020 has just now been severely impacted and not for the positive. In the grand scheme of things, racing is just something that most of us do for fun, to push ourselves against the best competitors willing to toe the line, and how we get that natural-high that many of us thrive on. Racing is not the be all end all to life, for sure. However for many racing is hugely social, bringing like-minded folks together to share stories, catch up with friends (practically family), and frankly to just be together. These gatherings can be small local events with  50-100 people and they can be downright huge at thousands of people, not to mention all of the volunteers and friends & family supporting their athlete. Therein lies the problem because at this very moment the COVID-19 virus has become a Pandemic, continues to spread, and spread fast. Unnervingly fast. What is the countries best defense against such an outbreak? Stop the spread! What is one o...

Or as my beautiful wife just informed me, " Talking to you during these times is like a Mental Mosh Pit " - Angie Coughing, sneezing, blowing my nose, body feeling beyond fatigued as in ZERO energy (lifting my arms was a chore), a general hot mess of a human being, yet I found myself in that all too common mental-ballet that endurance athletes find themselves in of deciding whether or not to attend a race that I worked so hard for and was slated for Sunday. This was my mental and physical state as of Friday, 2/14/2020 and after I already canceled the hotel room. Saturday morning I woke up, having fallen asleep after 1:30am, feeling so much better so what did I do? Naturally, I packed my race bag for the 50k that I was now going to race the next day.  #winning #notreally Leading up to this sad state of affairs was a high volume three week training block with more running than I had ever taken on. I am training for my first 100-mile trail running race set for the end...

I have the perfect recipe for Peanut Butter!!  Third run in my new Saucony Peregrine 10s. Ingredients Water - two days worth should suffice Binder - 12.4 miles of dirt, root, & rock style trails (preferably in an area that has clay soil) Blender - roughly 400 trail runners (amount may vary based on ingredient #1) Instructions : Add water to the binder ingredient before adding the final ingredient and let rest overnight. This gives the binder and water time to really set in for a more moist product. Then simply add the final ingredient over the span of 4.5 - 8 hours allowing the peanut butter mixture to really take shape, work out any chunks (we're looking for a smooth and not chunky consistency), and provide a well-mixed final product. I think they need to rename the race from Rocks & Roots Ultra 50k to Peanut Butter & Brownie Batter Ultra 50k, but I am getting ahead of myself. The course is at Alum Creek State Park near Columbu...

Near Hale Farm & Village around miles 17 & 60 The Ramp Up The ramp-up for this trail run would start the week following the Marji Gesick 100(ish) ... errr ... more like 108. #blametodd and #blamedanny  I did not have a ton of miles the first week but I only had 3-weeks to ramp-up as I had selected a weekend where my daughter and wife would not be around so that I did not completely toast a day that would take me away from them had they been home. The ramp-up went something like this and was right out of the playbook from what I did for the Burning River Back-50 Mile Race over the summer: Week One - (31.2 miles and 109 cycling miles) 9/26 - 1:10-hours just to see where the legs are (8 miles) 9/28 - 2+ hours with a Trail 1/2 marathon distance (13.1 miles) 9/29 - 1:22 hours with 5-minute hard hill repeats x4 (9 miles) Week Two - (56.1 miles and 127 cycling miles) 9/30 - 1:04-hours (7.5 miles) 10/1 - 2+ hours (12 miles) (this was four days of running in...