Endurance Planet, Booze & Trail Running

So this is how I ended my last post:

" I can't believe some of the opportunities triathlon has opened up for me, you never know what is around the corner."

How true it is, I had an unexpectedly awesome weekend!  It started with a Podcast.  Endurance Planet is the first podcast I ever listened to, and I started listening shortly after Tawnee & Lucho hooked up for "Ask the Ultrarunner/Coaches" back in the end of 2011, before I even knew what order swim/bike/run was in a triathlon and was hoping to survive a marathon. 

Well this weekend Endurance Planets wicked host Tawnee Prezak came to visit chilly Colorado.  She put out the call on the podcast that she was coming up and looking to meet any Endurance Planet fans so I got in touch.  I was excited to meet her, love the podcast, awesome passionate triathlete and we're both coached by Lucho.  I figured we could commiserate over some of the crazy stuff he comes up with :p

Now like every time I seem to get together with triathletes, the events revolved around Beer :p  I swear I only drink around triathletes.  Tawnee's man John came along for the trip and he's a Beer enthusiast (not sure thats a strong enough word, he really knows his stuff!) so hitting up some local breweries was on the agenda.  Its been such a whorl wind getting set up in Denver, I haven't taken the time to explore some of the local attractions, and I have to say there are some pretty cool local breweries around here.  Check out Tawnee's blog for more details about the breweries!  

 

Tawnee & I

When you think Breweries, what’s the first thing you think of?  Obviously it's Kombucha...wait...what?  Randomness, I met up with Lucho, Tawnee and John at Crooked Stave and had my first taste of this stuff.  Now I've heard great things about how it can help with gut bacteria, but when you Google Kombucha this is the description, "a food supplement prepared from a symbiotic colony of yeast and bacteria that is added to tea for its alleged health benefits" Sounds yummy eh?  I figured because its good for me it must taste horrible (5 year old mentality coming out :p).  Luckily Tawnee insisted I try some and....it tasted great!  Sweet, but bubbly nothing like the mould flavour I had imagined.  So I hightailed it over to Whole Paycheque to grab a few bottles, thanks for the new expensive habit Tawnee :p

The next day was definitely an adventure.  It had been the coldest week since I've arrived in Colorado, to the point I gave in and did a few treadmill runs last week.  What better way to spend an Saturday than enjoying it outside with freezing fog, temperatures below 20 degrees F on an icy trail?  Actually I couldn't think of a better way to spend it, it was an absolute blast and of course racked up a few bad ass points that day (you can trade those in race day for speed).  

So a group of ultrarunners and triathletes assembled in the freezing fog at Flatirons Vista to set off on an icy adventure.  Check out the video John shot of our adventure click here.

Neeraj, GZ, Lucho, Tawnee, John, Me

Lucho with his favourite athletes...ok he didn't say that but come on.... :p

No visibility!

The biggest shock of this run...Lucho ran :p  He had packed up his running clothes, started giving away running shoes, retired.  It was great to have him out there, he coaches Tawnee and I so it was cool to run with both of them.  Hoping to drag him out on some bike rides this season, so he can kick my ass on the road :)  We had another super star triathlete spotting on the run (Lucho being the 1st of course), Mary Beth Ellis was out there cruising in the snow with her dog making it look easy!  Only in Boulder...

He runs again!

Now the ultrarunners definitely knew how to get over this terrain, they made it look easy!  I know I was sliding all over the place, I think my core got more of a workout than anything else just recovering from near faceplants!  I haven't had so much fun training in a long time, it wasn't the crazy terrain but the company.  I think I need to make more of an effort to find some training partners.  I had an awesome group to train with in Midland, TX, that made even the most stomach turning brutal sessions a lot more enjoyable, but pretty much spent last year training by myself in Scotland.

We ended up cruising through just over 9 miles at 10:15 pace. This kind of running its definitely more about the time on your feet than mileage.  I'm absolutely going to be doing more trail running, just take speed out of the equation enjoy the scenery, go off effort and worry less about numbers. I was super impressed with Tawnee and John coming up here to run at elevation, I was knocked on my ass for months after moving up here and they just cruised through it!

What do you do after a frosty run?  Head to a brewery in Boulder of course!  We hit up Southern Sun for some refreshments and food.  Chill ski lodge like place that was made even better by good conversation and food. John ordered some beer samplers, I'm definitely digging the beer sampling, and we tasted some of their specialties.  The stand out one for me was a Mint Stout, it was bizarre, tasted like a thin mint!

I love it, the randomness, new experiences, epic conditions and good beer, what more could you ask for?  I'll say it again, never know what is around the corner with this triathlon adventure, the people, experiences, places its taken me have been an unexpected bonus to this crazy sport.  Maybe next time I'll be blogging from Taiwan, I have no plans to travel there but insane stuff like last minute races in exotic locations just seems to happen lol. 

Carpe Diem!

Thankfully It warmed up a bit in Denver this week!

Left is Sundays snow run, by Thursday warm and sunny!