Fear in Fair Hill

The other day Marc and I had planned a trail run. I still hate running. Nothing has changed. But it's a necessary evil, so we were going running. The original plan was to meet up and run right after work when it is nice and bright and sunny. However, as it goes, plans change and we ended up meeting up later than anticipated and didn't head out until around dusk.
We decide to just run a trail near home to try to conserve some daylight. When we get to the trail Marc asks how far I'm going to run. He times his runs, I just run as far as I can and then walk back. So he suggests that I go one way and he heads off in the other and then we'll meet up out on the trail. I say that I don't think this is wise as I always ride the opposite direction and I was afraid of getting lost. He assures me I won't and we head off in opposite directions.
My run started off pretty well for a change. I was going at a decent pace (for me) and I didn't feel like my feet were going to shatter every time they hit the ground. Then I started getting hot. I had asked Marc if it was getting cold out before we left the house. He said yes so I put on a long sleeve t-shirt over my short sleeve one and wore pants instead of shorts. Though it had cooled down, it wasn't that cold. So I'm sweating my ass off and running along; going deeper and deeper into the woods. As I go in deeper I notice it's getting really dark. I start to hear noises. They're kinda creeping me out. Stories of wandering cougars start going through my head, but I keep plodding along. I come to a fork in the trail. Crap I don't know which way to go. I start to go one way and then rethink it and go the other. I continue to move along. I come to another fork and another. Then I'm on a fairly steep rocky downhill. This is odd I think. As I've never come up a rocky decent going up the other way. But I just keep going. I figure maybe it seems worse cause I'm running instead of on my bike. Suddenly I hit the stream at the bottom. There's no crossing. Crap, it's the wrong trail. I'm lost.
It's getting really dark. I pause for a moment contemplating whether I should cross the stream anyway and run across the woods as I know which direction eventually I'll find the trail and run into Marc. I decide against it cause then I'd be running in sopping wet sneakers and it's best to stay on the trail when lost. If I leave the trail then I'm really in trouble.
At this point, I'm lost, I'm getting tired and would normally start walking, but it's getting dark and I don't know where I am. So I turn back to run back up the trail. I now have to run up the steep rocky trail I had just come down. I come to a fork. I try to remember which way I had just come. I keep hearing noises. I figure Marc should be coming up behind me soon. But am I even on the same trail? I don't know how lost I am. I'm running and looking behind me. It's like a scene out of a horror movie where the audience is yelling at the girl in the movie to keep running and stop looking back. I'm tripping all over the place because I keep looking back. I'm completely exhausted at this point, but I can't stop running due to fear. My knees are screaming. I keep looking back. Still no Marc. Where is he? I look again, still nothing, a split second later he's behind me and closing fast. He must have been behind a tree or something when I had looked previously cause he was so close it scared the crap out of me. I screamed and almost fell down as I tripped yet again. I followed him back to the car and then we went home. I will no longer run by myself at dusk, in the woods, on a trail I'm not sure of, or with too many clothes.

Here's a shot from Lilipons yesterday. I usually look like I'm either lollygagging around or coughing up a lung. But here I actually look like I'm working. I still look like I'm suffering, but that's ok, that's cross.

Thanks Mike for the picture.

Picture Pages

Today was Lilipons. Usually when you go to a cross race, it's a park of some sort. There's trees, a fields and some road of some sort. It's great for viewing the race, but never what you'd call picturesque. Lilipons was an exception. This was my first time going to this race. It was a great place for a cross race. The course was great, there was some technical little run-up's, which were cool, and there were liliponds everywhere. It was so neat looking. The race course weaved in and out around them. I saw some broken tape in some places. I'm pretty sure there were a few folks that took the plunge. I saw one guy for sure. Anyway, here are some of my favorite shots from today's events.


Marc, Wes, Amy and I loaded up the toaster with 5 bikes, a gazilion wheels and all our crap and headed off at 6:45am. My race was the first one and Wes's was the last. It was a long day. A good day, but long. I did better this week. I had a lot of fun, still very painful, but did better overall.






Wes and Amy riding along. Wes looks a little scared.













This is one of the cool little landscapes they have set up. Amy liked this little guy.












Marc and Ethan warming up before their race.












Tom, Mike, and Kurt cooling down after their race?












FFA makes a new friend.



















Marc doing what he does.













Everyone hanging out after getting done races. One more to go. Of course I picked this shot cause Fred the Wonder Dog is in it.











Here's my version of the Tour de France sunflower picture. Yeah, you can barely tell there are racers in the picture, but who cares. It looks cool. I actually think that first little spec is Marc.









This was just some cool old dog that let me get down on the ground and play with him. He was nice. My first thought was he looked a bit rough and might take my arm off. But it turns out he's an old softy.

Number One

Today was the first cross race for this area. I'm not going to say much. It was hard, everyone was fast, I wasn't quite as fast as everyone else. Oh well. These things happen. It was still overall a good day. I had a lot of fun. It was my first cross race since 1999. The only way I know this is when Marc went to renew my license for me, it was still in my maiden name. Time goes by so fast.
Everyone did really well today and it was a great day. Luckily the rain held off until we were leaving. Then a monsoon rolled in for the drive home. I think it was due to all the wishing everyone was doing all day for rain. Generally I hate rain. But my race was hot and there was no feed. There were a few drops of rain every so often. I kept hoping the sky would open up to cool me down. But alas it did not. Later in talking to someone else I found out he was thinking the same thing during his race. I imagine there were probably others.

TGIF

I am very happy today. For one it's Friday, which is always a good thing. And it's actually a weekend again as I went back to work this week. So I have a week behind me now. But what's even better is I just got my mini back. I dropped it off two weeks ago to get the roof fixed after my unfortunate bikerack/garage incident. Today it was finally done and I was able to pick it up. Yeah!
In the meantime I've been driving a rental, a Pontiac Vibe. I had no idea what this was when I was at the rental center picking up the car. I just said give me the smallest and cheapest car you have. The Vibe was it. For those that don't know what a Vibe is, it's not small, not even close. It's kinda like a little SUV. So compared to other SUV's, then yeah, it's small. Compared to a Mini, it's huge! Let's just say my road bike fit in the back completely intact.
So I've been driving the Vibe. It felt like a big boat, but as the days went on I got used to it. I even started to think maybe it wasn't all too bad. Then I picked my car up. I got in and oh, it felt so nice to be back on leather seats. Then I adjusted everything and I felt oddly high. Not cause my seat was out of adjustment, it was just cause I could see again. I was basically a driving head in the Vibe. I couldn't see crap. Then I pulled out onto the highway and hit the gas hard, cause the Vibe required that just to move. I took off like a shot. Yes! A big smile came across my face. I love my car. I'm so happy it's back. Oh, and the shop did an awesome job. It looks just like knew. You'd never know. Beautiful.
So today is a good day.

Everyday

This is Chris. Chris is awesome. He's my guitar teacher. Playing guitar is actually something I do more than riding. I haven't been playing long. I was bored one day and decided I was going to start playing guitar. Cause you know you can just do those sorts of things. Or so I thought. I figured I'd get a guitar, take a few lessons and I'd be playing in no time. Actually when I first told Marc about my intentions I had said I was going to teach myself. He quickly said no way, if I was going to get a guitar, I was going to get someone to teach me how to play. That's when he introduced me to Chris. That was a little over two years ago.
What started out as something to keep me busy when I get bored, quickly turned into a true passion. I love playing. It's great. I love everything about it. Well most everything. Sometimes Chris and I don't see eye to eye on what he wants me to do and what I'm willing to do. I try to keep an open mind and he just laughs at me as I scrunch up my face when he asks me to play rock or improvise. I still do them even though they aren't my favorites.
My favorite is actually classical. When I first started playing Chris had asked me what I wanted to get out of it. I had said I just wanted to be able to play whatever, thinking probably something rock related. He has since taught me all kinds of stuff and one was classical. When he first showed me classical I was like wow this sucks. I hated it. My fingers just didn't work that way. Well somewhere along the way everything changed. I love it. I love all the intricacy it contains. I love to read music. I love the feeling of accomplishment after working on a really hard piece until it flows.
The last two weeks I've been kinda bummed because I had completed my classical book and Chris didn't know which book he wanted me to do next. Tonight I got my next book. Yeah the guy looks like some kind of 70's reject with the turtleneck and feathered hair. But if the music is anything like the first one, it'll be great.
Though classical is my favorite type to play, I do not have a classical guitar. I play on an acoustic or electric. My electric is my favorite. Though Chris keeps telling me I should get a classical. We'll see, one day.
Basically if I hadn't gotten bored one weekend when Marc was away, I may not have ended up finding something that I truly love doing so much.

Monkey See, Monkey Do

I did cross practice yesterday and my legs said enough is enough. They were tight balls of knots. They hurt so bad, I could barely go up and down stairs. Marc tried rubbing them out for me and it was just agony. When I woke up this morning I lay in bed thinking there's no way I'm riding today, my legs need a break. I get up, go down stairs, look out the window and it's beautiful. I talk to Marc and tell him I don't think I'm gonna ride, I'm gonna take a rest day. I wait for his response, thinking it will be, no you need to get out and at least spin them out. Instead he says ok. Crap, ok, I'm going riding.
I follow him down to the PWC light ride. I figure I'll just do flats down there won't be bad. I'll ride with them to Frazier and then pull off and do my own thing. We take off, and it's not too bad. By the first turn I'm in my big ring. Mmmm, not good, Marc told me to stay out of my big ring today. Oh well, I'm still spinning. I'm talking to Billy V. He asks me if I race road when not racing cross. I said "no way, mountain bike. On the road you get too hurt". He replies with, "well you fall more in mountain biking". I said "yes, but it's bumps and bruises, on the road you're loosing skin". He chuckled and agreed.
We get to Frazier. Marc asks if I'm going to pull off. I said not yet, I'm doing ok, I'll hang in a little longer. We ride on, I'm hanging on to the wheel in front of me trying my best not do to anything stupid in the pack. We hit the two more turns. Each time Marc asks if I'm pulling off. I said I'll wait until we get to 213, then I'll head off to Locust Point. It was kinda nice cruising along at a nice pace. I couldn't do that by myself. We get to 213, crap, the pack makes a right, I'm on the inside, I can't make a left. Oh well, going the wrong way now. We get out to 40 and we're headed off to Northeast. Now this is bad, I can't stay with this group and I no longer know how to get back. Finally Marc pulls up beside me and tells me where I need to go to get back. Finally I pull off.
I'm now on my own on roads I don't know. I ride on and get out to an intersection I recognize. It's only a few miles from my house, but my car was at Peoples. I start working my way back. I hate going through major intersections, so I took off hard to get through quickly. On the other side I'm riding along, spinning trying to recover a bit and this guy pulls up beside me and say hi and tries to ride on past. Well of course I can't let that happen. Especially since he looked like some guy just out for a Sunday ride. He had on a t-shirt and shorts, sneakers, had some old bike and toe clips, he must have been easily 250 lbs or more. So I click up a couple gears to pass him. Only he sees me and he clicks up, or kinda clicks up. His gears sounded a mess. So now we're racing down 213, finally I get in front of him, but I think I can still hear those gears behind me. We come to a slight down hill, and here he comes rolling up again. Gearth was on his side. It took everything to get him up the next roller. I just couldn't believe I couldn't get this guy off me. But I'm sure he was thinking, there's no way I'm letting this little girl drop me. Finally I turned off and he went straight. I'm sure he had a heart attach shortly there after.
So I'm almost back and then I see a rider, we wave to each other, and as we get closer we recognize each other. It's Fort James. We turn around and talk. He says he's headed out to Locust Point and asked if I wanted to go. I said sure, I was supposed to be headed there in the first place. So we go down around Locust Point, start working our way back, and finally I get back to the car.
So good for a nice easy ride. Ooops.