CO2011
Boulder Running Company - the Hoka One One brand of gimmicky triathlete shoes.
Ben tried on one that was specifically designed for downhill trail running. Do you switch to a different pair, mid-run, for uphill trail running?
Then, we went to the Fleet Feet in Boulder. It was tiny!! So tiny they couldn't keep the shoes on the wall, but they hung them from the ceiling. It was a pretty cool concept:
After messing around at the running stores, we decided to get some food at Panera and then drive up Flagstaff to let the food settle and kill some time.
Then we ran up Flagstaff... haha, kinda.
Chataqua Park, the mouth to many many trails, including Mesa and Flagstaff. That's gravel path is a pretty solid uphill, even though it doesn't look like it in the photo. Actually, the trail to Flagstaff is way off to the right. This one will take you to Mesa.
Ben held the camera phone while I ran... I needed all the head start I could get. Here's an example of the steps that always get me -- so hard for short legs. This is me riking.
And some more photos, posed this time. Workin' out my new 101s.
And he carried our water too!
So, funny story. Emily mentioned in an earlier post that she and Scott got stuck on Flagstaff in hail, when they went to run there in the evening. (Never. Even at relatively low altitudes, weather is completely unpredictable up there...)
Anyway, Ben and I took a different trail into the Flagstaff trails than I had used when I ran with the Newton group earlier in the week, so it was unfamiliar to me. We must've totally missed a turn because we got hardcore L-O-S-T lost. To the point where we were climbing up these gigantic boulders and following sad-looking run-off streams (that were clearly not the trail) because it meant getting closer to the top... but as you can see in the photos above, the trail is pretty obvious. I have no idea how we lost it.
Each climb seemed to go on forever! We'd climb on hands and knees up a large boulder, thinking that above the next one - to where we could see - there would either be a road or that would be the peak. But sadly, no. It kept going on and on. We told ourselves we had to be close each and every time, so we kept on going, rather than turning around... because going back down is much scarier than up when you're climbing on huge rocks. Finally, after climbing up about 1/4 of the moutain, we reached the amphitheater and the flagstaff (get it?) at the top -- we took some crazy backwards way and climbed into the back of the amphitheater sans trails. Just climbing. No riking, just climbing. It was ridiculous.
Honestly, the view was only ok because it was obscured by trees. But seeing as we did Sanitas and I didn't make it all the way to the top of Flagstaff earlier this week, I was glad we finally conquered it!!
If you recall the original picture above of Chataqua Park and that trail, here it is from wayyyy above. The trail pictured is along the treeline at the top edge of the park. You can see all the little trails that cross through that open hilly park space. We riked all the way up from down there!
Heading down...
We must be completely dumb. Could we have missed trails this obvious?
Awesome view of the city in the background.
Sun was going down as we rushed to finish...
'Cause then we headed to Pearl Street in Boulder for the Pear Street Mile. It's a quick one-mile race, lollipop-shaped course, that goes right through downtown Boulder. It's amazing... I would like to do one in Bloomington, but the city is not runner-friend when it comes to closing streets, even if for the few minutes it took these elites to run a mile.
Women's elite race. Winner ran 4:43.
Men's Elite race. We realized we'd chatted at breakfast with the winner and runner-up at the Newton retail summit days before. Today was the launching of their Newton team, Team Alchemy. Winner ran 4:15.... mind you, this is at altitude!
The Boulder Theater was right around the last turn to the finish line. This is where we had our Newton night out on Monday! It's cool and historic-y.
Annnd the finish line, right on the Pearl Street Mall.
After this we went over to meet up with some friends, Brice and Alyssa, who literally moved to Boulder less than 24 hours prior. Alyssa hadn't seen the Mall and we decided to go there and eat at Mountain Sun Brewery. Good food! They were out of a lot of stuff, but it's all good.
Then, I called Mike and he came out again, so we all trucked over to Spooners for some frozen yogurt. We listened to Mike tell us about his newest orientation "assignment" and the $5 challenge (your team gets 5 bucks and 2 hours to make as much money as you can, legally). So we came up with a bunch of stupid ideas for him, which was wayyy more entertaining than the legit ideas. :) I'm hoping Brice and Mike can pull it together to become the CU Boulder running club this year..........
Another late night again. How do we keep doing this?!
No comments:
Post a Comment