Living Above the Geoid: Going to Try This Again...

I'm going to try and start writing here again. After half a year of not writing, the shorter forms of Bookface and Twitter are no longer cutting it for me. Plus I have a new thing for 2015, or more accurately restarting an old thing.

Starting on Monday (January 12 for those counting), I'm going to be coached by Jonathan Davis, who is the man behind 92Fifty (the team race for) and Elevated Legs. He is a very experienced 24 hour (former national champion, if I remember correctly) and 100 mile racer, so I'm very excited to be working under him. He will be working around my busy work schedule, so when I'm travelling I'll be running and doing core work and cross training. I actually like running, and there are some pretty fun places to run where I usually travel. After 1.5 years in Colorado and basically three years off any formal training plan, I'm very excited to get at it. There are a lot of great races here in the West, and I have gotten the itch to explore them all. To the right of these words is what I'm looking at for this year. As you can see, there's the possibility of a full NUE season there using none of the NUE races I've done before. Also there is the Vapor Trail 125. I remember reading about this race many years ago and thinking that it would be hard; all but the first 10 and last 10 miles of the race are over 8500 ft and you spend a good portion above treeline at night. JD (who has done many 24 hour solos) says it's the hardest one day race anywhere. I want to give it a try this year. My goal is to finish, and hopefully finish strong. Another big one is the Maah Daah Hey 100. That is a 105 mi point-to-point singletrack race on the Maah Daah Hey Trail in North Dakota. North Dakota you say? You're confused about why one would go to North Dakota for anything? Well, I can guarantee you that it will be worth it, and I haven't even been there yet. I'm very excited for both of these races.

Saturday I got on my bike for the first time this year. I did a short loop at White Ranch because I was heading up the mountains on Sunday to do a 4 hr ride from the Shop down to Idaho Springs. Saturday's loop was fun, if a bit icy. I rode early to avoid snowmelt, so everything was still very frozen. I had a hiker ask me at the trailhead how I did with ice. I told him that it only made it more interesting. I think I'm one of those mountain bikers who is not turned away by bad trail conditions (unless I'd damage the trail), so riding on packed, footprint-ridden snow was just another thing. I doubt many people rode trails that day. It was a good first ride of the year. Later that afternoon Mrs. Geology and I went on a walk on some of the paved trails around Golden.

Sunday's main event was the classic Black Hawk to Idaho Springs loop coming back on Oh My God Road and Dory Hill Road. It was a good ride, but definitely a hard jump into 2015 training. 7k of climbing over 45 mi in 5.5 hrs, but I made it home in good spirits. Now I'm shoving food in my face and waiting for a reasonable hour to go to bed.

Some pictures from White Ranch: