Birthday Challenge – 45 years old

I turned 45 on September 6th. But that was Labor Day weekend and that seemed like a busy weekend to try to do a good challenge. So I decided to do the challenge the next weekend. After hashing it out and trying to figure out what exactly to do I came up with the challenge. It was a 2-part challenge. Part 1 was a weekend challenge:

In 45 hours I would run/jog/hike 45 kilometers(28 miles), ride my bike off 45 obstacles and climb 45 boulder problems. I knew I could do the boulder problems and the obstacles. I wasn’t sure about the run/jog/hike, especially since I wanted to do it all in one go if possible.

Bob decided to join me and let me know that he was going to try to get here Friday September 9th with enough time and light to get a mountain bike ride in. We  got our stuff ready, had an oat soda or two and headed to the trail head. Immediately I got a quick huck off the slab in.

Obstacle #1

We quickly headed out for the ride. It was a pretty good mix of riding and hitting stunts. We got some good trail riding in and I got to ride some fun stuff.

George's Drop

This is one I helped build and it’s pretty spicy.

Homeless Drop

This roller is so good you can do it from both directions. The picture’s a bit blurry, but I kind of like that about it.

Steep gumdrop foller

We finished up and headed home. I think we had almost 20 obstacles ridden, so it was a good start to the challenge. We rode into a nice sunset on our way to the car. 

Sunset at Sycamore Rocks

 When we got home Amber had made us some delicious stir fry and then we sat on the patio and watched the lightning and hydrated with a few more oat sodas.

Lightning

Saturday morning we had a little bit of a leisurely start, probably hitting the road for the first run around 9am. I have a loop I do from my house that is either 3 or 4 miles depending on how I do it. We did the 4 mile variation and I took it easy and walked up any uphills, knowing that my legs were going to get hammered and I’d need all the help I could get by the end of the day. The run went well. We grabbed some supplies for the day and went out to the next leg. This was a long 12 mile run in the desert. Pat joined us for this and we got busy. It actually has a fair amount of climbing at the start, so I walked a lot of that and then tried to job as much as possible.

The weather was pretty amazing. The were some clouds in the sky and it was pretty cool. I think it was the best weather I’ve ever had for a birthday challenge. You could see a potential for rain but it seemed like we might not get any where we were. So I called myself lucky and kept going.

At somewhere around mile 10 total I told Bob that we had done 10 miles and he was guessing that we had already done 16. I think he just normally goes by time and since his pace is faster than mine he assumed we had ran farther than we did. Oh well, I figure the gps doesn’t lie too much.

Pat and I running towards Bell Mountain.

Bob and I cruising on a nice downhill section.

Somewhere around the 11 or 12 mile mark my legs started to worry me. I was getting these little shocks in my thigh muscles that are usually a pre-curser to cramping. Sure enough, not too long later I started to get little cramps. Most of them were on my abductor muscles on the thigh and they weren’t too bad but it kept me from running too much. I would run a little bit, walk a little bit, run a little bit, etc… The last 4 miles were pretty grueling and by the time I got back to the car I was feeling pretty hammered. Another 12 miles didn’t seem so feasible right then.

Feeling Dead

 We headed home to resupply, grab some bouldering gear and rehudrate. I have had some good luck with pickle juice helping me on bad cramping days, so when we got home I ate the rest of the pickles in the house and drank all the juice. I also had some sports drinks, water and a beer. I had planned on doing all the running in one go, but Bob and I decided that it might be better to go do some bouldering and then do some more running after that.

We headed to an area called Airport Rocks and started playing around. It’s always fun taking someone new to an area. Bob was exploring and looking at things that we hadn’t paid much attention to. Unfortunately it seemed like someone had recently had a big paintball battle there. I couldn’t believe how many paintballs were littered on the ground and the stuff on the rocks was still wet and slimy. We had to skip a few problems and I definitely slipped on a few problems due to wet fingertips or shoes.

Paintball splattered boulders aren't perfect for climbing.

We also admired the graffiti. There was a whole lot of it promoting 4:20 and smoking weed, as well as the gratuitous sexual references. We liked this one a lot.

We weren’t sure whether she was supposed to be a ‘Tard or a Turd but we liked the amibiguity of it.

We managed to get 35 Boulder problems in and decided to get some more trail running in. Just as we were getting in the car there was a very loud clap of thunder. We figured we were safer in the car, so we hopped in and took off.

We were back at the Slab for some trail running and it seemed like we were going to be alright with the weather. But as we started to jog up the trail it started to rain slightly and we could see lightning in the distance. As we continued to run it seemed like the storm and lightning was coming towards us and the rain was getting harder. Bob said that it was my challenge, so he’d let me decide what to do. We kept going but then it just seemed like a bad idea to keep going so we turned around. Fortunately it’s mostly downhill to the car so we made good time. Unfortunately it was really starting to rain so we got soaked.  Still we did get another 3 miles or so in, which got me to 19 total.

We quickly left the storm behind, since everything was pretty localized. But when we got back home it was just starting to sprinkle there. Drats. We still had a little light left, so we decided to do another short run and figured that we could handle getting wet if that’s what happened. The rain stopped almost as soon as we started, so we didn’t have to worry about that. We got four miles in and finished as it was getting dark. 23 miles down, 5 more to go. Time to clean up and get some dinner.

We went to Viva Maria’s a favorite Mexican Restaurant of ours and had some margaritas and way too much food. By the end of dinner both Bob and I felt like crap. I think we had done too much exercise to digest our food properly and we felt like we had huge food bombs in our guts. Bob and talked about putting some beers in his backpack and going for a walk to get another couple miles in. So we did. The moon was almost full so everything was pretty well lit. We were also hoping that walking would make our stomachs feel better, but it never happened. In the end, we just kept walking and I finished the last five miles I had. 45K of running/jogging/walking down. Time to sit on the patio, watch some more lightning and relax before heading to bed.

We were pretty leisurely again on Sunday morning. I had 10 more boulder problems and 25 more obstacles on the bike and we figured we could get it done without having to stress too much. We headed to Horseman’s Center and the Napkin for the bouldering and Pat met us there.

Tubby ticking #39

Pat was bouldering well, even doing some of the circus routes. This one is called “Belva Rocks” and you can only touch the rock with your feet, knees, and/or head.

I couldn’t do it that day, but this picture is a very good reminder of why I want to lose 45 pounds over the course of the next year. But Pat floated it.

The most notorious problem on the boulder is “The Sound of Gummy Tapping.” It’s not that hard, but I broke my ankle falling off it a few years ago and our friend Josh broke his wrist falling off of it many years prior. Neither of us had a good spotter. Now we refuse to do it without making sure we are spotted well.

I finished the bouldering in good style with an ascent of a fun endurance problem that is still waiting for a name from Pat. Only a bunch of bike stunts to go. I switched over to my biking gear and started playing around on the rocks at Horseman’s Center. It was fun cruising around and looking for things to try. It went pretty quick and soon I was almost done.

In the video on this one you can see my front wheel wash out, but I was able to save it. Definitely scary. Bob thought I was done here, but I was pretty sure I had one more.

That was the last one, but I did one more for good measure. Challenge completed. I was tired but satisfied and feeling good. We headed home and a few hours later some friends joined us for a BBQ at our house where Amber and I made pizza on the BBQ. We hadn’t tried it before but it turned out pretty good.

Here’s the video of most of the 45 stunts on the bike. Like usual they always look easier on video than when you are staring them in the face. Why is that?

Now all I have to do is lose 45 pounds quickly. I’ve started working on it, but there’s a long ways to go.