The beginning of the end

Sunday 2/23
Week 1/16 for Mohican 100 miler

Mingo Creek County Park - http://www.co.washington.pa.us/index.aspx?nid=164

14 miles 2:08

Coming in potentially less prepared than ever, the early morning commute from Morgantown, WV to Mingo Creek and 14 miles of running what felt like constant inclination all but did me in. I had a late night and did not sleep a wink last night while bottoming a bottle of wine roughly 3 hours before we began our run. Last night was my last night before I began my venture to my first 100 mile race this June. As for today's run, it was a blast and my first time in this park. Staying off of the road for all but the last few miles, we ventured up and down the park's muddy, wet, and icy trails. On several occasions we ended up on private property, too. With every fork in the trails we seemed to incidentally pick the more arduous route. The most damaging decision came ten miles in where we were faced with the choice of returning to our cars or climbing up Mansion hill, a road that was steep enough to suck any life my legs had a quarter of the way up. Luckily we turned around at the top and skidded back to the bottom and returned to our cars. With my run in the books, I finally had the opportunity to catch some shut eye.

Once we made it back into Morgantown, I took a few minutes to wake up enough to put in a pick up order at Pizza Al's and picked up a large pizza to share with no one. After a few slices of heaven I crawled up to my bed and crashed from 1-830 pm. I have decided to start a blog; not out of vein, but for years the funniest stories have come outta my running with my friend and eventually I will be able to share all of my past stories along with every new one when it happens.

This first blog will probably be longer than most because I would like to do a brief background on me and my amigos. I graduated from Fairmont Senior High (WV) in 2011. My high school marks were 1:58 800m, 4:22 1600m (hit that mark about a dozen times), 9:08 3200m, 15:26 5k. I went to Oklahoma University for a semester before returning home to Morgantown. Last August I ventured out to the Grand Tetons to take fourth in my first trail marathon.

Josh Simpson (driver in the picture above) will make the most appearances on my blog. Roommate for the past two years, personal coach throughout high school and post, and leader of the pack are his roles. His accolades are to long to list, but a few quick highlights would be a two time Olympic Trialist in the 10k and Marathon. 28:12 in the 10k. Captain of a US cross team, and two time member on a US cross country team. As far as I have learned in the last few years: if you do anything with him, you will lose. But we always keep trying. Glutton for punishment, I suppose.

Travis Simpson is Josh's older brother and will partake in most of our Sunday runs this year. The three of us are heading out to Montana this fall for the second running of Run the Rut 50k. As the summer comes around that will be the main topic of discussion as the three of us will be trying to maximize our fitness and test our limits out west. As of now, Travis is the most experienced at longer races and carries the Simpson gene that makes them impossible to break. He also serves as my beard consultant. That role consists of making me feel like a little kid when I look like a little kid. I will have a lengthy beard come September to keep my consultant happy.

Adam Schroer was the fourth amigo that trekked through the muddy wonderland this morning. He is the newest addition to our group, coming to WVU for grad school to study stuff that I don't understand. A 2:26 marathoner at Chicago, he seems to only be capable of going one pace: hard. Recently he almost set a new PB in the mile although he hadn't run 14 of the previous 16 days. At some point this week I will share the video of four unprepared runners drawing their own blood and blindly crushing an indoor mile. This May Adam will join myself in Josh in a house that will undoubtedly bring endless epic tales.

There are a handful of mates that I will mention more as they re-enter my running. Here is the big races on my calendar year:

Pilot Mountain Payback Trail Marathon (North Carolina) - 4/12 **
Mohican 100 trail run (Ohio) - 6/22-23
Run the Rut 50k (Montana) - 9/something

**Postponed, originally was scheduled 2/15.

There are sure to be several races added randomly this year.

TOMORROW: Florida Vacation in January 

• Trail Half Marathon Recap
• 30 hours in the car roundtrip
• Coming home to a flooded town home!