If you're lucky enough to be in the mountains, you are lucky enough.

When something bad happens, you have three choices: let it define you, let it destroy you, or let it strengthen you.

Sunday, September 09, 2007

McKenzie 50k

It was a fun day hopping from AS to AS at MacKenzie (regular) race yesterday and taking pictures. The day was gorgeous, so were the trails, and the crowd was the best as usual. I did nothing special but drove along the road and waited at the AS's for the runners to come through. I did go for a little 4+ mile run at AS#1 out-n-back and tried to catch majority of folks on camera. There was no pain anywhere as well for me. I hope the pictures tell a better story, I need to start gettin' back to normal life and may be hit a little nap at some point.

Photostream
The trails at McKenzie river 50k are beautiful and shaded (sans the lava section, but it's short and early on), and the last 11M go downhill with a couple of bumps. The course is so easy to spectate on (or crew if you wish), it's amazing - the whole trail runs along the river and parallels the road. While the first set of pictures I took had fast-middle-back runners, as the day progressed, I had to naviagte to include more of the first half of the racers.

I also had a great evening in Eugene exploring the city with my SD100 runner Adrien (hello, did you send an application yet? - BTW, I convinced 3 more people to sing up for various 100M races, if you're not sure you can handle my force, don't be around, and if I never finish my number 10 100M race, I can at least say I lulled a few dozen of people to do it for me:)), walking the streets, visiting Saturday Market and eating lots of good food (drinking was involved too).

I ran in late afternoon today 12 miles on trails and had a blast. Although I have to admit, my legs felt quite a fatigue between miles 7 and 10 - like, hey, we kinda liked doing nothing and drinking lots...wait a minute, may be that's the fatigue problem, I had been drinking a lot lately, drowning my free time from running and my dreams...nah; anyway, I found life in my legs at the end. So with all that and hopefully next week of some good running/training I am in for Bear 100. What do I have to loose after all? May be Gods will be nice to me and I manage to get a long run next weekend too (and even better if it's a short-ish race on trails, something like a marathon or a 50k, what we have a couple around exactly on time, but I may not have time...). Before I know it, I'll be back to taper - what a live I am living, huh?!

13 comments:

Backofpack said...

Looks like a beautiful day on the trails. Very nice!

wendy said...

I love the pic of you dancing - you look so happy! And, 12 miles, that's awesome, I hope they were pain free like the 4 you did. Best wishes for Bear!

Bruce said...

Hey its great you're up and running again so soon after the Cascade 100. Hope it stays that way.

Bob - BlogMYruns.com said...

Looks like another fantastic weekend for ya Olga, and glad ur able to get some running in again but please don't push urself to hard!

Sarah said...

I thought I had posted a comment yesterday!

Great to see you out on the trails! What an incredible event with awesome people and scenery. I'm definitely running it again in 2008.

Bret said...

Good to see you again. That beer sure looked good! I stole some of your pictures of the race. Thanks for taking some. One day I will carry a camera too.

King Arthur said...

Thanks Olga
I know that you're tough enough to finish Plain.

Rick Gaston said...

I hope you know what you are doing. Personally I will go against the grain and say you shouldn't be runing bear 100 not with the injuries you've suffered.

Anonymous said...

Naps are good! I highly recomend taking one. Good Luck at Bear and say hi to Paul Schoenlaub if you happen to run into him. Hes trying to finish up the Rocky Mountain Slam. Tell him I said Flatrock won't be the same without him.

sherpajohn said...

Good luck at Bear Olga.. take it easy out there!

Jean said...

Looks like a beautiful weekend, Olga. That Pacific Northwest is gorgeous!

Best wishes to you in your training! :)

Matt said...

Olga, cool pics! Nice to see you and get to know you a bit, in person, at MRTR.

But.... completely NOT fair to talk a guy into a 100 miler while a) he's still in a post ultra endorphin euphoria, and b) has a post ultra beer in him. But what the hell, 100 still sounds like a good idea! WS if I'm lucky in lotto... plan B TBD if not!

Unknown said...

was that alex in your photos? green tent, wearing headphones.