July Summary, Trail Marking, Steve Hawthorne

August sneaked in under cover of darkness, and pushed July out the window. Sorry to see July go, it was a good month of real summer weather: hot, humid, lots of thunder storms, hot, humid. I thoroughly enjoyed all of it, including riding my bike home through many of those storms. Every time I rode my bike to work in July, it rained on the ride home. On some days I got only a sprinkle, on others it rained so hard I could have paddled rather than peddled.
I didn't do much speed work in July, mostly due to trying to get enough miles in to prepare for my first ultra. I did go to the track on Tuesday of this week. Despite the nagging thoughts that I hadn't given myself enough time to recover from the BT50k, I was pleased to clock three miles as follow: 5:56, 5:55, and 5:54. That is probably the best, most consistent interval session I've had. It was reassuring to know that I could bounce back from the 50k so quickly. I went right home and had a beer to celebrate.

Totals for July 2008
- 206 miles running
- 175 miles biking




I marked trails for the Burning River 100 Mile Endurance Run for 8 hours on Saturday (with Paul R.) and four hours on Sunday, I met up with Paul R. and Jeff U. yesterday at 5:00 PM and we marked trails until around 9:30 PM. The race starts tomorrow (Saturday, August 2) at 5:00 AM, so we had to be sure to get this last section done. On Saturday morning, I'll run sections of the trail to check for storm and/or vandal damage to the markings. During the race, Sue and I will be working the Aid station at the Boston Store. Among all the other things going on, I'll try to take some photos to include on the next blog post, because this blogging thing gets a bit tedious without colorful, fun images.

Steve Hawthorne, an extraordinary human being.