Please follow me to my "new" blog!

Hi Followers!

I'm going to make some of your lives easier(including mine).....I/we decided that I'm going to transition to writing all my entries to our "A Life More Complete" blog.   For those of you that haven't checked it out yet, it started as a blog about just our adventures together (vacations, geocaching, wedding, etc).  Our individual blogs became a place for just our personal posts, mostly about races and training.

I have not be very good at maintaining my personal blog, most of the time if I write up a blog entry it has been on our combined blog and as such the personal blog has suffered. I think having one blog to maintain and update should make my life a bit easier and allow me to write more and more often.

AND it will give you the opportunity to follow me and us on all of OUR crazy adventures in training, racing, and life :)  And the many other fun things we do, like geocaching.  I'll have much better information and detail on the new pages I'm creating as well

PLEASE UPDATE YOUR "FOLLOW" TO http://alifemorecomplete.blogspot.com

Thanks and see you over there

Mark

Race Recap: 2010 Ragnar Relay

This past weekend was the Ragnar Relay Great River and I was part of Team #94 "Java Junkies"

If your not familiar with Ragnar Relay it is a 200ish mile 24+ hour relay race and Ragnar Relay Great River specifically is 193 miles from Winona to Minneapolis. The relay team consists of 12 runners divided into two vans of 6. The runners take turns running their legs 1-36 and switching vans at the major exchanges; 6, 12, 18, 24, 30. Each runner is assigned a runner number and they then run three legs throughout the course of the relay. Leg distances are anywhere between 3.1 and 8.5 miles and the total distance that each runner cover is between 12.4 miles and 21.8 miles.

Kris and I (Kris was Team Captain) put together our Java junkies team from our family and friends, a lot of them coming from TNT. Van 1 consisted of our friend Brady and several TNT friends, Dan, Lance, Rich, Dawn and her friend Melissa. Van 2 was myself, Kris, Michael(my brother), his wife Cari, Kris friend Mandy and my best friend Steve.

 Van #2 Pre-Race Lunch (We all look good now)

We got up early on Friday morning to drive down and see Van #1 get started on their first set of legs, not really necessary, as Van #2 can start at exchange #6 the first major exchange, but we wanted to be a team and start this adventure together.

Prior to the race Ragnar provides you with a Race Bible which summarizes the rules and breaks down each of the race legs including distances, elevations and map directions. It also classifies legs as either Easy, Moderate, Hard and Hard. Those classifications take into a couple of different factors, distance and elevation changes. The one thing that the race bible does not really touch on is the various weather conditions during your different legs, and since this race is in the middle of August, heat is an issue.

During the relay, I was runner #8 and my legs were as follows: Leg 8 - 5.2 miles, Leg 20 - 5.4 miles and Leg 32 - 6.0 miles.

** Side Note - Before the race, I finally got a chance to buy a GPS training watch that I have been saving for a long time. I had been planning on getting either the Garmin 405CX or the 310XT but a few weeks ago I saw that Timex has a new Ironman Global Trainer and it not only had all of the features I was looking for but it  is also considerably cheaper then the Garmins. During the race was the second time I have ever used the new GPS trainer and I love it! I have included links in my times that take you to the online data from the Global Trainer.

First Leg: Leg 8 - Hard - Start Time 5:30pm - Temp 82; Dew point was close to 70 degrees - My first leg was by far the hardest of all three. It was defined as hard because of two major hills in the middle of the leg. Most of the morning and early afternoon was cloudy and that was helping keep temps down even though it was still very humid. While we were at Exchange 6 and waiting for runner #6 the clouds cleared out and it got very hot on top of the humidity and by the time I got on the course it was mostly sunny, fortunately the first hill was mostly in the shade.

The second hill was just torture, no shade, long and you could see the entire hill all the way to the top.

I am in this picture, I am all the way at the bottom, just a tiny speck.

I ended up walking a bit on both hills just to keep from over doing it. On the second hill, while I was walking I turned and looked to my right and it was Scott Dobbins, a friend from TNT, so I started running again and Scott helped pull me up the hill to the top. 

Running next to Scott to the top of the hill.

First Leg Done! 5.21 Miles - Time 45:19 Avg. Pace 8:41

In between our first set of legs and the second set of legs we were at the Prescott High School, Exchange 12 where your could take a shower, sleep, eat. Kris and I choose to skip the shower and try to get in as much sleep as possible. For a $3 dollar donation to the school athletic fund, you could sleep in the Gym or library, but we choose to just throw our blankets on the grass by our van. We ended up getting about 3 hours of sleep before we had to be up and getting ready for the exchange back from Van 1 to us. Combined with the 4 hours of sleep we got on Thursday night that made 7 hours total from when we woke up on Thursday morning until we went to bed at 10pm on Saturday night.

Second Leg: Leg 20 - Hard - Start Time 3:58AM - Temp low 70's; Heavy Fog. My second leg was in the middle of the night and from my experience during my last Ragnar, I was looking forward to this leg. There must be something about running in the middle of the night in the middle of no where. Two years ago I had an absolutely amazing time with clear skies and a beautiful moon to run in. This year I had a completely different experience but by any means no less enjoyable. While Kris was running her leg, we noticed how hazy it had become, not quite fog but think humidity in the air that you could see. After she handed of the snap bracelet to me at exchange 19 the fog started to really settle in. This time my leg had one serious hill but only because I had to go down into a deep river valley at Kinnickinnic State Park. As I approached the valley I really noticed how think the fog was getting and I even had to turn my head lamp down to it;s lowest setting so I was not running through a white out caused by the lamp and all the fog. Again the hill got the best of me and I had to spend a bit walking just to save some energy. One of the tings that the race bible can't tell you about is how your energy start to fade on the second leg, not enough food and defiantly not enough sleep starts to eat away at your energy reserves. So up out of the valley I climbed and my team was able to toss me a poweraide that i carried the remainder of the leg. By this time the fog was getting rediculas, at one point I even got to within 5 feet of another runner before I could see him, he did have a blinking red taillight but it was really weak and I only saw it at the last minute. All in all this leg provided me with another very enjoyable, if not sureal Ragnar experiance that I will always remember. Leg Two Done! 5.32 Miles - Time 41:40 Avg. Pace 7:50

The second big exchange was at the Lifetime Fitness in Woodbury. At first I did not put two and two together but this worked out beautiful and Kris and I Lifetime members and we juts grabbed out gear, went into the club and soaked in the whirlpool for a while, showered and rolled out our muscles a bit with the foam rollers. That felt really good! And I don't think I would have been in as good a shape as a was starting my last leg.


Third and Last Leg: Leg 32 - Hard - Start Time 12:10PM - Temp 74; Dew point 68 and overcast. Third and last leg and I was not even sure what to expect from this leg. As I started out I wasn't thrilled with the first half of the leg, a lot of urban running on the side of the road smelling car exhaust, not very  fun but at about the half way point the route turned off onto a path the runs along Battle Creek. This was beautiful! I have never been here before and I was not sure what to expect but this is an amazing trail. I had so much fun and I think it showed in my run. Most of this leg was down hill and I was able to keep up and strong pace, never stopping or walking.

 The only downfall of this leg was that is was mostly downhill, and it was very hard on my legs, ankles and knees. I was very sore the next day. During my other legs I had been mentally counting the number of runner that I passed and the number of runners that passed me and came up with a net number for each leg. Just before this leg at exchange 30 I figured out that is called road kills. Learn something everyday. I got 6 roadkill's on this leg. Something that I think we will track during our next Ragnar. Leg 3 and my Ragnar Done! 5.83 miles - Time 45:00, Avg. Pace 7:43 My best performance of the race, even though it was my final leg, which by then I was exhausted.

My sister in law Cari, was our last runner and I give her tremendous credit, that last leg was almost 6 miles and it had gotten incredibly hot again, she did a great job and as she was finishing we all joined her to cross the finish line together as a team. Total time for Java Junkies #94 - 31:00:57 We came in 220/286 teams and 145/192 Open Division - Mixed. We easily would have been well under 31 hours had Cari and several other runner had not been stopped by a train for about 8 minutes with about a 1/2 mile to go. Next time!!

Java Junkies - #94 at the Finish Line (minus Brandy and Lance)

Van #2 Cari, Michael (w/Michaela), Me, Kris, Many and Steve.

Is it too soon to start thinking about our next Ragnar? I have done Great River twice now, perhaps a different Ragnar? They recently took over a relay from Madison to Chicago and next June will be the first running of that Ragnar Race. Mmmmmm.......

Next up Minneapolis Duathlon on August 29th

Race Recap: Graniteman Triathlon.

 First off, I really liked this race a lot!

I originally signed up for Graniteman because I was looking for a race that I could do by myself, Kris does Minneman every year and that is sort of her race so I wanted to find a race for me. Last year I did Lifetime Triathlon one week after Minneman and that was OK, but honestly Lifetime is a lot of hype and the emphasis is on the Elites and the average age groupers don't get much especially considering it is one of the most expensive Tri's I have ever signed up for.

Graniteman had a number of things that attracted me to the race. First and foremost was the swim course, Graniteman has been around for 7 years but this year they moved to an entirely new location in Warner Lake Park and the swim is a straight point to point .46 mile swim, no turns to fight around and as it turned out a nice lake, a little murky with no weeds to speak of.

Heading into this weekend we have not gotten much training in at all due to the new priority of getting Kris moved into my house. Take a moment to read our combined blog A Life More Complete for more details. With our focus on the move and lack of training this past week, skipped Core, no swims at all but we did have a very hard weights on Wednesday night which left us sore for most of the week. So with all of that I was not in the best place for this race and to top it off I we did not get in our pre-race soak.

The race is in Lake Warner Park and it has a bit of an unusual start, there is only transition but it is at the north end of the lake and you have to walk to the swim start at the south end of the lake. I was in wave 8 out of 9, another plus if you ask me, less chance to get run over during the swim. I started the swim and felt pretty good, but my lack of swimming this season came back to bite me again, about a 1/3 of the way across the lake my anxiety got the best of me, call it a combination of dark water, lack of training and the curse of starting off too fast during a race. Whatever it is I had to flip over onto my back and regroup, I keep swimming but with my own personal swim stroke, don't even know what it is called but it keeps me moving forward. Not sure how far I swam that way, maybe another 1/3 but after gathering myself I flipped back over and finished the swim fairly strongly.

Out of the water and into transition, I was trying a new tactic to wash my feet and speed up my T1 time, which I have been historically very slow at. I brought an additional towel and after rinsing my feet from my water bottle I stepped onto that towel to dry and keep dirt out of my bike shoes. It seamed to work since I got out of transition in 1:44 which might just be my fastest T1 time ever.

Out on the bike and this is the area I am hoping to be able to improve the most so I planned to put most of my energy on my bike today. The bike course was 15 miles and it was mostly gentle rollers, not two hard but I was at a slight disadvantage; I did not know then course and somehow I had it in my head that the course was 13 miles. My cycle computer had a dead battery so I honestly did not have any idea of how I was doing during the ride. And I am still having problems with my front derailer, I dropped my chain again that makes  two races in a row. Sigh.....

OK back to transition for T2, which is always pretty fast for me, I don't wear socks during the bike and then can just slip into my running shoes grab my visor and go. Back out on the course. The last mile of the bike you ride on the other side of the road from the runners and you sort of get an feel for what to expect on the run. It is a straight out and back with just one turn before the turn around. Unfortunately, the run course also has several rolling hills, not as bad as Waconia was but enough to make the run that much harder.

Having pushed pretty hard on the bike, I was shooting for a 20mph average or better, I used up a lot of my energy, and strting the run was harder then I was expecting, the weather was not helping , sunny and warm which is always one of my downfalls during a run. But I pushed on and after the first mile or so I was feeling a little better, I think my last gel might have been kicking in so i was able to add a little bit more speed and was able to finish strong. One critique would be that they needed two water stops, not just the one right at the turn around, or put the water spot farther away from the turn around and it can act as two water stops on the course.

I finished with a time of 1:29:18 and with the exception of the swim, I will count this as one of my most successful triathlons. Better then 50% in all categories, overall, division and gender. And one of the best part of the day was having my own personal cheerleader and photographer. Kris did a great job cheering me on during the race.

Mark Kuhn
bib number:	206
age:	40
gender:	M
location:	Robbinsdale, MN
overall place:	114 out of 367
division place:	20 out of 42
gender place:	89 out of 208
time:	1:29:18
swim:	16:40 (2:15/100y)
trn1:	1:44
bike:	45:15 (19.9 mph)
trn2:	0:56
run:	24:45 (7:57 pace)

Next up: Ragnar Relay (unfortunately more then a month away)