defining success

 It's fun to train for races. The things I prioritize in races are

-are they located close to me?

-do they work with my schedule?

-do I have a chance of winning them?

-are they a distance I want to train for?

I don't particularly like traveling for races. I don't like large races where I'm going to be buried in the pack. I want a local race against good competition with a result that is meaningful to me. Earlier this year I figured out a training schedule that I think will work really well for improving my fitness and keeping me motivated. Roughly, it's

fall- run sub-6 min miles

winter: run A LOT of miles. with long runs and once a week mile repeats

spring: run VO2max workouts with hills

summer: run fast 400s and track meets.

To coincide with each season is a race. In the Fall I want to the Harrisonburg Half Marathon and the Harrisonburg Turkey Trot. In the Winter/Spring my big goal is the Charlottesville 10 miler. In the Spring/Summer my goal is the Bruce Barnes Downhill Mile. And in the summer my goals are the local all-comers track meets. 

I think each race is supported by the training that goes into it and they feel like achievable goals. I know from past experience that I have the potential of competing well in each of these races. That's motivating to me and I'd be really happy to see year over year improvement. 

The half marathon is coming up soon and I'm looking forward to it. The course looks like it's kind of a mess but my training has been going great and I'm excited to compete. 

you get to find out something about yourself

I'm trying to trick myself into being excited about this run and I think what I'm going with is

I just wanna work hard and go fast

isolated cave water

deer have a gentle spirit!!!

THE CAR IS SPICY!

"I'M SERIOUS! I LICKED IT! IT'S SPICY"

-a small child to her father as I started my run this evening

an A day

 I ate well. I made some art. I had a lot of fun coaching and felt like I did a good job. I had a good run. I did some rehab and stretching and rolling. This is the model day. keep it going.

one time I was volunteering with a cross country team

and they told me their valedictorian had been hit by a car while walking TWICE in the same year...

talk about street smarts 

excited to improve!

 it can be easy to get down on myself or feel tired or tell myself I feel tired. but there's a lot to be excited for! every day is a day to get better! I really believe that.

another hilarious skit

 a skit for four players

person 1: Gentlemen, it's nice to meet you. My name is Ranch Dubois and I made my fortune unexpiring milk. I found a way to take expired milk and make it un-expired and then I sell it back to schools and grocery stores.

person 2: It's a pleasure to be here. My name is Monthly Billings. I made my fortune extracting iodine from the ocean. I have nearly exhausted the ocean's supply of iodine that I keep in a large tanks hidden in a secret bunker in the wastelands of Nevada. Whenever anyone wants iodine, they have to go through me. Monthly Billings.

person 3: And I'm Colgate Smolgate. I make those tiny toothpastes. Y'know the tiny ones. That's my whole thing. I'm smol.

person 4: Well, gentlemen, I'm sorry but I think there's been a mistake. It would appear that I do not belong in your esteemed company because my name is Humphrey Dollarsign and I am but a humble van salesman.

person 1: No no no, this isn't for rich people. We're all here to fright to the death.

person 3: Did you say fight to the death?

person 1: Nope. Fright to the death.

person 4: I really appreciate your hospitality Ranch Dubois and I would love to stay longer and participate in this jovial past-time but I really must be going. My wife and kids are probably wondering why I haven't come home for dinner yet and I-

person 2: boo!

person 4 dies from fright

The remaining three persons stand over the corpse of person 4 and laugh

a hilarious skit

 this is a hilarious skit for two people to perform on a given day

person 1: hello, I am person #1. I am an elder welder helper. I assist welders who are advanced in age.

person 2: hello, I am the second person. An unlikely series of events has led me to store my entire life savings inside of a bowling ball. That bowling ball made its way to the bowling alley we find ourselves in and has now been lost among the thousands of other bowling balls. We are at the largest bowling alley ever made.

person 1: How foolish of you. I would assist but my boss doesn't like it when I get distracted. 

person 2: Looks like this is a total strike-out.

person 1: What?

person 2: You know, because bowling.

person 1: oh I get it.

i just fell down a rabbit hole about goodstein's theorem

moral of the story, you can kill any hydra if you chop enough times 

poem for September 15th

unintended consequences concerning creation

when I water my plants

it creates pools of water in the plastic containers beneath their pots

mosquitoes lay eggs in small pools of still water

my apartment is infested with mosquitoes.

But I told my friends

that I think

the mosquitoes know who I am

and recognize me as their god

the source from which all life flows.

The mosquito has no choice in the matter.

The only thing it can do is suck blood to survive.

And the only thing I can do is make tasty tasty blood

round the clock.

But still

in the shower last night

when a mosquito flew out of my reach

and was perched high on my wall

with what I can only imagine as a smug expression

I took some satisfaction

in grabbing my bath towel and slapping it out of existence.

Sept 14th

 a lot of what I write is just reminders of things. 

What do I want climbers I coach to get out of climbing?

I think climbing is a lifelong activity/skill/sport that challenges the body and mind and a lot of adults I meet wish they had started climbing sooner. So, I'd like the climbers I coach to be those kids that did start sooner and grow up with a love of climbing. With most of the climbers, I only get 2 hours out of the week in a crowded gym. I said this a year ago but if you spend enough time and are paying attention and invested in a common goal/interest then moments of connection will happen. 

Do you like climbing? Do you want to find out how good you can be at it?

That's really all that matters.

what did I do today?

 - I completed the online stuff I have to do to be a coach

-I tried some climbs and also tried a challenge where I tried to send four hard climbs that I've worked on for the past 2 weeks all in one session. I got really close. I was about one move short on one climb. Not bad. I may try again tomorrow.

-I coached! It was fun. 

- I had an idea for a big drawing I could do and also thought about a plan for next summer

-ran with smriti on bike

-ate a burrito

-wrote this

oh and I laid down on the gym mats and let a guy do a tape outline of me to let people know to not stand there or walk there because they could get fallen on

the humidity dropped

you can smell it

9/9

 Today I sat outside most of the morning. It was very relaxing. I think they sprayed to get rid of mosquitoes or something because I was never bit. I had some good climbs and also a decent run. I'm just really tired and I need to rest a lot tonight and tomorrow. It's a good tired though. 

I've run 13 sub-6 miles this week so far. I think I can get to 20 on Sunday. My goal for the Fall was to run 30 sub-6 miles in a week. It was starting to seem a little unlikely but I think when the weather improves they will start to feel a lot easier. I've been trying to plan out a fun way to do it. Or a possible way to do it.

It might make the most sense to do 4 sessions going Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Sunday. And for whatever reason the numbers in my head were 8, 7, 5, 10. I'll probably end up trying it. I also thought it might make sense to go Monday, Tuesday, Friday, Sunday. Sometimes I'll end up feeling good the day after a workout and then it would give me 2 consecutive days of rest before Friday. That might be what I try. We'll see. Right now I'm thoroughly wiped. Starting from Monday I went 2, 5, 0, 5, 1. And like I said some of those runs were made harder than they absolutely needed to be. I'm excited about my fitness regardless. I think I'm going to be a lot stronger by the end of November than I've been in a long time.

September 7th: Great Climbing Session

 I sent the blue v5 that I had worked a couple times last session. I figured out all the moves and can send in two parts the white v5 that I learned was possible from one of my athletes yesterday. And after I got tired of that I hopped on a v6 that I figured I had no chance of sending and also worked all the moves really fast. It was really nice to be pleasantly surprised by my ability to do things. The other week I had three climbs that I thought for sure I could do and the more I worked them, I realized they were actually way more difficult than I anticipated. This time it was kind of the opposite where things happened much faster than I thought. 

Anyway

Anyway here's a good picture from a party I went to the other week. The theme was space and you can't tell but I'm covered in glitter. There are no sleeves in space.

September 6: Learning from my mistakes

 Today I had coaching in the evening and I had a decision to make. I had to decide if I would run before coaching in the early afternoon or after coaching in the dark. I was getting myself hyped up to run before coaching because running in the daylight gives me more options for where to go and also I would be able to climb after coaching. Running at night gives me better overall conditions. Well, flashback to Sunday where I did run in the middle of the day and I absolutely cratered. I think just based on the air temperature it was only like mid 80s on Sunday and it was the same today but in the sun and with the dew point it was absolutely brutal. I looked at the conditions and I stepped outside today and I said, no way. I'm waiting until the evening. And it was fortunate that I did for two reasons. 

1- I had an absolutely amazing workout. And it wasn't amazing because I ran incredible splits--they were actually not that impressive. It was amazing because it's the first workout where I've felt comfortable doing it. I knew I could hit the paces I wanted and I wasn't pressing the whole time. So I'm really happy about that. I intentionally set my goal pace of sub-6 minute miles mostly because when I'm in shape it's a pace that isn't too strenuous. So far the workouts I've done--most of which I've run too hard if I was truly just trying to run 5:59s-- have not felt "easy" in the strictest sense. But today it truly felt comfortable and I had been waiting for the feeling to come around. 

oh and 2 was because I got a text to draw on the chalkboard in the climbing gym and I got paid for it :D

So, happy I made good choices.

happy labor day

never forget that labor day is the watered down version of may day

It's hard to draw individual things

There's this story about this farmer and he's got a big farm and people who work on the farm with him. And one day this guy is walking down the road and he sees the farmer repairing this long fence that needs repairing or whatever. And the guy says, "hey do you want help with that?". And the farmer says, "sure."

Now, this is a big job that would probably take a whole team of people over a week to finish. But the guy shows up bright and early the next day and he finishes fixing the fence all in one day. The farmer is ecstatic. He says, "that was incredible! Hey, I've got all this hay that needs bailing. Think you can do that for me?" And the guy says, "sure." Now, this is an even bigger job that would require like machines and a whole host of people. But the guy shows up the next day and he gets it all done in one day. And this process continues. Cleaning out the stables uh...cutting the grass...y'know, farm things. And the farmer is just tickled because this random guy is incredible. And then one day he says to the guy, "Hey, buddy you've been working really hard out in the hot sun and I really appreciate everything you've done for me. How bout I give you an easy task for the day." The guy says, "sure." The farmer says, "All I need you to do is to go down to the nice cool basement and sort my potatoes for me. Just make three piles. One pile is for the duds and one pile is for the ones that are fine but kinda weird looking and one pile is for the a-1 potatoes that I'll take to market." The guy says, "ok."

After only 30 minutes the farmer sees the guy walking out to him in the field. "Wow! You're done already?!" The guy says, "I quit. I can't do this for another minute. Find someone else."

The farmer is shocked, "What do you mean?! This was an easy job!" The guy says, "No, the other stuff was easy. With this, every potato you gotta stop and say, 'well, is this one really good or just okay--or is this one a dud or just weird looking.' It's too much."

---------------------------------------

Maybe I butchered that story, it's not my own. But it's how I feel about this drawing I've been working on. It's kinda like Where's Waldo-esque scene with a whole bunch of different characters all spread out. Initially it was fun. I drew like two little goblins and I was like, "oh I could just fill a whole page with these." It's even in a really flat 2D style. Sitting down and committing to drawing an actually thing though is just so much more tiring than making lines. I can make lines all day. It's no trouble. Drawing out a ton of characters is like sorting potatoes. 

What was I talking about? Labor creates value. People should own their labor. 

Sept 1st: tempo and projecting

 Woke up excited to run. Crushed a 5 mile tempo. Still running in the heat, even though the dew point dropped the sun was still super bright so I think we can safely say the conditions were terrible. It's important to run in terrible conditions, especially now, when getting back in shape. These runs feel hard now but when it finally cools down and my body adapts I'm going to be crushing these miles left and right. I'm trying out being excited about running and my training. I haven't really done anything to warrant much excitement yet but it's more fun to be energized by it and than thinking, "oh, ho-hum, a long ways off from what I could do at my best."

This is uncharted territory. I've never set out to see how many sub-6 miles I can run in a week. Regardless of where I end up, it'll be a baseline that I can come back to and I know that I'll make progress and improve. I'm excited to see where it takes me.

In the evening I did some climbing and spent a majority of my time just trying about 2 moves on a v5 and a v6. I'm glad that I'm trying harder stuff than in the past because I know that's what is going to make me stronger. There were also lots of people that I know at the gym and that was really fun to be social as well.

When I start working more I know it's going to be harder to fit in days like this but I'll just have to be more diligent about my time and rest. For now though, having fun. Coaching starts up next week and then shortly after that I'll be working a lot of weekends. It's work I'm happy to do though so I'm thankful for that.

My other goals are to eat more and drink more water.