Sean Gillies Blog
The first half of summer has flown by. I'm quickly catching up on six busy weeks here. 53 hours, 52 minutes all training 130.1 miles running and hiking 16,220 feet D+ running and hiking That's about 9 hours of exercise, 22 miles of running and hiking, and 2,700 feet D+ per week. I've been active enough to maintain my base fitness, but haven't done much building. Travel and vacation have kept me…
Welcome to week one of my year's second eighteen week training program. I'm gearing up for a race that I've never run before, a long-standing one that is close to home: Steamboat Springs' Run Rabbit Run . The 50 mile course goes from the base of Steamboat Mountain, up Right-o-way, then up next to the Thunderhead Express lift, and then (as far as I can tell) up around Tornado and Buddy's Run to one…
Nine years ago, I ran a 18 km race in the hills north of Montpellier, France, part of a big three-day festival of races called Festa Trail . I have good memories of the event. The weather was great, it was more runnable than Trail Quillan , and one of the race organizers emailed me the day after I posted to express interest in my blog post. I had some leg cramps at Festa Trail. Cramping is the…
I was anticipating a good day at Quad Rock and instead I flopped. I finished in 8:14:46. 186th out of 209 finishers, my poorest place at this race by a big margin. And I'd expected to match, if not exceed, my previous best. What explains this fiasco? My major problem was acute leg muscle cramping, but there were some minor issues as well. In the week before the race I did my mobility and core…
Week 16 is over. It's six days to Quad Rock. 10 hours, 11 minutes all training 18 miles running 2,385 ft D+ running I did a small set of hard running intervals, some steady running, and one last hilly run on the Quad Rock course with a friend on Friday. We pushed the pace on the upper half of the first climb, going up Towers Trail, and I was just a few seconds off my personal bests on those…
You've probably seen links to "The Future of Everything is Lies, I Guess" already. I've just finished the last installment. This is an excellent series of posts with many references. If we meet to talk about the industry, I'm almost certainly going to ask if you've read it. This is bullshit about bullshit machines, and I mean it. It is neither balanced nor complete: others have covered ecological…
Week 15 was my peak week before Quad Rock on May 9. I didn't run a lot, but it was all high quality running. 14 hours, 23 minutes all training 24.8 miles running 6,020 feet D+ running Tuesday I hiked and ran up and down Green Mountain in Boulder, my first time on that mountain. I went up the steeper east side and down the more runnable west side. The trail is ridiculously steep: in the first mile…
Welp, I'm joining the ranks of the unemployed tech workers again. As before, I'm in a good situation. I don't depend on my former employer for health insurance. I've got some severance and savings, my family is in good health, we have a roof over our heads, and I have good connections. I don't feel afraid. But maybe I should? The job market is worse than last time this happened to me . I've seen…
Hello, my name is Sean Gillies, and this is my blog. I write about running, cooking and eating, gardening, travel, family, programming, Python, API design, geography, geographic data formats and protocols, open source, and internet standards. Fort Collins, Colorado, is my home. Email me with questions or comments on any of my posts: sean.gillies@gmail.com . Update: I'm currently looking for work…
I needed my training to begin to peak in week 14. Quad Rock is in 20 days (at this writing), and I won't get much adaptation to workout loading in the last 13 days. Weeks 14 and 15 would be my last opportunities to get faster and stronger before the race. Fortunately, a return to good health and favorable weather helped make this my best week yet. 13 hours, 8 minutes all training 42.7 miles…