I made the promise to myself that I would get the next blog post done before my next big event, and by-golly I think I did it. Still a little late, but hey. It’s here. Beginning of September I cycled in the Michigan-based touring event the DalMac, that, depending on your route, can take you anywhere from 2 to 5 days and 73 to 500+ miles.. This was not an event I had planned on, so one day, just kind of on a whim I was looking it up, and it piqued my interest as a new challenge. The only spot left available was on the 5-day East route, straight up through the gut of the mitten. I figured it would be a good introduction to the whole thing since I, A. Had never done a cycling event, and B. honestly just don't cycle very much unless I needed an excuse to escape summer heat so I don't have to run in it. The 5-day East route was sort of middle of the road when it came to the distances and had fewer hills than the 5-day west route, so I figured it would be a nice start. Skip forward a few months and I'm just coming off of finishing for summer ultra’s and take basically all of August to train up on the cycle a bit. I was putting in great mileage and honestly my only concern going into DalMac Day 1 was: “How is my ass going to feel on day 5?”
So, Day 1, show up to the facility to take off, waiting for an announcement to be made about starting time, eventually ask someone who looks like they know what's going on, apparently you just kind of mosey your way out whenever you like. How bohemian of them. Would’ve been nice to know though. Ride with a group till out of the city then I basically am on my own for the rest of the day. Day 2. I decide to be super lax about sleeping in, taking my time to get ready, make some coffee, just chill. From this day on I would follow this plan, because being the last one out of the camp meant I would show up in the middle of the pack at the next destination. Doing this ensured I wasn’t just racing out first thing in the morning to be bored all day at the next location. I got to chat with people and cheer them on. I stopped at nearly every gas station to eat snacks and whatever local fare they had. I made a “trip” out of it instead of it being any sort of race. Because it's not. It never really claims to be. Maybe there are some that feel differently that ride the 5-day century. But this most definitely was not a race. There were families riding it together, seniors just making their way from place to place, it was a tour. And honestly it's my fault for assuming any sort of ‘competitive’ challenge from it. So, for what it is, it's great, it's a fun tour through Michigan and the longer routes are definitely in the back of mind for another day. But, what it did do, is open my eyes to the distance that can be covered by bike in just a few days. I had always rode in a circle back to the house or an out & back route. Never a Point A to Point B. It's definitely made me think a lot about the idea of bike-packing. The idea just interests me, from the planning that would be required, to the carrying of everything you need to go from spot to spot, the things you would see on the way that you normally would skip over or miss because of being in a fast-moving car. So, definitely something I will be looking into.
But, onto life’s latest blessing in disguise: trail running. The next big event, the Bear Lake Ultra is mostly a trail/gravel type race from what I can tell. So to prepare for it I finally got to swap in a majority of my road miles for trail miles. A welcome trade. I had always enjoyed the few times I had been able to make it to some trails, but never really knew about any, how to find them, or what to expect. Combined with the previous events all being road events meant I just didn't make it to the trails for any sort of real mileage. But with the miles now being a necessity, unless I wanted to repeat the same 2 mile loop a few hundred times, it was time to seek out some new trails. And honestly, this is another place where I can thank having to train for the DalMac on the bike, because on the bike I had to become much more brazen with my routes if I wanted to put in any real mileage without circling the same area over and over. And sure enough, locally, on a trail set that I had actually been to before but had been too apprehensive around the bikes and didn’t know the area well enough, and just never made it back out to explore more, held plenty of good miles to run. And this is where I spent the majority of my miles for training. Get out of work, eat a small meal, get suited up and hydration/calories prepped, drive to the trails, run as far as you could before dusk. Rinse, repeat. But honestly, despite the many roots I tripped over and ate shit, I absolutely fell in love. It takes me back to being a child running through the woods. I don’t particularly worry about my pace, I just go off of feel and how comfortable I am with the particular terrain. It's generally in the shade, enough said on that one. And for once, I actually got to incorporate some real elevation change into my training. Which brings me to a tip: incorporate slowly. It was definitely a tricky balance towards the end to get enough trail miles, but also not injure anything. We’ll see if it was enough. But if you haven’t been trail running, I highly suggest going out to a local trail and just going for a light jog, minding where your feet are of course. It's such a freeing experience.
Thanks to any and all that have read this, I’m well aware that it seems like the ramblings of a wild person. And at times you would be right. But running helps keep that at bay and even though I struggle to get these out in a timely fashion, I do enjoy sharing all this with you. So, Thank you.
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