…for “This Year’s Adventure I Envy Most”: Nabesna to McCarthy bikepackraft
Early leader in the clubhouse…
July 3rd, 2009Pete’s Great Divide Race Ends Early
July 1st, 2009I’ve been following the two Continental Divide mountain bike races that are currently taking place in the Rocky Mountains between the Canadian and Mexican border. The races (I’m not going to get into why there are two separate races, its a rat’s nest) caught my attention because a few Iditarod Trail Invitational racers (Pete Basinger, Jay & Tracey Petervary, Jill Homer) were competing. Jay & Tracey just finished the race on a tandem, which is just insane. Pete wasn’t so lucky.
About a year ago at this time, Pete basically saved a girl’s life after her now-infamous bear attack in Anchorage. This year, Pete was on the other end of a nasty mountain bike accident. He was descending a pass in southern Colorado when he was hit by a truck towing a horse trailer. Luckly, it sounds like he escaped with only a broken clavicle. That’s good news, but a broken clavicle is still a bummer unless you’ve got Lance Armstrong’s medical team.
Before the crash, Pete was absolutely crushing it in BOTH divide races. In typical Pete fashion, one 2,500 mile race wasn’t enough, so he worked some logistical magic in order to do both at the same time. He started in Banff (the start of the Tour Divide race) by himself and then managed to make it to the Montana border in time to offically start the Great Divide Race as well. He was possibly setting course records along the way, but it was hard to tell because he was in stealth mode. It took days before people even figured out he was on the course. It was a really cool feat and was the most interesting story line of this year’s race. It’s a shame he didn’t get to finish it off.
Pete is a remarkable athlete and a great guy. I feel very lucky that got to ski near him for this year’s Iditarod Invitational. Get well soon, Pete!
Off and Running
June 25th, 2009[Programming Note: I am hopeful that this will be the last extended post about my Achilles tendon tear. I think I am passing the point in my recovery where I can stop writing about the stuff I wish I was doing, and start writing about the stuff I am actually doing. Any subsequent posts probably mean I've done something very, very bad. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.]
Today I went for my first run since tearing my Achilles tendon in March. Come to think of it, this was my first run since November. That’s the longest layoff between runs since I was eleven years old. It was the most pathetic run ever - twenty minutes on a track at a 10 minute mile pace - but it was a big step in my rehabilitation.
My biggest revelation during my layoff has been how much I love running. I haven’t thought of myself as a runner for twenty years…
[Glory days alert]
When I was a six-foot, 150 pound high school sophomore in New Hampshire, I finished sixth in the state in cros-country running. In the state championship race, everyone ahead of me was a senior. My running future looked bright. I began wondering if I should focus on running as my primary sport. But over the next few years, I added twenty-five pounds to my skinny frame, and my running only got slower from then on.
[/Glory days alert]
I quickly came to view running simply as a training method for skiing. Sure, I enjoyed running, but I never looked forward to it the way I looked forward to skiing, or a hike, or a long bike ride. I did it almost with thinking about it. Like breathing. Or eating. Running was always there, it was an easy fallback. Just put on my shoes and head out the door. I took it for granted. I could always go running.
Until I couldn’t.
I’ve said before that I’ve dealt fairly well with the mental aspects of being injured. I ‘ve been able to stay upbeat even when I see or hear of people skiing, biking, or hiking. But my heart sank every time I saw someone running. It was an unexpectedly vicious blow to my psyche that surprised me every time it happened. I think I had subconciously decided that, until I could run again, I was still injured. The biking and walking were just rehab. In my mind, I wouldn’t be healthly until I could leap forward with both feet off the ground.
On Monday, at my physical therapist’s recommendation, I went to the track to do a jogging pre-test. I walked ten minutes to warm up. Then I jogged for 30 seconds, followed by a minute of walking. I repeated that for ten minutes. My leg was feeling great. I had to really pay attention to my pace. If I let my mind wander, my tempo would start to increase too much. For the following ten minutes, I picked it up it to one minute of running, one minute of walking. Still everything felt good. I finished with one full lap of jogging, which I did in a barn-burning time of three minutes. I would have jumped for joy if I could have.
So after a few days of rest, I was ready to up the ante to a full jog. Tonight I went back to the track and ran for twenty minutes straight. My leg felt fine, which was a huge relief. It was mentally exhilarating and physically exhausting. Having passed those tests, the next task is to improve my fitness.
The irony of this whole situation is that my main purpose for doing the Iditarod Inviational was to get back into shape. Yet here I am three months later, in the worst shape of my life. There is a long road ahead and the next month is going to be crucial. The doctor says that in 4-6 weeks I should be back to doing “anything your wife would have let you do before the injury.” But not only does my leg need to be healed to do that stuff, but I also have to be in shape. So this month’s task is to regain fitness without overdoing the Achilles rehab. It is a delicate balancing act. I’ve already found out the hard way that rehabbing an Achilles tendon requires patience and restraint. Overdoing it, even just a little bit, can set me back weeks.
The training year starts now. It’s about time.
Adventures in Commuting, part 3
June 19th, 2009My wife and I both wish we could commute to work by bike everyday. But because of our daycare arrangement and that pesky “You must work 8 hours a day” rule, it simply isn’t possible.
So instead we’ve worked out a complicated compromise. I bike to work early in the morning. She drives in later after dropping the kiddo off at daycare. In the afternoon, I bike over to her office and get the car. I go pick up the kiddo, and she bikes home later. So we each get to bike one way. It works out pretty well, except for one hitch: there is no good route to get from my office to her office on a bike. Its only about a mile, but I have to take my life into my hands and cross the worst of midtown traffic.
I am constantly looking for a new route that is safer, more scenic, or at least shorter. This past winter I heard about a new path being built in a lesser-known park in midtown. Could this be a missing link I needed? Earlier this week I decided to give it a try. I found the park easy enough, but I couldn’t find any trails. So I started busting through the tall grass, carying my bike.
Midtown Anchorage - Anyone know where this is?
The bad news was that in a matter of minutes, I was up to calves in muck and it was getting deeper. The good news was at least this covered up my fashion faux-pas of wearing argyle dress socks with cycling shoes. Turn around? Are you kidding? I was not about to accept defeat from a tiny park in midtown. I pushed on.
I felt bad that I was probably disturbing the wetland habitat, but I have to admit that I was loving it. The best summer adventures usually involve some degree of bushwhacking or mud-slogging, but since I’ve been injured I’ve been missing out on all that fun. I desperately needed up up my slog quotient.
It only took a few minutes to cross the bog and I found the trail (still a work in progress) on the other side. I didn’t find a magical corridor through midtown, but I did find a nice little slice of the outdoors hidden in the middle of the city. I like living in a pace where my commute from work can turn into a mud-filled adventure. And besides, its not really summer in Alaska until you’ve bushwhacked through a mud bog.
Chulitna Float Trip
June 18th, 2009
Last weekend I floated the Chulitna River with a large group of guys. It was a bachelor party, which means “what happens on the river, stays on the river.” Sorry, no stories here.
The only reason I’m posting this is because I use this website as my outdoor journal. When I can’t remember how far a trip was, or how long it took me, I look it up on in my blog. I think the Chulitna offers some great opportunity for family float trips or short packrafting runs in the future, so I want to make sure I’ve got some of the vitals written down.
If you’re looking for info on floating the Chulitna, this might help. If you are looking for sordid tales of debauchery… man, o man have you come to the wrong place.
We put in on the East Fork at the Parks Highway about 4:30 PM on Friday. We floated for about two hours to our first camp at Honolulu Creek. This nine mile section (and the next several miles after the camp site) were wavy Class II. Quite a few boulders created holes and eddies to practice in. There were some sweepers which were easily avoided. This section was a lot of fun.
On Saturday we floated about 30 miles in seven hours, including stops. The river became braided and flat, but was still moving between 5-7 mph depending on the spot. We camped on a huge gravel bar in the middle of the river. Sunday we floated about 20 miles in four and a half hours (with fewer stops) to complete the 60 mile trip. We took out at the highway bridge near the Princess Lodge. The Tokositna river came in about an hour and half before the takeout.
There is no gauge on the river, but flow appeared to be average for this time of year.
Packrafting Montana Creek
June 1st, 2009One way that I have consoled myself during my healing process has been to think about packrafting. Of all my favorite activities, its the only one I figured I could do while injured. Well, maybe not the “packing” part, but definitely the “rafting” part. I’ve been scouting road-accessible floats that don’t require any hiking. And now that I am starting to bike again, that will open up a few more options. With my leg on the mend, I am ready to jump into the boat again.
Linda’s parents are currently visiting us for two weeks. We took them to a cabin on Benka Lake near Talkeetna this past weekend. One of the things we give up by living in Alaska is having grandparents (aka free babysitters) nearby. So when they come to visit, we generally exploit them so that Linda and I can have some play time, sans toddler. This time, Linda and I were able to sneak away during the little one’s nap for a short packraft/bike ride loop near the cabin.
Linda on Montana Creek
We put in on Montana Creek at the Yoder Road bridge and floated eight miles down to the Parks Highway. It was a decent float at the 6.13 foot water level, but lots of strainers and sweepers in the river kept it from being truly fun rafting. Without the wood, it would be a leisurely class I-II float. As is, the obstacles make it a solid class II that requires attention to each bend in the stream. There were about 5 places we had to get out and bushwhack around trees that had fallen across the entire creek. It was similar to the lower part of Willow Creek just before the Parks Highway. The photo is from one of the rare sections without any strainers when I had enough time to get out the camera.
The most excitement came when we spooked a mother moose with calf. She darted across the creek in front of us and up onto the opposite bank. Baby followed, but couldn’t lift himself out of the water. As baby struggled with front legs on the bank, hind legs in the 3-foot deep water, momma moose charged towards me as I tried to float by. When I became convinced she was about to jump into the water and stomp on me, I bailed onto a gravel bar on the opposite bank and ran back upstream. Momma continued to parallel me, but thankfully she stayed on her side of the creek. Baby eventually got up onto the bank after a couple minutes of trying, and they both quickly disappeared into the woods.
When we reached the Park Highway, we grabbed our previously-stashed bikes and rode 8 miles back up to the cabin off Yoder Road. It was a fun little nap-time outing. A perfect warm-up run, since we hadn’t been in our boats since last summer. Two hours of rafting, half an hour of biking.
I was glad to finally be doing an activity where I didn’t need to worry about my leg. I wore my leg brace so I’d be prepared for those times when I needed to jump out of the boat, and it was fine the whole time.
Even better, I was glad to be able to have an outing with Linda. Its a rare treat when we get to packraft together these days. Biking and hiking are easy to do with a two-year old. Packrafting, not so much - he really hates it when I bungee-cord him to the bow.
When I Come Around
May 7th, 2009An update on my torn Achilles tendon.
The last time I wrote, I was very frustrated with my progress, or lack thereof. The first thing the doctor told me when he diagnosed the injury was that no healing could take place until the swelling went away. Additionally, every single person I talked with who has experienced an Achilles injury (and there are lots of them) said the same thing: “Don’t rush it. I tried to come back too soon, and I paid for it for years afterwards.” This scared me enough that I decided I was going to be a model patient. No pushing the envelope. I did everything I was supposed to do: ice, heat, medication, no stress on the leg. Yet my swelling persisted. This was very disappointing. I wasn’t healing.
When I started physical therapy a few weeks ago, I had a breakthrough. The swelling went down dramatically after doing therapy exercises and stressing it a little bit. It turned out that the swelling wasn’t from a persistent injury, it was from being so sedentary. My legs are used to moving, not sitting immobilized in a cast. Without any activity, fluid was just collecting in my ankle. The therapy was just what I needed. The light activity was getting my blood pumping and flushing out the ankle. And more importantly, I had no pain, even as we gradually increased the strain on the tendon. Finally, progress.
I’ve never been a believer in structured physical therapy for active people like myself. For previous injuries (mostly broken bones) I simply eased back into my normal activities gradually. I thought physical therapy was for old people, fragile people. But this experience has taught me the value of having a professional therapist who knows how much stress to apply and when to apply it. It has made a huge difference for me in just a few short weeks.
I’d also like to thank my friends for not posting any pictures of epic crust skiing adventures on the web while I’ve been sidelined. Or at least not sending me the link to any such pictures. Being ignorant of what I am missing has also made me feel a lot better.
Right now, I am almost back to my normal range of motion in the ankle. I am riding a bike regularly without the boot. I still wear the boot most of the time around the house and at work, and will for another 2-4 weeks. This is mainly to prevent any odd twists or tweaks that could set me back. The doc says that I should be back to normal in six weeks, which will be early June. That sounds great to me, but the doc also issued a stern warning that he meant “normal for normal people, not normal for someone stupid enough to ski 350 miles.”
Point taken.
A Quick Hit At Portage Lake
May 6th, 2009I should have known that one ski trip to Skookum Glacier wasn’t going to satiate my lust for crust this spring. Like any true addict, “just one” fix quickly leads to an overwhelming urge for another. My body may be injured, but my mind still craves copious amounts of sun and snow. No amount of bike riding was going to make the urge go away.
So yesterday I succumbed and headed to Portage Lake. With weekend temepratures hitting 70 degrees in Anchorage, I wasn’t sure the lake would still be skiable, so I had Turnagain Pass in mind as a back-up plan. When I arrived at the lake, it looked perfect. The crust was firm and smooth. There was a bustle of construction activity (lots of people and trucks) at the rock slide site, which led me to believe that there wouldn’t be any blasting anytime soon. So I geared up and headed across the lake.
Its about three miles to get back to the glacier. The first mile was great skiing. Fast and flat - perfect for my leg, which is still in the walking cast. After the first mile, though, the snow started getting punchy. At this point in the spring, the “snow” on the lake is really just a foot-thick layer of slush on top of ice. So each time I punched through, my foot dove into a soggy mess. For the next mile, I did my best to stay on top of the snow. But soon the crust was completely gone and I was trudging through slush. Bummer. At this point, making it to Portage Pass was out of the question, so I decided to trudge ahead until I could see the glacier, then turn around.
Proof that I made it. All 2.5 miles of it.
When returning to the car, I played around on the firmer crust on the north end of the lake a bit, watching the rock slide work. I finished skiing about 9:00 AM. When I got back to Anchorage, I found out that the blasting began a few hours after I left. I wish I’d been able to stay and watch! I found it amusing and slightly aggravating that the last time I was there, there were a bunch of warning signs even though the blasting wouldn’t take place for almost two weeks. Then yesterday, with the blasting only a few hours away, no signs at all!
Apres Ski
Even though the skiing wasn’t very good, it was great to be on skis again. And the trip was worth it for the drive alone - I saw a coyote, a fox, a moose and a bison along the way! (Okay, okay, the bison was at Big Game Alaska. But the others were legit.)
The Last Temptation of Crust
April 22nd, 2009Attention: Everyone who selected April 22 in their office pool for “the day that Cory finally ignores Doctor’s (and wife’s) orders and goes skiing,” please pick up your winnings at the front desk.
Monday of this week was the first day of excellent crust ski weather we’ve had so far this spring. Blinding sunshine, frozen snowpack. But I was a good patient and stayed home (well, at work actually).
Tuesday was also an epic crust day and I probably would have given in, except that my son was sick. I figured that if my wife had to stay home with vomiting toddler, I should probably go to work and contribute to the collective family good, rather than go play in the sun. I’m very sympathetic like that.
But when Wednesday morning dawned with clear skies and cold temperatures, well, I think we can all agree that no mortal man can be expected to resist that temptation three days in a row.
One reason I hadn’t been skiing (or doing anything mildly active) prior to today was that my ankle has continued to be swollen. Not good for healing. No matter how I try to baby it, the swelling doesn’t go down. But then yesterday, I had my first real physical therapy session. The therapist really stressed the ankle a lot more than I ever had in the past six weeks. At first, the tendon felt extremely tight and weak, but the more I worked it, the better it felt. And then, when I woke up this morning and saw that the ankle was less swollen than ever since the injury, a lightbulb went off in my head. Maybe a little bit of activity is exactly what I need to reduce the swelling, to get the blood flowing and flush out the ankle. That was all the excuse I needed to grab my skis.
So this morning I drove down to Portage Lake. I picked Portage because its a short, flat, easy ski with spectacular scenery. I could get my crust ski fix without pushing my Achilles too much. But when I got there, there were signs saying “DANGER! Blasting in area - Stay off ice.” The lake looked fine and it didn’t look like they were blasting today, so I thought about going anyway. But I was by myself with no one else around, and on a gimp leg, so I decided to play it safe. I drove down the road to the Placer River valley and headed towards Skookum Glacier instead.
The crust was near-perfect: rock hard with no volcanic ash. My technique was a little sloppy, and I fatigued quickly (did I really lose that much fitness in six weeks? Ouch.), but the ski was spectacular.
I knew I needed to be extra careful of my tendon while skiing. So it was fortunate that I had a pair of Salomon’s latest top-secret prototype boots to protect me. Currently I think there are only three pairs in existence. Mathias Fredriksson has a pair, Andy Gerlach had a pair, I have a pair. Check out my photos.
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The whole trip made me so happy. Early morning drive down Turnagain Arm, cruising on top of the firm snow while the crystals sparkled in the sun, feeling my blood pumping again, soaking up the sunshine, and even stopping for a snack at the Tesoro on the way home. It was great to be back in the spring routine again, if only for a day.
Cue up the Tom Petty
April 20th, 2009I thought I was handling my Achilles injury pretty well.
Even though March and April are my favorite months to ski in Alaska, I haven’t been too depressed. Maybe the fact that volcanic ash has slightly tarnished the snow conditions has helped me from being disappointed. But I’ve been focusing on doing what I need to do to get better (ice, heat, stretching, etc), so I haven’t been able to dwell on missing out. But as my recovery has dragged out longer than I hoped, its been getting harder to stay upbeat.
I was talking with my friend Erik the other day about how we endurance athletes program our minds to endure suffering, and how that translates to other aspects of our life. We inflict pain on ourselves on a daily basis. Sometime good pain, sometimes bad pain. We’ve training our bodies to handle the pain by focusing on the goal. Keep moving, the pain will end as soon as I make it to the finish line. But in life, we don’t always know if there will be a finish, never mind where it will be. This throws a monkeywrench into our coping strategies.
If the doctor had told me, “Your leg is going to hurt like hell for a month, but then it will be 100% healed,” I would have been thrilled. Instead my leg feels fine, but I have no idea when I’ll be able to use it again. This is so much harder to deal with. I’m stuck searching for a finish line that keeps moving. First, my goal was to be recovered in time for crust skiing season (April). Then, when I realized the extend of the injury, the goal was to be ready for Orienteering season (starts in May). Now I have reset my target again - this time to be ready for packrafting and peakbagging this summer (June/July). It could very well be delayed again.
The thing that has hit me the hardest is seeing other people move on. All my friends are making their summer adventure plans. All my fellow Iditarod Trail invitational racers are training for their next adventures. Meanwhile, I’m still stuck in the wake of the ITI. The analogy that keeps popping into my head is that its like our Rainy Pass trail-breaking adventure, if only everyone else made it through and I was left behind, still stuck in the waist-deep snow, moving one agonizing step at a time.
I’m stuck in “wait and see” mode, and the waiting is the hardest part.
