This Site is Moving

I'm still going to keep this site because there is a lot of stuff on here I want to keep.  But all new post are on WordPress.  At ultradad100.wordpress.com here is the first post http://wp.me/p1ZONV-1

The Whole Food Project

http://www.thewholefoodproject.com/#4e644af5aa6c8

Check out this new site. Just click on the link. This site has some really valuable information! I am a member and a supporter. Tara is a friend of ours, and we have learned a lot from the Whole Food Project. Let me know what you think!

I lead an interesting life

I lead an interesting life.  With 4 children it's never boring.  It's never quiet and never boring.  What follows is an amalgam of the past 5 weeks or there abouts.  At times my head spins so much I lose track of the days.

Last month my eldest son took Gold in a speech contest conducted entirely in French.  How cool is that?  His topic was racsim.



One week later my middle son got some sort of infection and his first severe migraine that laid him up in Childrens Hospital for a weekend.  One course of antibiotic, a couple of blood tests a CT scan and a spinal tap and we are all good.

The very next weekend we are in a lacrosse tournament in Vancouver where he wins the Gold Medal. Nice recovery my boy!

Last weekend I was at a structure fire.  The person who was transported via this helicopter apparently lit a cigarette in the garage and some fumes ignited. The explosion shook the entire block.  I took this pic with my Blackberry and caught the rainbow.

Same weekend I ran the Run for Water Half Marathon.  I've never run a half marathon with a running stroller but thought it would be fun.  I wasn't wrong. Final time was 1:52.18 which was good for 112th out of 504 runners. Kallie had a blast she loved the candy on the course!


What you aren't seeing is pictures from the swim meet jammed in there for good measure.  My oldest got 5 PRs which was pretty much every single event he swam and my youngest son got 4 PRs.  Amazing!  We juggled in two lacrosse games during the weekend.  did I forget to mention that?

I thought I would add this one in.  After a fun filled weekend I am in Edmonton I just get out of the car at the hotel and the SWAT team is taking down something.  I don't think I've ever seen assault rifles in real life before.

On Any Given Monday

I’m not going to lie. I love going to Kelowna because it affords me the opportunity to run my favorite trail, the Greenway. The Greenway is the name given to it by the locals. The name on the sign says Mission Creek Greenway. I’m sure the name Greenway is used in several communities as a descriptive term of the scenery surrounding the trail itself. For the most part the Greenway is kind of boring. Of the 16 km in length about 10 km of it fairly flat, the trail is wide enough for a vehicle to drive and has a long sweeping bend to it where you can see pedestrian traffic for a hundred feet or so. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t like boring. Boring is beautiful because it follows Mission Creek and is far enough removed from urbanization that you can’t hear the cars and for the most part can’t see the city.

It’s the east end of the Greenway that I live for. I’ve been coming to Kelowna for 5 years now and only recently have I run the east end of the Greenway. For 5 years, typically the third Monday of any given month you would find me on the Greenway. From about the kilometer 10 marker to the end at kilometer 16 the trail twists and turns leaving the creek’s edge to get up to the top of the bank only to have you taken back down and return to the top once more. It’s hard to believe that this creek could have cut such a profile 300 or so feet deep into the earth. The views at this end are breathtaking. It’s either that or the climb up to the top of the bank leaves you out of breath.

This end is not for the faint of heart or for cyclists with steps cut into the multitude of switchbacks going up and down the bank. Maybe that’s why I love this end so much because it’s not for everyone but it is for me.

On this particular Monday I had a couple of rough days leading up to this trip. My son Ethan was admitted to the hospital complaining of vomiting and a severe headache. Shuttling back and forth all weekend and seeing very little of my wife, sleeping on the couch provided in his room we made the best of it. The neurologist was convinced that it was a severe migraine but we had to rule out things like meningitis so he got a spinal tap and a CT scan. Blood tests gave confounding results which ended up keeping us there the whole weekend. After a clearly negative blood culture he was given the clearance to go home and I was clear to resume my work life.

I don’t know about you but I appreciate my weekend for the small amount of respite it gives me from the stress of my job. To go from one stressful situation to another and then back again left me tightly wound and ready to pop.

I approached this run like an uncorking of sorts. This was my make or break. I knew going in that my fitness had kind of fallen off a bit. But call it naïveté or just plain stupidity the 10% rule went right out the window. My longest run in the recent weeks had been a 10 miler and I could hit 14 on a really good day.

I started slow and went even slower going up the switchbacks but one I made the turn from the far end of the Greenway (16KM marker) I still felt good. For a moment I thought I could do 20. Wow 20 miles, the benchmark long run for most marathoners. The thought ruminated in my head for the next few miles.

My pace thus far was a pedestrian 12 minute miles. After starting the Greenway at the 6 km mark and heading east the steep grades quickly sapped speed from my overall pace. Now back in the flatter portion of the Greenway my pace became more consistent and the overall pace picked up.

As I ran past the point where I entered the Greenway I still felt okay. My nutrition was getting low as I had consumed 2 Clif bars and a Chocolate #9 gel in the 2 ½ hours I had been out there. My stomach was starting to grumble. It’s 6 km (4miles) to the other end of the Greenway. The sun was setting on the horizon and on my legs my fitness was starting to show.

As my Garmin hit the 3 hour mark, it kind of reminded me that I haven’t run 3 hrs in a long long time. I really wanted to hit the 20 mile mark but I opted to turn for home with 3km to the end of the trail. My legs weren’t thrashed but they were starting to stiffen up.

The Garmin chimed in at 18.34 miles in 3:16 with an elevation gain of over 1,600 feet. I was pretty happy with that.

Episode 63 The Spare Test Kit

#publishing: "http://ultradad.libsyn.com/u-d-63-the-spare-test-kit"

Random thoughts from the Weekend

Random thoughts from the weekend. 5 of 7

1) Do think running style in genetic? After watching two lacrosse games this weekend I have decided that my lacrosse playing son, I only have one child who plays lacrosse, runs identically to me. The picture isn’t pretty but freakishly déjà vu. I have been criticized for my feet barely leaving the ground, stiff legged with no heel kick to my stride and fairly flat footed. I guess the telltale sign that we share the same gene pool is my mother in law’s exasperated comment “Oh my gosh he runs like Rob!” I wasn’t built for speed but I have run a Boston qualifier.

2) Have you ever heard the expression, “This place is like a Rat’s Nest”. After today’s spring clean up I now have a basis for comparison. The garden shed was overrun with either mice or rat’s which were feeding on the leftover grass seed. Over the winter the rats found safe haven in the dormant garden shed. Rat’s nests look like a big ball of litter. It was gross.

3) I found a thread sewn into the collar of the shirt that I was wearing today. It made me smile. When we travelled to Ethiopia to bring home our daughter we stayed at this tiny hotel that had a laundry service. In order to indentify the clothes as yours and not anyone else’s they color coded your laundry with single thread sewn into various places on the shirt. That thread has been there for 25 months. I’m also thinking that I need some new shirts.

4) I’m not sure which news is bigger. The death of Osama bin Laden or the Royal Wedding. you decide

5) One man’s junk is another man’s treasure. As we cleansed our garage, shed and garden shed of excess junk that has been building up for years. I placed all of it on the curb. Since that time a steady stream of pickup trucks have been driving by and picking through my junk. Go figure.

6) Lacrosse is a very cool sport. My kids have never played in fast paced team sports. We’ve swum competitively every summer which is exciting for the two possibly three minutes that the race goes on for but then it’s over. Lacrosse is heart stopping action packed for three 20 minute periods. I’m exhausted and I didn’t run a lick this weekend. One win One loss.

Run for Water (One month counting)

The Run for Water is a fabulous run. Not so much for the scenic views of Abbotsford or the incredible volunteers but rather the cause. The cause is bringing fresh water to small villages in Ethiopia. Each year for the past 3 years, we’ve run this run as a family. We started strong with all seven (Nana included). It was a tough year I pushed Owen my then 5 year old in the BOB running stroller for the 10K. My oldest went with Nana and Ethan ran with my beautiful running wife. If you could describe running as a bug, an infection perhaps, she got her first taste of it then. She cured her self for awhile but by the following year the infection came back.


The next year she was serious. We started buying running clothes, outfits! New shoes were a necessity. That year she picked up a running jacket, new shoes, a Nike+ sensor My wallet started to hurt a little. I picked out a beautiful pink Fuel Belt for her one special occasion. From a long time runner it was fun to watch her develop, too watch her infection turn into a full blown disease.

Unfortunately life gets in the way. As we runners have all discovered the cure for a serious case of the running disease is a busy life. You see my wife is not only married to a serious runner (LOL), mother of 4 children, full-time career but is also working on her degree in Social Work. And you thought I burned the candle at both ends. Needless to say sometimes life just crashes down around you and you can’t run. No time! No energy! You know the tune! But I’ll tell you the biggest turn on in the entire world is commiserating with your beautiful wife when she says, “I missed my run today, damn it!”

I know things are starting to go my way and she is starting to understand the runner’s mind. Now the runner’s mind is a complex thing far too complex to discuss in just one blog post. But when she was signing up for this run she asked me what event I was going to run. This event has a 5K, a 10K, a half marathon and for the first time this year a marathon. I joked with her that I would run the marathon.

She said, “You couldn’t run the marathon?” And I responded, “I bet I could!”

The only catch was this is Jenny’s event, it’s her time. I run with our daughter no matter what. I slept on it that night and thought of every logistical consideration and came to the conclusion that I could probably complete the marathon with a running stroller. No Boston qualifier but still finish. However keeping my daughter trapped in a running stroller for 4 hours seemed almost cruel. Although Kallie loves running with me in the stroller, 4 hours is a bit much.

In the end I signed up for the half marathon. A daunting task with a 35 lb child and a running stroller but I relish the challenge. I’ve always wanted to be one of those guys who can pop off a marathon in a weekend whenever and wherever they wanted. I am almost positive I could have but not with the circumstance. Maybe one day but not today.

I’m grateful for the opportunity to run a half marathon and my running future is only getting brighter.