Experiencing the Rainbow of Fun

It’s here, and my 10 day forecast is like serotonin for the soul.  Indian Summer (hopefully this is not a racially charged term for anyone out there).  The phrase has been traced back to the late 1700’s in the North American continent and refers to unseasonably warm days and clear skies.  It’s even used around some European countries such as France, Italy, and Spain.  Regardless of it’s inception, I think generations, civilizations, and you and I can agree that it is quite possibly one of the finest if not THEEE finest time of the year in Montana.  My top five reasons for it being awesome are-

1.  Canada has left the building… That’s right, we’ve got our town back.  We can go out to dinner without reservations, we can park on main street, we don’t have constant toy envy, we know the people we run into at the coffee shop, the bar, or the grocery store, and it’s only mildly annoying to ride the Whitefish Trail after 5 or on a weekend.

2. The weather is warm and I’m not quite yet reliant on my vasodilators for Reynaud’s.  It doesn’t require a 10 minute scalding shower to get blood back into my fingers and toes after a bike ride.

3.  The skies are fairy tale clear and the colors are kaleidoscope beautiful.  The air is so clear, the greens are greener, blues deeper, and reds, yellows, oranges and browns make every outing unique and constantly changing.  Also, the vegetation has died back in the high country making the Alpine singletrack ultimately rip-worthy.

4.  There is no urgency to train for the next whatever, or abstain from that extra treat.  As part of being a mammal, it’s perfectly natural to start to pad your “ass”ets for the future.  I can ride for as long or as short as I want to, or I can not ride and opt to do something completely absurd like golf.

5. There is a subtle feeling of the turning of the tide where the sensation to “fit it all in” dissolves into the simple joy of soaking up a few direct rays of sunlight while smelling the freshness of fall drifting on the breeze.  Fall feels like a time when we start to exchange some of our outdoor adventures and activities for indoor activities such as dinner parties with friends.

The funny thing is I used to hate fall, but I hadn’t found an appreciation for all the things it has to offer nor did I realize that it is a time to relax a little and allow the bod piece to recharge after a full throttle summer.  Last Wednesday the teammates and I found a magical hole in our crazy schedules and managed to get out for a full day of epic riding across 7000′ peaks that guard the Swan Valley from the Bob Marshall Wilderness.

Matty, Clint, Rose and I cruised along the Swan Crest Trail (Alpine 7) through a mixing of smoke and clear skies and we found ourselves grinning ear to ear delighted in the smoothness of the trail and the invigoration of riding along alpine ridges and craggy summits.  The colors were spectacular and company exceptional.  I could’ve been okay with us taking a little more time along the way, but the Dr. had an important phone conference so we ended up blasting it at a record pace and finished the whole 44 mile loop with 7200′ of climbing in 5 and 1/2 hours.  It was so good I’m going back again tomorrow with an open invite to any and all who want to join along.  There couldn’t be a better final trail ride to put the exclamation point on this Indian Summer.  Type 1 fun for sure (the kind that is just plain fun without suffering)

In other news I some how was caught up in the inertia of The Rut ultra-race this fall and signed up thinking, “It can’t be much different from a big day in the Park right?”  The Rut entailed a 50 kilometer foot race with over 11,000′ of climbing with a top out on Lone Peak at 11,116′.

With a 6 a.m. headlamp start I filed into the top 20 of some of the best and the best ultra runner in the world (Killian Jornet).  We immediately funneled into a steep flow-track climb that alternated between barely runnable and a ridiculously brisk paced hike (banked turns are steep to run up!).  Within 15 minutes I thought, “Hmmm… this doesn’t feel too bad, kind of like the start of a fast 100 mile mtb race.  I should be fine”.  Fifteen minutes later we topped out on our first climb and started running down hill.  That’s when reality set in and my hamstrings and calves informed me that they plan on revolting until either A) I drop out or B) never.  Yep, all I could think about for two hours straight was think about how and when I wanted to quit.  Somehow I pushed through that wall only to be confronted with the wall of a 2000′ climb up choss at noticeable elevation to the top of Lone Peak.  There was plenty of brutality between those moments, like the airy ridge traverse of the Headwaters, an unbelievably steep grass and rock downhill below Challenger lift, a mentally exhausting service road grunt to the Tram dock just to come back down, and screaming barfies in my hands as they finally came back to life after 4 hours of racing with meat mitts.  I thought the climb up Lone Peak would actually be my jam since I’d felt like it was the closest resemblance to park peak scrambling on the course.  Unfortunately, the spacy and slightly queezy sensation of extreme exertion at 11000′ coupled with severely cramping calves and hammy’s left me floundering up the loose scree and ankle-biting clinker blocks.  Summiting was awesome, and the high fiver from David Steele motivated me to crunch down 4000′ of brutal quad-crushing dh to catch and pass some of my fellow cycle-racers and ignore the thoughts of cutting the race short by writing off the final loop up and around Andesite Mountain. The final 5 km of racing were almost all down what should have been a pleasant gradient with only a couple painful spikes of uphill.  But the ol’ hammy’s and calves were in full revolt mode as I had to stop and stretch every 5 minutes just to free them up enough to regain any sort of a jogging gate.  I’ve never had the back of my legs be so gripped during downhill running, but I’m pretty sure it had to do with going out way to hot in my first 30 minutes of racing (oddly nice to be making rookie mistakes in endurance racing).  The back of my head was telling me I was going a little deep at the beginning of the race, but after 15 minutes I figured the damage had been done, and I literally would have had to pull off the trail and stand by waiting till 100 or so racers filed by before I could get back into the trail.  Hindsight it would’ve been wise of me to do so, but pride can sure get in the way of making sound decisions.  This event has been placed in an approximate 2.5 out of 3 on the fun charts.  Somewhere between that was cool, but not fun, and I can’t say I’d do it again.  A week later and I’m still not able to run, which is a shame with the tall peaks of Glacier beckoning through the clear Indian Summer skies.  Maybe next week!

Enjoy yours to the fullest!

*All the good photos are courtesy of Myke Hermsmeyer Photography, thanks for the cheering and great coverage Myke!