Adventures in Onionism

That's it, the title is the post. No, of course that's not the post, but I am wondering. My schedule has filled in a bit for the year. I'm now signed up for: Orcas 100 (Feb), Paiute Meadows 50K (May), Scout Mountain 100 (June), TRT 100 (July), and hope to run the fun runs Lupine Loopfest (Feb), Desolate Peaks (August), and Euchre Bar Massacre (October). But the big news is that I got selected in the UTMB lottery. I have until the 29th of January to confirm my registration. For the non-runners: UTMB is a 106-mile loop around Mont Blanc through France, Switzerland, and Italy, starting and ending in Chamonix. By all accounts it is spectacularly beautiful and very difficult, with about 33,000 feet of climbing. For most of my running life I haven't really cared about European races or followed European runners, but I got swept up in the spectacle of it last year. It was the race's 20th year, an American man finally won (Jim), and also finished second (Zack), and Courtney...

2023 Races: I ran five ultras this year. That doesn't seem like all that many to me. Looking back at my Ultrasignup results, I've run a low of four (2014) and a high of eleven (2015) ultras since I got into the sport. (Aside from 2020 when everything was cancelled.) Black Canyon 100K, 60K Double Silver State 50K Western States 100 Crazy Mountain 100 Chicago Marathon Hidden Valley Hammer 10K I was pretty happy with the Black Canyon double in February. It meant my body was finally back to normal after Tor in 2022. (I'm not happy that there was absolutely no recognition by the race org of the double, despite promises to the contrary, so I'll just keep howling into the void about that--add it to my "Just serve soy sauce flavored ramen. It's vegetarian and tastes just as salty!" evergreen ultra complaint.) I was happy with Silver State 50K until the day after when my hamstring threw a fit. I think I can no longer run a race the day after a nine-hour drive. I wa...

I recently finished hiking or running every maintained mile of trail in Joshua Tree National Park.  I started this project in spring 2021 when we bought a house two miles from Black Rock campground. I'd thought of trying to do something along these lines back in my thru-hiking days. Simple Google searches indicate Yosemite has " more than 750 miles of trail ," Yellowstone " more than 900 ." Someday I thought I'd spend a summer entirely in one of those parks, Memorial Day to Labor Day, hiking every mile of trail. Bear canisters and permits seem like an issue, but a surmountable obstacle. Memorial Day is early, but not too much worse than my 2004 PCT thru-hike when I left Kennedy Meadows Memorial Day weekend. Perhaps it would be much worse in Yellowstone, but it would be nice to get some time in the parks in early June before mosquito season really ramps up in July.  Cool Of course I have a real job now so I can't spend the entire summer hiking...