Old Kentucky Home

Another long weekend with the girls, another post. Let’s go!

We decided to do some regional touring this past weekend in My Old Kentucky Home. The trip started Thursday morning with a drive to the Red River Gorge recreational area. It was hot, so we had to be focused. Our destinations were the Natural Bridge State Park where we rode the Skylift to the top of the bridge for some very short hikes to overlooks, the Hemlock Lodge for lunch, and the Whittleton Branch creek hike (with varying toddler moods).

 

When we left Thursday afternoon the girls were wiped out, so slept most of the way to Louisville where we relaxed at Jeff’s parents’ house for the night.

Friday morning consisted of a visit to the Kentucky Science Center…free if you are a Cincy Museum Center member.

Then, we had lunch with the business crowd at a café downtown before taking a walk along the river. We concluded the day by having dinner at Noosh Nosh, a family style, yet semi-upscale eatery which was terrific (once we got seated).

Saturday was a leisurely morning before attending a friends’ 2^nd birthday party at a bounce-house gymnasium, which Jeff enjoyed as well as the girls.

After a midday break we headed out to break the heat at Lakeside Swim Club, which was probably the biggest hit of the entire weekend.

Saturday night concluded with a fire-pit and s’mores at home.

Father’s Day was more business than pleasure since it was finally time to head home, but not before enjoying a home-made brunch and having a little more play time with the grandparents.

 
Father’s Day Picture with the girls    &    Amelia posing with our first pepper from our garden

All-in-all it was a great few days of fun and we enjoyed taking advantage of having the extra hands around to help with the girls.

Long Weekend in the Big Easy

After such a long break from the blog I won’t attempt to provide any recap. Basically we’ve been busy with a growing family and haven’t travelled or raced all that much. However, we just got back from a long weekend vacation, our first with two children and figured it was noteworthy enough to resurrect the blog. So here’s a recap of our New Orleans spring break.

We left Cincinnati Wednesday evening after work and made our way to Louisville to have dinner and visit my parents. The goal here was twofold: 1) Drop off Derby for the weekend & 2) Exhaust the girls so we could drive our first long leg through the night with (hopefully) sleeping children.

By around 11 we figured the girls were thoroughly gassed (thanks to my parents for staying up late with us –and letting me catch a catnap) so we continued southward. All was quiet through Kentucky and Tennessee, but by the time we entered Alabama it started to get weird. The girls were both awake and Susan and I both had not slept any, so we were running on fumes. It was at this time that Lily started having visions of birds in her car seat and struggled to be kept calm for the remainder of the ride…we’re still not sure what happened here.

Just before sunrise we arrived in Montgomery for a few hours of napping (for me) and a visit with Susan’s friend and playdate for the girls. The fact they were capable of playing at this point amazes me.

We continued southward around lunchtime on Thursday. It was here that Lily finally gave in to exhaustion and passed out for the next 5 ½ hours until we arrived in the Big Easy. After such epic travel we were out of sorts, so didn’t plan much for Thursday evening other than getting settled in the rental and stocking the fridge. We did jump right into the Creole food scene by having Jacques-Imo’s for dinner including jambalaya and shrimp and gator cheesecake (must have).

Friday morning I kicked off with a run along the Mississippi River Trail. It’s not scenic, especially when it’s overcast and the river is high. However, it’s a well-groomed path and uninterrupted for miles on end…functional. After clean-up and a leisurely breakfast we walked the 5 or so blocks to St. Charles St and took a ride on the historic St. Charles Trolley toward Canal Street. For $6 we were able to ride trolleys (and buses) all day.

The ride is SLOW (you could walk faster), but is an experience in itself and offers a tour of the variety of neighborhoods across the city. The terminus at Canal Street is tourist central so we quickly ducked into the surprisingly quiet streets of the French Quarter for lunch (apparently the Friday after St. Patrick’s Day is a bit of downtime for revelry). A few blocks later we stumbled upon a tasty looking menu at a restaurant that wasn’t overly crowded. Turns out it was the famous K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen and we just beat the lunch rush but had no idea. The oyster po’ boy and the potato leek soup were particular favorites and by the time we left there was a line snaking throughout the dining room to order.

Other sights from Friday afternoon included Bourbon Street, the French Market, rainy Jackson Square, and the World War II Museum which was very impressive.

The long ride back Uptown on the trolley was shared with local commuters and was standing room only for the first half of the ride. We got a local tip on the way which led us to dinner at a local diner (eat at the counter style), the Camellia Grill only a few blocks from our house.

Saturday started with another run, this time to the more scenic Audubon Park via the Mississippi River Trail in the other direction. Similar to Friday morning, we were slow to get going, but eventually drove downtown to the Riverwalk Outlets to get “brunch” beignets at the less crowded Café du Monde coffee shop housed within.

 

From there we walked south past the convention center to Mardi Gras World where a number of floats and work-in progress décor items are housed. It was an interesting tour to see a bit on the history of Mardi Gras as well as how the floats are made, but overpriced for what you get in my opinion.

We concluded the downtown activities with a walk back to the Warehouse Arts District for lunch and quick Easter dress shopping for the girls at the outlets before returning home early evening to watch (disappointing) NCAA tourney games. After the break at the house, we walked back out for dinner a few blocks away on Oak Street where a number of Uptown dining establishments are.

Sunday would be our last (half) day in NOLA before making our way back north. We slept in again, because vacation. I took one last quick run, this time down the St. Charles trolley line which I got a kick out of even if it’s a regular occurrence for the locals. Then we cleaned up the rental and checked out around 10am. It was finally a warm and sunny day, so we made our last activity a trip to the north side of town to the City Park to one of the free playgrounds. Storyland looked awesome as we drove by but was crowded and we figured we wouldn’t get our money’s worth considering we were only planning on hanging out for an hour or so.

Early afternoon on Sunday, we departed New Orleans having no idea that The Passion would be taking place in town just after we left. On our way out of town we stopped for southern cuisine (non-Creole) at Ma Momma’s House of Cornbread, Chicken & Waffles. The restaurant is in an unassuming strip center just off the interstate, but was delicious and service was very friendly. My fish and grits was terrific and Lily’s grilled cheese was good enough to get her to thank the waitress for the delicious food. We even got free bags of potato chips for the road!

Our Sunday driving route wasn’t entirely backtracking. We drove through Mississippi instead of Alabama with a stop outside Jackson, MS to visit friends. Mississippi highway driving is significantly more scenic than Alabama highway driving. A long Sunday finally ended just south of Nashville, TN and we finished the journey home (with a lunch stop in Louisville) on Monday. Considering all the driving we put the girls (and ourselves) through the trip was an unquestionable success. Kudos to Susan for picking the location and taking care of much of the logistics…so where to next?

Topo Trail Marathon Race Report

Once again it has been a while since a blog update. Hopefully we will have a couple upcoming since we just closed on our new house last week. However, the topic of this post is a race report. That’s right; I do still race from time to time. This race was also a bit of a milestone for me; being my longest trail race…taking me ever closer to the abyss that is ultra-running.

Throughout all of 2014 I have been inching up my average running volume. Partially this is because running is the easiest of the triathlon activities to knock out in limited time and mostly because running is where I started with endurance sports and seems to be where I always circle back…it’s where my sporting heart lies.

Philosophical musings aside; I have gotten to a point where 40-50 mile weeks are the norm and I’m edging up to 60-70 mile weeks when in a build for a particular race. I’m not sure there’s a point to highlighting my training volume other than to say I came into my goal race this past weekend with a strong endurance base.

A little about the race itself: The Topo Trail Marathon was held the first Sunday in December at East Fork State Park, about 45 minutes east of Cincinnati. It is run by the Topo Adventure Sports team, who host numerous regional trail and adventure racing events. I have had prior experience running their “no frills” winter trail running series races, so had an idea of what to expect from a race hosting standpoint. They do a great job of course planning (and in some cases replanning) and tend to know what dedicated trail runners are looking for, which usually isn’t much other than trails. The inaugural trail marathon was a larger undertaking and included “upgrades” from the normal offerings including medals, tech shirts and chip timing. As with any first year event there were some hiccups, but overall from a runner’s perspective it seemed an efficient operation. The course was a ~6.5 mile loop (a little short per my GPS, but accurate trail measurements are hard to take), so they also had shorter race options of a 1 loop and 2 loop (half marathon).

The week leading up to the race was unseasonably wet, with steady rain falling from Thursday through Saturday morning (less than 24 hours before start) and low to mild temperatures. For this reason, the organizers had to change the course to less fragile trails to limit the amount of erosion we would cause (and also make the course more runnable I assume). The new course included a mile on roads at the start of each loop and a section ~1 mile long on a mostly paved park access road in the middle of the loop. The rest of the course was dirt (mud) single-track trails.

The impending muddiness had me less enthusiastic going into the event than I normally would be. I wasn’t worried about getting muddy…that’s just par for the course when trail running. My main concern was the course would be so “squishy” it would be nearly impossible to run and the day would end up an excruciatingly long hike. However, when the sun was shining on race morning and the director indicated the new course was pretty firm (including showing us the lack of mud on his shoes), my spirits rose and I was ready to go.

Since the first mile was on roads, I decided to take it out faster than goal pace so I could get ahead of as many people as possible before entering the trail to take advantage of one lap of only minimally trampled mud. I knew with the shorter events starting at the same time we got to lap 2 the previously semi-firm trail would be worked up and more sticky. I entered the woods with about 20 or so runners ahead of me…mission accomplished.

Once on the trail I started evaluating the footing which was initially pretty firm. I was able to still hold a pretty good pace for the next mile, but started consciously backing myself off since there was a lot of running yet to be done. I let a few groups pass who looked to be more aggressive and eased into my comfort zone. The first 3 miles of the loop were pretty fast, being more downhill than up and including both paved sections. The mile around mile 4 was the most difficult and slowest. The remainder of the loop was a mixed bag, with some stretches that rolled but allowed for good speed, a couple steep climbs and slippery descents, and a few tricky bridge crossings (no rails!). Most of the first lap I spent mentally mapping the course so I’d be able to talk myself through the laps ahead.

I came through lap 1 at just about 50 minutes…almost 10 minutes ahead of my expected pace. I waved to my parents who came out to the start with me, showed off a less than graceful slip in the mud right in front of them, and headed out for lap 2 with a small group. For the next 3 miles our group ran as a pack. I gathered that the most vocal of the group was an experienced ultra-runner so I thought he’d be a good guide for the middle portion of the race. Unfortunately, he took a tumble early in mile 3 and slowed his pace quite a bit afterward and the group started to break apart. I went ahead with another runner, but was soon on my own again.

With about 1.5 miles left in lap two, my body was letting me know it was time for a bathroom break. We had got to the course only 20 minutes before the race and there was a line at the time so I passed on a pre-race trip. Luckily I was close enough to the end of the lap that I was able to take a pit stop just before heading out for lap 3. The port-a-john was ever so slightly angled backward relative to the ground, so I had a difficult time standing up to leave (and of course had the fear of it tipping always in the back of my mind). Business done, I left for lap 3 still feeling strong.

On the first mile of this lap I met up with the ultra-runner again, but his pace had slowed some so I exchanged some well-wishes in passing this time. Thinking back on lap 3, I don’t remember much worthy of highlighting. The course was getting increasingly sloppy in the wet-spots due to the traffic churn and the rising temperatures so footing was increasingly a challenge. I took a couple tumbles in laps 3 and 4, but all were of the trip and roll variety and left me mostly clean and uninjured.

My main focus for lap 3 was to fight the urge to speed up and to keep up a steady nutrition and hydration regimen. I had a hand-held water bottle that I refilled each lap at the 1 mile aid station. I also grabbed gels with caffeine at this station (2 each for laps 2 and 3, 1 for lap 4). The five gels and my Indian from the previous night’s dinner were my calorie fuel sources.

Near the end of lap 3, I started passing other full distance runners that were slowing in the later laps. As I came through the lap 3 banner I knew I was in line for a strong finish. My legs were starting to stiffen a bit, but my energy was still good and I knew I could hold up. I passed a woman just as we entered lap 4 (who turned out to be the overall female winner) and as we headed out she joked about catching me on the hills later in the lap. Subconsciously, I think that caused me to speed up for the paved first mile and give myself a nice buffer. I never saw her again and finished about 5 minutes ahead so it must have worked.

As I hit the 2^nd paved section (just after mile 2), my legs really started aching with the pounding. My feet were already wet and were starting to get tenderer. I was worried that I was starting to fall apart, but as soon as I hit the trails again everything felt much better. Over the last 3.5 miles I used the mental maps I created to divide the remaining course into segments (i.e. the “tough 10 minutes” surrounding the mile 4 marker). I also took a few more risks with pacing in tricky spots. In the last 2 miles I steadily passed a few other runners (I think I was lapping them) who provided great motivation to keep up the pace. With about .25 miles to go I took my last fall for good measure and then jogged into the finish, where Susan and Lily had arrived to see me in…a nice bonus.

 

Post-race, the effort hit me and I was stiff, tired, and hungry. However, the pain was eased a bit by learning that I finished 6^th overall. Also, I knew if I needed to I could have knocked out another lap (at a slower pace with more nutrition). All told, the race went far better than I had anticipated and provided a nice cap to the 2014 running season.

Big Events in the Big Apple

It has been an eventful summer, despite the lack of blogging on the topic. Just since the return from Alaska, there have been multiple trips to the lake house, a triathlon fail and surprise birthday in Chicago, a trip to Memphis for MommyCon, and our 6^th wedding anniversary. We’re probably overdue for a recap blog on the aforementioned.

Regardless, a trip to the Big Apple is always worth a blog post, especially if a family wedding is involved. So here we go…

Labor Day weekend we left Cincy in the afternoon and flew (via Newark) to New York City and our weekend digs at the Sheraton Tribeca. Since we have family with a condo only a few blocks away, TriBeCa is like our home base when on the island (we’re so chic), so we were familiar with the surroundings. My (Jeff’s) parents were already at the hotel as we arrived so met us and helped settle us in.

Before the trip…way back in December for Christmas…Susan and I had decided to plan date nights for one another as our present. One of my dates was a dinner at Tamarind which was the first Indian dining experience either of us had ever had about 5 years ago on a trip to NYC (thanks Craig and Teresa).  If you aren’t aware, Indian is now Susan’s FAVORITE food group…and I’m quite fond of it, too.

The Friday evening weather was perfect, so we left Lily with her grandparents a little early and walked from the hotel past the restaurant and to the Hudson River. After some time meandering, we returned to the restaurant where dinner was terrific as expected. Then we returned to the hotel for the night.

Saturday morning started early for me since I had a long run (10 miles) to complete. The weather was clear and mild as I left from the hotel. My run took me across the Brooklyn Bridge and back, the around the southern tip of Manhattan before running along the Hudson River paths and finally returning to the hotel…awesome scenery.

After the run and everyone waking up, we spent the late morning walking the Highline then heading through Chelsea Market.

  

We took the subway back south to TriBeCa and walked to the Tribeca Tap House for lunch and a little football watching, then took a break before leaving for the main event of the weekend…the Kissel-Foskett Wedding near the NYC municipal buildings downtown. The wedding ceremony was beautiful and had some interesting wrinkles like having the whole audience gather around the stage for the exchange of vows and the bride and groom exiting the church to a naval sword arch.

Post wedding, we walked back to the hotel for a little relaxation before heading to the reception, which was kicked off with a rooftop cocktail hour that was amazing! The views were spectacular and the hors d’oeuvres offered a “tasting trip” around the world. There was a table with a Mediterranean theme, a sushi table, and a taco and nacho bar. There was also wait staff with trays including foie gras, quesadillas, sliders and fries, stuffed mushrooms…and that’s only what I saw.

 

Once the wedding party arrived, we were moved to the interior dining room for the toasts, dinner (as if the cocktail hour food wasn’t enough), and dancing. The band was another highlight with three lead singers giving them almost unlimited range. Unfortunately all the sight-seeing hype kept Lily from getting a good nap, so Susan and I had to duck out of the reception early to put her to bed.

Sunday morning started with another early run along the Hudson. Then the rest of the morning was spent relaxing in the room and letting Lily sleep in. We had a (wedding family) brunch scheduled at ROC at 11am so finally ventured out to walk to the restaurant around 10:45. The “brunch” was actually a 4-course meal, so took a few hours giving us quality time to spend with the Kissels before many people left town that afternoon.

With our bellies full after lunch, we took the subway to the north side of Central Park to walk the food off. We meandered south and around the reservoir where we got some cool pictures of the skyline mixed with nature. Lily also got a chance to stretch her legs in the park before our trip was cut a bit short by a pop-up thunderstorm.

    

During the afternoon rains, we rested at the hotel for a couple more hours before meeting again to head to a dinner to celebrate my parents’ wedding anniversary at The Harrison. My aunt and uncle whose daughter was the bride happened to also be dining with a different group at the same restaurant and gave us a great gift by sending us wine and champagne for our meal. They know their way around a wine list too (unlike us), so the selections were great. The dinner was excellent and perfect for a celebration. Lily slept most of it, but woke up just in time to eat (she rarely misses a food opportunity).

After dinner, a few of us decided to head out on the town (Lily and Susan stayed in for bedtime). My brother-in-law, Jason, was looking for live music so we walked about a mile to a venue that we hoped was promising only to find it overcrowded and loud. Luckily it was good weather for an evening walk. We cabbed back to TriBeCa and tried a few more bars with limited success (too crowded or closed) before settling down at a dive just around the corner from the hotel.

Monday morning Susan wasn’t feeling well, so I took Lily and went to brunch with my family at Bubby’s. The pancakes were the highlight. Unfortunately the brunch brought an end to our time in the city, so afterward we bee-lined back to the hotel to finish packing and grab a car back to the airport (where we enjoyed a 2.5 hour delay).

What a great weekend!