A while ago, I had a really good friend of mine from college come to Las Vegas on business. We spoke beforehand and promised to contact each other when she arrived to meet up and catch up. Our original plan was for me to head down to the Las Vegas strip and we’d meet and have a few drinks. Well, there were a couple of issues with this plan: my work demands and those of my family. As hard as we tried, we just couldn’t get it to work. Add to this the fact that my parents were also in town, the demands on my time were stretched extremely thin.

Ready to succumb to defeat, the running spirits intervened. She had been running in the mornings before her conferences on the strip and I had happened to mention I was going for a long run on Saturday. Well, one thing led to another and we finally scheduled a running date up in Red Rock Canyon for the predawn hours the next day.

Navigating the strip in the early morning hours is a little different from other cities. The streets are not desolate and in fact are filled with the previous nights partygoers finally returning to there wherever they came. Lisa was ready and we headed up into the foothills of the Spring Mountains and up to the canyon in the still sunless sky. I love running while it’s dark and watching the sun rise. It has to be the biggest high I get from running and in Red Rock it’s tenfold.

We setoff from the entrance planning to run to the high point of the loop and then back – 9 miles total. Among the dark shadows of the red and gold sandstone, we talked and ran, talked and ran. There were no interruptions by waiters or struggling to hear one another over a driving beat from the DJ booth. We covered topics from college to what has happened since we last got together many years ago. We arrived at the summit just as the sun reached the top peaks and had someone take the photo above. Now that’s a souvenir that no casino could provide. Learning that a bike race was headed our way, we quickly setoff on our return trip.

While many of us have experienced runs like this before is irrelevant. The point of the story is this: never will I meet an old acquaintance for drinks again. You better hope your a runner because that’s where we’re going if you want to get together. Lisa and I shared a lifetime of memories and stories in the hour and forty minutes running together than we ever would have been able to share anywhere else.

Next time you come to Vegas, bring your running shoes and then give me a holler.

RMFR

I’m a few days late with this update but didn’t want to leave anybody hanging from my earlier post. I’m going to blame daylight savings for my tardiness. The short story – same run, nearly same result (with a few exceptions).

I had a ton of confidence going into my 2nd 20-miler. No injuries, felt great and had a really good tempo run a couple days before. My goal was to settle down, relax and take the first half slow. I wanted to negative split my long run to see if I had the wheels at the end. Good game plan…poorly executed!!! I ran my first 10 miles at 9:40 min/mile. If you know anything about me, that’s pretty fast for a long run (my long tempo runs are 9 min/miles). So right off the bat, my game plan is shot. At the time though, I thought I was going to kill this run on the way back.

To give you a little background on my route, it’s along Nevada State Route 159 and weaves thru the Spring Mountains on the western valley of Las Vegas. You wouldn’t really know it by driving it but there’s quite an elevation change. While the elevation change from the lowest to highest point is only about 700 ft., the total elevation change of this run is nearly 2,000 ft. So, by busting out the hills early in my run, I had nothing left for them on the way back.

Confidence is still high knowing that not only am I putting in quality miles, but I’m doing it on some serious inclines. In a perfect world, all our long runs would be gradual downhills the whole way but nothing about this world is really perfect now is it.

With the Rock-n-Roll Las Vegas Marathon now only 33 days away and 2 more 20-milers on my schedule, I’m feeling very confident. It’s been a great running year and nothing’s going to slow this freight train. That and the fact that the marathon course only has 1,000 ft. elevation change and the last six are pretty much downhill.

I’ve been struggling as of late so I thought I’d throw a wrench into the workout routine. I went on a trail run. I know for most of you, this isn’t a novel idea but for me I’ve been an “Urban Warrior” since I started running. The crazy thing is, it’s not like I have to go very far to get to the desert and trails – less than a 1/4 mile.

I live on the west side of Las Vegas adjacent to the Spring Mountains and the Red Rock Conservation Area. There’s a lot of construction going on and it’s amazing how easy it was to run up there. There are semi-graded roads that could literally hold four lanes of traffic. This morning, the most they held was myself and a couple of bunnies.

Here’s an aerial of the area (from what I can measure online, it’s about 3 miles up to the first outcroppings of red rock). NOTE: If my family or friends want to know what to get me for my birthday in June, click here or here!!!

I was really hoping for some spirituality this morning taking in God’s creations (being one with my surroundings) and with “God Skys” (right B?) it was looking good from the beginning.

My son doesn't call these "God Skys" but says that people go to heaven by going up the rays of the sun to God.

The climb was steep but I didn’t think about it much. With my mantra by my side and trying to figure out which way to go, it didn’t take too long to reach my destination.

This goes back forever and I can't wait to get a descent pair of trail shoes and an entire morning to explore how far back these trails goes.

The way back down was a piece of cake and took about 15 minutes less than it took to get up here. I “hanked” a left when I should have gone straight and came out 1/2 mile from where I entered. It’s funny how things look entirely strange from a different perspective.

This photo is from my highest point. The red circle indicates the Las Vegas strip. The yellow circle is the Red Rock Resort.

The point of this entire post is that changing things up is good…no GREAT!!! Was I fully energized? No. Was I fully in a meditative state with God? No. Was my running desire restored? You bet your “Slump Buster”!!! Now I’m going to pick up a pair of Nike Air Terra Humara’s tomorrow.