On Top of the Mountain

Mission accomplished!  I completed the 30 day challenge in 28 days.  I am happy I started something like this.  It was great training and I learned a lot.

Mt Everest Challenge Week No. 4 Review

Challenge Day	Todays Miles	Total Miles	Miles Left
22 Day Total	20,132	20,132	8,897
Day No. 23	1,060	21,192	7,837
Day No. 24	2,067	23,259	5,770
Day No. 25	1,302	24,561	4,468
Day No. 26	1,273	25,834	3,195
Day No. 27	1,514	27,348	1,681
Day No. 28	1,994	29,342	COMPLETED
Day No. 29	Who Cares	COMPLETED	COMPLETED
Day No. 30	Who Cares	COMPLETED	COMPLETED

The days in the above chart are links to my Strava profile for the corresponding run. The graphic below is from my Strava profile with the days I ran and the elevation totals on those days.

Things I learned.

1. Set goals.  This works on so many levels.  Goals within goals.  My main goal is to complete my 100 miler.  So I have to setup the mini goals to obtain it.  If I didn’t do this challenge there would be no way I would have put in the effort I did.
2. Excuses and Reasons.  There was many days I was just to tired to run.  I am doing crossfit 5 days a week along with running elevation.  So a few days I made excuses and did not run (I had to make it up another day).  Then there was an actual blizzard of 2+feet of snow.  That was a reason for a break (had to make that up spread out over several days).  The moral of the story is get’er done.  Doesn’t matter what is going on around you.  If you say you are going to do it there is no excuse or reason for you not to complete the task at hand.
3. I hate winter.  Snow is beautiful for about 1 day.  After that it gets in the way.  I had a blast with the kids but I want warmer weather so I can be outdoors more.
4. Bunch of running crap.  My posture sucks going uphill and I improved on that.  I figured out my turnover.  Smaller faster steps which I still need improvement on.  My downhill is a little more controlled rather than huge hard landing steps.  The biggest thing was I learned on was how to run in the now.  I didn’t stress on how much more I had to do or how much was already completed.  I just ran and had fun.

Another super cool thing is that I am ranked 844 out of 73,555 people.  Strava does the same climbing challenge every month to earn a badge.  It means nothing but it is a little bit of a motivator.  I looked at this the past week and was excited to run more to break into the top 1,000.  So it worked.

On a side note.  I follow Sally Mcrae and elite runner.  She is super awesome.  She posted about what training everyone did that week and I posted my video of the dogs and I running in a blizzard.  She actually watched it and responded.   Here is the link to the video.  I was so pumped.  My wife made fun of me for being so excited.   Great week.

Be Awesome.  Inspire People.

 

Celebrating 100+ Followers

I am a talker, more of a doer but never thought of myself as a writer.  I have great ideas but it is hard for me to translate them from the crowd of voices in my head to paper.  Most of the time it is just going to be a bunch of jumbled words that flow unfiltered to this blog.  I hope that most people understand it and/or are slightly entertained by it.

If you are a runner you will relate to tracking things.  When I first started 5 years ago I tracked pace and lived by it.  Then it went into mileage, elevation, calories & a billion other things.  All which are important but doesn’t really matter to a non-elite person.  They are just little bookmarks or guides to help you better yourself.  Embarking on something like completing a 100 mile mountain race I think deserves some tracking.  As in, tracking the journey not the individual stats.  So I started this blog and “the origins” a series on my YouTube channel to document what I can.

To have people follow and like what I do is pretty motivating.  To have more than 100 strangers follow you is insane and humbling.  Thank you for caring and for all the positive energy and comments.  If you have any questions about my training or any suggestions on what to blog or video let me know.  Thank you again 100+ followers.

Be awesome.  Inspire people.

Falling Behind

Mt Everest Challenge Week No. 3 Review

Challenge Day	Todays Miles	Total Miles	Miles Left
15 Day Total	15,469	15,469	13,560
Day No. 16	1,145	16,614	12,415
Day No. 17	289	16,903	12,126
Day No. 18	SNOW	16,903	12,126
Day No. 19	SNOW	16,903	12,126
Day No. 20	FAIL	16,903	12,126
Day No. 21	1,145	18,048	10,981
Day No. 22	2,084	20,132	8,897

The days in the above chart are links to my Strava profile for the corresponding run.

Reasons or excuses?  Reasons or excuses?  Reasons or excuses?  The bottom line is that I am behind in my elevation to make my goal.  The 2 feet of snow we received really put a hurting on me.  My family does not own a snowblower (pity party) so I became the human snowblower.   Now I have the back of a 90 year old man.  Suck it up buttercup, am I right?

Reasons or excuses?  Reasons or excuses?  Life and more snow made a few days somewhat unsafe and unproductive for me to run.  I made a few adjustment and decided to go slow and steady on the same path I have been taking for the whole challenge.  I chose to wear my military boots for the snow trekking  since some spots of the snow is past my knees.  It was definitely the right choice but my knees and ankles will need some time after this week to recover.

Will I hit the 29,029 feet goal of the challenge?  I am not the type to fail at things.  I have a little over 20,000 feet in for the month.  So as long as I stay on course and hit my typical 1,100 feet per day I have this in the bag.  Determination.  Dedication.  Most importantly Discipline.  Positive thoughts please.  See you at the top.

Be Awesome.  Inspire People.

Running With Friends

Pennsylvania is going through the snowpocalypse of 2017.  We accumulated over 2 feet of snow and it is still a blizzard outside.  I am in the middle of a running challenge.  I am trying to run over 29,029 feet of elevation in 30 days.  Today would be just another day in the eyes of training.  So I gathered some friends and went for a…..  Slow trek uphill.

In the last two days I ran over 4,000 feet of elevation.  Yesterday, during crossfit, we did a billion pistols (basically one legged squats) and 4 sets of 6 reps of our max of back squats. My legs are in a tad bit of pain.  To help recover I did the basic stretches and smashed some sore areas with a foam roller which helps but my muscles are spent.  Then the storm came.  The shovel is going to be used as todays workout tool.  Running (slow uphill trekking) will be the cool down.

The photo on the left was from my run yesterday.  Beautiful day.  It was warm enough to where the snow was melting.  The photo on the right was during the snowstorm.  Same spot as the photo on the left but with zero visibility.  I have two Goldendoodles (Jake & Vader).  They are the best friends anyone could ever have.  They would even climb a mountain in two feet of snow during a blizzard to hang out with me.  I couldn’t ask for anything more.

Be Awesome.  Inspire People.

Winter Blows!

First of all, who is the dumbass that commits to a climbing challenge in the middle of winter.  It’s this dumbass.  The climbing isn’t the issue it is the cold and the damn wind. The wind is my enemy.

Mt Everest Challenge Week No. 2 Review

Challenge Day	Todays Miles	Total Miles	Miles Left
8 Day Total	7,605	7,605	21,424
Day No. 9	1,165	8,770	20,259
Day No. 10	Fail	8,770	20,259
Day No. 11a Day No. 11b	1,450	10,220	18,809
Day No. 12	1,148	11,368	17,661
Day No. 13	977	12,345	16,684
Day No. 14	Fail	12,345	16,684
Day No. 15	3,124	15,469	13,560

The days in the above chart are links to my Strava profile for the corresponding run.

This week family plans and crazy weather made things difficult.  If I take more than 2 days off during the week I am a dead man.  I was doing the math on day 15 and I was behind by 3,000 feet.  That was so demoralizing.  I plan on doing 1,100 feet on average per day which gives me a tiny buffer but not when you skip days.  The east coast is expecting a foot of snow this upcoming week so I am trying to catch up on my missed elevation.  I don’t want to get to a point of no return.  So I banged out a 3,000+ft day and got back on point.  On too week number 3.

Be Awesome.  Inspire People.

Socially Motivated

Train.  Train.  Train or be derailed I read in a book once.  I am not comfortable in front of a camera and my writing is around a third grade level.  So why not attack both and be socially awkward for millions to see.  I want to put myself out to the world, not to be cool but to hold myself accountable to my goals.

I think what I do is pretty cool.  The idea of running up mountains for 30+ hours straight is pretty insane to the normal person.  Friends and family push me to document, “the journey”.  So I decided to figure out how to do it.  Social media is my new side job.

Where do you even begin?  Yes, what I do is interesting but how do you show others in a way for them to think it’s as kick ass cool as it actually is?  I will break down the basics of what I did and why.  Things are in the beginning stages of awesomeness.

1. Strava – This is the link to my Strava profile.  I track all my runs and cycling on here.  I take CrossFit 5 days a week.  I used to post those but it got to be to much.  I have it to where almost every post I publish gets around 1k likes.  I feel cool because most elites don’t even touch that statistic.  Being Liked is a previous article I wrote explaining how I get so many Kudos (that is a strava like).

2. Instagram -This is the link to my Instagram profile.  I add something to this almost everyday.  It is usually a clever but  dumb selfie I take and I caption it with the training stats for the day.  The cool thing about this is I can post certain video clips and it attaches to my Facebook page.  That kills 2 birds with one stone. (Disclaimer: I never killed a bird before.)

3. Facebook – This is the link to my Facebook profile.  I have 2 accounts in facebook.  I have my personal one and I have my RosserRuns account.  The reason I have 2 of them is so I can keep all the sarcastic, funny everyday posts on my personal account.  The RosserRuns account I have 99.99% running related things attached to it.  This is easier to keep life organized.  My feed is all running.  I do Facebook live often.  I add photos in an OCD way that I don’t post on any of the other media outlets.  Any cool article and videos I see from around the interwebs I post to the running page.  Friend requests are welcome.

4. YouTube – This is the link to my YouTube channel.  This is the one I am making the most progress at.  I have an old school commodore 64 as a computer so my software crashes upon every edit I make.  I have a GoPro and a Samasung Galaxy S5 that I take all of my photos and videos on.  I have 2 series that I am currently working on.

• 30 Seconds – I am in the middle of a climbing Mt Everest Challenge.  The jist of that is I am trying to climb over 29,000ft in 30 days.  Most of my training I take the GoPro out with me to get footage.  If I get some good footage that day I put together a 30second preview and link my strava run to it.  I save the longer edits for my origions series.
• the origions – This is my work in progress.  I enjoy this the most.  I figure out new editing techniques each week.  The videos get longer and I receive more feedback which I use for the next episode.  This I want to pump out a video or two a week showing my training.  So this I will have my crossfit, cycling and running in the videos.  The Eastern States 100 that I am training for isn’t until August so I should get a lot of videos in by then.

I am not that comfortable in front of the camera yet.  I guess it comes with time.  Just like everyone else I have the self image thing going on.  Each video gets more of my talking and explaining things which I see as a plus.  Very shortly I will be doing reviews on the gear that I use.   I am not sponsored and I don’t get any freebies so what I review will be just from my experience with the product.  My main thing is just to get some real content on the channel so people have a reason to subscribe and come back.  If you have any ideas for the channel I will listen to them.

5. WordPress Blogs – This is the link to my RosserRuns blogs.  At times my words are unfiltered thoughts that flow from my chaotic brain.  I want to have this site as the main hub to all that is RosserRuns.  I will get a few articles in a week.  I may also have some guest writers doing alternative stories to reach a larger audience.  I have a web design background so I will have the article as interactive as possible with clickable links and widgets.  One day when I upgrade the account I will have videos embedded as well to make life easier for all.

Like, Follow & Share.  Blah. Blah. Blah.

Be Awesome.  Inspire People.

Up, Up & No Way!

Mt Everest Challenge Week No. 1 Review

Challenge Day	Todays Miles	Total Miles	Miles Left
Day No. 1	1,729	1,729	27,300
Day No. 2	1,178	2,907	26,122
Day No. 3	295	3,202	25,827
Day No. 4	1,480	4,682	24,347
Day No. 5	1,181	5,863	23,166
Day No. 6	Fail	5,863	23,166
Day No. 7	Fail	5,863	23,166
Day No. 8	1,742	7,605	21,424

The days in the above chart are links to my Strava profile for the corresponding run. 

Not a total failure.  I have built in fail safes. Unexpected family plans arose and I was in the concrete jungle of Philadelphia ish.  Running was an option but everything is flat and I would have been wasting my time.  I will just add a few extra feet onto some of my runs this week to make up the slack.

I am using Strava so the numbers are traceable and standard.  The only downfall is that Strava starts the week on Monday when I start the week on Sunday.  So there is a one day layover from when I started.  This will be a 30 day challenge from the start day.  I am not the type of person that just barely makes his goals.  I usually destroy them.

I am working on video logs for the challenge on my YouTube channel. Please check it outn and leave a comment on what you think.  Like, share, subscribe for updates & blah blah blah social media plugs.  The vlogs are called 30 seconds because I want them as short glimpses into that day.  Longer videos will be created weekly.

I appreciate feedback on the challenge and my progress.  If you have any other ideas on running challenges that would help my training for elevated 100 milers I am game.

Be awesome. Inspire people.