After the Bolder Boulder we headed for the Great Sand Dunes. Todd took us on a minor detour without telling me where we were going. I was not expecting what I saw on the side of that hill. A radically anti-government guy named Jim Bishop has been building a giant castle out of big rocks and wrought iron on his property since 1969… by himself. The top of the tallest tower stands 160 feet up! And yes you can go all the way up there on rough hand-built steps. It was really nerve wracking. He built a metal dragon head on the peaked roof that will be capable of spitting fire 30 feet! Unbelievable.

In the evening we watched the sunset over The Great Sand Dunes and the whole San Luis Valley from our lodge room porch. What a view!

Check this out: Jim Bishop’s Story
More info: Bishop Castle on Wikipedia

Vacation Workout 1: Bolder Boulder Sprints. Time: 53:17

This year I decided to run the Bolder Boulder 10k Race like a true CrossFitter. I started with a 30 second sprint. Every time I crossed under a Kilometer marker I sprinted all out for 30 seconds for a total of 10 sprints. I sprinted the last one up the Folsom hill and through the stadium. In between sprints the original plan was to slow way down and fully recover yet still maintain a pace that would at least put me under an hour. The CrossFitter in me wouldn’t let me slow down as much as I had planned. About halfway through I realized I was making pretty good time overall and picked it up a little. I don’t know my time yet but I will be surprised if I am more than a couple minutes over last year’s time of 52:05 when I ran 5 days a week for three months in preparation. I have only run once for 15 minutes since March!

Posted from iPhone. I am on the road!

UPDATE:
Last year’s time: 52:05
This year’s time: 53:17

Yesterday Front Range CrossFit generously hosted a workout for the Affiliate Cup Teams from Colorado going to California. The workout:

Four stations:
20 wall balls at a 10’ target (14# for girls, 20# for boys)
15 kipping pull ups
10 snatches (75# for girls, ??? for boys)
5 deadlift singles (165# for girls, ??? for boys) each rep followed by 2 jumps over a stick (20” for girls, 24” for boys)

2 men and 2 women form one team. Each person from the team starts at one station. When the clock starts everyone does a set at their station. After all four people finish at their station the team rotates. This continues until everyone on the team has done every station 3 times. My only sticking point was snatch. My technique is so lacking I ended up pressing most of them. A lift like that is a lot more work for you arms than it would be for your legs if they were done correctly. That is one thing I definitely need to work on between now and July.

It was such a relief when it was over. I was chatting with the owner of the gym, Skip, about what a great workout it had been when he cracked a smile and announced “We are going to do that again”.  I laughed and laughed. And then he said, “No, I’m serious”. After a ten minute break he had us go through a single rotation one more time as fast as we could. It was an incredible test of mental focus to think I was done with something so strenuous and then have to get up and  do it again. I failed this mental test miserably on the wall balls when my 1 set of 20 turned into 1 set of 10 and 2 sets of 5. I dropped the ball twice, both literally and figuratively. I feel motivated to make sure that doesn’t happen again. Nothing feels worse than going through all that hard work and knowing at the end that you could have done better.

Here is a great video of North Central Regionals:

It is official! I am on vacation until June 9th! We don’t actually leave until Monday but still, what a relief. Front Range CrossFit in Aurora has generously invited the Colorado Affiliate Cup Teams to their gym for a workout today. I cannot wait to find out what we will be doing. My last official CrossFit workout for the next 10 days (except for the ones I will be doing on my own, of course).

I have been taking breaks from the daily CrossFit workouts plenty lately. The more rest I get the more I seem to need. Last week it was my calf muscles. Today it is my shoulders. I figured out that I put over 5000 pounds above my head in 2 days. All I have to do is shrug and my trapezius muscles cramp up. Ouch! Today was going to be a fun one too. 3 rounds for time of 10 pull ups, 15 burpees, 20 box jumps, and 25 wall balls. 75 wall balls today? No way. I guess I will go run sprints instead. I imagine I will probably end up doing the box jumps too.

You know it is time for a vacation when the highlight of your day is working out. CrossFit makes it a little different since every workout you survive is a major accomplishment.

Take yesterday morning’s workout for example: 20 push jerks at 120# and 40 burpees for time. The most I have push jerked as a 1 rep max is 130. That means I had to do over 92% of my former 1 rep max 20 times. About halfway through I started failing and dumping the bar behind me. I had to forget about the clock and concentrate on just surviving one rep at a time. Getting through that was a major accomplishment for me so of course it is ONE highlight of the day.

But the ONLY one? Sad. We tried to set aside Wednesday nights as a date night. Last night we ate dinner at Qdoba and spent the better part of the evening at Home Depot. And yes I also went to Bed Bath and Beyond.

It always seems like the week before a vacation is the most stressful time of all. There are so many things going on between now and Monday I can barely keep track. I have a ton of work to do and yesterday was a repeat of a few days from last week when I spent all day on one problem and couldn’t figure it out. Today is a new day and I have new ideas that I hope help. In the meantime, I just need to stop stressing out. All the craziness now will just make the actual vacation that much nicer anyway.

Next Monday (as part of my first life) I am going on vacation. First we’ll drive south to Great Sand Dunes National Park. Then over to Pagosa Springs to stay in a time share courtesy of my uncle Terry for a couple nights. Our next stop will be in Durango were we will ride the train to Silverton and possibly do the zip lines. We will check out Mesa Verde for a couple days and finally end up in Telluride. It isn’t exactly scuba diving in Bonaire or riding helicopters in Hawaii but I am still excited for the trip.

After writing about my dream closet yesterday I realized I really need to be living at least three different lives simultaneously. In one life I would live in a small condo with just the essentials and I would spend all my time travelling and seeing the world. Half the trips would be for pleasure and adventure and the other half would be to help where people need help.

In my second life I would live in a modest house and raise a couple kids and drive them to soccer practice. I would organize bake sales and work 9-5 and the family would spend summer afternoons at the pool. We would go on modest family vacations once a year if possible and Christmas would be our favorite time of the year.

In my third life I would design my own dream house to include the dream closet I wrote about yesterday. I would be independently wealthy so instead of working I would dedicate all my time to sports and all my other various hobbies (I would have time for many).

Reincarnation would help but not if you don’t fully remember your former life. So…  I guess i will have to make the best of it with just one.

I finally switched out my closet for summer. When the summer clothes come out it is like getting a whole new wardrobe. I run across items I forgot I had.

In my dream closet I would never have to switch out my clothes. It would be the size of a large bedroom. One wall would be for workout clothes, one for casual clothes, one for nicer stuff, and the fourth just for shoes and purses. There would be an island in the middle like in a kitchen for folding and ironing. Part of that would be a vanity for doing hair and makeup. There would be a skylight for natural lighting, a full length mirror, and a small TV so I can watch the news while I do laundry. And the laundry room would be attached so I would never have to carry loads of clothes across the house.

Then I would go to Honduras to visit my sponsored kid whose whole house is the size of that closet and sleeps 7 people. And when I got home I would sit on the island in my closet and cry and cry about how many families I could have helped instead of buying all those clothes. Sigh.