The Knucklehead Saga Continues

First...hope to post more photos of our friends finishing the last stage. Helen got some great shots.

Here is the latest Knucklehed story...We left Beaver Creek Sunday morning to visit my cousin in Meade, Co. After a brief visit George's step daughter stops by and picks him up. We unpack the car and get his luggage transferred to his daughter's car.
WELL...there are two red bags...you got it...my bag is now in Dallas and George's in New Jersey!!!

The flight home yesterday was uneventful...except I met the same DNC delegates that flew out with me two weeks ago. Harvey and Diane. We had a lot laughs. But a cute story...Harvey has a 95 year old mother who loves Tom Brokaw. Harvey bumps into Brokaw and asked him if he would mine calling his mother to say hello. Harvey gets his Mom on the cell phone and Brokaw talks to her for a few minutes. Made her day, week and month.

A little tired today and a busy day at work. Hope by the end of the week to finish the stages and summarize my experience at the TransRockie. If there are any Gore-Tex-TransRockie folks reading this blog I would like to thank them for a wonderful experience. I hope to elaborate more in the coming days about that experience both positive and negative(mostly positive).

Day 3 of The Quest

25 miles. Feeling much better after reaching 12,500 and not getting sick. Only had to go up to 11,750. George and I are cranky for the 1st 12 miles and we are not working well as a team. I wanted to join Jo and Sat after 12 miles. But after we cleared 11,750 we started running better as a team. I am having a lot of trouble running downhill on the trails. I much better when I get to the flat areas.
We were running to Camp Hale ( an old Army Camp). Once I get to the flats I feel great. Both George and I are able to make up a lot of time. We are having a friendly rivalry with the OLD GOATS(see photo) Steve(64) and Doug(69). They kicked our butt on Tuesday we beat them on Monday mainly because it was flat and only a small climb (1000ft). We could not make-up enough time to catch them...but we pick off a couple of other teams. We passed Jo and Sat but Jo was not feeling well...she had a case of sun stroke.

After the race we soaked our legs in a cold stream...that felt great. Camp Hale was a real nice place with a restaurant and running water and a toilet. But NO Internet access. We had a good dinner and watch the award ceremony. Our friends Christina and Kendra are in second place for the mixed 80's. Team Achilles( see photo above)

An UpDate

Hi All

Wanted to let everyone know we ALL MADE IT!!! Finally have Internet access and battery. Will up date everyone with days 3-6. Either tonight or tomorrow. Have to get ready for the banquet that starts in 30 minutes.

Day 2 OF THE QUEST

Need to be brief...battery low...Sick as a dog Monday night...did not think i would make Tuesday was in my tent at 7:00 with the chills etc...I thought the Quest was over after 1 day. Fever broke at Midnight. Was very weak and had to climb to 12,500 on Tuesday. Make a long story short. We made it. Thanks to a lot of help from a lot of people. We ended up teaming up with a total of 8 people and we help each other through the ordeal. Speaciall thanks to OLD Goat Steve. But a Big,BIG Thank You to Jo who paced us all the way up and all the way down. It was the best feeling I have had in a very long time when reach 12,500. I hope to post some photos if the battery holds out.

Day 1 Of The Quest

Started out early got up at 6:00am too nervous to sleep. Peed and poop 1000x. Met everybody downstairs for breakfast at 7:00. After breakfast Peed and Pooped 100x more. Then off to the start line it was 80 degrees not happy. But we were with all of our new friends and everyone was anxious to get it started. The Race started at 10:00. George and I started off on our quest. It was supposed to be an easy run 12.9 miles. NOT that easy. We finished in about 2 1/2 hrs. I think the altitude killed me and it seem like it was all UPHILL all the way.

Have felt better...but hope to come back strong tomorrow. We have to climb to 12,500. Off too dinner.

George: For those of us that know and love Fred, let me simply say that his colon is problematic. We all know the rest of the story.

Well, the news flash of today is the temperature... it's too hot for this insanity and we are hoping for a tornado tonight to change the air pressure in the rocky mountains. Nonetheless, we did okay today... no major tactical errors, but there were spots that we could have went a bit slower. Paulie, we took a sugar tablet when we were feeling crappy and I think it helped.... even if it didn't, we think it did... so mission accomplished.

Tomorrow will be a unique day.... signficicant 3 mile clime to 1250 feet and then a long descent. We can do it, because after all.... this is a VISION QUEST !

Until tomorrow.

T-1 The Race Begins Tomorrow But We Did a Preliminary Tonight In A ThunderStorm

George: To my fellow runners ... I am proud of you and please be safe, put your troubles aside for a week and have a great race ! God Bless, see you at the campfire.

To my daughters, Nikki and Chynna... I love you and I will see you soon.

Freddy : Good Luck everybody!!! Enjoyed today...hope to do the same tomorrow.

Katie, Freddy and Helen I hope you are reading the Blog and I miss you guys!

Days 163 & 164

Up at 5:00am slept about 2hrs Thursday night. Said goodbye to Katie and Freddy & Helen. Got to the airport no problem plane was on time. Leave it to me sit next to a DNC delegate from NJ slotted to vote for Obama. Well we got into a shouting match and the plane almost had to be diverted !!!! JUST KIDDING...She was a nice little old lady with her husband. I was a good boy and did not talk politics.

The plane landed early, got my luggage and went to find George. Found George then went to find our ride. We had a little wait for the shuttle so we had lunch. After lunch we found the shuttle and 4 more Transrockie runners. Then off to Buena Vista a 21/2hr ride. It was a nice ride got to talk to the other 4 runners. We all had a story about our training.

We got into our hotel around 3:30. Unpacked, and went across street for dinner with our new friends. We had a good time with a lot of laughs. Saw some pretty powerful lighting storms after dinner. We were in bed at 8:30. Long day but did not feel that horrible. Slept halfway decent...the ear plugs worked...George did not snore too much.

Saturday, woke up early and went down for some breakfast and decided to go for a short run. At breakfast we met Jo and Sat our UK blogging buddies who had gotten in late Friday night. They decided to join us on our run. It was nice easy run down to the river and we did not feel too bad. But the Altitude was felt. We also hooked up with some more folks from Toronto and we all went to dinner together. It was a nice day.

This is George: ditto above regarding meeting some new friends.
We are assessing our new friends intent for the race.... looking clandistinely for those that can meet our goal to run slowly and arrive safely. What we are finding is a diversity of experiences and folks that are vets of ultramarathons, folks that have coaches, folks that have sophisticated support networks.... I fear that we are doomed to running at the back of the pack all alone. The good news is that we have about 600 brownies with us, so we won't be hungry and we won't have to share.

In all seriousness, it is great to be around individuals that share our interest and are looking to achieve a goal without much in the way of expectation for "Glory " or recognition ... it's just cool to have a a stretch objective, become a bit fitter and take on a challenge that is a bit daunting. I'm proud of us all and look forward to the week ahead for the running, the scenery and the fellowship.... hard to say which will be the best element of the experience, but it is already clear that this will be a blast.

Stay tuned for updates from the maniacally engaged webmaster of this blog.... Freddie the Magnificent... Cheers !\