ZombieRunner Blog

A guy emailed me today to ask if he could use some photos to write an article on my running photography.

Here’s the article.

Small world — seeing as I’m part Norwegian.

- dc

This is a moment in Zombie History. Our house now smells like licorice, ginger and peppermint. That’s not the moment though, that’s ongoing. We are an official Altoids dealer. It was hard to imagine what 320 pounds of Altoids might look like, but it wasn’t all that big. But it did require a special truck and arrived on a palette. The driver got the handtruck and wheeled the delivery in. We feel like a big business on occaisions like this. And I guess we’re getting there.

The Altoids reps like us because we can do promotions together and “think outside the box.” Who would have thought of marketing mints to runners? But we think it goes pretty well with the JavaJuice, and who wouldn’t like a minty fresh feeling after a long run? How about curiously strong mints for curiously strong runners?

Of course, the main thing for us is that we like Altoids. A lot. And now we have 320 pounds of them.

gillian

A friend forwarded this article. Let’s hope it doesn’t happen.

A massive mining operation near the Sunol-Ohlone wilderness will send the East Bay’s coveted elk and eagles fleeing.

Read the article here.

- dc

I was drinking this tea, and looked under the cap at the writing:

It isn’t the mountain ahead that wears you out; it’s the grain of sand in your shoe. –anonymous

It seems appropriate since we talk to so many people about feet and blisters. I noticed even Don got blisters from Saturday’s run through the mud. We talked with Chris Kostman, race director for the Badwater Ultramarathon, last night. We will be providing foot kits for the runners! And, we’ll be at the race helping people with their feet. It takes a lot of steps to go 135 miles.

Anyway, the iced tea was really good: Honest Tea, tastes like real tea and is only slightly sweet. Finally a tea that matches my taste.

gillian

One of the reasons to run ultras that are 50 mile or longer is that you get to spend a whole day out there. We knew American River 50M would be like that for us. This race starts in the heart of Sacramento and follows bike paths and trails along the American River to Auburn, finishing at the Auburn Dam Overlook (yes, that means a big hill at the end). With the weather we’ve been having in normally sunny but now rainy CA, the trail portion of this run turned into a great mudfest. It’s always amazing the different types of mud you can discover in a single run: brown, swampy stuff, red, slippery stuff, the occasional section of shoe-sucking mud, and my favorite, chocolate pudding. Chocolate pudding on a hill was the best. Some runners attempted to go around mud, but sooner or later, everyone gave in and just went through the middle. One reason: the more you tried to avoid the mud, the more you would go through the poison oak.

The weather started off a little gloomy, but temperatures were great for running and the sun showed up a little bit. Volunteers at aid stations were in good spirits and so helpful as always. For this run you even get spectators along parts of the course, and crew people helping their runners–often runners attempting their first 50 miler. Seeing those runners cross the finish line is great. Norm announced runners as they finished, and would “encourage” them to run across the line (walking is NOT allowed at that point). As emotional the run is for first-timers, it still gets to me too, with this as my fifth AR50 finish. Because the race is point-to-point, you get a definite sense of awe about the distance covered. As you head west by car to return to Sacramento, you can see the downtown buildings marking the city way in the distance. It seems a long way to run.

gillian

I got a call today from a local guy, who’d found us as a Bay Area source for Aloksak waterproof bags. He said that he needed a couple of packs of them, and that he’d like to pick them up today. He also mentioned that he worked in Mountain View, at the NASA Ames Research Center. Close by I thought, so offered to deliver the order. I met him outside the gate at Moffett Field and gave him his order.

As he was getting into his car I asked him, “So, what are you going to use the Aloksak bags for?”. He said, and I’m not making this up: “We’re going to see if we can get the astronauts to go to the bathroom in them.”

You suppose I was privy (as it were) to classified information?

Today’s run on Black Mountain was so much better than last week’s. After the run last week I was sore for 4 days and Don was declaring the end of his ultra career. This week we ran the uphills and enjoyed the light fading from dusk to darkness. I figured it was all because we ate MOJO Bars before we set off.

The other fun part was trying out our new samples of energy gels. One is on our web site already - Accel Gel, which has carbohydrates and some protein. The other samples are gels that are not yet released! As soon as they are available, we’ll have them available.

The only bad part was that I couldn’t run faster on the downhills, since it was already dark. But there will be other runs. It was good to see the improvement from the week before. Also, Don and I are both getting more used to our Inov-8 shoes. I think they’re great for running in the dark because you can pretty much feel your way along the trail.

We are lucky to have such great weather in February - it was warm enough for short sleeves.

gillian

So, imagine a trade show that’s really big. Now imagine that trade show is full of booths of all your favorite stuff related to running and outdoor sports, and all the people working there are dressed in outdoor cool clothing with the latest trail shoes and sandals instead of stuffy old business suits. Then imagine that you can buy anything you want! That’s kind of what the Outdoor Retailer show is like for us. The exhibitors at the show are all the vendors, ranging from popular ones you’ve heard of like Montrail, Brooks, Inov-8, Wigwam, to makers of raw goods, including high-tech fabrics and materials.

Since we’ve attended the show before (in the summer), we had our plan of attack before we started. Visit current vendors for new product, visit our list of planned vendors to add, and then shop around for cool new stuff. The current vendors had new things for us. Inov-8 has some new models coming soon, so we pre-ordered those, and Julbo has a new style of sunglasses that are great for trail runners. GU is adding a new flavor gel, which we got to try. Then we stopped by Powerbar. They are changing their gels, have a couple new flavors, and the bars are revamped too (not the chewy performance bars, but the other ones). We are definitely adding some bars to our product line. The trend there is toward natural ingredients–dried fruits, nuts, and not a whole lot else. There is a realization that people like ingredients they can pronounce.

For clothing, super light and super breathable are always demonstrated. It seemed like Gore-Tex was everywhere. The Gore-Tex branding is getting a big push and so many vendors display that label. I was interested in the offerings that are considered soft shells–zip tops of mid-weight fabric that have some wind-stopping qualities to them but are not waterproof. A few vendors had versions of the top with waterproof fabric over the shoulders, providing a great combination of comfort and protection from the elements. We have a fondness for Sierra Designs–friendly reps, reasonably priced items, and theirs was the first rain gear we bought for running back in 2000, which we used for the LA Marathon during a torential downpour (we were smiling a lot more than the runners in plastic bags).

As we walk the exhibit hall, some sales reps are more aggressive than others and want to hand out free samples. Some are handy, like lip balms and energy bars, but others, well, would you believe we came home with a “toilet in a bag”? Anyway, often the overly-friendly rep approach pays off, as we learn about products that we hadn’t even considered. Some are sort of wacky (kind of fitting for the name ZombieRunner) and others are so practical that of course we should have thought of them.

We brought back as many brochures as we could carry and placed a great batch of orders. We can’t wait for it all to show up. It’s all in a hard day’s work.

gillian

The other night I had the pleasure of talking with one of our favorite customers. He is a state trooper in Kentucky who calls while on his way to work or sometimes on the job. His accent is Kentucky through and through, and he has trouble finding local people who understand his ultrarunning habit. Last time we spoke he was preparing for the JFK 50 Miler, which was in November.
He’s a lot of fun to talk with because he appreciates all the ultra advice, and sometimes he has to pause and take radio calls (which I can sort of hear). He’s working on a set of 3 long runs for 2006, one of them is the Great Eastern Endurance Run 100K, which will be his first of that distance. We hope that he’ll come out and visit us in CA sometime. Maybe for Western States in 2007? Although he is so modest, he’s not sure he’s ready for that kind of distance. Yet.

Panasonic just introduced the DMC-FZ7 a replacement for the camera I’ve been using to shoot during my runs.

The most important new feature is the addition of manual focus (controlled by a joystick - remains to be seen how easy it it to use, say, compared to a manual focus ring).

I was hoping for RAW support, but alas. Also, with 12x zoom, it’d be nice to have a wider range, maybe 28-336mm instead of the 36-432mm that it has.

The FZ5 is a terrific running camera (it’s not tiny, but for its capabilities, it quite small). The FZ7 looks like an improvement — probably not enough to trade in an FZ5, but if I were shopping for a new camera (or if I still owned an FZ3) I’d probably get the FZ7.

Ideally I’d do all my shooting with an SLR - the photos are much better. But when I’m out there running for many hours, especially in a 50 or 100 miler, carrying that much weight is out of the question — not if I want to make the cutoffs

- dc