Fueled by Fine Wine

Number three is in the bag! And seeing as I am having a hard time going up and down stairs today I might as well update this.
Fueled by Fine Wine as an absolutely stunning course put on by the Dundee Vineyards Association in Dundee, Oregon in the Willamette Valley (now make sure you pronounce that correctly). The course covered a variety of terrain, from asphalt to gravel to farm paths through the vineyards. From descriptions of last year's course we knew we were in for something special and something challenging, these race organizers love their hills. I will never again complain about having to head up 8th Ave to UBC, at least with 8th there is a block or two of warm-up - not the case this weekend, over the start line out of a park and boom there's the first hill, that went on and on and on (or so it seemed), we climbed through the residential area of Dundee before venturing into the vineyards and heading back down again to Fox Farm Road, it was very challenging to not turn off and head straight back to bead as we ran right by our home for the weekend, Fox Farm Cottage. More hills were to follow, and more vineyards, and more hills, you get the picture. The most challenging hill took us for a loop around vineyards with some of the most spectacular views. Thank you to Newton for the Tuesday night training sessions - I know they helped, and thanks to Kate for the trail runs on the North Shore, they sure gave me the confidence to run downhill on farm tracks and to conserve energy by walking up the big ones. With one more hill at mile 12 the finish line was finally in sight, and not only a finish line but a fantastic medal and wine tasting with at least 20 local wineries, can you say pinot noir at 9:30 am?
The organizers were correct, you may not get your best time but you will have your best time - it was a fantastic experience. (Dave may disagree but perhaps he took the run a little too seriously :))

Here's a few pics, you'll note you don't see many people actually running up those hills, in fact I don't think I've ever seen such a large portion of the field walking the hills. 

On the other thing that I am supposed to be working on while doing all these runs - well the last couple weeks have not been all that productive but...I have nailed down my research questions and am continuing to expand my background knowledge learning all about advocacy coalition theory, tenure and promotion policies and practices, and also exploring qualitative research techniques. I'm also exploring means of keeping my work organized, OneNote is looking promising but I've got to figure out what office 2010 has done to my laptop, they don't like each other. Another month of so of reading and processing and then it will be time for comprehensive exams in early fall - if I can figure out the paperwork that is.

Next up - the Delta Half sometime around August 14th.

Is it time already?

Yes it is - time for number three.
Later this week I will be hopping in the car for a drive to Portland, eventually ending up in Dundee, Oregon for the Fueled by Fine Wine Half Marathon. Plans for this trip have changed a little (well maybe a lot) since we first decided to venture to the Willamette Valley. What was initially going to be a family trip to the Oregon coast ending up in Dundee for a little wine and running, has become a father-son road trip across the US. Dave has been talking about getting a classic car for a while, and a little more than a week ago he found what he wanted - a 1966 El Camino. A day later and a few hours spent watching e-bay he was an owner - one small problem though, the car was located in Anna, Illinois (where?). After a busy weekend of planning I dropped Dave and Michael off at Seatac airport, they flew to St. Louis, got a ride to Anna and picked up the "kami" (as it is now affectionately known) on the morning of June 29th. Since then they have been making their way across the US: Sullivan, Missouri, Kansas City, Grand Island, Nebraska, Cheyenne, Wyoming, and currently in Evanston, Wyoming. We will be meeting up in Portland probably on Wednesday this week, and then will spend a few days exploring Portland - I think the boys may have had enough driving by then and a trip to the coast may have to wait for another year :)

When we do finally get to the half marathon location, we will get to enjoy running through and by a number of Willamette Valley wineries, and then get to sample the wines at a tasting after the run (no wines on course this time). Won't be looking for any PB's this time around, the route looks just a tad challenging (although they say the hills aren't quite so bad this year).

Stay tuned, I'll be back with a race report and restaurant reviews in a little over a week.

A few more pics.

Here are a few more pics from the Whistler half.

Now since this endeavor has a second part to it - namely get a dissertation written I thought I should provide a short update on that front.
My work office is officially cleaned up and ready for my replacement to take over. That means I'm working from home or SFU from now on.
I am three weeks into a directed readings course and so far so good, 15 articles down, 35 (or more) to go. 2 funding and fellowship applications complete, next up is shrink the research proposal and finish off the literature search on Sabatier's Advocacy Coalition Framework. So now it's off to find somewhere comfortable to read, read and read some more.

2 down - 10 to go

2 down - 10 to go!
The second official event is now history! I'm very happy to have PB'd on the first one in May, because now I don't need to worry about my times :)
Saturday, June 4th was the inaugural Whistler Half Marathon and what a day it was. Our horrible Spring disappeared for a while leaving us with an absolutely glorious day, sunshine all the way.
Friday was a busy pre-race day, accompanied Michael's class on their big grade 5 field trip to Victoria, MP and I opted out of the parliament building tour in order to catch the 5:00 ferry to Tsawwassen and then make the trek to Whistler. Dave had gone up earlier in the afternoon so he could pick up our race packages. It was a beautiful drive with a total of 4 bears spotted on route.
Saturday morning came awfully early but the sun was out and there was a good crowd of Alma runners at the start line:

I had taken what I thought was a pretty good look at the route for the race but apparently I didn't look close enough, while I though we headed out to Rainbow park on the first part of the race we actually headed up Blueberry Hill. Blueberry is far too unassuming a name for that hill, it went on and on and on. I knew the Valley trail alongside the golf course was hilly but the road was even worse, thank goodness for the down hill stretch that followed. From the summit of Blueberry Hill we sailed down to Wayside park, good directing Jacquie, then some more up as we looped around and came back to Blueberry Hill this time to take the golf course route down. Now we headed off to Rainbow Park and the turn around point, another loop around a residential area then back to the golf course to run alongside the front nine. Along the way we saw lots of evidence of bears, the poop exhibit at the museum in Victoria on Friday proved useful to identify the piles o'poop at the side of the trail. Luckily we didn't see any of the poop depositors, although it sounds like some of the later runners and walkers did encounter at least one bear on the trail. From the golf course we crossed under the highway, took a jaunt through the Village, past the cheering throngs (Newton), and off to the Upper Village (at least I think that's where we went), a few more dipsy doodles and it was back to the Olympic plaza and the finish line.

It truly was a spectacular course and a spectacular day. Many thanks to Nicole for sticking with me through a not very energetic run, I really appreciated the company. Congratulations to those that managed to achieve PB's on a very challenging course; I know for sure that Dave and Christine did, and congrats to all the Alma runners that finished: Andy, Liz, Sebastien, Emma, Nicole, Bob, Phil, Anna, Lina, Susan, Andrew, Tony, and any one else that I may have missed :)
The course organization was wonderful, the volunteers were great and the spectators who came out along the route were fantastic, there was incredible community support for this inaugural race. The only thing missing was a medal for finishing, although the original print is lovely I'm not sure how I'll display it with my 11 other medals :)

The afternoon was spent scouring the Village for the best calamari in town (Carumba wins) and the sickest backpack we could find for Michael.

Then it was the Garibaldi Lift Company in time for the big game - Go Canucks Go!

What a goal Burrows, now that's the way to end an overtime period!

All in all a wonderful weekend!
Next up.....get some work done on that darn degree, get back into a good running routine, I have learned that I cannot run a good half marathon on one run a week, and prepare for the next event - Fueled by Fine Wine in Dundee, Oregon, anyone care to join us??????

Half-Corked

What could be better than a beautiful sunny morning and an 18.3 km run with 9 wineries along the way?
Hmmmm, I can't think of anything can you?

This past Sunday was the second annual Oliver Half Corked Marathon organized by the Oliver and Osoyoos Winery Association (formerly SOWA south okanagan winery association). Team Greased Lightening consisting of Danny, Kinnecki, Rizzo, Jan, Frenchie, Cookie, Marty and Sandy (bad version) was ready to go and fueled up with some Gerhinger Bros wines at 8:00 am.

Following the costume parade and judging we were off, with a quick stop to drop off the ghetto blaster (don't know why Ken didn't want to carry it the whole 18.3 km). After a short downhill jog and onto the farm roads we were in the midst of Tinhorn Creek vineyards - once again Tinhorn served up some lovely Sangria, white this year, and refreshing watermelon. If you are interested in the sangria recipe Tinhorn has posted it on their website - beware it serves 144, you may want to scale things down a little. Another short trek along the farm roads took us to Iniskillan but wait, there was Dave but what happened to Greased Lightening? Apparently it must have been a Ford for it was "found on roadside dead" - a fautly seatbelt bolt prevented Dave from carrying our transportation for the whole race. Erica did a great job at ensuring our beautiful vehicle made it's way to one of the support shuttles so it we could retrieve it at the end of the run. From there the wineries kept coming fast and furious, Road 13 and Rustico Cellars were up next - at this rate we were going to run out of wineries well before we ran out of distance. From Rustico we went down into the valley, crossed the highway and travelled along the canal, being careful to avoid the "drowning machine" and started our trek up the other side of the Golden Mile with a visit to Silver Sage - a beautiful setting, this is where the race ended last year, with some interesting wines. After Silver Sage there were some hills to climb to reach Church and State, followed by Stoneboat and Oliver Twist. Stoneboat wins for the most refreshing presentation of a wine, they turned their white blend, Chorus, into a delicous granita with grapefruit, lemon, lime and orange juices. Leah assures me we can easily make this treat. Leaving Oliver Twist we left the vineyards and continued our journey on Black Sage Road. If you've been counting you will notice we are already at 9 wineries, and the distance at this point was only around 12 km, the next 6 km were not looking too good. We had been warned so the rather long hill at 13 km was not a surprise but I think all would agree it was very long and some of that Tinhorn sangria would have been very welcome half way up. While there was no sangria to be had, there were apple fritters and fizzy fruit drinks to be had at the top, and then a short jaunt down the hill to La Quinta Ferria for the last winery stop, and then it was all downhill to the Oliver Community Centre.
Most of our group stuck together, finishing in just under 3:00, not the speediest of times but possible one of the funest times.
The finish line provided a lovely lunch, and guess what else? More wine, the association wineries that were not part of the route were present at the finish line to offer their selections.
Finally the morning finished off with presentations of awards, our hard work on costumes paid off and Greased Lightening won the best group costume award - a 3.0 L magnum of limited edition Half Corked Red wine. Every participant received a bottle of this wine in their race packages, a blend of reds from all 23 participating wineries. Team Greased Lightening thouroughly enjoyed their winnings that evening.

Here are a few pics of our day :)

And next up.....the Whistler half in one and a half days - stay tuned.

What's next

This week the realization sunk in - I have to do 11 more of these!!!! What was I thinking......

And then I realized that for my next event, I actually have 2 within 7 days, now I really wonder what I was thinking.

Coming up at the end of May is the second annual Half Corked Marathon, last year this event was 17 km long, and this year's course has yet to be made public, the race organizers are saying something between 17 and 21. Organized by Jack Wessel and sponsored by SOWA (South Okanagan Wineries Association) this event if the Okanagan's answer to Medoc. The inaugural event last year had about 250 participants run 17 km through the Golden Mile area of Oliver, through vineyards and finishing up at a winery for a fantastic gourmet lunch. The registration good bag included a bottle of wine from one of the sponsoring wineries, the pasta dinner included wine tasting, as did the course itself. On course we were able to sample wine from Oliver Twist, Stone Boat, Tinhorn Creek, Burrowing Owl, Dessert Hills and finally Black Sage vineyards - now that is a half marathon. Many of the participants last year got into the spirit and ran in costume (including Bacchus and his bevy of Greek Goddesses). If you are interested in participating in this event you will have to wait for next year, registration sold out within a matter of days.

While the event itself doesn't have an associated charity, a charity of note in the area is the Burrowing Owl Conservation Society, check out their web page for the burrow cam and more.

A mere six days after the half corked is the inaugural Whistler Half Marathon. The course winds through the Whistler Valley, it promises to be scenic and challenging, the altitude difference between Vancouver and Whistler can be noticeable. Unlike many events, this one is being held on a Saturday, leaving the rest of the weekend to relax and enjoy the surroundings.

The Whistler half have chosen the Chrohn's and Colitis Foundation of Canada as their fund-raising partner, $5 from every registration will be heading to the foundation.

This event is also sold out, but if you want to participate they are still looking for volunteers :)

1 down 11 to go

Well the first one is done! Eugene half marathon, May 1st, 2011 with a PB to boot, 2:12:50 (previous PB was 2:14:03)

The weekend was great, we headed down to Eugene on Friday, spent Saturday at the run expo and exploring the Eugene market, next time we will definitely stay downtown. The downtown area seemed to have just a little more character than the burbs did - although the mall across the parking lot was very convenient.
Saturday evening was a lovely dinner at Ambrosia restaurant with our Alma running room friends, I think we had a total of 20 people there although at four different tables. Then back to our hotel to see the Canucks not quite win game 2 against Nashville. You can't say we weren't prepared though, the Pearce family had their jerseys on towel at the ready.

Sunday morning came early, at 5:45 we were all outside to catch our very convenient shuttle to the start line. We got to the start line in no time, had a chance to check our bags, and were very thankful for the U of Oregon opening up the law building to keep us warm while we waited. The sun was out but it was a little chilly out there. Shortly after 7:00 off we went. The half and full marathoners started together and followed the same course for the first 10 miles. Karen Walker and I were the only half marathoners in the group, we started just behind the 4:30 marathon pace leader and stuck together for the entire race. The first 8 miles of the race have a few ups and downs, we were anticipating a major hill around 4:00 miles, which was much less than expected and followed by a wonderful downhill stretch, the second major hill was just around 8 miles, this is were we caught and passed the 4:30 bunny. Around 10 miles the half course split from the full, and we finished off our last three miles without the marathoners. I was very happy to finish off with a PB of 2:12:50, and to finish before the first marathoner came in :) Even happier that my foot was fine for the race and after, and the PB was not expected at all, perhaps it was a combination of perfect weather, a beautiful course, great spectators, and finishing in Hayward field.

Karen and I then had the pleasure of sitting in the stands and cheering in all of our marathoners, Michael made it to the stadium in time to see Dave come in. Thanks so much to Suzana and Angie for hanging out with Michael and getting him out to see his Dad run his first marathon. Dave finished in a great time of 4:09:56, I'm very proud of him for successfully completing his first marathon of what I'm sure will be many more.

Sunday afternoon was a pretty lazy event, and Monday morning we were headed home, but not without a couple stops: the Bread and Ink Cafe in Portland for a wonderful brunch, and then Moonstruck truffles for some beautiful and yummy critter truffles.

Next up is the Oliver Half Corked on May 29th and the Whistler half on June 4th, a new challenge, two half's in seven days.... eeek......stay tuned.

Oops almost forgot - as far as the Ed.D. goes, my registration has been completed for the directed readings course, time to get going on annotating those 50 articles, that's 5 a week for the next 10 weeks, sigh....