Truckee Adventures

Riley and Alec are out in Truckee this summer - they're training with Spencer and the rest of the Far West crew.  Here's Riley's account of their adventures so far:

Alec and I headed out with fellow EISA skiers Calvin Wight and Josh Harrington from Colby and Williams, respectively. Prior to this trip I read On The Road, which had me buzzing with beatnik vibes for our westward adventure. Every stop the four of us did some sort of adventure run, hitting up the Niagara river, North/South Dakota badlands, Baldy Peak in Bozeman, MT and even in a quaint park tucked into the suburbs of Chicago. We were able to see Tess Hamilton and former Bowdoin skier Rainer Kenney in Jackson, WY, where we managed to get in some L3 skate intervals and an awesome hike/run up Death Canyon with Rainer.

 Here is a sweet campsite we stayed at with the Grand Tetons behind us.

Tomorrow will be our fourth week of training and it has been really great so far. We do a fair bit of roller skiing, adventure running and strength twice a week in a local park. Intervals have been very tough for me, partly because of the altitude and partly because there are some fast guys our here. We did a 1 mile time trial a week ago up a fairly step set of switchbacks. The fastest time ever recorded is 10:07 by Noah Hoffman. I recorded a 12:06, Alec a 11:58 and Spencer was around 10:58. I think my running is not as strong as my skiing so I felt happy with this time, especially since it was my first time doing it too. I hope to get it down to around 11:30 next time.

Alec running the time trial.

There was also a 1 mile fun run in town that was mostly down hill with over 500 participants. I got there late because Josh’s car broke down and I also did not have shoes because of a mix up with someone who was supposed to bring me gear for the race. I had no option but to run the race in socks. I got 10^th, beating a lot of people that weren’t very competitive but also some fast people. I also PR’d my mile time with 4:58. The winning time was 4:17. Me and two other Far West skiers made the newspaper too.

On the left is Gus Johnson, a former UNR skier, middle left is Dylan McGarthwaite with a killer costume that ripped at the crotch, right middle is a giant dude from London, and then me without socks sprinting to the finish.