Thrill Seeker

I like that I have an adventurous daughter. I like that Megan and I have been on roller coasters together. Megan doesn't seem to have much fear when it comes to trying new things, and long term, that's a positive quality to have in my opinion. In my experience, it's always my fear of something that prevents me from doing something cool.

What I don't like is how that fearlessness translates into a 5-year old. It means she has no fear going down the street, to walk head long into other families going-ons. It means she wants to explore and meet and play with all the kids on her block (of which there are quite a few now in her age range). But mostly it means going places without telling Mom and Dad, thus we get scared because we don't know where she is. So until we get that figured out, it's back to the drawing board. No more alone time outside until we get those limits and restrictions being followed consistently.

However, on the positive side, having an adventurous daughter translated into an AWESOME fun time at the Renaissance Festival! The last time we went was back in 2008, so Megan would have just been turning 3. I think it was a much bigger experience for her this year, and hopefully the start of a longer tradition.

Oddly enough, the little fairy girl at the entrance handing out magic stones was there again this year. We made our rounds, stopped at a few shows, but the big draw for Megan this year were all the crazy activities and rides. Megan wanted to try it all!

We came across a reptile display, and a huge boa was out. Everyone was crowded around, and the gal asked if anyone had any questions. Megan was quick to ask if snakes were mean.

After the snakes, I saw a climbing tower. I thought we'd give it a shot, and Megan got super excited. Next thing I know she's climbing up this thing like a crazy monkey. She could have kept going higher, but then looked back to realize how high she had gotten and wanted to come down.

She also had an awesome time on a human powered horse swing and jumped on the back of a guy who said he was a bench. Megan laughed and told him he wasn't a bench, but he insisted (don't worry, I made sure she tipped well).

But the kicker was the bungee cord trampoline. I was honestly worried about it, but Megan had a killer time. In fact, she had so much fun she insisted I let her do it one more time. She went even higher the second time. Check out this video:



I think we will be going again next year.

The Big One

I've been hinting about it for a few weeks now. Mentioning my summer training, a different "style" of training, and my first attempts at interval training and speedwork (strideouts). So what is the big mystery? Can you guess?

Yes, I decided to train for and run my first marathon this year. The Twin Cities Marathon to be exact. Why did I keep it a big secret? I honestly don't know. I didn't even tell Andrea until a week before I started the training, despite the fact that I had signed up months earlier. I suppose it was because I hadn't fully decided why I was running a marathon yet. Was it just to see if I could do it? Was it for some bigger reason? I wasn't sure.

In the end, I've come to terms with why I'm doing it. And that will remain my special secret, and my special source of motivation while I'm out there. I've trained really hard this summer to not just finish a marathon, but RUN a marathon. I would consider my goal aggressive for a first time marathon. I also am confident that as long as there are not huge factors against me, I can achieve it.

Huge factors include: weather & injury. Weather is out of my control, but injury isn't. And tonight, after a 5 mile strideout session, I've developed one heck of a shin splint. I'm trying to remain calm. I've healed quickly in the past. Tomorrow is a rest day. Should I skip my last long run Sunday? Maybe... I'll see how it feels then. My buddy says it's a pre-marathon phantom pain. But it sure does hurt for being a "phantom".

The race is in 9 days, on October 3rd. For those not familiar with the TC Marathon, it starts in downtown Minneapolis, runs around the lakes where so many other races are done, towards Lake Nokomis, up along the Mississippi, and then straight over into St. Paul, ending at the Capital. Here is an interactive map link. The marathon starts at 8am, so feel free to come on down and cheer for me. I'll post more info closer to that weekend, including where I should be at various times. You can also follow my progress with automatic text updates. Just register here, using my name or bib number.

Text updates on Shawn's marathon progress! Bib number 858.

Great Race - 16th Place!

On Saturday, I had yet another race, coming off my 25k from last weekend. This time it was a 10k around Lake Nokomis, which is the best flat 10k around. It was also the location of my previous personal best 10k. I set out on Saturday to set a new PR, mostly just as a final confidence builder leading into the big race.

It was probably the smallest race event I've ever done, with only 139 registered finishers. I talked shop with a few people under a tree as we avoided some early morning light rain. The talk turned to how there were a lot of "fast runners" on this course last year, in the 5-6 minute/mile range. Another girl chimed in how a friend of hers just ran his first half marathon in 1:15. Ummm sure. That's the time of an elite top runner athlete. No first timer, I don't care how fit they are, is gonna run that.

Anyway, I went along with the banter, thinking mostly about my goal. The time to beat? 42:27. The pace to beat? 6:50 minute/mile. I lined up at the start, only a few people back. I started fast with the pack, and quickly slowed to establish my pace. It was almost like the order of how people were going to finish were set within that first mile.

During the run, I only passed 2 people and I was never passed. After mile 3, I was completely alone. I mean, COMPLETELY. The person that finished ahead of me was a full minute ahead of me, and the person behind me was a full minute behind. This was a very weird feeling. With no one to pace or help motivate me to push harder, all I had was myself.

By the end of the race, I was pretty sure I had been able to beat my time. I was only watching my pace and never the total elapsed time so I couldn't be sure. I finished 16th overall, total time of 41:52, pace of 6:46. Finishing in the top 20 of a 10k like that was pretty damn cool. It was exactly the confidence builder I was looking for, and told me that all the training this summer really has had an impact on my running.

No Pics For You!

Too many pretty pictures and videos lately, time to get back to the brass tacks of blogging. Last weekend was good, with both ups and downs. Every weekend in Sept is packed, as we try to squeeze as much fun as we can out of the final days of nice weather.

Saturday we did a Who Done It Hike, at a nice wooded park area near our house. It was one of those good in theory, bad in practice events. Don't get me wrong, the free bagels and Cliff bars were great, but the actual hike itself ended up being a bit of a chore. The "mystery" was geared more towards the older crowd (6th grade+). It just involved a ton of paper hand outs to read. I guess I was hoping for some live action stuff, with a few actors or something. We got a baby backpack for Casey and she promptly fell asleep 10 minutes in, but the hike was tough for Megan. She just wants to do her own thing and explore at her own pace. It's hard for me sometimes to shut off my stupid goal oriented brain. At one point Megan got tired, and so with 25 lbs. of Casey strapped to my back, I carried the 50 lbs. of Megan for probably a good quarter mile. That was a bit tough.

We came home and rested and then hit up a local car shop doing a customer appreciation day. We mainly just go because they have bouncers and sometimes free pony rides. This year no ponies, and it was so windy out that we cut it short. I did a short run after that.

Sunday was a 25k race for me. I had no plans on doing a speed race, as I'm all about pace now. I got down early because my schedule called for 20 miles, and 25k is 15.5 miles. While doing my pre-race run, I bumped into someone I knew, and before I realized it, we ended up doing a full second loop around the lake, which I didn't mean to do. Ended up doing 22 miles for the day after all was said and done. But more importantly, my pacing was excellent and I felt great afterwards.



Legs were a little tight on my run tonight, but things start to slow down from here on out. Slow down for what you ask? We'll, I'm sure most people can figure it out by now. If it isn't obvious, check back this weekend for more info.

Como Zoo Soo Foo!

This week has been busy and I choose to play some video games instead of blog, so I'm a bit light on posts. Last weekend we had an awesome fun labor day weekend, ending Monday with a long morning and afternoon at the Como Zoo Amusement Park. Andrea got a few end of season unlimited ride passes for a good deal.

Megan loved the swing ride, she had recently gone on one while staying with our friends over vacation. She could also go on a bunch of rides by herself, which was really cool! She just loved picking whatever rides she wanted to go on.

Casey was even able to get in on the action, doing one ride by herself and a spinning tea-cup ride with me. She was having a great time all day, check out the video of her at the end.

For the bigger rides, we just took turns with Megan. That Frog Hopper ride was awesome fun for the kids! Getting her ready for some Power Tower action in a few years. She did it 2 more times by herself.

We ended the day stumbling across a kids entertainer/juggler/magician guy. Megan quickly ran to the front row and sat down in a chair to watch. No big deal we thought, as we hung back. Next thing we know, Megan is up walking around on stage with this guy. I'm thinking, do I run up and get her off and make a scene or do I just let this play out? I mean, the guys a professional child entertainer. He knows how to deal with this right? Sure enough, he got her involved with a rope magic trick and she did okay and went back to her seat when directed. Whewww...

You know you've completely exhausted your kids when they end the day with handfuls of cotton candy that they are too tired to even eat. Now that's a great day.

Here is a cute video of Casey from the start of the morning, hanging out on one of those "insert-a-quarter" rides (that I think are actually 0.75 cents now).



And another video of us at this park area that is inside the middle of the amusement park, having fun on this zip-cord thingy. After doing it a few times, Casey held on all by herself (with Andrea walking along to catch her should she drop). She loved it!

Even More Food and Wine

Saturday morning I woke up with a minor hangover. Just enough to feel dehydrated with a mild headache. I ate a nice big breakfast, downed a couple Advil, and headed out for a morning run. 6 miles later, my headache was gone and I was feeling great. Man I love running, it is a serious cure all.

While everyone else at the resort was out enjoying the afternoon weather doing silly things like golfing or fishing, we stuck to the various indoor activities. First up was a pastry demonstration. Madden's pastry chef of 16 years showed us how she prepared various desserts we were going to have for dinner. (and then we sampled some!)

I left that presentation early to head over to the home beer brewing demonstration. Oddly enough, the night before I met Dan, the executive chef of RJ's American Grill. Just so happens Dan is heavy into home brewing. He quickly schooled me on the primary difference between All-Grain brewing and extract brewing. Basically it amounts to the difference between baking a cake from scratch or making it from a mix you buy at the store. "Serious" home brewers do all-grain brewing. Is this a new hobby I'd like to explore? Yes... at this point in my life? No. But I can clearly see sometime in the near future investing in the space and equipment for some all-grain home brewing. In the meantime, I think I might ask for a cheap intro-starter extract brewing kit for Christmas, and try to brew up some beers that would be ready by spring or early summer time.

After downing a few beer samples, we headed over to the next presentation, hand crafted chocolates! They were totally awesome, although the guy doing the presentation was a bit eccentric. We had to take our chocolate and bolt mid way through, because next up was the serious event of the day: Wine tasting!

The wine tasting was a very elaborate setup, with a large projector presentation and everything. I learned more about wine in that 2 hours than I ever knew my whole life. The wine tasting itself was 10 different wines, 5 white, 5 red. It was called a "tier" tasting, because you started out with the cheap wines and worked up to the grand finale expensive wine. And that last one was damn good, and noticeably different. There were only two samples where I drank the whole sample, and that was one of them.

After that all that wine, we both needed a little break so we napped (passed out?) for about an hour before dinner. Dinner ended up being a choose-your-own-adventure, with all the chefs lined up around the edges of a large meeting room. Each one was preparing their dish, and you could just pick whatever you wanted. In between the chefs was even more wine and champagne, although by this time we had both had enough. Here were some of my favorite dishes of the night:

Left: Scallops with coleslaw. Right: Sea bass with brussel sprouts (awesome!)

Left: Dan's crab cakes (best dish of the night) Right: Grouper fish (10 min wait!)

The dessert display and a picture of us prior to dinner.

Some dishes not pictured included goat, Asian salad with duck, veal, lamb chops, and prime rib. After dinner, we headed back to the room, full, exhausted, and ready to relax the rest of the night. The next morning I woke up at 5:30am for my big 18 mile run, which was the perfect cap to the weekend. We had one last big brunch where some of the chefs were back preparing even more exotic breakfast items. I stuck to some basics, although I did get a cup of a very tasty chia tea.