Roots to Shoots

During the weekend of March 23-25 I'll be attending a conference in Durango, CO at Fort Lewis College. It's be an incredible pleasure of mine to be volunteering my time to head the Fun and Fundraising sub-committee for this conference, as well as partaking in the workshop proposals sub-committee. This conference is better known as The Association For Experiential Education Rocky Mountain Regional Conference. The theme for this years conference is From Roots to Shoots : Experience The Solution.

(From The AEE Website)
Experiential Educators include teachers, camp counselors, corporate team builders, therapists, challenge course practitioners, environmental educators, guides, instructors, coaches, mental health professionals . . . and the list goes on. An Experiential Educator is anyone who teaches through direct experience.

The Association for Experiential Education (AEE) is a nonprofit, professional membership association dedicated to experiential education and the students, educators and practitioners who utilize its philosophy. We strive to:

• Connect educators in practical ways so that they have access to the growing body of knowledge that fuels their growth and development
• Publish and provide access to relevant research, publications and resources
• Raise the quality and performance of experiential programs through our accreditation program
• Increase recognition of experiential education worldwide

Interview: Eric Payne

Name: Eric “Hearsay” Payne

Age: 30

Location: Lyons, CO

Birthplace: Richmond, VA

Years Running: 3+

Years Running Ultras: 3

Notable Ultra Accomplishments:

Ultra(runs):Bear 100, San Juan Solstice 50, Jemez 50, Desert RATS 50

Ultra(thru-hikes): Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail, Pacific Northwest Trail, Grand Enchantment “Trail”, Arizona Trail FKT attempt

Ultra(bike trips): 1,600 mile jeep road loop of Colorado's Western Slope/Southern Utah. 5,000+ mi through Baja, Mainland Mexico, Belize, and Guatemala

Sherpa John (SJ): Eric, I want to take a moment to thank you again for taking the time to conduct an interview with us here on Human Potential. From time to time we seek out those, "regular folks," among us who seek out amazing experiences and you're definitely one of those folks. So thanks for joining us.

Eric Payne (EP): Anyone who can scheme up an event like The Trail Ridge Assault is a friend of mine. I'm happy to chat with you about all things running/hiking/adventure-scheming.

RR: Frozen Dead Guy 50K

Saturday, February 18, 2012
Nederland, CO
28 Miles
4,075' Gain/6,509' Loss
------------------------------------

The second event of this years Team Sherpa Winter Expeditions started in the frigid town of Nederland Colorado. Ned is home to The World Famous Frozen Dead Guy, whose annual festival is coming up in 2 weeks. Nederland is nestled at an elevation of 8,228' above sea level and to my knowledge, is the current winter home of UltraRunner Geoff Rowes. One of the classic Boulder running routes is running from Ned to Boulder on mostly if not all trails. This is the basis of this months Winter Expedition.

After picking up the gang at Chautauqua Meadow, of course right after receiving a speeding ticket from Boulder police in my haste to erase my running late, we drove our carpool up to Nederland. We received a slight dusting of snow over night and it left Boulder Canyon an icy treacherous drive up. In Ned we slowly peeled out of the vehicles and into the frosty morning air. AM temps in Ned are hovering around 8 degrees with a brisk wind rushing down off of the Divide. Snow is swirling all around the parking lots while the town is still embraced by the blueish-greayish hue of a still early morning light. The sailors had come back for more, Ray, Steven and Dennis. Brad from Denver, Jeff from Grand Junction and Dan from Morrison. Seven us of total, all standing outside the bathroom door of the local super market. :)

Interview: Jax "365" Mariash

For the third year in a row during the month of January, The Streak! Program went on with great success thanks to those who agree to participate. However, running 31 days in a row with the off chance at a naked mile, pales in comparison to what one dedicated runner is nearing completion of. In this interview, we're going to introduce you to an individual who is pushing the envelope in a running streak. This young woman embodies the true meaning of Human Potential and it is a true privilege to interview her here for the blog.

Name: Jax Mariash
Age: 32
Hometown/Location: Broomfield, CO
Years Running: Since I was 5 (27)
Years Running Ultras (If Any): none. Did 8 marathons so far
Notable Race Finishes: Bronze medal at duathlon world championships and first American in 2008 and double national champion in short and long course duathlon in 2008. But would rather focus on the races during the run mission on my team boulder track club - 9th at chicago half marathon, 3rd at indy half marathon, 1st at a 10k in Oregon on Aug 20th.

RMNP Snowing

It's finally snowy here in Colorado. A little over a week ago now we had a store of epic proportions. Here in Louisville we received 26" of snow. Boulder handled 22". The previous record for one storm total snowfall in the month of February was 16". That last storm really gave us a wallop. It's funny though. 22" back in New Hampshire is a pretty normal Nor'Easter. Just another storm, where the plows head out and have the streets scraped to pavement for both the morning and evening commutes. Anything less then that, and you can bet elected officials are soon to be voted out of office and someone at Public Works of the DOT are out of a job as well. Here in Boulder.. we landed 22" of snow and we were practically snowed in for 2 days.

The jackpot for the storm was a few miles away from here up on the Peak to Peak Highway in a town called Pinecliffe, CO. They scored a whopping 56" of snow in 24 hours. Think about that for a minute. Yes.. it snowed so hard that it looked like it was raining. The upslope snows are impressive. And yet, we're not satisfied. While I grumble and moan that my trails are still under 6" of snow today; most Coloradians are still grumbling about there not being enough snow on the Divide. Bear Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park is sporting a base of 50" of snow. Hard to believe that there was 22 FEET in mid June of 2011 in those parts of the park. Regardless of the the water woes, it's finally snowing around here and it looks gorgeous. Below are some photos from this past weekend trip to Rocky Mountain National Park.

Get Ready..

So this is going to be one of those posts where I just shot from the hip and kind of update the world on where I'm at, how I'm feeling and what lies ahead. Life is throwing me a handful of changes as of late.. mostly good changes of course and some rather exciting. Everything, in a way, relates to my mission for this year to return to my roots. Let's just get into it.

In this post we'll talk a little more about how the streak went. We'll talk about the exciting success of this years Winter Expeditions/Fat Ass events here in the Front Range. I have news about May's Rim2Rim2Rim run in the Grand Canyon, My 100 Miler Schedule is set, so we'll look at that; and finally a look at motivation during these long, down, days of February.

The Streak
January went extremely well as I completed another successful year of streaking (failed in 2010). It was a lot easier then it's been in years past thought, not without it coming with the rough days. In the end I set a new personal best for consecutive days run at 34, and miles run during a streak at 140.2 miles. The streak had the most participants yet and the most complete streakers as well. So, I'm hopeful and excited about that. Unfortunately, as I write this post, I haven't run since day 34 of the Streak (Saturday) and have enjoyed the time off.. but now it's truly time to get to work.

RR: Frozen Front Range Marathon

Saturday, January 28, 2012
Boulder, CO
23 Miles
9,500' Gain / 9,385' Loss
-----------------------------------
Check out the Video of this event by Clicking Here

Winter Expedition #1
Every winter it has become a tradition of mine to create a series of Fat Ass runs for myself and a number of my friends. In years past, I could always count on the same 3 or 4 folks to show up and run with me back in New Hampshire. This year I went out on a limb and decided to invite all of fellow runners in the boulder and Fort Collins Front Range of Colorado. The early response to the invite of these expeditions was mixed. In the end, I acquired a mailing list of some 20-25 runners who wanted to be kept in the loop for these events. Then of course, I got a few know it all e-mails from a few runners who warned me about Boulder's Open Space and Mountain Parks regulations, permits, rangers and every other negative thing they could think of. In the end, I'm proud to work as a professional guide in Boulder. I had a permit in hand just in case and at the end of the day, our group was never big enough for it to even matter.

STREAK! 2012

On January 1st, 2012; Eight of us started out in the quest for the Streak! On January 31st, six of us were still running at least the minimum of 2 Miles a day, every day for the month of January. And of course, there was the daring few who managed to run the naked mile on the 31st to celebrate their accomplishments (see below).

Streak! is a challenge I started in January 2010. In it's inaugural year, runners were challenged to run at least a mile a day, for 31 days. In the second addition, runners were challenged to 2 miles a day and the challenge stretched into Valentines Day. For the Third Annual Streak! Challenge, I combined the first two years and just made it a minimum of 2 miles a day for 31 days. This years added twist, was the inclusion of a second challenge called "31 Days of Something New." One person signed up for something new and they fell off the wagon about halfway through the month. Bummer.

(For more and photos.. click "Read More" below)