Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone!

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! I sure have missed everyone! I cant wait to catch up with you all and see what has been going on!

For the New Year we have great things planned! We have had a lot of requests from friends to please do a smaller version of the trails training with less miles, and so we have teamed up with the race director of OC Chili Winter Trail Series, and are doing just that.

"OC Chili Winter Trail Run Series will keep you motivated to stay fit during the chili winter months with a scenic 5 mile run through O'Neil Regional Park." Races are 2-12-11, 3-12-11, and 4-16-11.

This is an 18 week training plan beginning January 8th, and a great introductory to trails. We will meet on Saturdays at 9am in O'Neil Park. Fees are $125.00 and include shirt, goody bag, buff goodies, and of course your training plan. This is the meeting spot of the OC Chili Run (Link) . Getting There- Take Santa Margarita Pkwy make a LEFT at Avenida De Las Flores. Make a Left at El Camino Montana parking will be along the right hand side just a few blocks.

For the folks that have been with us and want to continue on for longer runs on Sundays, our Race is Leona Divide 30k, 50k, and 50 miler! This is an awesome race, one of my favorites, and an absolute beauty!

We have your 20 week program all ready for you, and we will meet Sundays at 7am beginning January 9th. We would also like to have Leona group meet on Saturdays if you would like with the OC Chili Group. We will go back to our old stomping grounds in El Moro, and have a couple of road trips. Fees are $125.00 and include the same as before, except for if returners (you get a discount) Also, if you have run a 50 mile race and trained with our group, you no longer need training or need to pay, so please come run the trails with us and be a mentor for our newbies. :)

Have a great New Year, and we hope to see you soon!

Looking Ahead

As the end of the year comes to a end we look at what we accomplished, and we look forward to the new year. It's at this time we start creating new goals or milestones for ourselves to have that feeling of accomplishment.

Since Northface we have been resting and wrapping up our snails group goal race, Make Room for Santa which was held last Sunday.


As of now Whiting is Closed :( sooo sorry guys so we will not run at 7am...

Since we will not be meeting please keep us updated on what you have been up to and your plans for next year. Everyone has been truly inspirational and has had a positive impact on the Trail Tales.

As we look ahead here are some some races to consider as you are planning next year. We have partnered with Book that Event in hosting training run for the OC Chili Series. The Chili series is a 4-5 mile trail run held in O'Neil Park. The races will be held 2/12, 3/12, and 4/12- We will be hosting training runs on Saturdays at 9am! Yes, 9am for those that love to sleep in. You can expect to run for about 1hr :)

For a longer distance consideration- you may want to check out Leona Divide- There are plenty of awesome choices to pick from. 50 mile, 50k (30mile), and now 30k (18.6mile), this course is amazing... if you love single track runs this run is for you. This was my first 50 mile race- I would like to share with you my race recap with highlights from the race from my point of you. Also here is incomplete video of collection of photos from the time we started training together.

You can expect several new things in the next session- Several running opportunities to connect with the group during the week. We will be hosting group track workouts on Wednesday, Saturday runs at 9am (short distance) and Sunday's at 7am for the long stuff.

We will also have a few speaking work opportunities on Jan 26, at REI Tustin and the 27th at Huntington beach at 6:30pm :)
You can view most all this and more on our public calendar

Northface Endurance Challenge 50k!

I am so glad we decided to do the Northface Endurance Challenge. My body doesn't like me right now, but it is the most beautiful course! I am looking forward to doing it again, minus the rain and mud! :) For those of you who didn't do it this year, trust me when I say, you must put this one on your bucket list! I have also learned, we must do more hill work for this race. :) But let us start from the beginning...

We left Thursday morning to get up to see my sister and kids who lives in San Jose, and spend a night with her. We had lots of time to take our time and have a nice drive and do lots of pit stops. Sue had fun, and took a nice nap...

We had lunch at Harris Ranch, Pete stopped at a rest stop for the first time in his life, and made it to my sisters before the kids needed to be put down for the night. She had a great dinner with wine and everything waiting for our arrival. SO SWEET! It was really a great visit, but too short. The best thing though is that we have a new member, my niece Alyce Mae Namimatsu! Isn't she so cute in her buff and cuff?!

Friday morning we headed up to San Fransisco to the packet pickup. I did great I have to say with all the driving and parking in the city, cause sometimes (mostly) that is a pain in the ass. We all got our great packets, and then Pete had said he had never been on a cable car or been to Pier 39, so that's what we did for the rest of that day...

That evening was time to find our hotel in Tiburon and settle in for the evening so we could get up and have a great race the next morning. But first, a bit more site seeing....

Race morning came oh to soon, and not enough sleep as usual for a race morning. the coffee woke Sue up (by the way she didn't have to be up until 8 am cause her race didn't start until 9)
Sorry Sue. But we found the shuttles no problem, got to the race no problem, handed out Odwalla products, no problem, and then found Esteban, Shelly, and Kristin!! YAY!

The race started and WOW what a beautiful course. Really an awesome run. There is a little bit of everything in this race. The one thing I wasn't counting on was the rain and mud, along with the tremendous amount of climbing! Everyone did an outstanding job at this race, and you should ALL be SO proud! This was the hardest 50K Pete and I have ever done hands down. Sue has done a ton of races, and she says the Marathon was by far the hardest Marathon she has ever done. So for you first timers, it wasn't easy baby, but you all did it! YAY! WHOA!

CONGRATULATIONS!!!