Epic 2 Week Break.

Every year the majestic animal known as the middle distance runner is set free by his/her coaches and allowed to do WHATEVER he/she wants. To see what happens in the absolute freedom, lets take Canadian middle distance runner, Peter Corrigan as an example.

I have to say, this 2 week break was like no other break I've ever had. I took this break more seriously than ever before. I'll have to go back to Toronto just after my less than stellar heat of the 1500m at nationals. Cliff Childs and I were both mildly disappointed after missing out on the final by a few spots and headed directly to the liquor store and picked up a few beers. We were staying in different places so we split ways with plans to meet up at the track in 30mins. I took the subway back up to the apartment I was staying in and freshened up. I decided I'd walk back to the track and enjoy the nice day. I also decided it would be a good idea to keep it classy and brown-bag a couple beers on my way. On my way to the track I ran into my newly engaged friends, Matt Norminton and Jen Kemp, so I sat and had another beer with Matt. So after about 75mins I finally made it to the track. Watched a few races, and then headed out to the pub to drink. I went to bed around 2:30am that night, got up around 11am did some mild detox and started drinking again around 4pm. This night was so much fun, I'm pretty sure I danced for like 4-5 hours straight. I stayed up and got on a bus at 6am to head to the airport and ended up stayin awake until about 8am when I crashed on a bench in the airport. woke up around 9am to get on my flight, lucked out with 3 seats to myself, sprawled out and fell asleep before take off. I slept on and off the entire flight and woke up in Victoria, my body ravaged, my voice gone, and unsure how much dignity I had left, haha. Karl Robertson picked us up from the airport, I was trying to tell stories but gave up after a few mins because my voice was so bad. On the ride Karl asked if I wanted to come camping with him and a few others later that afternoon. Without hesitation I said "NO". I was in no shape to go camping. When I got home I went straight to bed, slept for about 4 hours, woke up, called Karl and told him to come pick me up. Went to the liquor store, bought 16 Pilsners and got right back down to business. After some story telling, laughs, and a little skinny dipping it was 2am and time for bed. We woke up at 9 the next morning and I cracked my first beer at 9:30 and had hotdogs and cheese-smokies for breakfast. That afternoon we went and rafted down the Cowichan river and then I headed home to finally give my body a rest.

I took a few days down, put in some hours at work. I also did a ton of climbing and went to Thetis lake and did some cliff jumping and about 100x more swimming than I had done in recent memory.

I was just biding my time in these days off until August 11th. This was a date that was down in a lot of people's day planners for a few weeks. Not only was it Deirdre's (and all of the engineer's) last exam of summer school and one of her last days in Victoria, but also Kendra's Birthday and one of Logan's last days here as well. To celebrate Dee and I decided to have people over all day for BBQ and drinks. On my way home from work at 2 I stopped by the liquor store and picked up a cheap flat of beer to enforce the mandatory shotgun upon entry into the backyard. Long story short, the night was amazing, everyone had a blast, there was no drama, no crying, one guy puked, but at like 6 so he slept for a few hours and then rallied like a champ. The party really lived up to expecations, if not exceeded them.

The following night Kendra had some friends from home over to Victoria and we went out for a night on the town. We decided to start classy and head to Monty's and then continuing the classy we went to Plan B. It was another awesome night of good times and dancing. After we got home from the bar a couple buddies and myself sat in my backyard watched the meteors.

Today I'm heading up-island to Uculuelet to visit my good friend TJ. We're going to go do some ocean fishing tomorrow morning, some bouldering and also hike up a mountain. Soon after I get back from TJ's I'm heading out to Calgary for a week to see friends and family. Also, Darren St. Clair, a good friend from the UK is coming to visit. I'm really excited to see him and spend some time out in to the REAL mountains.

As I said earlier, I've taken this break more serious than ever before. I partied harder, relaxed more, and did more epic things than any break I've ever had in the past. I'm going to do my first run today up in Uculuelet and I am really excited. I actually had to force myself to NOT run these past couple days. Luckily the scorching heat helped a bit. I'm stoked on getting out there this fall, healthy and injury free and pounding out MILES! I've started reading Once a Runner for the umpteenth time to get me even more pumped. I am totally refreshed and got some things out of my system now before the season starts.

WOO RUNNING!