Counting down the days...

October is coming to a close rather quickly, which means my time as a resident of Michigan is dwindling. 

In just over 2 weeks, Jenna and I will be heading down to Indianapolis.  We will both be finishing out our current jobs on November 4th, and then will be making the move on November 9th!

We have have decided to try and save a few dollars in the move by using the strategy employed by these people...

Just another use for duct tape

I support the creativity, but we actually have reserved a moving van.  I did scour the web to find an online coupon code to get 25% off though!

Things have really fallen in to place for us in the past several weeks, which has been a huge blessing and confirmation in our minds that this move is God's will for our lives right now.

Jenna has secured a job, after having a handful of interviews over the course of two days.  She had several offers to choose from, and we are confident she has picked the best place for her.

We have also been able to sign a lease for a new apartment!  We had thought this was going to be a tough endeavor since we would have limited time to be down in Indy before the actual move to check out different complexes and locations. 

We managed to be able to take several tours on a weekend we were down there, and found an available apartment at The Park at Eagle Creek!



Main office and pool

We initially passed over this complex because the prices listed on the website were higher than we wanted to be paying, but when we stopped by to take a tour, they happened to have a few deals going on that will be saving us a considerable amount of money on rent!

We did decide to upgrade a little bit, and get a two bedroom apartment, rather than a one bedroom which we currently have.   So, when you come to visit us, you get the privacy of your own bedroom, and will be kept company in it by my bikes. :)

One other thing I am rather excited about is that it is right across the street from the largest park in Indianapolis, Eagle Creek Park.  It is over 5,000 acres of water, trees, and trails, which will hopefully allow me to cope with being away from Yankee Springs and Fort Custer.

Trail along Eagle Creek Reservoir

The packing process is a work in progress, since we can't just pack everything away yet.  We still have to live and eat for the next 2+ weeks.

 I really do not enjoy anything about packing, except for the fact that I have about 50 boxes in our apartment right now, which are great for fort making.

Fort or doghouse??

We have actually do have quite a bit packed though, and the boxes are starting to pile up in our apartment.

Since most of the essentials are lined up and taken care of, we don't have to make any more trips down to Indy prior to moving day.  Which means we have more time to see friends and family over the next couple of weeks!

Fall Color Tour

In recent months I have grown fairly fond of a couple different HDR apps for the camera on my phone.  The app makes my sub-par camera skills make me look like I know what I am doing.

With the beautiful fall weather we have had recently, I have been able to take advantage by getting a few bike rides in.  Not only am I able to get a little workout in, but I am able to enjoy God's beautiful creation at the same time.

I have taken all the pictures below, and all but one of them has occurred on a bike ride. 

So get up off your couch, find your helmet (just in case you encounter some wildlife), and go out for a ride before the fall color turns to snow piles!






The One Where They Move...

For anyone that came to this blog expecting me to announce that Jenna is prego, I am sorry to disappoint you.  She is not currently with child.  I am also not announcing the arrival of the iPhone 5.  Sorry.

The big news is actually that we are moving!  We are going to be moving down to Indianapolis in mid-November.
 

Why Indianapolis?  The primary reason is family.  Jenna's parents and sister live down in Indy.  Jenna has lived in Michigan for the past 9 years, which is much longer than she originally planned.  I take the blame for some of this, as she just couldn't resist my advances and ended up marrying me, giving her reason to stay in Michigan longer :)

Thankfully, we have been blessed with wonderfully versatile careers, where job opportunities are plentiful.  Last week I was offered a position at ATI Physical Therapy.  I had applied and interviewed at several places and ATI was my top choice, so I was excited to be able to accept the offer.  There is great opportunity for further career development, and the company values the same things I do when it comes to patient care.

Jenna is currently in the process of job seeking and has several interviews set up.

This big change isn't a decision we made on a whim.  We have put a lot of thought and prayer into this move. 

This big change also isn't easy.  My family is in Michigan.  We have many friendships, started our careers here, and have been involved at an awesome church..

I will still be a Michigander at heart.  The Lions, Tigers, Pistons, Red Wings, and Wolverines will always be my teams, regardless how poorly they might perform.  Plus, when the Lions make the Super Bowl this year I will already be down in Indy!

And as crazy as it sounds, I will miss the lake affect snow, and all the outdoor fun it provides.   Believe it or not, going 200 miles south and away from Lake Michigan reduces the annual snowfall to about 20 inches per year, down from the 80 inches per year that Kalamazoo averages.

The good news is that you will all now have a good reason to drive on down to Indy.  It's less than four hours, so it easily doable in a day, or a weekend.  We will welcome all visitors!  Also, since my family is here, we will be back often.  So, we aren't just disappearing off the face of the earth.

We will be sad to be leaving family, friends, co-workers, and everything that is Pure Michigan, but we are confident God has great things in store for us in Indianapolis!

Apple Cider Century 2011

This year I decided to ride in my first century bike ride.  I have been wanting to complete one for a while, but it has never really taken precedence with time or financial resources.

I decided to throw in the towel for all running and adventure racing in mid-July due to some injury concerns.  I was still able to bike without any pain, so I decided that a century ride would work out perfect this year.

The Apple Cider Century Ride was recommended to me by several people.  I recruited Doug VanDyk to ride with me.

I had been riding all summer, just nothing real long.  Doug and I also did a few early morning training rides together to try and prepare a little.

I was never too concerned about finishing because the pace of the ride is whatever you want it to be, and since its not a race, there is no need to push it to the limit.  Also, there are built in SAG stops along the way.  (SAG = Support and Gear)

I found out the week of the ride that friend, Daren Wendell, and his friend Jake Boley were also going to be riding. 

The weather forecast the week of the ride looked pretty awful.  Cold and lots of rain.  I was counting on the weather forecast being wrong, as it often is in Michigan, but it wasn't.

It started raining right as we started the ride.  We were still hopeful at this point, as the forecast called for scattered showers.   The 'scattered showers' ended up being consistent showers, with scattered pouring rain.

We made it through the first 28 miles and arrived at the first SAG stop.  Our spirits were lifted with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, apple cider, and hot potato soup.

We enjoyed the stop a little too much, and because of the rain and cool temperatures we stiffened up a bit.  Of course, we had a couple of hills to climb after the first stop, and then had a long, rainy stretch straight into the teeth of the wind.  We were out in the country and amongst the farmland, so there was nothing to help block the wind.

We reached the second SAG stop which was about 54 miles into the race.  It was pouring rain.  We were cold, wet, and tired.  Daren reached the stop first, and as I rolled up, he asked how I felt about the Apple Cider 62 mile ride.  At this point I had no problem cutting our ride short, as I was pretty miserable, being so wet and cold.  Jake and Doug were down with the plan too.

Thankfully, this ride had multiple routes, just in case you needed to turn off early.  We took full advantage of this feature, along with plenty of other riders who had originally planned on completing the 100 mile ride.  The mileage wasn't measured correctly, so the 62 mile route was actually 66 miles.  So, we still completed a century ride, it was just a metric century (100 kilometers).

We finished the ride, and then the sun promptly came out.

All in all it was a good time, and despite the poor weather, we still had fun.  I should also note, we had out own personal, amazing SAG crew, Jake's wife Amy and friend Adrienne!

I now have a two hour cleaning project awaiting me, as my bike is absolutely filthy after riding through the rain for 4+ hours.

 Hopefully, the next time I decide on a long ride, the weather will cooperate. 

We were all smiling at this point, prior to the ride, and prior to the wet and cold!

Yankee Springs Recreation Area

A few weeks ago, we ventured out to Yankee Springs Recreation Area for a weekend of camping with Chris and Erika Vonk.   This was the second installment of what has become a yearly event for us.  This years trip, did not disappoint, with perfect weather, plenty of bugs, and off-key worship songs.

We headed up to Yankee on a Friday after I got out of work.  Chris and Erika go there before us and warned us that three of the neighboring campsites were occupied by a Youth Group on some sort of camping retreat. 

Our site in the foreground, and their setup in the background.

Now, I fully support these types of adventures for students to get them into the outdoors, however, they set up ‘central camp’ 10 feet away from our fire pit.  It made for a rather awkward set up.  We were quite involved in their weekend.   We heard conversations, watched games and listened to some not so on key a cappella worship songs.  

Outside of the awkward set up it was a nice weekend.  The weather was perfect.  The temps hit the 80s during the day and down into the 50s at night.

We tried a little orienteering; however, the mosquitoes and spider webs thwarted that attempt.  We also did a little geo-caching, which was successful as we found 2 different caches!

We rented kayaks for an hour and explored Gun Lake.

We also enjoyed s’mores, hobo pies, and numerous games of Farkle, which everyone won at least once except for me.  For a game of luck, I am pretty bad at it.  

 We even had an attempt at making some jiffy pop over the fire (epic fail).  However, the kids next door were mesmerized, and clapped when Chris had finished.  Little did they know that not a single kernel had popped, but Chris had only managed to get the foil to expand.

It was a great weekend at one of my favorite places in Michigan. 

Running in Place

"Runnin' the Course" has been running in place lately.  It has been several months since my last post.  I have had good intentions of posting, and plenty of things to write about, but have just not made time to actually sit down and do it.

In the past several months Jenna and I have kept quite busy. 

• Organized and put on an adventure race for friends and family
• Completed the Indianapolis Mini-Marathon
• Celebrated Jenna's 26th birthday
• Watched my little sister, Abby, graduate high school
• Jenna's wisdom teeth came out
• Competed in (and won!) an adventure race with Jake Grevenstuk
• Took a vacation thru Northern Michigan and the UP
• Watched the Tigers beat the Diamondbacks
• Completed an adventure race with Jenna in GR

Those are just some of the highlights, as there have been many other hangouts and get-togthers with friends and family.  We are just enjoying our summer to the fullest!

And that brings you up to date a far as events and happenings go.

Now, the real reason for titling this blog post 'Running in Place".  It describes my current situation.

I have been dealing with a knee issue for the past 2+ months now.  It began at the half marathon I ran in May.  I took some time off and just did some biking for the next 4 weeks.  I then completed the Spring Adventure Challenge Adventure Race.  The knee felt good for a while, but was rather sore and painful by the end of the race.  

I gave my knee 4 weeks of my self-provided rehab.  I also continued to bike, as that was not painful.   I then participated in the Grand Rapids Urban Adventure Race with Jenna, my sister Theresa, and my Dad.  It was only a 4 hour race, and designed for beginners, so I figured it would be a piece of cake for my knee to handle.

I was wrong.  It only took about half a mile for my knee to start screaming at me.  Of course, I finished the race, but my knee wasn't happy.

I was quite discouraged.   I still had 3 adventure races on my calendar.  A 15 hour race in 3 weeks, a 4 hour race in 5 weeks, and a 28 hour race in September.  

Now, I love adventure racing,  it gives me some excellent goals to train and stay in shape for, so this knee injury presented me with a difficult decision.

I decided that I would need to shutdown things down when it comes to races, and focus on getting my knee back to health.  I am not excited about missing races, but I do want to get things right.

One would think I would be able to fix myself, but things have not been quite that easy.  I have recruited some help from a friend and colleague to help me rehab.  We can't really figure out exactly what is going on (and we have tried a little bit of everything), but just know that there is some sort of patello-femoral dysfunction, or maybe a mild quadriceps muscle tear that I didn't allow to heal appropriately. 

 So, if anyone actually reads this and wants to throw their two cents in about what they think is wrong , I am currently hearing all theories!

I won't be going to the Doc, because I will just get referred to PT.  And I am not going to have imaging done, because I am pretty sure, it would not show anything, and then I would be out $2000.   

As of now, I am on the 60-day disabled list, and just trying to stay in shape with any activity that doesn't aggravate the knee. 

Hoping that my season of 'running in place' comes to a close soon!

I Won't Grow Up...

Famous (or maybe not so famous) words of the one and only Peter Pan, "I Won't Grow Up...".   This phrase has come to mind recently as it relates to my choice of recovery drink/food following workouts.

My recovery drink of choice is currently Chocolate Milk.  That's right, a childhood favorite, resurrected as a beneficial adult drink.

There are hundreds of options out there for re-fueling after a tough workout.  Sports drinks have always been a favorite of mine, but I don't always have them around. 

You can walk into GNC and be overwhelmed with the variety of different types of recovery drinks, or performance enhancing supplements.

Not only does chocolate milk taste absolutely delicious, it is relatively inexpensive.  I always have milk on hand, it is a staple of my diet.  So for me, all it takes is a keeping a bottle of Hershey's Chocolate syrup in stock, which is currently selling for just over $3 at Meijer,

AND...there is actually some research to support the use of chocolate milk as an effective recovery drink. The results showed chocolate milk to be just as beneficial as any of the expensive stuff you can buy at GNC, in this study's case,  Endurox R4.

Here's a small snippet from the results of the study...

In the study, nine male cyclists rode until their muscles were depleted of energy, then rested four hours and biked again until exhaustion. During the rest period, the cyclists drank low-fat chocolate milk, Gatorade, or Endurox R4. During a second round of exercise, the cyclists who drank the chocolate milk were able to bike about 50% longer than those who drank Endurox, and about as long as those who drank the Gatorade.

I should mention, the research was partially funded by the Dairy and Nutrition Council, but interesting findings none the less. 

Please note,  I am not advocating for excessive consumption of chocolate milk for the sedentary individual, or by those who are exercising for weight loss purposes.  It is still full of sugar, but that sugar combined with the protein in milk is optimal for replenishing energy stores after long or tough workouts.

So get up off the couch, go for a run, ride, swim or whatever mode of exercise you desire and then return to your childhood by drinking an ice-cold glass of chocolate milk to recover!