Liquid Run 2017

Last year, I heard about something new, the Liquid Run.  But it was scheduled for the same weekend that I did the Irvine Lake Mud Run last year, and I was already signed up for that one.  When they announced the dates this year, and it was the weekend after the Irvine Lake Mud Run, I signed up.

So June 24th, I drove down to Newport Beach to try something new.

This isn’t like the runs I normally do.  The course was only a quarter mile, and it was all on floating platforms in a little cove.  There were things for us to climb over and go around and even slide down.  It looked like fun.

However, the experience wasn’t nearly as fun as I wanted it to be.  While there didn’t appear to be crowds early, they were backed up by the time I went to run it, so I started late.  Not that it helped.  For the first third of the course, we were stuck in a traffic jam and just barely inching forward.  Things did get better after that, fortunately.  I might have baled if it didn’t get better.

Even when we started to get moving, I didn’t have that much fun with it.  I mentioned the floating platforms, right?  The made standing very difficult, especially if you have no sense of balance like I do.  Plus the platforms were slippery when wet.  And I had a hard time getting over some of the obstacles since I couldn’t push off since my feet were slipping.

I wound up being out there much longer than I thought I would be.  The lockers I had to rent from were looking to move on by that time, but they waited, fortunately.  And I was meeting Joy for lunch, and I was much later than I told her I would be.

So, I won’t be signing up for this one again.  Other people seemed to really enjoy it, but it wasn’t my thing.  I don’t regret it, however, since I wanted to try it out and see what I thought.

Irvine Lake Summer of Mud 2017

Okay, back to June.  On June 17th, I did the Irvine Lake Mud Run, my second of three runs in a row that month.

Considering how poorly I’d done the Saturday before at Camp Pendleton, I was concerned about how this one would go.  I was still getting over being sick, although I was definitely on the mend.  I hadn’t been running much in between, however.

But this is a shorter course, and I was able to run most of it no problem.

There weren’t many surprises on the course this year, but that’s okay.  It’s still one of my favorites thanks to the mud slide.  And the lines were so short when I got there I may have done it twice this year.  About the only crowd was the crowd for the shower at the end, but that’s a minor issue.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a chance to hang out with any Irwins or Smiths afterward since they were all busy that day.  It meant I drove down and back and just did the run.  On the other hand, I wasn’t stressing over anyone waiting for me, which was very nice.

At one point while I was running, I heard someone in a golf cart shout out “Is that THE Mark Baker?”  From a later comment on Facebook, I confirmed it was the guy who runs this particular mud run.  Hadn’t interacted with him much on Facebook recently, so I’m surprised he still recognized me.  Definitely put a smile on my face.

Summer League 2017

I’m so far behind, Summer League is almost over and I haven’t talked about it at all yet.

Yes, I’m playing ultimate Frisbee Summer League again.  The sad part is, they are using a bunch of different fields this year, and only one of them was close to me.  Even worse, the one close to me we only play at twice, and I missed one of those games.  Most of the fields are far.  Like an hour with traffic far.

But it’s still worth it.  It helps that my team has a winning record!  We are in the middle of the pack, but I will take it.  Seriously, this is so much better than the leagues where my team didn’t win at all.

It helps that we have some very athletic men, the kind who can get everything.  And our women are wonderful.

Honestly, there’s only one weak link on the team – me.  I’m feeling slower than ever this year, thanks in large part to how little I’ve been running this summer.  I have to start ramping that up for a mud run I have in a month.  A month from today in fact.  Yikes!!  But I’m playing only a few points, so it’s not a huge deal to the team.  I don’t have as much opportunity to contribute to the team as a result, but I do what I can when I am on.  Usually, they are poaching off of me, and we need to figure out how to best use that as a team to work the disc down the field and make them pay.

Camp Pendleton Mud Run 2017

I was getting so close to catching up, and then I stopped blogging again, didn’t I?  Let’s fix that.

June 10th was the Camp Pendleton Mud Run this year.  It was unfortunate timing since I was still fighting off bronchitis, and I hadn’t gone running for several weeks.  Between the two, this was not the best time I’d turned in.  In fact, I finished in over two hours instead of my usual 1:45 or so.  But I finished.

It was a cool day.  We’ve had tons of heat since then, but that day was almost cold.  The sun finally came through as I was leaving.  Naturally.

I was exhausted when I finished, but I had so much fun on the course.  We actually got to go through some of the buildings in Combat Hill this year, which was nice.  Even though we’d had more rain than the last few years, there still wasn’t enough water in the former reservoir to swim, so we crawled under nets again.

This is just a fun course where we get to be on a military base.  I really like that.