KeithWikle.com

The only problem with being crazy is that you don’t recognize your own behavior as insane. But if today was any indication of sanity, I might have displayed it. I drove to Silver Beach to surf after the Grand Mere Grind, 10k trail race. I took one look at the beach there and decided the north side of the pier would be better for surfing. So I drove over to Tiscornia park. I suited up while the windsurfers were changing sails. Storm sails are smaller surface area sails for days like today. I walked my kayak down to the beach and waited patiently for the water to come to me. The wind nearly ripped the paddle from my hands and blew it to Traverse city. Tiny ponds of abandoned waves were high on the beach, and the 40 knot gale blew whitecaps and spray in these little miniature lakes above the high water mark. I pictured a miniature kayaker waiting on the shore for a wave to come and annihilate this miniature universe. I waited a while and then finally a big wave broke right near shore and I paddled hard in three inches of water to get out. I looked back and my little mini lake was gone.

I made it out to about the third set of breakers where I saw some curling dumpers with a huge amount of sand in the water, signifying a nasty rip current. In five short minutes of trying to break out past the first few sets I was blown halfway to Rocky Gap, which is about a mile down the beach from Tiscornia. I got dunked three times tail to nose pitchpole without ever really being “ready”. I almost had the paddle ripped from my hands twice, but I rolled up and then managed to surf a few messy shore breaks into the beach. I looked at the wind, and the waves, (which were not giant in terms of height) and tactfully made a retreat. I walked the boogie back down the beach to Tiscornia. While I was doing this, still with a smile on my face, I realized that I loved kayaking enough to wait for a better day. I have had far better waves with far less wind and consequently some of the best moments on the water ever this year, (perhaps in part due to the fact that I almost moved away).

The magnetic fields song crazy for you but not that crazy came to mind. “I performed acts of devotion as if you were Ginesh…”

I had all sorts of things that took precedence over running and swimming this week. Hockey hockey hockey, and surfing.

47:00 5 Miles milham creek.

It felt slow, and I guess it’s ok. I used to be able to do that stretch in 38:00. Trying to keep the whole picture in mind though.

I am playing hockey with work folks this week. I went on skates for the first time this week since age 10. I didn’t do too badly. I think it’s good to do something new. I saw Tom Deater skate around the rink like a pro, and I hope that’s how I look in a kayak. Humility should be your first lesson as a teacher. I’ve been dunking Tom for about two weeks, and I feel a failure as a teacher to instruct rolling. He is getting closer, but I can’t tell if it is my fault/help that is getting him there.

I did 25:49 in the pool with the new method in the tube, I got tons more glide and tried to pay attention to being a little porpoise. I think it’s working. I will be able to do more next week.

Four miles on Milham creek, new shoes with new orthodics, we’ll see if I need to switch.

34:56- 4+ Miles

The blue-white beam of my LED headlamp jostles over the packed dirt road as if it were the cratered surface of the moon. The narrow field of vision is disorienting, like watching someone run through a camcorder. The wind is up, 20-25 knots which makes my soul ache a bit as I picture Lake Michigan frothing up, as if Gabriel had shaken up a can of root beer. But the wind rushes through the trees separating them from their leaves. The dying canopy of autumn gyrates in the wind, causing the shadows on the ground to dance in my little moon-man beam. The noises are all crisp snaps and rustles, which somehow seems more alive than the noise of birds, and animals. Running in the dark is not really safe, but it really heightens your appreciation for sounds. The sound of the wind through the trees, which was so loud I could hear it over my iPOD, actually made me pause, and i took it off for the rest of the run, to listen to the sounds of snapping branches, falling leaves, and the groaning and creaking of weak branches high up as the gale brushed them forward and back like short bristly hair bound to come out at the roots.

The wind to me seems to have a character all its own, fall storms that blow leaves are in essence Michigan for me. A shower of luminescent orange over a dirt road on a windy day pretty much cements my reasons for living here. You can keep Florida!
45:55-5 miles I think

Got the new mizuno shoes, the wave renegade, 10.5. Ran in downtown kzoo on wednesday. 35:00 minutes, no idea on distance. It was a run for the bathroom through a physicians entrance at the WMU medical entrance. I felt like a robert redford character in 3 days of the condor, except for my Chrohn’s disease. I waited for the doc to run his card and then I snuck, (sneaked) in right behind him to the toilet.

New shoes were too small. I have a serious problem, one might even say deficiency in being able to analyze my feet, and determine if shoes fit or not. Luckily gazelle sports lets me return shoes i’ve already run in.

So I went back today and traded in for 11’s.