Spinning Out of Control

This summer I had an amazing opportunity to ride, on my old mountain bike, the full length of Smithbrook Road. Smithbrook is a serivce road that intersects Highway 2 just East of Stevens Pass. Labled NFD 6700 RD on the map, its common name is Smithbrook due to the actual brook it parallels in the first few miles. The well used dirt road climbs up Nason Ridge from 3200' to a saddle at 4600' in the first 4 miles then gently descends to the paved Little Wenatchee River Road at 13 miles. The first 2 to 3 miles of Smithbrook road are the most traveled allowing access to trail heads leading to Lichtenwasseer Lake, Lichtneberg Mountain and Lake Valhalla. If you continue to the top of Nason ridge you enter more untraveled areas. The view from top is as expected, spectacular.

So it was during the downhill portion of the ride I encountered a few trees that bring me to today's topic. Spiral growth patterns in wood. I have seen it many times running through the Cascades and other forested areas. Areas where fire has run through and eaten the bark and also older trees, with missing bark, displaying a twisted growth pattern in the wood. I've always wondered what causes this type of growth pattern, genetic defect or environmental triggers.

The illustrations below ilustrating the sprial growth pattern are taken from the following website:

http://www.ag.auburn.edu/aaes/communications/bulletins/figureinwood/index.htmlSpiral Grain As mentioned before, normal orientation of longitudinal cellular elements is parallel to the longitudinal axis (Figure 10). However, slight undetectable spiraling is a rule rather than an exception in most trees. In certain trees, elements are sloped or spiraled circumferentially to an extent sufficient to be detected. When wood with this characteristic is split, exposed surfaces will not be parallel to the longitudinal axis as in straight-grained material (Figure 11). Spiral grain occurs quite commonly in certain species and is considered a defect in many cases (60, 85).

Obviously there is some sort of increased strength as a result of the spiral pattern as it can be seen utilized in iron work, fiberglass lamp poles, and PoleVaulting poles. I am sure there are many other general applications that I am just not aware of.

Studies similar to the JULIA RAUCHFUSS1* and JAMES H. SPEER research done in Illinois show no single reason for the growth pattern, at least in White Oak trees. They sight an extensive list of references none of which conclusively determine a single cause for the spiral growth pattern; wind, slope, soil, age, sun, Coriolis effect, and the like. They do however state the effect on timber value. Apparently the commercial value of such wood is very low as the strength of the milled timber from such trees is inconsistent at best and very poor at its worst. Other websites from Wood Workers and Wood Turners discuss the growth pattern as a flaw and suggest shunning such wood as undesirable for standard projects. One possible positive is the use of younger spiral growth trees as power and light poles. In this application the tree is not processed or milled past its basic form and the spiral pattern is actually a benefit. In the above photo taken on a rainy day, sorry for the blur, you can see the grain and the long crack on the surface that spirals up the pole. I guess when we are confronted with a topic like this and discover that many smarter people have studied it to death and still do not have an answer, we should accept the fact that the answer may not be within our grasp or just to complicated to pin down. Doesn't help much. Still, the trees are cool to look at. Tony

Max Heart Rate

What is your max heart rate? Not, how fast have you had your heart beat but what is your max rate? It is easy to find out. If you look just under your left ventricle right next to the model number you should see some stats that will have the max rate. Try not to read the rest, warrantee, expiration and the like, it's to depressing. Seriously how do you figure it out? A lot of the training I have done is based on knowing this number and then extrapolating efforts from there. Things like: "run at an effort of 50% of MAXHR", "cool down at 30% of MAXRH", "15 min at 85%MHR", and the like. Have I been running to hard to 20 years? Have I been not running hard enough for 20 years? Have you ever seen a EKG of a person sneezing? It's cool, never mind. I have found many of the simple equations having you add your age and subtract the number of petals on a south slope growing flower of your choice. Or just.....guess. I know everyone has there favorite way of determing the magic number and I guess it is a mute point, cuz God gave us all a different set of A, T, C, and G's. We could really find out the MAXHR of each person in a similar fashion as the Navy created the current SCUBA Diving Decompression tables. But we would have a lot fewer runners around. "Dr. Fartlek said that just before his hearts exploded it was beating at a rate of 210bpm. I guess that was his MAXHR." Here is what I have come up with (forgive the plagerism but I have had this little bit of info for so long I do not know where it came from.): "Summary data Target intensity for health benefits = 40% VO2 max = 63% HR max Target intensity for aerobic fitness = 60-80% VO2max = 75-88% HR max Target intensity for elite training = >85% VO2max = >92% HR max Swain et al equation: % HR max = 0.64 x % VO2 max + 37 Miller et al formula: HR max = 217 - (0.85 x age) -3 beats for swimming -5 beats for cycling elite sub 30 YO –3 beats elite +50YO +2 beats elite +55YO +4 beats Londeree & Moeschberger interactive formula: HR max = 199.1 + 0.119 x AEF4 + 0.112 x AE + 6.28 x EF3 + 3.485 x F2 + 2.468 - 0.0006 x A4 - 0.591 x A A = age; A4 =(age4)/1000; E = exercise type, if run = 1, if bike = 0; if sedentary F2 = 1, otherwise F2 = 0; if active F3 = 1. otherwise F3 = 0; if endurance trained F4 = 1, otherwise F4 = 0 Raphael Brandon " So 220-your age seems a bit easier don't ya think. I have graph of my heart rate during the Firefighter Stairclimb here in Seattle and I spent just around 6 minutes above 190 and almost 1 minute above 200 maxing at 203bpm. And look Ma I can still type. So my max must be above 203, right? I know there are many waaaaaaaaay smarter people out there with great answers and explanations but I just don't really care much to spend the money and time, plus every time I look at the computer on my wrist calculating and displaying all 5 lines of data downloaded every millisecond from the 32 satellites orbiting the earth high above my head I tend to trip over a protruding stick or rock and miss the beautiful colors of fall, oftentimes my fall. Oh the joys of running in NW woods at 187.352bpm. Next time a question about trees. Tony

The Hammer The File and The Furnace

Excerpt from A. W. Tozer It [is] the enraptured who [can] shout in the midst of serious and painful trials, "Praise God for the hammer, the file and the furnace." The hammer is a useful tool, but the nail, if it had feeling and intelligence, could present another side of the story. For the nail knows the hammer only as an opponent, a brutal, merciless enemy who lives to pound it into submission, to beat it down out of sight and clinch it into place. That is the nail's view of the hammer, and it is accurate except for one thing: The nail forgets that both it and the hammer are servants of the same workman. Let the nail but remember that the hammer is held by the workman and all resentment toward it will disappear. The carpenter decides whose head will be beaten next and what hammer shall be used in the beating. That is his sovereign right. When the nail has surrendered to the will of the workman and has gotten a little glimpse of his benign plans for its future it will yield to the hammer without complaint. The file is more painful still, for its business is to bite into the soft metal, scraping and eating away the edges till it has shaped the metal to its will. Yet the file has, in truth, no real will in the matter, but serves another master as the metal also does. It is the master and not the file that decides how much shall be eaten away, what shape the metal shall take, and how long the painful filing shall continue. Let the metal accept the will of the master and it will not try to dictate when or how it shall be filed. As for the furnace, it is the worst of all. Ruthless and savage, it leaps at every combustible thing that enters it and never relaxes its fury till it has reduced it all to shapeless ashes. All that refuses to burn is melted to a mass of helpless matter, without will or purpose of its own. When everything is melted that will melt and all is burned that will burn, then and not till then the furnace calms down and rests from its destructive fury. With all this known to him, how could [anyone] find it in his heart to praise God for the hammer, the file and the furnace? Timely thoughts, Tony

Found While Running

There will always be the philosophical, "I found myself while running" story but that will have to wait for another time.

Today I logged an easy 3 miler. It was a variation on the "short loop" near the house. I parked the car at Salem Woods Elementary and timed the run just so I would finish as Gabe was released from class. As I descended the grade to the school parking lot I spotted a 1 1/2 wide roll of black electrical tape. That would have been helpful last night. I installed a CD/stereo in my little Civic and has no tape to wrap the spliced wires with, so I cannibalized what little tape I could find inside the dash. It was ugly. this roll will come in handy some time.

I finished the run picked up Gabe and came home then thought of all the interesting things I have found while running. To shorten the list I dismissed all the natural items like cool rocks, driftwood and weird leaves. So here are a few.

Twice I have found $20 bills, once in the parking lot of Sultan High School and once on the pipeline trail just up the street. Other monetary items include various coins here in the states, Mexico and in Managua Nicaragua. Money is an easy on to start with pennies are to easy unless they are tails up and are wheat backs, for some reason the wheat backs are cooler.

Tools are another category of items I find a lot of. Wrenches, screwdriver, hexes, hammers, a hatchet, socket parts. The best are the Craftsman tools for the lifetime guarantee. I stop in at Sears tell the guys I found in on the road and they scrounge up a new one lickety-split. I guess they know the guy who's truck it fell off will be in some day to replace it.

one of my most memorable finds was this aluminum miners helmet. I was easily 8 miles in on some back logging roads near Sultan above the Skykomish river, somewhere near the summit of Haystack Mountain. I had reached the end of the rugged roads overgrown with small alder trees when I came upon a clearing with a bunch of old logging debris; cables, rusty metal parts and this helmet have buried in the dirt. It was pretty mangled when I found it so I tried to open it up a bit but it seemed to not like being worked and started to break along the crease lines. It was a cold fall day and there was an early snow on the ground. I had not worn gloves and used the time proven "pull-your-sleeve-cuffs-over-your-hands" technique. It was working wonderfully. So carrying the helmet with its wonderfully effective ability to conduct heat seemed to be sucking any remaining warmth from my already chilled hands. Oh the price you pay for"take-me-homes".

A while back I found this water bottle. Most water bottles on the side of the road are most undesirable being filled with unwanted fluids. But this bad boy was open and left in the middle of the road. I surmised, due to its pristine condition, it had fallen off a bike. It smelled like the typical plastic water bottle and has proven itself very useful since being sterilized with a strong bleach bath.

Various pieces of sporting equipment would include: golf balls, baseballs, soccer balls, basketballs, a left footed Jr. snowshoe, three baseball gloves, and a play swing with chains. That last one was tough to carry home.

I recall going on a run to clear my head from a project I was working on at home. It was a tree stand for hunting deer in the woods. While on the run I found two large chunks of pressure treated 4x4 perfect for finishing the project.

I remember a story of a gent who collects lead tire balance weights. I see a lot of those, but leave them for him out of respect. Of course

I don't recall many other items right now but I'm sure in my now 17016 miles I have found many other things.

Now on to running goals. I really have only three hard goal the soft ones are not worth mentioning. But he hard goals are: running a sub 5:00 mile, running a sub 3:00:00 marathon and running around the world. I attained the mile goal a few years back running a 4:59 on a really hard track at a High School track in Lynnwood. Qualifying for Boston I hammered out a 3:08 marathon on the old flat and boring Seattle course. I don't think I will ever have the chance to train like that again. But we'll see. The run around the world thing is a lifetime goal. The number I have chosen is 24,902, though people argue about the exact number. I am currently at 17, 016, only 7886 miles to go.

"Trials of miles."

Tony