Wholistic Fitness

My breath comes in thrusts, like a spawning salmon determined toward higher, purer waters.  Just 4 days after racing Imogene – and the very morning after teaching a HP Yoga™ PROP WORKOUT – i somehow have again managed to forget both my age and adult responsibilities and find myself bolting about the alpine tundra like a Rocky Mountain ram. …come, let’s share a Recovery Run together in my beloved pranic playground in the high San Juans as the highest chakra of Mother Earth whispers soft, tensionless saluations as she begin to hunkers down for a long, cold winter…

the view outside my front door before departure…at 6,512′ misty fingers curled and swam among the foothills as if attempting to coax secrets from the juniper and yucca…

Animas Valley…faint clouds flow like a boundless river among the red rock strata…

First San Juan snow sighting of the new season upcoming…and it’s still more than a week before the first day of autumn!  yeah, baby!

The moist midwifery of September at 10, 908′ kisses away all tears about such a short heaven of a summer taking leave.   Like a kite-string, pale and vaporous, the beginning of the trail beckons to me in ways far more seductive than my willpower can refuse.

pausing to appreciate the short stint of summer growth on a small Pine…the paler green indicates how much ‘bigger’ she was able to grow during the brief summer right at timberline; which here is about 6,000′ higher than in Europe!

Even the hardiest of wildflowers, such as the Lupine, grow somber, wilting, and must bow to the silent, orderly existence which rules this sparse, high kingdom.

It’s a weird thing, once you faithfully complete one of the WF Sacred Pilgrimages* like Imogene Pass Race; afterward, you’re filled with a feeling of invincible verve.   I remember when (thanks to my Motorola teammates) I managed to win the Tour de Gila 5-day Stage race in my younger years…afterward, I was like, “C’mon Tour de France, you ain’t sooo baaad!”    It must be a bit like being a crack addict; except this ‘high’ ain’t crack…it’s track; singleTrack…preferably singletrack which staircases in serpentine lines above timberline leaving the rest of the hurried world far below.  Tapping out a footfall/breath tempo sometimes only inches long yet long enough  to re-find our Soul Self upon the slow hush of unwavering dirt lines monumented by granite tassled rills and backdropped by great mosques of colouir-clawed high peaks….

May you, whoever you are, find some comfort and power and wild spirit within the following pics i paused long enough in my sweet, running madness to bring to you, my Precious Sangha Toward Wholeness…

Namaste, most noble warrior brothers and sisters along the steep and direct Path of Self Transformation through lifelong sweat and stillness…

your little creature throbbing among the Gramma Grass and Grounsel,

ilg

* There are three WF Sacred Sweat Pilgrimages which all faithful WF Students endeavor to complete…some,  like your crazy coach has been doing for a long time,  in one calendar year. They are listed below in order of seasonal progression:  Mt. Taylor Winter Quad (feb),  Iron Horse Bicycle Classic (may), Imogene Pass Race (sept).  Special Transmissions are given toward those Students who faithfully take such Pilgrimage.