Monday: 10 miles, 2000ft of gain, foothills trail. The temperature contrast between the base and the top of the ridge is amazing - it felt like at least 10 degrees today.
Tuesday: 8 miles, 1500ft of gain, foothills trail. I had an accident on the bike yesterday (plowed into the side of an SUV as he switched lanes in front of me at a light) that gave me some nice abrasions on my hands and bruised my kneecap, so I took it a little easy this morning. Thankfully, nothing feels abnormal.
Wednesday: 12 miles, 2500ft of gain, foothills trail and Reservoir Ridge. Today was cold (mid- to low-twenties) with a 20mph northerly wind, making the windchill close to zero. Nevertheless, I did the big foothills+reservoir ridge out-and-back. Reservoir Ridge has great trails - with the exception of the east side by Michaud Lane, the trail is rolling with only a few rocks. As I rounded the north end of the ridge I was blasted with cold, high winds, and could see snow falling over Bellvue. The tailwind on the way back was great, though I don't think it compensated for the brutal headwind on the way out. Pace was around 7.5mph, which is fine with me because the uphills and downhills are steep and full of rocks and switchbacks, which really slow you down.
Thursday: 8 miles, 1500ft of gain, foothills trail. Brutal winds on the ridge - 20mph with gusts upwards of 35mph. I would grind to a halt every once in a while when the gusts would pick up, but it was a lot of fun getting carried up the hills with the tailwind on the way back.
Friday: 22 miles, 4000ft of gain, Horsetooth Mountain and Lory State Park. This was a repeat of last week with an extra two mile loop thrown in at the turn-around in Lory. I didn't eat too well the night before, so I felt really sluggish in the middle of the run. My calves were calling out for calories so I doubled my intake to - gasp! - two Gu's on this run. I really cruised down Towers, breaking 10mph and not even feeling a twinge from my IT-band. Below is the GPS track. You can see that a little less than half of the run is spent in the rolling meadows at the base of the mountains, which, for whatever reason today, were getting blasted with winds. That might have been a wind-tunnel effect with the breaks in the hogback along the reservoir.
My new phone has a much better receiver than my old GPS watch, but the sampling rate is still low enough that it smooths out the sections with lots of switchbacks. This is really apparent with the Westridge trail, where the relatively dense forest plays hell with the signal.
Saturday: Off.
Mileage: 60 miles
Time: 8 hours
Elevation gain: 11,500ft
I'm trying out the micro-cycle training (every 4th week, drop down abruptly in mileage, then resume a 10% per week increase), but with the modification that I continually increase the length of the long run. So, next week I'll dial down the weekly mileage but do ~24 miles.
Getting really stoked for Hagg Lake!
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