Category: Leadville

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Week 4 recap, Run the Pemi Loop

Week 4 was pretty good until it wasn’t. Ha. That is fun to write. Kind of. Not really.

Every day this week was great until the fiasco that was Sunday. The week started with a Tuesday-Wednesday-Friday run schedule. It should have been Tuesday-Wednesday-Thursday and then maybe Saturday would’ve been a little different; but should’ve, could’ves will kill you. 

Saturday was the Pemi Loop with a wake up call at 2:30am. At the Lincoln Woods trailhead at 4:30 to meet Bob, Mark and Jen. We are all running Leadville 100 in a few weeks. We started with headlamps on the Osseo Trail and then about 45 minute in could turn them off.

Up over Flume, Liberty, Haystack, Lincoln, Lafayette, Garfield, South Twin, Bond and Bondcliff.

Stole this picture from Mark’s Facebook page. Franconia Ridge heading to Lafayette.

The best part was the Franconia Ridge and the Bonds. Beautiful, above treeline hiking and running.

Heading to Bond – my favorite part!

The hardest part was the doom and gloom of the Garfield Ridge and the .8 mile climb up South Twin. 

It was a hot day and I did a lot of things wrong: not enough water, no electrolytes, not enough food – all contributing to the fiasco that was Sunday. 

I woke up with low energy and super low heart rate, which scared me. I really wanted to rally and have a great day with a run in the morning to start. But nope. Couldn’t do it. At 5:00 pm I finally got out of bed and got in a swim with Winnie and ate a good meal. Today, Monday, still sore but energy seems to be restored. 

I’m not sure I could do the Pemi Loop solo. It was so fun to talk and laugh with people. There were about 10 runners we encountered that were doing the clockwise Pemi Loop. It’s pretty popular. I think now, two days later, I might do this again. Maybe in the fall. 

Now it’s time for Week 3 and to have a good almost-taper week.

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100 mile motivation

From Semi-Rad, a speech he gave at a graduation. I just love this!

Running 100 miles requires a lot of steps—226,000 steps, according to my watch. In my experience, about 10,000 of those steps are fun. The rest of those 226,000 steps are pure persistence, through blisters, foot and leg pain, chafing, indigestion, fatigue, sleep deprivation, and sometimes mild hallucinations.

I’ve discovered that it’s a lot like wanting to be a writer when you grow up, or, I’m guessing, being an astronaut or even a small business owner: you have a dream one day, and then you spend years working toward it, many times only motivated to continue by a faint memory of that first dream of seeing yourself cross a finish line, or sign a book deal, sit in a space shuttle, or on the opening day of your shop.

You start because of a dream, but you finish because you become good at talking yourself out of giving up. This is persistence.

People may call you stubborn—that’s OK.

Stubborn is just a dirty word for driven, and driven people get things done.

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Roger said Yes

My plan for Leadville is all falling into place.

Today is a rest day after traveling and running for four days in a row. I feel a bit like I should’ve at least gone for a bike ride but opted for cleaning the house (this never happens, choosing cleaning over a ride) and organizing my house. I had a great dinner and now ready to rest; after three hours of sleep from yesterday’s traveling back to New Hampshire.

The big news of the day: Roger said yes. Yes to pacing me on the first leg, and hardest: Winfield to Twin Lakes. He is the strongest, toughest endurance athlete I know. And he said yes. You know what this means?

I have to get to Winfield under the cutoff.

And if I do, my pacers will bring me to the finish. I’m sure of it.

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Pikes Peak, Week 6

I hiked my first 14er in Colorado this week. Woo Hoo. It was great training but I was also pretty dizzy once I reach 13,000 feet. Talk about zombie.

The view from the Barr Trail on Pikes Peak

I tried to keep up with Roger from the start of the trailhead and lost him 30 minutes in. I made friends at mile 5 with Jim from Colorado Springs. He’s training for Rabbit Run 100. It was a good day of meeting new friends and hiking with old ones (not old people, ha).

The hike was arranged by Whitney and Kathleen and included many people from Grand County. The dinner before was fantastic and I asked Roger if he would pace me the first, hardest section of Leadville. He’s thinking about it. Once I get his okay, then all the planning will be just about finalized.

But let’s talk about Week 6

Monday – Recovery Day
Tuesday – Breakthrough trail run – 10 miles.
Wednesday – Off (I wasn’t feeling it. Didn’t bike either. An off training day)
Thursday – 5 miles
Friday – Travel to Colorado, Running at 5,500 in Littleton 4.5
Saturday – Running at 5,500 in Littleton, 3.5, walking around Colorado Springs, CO
Sunday – Pikes Peak and 2 extra miles at the end 26 miles
Total Miles: 49.1

It was a good week. However, from talking to runners training for the 100 mile run in Leadville, I’m feeling a little behind. I haven’t done hill repeats and I’m not doing speed work. I haven’t run much at night and I haven’t done loops on Kearsarge like I promised myself.

I have some work to do. I have 3 big training weeks coming up and 2 weeks of recovery. Hiking Pikes Peak really made me question my ability to finish Leadville. Although I felt good this morning after the Pikes Peak hike/run and ran 10 miles today. I just have to do the hard training days, do the weights and core work and just freaking do the hill repeats.

My problem is that I don’t enjoy the workouts. I just want to run and hike and explore. I want to see new places and push the limits of what I think I can do. Stupid hill repeats. I’m going to do them. I will.

Hills, I will destroy hills.