Running in the Rockies

AM: 12.16 in 9:37 avg pace at the Boulder Reservoir. Avg elevation: 5,300, ~450 gain/loss. Avg heart rate: 153, Max heart rate: 175. 

 Decided to head down to the reservoir for a longish run this morning before work. Hubby and I decided to work this weekend so that we could take Thursday and Friday off next week and have a 4 day weekend. Really looking forward to that. The run was awesome. I really needed a nice easy long run over relatively easy terrain. I tried to keep my heart rate between 145-155, and I did pretty well except for the hills. Noticing some soreness on the outside of right ankle, so I think I will take tomorrow off and try to hit a couple yoga classes, lift, and do lots of stretching. 

AM: ~ hr hike with pups this morning. Pretty cold, but nice in the sunshine. Stretched and foam rolled when we got home. 

Work, work, then work some more! Looking forward to the 4 day weekend we have planned.

PM: Hot tub.. excellent.

AM: 5 on trails with pups + 3 more on roads alone near house in 11:22 avg pace. I forgot my heart rate monitor at work yesterday and it felt nice to run without it for a change. I should probably try to run sans watch a few times a week- would probably do me some good instead of looking at these incredibly slow paces. Avg elevation: 8,500', 1,170' gain/loss. Beautiful morning for a run. Legs felt pretty good, still some stiffness in lower legs- probably from all the trail running the last couple weeks. Need to do some stretching and foam rolling this evening. 

AM: 5 alone on usual route + 3 miles on trails with pups in 11:32 avg pace. Avg elevation: 8,500, 1,389' gain/loss. Avg heart rate: 149, Max heart rate: 169. Felt a little more tired than usual this morning. I think working 12 days in a row is pretty rough on me. Am really looking forward to this long weekend. A bit windy today and spitting some snow. The little one demolished one of my favorite smart wool trail socks. Such a bummer, I think I wore them twice and they were so comfy! My fault though- I left it within reach. Ah-well. 

Another unplanned day off. Maybe for the best. I don't want to push the mileage up too quickly and get injured. We worked on the house all day and then took a nice walk down to town to run some errands. We are removing the front deck because it's a terrible fire hazard (forest fire) and we've decided to replace it with flagstone instead. Upon removing the wood, we realized that it was actually redwood and in pretty good shape in most places. It was painted, so we had no idea what kind of wood it was, but assumed fir. Why anyone would paint redwood is beyond me- what a beautiful wood! So we were pretty careful removing the screws and sections and decided to plane it (and maybe rip it if we can find a place that will do it for a reasonable price) and use it as wood flooring in the house. Sweet! 

 Lower back and hamstrings were a bit sore from leaning over to remove screws all day. Good cross training I figure. 

AM: Headed to Golden Gate State Park this morning with hubby and older pup (younger one still getting too car sick and this road would not have been pleasant for anyone in the car). Wanted to preview the 12 mi course for the Golden Gate Dirty Thirty in a couple weekends and the hubby was going to hike with the pup. However, numerous warning signs of recent mountain lion sightings left us feeling uneasy. The hubby wanted me to take the pup (who is really a medium sized, sweet, but wuss of a dog who often hides behind me when we approach 'scary' tree stumps... ha! not a lot of protection from him). I didn't feel comfortable with my hubby hiking alone so I decided to just hike with them and do the top section and second half of the 12 mile course. I know if I would have been alone, I would have just run it- but having the hubby and pup there and feeling responsible for their well-being probably lead to a better/safer decision. The funny thing is that I KNOW there are mountain lions where I run with the pups every day.. but somehow by not having warning signs makes the threat seem less imminent I suppose. The one thing good thing about the trails near our house is that they are closer to 'civilization' and a bit higher in elevation, which may make it less likely for us to become a tasty treat for a hungry lion??

Anyways, the hike was nice although there are definitely sections of the trail /course that I may not be able to run.. pretty steep in some places. I'm actually a little more worried about the downhill than the uphill though. Likely to be a quad/knee killer.

Decided to run up Rollins Pass with the hubby biking this morning. Gorgeous day and warm temperatures may have obscured my memory for how long the snow sticks around in the high country. Needless to say, we were stopped by snow within the first mile (started around 9,200'). We pushed on hoping that the snow would let up a bit, but it was post holing for the most part with the hubby walking his bike. We made it to the first switch back (~2.5 miles) and decided to turn around. I really wanted to get a long run in, so I decided to run back down Tolland Rd to Rollinsville. It's mostly downhill with some rollers. It was too beautiful of a day to miss out completely. So, the total mileage was around 13.6 with an average pace of ~10:30. Although, the run up the pass was significantly slower (some miles were ~15:00 pace because of walking/post holing) and the downhill section once I hit the road was ~9:00 avg pace. Starting elevation: 9,200, max elevation: 9,400, Min elevation: 8, 500. Avg heart rate: 154, Max heart rate: 180.