Summit junkie!

Lake Mountain with Jun:

Sunday mornings are perfect for a run. The kids are all asleep and nobody seems to be out on the trails, so Jun and I have been hitting it every Sunday recently and it is the perfect way to start my day. We hadn't been up Lake Mountain for a few weeks so we decided to get on it. The track up to the top was softer than we had hoped, so it was slow going and both of us were lacking our usual energy. It was quite windy in sections, but overall not bad and I was pretty hot most of the run.

We hit the summit in 1:16 which is pretty slow for us. The views were sweet and the air was fresh and clean, something we haven't seen for about a month. The run down was better, but we were punching through the snow in some spots which slowed us down, but it wasn't terrible. We settled into a nice pace and just chatted the whole way down.

Weights at the gym for an hour working my upper body/core. The gym is soooo stinky these days.

Ave Twin Peaks with Jun, Dorsimus and Je10:

When Jun texted last night about running the Ave Twins smornin' my first thought was "No way the weather is gonna totally blow", but after thinking about it I decided I could make the drive in early before the massive traffic jam that I knew would happen because of the storm, so I decided it was a brilliant idea to get out and run to avoid the crappy commute. We met at the state capitol building at 5:30 am and it was already snowing. It snowed on us the entire run, but we didn't care. The trail wasn't as good as it has been, but it made for a better workout. Our pace wasn't too fast and we just chatted all the way up. The ridge was kind of a mess with deep snow and that slowed us down a lot.

As we approached the first peak Jun and I were making excuses as to why we didn't want to tag the second peak, but Je10 basically called us out and I knew we would end up slogging over to #2. Ah well, it sucked, but it was still fun. We were laughing most of the way over. On #2 we all ate something and I took my glove off and after a few minutes my hand was completely numb. I couldn't even turn off my headlamp for a picture. More laughs and then we slogged back over to #1.

The run/slog down was just as much fun. The conditions were pretty bad, but it didn't seem to bother us at all and we had a blast. I'm not sure what our time was, but I know it was slow. It was a great crew and a really fun morning.

8 on the track at the gym. I started out with 3 easy miles and then I started feeling really good and picked up the pace for 3 miles, running between 7-7:30 with some dips into the 6's. I felt really good. Finished it off with two easy cool down miles. So hungry.

Mt. Wire with Jun.

SLOG

We were hoping to tag Wire and then do more miles on the BST, but that was assuming some dummy or dummies had been up to the top since the storm. Well, nobody was dumb enough to do it until us today. It was a total slog in deep snow all the way to the top. Yes, it was an excellent workout, but we didn't get the miles we had hoped for. Down lower it was warm, but as we made our way up it cooled significantly and the wind picked up. It was cold.

We saw at least 30 head of deer and also a big herd of elk that we watched for about 15 minutes before they took off. Awesome. Just before the second saddle the deep snow was ridiculous and I was happy to have Jun break all the trail. Crotch deep! We finally made it to the summit ridge where it was actually in pretty good shape because it was windblown and we ran it up to the top.

The run down was fun, but the deep snow just sapped my energy. I did take a graceful fall that Jun captured on video. See it here FACE PLANT.

The conditions sucked, but we still had a great time as always. Check out Jun's blog for a few pics.

Dimple Dell Gully trail with Jun and Brent:

The sun was out and it was a perfect weather day for a run in the DD gully. I met Jun and Brent at the park next to the Trax station. The first mile or so was pretty awesome and the trail was in great shape, but the higher we went the conditions deteriorated some and it became more of a slog. Brent turned back 3 miles in and at mile 5 I had to turnaround because I was running out of time. Jun kept going all the way up to the lower Bell Canyon reservoir.

The run back wasn't as fun by myself and it seemed like the trail got worse as it baked in the sun. Sloppy. The last few miles were a slog, but I was glad I got out on such a nice day.