Alley Loop Marathon week (see previous entry for Sunday-Friday. Wk 6 (of 2018)
R – 55 miles/ S – 3 hours/ Bike – 10 hours / Total: 19 hours
The week after the Alley loop started off with me feeling a little bit congested and other the weather. Not bad enough to miss any school or class. It was a busy week, with conferences at school until 7:30 PM on two of the nights and worship team practice on Thursday night. That also limited my afternoon on Saturday, as we perform a Saturday service at 5 (worship team rehearses at 4). Sundays are a little more compact on worship team weeks as well, since we rehearse an hour before the first service. It gives me an outlet to use a talent to worship, as well as balance. Even though it makes training harder, if at any point I feel like dropping it as a commitment in my life, I think about what is really important and why I’m training in the first place: to bring glory to God and to worship him. If I replace actual worship through service in music with more training, something isn’t right.
Here is the training from the rest of February:
wk 7
S – Am – 9 miles
PM – 2 hr bike
M – am – 9 miles
Pm – off
T – Am – 9 mile run
Pm – 60 min bike wsome intervals
W – Am – 2.5 hr skate ski @ wolf creek
PM – off – had to work until 7:30PM
TH – am – 9 mile run
PM – conferences til 7:30 and worship practice after
F – am – 9 mile run
Pm – 2 hr skate ski @ Mt. Massive G.C. (Leadville)
S – Mineral Belt trail Leadville Loppet (44K)
Details: 9am start/20 degrees, blue sky, cold, packed snow, good conditions. Raced very well; on climbs, never was passed and almost caught leaders but kept losing them on the descents. Their glide wax must have been just a little bit better! 3rd place in men, 4th overall. Time: 2:28. Great event overall – huge soup buffet in the gym afterwards with raffle and awards. Probably 50 different homemade soups and dishes, plus homemade desserts. Mayor was the emcee – was funny. Great event to be a part of. Talked to winner of race, Adam, who happened to be a former professional cyclist out of Boulder. He beat me by 9 minutes and also was in the Alley Loop. Talked about potential future races.
Pm – 50 min skate @ Mt. Massive GC – Just hadn’t had enough skiing yet I guess:)
Totals: 56 miles/ ski – 8 hours/ bike = 1.5 hrs – total = 16 hours
wk 8
S – 2.5 hour skate ski on mineral belt trail – 24 total miles. did some no pole work
PM – 60 min bike trainer workout (150-180 watts)
M – am – 9 miles
pm – 60 min rollerski on new rollerskis
T – AM – 9 mile run
PM – 60 min rollerski
W – noon – 9 mile run
pm – 60 min rollerski
Th – am 9 mile run
PM – 60 min rollerski
F – AM = 5 miles
PM – 75 min skate ski in the dark @ Wolf Creek
S – 9 miles
PM – 1.5 hr skate ski @ wolf creek.
Totals – R – 50 miles/ B – 1 hr/ ski – 5.5 hrs/ rollerski – 4 hrs / Total – 16.5
wk 9
S – am – 9 miles
pm – 1.5 hr rollerski
M – 9 miles
PM 40 min bike – popped tire
T – am – 60 min rollerski
noon – 60 min run with 2x1H/1E, 4x3H/2E, 2x 1H/1E
pm – 80 min bike
W – 5 miles easy
PM – 75 min rollerski
TH – am – 9 mile run
Pm – off
FR- am – 9 mile run
pm – 1 hr rollerski
S – 2.5 hr skate ski @ wolf creek
pm – off
totals – R – 50 miles/ Bike – 2 hrs/ Ski – 2.5 hr/ rollerski – 4.25 hrs/ total – 15 hrs
February Totals
wk 6 – 19
wk 7 – 16
wk 8 – 16.5
wk 9 – 15
66.5
Jan – 76
Feb – 66.5
Year total to date = 142.5
Moment of the month:
I had gone for a run in the morning, brought my skis to school, and was ready to drive the 75 minutes to Wolf Creek as soon as I left work in order to get on some snow. I had just read Peter Vordenberg’s biography and he talked about growing up in Boulder and driving up to Eldora ski resort after school. It would be dark and cold by the time they got there, and the cold winds greeted them by swinging the door of the van open when they piled out. It reminded me of the brutal winters up north in Moorhead, MN. Training up there makes you tough. I figured driving for 75 minutes to practice was not out of the ordinary for pro skiers. Even if they were in a van driven by coaches and could probably sleep on the way out and back….
I drove out and was hoping to only have to drive 50 minutes to South Fork and use a set of trails there. When I arrived where I thought the trail should be, I couldn’t see anything. I drove back and forth, wasting precious daylight as I searched in vain for a set of tracks. Finally, I decided that nothing was there, and I packed it up and headed farther up the pass to Wolf Creek. When I pulled into the lot, it was about 5:00. The ski resort workers were all leaving, and giving me a look like, “is he supposed to be here?” I put on my headlamp and headed down the steep, long descent to the meadow where the trail is. It was ominous. Of course, I would eventually have to trek back up the approximately 300 foot descent at some point to get back to my car.
In the valley the snow was terrible. Slow, squishy – vintage Wolf Creek conditions. AT first I was mad, because it was so hard, it didn’t even really feel like skiing. There wasn’t any glide, no rhythm. The wind, which I thought would die down, had actually picked up, and it was blasting me in the face. Soon, it started to snow a little, making the glide conditions even worse. I was tired from my run in the morning, from work that day, and from the drive. I guess this is why no one does this, I thought. I stopped to rest a few times; I had to at least ski for over an hour. You can’t drive for longer than you workout – that is my rule! Eventually, I embraced it all. This was my training grounds. This was making me tougher. Who in their right mind is out here doing this – only the “everydayathlete.” I didn’t worry about my garmin stats – this workout was about coming all the way out here and doing it in the dark. It was one of those ‘epic’ workouts – one that you don’t really forget because it was so surreal. I’ve had a lot of them over the years, and when you are really low on motivation, sometimes the glimmer from them gets you back out on the road. This was the defining moment of the month for sure.
Seder-Skier.com 