Week in Review (March 31 - April 6)

Tuesday (12,866 steps) - Olive walk before work. Went to the gym at lunch for the StairMaster. Only had 25 minutes to do, so it didn't seem quite as bad as the last few weeks. I had a little extra time so I also did a "power walk" treadmill class. We had to do 20 second "all out" pace "sprints" and I cannot believe I was able to get up to 5.1 mph, which is basically my run pace. all this to say that 20 seconds of that was MUCH harder than running for 20 seconds. Work has hellacious again and I got out a little late. Took Olive for a walk and when I got back Ben had already made dinner, yay! Good Wife.

Wednesday (10,295 steps) - Peloton and Olive walk before going to work. Went to the gym at lunch to do strength training and another treadmill hike. Traffic was total garbage, home almost 20 minutes later than usual. Took Olive for a walk. Dinner and Good Wife.

Thursday (19,189 steps) - Yay for work from home! I finally decided to buckle down and get started on my REALLY packing for my upcoming race. The biggest catalyst with this one is that I only get one drop bag and it has a weight limit. Not a HUGE deal, but since I get to have access at every checkpoint, I really want to be smart with what I pack. Missing some nutrition and maybe last-minute gear, but I am at only half the max weight, so I think I'm doing pretty good.

Ariel messaged to ask me if I wanted to join her for a free entree from Qdoba for national burrito day. We came up with an elaborate plan to meet up, but that meant I had to rush out of the house to get my workout done first. Drove over to North Table for some repeats up the Quarry fire road. There was another gal there doing repeats and she was the fastest hiker I have ever seen in real life! I did 3 and a partial repeats in just over an hour and then rushed to meet Ariel.

Timing was perfect and I got my free burrito bowl. Headed home and ate it while it was still warm before taking Olive out for her walk.

Also squeezed in my first sauna session in a while. Really happy that the extra attorney has been transitioned back off my desk, my days are back to normal. Met up with Ben at Torchy's for dinner. We had barely sat down when Ariel messaged that since her car was out of coolant again that she wanted to drop off her car NOW so that the shop could look at it in the morning. We drove down after eating to meet up with Ariel and leave her with my car (yet again). Took Olive for a walk when we got home. Good Wife.

Friday (14,409 steps) - Well, without a car, that meant that Ben needed to take me to work. I took Olive for an early morning walk and then we stopped at Dutch Bros before heading into Denve.r We all look thrilled.

Olive even got to visit the other floor of our office for the first time today since we got to work so early.

Took her for a long walk at lunch - sort of forgetting that it was the Rockies home opener. Everything was NUTS.

Ben texted that he was leaving just after 4:30 and the map initially said he would only be about 15 minutes. Spoiler, with traffic and Rockies game chaos it was MUCH longer than that.

We dropped Olive off at home so we could go to happy hour. Busy like usual and since it was really windy no one was sitting outside. Got dinner there, the burgers are really good but I still wish we had more food truck options.

Good Wife.

Saturday (29,074 steps) - Did some cleaning and Ben went to get us Dutch Bros while I took Olive for a walk. We then headed up to Boulder to meet Terri for a run.

Ben had suggested our "normal" nine-mile loop. We didn't do a ton of running, which was fine by me. 

We decided to do something different and go to Lulu's BBQ in Louisville after our run. We got a plate to share, and for a fun surprise, we ran into a former bartender from 4 Noses that now works there. When we got home I took Olive for another long walk to the lake before we settled in for the evening.

Sunday (15,298 steps) - Sunday fun day - back up to Boulder. Definitely overdressed for this one!

Rails End after, where there was a new food truck for us to try. Mediterranean and the food was AMAZING, I really hope that we see this one again!

Took Olive for another walk when we got home. No recollection of the rest of the evening.

Monday (15,869 steps) - Work from home! Did laundry and a quick row session. Surprise coffee drop off from Ariel before taking Olive out for her long walk.

I went out for my run. Since I am finally tapering it was shorter and I felt great the whole time. Took Olive for another walk. After work I did some reading waiting for Ben to get home since I still don't have my car back. He stopped at Costco to pick up groceries and pizza for dinner. Good Wife.

Stats:

• 117,000 steps
• 20.31 miles run
• 16.52 miles walked
• 50 minutes of cardio
• 45 minutes of strength
• 25 minutes of sauna

Week in Review (March 24 - March 30)

Tuesday (17,503 steps) - Olive walk before going to work. Went to the gym at lunch to get in my StairMaster workout.

45 minutes is a long time... Got a little bit of work done and then went for a walk, just to get outside. Work is so horrible right now with an additional attorney on my desk. After work headed home and took Olive for a walk. We had to work on A's car for a bit to see if we could figure out why her car seems to be leaking oil still. 

Dinner and Good Wife.

Wednesday (18,239 steps) - Having to deal with Ariel's car meant that I switched my in office days. I had no idea how I was going to be able to squeeze in my run. Much to my surprise, I found out that the Boulder trailheads open at 5 am daily? What??? I never knew... I had made plans to actually run before work, which I hate doing. I will say that this run was rather enjoyable. Perfect weather, felt good and saw basically no one until I was on the way back to my car.

Got started on my work. Ariel headed to Big O first to get her tire replaced and then I drove down to pick her up after she dropped her car off at Black Canyon. Ariel joined me and Olive for our walk to the lake. We ended up doing Torchy's, which was definitely a change for us. Good Wife.

Thursday (10,421 steps) - Peloton before taking Olive for a walk and going to work. Another insanely busy day and it was weird being in office on a Thursday. Gym at lunch.

Took Olive for a walk when I got home. We didn't know what to do for food and since Ben had to run out for some errands he picked us up Chili's for dinner.

We definitely seem to eat out more with Ariel not being at home. Good Wife.

Friday (10,296 steps) - Olive walk before going to work. Took her for a walk late morning while I was waiting for a big appellate filing.

Unfortunately, most of the day ended up being a disaster. So busy and things were not ready on time.

While I knew I was going to have a tough time with the filing, we ran into SO many issues. I am normally off work at 4:30 and Olive and I were still at the office after 5! Ariel's car ended up not being ready (UGH), so I headed home after I finally got off work. Ben and I went down to Parry's for dinner.

As a random aside, this marked 100 days since the last time I had alcohol. Am I quitting for good? Who knows, but after hitting triple digits I am definitely thinking more about if I'll have it again. It would have to be something absolute amazing. Good Wife.

Saturday (38,249 steps) - With a big workout on schedule, Ben and I were going to be on our own. I took Olive for a walk before we headed up to Boulder for a long vert day. It was already feeling relatively warm, which wasn't great news since I expected to be out for five-ish hours. We started near our normal spot at the base of NCAR/Skunk.

A large number of people on the trails. With this being my last big effort before my next race, we were doing a lot more hiking than running. I also was carrying my full pack - complete with extra water/snacks for Ben since he isn't using a pack right now.

Did a detour up Fern and down Shanahan Ridge before continuing on Mesa toward Shadow Canyon. 

I feel like we do this climb once or twice a year and it is ALWAYS a kick in the ass. It is hot and STEEP. According to Strava, we climb over 1300' in one mile. ROUGH.

We took a break at the saddle to have something to eat and mentally prepare for almost half our route still remaining. 

I also always seem to forget how much I loathe a steep and technical descent. At least at this point we finally had some cloud cover and a slight breeze - making things much more manageable.

By the time we got off the really steep stuff I could tell that our run/hike was going to be taking about an hour longer than I had planned. I was trying to get Ben to do some occasional running just so we could be done with it but he wasn't really having it.

When we got down to the Bear service road I finally decided to just run to the truck. He knew where I would be! We made plans to meet up with Tyler, Terri and Larry at Murphy's for a drink and a snack. We didn't stay too long because Larry and Terri both had plans. Tyler joined me and Ben at 4 Noses for a little bit more socializing before we went home. Took Olive for a walk and Ben ordered in Thai food for dinner.

Good Wife.

Sunday (20,469 steps) - Did some things around the house while Ben went to pick up Dutch Bros. before Ariel went to work. Up to Boulder for another vert day! 

On the way down we talked to a volunteer and he gave us some good information about who to contact about Olive's voice/sight tag. It's been nearly a month and we still haven't received it. We stopped at Rails End for a snack. The new, slow guy was working so didn't stay as long as we planned. We did have a good snack/lunch though.

Dropped Olive off for her grooming appointment and went to Costco to get our weekly shopping done. Had just enough time to shower and walk to Emily's to pick her up. She looks very cute!

No recollection of what did later. I assume dinner at some point (leftover Thai?) and Good Wife.

Monday (16,729 steps) - Thankfully, a work from home day. Crazy busy trying to get caught up with everything I did not get to on Friday.

Took Olive for a walk to the lake at lunch.

Then I got my run in. I just love taper so much. 45 minutes just flew by. Ariel showed up right as I was making lunch (flautas in the air fryer) with bad news about her car - turns out the minor problem is back up to being a bigger problem again. After work we headed down to Black Canyon to pick her car up and scheduled the bigger work for two weeks out while I am gone so she can use my car. Will it never end? I got a few minutes from the house when she called to say she had to pull off the highway because her car was overheating. OF COURSE IT WAS. Waited for Ben to get home and then we drove down to Golden (in separate cars in case she needed mine back) to figure out the issue. It was seemingly an easy fix - she just happened to be out of coolant. Sigh. We went to New Terrain since we were just down the street before getting home and having an incredibly late dinner of Panda delivered. Barely time for an episode of Good Wife before bed. 

Stats:

• 131,906 steps
• 27.3 miles run
• 12.86 miles walked
• 75 minutes of cardio
• 55 minutes of strength
• 0 minutes of sauna