Week in Review (March 1 - March 7)

Tuesday (10,387 steps) - Got up early and did strength training before heading into the office for work. It was actually really nice out, so I went for a walk at lunch. Basically right after I got off work I headed over to the school for an orchestra concert. 

She wanted to stick around for band, so it was a relatively late evening. Did a yoga video when I got home.

Wednesday (24,529 steps) - Work in the office. I was pretty excited to go to Green Mountain after work because it was going to be warm enough to run in BARE ARMS. Of course I ended up getting stuck in some awful traffic on the way there and by the time I got there I only got to the top once before needing to put on my jacket (that I thankfully threw in my pack at the last minute). Coach wanted me to get in 3,000' of vert, and for some reason I thought that would be around 7.5 miles. I was mildly annoyed when it was over 9 and I didn't get off the mountain until after 8. Sigh.

Thursday (7,965 steps) - Work from home. Did a full body strength video and took Pika for a walk. Went to Torchy's for a beer and to get take out.

Friday (15,115 steps) - Wash Park and coffee with the gang. As I was getting ready to leave - Ben showed up! He was in the area for work and saw my car so he stopped in. Fun surprise! Upon getting to work I realized my main attorney had already started her vacation, so I headed home at lunch to walk Pika and worked the rest of the day from home. Started pulling out all my crap that I need to get packed for the next race. Ugh. It always seems so overwhelming to pack for out of state events.

Saturday (50,666 steps) - Woke up a bit earlier than I thought I might. A had her track-a-thon in the morning and Ben attended and took pictures since I had my long run to do. This is the first time I've seen her run in a jacket and a hat in a long time.

I had mapped out a few options for a long run - with most of them heading out towards Standley Lake first so I could hit up the bathroom at the trail head before continuing on. Decided on the "sketchiest" of the routes (yes, I knew it wasn't going to be great even when I mapped it out). I had 5 hours on schedule, and estimated I'd be able to meet up with Ben at Woods Boss sometime around 2:00 pm. When I had been getting ready it just looked cold out, it wasn't doing anything else. Basically as soon as I got off the street the light, freezing rain started. I had initially started in a Smartwool top and vest, but within a few miles I was already soaked through and getting colder. Thankfully, I had packed a variety of layers. Three miles in I swapped out the vest for my Salomon rain jacket, which I would end up keeping on the rest of the day. Headed down on Little Dry Creek and it was cold, cold, cold. I saw this spray painted on the sidewalk and thought I'd never seen more applicable graffiti. I even sent it to Ben, haha.

By the time I got to Sheridan, I knew I was entering the "not so desirable" part of the trail system. There were lots of places where there were homeless people with tents set up. Dogs tied to broken down campers. And I've never seen SO.MUCH.LITTER.AND.GARBAGE. in my life. Thankfully, I never actually felt unsafe, but man, this was probably the most visually displeasing run I've ever done. 

From a distance, that tree looks like it is waving! Actually, it's a statue, so I wasn't wrong

The construction that had been going on for years at Twin Lakes was finally completed, and it was probably the nicest section for many miles. That was also the only other guaranteed bathroom on my route, but I didn't need to stop. The rest of the run was just ensuring I made my handful of correct turns- I was glad to have put the route on my watch since the closer I got to Denver, none of the intersections were marked. The only pictures I took were of the street art/graffiti. 

Bridge leaving Clear Creek heading to the Platte River

In addition to not being a visually nice route, it also REALLY smelled. Seriously, I never need to run these paths ever again.

The area around Globeville and Rino was definitely the worst. There were way more unsavory people wandering around, fires on the side of the trail, trash, and dead animals. So disgusting. Finally when I got closer to the city I was on the trails that I actually run/walk a lot during work (more so in the summer) and I knew I was getting close. I couldn't quite remember the intersection for the brewery, so I pulled out my map and had to get off in a weird place - but I like the street art. From there I had only a little over a mile left!

Blue bear at the Convention Center

From here, I had 8-9 block to go, but I had to wait at almost every single intersection. FINALLY got there, and the timing was perfect, as Ben had just arrived. Thankfully, he had brought me a towel to dry off and a change of clothes. I was freezing.

Greg met us for a beer and for fun, Ben bought me a buckle from the brewery to commemorate my obnoxious run, haha. We stopped at Odyssey on the way home - I got a special beer that came with a cookie and it was delicious.

Stopped at Costco on the way home to pick up dinner. 

Sunday (8,990 steps) - Ben's long run day, and since I had to go to Boulder for a Runners Roost team meeting, I suggested that he go with me and run home. He had even worse weather, I think. It was in the low 20's and snowing, and he said that most of the bike path wasn't plowed and that there was inches of snow. Anyway. The meeting went well and I was able to get this years team gear. Ariel had also come with me so that she could get some spikes. I also bribed her with breakfast at the Walnut Cafe, which was delicious.

Ariel and I took Pika for a walk, and I'm pretty sure she was the only one that enjoyed it.

Did an hour long Peloton ride. Nothing else?

Monday (8,121 steps) - Work from home. Took Pika for a walk at lunch and did an easy Peloton ride. 

Stats:

• 125,773 steps
• 33.13 miles run
• 80 minutes of cardio
• 92 minutes of strength training

Week in Review (February 22 - February 28)

Tuesday (6,057 steps) - THANKFULLY, it was an indoor workout day. Before work I did about 50 minutes of strength training (lower body, upper body, core). 

Then I had to go to work in the office. It was ridiculously cold all day. After work I did a Peloton ride.

Wednesday (19,693 steps) - Work in the office. I was definitely dreading my "run" after work. It was still barely above freezing, and my coach had given me a 2k vert goal. As I was driving to Green Mountain I was thinking... this isn't the worst, it's warmed up! Of course by the time I got to the lot it was like 5 degrees. I met up with DTR although I planned on doing my own thing. Overall, I guess it wasn't HORRIBLE, but the snow was deepish, and it was not smooth going. Shout out to the two gals I saw out there that literally jogged up the whole fire road. Amazing! It was real feel of -8 degrees when I finished. Gross.

The drive home was definitely worse than the run. There was snow blowing across the highway and I could barely see where I was going. Not fun. Did a 20 minute recovery ride on the Peloton when I got home.

Thursday (7,152 steps) - Work from home. Did my strength training during lunch before taking Pika for a walk. Still a lot of snow, but the sun finally came out! Cold.

And here's an adorable picture of Pika, just because

Friday (10,439 steps) - We skipped our morning walk at Wash Park because it was still around 0 and none of us were in the mood to freeze. Work in the office. After work Ben and I met up with Tyler for celebratory beers at Resolute. (We had tried to go to Bluegrass, but the last few times we have tried to go has been a pain trying to get seating, so we went elsewhere).

Saturday (42,370 steps) - Didn't set an alarm. Still woke up relatively early. Ate a quick breakfast and got my gear ready for my long run. Since the trails are garbage right now, I planned on running to Boulder and having Ben meet me for beers when I got there. I had planned out my route intentionally having a bathroom early on since I've been having issues with that lately. Around 3 miles in I realized I was on a race course. At least with my late start I only saw a few runners out. Oops!

I really had not worn enough clothes for the early miles. Most of the run was on the bike path that hugs the highway to Boulder, and it was definitely breezy in areas. 

I was overall feeling pretty good! Saw this cute bald eagle!

As I was getting closer to Boulder I realized that I was moving faster than I had planned and that I was probably going to need to modify my route.

I was pretty excited to get to the overlook - I knew it was mostly downhill from there. I was feeling pretty great in this sections.

Sure enough, when I got to the crossing to head towards Boulder I had to jump on Bobolink to get more "time" on feet. I'm really familiar with this section, but I did not count on the trails being sooo bad (still). I was only on the snow for about 2 miles, but it was NOT fun.

I was still too "fast" so I headed up towards the high school and the lake. When I arrived at Roost Ben was already there, although he said he had only been there a few minutes. We went to Southern Sun for lunch/beer. Sadly, there was no stout month :( but there was delicious grilled cheese! Vegged out most of the evening watching the Netflix show "All of Us are Dead."

Sunday (9,105 steps) - Did a Peloton ride and a pilates video before taking Pika for a walk. Had a quick lunch, then loaded her up to meet Ben in Morrison and then onto Breckenridge Brewery to meet up with Jandy and Maureen. Beer was ok, drive was far.

Stopped at Over Yonder on the way home. 

Monday (19,942 steps) - Up early to get my run out of the way. I had thought maybe I could do trails since it was still pretty cold, but the trails were all ice, so I did a modified loop. At least the sunrise was pretty!

Work from home. I was crazy busy since I was still covering for Nicole, but it made the day fly by. Took Pika for a walk at lunch. Nothing else?

Stats:

• 114,758
• 32.06 miles run
• 120 minutes of cardio
• 100 minutes of strength training

Week in Review (February 15 - February 21)

Tuesday (22,322 steps) - Got up early to get my strength training done before I had to go into the office. After work I headed over to Stone House for my run. I was "excited" to try for my first real run after all my foot issues. My only goal was to hopefully be out for an hour and maybe have negative splits. The first few miles were really not great and I was starting to regret my decision to run since I just had "cardio" on my schedule.

Luckily I started to feel better and the rest of the run was fine. Even after all the snow we've had most of the path was in pretty good condition, except for a few really icy spots.

I even saw an owl! 

I headed over to Green Mountain to deliver a bunch of Girl Scout cookies and to have a beer before heading home.

Wednesday (16,468 steps) - We had yet ANOTHER storm in the forecast, so I got up and did my miles before work. Thankfully, I was out early enough that the dirt was sort of soft and not loose mud. 

I had hoped to get out of work early enough to miss the storm, but sadly, I had to work my regular shift. Sigh. Peloton ride when I got home.

Thursday (16,348 steps) - Work from home. I had hills on schedule - and my coach hilariously said I should find "runnable" hills with at least 600' of gain. I've never been good at hills and I had initially thought I was going to do trails, but we got a lot of snow. I did some research and figured I'd have to do repeats at Dinosaur Ridge. Turns out, the run was AMAZING. Like probably one of the best in a while. I set up 30/30 intervals for the steep east side of the road and then ran the rest. 

Later, I also did some strength training. After I got off work Ben and I went to Goldspot to drop off Greg's cookies. It was pretty crowded, so we only stayed for one beer.

Friday (11,728 steps) - Wash Park with the gang before going to work.

I managed to get out of work early enough to head home for... my Peloton Century ride!!

This was a pretty tough workout. Sadly, no shout out though.

Saturday (40,095 steps) - Up stupid early for my long run. I had mapped out a route in Broomfield/Louisville area. I'd had the foresight to make sure that none of the sections were closed because of the fire, but I neglected to realized how much snow/ice was still out. Within minutes I knew this was going to be awful, but I didn't have time to do something else. It was chilly, but a beautiful morning.

Sadly, probably 75% of my route ended up being pretty awful. Anywhere there was snow was probably 1-2" of crunchy snow that was tough to run on, and anywhere there were bike tire tracks or footprints was icy. It was not fun. THEN, I realized that I had missed my turn, and that I probably had done at least 3/4 of a mile in the wrong direction of the big route I had created. 

I had also intentionally planned my route to have a bathroom fairly early, and the detour obviously had me getting there later than planned. Thankfully, it was open. The other issue I had was mapping. I thought that it would be pretty easy to navigate, but there were a lot of areas where I had to pull out Strava to make sure that I was on track. Strangely, the part I thought I would hate (running on the bike path along the highway) was actually the best part. I also had apparently created my route through part of the Marshall Fire area. It was pretty devastating to see first-hand, and it still smelled like smoke.

I managed to adjust the route enough to compensate for the early extra miles so that I would be able to finish around the same mileage/time I had planned. I was SUPER happy to be done, and rushed over to the school for A's first scrimmage of the year. 

It was fun to watch! Ariel ran really well, setting a PR in the mile (6:43) and 800 (3:00). She also ran the 400 in the medley. We picked up Panda Express for lunch and then took Pika for a walk. When Ben got home we headed over to Bluegrass for snacks and beer with Tyler.

Sunday (10,558 steps) - We had a busy morning! First we had to drive to meet up with Ruth to give her Girl Scout cookies, then it was down to Parker for Ben's housewarming party! Holy cow, that was far away. His house is cute and it was a fun morning hanging out with all our friends we don't see too often. Stopped to deliver more cookies on the way home. Took Pika for a walk and did a VERY long Peloton ride. Then headed down to Golden to meet Ben at Over Yonder. It was pretty busy and they had a band, I hate noise :(

Monday (18,200 steps) - With the storm coming in I opted to run before work. The weather was actually perfect! Low 30's, but sunny. Thank goodness for the port-o-potty halfway...

Work from home even though Ben and Ariel both had the day off for President's Day. Got an email later in the morning that I was accepted for another year as a Zensah ambassador. Woot!

After work we went to the new Tatttered Cover in Westminster. Fun: they have a bar! Sad: small location and they didn't have the book that I went to buy.

Soap display perfectly represents Ben (Calm the F Down), Me (Working From Home) and Ariel (Sociel Anxiety) haha

Headed home for dinner and watching America's Got Talent Extreme - I actually "know" one of the contestants! Had an amazing beer for Stout Month, but woof, 11+% pm a weeknight is tough.

Stats:

• 135,719 steps
• 37.98 miles run
• 150 minutes of cardio
• 70 minutes of strength training