Bear training week 10 recap
Week ten was a fun and productive one. I ran five days in a row, one on the treadmill, with 80 minutes of tempo and hard running or elliptical pedaling.
33.5 miles running
10 hours, 30 minutes all training
4,304 ft D+ running
Sunday I logged my biggest elevation gain and longest run of the season in Horsetooth Mountain Park. After a few days of rain and drizzle, there was water in the creeks, no dust on the trails, and the scents of damp soil and pine bark were in the air. The sand lily and springbeauty continue to bloom, and I saw the first flowering larkspur. At the end of the last long ramp on Towers Road, aka Creeping Death, I found some mountain ball cactus with bright fuschia flowers.
A plump hemisphere-shaped cactus with bright magenta blossoms.
My friend John Bender came along as I was photographing the cactus and we ran together for more than an hour. He has lived adjacent to the park for almost 40 years and is one of the founders of the local trail running community. I'll be cheering him on at Quad Rock in two weeks.
Week 11 will have more tempo running, and instead of a weekend long run, a 5K race with my family, all four of us in the same running event for the first time.
Arthur's Rock in Lory State Park, Colorado, under a clear blue sky.