Another week in review

Almost met my goal of running 25 miles this week.
  
March 12-18
Monday:  13.12 mile long run
Tuesday: 4.15 miles of speedwork
Wednesday: Rest
Thursday: 5.59 mile trail run
Friday: 5 hours of downhill skiing
Saturday: 1 hour walk after the rain & wind let up
Sunday: 11.12 mile hike

Total miles run: 22.86 

I think running just under 23 miles + skiing and hiking make up that 2.14 mile difference. I could also claim it's my taper before my mostly-trail half marathon this Saturday.  Though I have no time goal for that, and I haven't officially been following a training plan for the last month, so I probably can't really say I'm tapering.

Oh, I did crunches a couple nights before bed. But no dedicated arm work. I'm going to say that while skiing when I poled myself through slush that counted as some arm work.

I'm happy with my activity level Thursday through Sunday, which was when our friend Ben was visiting us from Buffalo (where it was sunny and 75...that never happens in March).  Meanwhile, SoCal got slammed with a winter storm Saturday and Sunday which meant cold, rainy and windy.  Luckily Ben likes to be outside as much as we do.

Skiing on Friday was awesome because it was over 50F and sunny, so that meant we didn't have to bundle up like I'm used to doing in the northeast.  Weekday skiing is cheaper than weekend skiing.  Also, we went on a Friday before a big snow storm. I'm sure many people were waiting until after the snow hit to ski, but snow on the mountain road requires snow chains, which we don't have.  And that road is already slightly terrifying without snow.  So Friday it was.

No one was there!!

No one there = no lines for the lifts = amazing.  Also means you get tired faster.


Hiking Highlights:

After raining most of the day Saturday, it cleared up a little on Sunday - but was still unseasonably cold in the 40s.  We took Ben to Placerita Canyon, a place we hiked when we came out here for our house-hunting trip in January, but added on a new-to-us trail. I don't think I've ever hiked 11 miles before yesterday.

Some of the trails were in rough shape from all the rain, and there were a lot of fallen rocks:

We saw an animal moving in the grass in the distance and at first thought it was a coyote but then it sat down and moved its front paw in a cat-like way, we noticed the dark tips on the ears, and realized it was a bobcat!

zoomed and cropped

Waterfalls, thanks to Saturday's rain.  Appropriately named "Waterfall Trail."

The dudes climbed up along the left. I waited at the bottom.

There was a lot of up hill

Surveying the land

Top of Los Pinetos Trail:

View of the Santa Clarita Valley including the doom-cloud over our house

This view was pretty nice, but Ben felt we should continue to the summit.

Ben at the top

I only made it as far as the 'X' before freaking out about all the snake holes I had passed on the way up and was currently standing in the middle of.  It was around 3300' elevation and the view was nice enough from there.  Ben made it up to about 3400 feet.

Self portrait from the X.  Don't look down.

The ground was squishy and it was tough walking up that vertical...coming down was kind of more like a controlled fall.  

Dan was a trooper and came back down with me after he made it to the tree.  He sort of talked me into quitting the uphill climb, so maybe he just wanted an excuse ;)

After we came down, we walked back around that little peak and found another short trail that gave us views in the other direction.

To the south toward Burbank and LA

 What else... Total Distance: 11.12 miles.  Elevation Gain: 2,278 ft.  Elevation map here:

 

The End.

How was your weekend?

Souvenirs from VT

Just a couple things we brought back from Vermont...

1. Real maple syrup;
2. the closest thing to my lifelong goal of seeing a real live moose-- two moose mugs (seriously, no moose sightings in four visits to Vermont since 2002?);
3. and hubs appears to have come back to NJ with the flu! :-/


I stopped at the store on the way home from work to get him some things and happened across yet another new addition to the Greek yogurt section... Dannon!  5.3 ounces for $.99 at my local Wegmans.  Reader Becky C had mentioned recently that Dannon had their own version. See my recent profession of love for Greek Yogurt here.

I picked up a plain and a vanilla, both fat free - those were the only two varieties available.  Looking forward to trying them out!

The last thing I brought back from Vermont with me was sore calves!  My calves have been feeling a little stiff since I woke up Monday morning (morning after day 2 of skiing).  Not sure if it was from standing around in the lift lines, or using my muscles differently, or my ski boots fitting snugly around my jumbo calves, but regardless- yikes!  Yesterday and today I felt like an old man walking around.


The Old Man Shuffle: That's what I shall refer to my 3.79 mile easy run tonight.  I went slow, my goal was to just move.  I tried to stretch my calves throughout the day, and debated whether or not to do my easy run tonight.  Needing to stop at the grocery store on my way home from work delayed my plans to run while it was still light out.

It didn't help that I wanted to watch "Watson" on Jeopardy at 7pm.  I ended up going for my run after Jeopardy ended; it was still 32F out.  I wasn't sure if I'd make it the full 4 miles my training plan called for, but thought I should move anyway to loosen up my thunder-calves.  While I felt stiff at first (hence, Old Man Shuffle), I eventually warmed up along the way and my legs do feel better now.

I'm hoping my legs feel even better tomorrow, we've got some great warm weather coming to NJ in the next couple days and I can't wait to run outside in it!  If not, maybe it will be an excuse to use my Massage Envy gift certificate from Christmas...(Wait, why do I need an excuse? I don't know why I haven't used it yet).

65 on Friday!? I may have to rework which day is my rest day this week.  How can I not run on Friday??

Good Skiing at Killington!

Two weekends ago, hubs and I made last minute plans to go skiing for a long weekend.  We were looking at taking a day trip to the Poconos (2 hours away) for a day of skiing. 

After further consideration… I haven’t touched any of my personal days at work this year yet, and have no plans to use any of them, so we could afford to take more time off.  Our friends were able to watch Molly Waffles for us.  We were able to find discounted hotel rooms and two day lift tickets very discounted through Killington’s “Snow Blind” deals – and we own our own equipment --  which brought the cost of a lift ticket down to…not much more than a Poconos lift ticket (but for much better skiing!). So we made the decision to go to Killington, VT.

Friday we made the ~5.5 hour drive from NJ to VT.  We checked in to our hotel and found a nearby pizza place for dinner.  We ordered some garlic knots, a buffalo chicken salad, and a spinach & tomato stromboli to split. (I don’t have food pics, I was pretty much always more engrossed with eating my food before I’d remember to take a picture).

Saturday we got up around 7 for breakfast in our hotel, packed our lunches, got ready and headed out to the mountain.  We were able to start skiing before 9am.

Visibility wasn’t good at the top of the mountain at first for seeing all the mountains in the distance, but that’s ok because it was snowing!

Later it cleared up some:

Riding up one of the lifts:

We stayed til about 3:30, stopping after a great run and before our legs were too sore so we still had something left for the next day.

Saturday night we got dinner at an Irish Pub, where there was live music.  I got an Irish Reuben and a Guinness, it hit the spot!  We stayed for a while after dinner to listen to the music for a while until we were afraid of falling asleep in the dark, warm pub.

Sunday was more skiing!  We got to the mountain around 9ish.  This was our beautiful view from the top!

The mountain wasn’t very crowded yet (or we found a not so crowded trail, anyway).

Check out all that fresh snow under my skis! (While on a lift).

Late morning we stopped at the Waffle Cabin:

and picked up one of these suckers:

and a cup of coffee to share.

Toward the end of the day there was more snow and high winds at the top of the mountain.  This is what visibility was like:

It was so windy the wind actually pushed me after I had stepped into my skis, before we were ready to ski down.  I couldn’t see too far in front of me. Luckily that stopped a little bit down from the top and we were able to enjoy the rest of the run.

We stuck it out until about 3:15 ish (lifts were only open until 4) considering how much we had skied over the previous two days.  My legs were starting to get a little tired, and it’s better stop than to keep going on tired legs and risk getting hurt on a black diamond.

It was great being able to ski on real fresh snow (I’m used to scraping down a smaller mountain on a sheet of ice), and also more tiring!  I was proud of being able to ski single black diamond trails at Killington! Hubby even chose to tackle a couple double black diamonds.  I did not have the balls.  Maybe 5 years ago when I was skiing regularly (as in, weekly), but I’m out of practice now.  Getting to ski 3 days this winter is a pretty big deal!

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I think my running and spinning have definitely helped keep my legs in shape, but it’s hard to simulate the muscles you use in skiing through other workouts (in my opinion).

While trying to find a graphic explaining ski trail difficulty, I found this funny picture that any other skiers out there might find funny:

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Sunday night we were going to order take out, pick up some beer and eat dinner at our hotel, but on our way to pick up the food – the gas light came on in our car; the gas stations between us and the restaurant were closed (at 7pm!?) and the place where we were going to get beer was farther away than we were comfortable driving with the gas light on, on a cold night. 

When we went to the restaurant to pick up the food, they had a really nice looking bar area, so we just ate there (pulled pork and beef brisket sandwiches – hey, we ate light during the day and skied for several hours, I think we earned our unhealthy dinners! :)

We each tried a local beer (Long Trail and Switchback) with our dinner.  We went back to the hotel where I watched the Grammys, and I didn’t make it very long past that. 

This morning we made the drive back to NJ, stopping for some maple syrup on our way out of town.  We got back home and picked up the dog from our friends’ before rush hour, so we encountered no traffic!  Overall it was a great weekend!  It was nice to try out a new place for skiing.  And tomorrow, it’s back to work…but at least it’s only a 4 day week.

Ski Preparations and a Pace Run

The previously mentioned friend's big 3-0 birthday celebration did not pan out for tonight.

So I thought I might be able to go to boot camp!  But I had to stop at the grocery store after work to pick up some necessities for our weekend trip:

Just a couple things.  

• Like a loaf of wheat bread
• some fluff
• some PB (already had that)
• apples
• bananas
• dried apricots
• dried mangoes
• Cheez-Its
• Kashi TLC Dark Chocolate and Cherry granola bars 
• Delicious car food like Peanut M&Ms, Swedish Fish, and Sour Patch Kids
• And a 6 pack of Saranac's Adirondack Trail Mix

We like to bring our own lunch for skiing, it's a lot cheaper than buying food at the ski lodge.  The PB and Fluff sandwiches While Skiing tradition began on my husband's and my first big ski trip together to Stowe during freshman year of college.  Somehow it has stuck.  Since breakfast is on the hotel, and lunch/snacks will be cheap, we'll go out for dinner.

I didn't get back from the store in time to make it to boot camp.  But it's probably a good thing, because tonight was going to focus on legs and maybe I don't want to over do it a day and a half before I ski.

This delightful package was waiting for me at home though!

It's my next pair of running shoes!  And a Camelbak insulated water bottle with a hand strap.  More on that later though (after this weekend, probably). 

After I ripped open my package like a Christmas present, I did get in a 3 mile pace run.  Outside.  It was 7pm, so... dark, and 23F.  I wore my headlamp, I was on ice-patrol.

Warm Up: .75 miles @ 11:00 pace.  Half of which was up the big hill behind my apartment.

Tempo:  Goal was 10:23-10:42 pace.  

Based on my goal half marathon time of 2:16-2:20 (I'd love for it to be closer to 2:16 or even less!)

Mile 1: 10:10!

Mile 2: 10:20

Mile 3: 10:23

Cool Down: .55 miles @ 11:37 pace (last .10 was walking).

Total: 4.31 miles in 45:38.  

Average pace: 10:36.

Apparently I had lots of energy despite last night's spinning and tempo run.  I was afraid I wasn't going to be able to maintain the pace for 3 miles since it was outside, and outside is still icy.  I was amazed at my first mile, I actually was closer to 10:00 at the beginning and had to slow it down.  I assume it defeats the purpose of the pace run if I run it too fast.  (Unless my training goes super awesome and I think I can up my pace more than I thought??? It might be too early to make that determination).

So I slowed it down some more for miles 2 and 3, to be closer to the pace I should have been running.  Mile 3 I was more like 10:15ish until I hit a seriously uncleared section of sidewalk that had become packed snow/ice with lots of uneven footprints in it and had to slow down so I didn't break my ankle.  Then since the ice section had brought my pace for that mile down to around 10:30ish, I REALLY sped up for the last .10 of the mile to make up for it.

I was pretty pleased with myself!  I was happy to easily hit the low end of my goal range. 

I came home to find the pup had un-made the bed for us.

Tomorrow, I'm off to Killington, VT to ski!  Where I will wear my special helmet.

(Stowe, VT - 12/31/09)

I'll try to at least post a couple pictures on here or through twitter over the weekend.  Otherwise, I'll be back to the blog after the weekend!

Wind and Social Events are Interfering with my Running.

Monday night I went to spinning.  I wore my running shoes and was prepared to run afterward, but the more I thought about it - because of my 8.87 mi long run Sunday, I thought I shouldn't push it by running last night too (in addition to my hour of spinning).

I did come home to do 100 crunches, 100 oblique crunches, a 90 second plank, then some things with 5lb weights: 25 hay balers and 25 "tick tocks" (or so they were called at the abs class I took over the summer).

Plan B:

After making the decision not to run Monday night, my plan was to run Tuesday afternoon, after work but before meeting up with friends from dinner (rescheduled from two weeks ago due to an impending ice storm).  However this afternoon, it sounded like my office was going to get sucked up into a tornado.  I checked the weather only to find a Wind Advisory.

Winds: Sustained North West Winds Generally at 20 to 30 MPH.  Wind gusts up to around 40 to 50 MPH.

Ok, running was out for the night. I can run into the 20s (F), and maybe the teens,  but I don't do gusts of 40-50 mph. 

Just for fun, here's a picture of a snow man our neighbors made last week, and to break up the text of this post.  The warm temps over the weekend destroyed him though.

My plans for the rest of this week were to get in a 35 minute tempo run (switching this week's and last week's speed workouts), and a 3 mile pace run that I never got in last week (because I instead did an easy run with hubs on Friday night). 

Thursday night is looking like potential plans to go out for a friend's big 3-0 after work. I can't turn into the crazy running girl who declines social events to run.

Plan C:

I'm thinking Wednesday I will bring my gym stuff to work with me, and go straight from work to gym in the afternoon. I should have plenty of time to do my 35 minute tempo run, then go to spinning.

I should be able to get in a nice 3 mile pace run before we head off for skiing Friday morning.  After declaring my love of last weekend's warm weather, it looks like this upcoming weekend I'll be giving up this:

 

for this:

But it will be so worth it for this:

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 :)