First OWS of Season + Evergreen Killer Hills

3 day weekends are great. Monday is Bolder Boulder, a 10k race in Boulder with 50,000 of my closest friends. I knew I would want at least one rest day before the race, but I also wanted to get in some training! Enter…3 day weekend. Today I had a great training, and the weather is phenomenal to boot!

Let’s back up to recap yesterday first though. I guess I feel like being super detailed today!!!

Friday 

E470 Bike Ride

I brought my bike on the light rail again but was getting a little sick of the Cherry Creek loop, plus the roads have lots of cracks and my wrists really take a beating after just one loop. I looked at google maps and the bicycling feature, as well as local mapmybike routes for ideas. I decided I wanted to head down and check out the e470 trail. This trail hugs the highway (e470) traveling east-west.

Route 

I went down to the gym around 11ish, changed, and then realized I forgot my bike keys at my desk. I threw my work clothes over my biking gear and ran up to get them. I need to try and remember them! I’d say I finally got on the bike around 11:30.

Elevation

 It was 4 miles south on a 2 lane sort of busy road to the start of the trail. There were a lot of up and down hills and I got a good sweat going. Once I reached the trail I rode 3.5 miles west towards the mountains. It was a perfect day and a bit hot actually. The e470 trail is paved and very well maintained. The only negative factor is that instead of exactly following the highway and going under bridges…the bike trail separates and goes up to the crossing road so you have to wait at lights. The roads are 1-3 miles apart so it isn’t like a city but not optimal!

Nice path

I turned around at 7.5 miles and headed back. Once I got back to the main road I seemed to hit every light! It was a bit frustrating, but I was outside enjoying the day during work – so I wasn’t that upset J

Mountains!

All in all it was a 15 mile ride, 950 ft of gain, and about 66 minutes (4:33 min/mile pace & 13.2 mph)

Unfortunately, it was a nicer day that I thought and got this awesome sports tan….

 

Currently sitting outside trying to reverse this...

Saturday

Open Water Swim - Grant Ranch

In the back of my head this week I had been thinking it’d be great to get over to Grant Ranch and do my first open water swim of the season! I wasn’t sure if that would happen…but yesterday I signed up for my 5 pack and decided it could definitely work!

Grant Ranch is in Littleton, and only about 20 minutes from my house. Mile High Multisport (a local tri club) has worked up a deal with Grant Ranch. OWSwimmers are allowed on weekends 7-9:30 and a few mornings and after work. It is a great facility, the lake is great, and there are kayakers out there for safety as well.

I got up at 6:30, ran to get coffee and made oats before I headed out. I left the house around 7:30. As I got closer, in my head I wasn’t nervous, but I must have been subconsciously. I could feel my nerves coming. I got my wet suit on and headed to the water. 

Beautiful morning!

When I got in I was immediately short of breath. I took a swim clinic last summer and one of the most helpful things I learned to get used to the water was to buoy up and down in the water. When you are under water, breathe heavily out and force out water and then come up breathe in and keep repeating. I did this over and over until my nerves settled down a bit. It is such a strange feeling not being able to see anything under water! Even though I love swimming, and always have, it is something very strange. I guess it is like riding a bike! I just thought it wouldn’t be as hard since I did it a lot last season!

The course has two options, ½ mile around 3 buoys or  you can swim 1 mile by continuing past the 2^nd buoy and making the triangle bigger. I planned to do the ½ mile route – this was my first OWS of the season, no need to rush things! 

I headed out and got the crawl going pretty well. SO different from my first experience. I breathe every three strokes, and I was doing one breast stroke about every eight or ten breathes so I could see where I was going. The first leg was definitely the hardest. Thoughts in my included, “why am I doing this to myself?” Then I would answer, “because it is so fun and you are lucky!”

After the first buoy, the second leg was shorter and went well. Once I rounded the final buoy I kicked it in to high gear and I was really flying! It was great. Someone passed me at one point on the first length, and it was a little less scary when there was someone else out there. But then again, when there are hundreds of other triathletes at a race, that’s a whole different story.

I didn’t have a watch on, but I think it took about 25-30 minutes. Great success!

Happy!

Evergreen Bike - Stagecoach and Bear Creek

Next, I headed to Evergreen for my bike ride! I had decided I wanted some hills and decided doing the tri route from last summer would be a great option. There are some KILLER hills.

Max Elevation 8,050

I got to the parking lot by 9:30, got out my bike, only to realize I had forgotten my helmet L I immediately called AA for reinforcement to the idea that I shouldn’t ride and I could just ride near the house, even though that was 45 minutes away and I already drove all the way to Evergreen! Then I thought maybe I could just buy one…AA knew the exact location of a place about 5 miles away! I headed over, to Bicycle Outfitters, and as I was explaining I just wanted to cheap helmet since I forgot mine (was looking to be $40) the guy said I could just borrow one! It was so nice of them, I was so happy! I headed back and after the 45 min detour…was ready to ride!

I absolutely love Evergreen, it is definitely my favorite town in Colorado that I have seen. I just wish it wasn’t so far from work because I’d love to live there! The ride starts off by going by Evergreen Lake and then continues back in the hills and more gorgeous terrain. The first five miles are a steady incline and definitely had me breathing hard.  I missed the turn at mile 5. I realized about 1.25 miles later that it didn’t look right. I pulled over, and another bike stopped a minute later and nicely directed me the right way. We chatted about how lucky we were and beautiful the scenery was. So very lucky J

Appropriately named Evergreen

I turned around and got back to the turn-off at 7.5 miles. The killer hills start here for the next 3 miles. I was so winded, it was such a good burn, but I pushed through. One of my miles was over 9 minutes, that should indicate how steep it was J The last 3 miles you lose about 700 feet of elevation so it is pretty fun! I was back to the car by 11:30 and ready to head home.

Downhill!

Overall it was a 14.4 mile ride, took 68 minutes with an average pace of 4:44 min/min (12.7 mph).

A great day in Colorado, for sure. I came home and AA had been cleaning all morning – the house looked great! We celebrated with Park Burger.

Testing Clipless Pedals

New shoes!

Pre-fall...

We also got the tools to put on my clipless pedals! Up until now I’d been using just cages and sneakers. I tested it out a few times in the alley, no problem! One last turn and I was ready to go inside…I wasn’t moving and trying to turn, and I completely fell over. I had some scratches to prove it J

My ouch

It was a great week for training – almost 4,000m for swimming and over 40 miles over biking! If I include the race on Monday….13 miles of running!

Bergen Peak Hike and Weekly Recap

The past week of workouts went pretty well!

Monday: AM swim – 1250 meters

Tuesday: Ran 3 miles on Treadmill but felt really slow

Wednesday: Spin for 45 min + Yoga

Thursday: AM swim – 1000meter + Boston run à Jen kept up the pace, so it felt good to go a bit faster

Friday: 30 min spin + 10 min Ellip

Sat: 5.5 mi run – this was two parts plus 6 mi bike ride to REI

Part #1 was a loop around Wash Park but then saw a dog on the loose and that took over! Second part was the last 2.75 miles and showed my friend Pete around the neighborhood

Sunday: 9 mi hike – Bergen Peak – SLUSHY

Monday: REST – was thinking I’d get up for a swim but I was beat…I’ll make it up tomorrow!

Totals: Run - 13 miles, Swim - 2250 meters, Bike - 23 miles, Other - Yoga & Ellip

Other highlights from the week:

• Salads for dinner! Made 3 great salads last week for dinner

Strawberries, Feta, Grilled Chicken, Spinach Salad + Lite Raspberry Vinaigrette

•  More snow for Denver

and it is snowing again...I'd say April snowiest so far!

• Saturday day out in Denver!

One of the great bike paths in Denver - biking to REI

Nuggets playoff game! We won!

Bergen Peak Hike!

Sunday was a great day to be out! Kelsey and I had been planning on doing South Boulder Peak, but after some research this week, the peak was closed due to fire last year and the other peak, Bear Peak, was icy and heavily covered in snow. So, instead, we decided to do Bergen Peak in Evergreen which AA and I did a few months ago. It was 8.8 miles RT and 2,023 ft gain. My friend Pete from college was visiting so he joined as well as the 3 pups! AA had rock training elsewhere in Evergreen for Alpine :-)

Route up Bergen!

We met at the Dino lots at 10 AM and quickly made it to the TH and easily found a spot. We parked off Stagecoach where the dog park is. I know it can be crowded, but we didn’t have any problems. One big debate was whether or not to bring snow shoes, we didn’t, but it was helpful to have yak traks.

Below is the elevation profile. For 4.4 miles to the top, it is steep in some parts, and just seems long in others! We were all dragging a little bit and stopped at a little over 2 miles for a snack. I had a banana and it was nice to sit down. Pete came from sea level so he wanted a little breather, although he was doing great! The trail to this point wasn’t awful, packed snow, and what not. But the next 2+ miles to the top was slushy, slushy, slushy! The trail had some nice overlooks and was very pretty. Time to the top was 2 hours 20 minutes. Note: once you think you are at the top you have to go an additional 1/10^th a mile over the radio tower to get to the sign!

Elevation Profile

We ate lunch QUICK and scurried down because we had dinner plans. The way down was way worse, a lot of the packed snow from earlier had melted and it was super wet and slushy. Luckily my boots did great the whole day, very happy with them. We didn’t stop at all and made it down in 1 hour, 50 min – the slush definitely slowed us down as I was worried about twisting my ankle!

The trail was sparse – only saw about a dozen people but I’m sure as the trails dries up it will definitely be more crowded! Great day out in the hills :-)

Ells Bells!

Kels and I!

Dogs of Bergen Peak

PS don’t forget sunscreen :-)

Most elevation on mile 3

Counting down the days

It is crazy I haven’t updated in 2 weeks! Everything has been so crazy!

My training has still been going really well! It would be way too long to update it all…so here are a few highlights! I have gotten in 3 runs per week. This week I only had one swim and 2 the week before. It was also bike to work day this week so my bike miles look larger! 2 bikes this week, and 3 last week!

Weekly totals (week of June 18^th and June 25^th)

Run	10.75	miles
Bike	28	miles
Swim	2050	meters
Other
Run	9.5	miles
Bike	48	miles
Swim	1250	meters
Other	Hiking

Thursday June 21^st

I completed my second stroke and stride! It went WAY better than my first! I finished the swim over 2 minutes faster! And then run I improved my pace by 45 seconds! So overall I shaved almost 5 minutes off my time. I am hoping to go this Thursday again which will be the final time before the tri next weekend.

stroke and stride results

Friday June 22^nd

Tink came to visit! We headed up to Dillon to bike around the lake. It was an awesome day with great views, and she did SO well with the altitude! She was coming straight from sea level J I also threw in some pics from camping (camped at Guanella Pass – awesome!)

Lake Dillon with Tink!

Riding, Riding

Our awesome site - Guanella Pass

Climbing things

Early morning wake up...

Tuesday June 26th 

Kickball – Tattoos and Tutus = Tat-tutu

Tat-tutu day!

 Wednesday June 27th 

Bike to work day! It is 16 miles to work and I took a different route home that was about 13 miles. Here is a pic Aaron took before we took off, it looks like I am going to my first day of school!

Bike 2 work day!

It is a great event that Denver tries to promote biking to work. I read their aim is to get the people that drive 1-3 miles to bike. While my 16 miles is a bit outside the range, it was still fun. They had some breakfast stations along the way to stop for food too!

Saturday June 30^th

Hike Mt Sherman! 14er #5 for me J

We had a great crew – 7 of us. Aaron and myself, our friends Jen and Jason (first 14er),  Kat and Kels and Sally. We were celebrating Kat’s last 14er of the season as she is moving to NYC L Her and Kelsey have done all 9 of the 14er hikes together! I’ve done all 5 of mine with AA and Kels and Kat too.

Anywho – it is located just past Fairplay, so we took 285 there Friday after work (2+ hours). We got to camp around 9 PM and were planning on rising at 3:45 AM (Jason thought it was a joke). After not the best sleep (forgot my sleeping bag) – we were ready to go at the trailhead at 5 AM. We summited at 7 AM. It was probably the easiest 14er I have done, but was still so great. The views were amazing and it was great to do in the early AM. On our way down everyone going up was already sweating bullets. Here are a few pics!

Sherman Route and Elevation

Sun coming up - Jason and Jen

Being Goofy

Group shot - Mt. Sherman!

Cool shot

Kat, Sally and Kels eating bfast!

Someone else came to the top and could take our picture

Heading back down - notice layers gone!

Sunday July 1^st

After napping for 2 hours after the hike, and getting 9+ hours of sleep, AA and I were ready for some more activities on Sunday! We headed to Evergreen in the AM to do the tri bike course again and ‘tri’ out the run!

We finished in about the same time ~1 hour but this time seemed easier and we did not stop at all! The first hard part is once you turn on to county road 475 all the way to Stagecoach.  Once you turn to Stagecoach just remember there is a downhill coming up so push it! The second hard part is right before the crazy downhill – my watch wasn’t working so I don’t have the mileage but it is right after you pass Greystone Rd around mile 7 – it might have been because I told AA the hardest part was over and there was one more climb. After you do this – the downhill to Elk Mountain Open Space is crazy. There is a tiny uphill to get to the entrance but you have a lot of speed so it is not bad!

Next we went over to Evergreen Lakehouse to start our run. It sort of started out in crazy sorts because there were troopers there and as we were walking to the start he pulled up and told us there was an Elk (cow-mom) just over the hill and that she was charging at people because the calf was near by. Of course our running course went right between the Elk and her baby. The trooper drove up and we inched behind him and luckily made it through OK.

The start of the run in UPHILL – it was HARD. After the first .75 miles and 200 ft elevation gain the rest is flat and downhill. Well – minus the staircase you have to run up! We aren’t quite sure, but I think we followed the course – and we ran on the small trail around the lake – so it could get crowded, but it will probably be thinned out by then. Both the biking and running are such a beautiful course. We saw the Elk and baby again as we were finishing. I told AA to go up to take a picture and when we looked down the hill his eyes met with the Elk – needless to say we didn’t get the picture.

AA running on trail at Evergreen Lake

Evergreen Lake

Then we stopped off in Golden and brought sandwiches and sat along the river. There were tons of people just hanging out by the river and lots of people tubing! It has been so hot in Denver and this is one great way to cool down!

Golden River

Tuesday July 3^rd

Brick workout at work (inside)

20 minutes on the cycle bike then 2 mile run on the treadmill.

I think I am still feeling it from the weekend and last week – I was TIRED! It was good to get in the workouts back to back though.

I may bike up to kickball tonight and then I’ll take tomorrow off (maybe just weights).

Unfortunately I DO NOT have tomorrow off for the 4^th of July from work! It is quarter end so my department has to come in. I’ll try not to be jealous of everyone in Wash Park and the BBQ AA is having at the house J Hopefully I will get out early!

So the Tri is quickly approaching. The next 2 weeks I want to keep the same frequency but drop the intensity. Thursday I will do the stroke and stride if I can get out of work. I am in Chicago this weekend for a wedding so I’ll see if I can get in a run. Next week I’ll just do shorter swim/bike/runs to be ready for Sunday! I am getting NERVOUS.