When I attempted the Leadville 100 in 2009 I kept up fairly well with my blog and I enjoy looking back and reading those posts. I need to be as diligent with this blog as I am with my training log. Before I can move forward though, I need to catch up. May as well start with January.
The New Year really started out well. Christmas was celebrated with family at my house and we continued the new year's celebrations by heading to my parents house on the central coast. Every day was spent either running or road biking. I sought out hills, hills, and more hills. One day the wind was blowing so strong while on the bike it almost broke me. Almost. Instead, it made me stronger. (I know, what a sappy cliche).
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| The girls enjoying post Christmas holiday lights at Cambria Pines Lodge |
On January 1, early in the morning, I found myself standing on top of Hazard Peak in Montana de Oro state park. It was the kind of run where I didn't want to be anywhere else in the world. I hiked strong uphill, pushed the downhills, and went "wheeeee" through the switchback down hill whoop de whoops. I told myself to remember this exact run, this exact moment, when I cross the finish line of the Leadville 100 run on August 18. This is why I run.
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| Looking at Morro Rock from Hazard peak |
After my run, the first day of January was spent with the family. What better way to celebrate 2013 than by taking the Polar Bear Plunge in Cayucos with thousands of other crazy people. Now Caitlyn loves the water, even really cold water, but we discovered she doesn't like really cold OCEAN water! But she's a gamer and we all made a quick dip into the Pacific.
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| It was a quick dip but it was enough! |
January saw me doing a lot of volume without any intensity, typical for a lot of athletes this time of year. Lots of long bike rides, long runs, and lots of elevation gain. One place where I know I failed in my Leadville preparation in 2009 was I didn't do enough climbing. I'm not going to make that mistake again.
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| On top of "The Wall" on Santa Rosa Creek Rd. |
Due to the weather, I found myself visiting the Cool/Auburn area quite frequently. 4 weekends in a row actually. A couple of solo long runs, a Way Too Cool group training run, and the Robert and Linda Mathis Memorial Run. Some nice photos of the memorial run can be found here, on Gretchen's blog.
I've really enjoyed the consistency of my workouts and the daily juggle of bike rides, runs, work, kids, school, sports, cooking, cleaning, laundry, and being a wife and mother. No moss growing under these feet, no sir. But without all that structure (and good time management skills), I would get lazy. In January I ran 128 miles (15,000 ft) and biked 380 miles (41,600 ft). 5:15 on the stationary bike. Stay tuned for February.
