S2S Training: Week 3 of 14

Week 3 goals:

• Long run of 20 miles OR split runs 15 & 8 miles, with 4,500ft elevation
• 10k Hill workout: 10km Hill Strength. 1.5-mile easy warm-up. 3.2 miles of continuous hilly terrain (or 5 x 3-minute hard uphill bounds with a slow jog recovery down). 1.5-mile easy cool-down.
• Wednesday 50-60 min Zone 2 trail
• Friday 4-5 miles easy

I already know I won't get my long run mileage or vert because I'm going on a girls' trip this weekend... will have to front-load some miles as much as possible, but leaving on Thursday morning super early will make that difficult. Gonna be a great trip though!

Monday

60 min Power Vinyasa - hot yoga @ Soul Yoga

Holy crap this class was so incredibly difficult! I was nervous because I had not signed up for a "power" class in so long, but the class time worked the best for my schedule so I went for it. Boy was it a level up from the regular Vinyasa classes I'd been doing! The class was centered around working on this pose which I'd never even heard of :

😵

Still I felt good that I got through it! (and no I did not successfully do that pose lol)

Tuesday

6.5 mi @ 9:19/mi

Mentally did NOT want to do this run. I should have run early morning but haven't been sleeping well and opted for a later alarm. Then meetings ran over and I couldn't get out at lunch so I had to run at the end of the day... and it was raining. Thankfully storms moved through fairly quickly and got out at the last minute to do this hill workout. Followed the recommended structure: 1.5 mi warmup, 5x 3min hill climb effort, 1.5 mi cooldown. I picked out a hill near work campus that I remembered being a decent steady climb from the days I used to ride my bike there. It wasn't super steep but it lasted just long enough to get the 3 minutes done (especially after the first rep when I slowed down). 

Maybe 70 feet or so per climb?

Finished the run and scooted back to campus just in time before they close the gates at 6pm and made it home to pick up the pup from doggy daycare. WHEW.

Wednesday

40 min singletrack EZ

Had a small window of time during the morning and headed out to the SCRA trails only to find them closed (likely due to the rain we've had lately) so after some quick thinking pivoted to Riverbend Equestrian Park nearby. I hadn't been to these trails since before Helene so wasn't sure what shape the trails would be in, but was pleasantly surprised to find them pretty clear! Not as many criss-cross options as there used to be, but the main perimeter and mid-line trail were clear enough to do a few loops. Cut the time a bit short since it was lost in the SCRA detour to start, but happy with what we were able to accomplish with little notice - hooray adaptability and not giving up when things don't go right!

Thursday

vacation wanderings

No significant mileage, just a long drive then a few meanders to see overlooks and such!

New River Gorge NP!

Friday

9.5 mi hike

We arranged a point-to-point hike on the Kaymoor Mine Trail and it was fabulous! 

Sunday

3 mi / 2-hr SUP

The weather cooperated for us to get out on stand-up paddleboards at Summersville Lake!

Week end thoughts:

Knew this one wouldn't be great on the training plan... but had fabulous time over the weekend regardless!

⛔Long run of 20 miles OR split runs 15 & 8 miles, with 4,500ft elevation - nope

✅10k Hill workout - yes!

🟨Wednesday 50-60 min Zone 2 trail - a little short, but close!

⛔Friday 4-5 miles easy - also nope

Really gotta hit the mileage hard this coming weekend if I'm going to feel confident in meeting goals.

S2S Training: Week 2 of 14

 This week's goals:

• Long run of 15 miles OR split runs 12 & 6 miles, with 3,000ft elevation
• 10k Hill workout: 10km Hill Strength. 1.5-mile easy warm-up. 3.2 miles of continuous hilly terrain (or 5 x 3-minute hard uphill bounds with a slow jog recovery down). 1.5-mile easy cool-down.
• Wednesday 50-60 min Zone 2 trail
• Friday 4-5 miles easy

Monday

Rest

Well, I mowed the yard but that was it.

Tuesday

6.28 mi @ 9:28/mi avg

Holy hills, Batman! I tried out a new route from my house and omg the hills. Almost 750 ft climbing in a 10k. 

Of course I also went out at the absolute hottest part of the day (gross). Yuck but wow. Didn't do the structured workout but I'd say this counts as hill training!

At least there was a nice view

Wednesday

47 min trail run (3.5 miles)

Didn't cover as much distance today during the Wednesday night trail miles, but both Ivy and I were tired! 

Sweet new GUTS trail socks

Always time for a pond dip

Thursday

rest!

Friday

4.7 mi @ 9:37/mi

Plan had 4-5 miles easy, Garmin suggested 45 mins base... so there you have it. Got out on the XC trails and did some random assortment of sections of the 5k but in the "wrong" direction just to keep things interesting. Legs were kinda still from Tuesday and knew I had a big day coming Saturday so tried to keep things easy!

Saturday

11.25 mi w/ 2,900 ft climbing

With some time constraints, I decided on the "split plan" option for the weekend long runs. Target was ~12ish miles and a lotta vert on the trails at Table Rock State Park. Up Pinnacle Mountain Trail, across on Ridge Trail, up to Governor's Rock, then back down Table Rock trail, finishing with a loop around the lake. The climb up Pinnacle is slightly more gentle than the climb up Table Rock, but I'd forgotten how overgrown that trail was... lord, I needed a machete! It would have been more runnable if there had not been such dense overgrowth. That was more mentally exhausting than anything.

Bald Knob for a quick break!

Snack once I got to Bald Knob, then proceeded up the rest of Pinnacle (still overgrown). Did not go all the way to the summit because again the trail looked super dense, so I continued on Ridge and finally got to run!

Made it across and up to Governor's Rock for another quick break before heading down the many many stairs all the way down the Table Rock descent. 

By the time I got to the Lakeside loop I was actually feeling pretty amazing and enjoyed the last couple of miles!

At the end there was a park interpreter who had one of their resident King snakes from the visitors center (which is closed for renovations) so I got to hold him! So cool 🐍

What a great day on trails!!

Sunday

6.4 mi @ 12:41/mi 

Much easier miles today on the trails at SCRA, but still managed almost 1000ft of climbing with all of the little rollers! Took Ivy with me and she did AMAZING on her longest run ever... she's such a great trail pup! We ran out and back on the Bob Ross Parkway all the way to the Saluda River. On the way back, however, we got caught in an absolute downpour and wow was that exciting. I mean completely drenched, but she just kept trucking. I didn't get any pics of us afterwards because we were just trying to get into the car and not soak everything (mostly unsuccessfully) but boy that was a fun run!

Turtle friend!

Snake friend!

Week Summary Thoughts

✅ Long Run Split - 12 & 6, with 3000 ft elevation - Maybe not quite there on mileage but I think the total of nearly 4,000 ft of vert gives the extra credit needed!

✅ Tuesday Hill work - again, not the plan but enough hills to count this as complete!

🟨 Wednesday 50-60 min Z2 - a little short on this one

✅ Friday 4-5 easy - yes!

Total of 32 miles run, 25+ of them on trail - yeah!! 💪

Feeling really good about this week and the training so far, but I know the weekends coming up are going to be busy and with school starting, all the routines are getting flipped on their heads. Going to be tough to keep up with the miles and especially the long runs needed, but gotta just do the best I can. 

S2S Training: Week 1 of 14

Time to actually train for something!

I'm signed up for the Sky to Summit 50k in October and looking forward to putting in trail miles and vert to prepare for it. Last time I ran was in 2021 where I honestly felt like I crushed it... did tons of training, weekly Altamont runs, and placed 5th overall female. I am not coming into this training with as strong or as fast of a base, but we'll see what my Google Gemini-generated training plan can do... (sorry to the actual running coaches out there... )

I know my September weekends are going to be really busy and therefore not allow a lot of time for long runs, so I asked Gemini to front-load my training plan in August and also utilize my weeknight trail access (during D's NICA practice) to maximize my trail miles. I also asked it to give me weekend long run options - either single day long run or split days long run. I think it did pretty well and this allows maximum flexibility in my training while building around known weekly obligations (like 10k Tuesday). 

So the structure is 

August = rapid build to peak

September = maintain & strengthen

October = final push & taper

For this week:

I'll be at Trail Camp this weekend, so anticipating some decent trail mileage.

Monday

2 mi pup run @ 12min/mi

Morning slow run in Cleveland Park after camp drop-off. Legs were pretty dead from the Reaper 50k on Saturday!

2 mi trail pup run

Two loops of the 1-mile "Every Second" trail at Lakeside during D's NICA practice.

Tuesday

6.36 mi XC run @ 9:14/mi

Double loop on the work XC course at lunch. Pretty speedy for this course and it was still quite hot! Legs coming back to life.

Wednesday

1.4 mi pup walk

Met up with Robin and Ru for a pup & coffee walk from Swamp Rabbit Grocery. Lovely morning!

4.24 mi @ 13:42/mi trail run

Goal was 50-60 minutes of easy Zone 2 running, and with a hot tired pup in tow, that was pretty easy to accomplish. 😅 Really loving these evenings at SCRA (aka "Yo Mama's House") while D has NICA practice.

The trail names here are the best

Thursday

rest!

Friday

4 mi trail run

Group run on day 1 at Trail Camp! Took a loop from camp to the Joyce Kilmer loop in the rain. Moist fun in the woods!

Trail campers!

Saturday

13.7 mi w/ 3,500ft elevation gain

This was a rough start to a run give the *ahem* Trail Camp shenanigans on the river the previous afternoon. It's also rude that the worst climbing is right at the beginning - you start out with a huge stair climb from the highway. The trail ascends almost 2,000 ft in less than 6 miles, then bombs down the other side to the Nantahala Outdoor Center losing the 2,000 ft you had gained minus another 1,300ft in the last 8 miles. All that being said, it was an amazing run through the forest and there's such a sense of accomplishment doing a long point-to-point run like this! The rain at the beginning kept things cool, gave the forest a quiet creepy mist, and made the sunshine at the river at the end more enjoyable.

Sunday

rest

Week Training Summary:

✅Long run of ~12 miles with 2,000ft elevation - slight over-achievement, but goal met!

🟨10k Hill workout - not a hill workout, but did the 10k

✅Wednesday 50-60 min Zone 2 trail - done

✅Friday 4-5 miles easy - done

Just over 32 miles for the week, but they were all trail miles!