Thursday 5/27

RUNNING

So far, a great week.

Monday - Easy 6 miles

Tuesday - Steady 7 miles

Wednesday - 7 miles after sitting around and eating a bunch of veggies = uhg.

Today summer school started and I'm blessed to be teaching 2 summer school classes. SDSU is also about an 8 minute drive to Mission Trails Park, home to a nice network of hilly trails and little peaks to climb and take-in the view of San Diego county.

So I brought my gear to school and drove to the base of Mt. Cowles right after school, before I picked-up Jack. I have not been climbing too much, instead opting for flatter, steadier efforts to maintain consistency and build endurance. That program has been going great, but I'm itching to get into some steadier climbing and building that part of my fitness, too. Cowles, from the trail head I frequent, is just 3 miles round trip with about 1300ft. of elevation gain. Some sections are very steep of man-made steps or large and small rock. This adds to the work-load of going up and combined with the scores of hikers make a few feet of Cowles un-runnable.

I ran to the top in 20:30 going very easy and having to hike these short sections I described. I came down in 10:15, again, going very easy and having to stop, walk to go around hikers or avoid the potential fall on some of the very steep, rocky parts. Unfortunately, I only had time for one trip. And it is clear to me that I need to do at least 2 trips for the kind of work-out that I want to do. If I'm there, I may as well get some work done!

In other words, I hardly broke a sweat. This is definitely a good sign. A daily double would be nice and looks to be less than an hour's worth of work. The view was incredible as Lake Murray and the Pacific were a rich blue and there was definitely some weather to the north and east. Much to look at before I headed back down.

One observation was the bunches of wild daisies that are starting to wither away. These little buggers pollenate the air like little pods of kryptonite. This helps one like me who has to tolerate the spring air. This has been a tough year. Even so, I've been getting stronger and today's run was effortless.

So, despite that I only did 3 miles today (needed to do child-pick-up and have kindergarten open house tonight!), I felt great being out on the trail climbing. This will be a staple the next month and half while school is in session. That's called two birds with one stone!

Shooting for 50-60 this week. I'll be heading-out of town on Saturday and may see some trail in two drastically different climates. Let's hope!

The best part of all of this is it's time to climb. Even my equipment will suggest this since I'm looking into purchasing a new watch that simplifies the whole program: Climb.

The Garmin is toast. It was a good run, pun intended. But the more I think about it, the more I don't really need pace, or distance (although that's nice!). Time for some vertical + mapmyrun.


RECOVERY

Not much on that end. I had a few Simpler Times and loved every one.

And I uncorked my Duvel.