Category Archives: run

2012 Training Log – Week 24

A rough start to this one, then I rallied and ended up with a good week. The time number is heavily skewed by all of the hiking on the weekend, but it all counts as far as I’m concerned. Some good time on the feet and at high altitude.

Monday
11 miles

Felt great during the first 3 miles, and was already composing my training log entry in my head. Something along the lines of – wow, 3 days off and back in action feeling great.

Then the wheels started to wobble before coming off completely at mile 7. I had to stop several times. I was badly overheated and had gone for the all-you-can-eat special at the buffet of suck. What a miserable run. Record heat and forest fire smoke made it like running in an oven while sucking on piece of charcoal.

These guys were waiting to pick at my carcass.

Tuesday
10 miles

Another cr@p sandwich on the menu today. This run was so bad it’s almost funny. I stopped about 100 times, then ended up walking the last mile. My calves actually felt good for once, but I had big-time foot issues. Seriously thinking about hanging up the running shoes and switching back to cycling for a while.

A sign of better things to come –

Wednesday
10 miles

After the terrible past two runs I’ve had most people would take that as a sign to back off, rest, wait for some sort of recovery to take place. Not me. I knew good run was in there, I just had to dig deep enough to find it. It helped immensely that today was about 20 degrees cooler than the previous two.

I decided to hit some intervals for the first time in months. .5 mile, .5 mile, 1 mile, .5 mile, .5 mile.

The first two .5 were 6:15 and 6:12 pace and felt under control. The mile was gradually uphill and I did it in 6:22 without pushing too hard, which told me my previous efforts on the .5’s were soft. I did the last two .5’s at 5:54 and 5:48 pace. I was doing 5-6 of these in the 5:40’s last fall, so I still have a ways to go, but I’m extremely happy to have a decent run and get some quality work done.

Thursday
10.5 miles

Steady 9 @ 7:45 pace on a hilly route. 1.5 cooldown. Happy with how this went after yesterday’s harder efforts.

Friday
7.6 miles

Easy recovery day.

Saturday
13 miles

Malcolm and I had a good day in the mountains. 5 x 14er summits. Topped out on Sherman at 1:00 in the morning, bivied under the stars near the trailhead, then up at 6:45 to hit the DeCaLiBron loop.

2012 Training Log – Week 23

Jun 19

Posted by chrisboyack

As my uncle once told me, “Life is what happens when you had other plans.”

I’m glad to have this week behind me. The running was not so great and then my daughter got very ill and ended up in the hospital for a few days. Thankfully, she is doing better now and got to come home yesterday. I withdrew from the Black Hills 100 miler I was going to run this weekend, I need to stay a little closer to home after all that has gone on lately.

Monday
9.5 miles

Tough-ish run. Still dealing with Saturday’s calf carnage. Had to stop 3-4x and let them settle down.

Also did a fast walk in the evening.

Went up to the state park last night and saw another bear. Two for two in the last week.

Tuesday
7.7 miles

Same route as yesterday. Rough for the first 4 miles, then the calves finally started to relent. Finished up feeling almost optimistic about things.

Did an evening walk with the camera on the east side of Chatfield. A different kind of ‘training’.

Wednesday
6.5 miles

Easy run at the Boneyard. Felt like crap.

Went for another hike in the state park. No bears this time.

Thursday
5.2 miles

Boneyard again. Rolling a little stronger today. Had to cut this one short to meet my wife and daughter at the ER.

Friday
0 miles

Hospital

Saturday
0 miles

Hospital

Sunday
0 miles

It was a Happy Father’s Day, we got to bring our daughter home from the hospital.

My teenage son posted this – guess I am doing a few things right:

Happy Father’s Day to the best dad in the entire world, Chris Boyack! Thanks for all the hard work that you have done and continue to do in order to make our family a happy one. We have done so many (choose one) incredible/fun/hard/maybe a little stupid/memorable things that I will never forget. I know I don’t say it nearly as much as I need to, but Dad, I’m really glad that you are my Dad.

Total: 29 miles / 4:37

Posted in run, training

5 Comments

2012 Training Log – Week 22

Jun 10

Posted by chrisboyack

Decent week. Another 70 miles with a few harder efforts and a bit more time on the trails than I am usually able to get. Feeling strong, but need to work out a few kinks that are holding me back.

Monday
8.2 miles

Boneyard workout. Laps are 1.2 miles. I did one easy, one hard, one easy, one hard, one easy. First hard effort was way too hot. Blew up at .93 and threw in the towel while on a 6:20 average pace. Ran steady on the second effort and completed my fastest lap there at a 6:55 average. Tough little course to run fast on (tight, twisty, lumpy, chunky, bumpy, hilly).

Tuesday
16 miles

Crazy wind in the afternoon, so I headed to Deer Creek Open Space thinking it would be somewhat sheltered and it was. Got in almost 3 hours of slow but steady climbing and descending on the trails. So-so run, I was 3 minutes off my best ascent time to the top of Red Mesa. During the climb, I passed a group of 4 guys hiking. Immediately afterwards the trail looped around a stand of scrub oak so I was out of sight (but not that far away). One of the hikers said, “Did you see that guy’s calves?? Daaaaamn!” That made me laugh because I was drenched in sweat and feeling fat and slow with calves that were about to explode.

On the drive home I went past a bad rollover accident on C-470. The Flight for Life helicopter was just lifting off when I got there. The sunset was beautiful, but the carnage below was a good reminder of how fast things can go bad.

Wednesday
7 miles

I felt more worked over than normal after last night’s run at Deer Creek, so I expected today to be a sucky grind. It actually turned out to be a pleasant outing on a beautiful morning. The calves felt better than they have in quite a while, and the pace (while not very fast) was decent and consistent the whole way. Nice run.

Got some pics of a balloon launch over Chatfield on the way to work.

Thursday
11.25 miles

2 mile warmup, 6 mile hilly tempo medium effort (157 avg) @ 7:29 pace, 3 mile cool down. Felt better than I thought I would, but not as good as I would like (common theme lately).

Went for an evening drive up to Roxborough State Park.

Can you spot the bear??

My ladies were glad to see me return from taking bear pictures still in one piece.

Friday
7.7 miles

Very easy laps at the Boneyard.

Saturday
21 miles

Decided at about 9pm last night to go up to Pine Valley Ranch and get in on the group training run being put on by the North Fork 50 RDs. There was a good turnout with around 25 people showing up.

We started at 8am and did the last 20 miles of the 50 mile course. It was a hot one, hitting 88 degrees by the time we finished. I had all kinds of drama with my calves getting so tight by 2 miles into it that both feet went entirely numb from the ankles down. I plodded through the discomfort, topping out on the first climb in about 7th place. Once the grade eased and we started hitting some descents, the calves relaxed a little and I started feeling really good. I passed all but one guy on the downhill (the guy in front had hit it pretty hard right from the start and was way out in front). We had to keep stopping and pulling off the trail for horses and riders coming in the opposite direction – there was some sort of equestrian event going on. Everyone was very cool about it, though.

Our little pack consolidated after the singletrack descent and rolled together on the dirt road into the aid station at mile 11. We caught the early leader just as we pulled in. I guess I’m making this sound like a race – it wasn’t, but it sort of felt somewhere between a training run and a race. Good practice, anyway.

I left the aid station first and headed up the final 1,000′ climb. It wasn’t that steep, but it was exposed and starting to get quite warm. One guy passed me and went on to run well to the finish. The early leader passed me also, but I passed him back just before the top and managed to come in as the second finisher for what that is worth (not much).

I was having excruciating foot pain during the final climb. I think maybe from the lack of circulation earlier? I was moaning in pain as I shuffled along – not fun. It wasn’t really impact related. Going up a smooth but shallow 1-2% grade was the worst. It seemed like my calves were stretching the plantar fascia to the limit and the balls of my feet were on fire. Once I hit the downhill, things got a little better.

The run was a mixed bag. My fitness seemed decent, but I keep having way too many mechanical issues.

Spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out with my daughter and counting butterflies while my wife went on a hike.