8/12, Tuesday - Creek Path, 5 miles, 200' , 0:46
Work is done now so I slept in. I realized I hadn't slept in for maybe a month with getting up early to go to the mountains. It was nice. After lounging about a bit I went out for a super relaxed jog around Eben G. and back through the gorgeous CU campus, actually really excited for school to start.
8/13, Wednesday - Grays (14,270') & Torreys (14,267'), 11 miles, 4,200', 3:45
Up Kelso Ridge, down the standard route. Went up with my friend Katie who has only been at altitude for a few days, but is a super talented runner as well as athlete in general. I was just glad there weren't many flats for her to burn me on! Our timing unfortunately made us run up & down the 4WD road from where I like to park as no cars even drove past for us to ask for a ride. Its okay though, we made pretty good time. As things got higher up and more technical, finally I was able to represent myself with dignity by exhibiting fluid scrambling along the ridge. Hardly stayed on either summit at all, and enjoyed the long downhill. Now I know if I run with Katie: I will lose on flats and moderate uphills; I will destroy on class 3 and "kamikaze style" downhill running. Also, next time I'd like to try and tag Kelso Mountain instead of dealing with the 4WD road - it shortcuts all the road (distance wise, not vertically) and gets you another summit; what could be better!
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| Katie starting the crux moves up to the "Knife Edge". The standard/descent route is clearly visible. |
8/13, Thursday - Creek Path, 5 miles, 300', 0:44
Finally seemed to have figured out the lacing on my huaraches. Anyways pretty relaxed outing except for one progression 6:50 mile that I had to work way too hard for - tired legs.8/14, Friday - Longs Peak (14,259'), 15 miles, 5,100', 4:59
Originally hoping Andrea would join me, but he feels completely non-acclimated to altitude after being here only a few days; he's obsessed with finally conquering Longs though, so I fully expect to get back up in a few days. Ended up taking the Keyhole route despite having interest in trying the Loft - I'll do an up the Loft down the Keyhole route with Andrea. Took the ascent fairly casual, only ran probably 30% and made the summit in 3:03, I hung around a little bit and was going to descend the Loft with a guy who had done it before, but he was going to spend like 35 minutes on the summit - I didn't feel like waiting that long so I just went down the Keyhole again. For some reason I arbitrarily decided I would break 5 hours, which is somewhat insignificant as its not overly fast and I hadn't even cared about time until about halfway back down the Trough, so the effort was all going to come from the final third. Anyways, I hustled back down and had to actually put serious effort into the run back down, running the last half mile in 3min, which is insane on trails - for me. Honestly though, 5 hours is a touch soft for me on this route, considering I spent ~10 minutes on the summit, ~20 minutes talking to people and didn't put forth any serious effort on the approach. Also I'm probably not super fresh with this being my 7th ranked peak in the last week. I think a better goal would be breaking 4:15 or even 4, still I was for some reason super stoked upon finishing barely under my "goal" time.
Not quite sure what to take for distance, as I've mapped it twice now with one registering 17 and one 15, which is a pretty big margin of error. More reason to go up again!
Not quite sure what to take for distance, as I've mapped it twice now with one registering 17 and one 15, which is a pretty big margin of error. More reason to go up again!
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| It was cloudy and misty going up but the top opened up above the clouds. |
8/15, Saturday - Mt. Massive Hike (14,421'), 14 miles, 4,700', 6:45
Spending the weekend at my buddy's mountain house with some other guys (Matt & Andy). Super relaxed hike up. This was my first summit in the Sawatch and I can easily see how it is so popular amongst runners - steep & runnable (kind of). Andy faded pretty bad on the summit and nearly fell asleep but regained his composure after getting a few hundred feet lower.
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| Summit of Massive looking Northwest |
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| Flexing my "Massive" muscles for Mt. Massive |
8/16, Sunday - Mt. Elbert Hike (14,433'), 9 miles, 4,500'
Again with the same guys, easy hike up the tallest mountain in Colorado - though highly non-technical. One of the guys surprised everyone when he pulled out a pumpkin pie on the summit to share. So that was awesome. Convinced Matt to run back down with me. Josh Arthur passed us heading up while we were jogging down, and nearly caught us before we were done. I'll be back to Elbert for an honest effort sometime - hopefully this year. Its a beautiful trail. Went in my Luna huaraches today and yesterday and loved it.
Week Totals:
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| Summit of Elbert looking Northwest to Mt. Massive. Neat clouds and shadows. |
Miles: 59
Vert:: 19,110
Time: 22:17
A proper week with nearly all of the substance coming from 14ers. I'm satisfied.
Sweet runs. Way to bomb down the final third on Friday. Even better was no serious to catches.
ReplyDeleteMan you have to update me more than once a week, get on the ball lol.
You haven't updated in while yourself though.....!
DeleteOh man I know, much needed break from blogging. I'm getting many more hours sleep lately lol
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