August 24 - August 30

8/24, Monday - AM: Campus Loop - 4 miles, 0:32, 200' - PM: 4th Flatiron + Green Mtn - 5 miles, 2600', 1:30
Easy loop around campus in the morning. Instead of the usual Green, Logan showed me his weird route up the 4th that puts you in this leg-splits chimney on the 3rd piece. It looks freaky at first (especially when you're me and have little experience with chimneys), but when you step in its pretty easy and secure. We made a quick tag of Green and just missed catching back up to the group with my extensive knowledge of shortcuts.

8/25, Tuesday - Flagstaff Intervals - 12 miles, 1600', 1:36
Good hard workout with Guy, 6 x 3min with 1min rest up the road; just trying to get faster! Longest true run in a while had me feeling my calves a lot on the way home, but everything else seemed to be in good shape for this foreign movement.

8/26, Wednesday - Tomato Rock, T-Zero, The Slot, Juniper Crack - 4 miles, 1000', 2:00
My legs felt pretty tired today so I today a recovery triathlon of biking, run-hiking and climbing. I started off with Tomato Rock, a peculiar sphere of boulder tucked away in the trees. I found some finger pockets on the south side that I felt really comfortable. I went up and down it a few times to memorize the sequence. Next was T-Zero which felt ridiculously easy on the second round. Next was The Slot which is an off-width 5.6 chimney. It took a little bit for me to figure out each sequence, specifically entering and exiting the chimney. Last I ascended the entirety of the First Pinnacle via the East Bench dihedral, then stepped across onto the south face and traversed into the 5.6 Juniper Crack. This was one felt way easier than the slot, but was much more exposed.

The Slot chimney.

8/27, Thursday - Marshall Mesa - 15 miles, 900', 1:53
This run ended up being very fun, despite me not being too excited for it as it is long and generally flat. Jack and I woke up early and started off at a good clip for the first miles. At about 4 miles in we saw a rattlesnake! It was lurking in the grass and I would not have seen it had it not been pointed out to me. I'd never seen one before but I was ever vigilant for the remainder of the run. At about 6 miles I began feeling pretty good and rolled on a downhill and kept an up tempo pace for the remainder of the loop with Jack coming in a few minutes after me. This was cool because I never beat Jack on something pure running, but since he has taken so much time off from his ankle woes he wasn't in prime fitness. Average pace was 7:27, so I think that was PR half-marathon (1:38) for me; I'll take it. Stiff calves walking around campus again today.

8/28, Friday - Off

8/29, Longs Peak Triathlon - Bike: 84 miles, 8500', 6:09 (Part 1 | Part 2) - Run/Climb: 12 miles, 5300', 5:11
I am so happy to finish this! I had wanted to do it last year, but I also wanted it to count as a triathlon of biking, running and climbing so I had postponed until I learned a technical route (though the true triathlon is climbing the - gulp - Diamond). Today I chose Kieners which meant I would non-chalantly be riding my bike out of Boulder with an ice-axe at 3:30AM. The ride passed peacefully though not without effort in the dark. I find I feel neither past nor future in the dark, its like it doesn't even happen. Of course that changes when you hop off the bike and you have to waddle your sore cycling bum up a snowfield. The ice was worse than last week to the point where I don't think I'll take the route again until May or June. Upper Kieners dragged on a while especially when I tried skirting around a roped party to the South and ended up looking up a (later confirmed) pitch of 5.7 in the Notch, I had to downclimb back to the roped party then go around. I was hearing rockfall all over the Diamond and Loft (Bill Wright abandoned climbing the face entirely, it was apparently so bad!); thankfully there was only one other party on Kieners and they were moving slow enough that I doubt they could generate the momentum to move a rock. The summit was a mob, but I needed a short break so I chatted a bit.Cables was surprisingly dry-ish so I dispatched it with ease then jogged the trail in.. I was completely sure that the ride home would be the hardest part, and it didn't disappoint. There are several rolling hills to surmount before descending South St Vrain, and then the innumerable hills back to Boulder are always quite soul-crushing. I ran out of water and calories about 17 miles from home, and I had already been over-rationing the few I had brought. Times for this are measured from the "gentlemen's club" on the edge of town since it has the final traffic light before open road, so I suffered through the mounds then after passing my checkpoint bought a Dr. Pepper at the first gas station I could find, chugged it and finished off the last 5 miles feeling a lot better.

A long way from home and only a waterbottle of Tailwind left!

8/30, Sunday - Bike - 16 miles, 500', 1:21
Met mama for a ride around before ending at her place for some breakfast!

Week Totals:
54 miles running /  119 miles biking
12,700' running / 11,900' biking
14:07 running / 7:49 biking

So many activities! Road running, trail running, hiking, bouldering, rock climbing, snow climbing and road biking. These are the weeks I should work towards, I had good quality throughout the week, took rest days very easy and put in a good long effort on the weekend. That's what will work best with classes too.