NW Trip--Part 1 (with Mom)

Saturday 7/13

We left Boulder and headed north for Sheridan, WY. Stopped in Douglas and walked along the North Platte River. Big rodeo in Sheridan the night we were there. Didn't go to see it, but saw everyone decked out in cowboy/cowgirl gear. Really nice downtown. Excursion to Montana after dinner. Sat in the hotel parking lot and ate Ben & Jerry's :-) (I did an awesome bike ride/run on a road that led up to Montana Sunday am.)

Sunday 7/14

Left Sheridan for Shelby, MT. Stopped outside of Billings at the Battlefield of Little Bighorn. Took scenic roads to Great Falls. Stopped in Great Falls and walked along the Missouri River before arriving in the very small town of Shelby. Found an awesome little restaurant down the road with burgers and steak.

Monday 7/15

Left Shelby and headed toward Glacier NP. Awesome windy, Mom says scary, open range road to park entrance. Drove Going-to-the-Sun Road. Very, very scenic--especially the crystal clear lakes and streams. Saw 2 mountain goats and left the park before all the big tour buses arrived. Visited White Fish, Montana ski resort town. Huckleberries everywhere! Drove more scenic roads into Idaho. Stayed in log cabin room next to highway in Sand Point. (I rode into town of Dover where I saw an osprey). Devoured huckleberry cobbler for dessert!

Tuesday 7/16

Headed south for Coeur D'Alene. Very impressed by the clean city, pristine lake, and scenic forests. We walked on the world's largest floating dock and then hiked around Tubbs Hill. Downtown was very cute, especially the beach where the Ironman starts. Searched for Mom's 1965 Girl Scout Round-up and learned we had passed the state park already. Next time... Continued south through Idaho and then cut west on unending scenic roads to Washington. Arrived in the wine country that is Walla Walla. Very cute downtown surrounded by dry, yellow, barren hills with the occasional vineyard. (I ran in the morning in Sand Point and swam at the Walla, Walla YMCA in the evening.) Dinner was at the Olive.

Wednesday 7/17

High tailed it out of Walla Walla for greener pastures....or should I say whiter mountains? :-) Drove through Yakima to Rainier National Park. Awestruck by the ginormousness of Rainier. It was huge and had lots and lots of glaciers on all flanks. Scouted out many waterfalls and hiked up part of the Skyline Trail to get a closer look. Sad to leave the park...but carried on to cute, historical town of Elber. Got fresh picked cherries and world famous northwest capuccino. Landed in Puyallup at fancy Best Western. Dinner along the Puget Sound in Tacoma followed drinks at the outdoor lounge area with fire feature.

Thursday 7/18

After a quick run in the parking lot, we headed west for the Pacific and Olympic National Park. The beach was huge and you could drive your car on it. Crazy! Saw giant trees, rainforests, and rocky shores. Very, very cool. Stopped to walk in Quinalt and also Port Angeles. Stopped for the night in Sequim, home of the Lavender Festival. Dinner included lavender-raspberry-white chocolate ice cream which was nasty. Tasted like soap. Lavender was pretty, though.

Friday 7/19

Finished the tour of the Olympic Peninsula through the cutest little town of Port Gamble. Looked like it was straight out of a movie. Took a ferry right into downtown Seattle. Walked (and ate) through Pike Place Market. The berries, flowers, fish, and everything else were incredible. Saw the "original" Starbucks and then walked around the Pioneer District. Saw the Space Needle and headed up to Everett. Replaced a tire on my bike and headed to Lake Stevens to check things out and go for a quick ride. Dinner was homemade salad in our hotel kitchenette.

Saturday 7/20

Walked around the waterfront in Mukilteo and then went to Lake Stevens for the official check-in. Got the lay of the land and previewed half of the bike course before picking up Dan at Sea-Tac. Brought him to Pike Place Market for late lunch (and lots of berries!). Early night for the big race in the morning.

Sunday 7/21

Race Day! I made Dan and Mom get up at 4:30 so we could leave by 5. Drove to Lake Stevens and got ready to race. I was the first wave of age-group swimmers--6:38am start time. Race day was cloudy and cool and the water was warm. I had an awesome swim (35:43), a very hilly bike ride (I swear we just climbing miles 30-50 with no downhill!) and a decent run (lots of awesome energy on the course). Finished around 1:00 and Mom and Dan had chocolate milk for me. Yum! AFter a dip in the hot tub back at the hotel, we had dinner in Mukilteo by the water.

Monday 7/22

All three of us went on the Boeing factory tour and then we dropped Mom off at the airport.

Triathlon Training Week 18

Swimming: 7000m (4.3 miles)
Biking: 125.8 miles
Running: 19 miles
Climbing: once at gym

Calf is still touchy, but runnable. Big event is next week. Yikes!

Triathlon Training Week 17

Swimming: 7400 yards (4.2 miles)
Biking: 105 miles
Running: 18 miles (woo hoo! 8 of these miles was up and down Mount Audubon!)
Hiking: 4 miles + a couple of good walks around the neighborhood
Climbing: once inside, once outside

Calf is good! Not perfect, but good! Feeling strong and excited the race is TWO weeks away. Getting tired of always running, biking, and swimming so it was good to mix it up with a lot of trail running and climbing this week. Great to get in the mountains!

Triathlon Training Week 16

It's getting closer....my race, that is. Three more weeks. Yikes!

Swim: 7080 yards (4.02 miles)
Bike: 166 miles
Run: 11 miles running! + 60 min on the elliptical (total equivalent of 17 miles)
Hiking: 3.5 hours
Climbing: once a gym

My calf is definitely getting stronger, which is very exciting. My 5-mile run today felt really good.

Triathlon Training Week 15

Swim: 7500m (4.6 miles)
Bike: 126 miles
Run: 10.5 miles
Climb: once inside, once outside
Hiking: 5 miles (approx.)

Today was my warm-up Olympic Tri. I PRed by a lot! It's hard to make a direct comparison because the bike course was almost 2 miles shorter than last year due to construction on Diagonal Highway. However, even if I account for the additional mileage, I still PRed by 7 minutes. Woo hoo!

Triathlon Training Week 14

Swim: 6600 meters (4.1 miles)
Bike: 201.1 miles (3000' climbing)
Run: 2.7 miles (yay!)
Elliptical: 3:50 (23 miles equivalent)
Hiking: easy 2.5 miles

FINALLY, I can run again...a little bit. Three runs this week...1/2 mile, 1 mile, and 1.2 this morning. This is really great news, especially since I'm supposed to be racing next weekend. Also, this week's bike rides are my all time record. Woo hoo! It was fun to get some climbing in there, too, up in Dillon/Frisco/Breckenridge. I definitely want to go back and ride more stuff up there. Got to swim in the Rez for the first time this season, too. All in all, an awesome week.

Five weeks to go...

Triathlon Training Week 13

Swim: 7100 yards (4 miles)
Bike: 148 miles
Run (Elliptical): 260 minutes (4:20 hours/equivalent of 26 miles)

Finally my calf is starting to feel better. Did a couple of walks the last few days and so far so good. I hope by the end of the week I'll be able to run a little bit. Fingers crossed!

Oh, and I climbed once at the gym and once outside at Catslab in Clear Creek Canyon.

Triathlon Training Week 12

Swim: 6350 yards (3.6 miles)
Bike: 127.6 miles
Run (Elliptical): 18 miles (180 minutes total)

Well, my calf is still not great. Went to the PT and she said it was a muscle strain or tear. I need to stay off it for another week (biking, swimming, and elliptical are fine), and then hopefully I can at least start walking or hiking. Fingers crossed!

Triathlon Training Week 11

Swimming: 5100 yards (2.9 miles)
Biking: 169 miles (I think this is a new weekly record!!!)
Running: 4 miles

Well, I'm definitely feeling much healthier this week. However, on my first run my calf got all knotted up to the point where I could barely jog home. Decided to stay off of it and have an appointment with my PT next week. I hope my trying to be smart this week ensures a quick recovery.

Triathlon Training Week 10

Swim: 1875 yards (1.06 miles)
Bike: 27 miles
Run: 7 miles

Just Tuesday and Wednesday....then I got Dan's death disease. Cold, fever, nasty sore throat couched me for four days! Yuck!

Triathlon Training Week 9

Swim: 7800 yards (4.4 miles)
Bike: 128 miles
Run: 20.7 miles

Triathlon Training Week 8

Swim: 5300 yards (3 miles)
Bike: 111.7 miles
Run: 22.5 miles
Hike: 3.4 miles
Elevation Gain overall: 4750'
Climb: 7 climbs @ gym

Triathlon Training Week 7

Swim: 4700 yards
Bike: 117.1 miles
Run: 21.8 miles

Triathlon Training Week 6

Bike-63.9 miles
swim-4300 yards
Run-18 miles
Climb-2 times at the gym

Week 5 Triathlon Training

This was the first week that I followed Coach Russ' plan. For the most part, it matched up with what I had been doing distance wise, but he included many more intervals and a LONG bike ride on Sunday. He also has his own strength training program that kicked my butt this week and took over an hour to do both times.

Swim: 4200 yds (2.4 miles)
Bike: 100.3 miles
Run: 10.8 miles
Climb: 1.5 hours at the gym

Triathlon Training Week 3

This has been a big week. It certainly helped that I didn't have to work and the weather was really nice. It's also comforting that I was able to almost triple the swim and bike race distances this week (typical tri guidelines are to triple the mileage of each discipline during a week of training once you get closer to the race). It's also great that I have a lot of friends (and my hubby!) that I can ride and hike with. I rode bikes with five different people this week and hiked/snowshoed with three. If I'm actually going to do the half Ironman, I'm going to need a lot of training buddies! Next week I get to cut back as it will be the fourth week (build for three, cut back the fourth).

Swim: 5200 yds (2.95 miles)
Bike: 133 miles
Run: 9 miles
Hike/snowshoe: 11 miles (1800' vertical)

Half Ironman Training Week 2

Swim: 3350 yds (1.9 miles)
Bike: 35 miles (very cold and snowy week--much of this was indoors. Yuck!)
Run: 11 miles
Ski: 20,000 vertical feet

Half Ironman Training

Well, I know we haven't posted anything in 6 months (I WILL get the Hawai'i stuff up some day), but it was really motivating for me last year to post training mileage totals as I prepared for my Olympic distance triathlon. Now that I've officially begun my 70.3 training (1.2 swim, 56 bike, 13.1 run), I'd like to try to do the same thing. So here goes...

Week of March 11th:
swim: 3250 yards (1.85 miles)
bike: 90 miles
run: 7 miles
hike: 3 miles

Triathlon!

Today I competed in the Boulder Peak Triathlon. It was a weird, wet, humid day but the skies cleared enough for us not to be rained on during the race. This course was harder than the one I did last year, as the cycling portion went up over Olde Stage road (900' over 2 miles; steepest section was 600' in 2/3 of a mile or 15% grade).

I finished in 3:07:06---9:30 faster than last year, despite the much more challenging bike ride. I'm very happy, but very tired :-)

Triathlon Training

Last week of tough training done! Now it's time to taper. Woo hoo!

Bike: 78 miles
Run: 17 miles
Swim: 2.2 miles
Hike: 7.5 miles
Climb: 3:00
YAYOG week 4 complete!