Monday:  Food poisoning recovery day.  Not my finest moment.  But by the end of the day, I was feeling mostly better.  There was no way in hell I was running today though.

Tuesday:  Crazy day squeezing in work, hut trip preparations, and a curling match (our first win!).  Yes, I am on a curling team:

Go SPACECATS!

I knew I was going to get some pretty solid workouts in in the upcoming days, so today was just a frantic rush to get everything done before heading out on the hut trip Wednesday morning.  Even then, I didn’t finish packing until about 2am.

Wednesday – Friday: My first hut trip!  My boyfriend and I headed to the outskirts of Breckenridge for a backcountry skiing trip up to Ken’s Cabin.  This was my first hut trip, and I was super excited.  I’ve wanted to do one of these since moving to Colorado.

We got to the trailhead around 2:30 in the afternoon or so, so if we were speedy, we could make it to the hut before dark.  The trail up to the hut is actually a dirt road that’s closed in the winter, so it was super easy to follow, and a really gentle grade.  I felt pretty comfortable skinning up the trail on the AT skis after only a few minutes, which was a pleasant surprise.  Unfortunately, my rental boots (I don’t have my own AT setup yet, so I rented skis and boots for this trip) were pretty much the worst things I’ve ever had on my feet ever – and I’m including my collection of 5 inch heels in that group.  After about a mile or so, I was in so much agony from the pinching of my toes, and the massive blisters I could already feel forming on my pinky toes, that I had to stop every 15(ish) feet to try to wiggle things around, and try not to cry.  By 2 miles in, I sat down on the trail and tore the boots off my feet out of a combination of pain and anger.  My wonderful, sweet boyfriend (he is a saint for dealing with my whining about those boots) fashioned a makeshift sled out of my skis and boots to haul behind me, and I hiked the last snowy and icy 4.5 miles up to the hut on top of the continental divide in my bootie slippers.  I must have been a sight.

I hiked 4.5 miles in these things!

The slippers were sweet relief (and held up amazingly well), but didn’t help much with weight distribution.  The smaller footprint (compared to skis or snowshoes), plus the 40+ pound backpack I was carrying resulted in a lot of postholing up to my knees, and sometimes deeper, as we got closer to the top of the divide.  It was slow going, but eventually, we made it to the hut!  Thank goodness!

The rest of the trip was relaxing and uneventful.  Wonderful company, a roaring fire, delicious food, beautiful scenery, and plenty of UNO and Scrabble made the time fly by, and eventually it was time to pack up and head back to civilization.

Heading back down from the divide

Fortunately, coming back down was easier on my toes than going up.  They still hurt quite a bit, but I looked at this as an adversity training day.  I kept reminding myself that my feet are going to feel a lot worse during Run Rabbit, so I might as well suck it up and deal with a couple little blisters.  Taking those boots off at the car was amazing.

Saturday:  Work make-up day with one of my best friends.  She’s busy working on a senior thesis project, and I needed to make up for my early “weekend” this week.

Sunday:  My first day on Michele’s training plan!  I would have loved to run outside, but as per usual during the Boulder spring, the winds were howling, and I would have gotten blown in every possible direction except the one I was trying to go.  So over to the rec center indoor track it was.  This was a speed day, with pretty short intervals.  I felt surprisingly good, considering how far I have to go still.  I enjoyed people watching on the track, and the intervals went by pretty quickly.  Overall, I knocked out 4.5 miles.  Then it was time to stretch (trying really hard to be good about this this year!) and do my strength workout.

I was really proud of myself for getting this first workout done – and as written!  Looking forward to seeing progress over the next several weeks and months.

What worked well this week:  Taking the leap to work with a coach!  Knowing that I made the conscious decision to work with Michele gives me that little extra fire under my butt to get out and do my workout, even if it’s so much more comfortable to stay on the couch in my sweatpants.  Which, let’s be honest, is awesome.

What didn’t work well this week:  Travel’s always a bitch.  Especially when I have to make up for the lost time at work, so I spend extra hours working instead of getting workouts in.

What I struggled with:  Nothing horrible this week.  Things were pretty crammed before the hut trip, so that could have been better.  But overall, no major problems.

What I will do to improve next week:  Keep on following Michele’s plan!

Total weekly mileage: If I count the 13 miles of cross country skiing/hiking, then 17.5 mi.  Still a low-volume week, but I’m just rebuilding my base right now.  I need to keep remembering that.