keystone

Keystone – 2.36 – 30:22.  9200 feet.  220 pounds (uh – imagine me groaning under the strain.)  It was a beautiful sunny morning in Keystone and after two weeks of no running (and lots of eating) I got my ass out on the road.  There’s nothing inspiring about a 30 minute run, other than I got out there and did it.

Keystone Lodge Spa – 2.7m – 30 mins.  Amy and I had massages at the Keystone Lodge Spa today.  I got a 30 minute treadmill run in before the massage.  It was something like minus 6 outside so I had no desire to suffer in the cold.  The treadmill was fine – the Keystone Lodge workout room is average, but at least it has three treadmills.  I was running next to a woman that was really cooking – she was doing 7 minute miles on the treadmill, which is quite a feat, especially at 9000 feet.  I can’t say I’m delighted with my running

Keystone – 1:01:00 – 4.72m.  Some bad sushi last night delayed my run until the afternoon (note to self – don’t keep eating wasabi tobiko if it doesn’t taste good.)  By the time I hit the road at 3pm, it was snowing.  I spent the first 30 minutes trying to figure out what acronym to make out of snow + hills + altitude and finally gave up and decided it was “Snail Hell” - which was close enough.  9200 feet, endless hills on an out and back course which means the down hills are the up hills and the up hills are the down hills (uh huh)

Keystone – 44:30 – 3.43.  El Tubo (also known as Lard Ass, fka “me”) felt a lot better today.  It was still a slow run – it being 9200” high up here and hilly.  The satanic cold that has decided I would be its host for a while is finally leaving my body.  However, “the enemy” (also known as “the scale”) told me that I weighed 219 today.  The last time I checked (two weeks ago) I was 215.  I guess that holiday chocolate has found its way directly to my ass.  Time to start eating half of my meals.

Keystone – 0:27:21 – 2.02.  I went for a short run today to try to shake the rest of the crud out of my chest. I took my dog Kenai which was an error because there were too many cars on the road up here.  After about 10 minutes of start / stop / Kenai come, I went off road with him onto the golf course that’s covered with two feet of snow.  It was too deep to run, so I just tromped through it with him for five minutes or so until we came to a plowed part that connected back to the main road.  I forgot to bring my HR chest strap, but I c

Keystone – 3.63 – 50:18.  The sky was blue, there was ice on the road, the temperature was 20 degrees, the altitude was 9200 feet, and I felt like crap.  If you’ve been following at home, you noticed that I didn’t run this week.  Even night, when I crawled into bed, I had pain in my sinuses (that magic spot between your eyes when it feels like you have tiny ball bearings rolling around in your head.)  I finally felt better yesterday but decided to take one more day off.  Last night, when I went to bed, I felt fine.

I had low expectations for today’s run and it delivered.  The combination of no running, being low energy anyway, cold recovery, and the altitude helped the run live down to its expectations.  I turned around after about 2 miles and ran into Amy within three minutes.  We had started at the same time and she was walking the route!  We walked together for a quarter of a mile and then I started up again.  At least I got my ass out there.

Keystone – 5.33 – 1:06. Friday is my rest day.  I love Friday’s.  I took Friday off.  I felt tired and sluggish on Saturday and ended up punting my Saturday run, figuring that I’d do a three hour run on Sunday.  I didn’t sleep well at all last night (probably woke up 30 times, which is highly unusual for me.)  When I finally got up Sunday, I still felt tired.  The “oh shit – I have cancer” thought went through my mind.  I rolled over, slept until 11, got up, had a cup of coffee, and went for a run.  I didn&

Keystone - 5.00 - 1:00. It's Thanksgiving - always a good day for a run to get a nice calorie deficit going early in the day before the 5000 calorie pigout / football / food coma experience that always happens in the afternoon. I did what is becoming my standard Keystone 1 hour loop - from my house to the horse stables and back.

Today I tried out my Nike+iPod gizmo that I bought a month ago but haven't managed to take out of the box. I put on The Fountainhead (which I'm quickly mowing through), my new Nike+ shoes, and my Nano with the + adapter. It was trivial to set up and it worked great the first half of the run. I ran with my Garmin 305 also - not surprisingly the time was the same for both but the distance was off (the Nike+ was about 10% further which - while good for my ego - was probably wrong.)

Keystone - 7.09 - 1:30. Today was a much easier run then yesterday even though I went 30 minutes longer and 2 miles further. I took it easy and kept my heart rate in the 150's. My speed was obviously slower (about :45 / mile slower) but the time passed quickly. I did the same core out and back from my house - so it was very hilly - but I detoured through Elk Creek and then up to the Nordic Center and around the another suburb to get the extra 30 minutes in. The sun went behind the mountain at about an hour and the temperature immediately dropped 10 degrees, but Howard Roark and Dominique Francon kept me company. As I was finishing up around 4pm, I noticed a bunch of cars heading up laden with ski gear and realized it was the day before Thanksgiving and Keystone was finally starting to fill up.