Following A Loose Plan

Today:
Run 16 miles

Yesterday:
Bike Commute 3 miles

A friend of mine who spends way too much time reading this boring blog told me that I don't write enough about my training anymore so this post is for her:

I've been feeling good on most of my runs or rides. I'm not really pushing the intensity or the mileage much at all right now. I'm just going out for runs when I feel like it and biking when I feel like riding. And on the days when I just can't deal with the weather I go to the gym and lift some weights. It's actually rained 23 days straight right now so that's been a little tough. I kind of like running in the rain but not biking so much. I would actually prefer to be riding a bit more than I am right now but I just can't find enough dry weather to get out on my bike much more than 5 or 6 hours a week.

My next race is still so far away that I'm really not trying to get too specific with my training. My general plan is to increase my hours of training about one hour per week such that I'm putting in about 16 hours by the end of October, 20 hours by the end of November, 24 by the end of December, and then peak at about 25 in early January before beginning to ease back slowly by mid January. As the weather turns to winter I'll replace most of my biking time with cross country skiing and much of my running will become very slow on snow packed trails, dragging my sled to get used to the type/pace of travel I'll be doing in The Iditarod Trail Invitational.

I'm also throwing the idea around in my head of biking the Susitna 100 which is one week before the ITI but that would involve taking an extra full week off from work (I would probably stay up there between the two races rather than flying back and forth to Juneau) and the two races combined would cost almost $1,000 just in entry fees! Throw in the travel expenses and missed work and I'd be looking at nearly $3,000 to do two races. Yuck.

Anyway, that's were my training is at now and where I see it taking me in the next several months. Is that better Nykole?

Totals for the past week: Run 41 miles; Bike 69 miles; in 13 hours and 45 minutes time.