Training for a 200 miler
Divide 200: Week 10: Phase 1
Prescribed mileage: 85/Completed miles: 85.04
Prescribed vert: 5-6k/Completed vert 5,012ft
Another week build, another dump of winter (I think we are on 6th winter lol).
This week was going to be a bit of a crap shoot form the start. A combination of bad weather, Sara taking on the CrossFit Open Quarterfinals and a busy week preparing for our move to our new house left little options for exciting miles, so I put on my big boy pants and accepted my fate of racking up very boring, repetitive road miles. And I did.
The body was coming off of a down week (70 miles) and physically felt great. The combination of a lower mileage week coupled with me cutting my strength days from from 5-6x a week to 3-4 have really let the miles feel great. The graph above is a mother reason why the miles feel so good: I’ve been smart as fuck. I’m not ignorant to the fact that I am a 210-220lb body trying to cover some big miles. I simply could not have jumped from my off season low mileage period and get into 70+ mile weeks right away. I’ve slow built this, +5 miles a week throughout the build, and my body has handled it really well.
Winter has been frustrating as an early fake spring gave me hopes of early alpine access, but Mother Nature slammed that door shut pretty firmly a few weeks ago. But we’re close, and our new house we move into this week has essentially unlimited alpine access out the front door, so the vert I’m missing now I very much will be making up when the snow melts out.
The next two weeks feel bigger. The mileage is only another 5 mile bump, but I’m living at 90 miles each week, with the second having a pretty beefy back to back. This coming week we both move into a new house and spend a few days with the in-laws for Easter, so getting ugly miles in will be the theme of the week. The following, with a bigger back to back effort, I’ll hopefully get into the lower alpine finally and have two big days out as we start to eyeball 100 miles per week and beyond.
Indirectly related to the 200 build, I got to watch my wife throw down in the CrossFit Open Quarterfinals most of the week, and Jesus is it humbling to see. Each day in the gym, there were 6-10 other girls going through their workouts with Sara, and every single one of them is pretty high level/elite, and seeing how that athlete type moves, performs and competes is ridiculously motivating. I don’t do CrossFit, I never have, but I admit it’s one of the more impressive modalities out there. I do look forward to the post 200 miler period where I can spend more time in the gym and get into some WOD’s with her so she can kick my ass around the gym. But, good lord did I marry an absolute savage. Proud of you babe.
Off to enjoy the rest of my recovery day, eat, sleep and get ready for what will probably be a very unfun week from a training perspective, but there is work to be done and it shall be done.
Onward, Always.