Scout Mountain 100 Training Log Week 17/20

Week 17

Weekly Totals: 66.7 miles and 14,734 feet of Vert

Weekly Reflection: The goal of this week was to hit my peak mileage and 20k of vert all at once. While I did peak in mileage I did give up on my 20K goal after several hours of post-holing and wrecking my knees on Friday. I was expecting to hit higher mileage but obviously cutting my run shorter on Wednesday, taking a rest on Thursday, and having to bail on our Friday plans did not get me where I was hoping. At the end of the day I know listening to my body is more important than getting miles for my ego and also staying injury free is my #1 priority. I think the decisions I made this week are reflective of my growth as a runner and person.

Monday
6 x 5 minutes uphill threshold workout: 7.93 miles and 2,129 feet of vert
Notes: I felt super good during this and completed it on the foothills trail. I ran downhill for about 3 minutes between reps to get back to the bottom. The mantra I used for the workout was “ You can lock in for five minutes”. 6 reps felt like a lot but afterwards I was so happy with it. I ran up to my usual turn around spot and then had a lot of fun letting myself run fast back down to the trailhead. I used to run that downhill as fast as I could pretty regularly but I haven’t in such a long time.

Tuesday
Foothills/ Sypes Loop : 13 miles and 2565 feet of vert
Notes: I had another really good day out on the foothills just vibing. I talked to my friend David on the phone for 20 minutes and then locked into a really fun flowstate. I did pretty decent running the back road stretch.

Wednesday
AM: 4 M Laps alternating direction: 7.57 miles and 3,267 feet of Vert
Notes: I did the first three laps with Mira. I was feeling pretty tired today. My knees were feeling pretty sore after four laps so I called it a day.
PM: Outlaw Brew Run “5k”
Notes: I’ve always wanted to go to one of these local Wednesday night timed 5k events and I finally had a night off work to do so. It was insanely busy. I ran with Mira and felt incredibly slow and sore mostly in the knees. I purposely kept the pace very easy. The crowd was insane.

Thursday
Rest Day
Notes: I took advantage of my optional rest day. My knees were aching and I just felt so tired so I decided to listen to my body.

Friday
Long Run: 23.6 miles and 5,498 feet of vert
Notes: Corine and I were attempting to do the entire foothills trail and like complete fools our plans were quickly ditched when we spent a couple hours crawling through waist deep post holes at 30-40 minutes per mile. I was expecting snow for sure but it was a lot worse than we imagined. Going up North Cottonwood in the spring is delusional and I know it. I make the same mistakes every spring in Montana but I do think they are necessary and I still get a lot out of the heinous experience. Corine and I got to tag Sacajawea peak and connect Johnson Canyon to Corbly Gulch. It was nice to see a new place in the Bridgers (top of Corbly) and get out with a friend that was down for the adventure. It was pretty much an 8 hour struggle bus capped with an hour of nice running on both sides.

Saturday
Long Run #2: 12 miles and 1112 feet of vert
Notes: Yesterday took everything out of me. I threw my vert goals out the window and hit Sourdough/ Bozeman creek trail with Twig. It was Twigs longest run at 12 miles and I felt like I was pushing it a bit by doing that since she had been resting so much from surgery. She did really good but I’m glad we did not go farther. At mile 7 I actually sat down to tape a blister that had really been bothering me. I was using my foot weirdly because of it. I knew I just needed to fix it although it was still painful. My feet were soaking wet and my ankles and knees were wrecked from yesterday. My knees did feel better after this run which was promising.

Sunday
Rest Day
Notes: My ego was tempted to run three more miles to hit 70 miles for the week but I knew resting was more important and those 3 miles wouldn’t do much for me anyways.