HIGH Altitude Training

What a GREAT Weekend! The US Pro Cycling Challenge was finishing up it's tour of Colorado this weekend and it provided some great opportunities to get out and do something out of the ordinary! Stage 5 of the race was from Steamboat to Breckenridge and lots of people I knew were going to try to make it up there to watch the finish on Saturday afternoon. I had gotten in an easy 8.5 miles on Friday and had made plans to go up there on Saturday morning to knock out my long run before heading into town for the race. As luck would have it though, my friend and former Riptide teammate, Pete Mallett was in town and was actually staying out in Boulder on Friday with another former teammate, Tate Behning. In addition, one of my good friends from Wisconsin, Jake Rhyner, had put me in touch with his former roommate, and new Colorado resident, Craig Schmidt. All 4 of us had it in mind to get in a long run that morning followed by the race finish in Breck that afternoon so we decided to meet up there and knock it out. We really didn't know what we were getting ourselves into though. The run was much hillier than expected and actually turned out to be at about 1,000ft higher elevation than I had expected! Here is a profile of the run:

Craig had added on an easy 2 miles before the group started, while Pete & Tate turned around a little early, finishing out somewhere around 11-12 miles. Craig and I ran 14.5 miles together and averaged about 7:16 pace throughout. Considering how bad I felt on my Thurs/Fri runs, I'm super happy with how it went. A big part of it was probably the fact that I hadn't run with anyone on a run since starting this training 4 weeks ago, so the time flew by. Well, that, and the fact that we all knew that we had an awesome day of Mexican food, beers and cycling waiting for us after the run.
So, while the guys headed back to the city later that afternoon, Becky and I had rented a condo in Breck for the night and stayed up there. In the morning I was able to get in another (short) hilly run before heading back to the city to catch the end of the tour.
All-in-all it was a great weekend and rounded out my 4th solid week of training. This coming week will be a little different as I shift things around so that I can be a little more rested for next Monday's 'Park-to-Park 10 Miler'.