Rock Repeats

After the last two weekends up in the high country, I spent this past weekend running around our local Fort Collins trails.  Saturday was Horsetooth Rock repeats and Sunday was an easy run on Blue Sky/Indian Summer.  Both days were typical northern Colorado summer days:  95 degrees, an afternoon storm and bull snakes galore (I saw a couple each day):


This guy was very irritated at having to share the trail


I started doing repeats up Horsetooth Rock as a regular part of my training on March 12, 2011.  I remember the date so specifically because that's the date I met Alene Nitzky at the top of the trail.  On that day, I was in the process of completing three repeats (about 13 miles with about 3,300' of gain), which was one more repeat than I was able to complete the previous weekend.  On my third and final trip up, I was tired but not completely exhausted, so I was more than a little satisfied with myself and particularly pleased with the improvement over the prior Saturday.  I reached the top, paused for a drink of water, and that's when I met Alene.

She came running up the hill, stopped to chat with me and within two minutes had completely (and I'm sure unintentionally) changed my entire training paradigm for the LT100.  I told her that I was training for Leadville and that I was running three repeats that day.  Instead of the impressed nod I was expecting, Alene told me that running three repeats was "a great start."

It turns out that Alene is a four-time Leadville veteran, a Badwater (135 miles through Death Valley) finisher, was in the process of training for a Badwater "double" (across the desert and back)(which she's running right now as I type) and is an all-around great person.


Alene on the Rock (in her Badwater garb)

As I stood there basking in my Horsetooth three-peat, Alene matter-of-factly told me that as part of her ultra training, she likes to run eight or more repeats up Horsetooth.  She told me the best recipe for success at the Leadville 100 is to (1) run/power hike up that hill, (2) run back down, (3) repeat until until your quads turn to jelly then (4) repeat some more.  Immediately less impressed with myself, right on the spot I set a training goal of running eight Horsetooth repeats, which I was able to build up to and complete six weeks later on April 23.

Since that day, my training focus shifted to hills.  Mileage was still important, of course, but vertical training became just as important.  For example, prior to March, I was averaging about 6,000' of vertical gain per month.  Since March, I have averaged over 30,000' of gain per month.  Although I keep mentioning vertical "gain" -- the uphill portion of hill work -- I have found that the corresponding downhill is more challenging and offers the far more room for improvement for me.  After all, it's the downhill that turns my quads to jelly, not the uphill. 

So, the overall purpose of these last four months of hill training has been to condition my quads in order to delay for as long as possible their inevitable jellifying.  Because I'm new to this, I don't really know if I'm taking the right approach to achieve this goal, but it feels right.  I guess I'll find out this coming weekend.  On Sunday, I'll be running the Silver Rush 50 up in Leadville as a training race.  I'm sure the distance combined with the multiple climbs up to 12,000' will tell me in unambiguous terms how my training is working.