Weekly Summary: Dec 6-12

12-06-2010
Mon-AM: 14 miles (2:04) Green Mt., 3000'
Up back and down NE Ridge-1st Flatiron-Skunk Canyon
PM: 9 miles (1:13) Creek Path
Ran easy with Scottie in the dark. Had to be kinda careful with the calf.

12-07-2010
Tue-AM: 14 miles (2:14) Green Mt. 3000'
Up back and down 1st Flatiron with Joe and Scott. Ran down to 13th St to meet them and then ran to the grocery store at the end to pick up a couple of things. Descended the front of Green with a CU Norwegian Nordic skier who was a bit taken aback at our precipitous route.
PM: 8 miles (1:04) Skunk Creek+3mi barefoot at Kitt
Legs felt surprisingly good.

12-08-2010
Wed-AM: 14 miles (2:05) Green Mt. 3500'
Ran with Joe up Gregory-Long Cyn-West Ridge and then down to the 1st Flatiron/Saddle Rock and then half-way back up Flagstaff on Crown Rocks before descending to EGF and running home.  Gloriously beautiful day but my legs felt pretty terrible.
PM: 11 miles (1:38) Green Mt. 2700'
Up front and down Ranger-Flagstaff Rd all in the dark.  Didn't get out until late and then my pace/effort was pretty severely limited by a dying headlamp battery on both the way up and the way down.  As such, I decided to bail onto the road for the remainder of the descent because my light was so weak.

12-09-2010
Thu-AM: 14 miles (2:11) Green Mt. 3000'
Up Gregory-Greenman and down 1st Flatiron to Saddle Rock+1.5mi barefoot at Kitt.  Legs tired from yesterday's double Green.
PM: 8 miles (1:02) Skunk Creek+3mi barefoot at Kitt
Legs felt great slicing through the dark.

12-10-2010
Fri-AM: 14 miles (2:03) Green Mt. 3000'
Up back and down Bear Cyn.  Another beautiful day, if a bit windy.

12-11-2010
Sat-AM: 24 miles (3:51) Green-Bear-Green, 7000'
Got out for a solo lap around Green and Bear feeling good, but on the summit of Bear I decided the inch of fresh snow was going to make Fern too much of a pain, so I ran back to Chat via the West Ridge and Bear Canyon.  However, I was planning on meeting Dave, Geoff and Bob at Chat for another easy lap on Green, so through Bear Canyon and back on Mesa I injected some legitimate pace into my legs for the first time since I strained the calf (in order to make up for the longer route) and it ended up being a really bad idea.  I felt my calf tighten ever so slightly as we stood around in the parking lot and then on the very easy effort up and down Green it only got worse.  By the end of the run I knew I'd really messed it up good again, so I limped back to the house and spent a lot of the rest of the day icing.

12-12-2010
Sun- zippo.  Calf wouldn't allow it.

Total
-Miles: 130
-Hours: 19h 25min
-Vertical: 25,200'

Boulder Summits (2010)
-Green: 289
-Bear: 29
-SoBo: 6
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Well, the story this week is pretty obvious.  I had the calf back to a place where jogging around on it--even up a mountain--was really no issue, but when Saturday rolled around and I inadvertently found myself actually running a decent pace for the first time in a long while, well, my calf protested fairly spectacularly.  It has me pretty bummed, and I'm only a small bit confident that I haven't set it back completely to square one.  All week I guess I'd kind of convinced myself that I was basically healthy, but that was a false confidence on account of the fact that I'd never pushed hard on the calf even the slightest bit all week.

If this doesn't completely rule out the Chubbilooski for me this coming weekend up in Fort Collins, at the very least it means I won't be doing anything but socially jogging around on the Horsetooth terrain.  Certainly nothing even remotely approaching a race-type effort or pace, unfortunately.  At this point I just want to get back to consistent running as quickly and easily as possible.  I'm still kicking myself over the bonehead move of running hard on it for even the shortest of stretches on Saturday.

While I went over 6000 miles on the year some time this week, what I thought to be an exceedingly modest goal at the beginning of the month--300 Green summits on the year--is beginning to look extremely touch-and-go, especially with a trip home to Nebraska planned before the end of the year.