Two weeks later I've run another cross country race (Conference Championships in Portland), completed eight intensity work outs in ten days, rested, completed numerous quizzes, finished a major project/paper, taken three exams, and VO2 Max tested in the lab. It's been a busy handful of days, but good none the less.
Conference was an experience as I once again attempted to fill the shoes of a runner at college level. The race in Portland was a rainy 5ks through a park. It fit my image of a cross country race to a tee, the trail was covered in leaves, it was a cool 50 degrees cloudy with rain drizzling all around us. The team did alright, I believe the boys finished 5th and the girls 6th...not as well as they had hoped but they've moved forward. I finished 7th on the team which gave me a spot on the regional team to compete in Fort Collins, CO in the NCAA mountain regionals today. However I didn't end up going and instead stayed home in Bozeman to get ready for snow. I enjoyed getting to race a little bit, I love running races, but it was very clear that I wasn't training or peaking for championship season like the rest of the spandex clad harriers.
Our biggest intensity period of the year finished up this past monday with bounding intervals, and never have I been more excited about having a rest day. My intensity week started with the race in portland and was followed with classic team sprints on Sunday, ski walking/bounding intervals monday, a 20 min running time trial on wednesday, natural intervals on friday, classic intervals on saturday, skate sprint intervals on sunday, and finally bounding with the cows on monday. It's awesome to have such a supportive team to push you through each and every interval, and it was incredible to watch everyone make it through what I would say is one of the hardest weeks of training I have ever completed in my life. Most importantly I was really happy to see that I made it through the entire week with out falling apart.
This past thursday I got to VO2 max test in the motion science lab on campus. VO2 max tests are painful, verging on brutal, and require an athlete to bound, run, or rollerski until absolute exhaustion. The real catch that gets me is that during this 10-20 minutes of pain you have a tube/mask/head gear contraption shoved in your mouth and attached to your head, your nose plugged and your finger pricked every three minutes...not exactly the most natural of activities. But as a skier I thrive on this kind of stuff. This is my fourth VO2 max test and although they never get easier (both physically and mentally) I've begun to really look forward to my next opportunity to test. The test can give us some important information which will help me evaluate my training to see if what I am doing is effective or not. This past summer when I last tested I had just come off a fairly draining track season and my numbers showed it's effect on my fitness levels. But after being attached to my heart rate monitor and listening to my body the last four months I'm glad to say I am on the up and up. This time last year I was faced with a potentially season ending surgery, and I'm really feeling the benefits of actually completing a dry land training period. I'm excited to be going into the winter racing season with a base and months and hours of training behind me, rather than the fear of trying to rebuild myself. West Yellowstone is a week away and have been dreaming about snow every night.
Am I ready to go? Yes. Are you?
