Monday

Bouldering @ Movement, 2 hours

Kept on the 45 overhanging wall, mostly on some problems in the new set.

Tuesday

Spin bike, 1 hour

Busy day, and just eeked this out at around 9pm

Wednesday

Bouldering @ Movement, 2 hours

New set on the 45 degree wall. Fun V5 that I found very challenging, and a new V6 I couldn’t yet top, but seemed promising. The initial crux is pretty tough for a big guy like me – it involves rotating your body and land a high left foot on a bulging volume. I basically have to cut feet this move, and that really drains my finger strength. The rest of the problem has smallish, but positive holds, and seems pretty beta-specific.

Spin Bike, 2 Hours

Oh fun.

Thursday

Rest

Forgot why I didn’t get after it – most likely because of the incredible amount of snow that was falling for me, and my disinterest in having to ride in it.

Friday

Bouldering @ Movement, 2 hours

Sucked back into the newly set V6. Gave it a lot of attention after warming up, but still couldn’t put the moves together. Great problem to earn some good lessons on. Not exactly my anti-style, but steep and crimpy is certainly challenging for Mr. Anvil legs, here.

Campus Board/Core/etc

Good sess. on the campus board – my first 1-3-5 leading with my left hand (two leading with my right today). Still can’t get too far on 1-2-x… on the middle size, but it seems realistic for the future.

Green Mountain

Decided since I took yesterday off, and was well-rested, that a PR attempt was in order. Problem was that the recent snow wasn’t going to make the trails the best for such silly things, but thought I’d try anyways, just to get a good workout in. Took my ascent up Amphitheater pretty casual, but decided conditions were OK enough to try to smoke going down West Ridge/Long Canyon/Flagstaff/Crown Rock. Beginning of the descent was rough – sloppy conditions slowed me down, but I was able to find a relatively good (LONG) stride, with a fairly slow cadence – was I attempting to float over much of the slop? But it felt fast. By the time I got to the bottom of Long Canyon, the trail was dry enough and I felt like I had been cruising for a while. Flagstaff flew by and I absolutely scorched going down Crow Rock Trail – a tricky bit of trail indeed. Def. a PR on that little section for sure.

Sadly, my track just wasn’t recorded all that well (track drift!), so my descent times were lost. Sigh. If I had to guess (looking at the track data itself), I made it down from the summit in around 47:21. As far I can tell my previous best is ~52:40. I’m cautioned to think I beat my PR on a route I’ve done as many times as this one – and in fact crushed it – I just don’t have enough confidence in the time-keeping comparison, so: who knows (throws up hands). Maybe I should wear a watch one of these years?

Saturday

Green Mountain x3

Getting in that vertical. This isn’t the steepest route (as in elevation gain over mileage), as just doing out and backs on Amphitheater/Saddle/Greenman trails (Doing the loop adds about a half mile). But, eh. Beautiful day, out there. Trails still sloppy up high, but getting pretty much perfect.

Sunday

Rest.

Made it a work day, once I woke up and felt like an old man. Had a bike ride planned but nix’d it.

Takeaways

Too many rest days (running/cycling)! – one is fine, but three days where I’m not logging anything is far too may. Then, I feel that I need to, “catch up”, and I do a workout like three laps up Green. I’m trying to move away from this, as it’s counterproductive to trying to raise fitness.

But, you know: Real World gets in the way, I’m not a professional athlete and that’s also fine. I need to figure out a better strategy to fit in just a road run for an hour from my house (something I haven’t done in months).

Four ticks of Green Mountain is actually great for the week, I just wish it wasn’t in basically 24 hours. My hope it to get better at consistency (an ongoing project). Funnily, my consistency in the climbing gym is almost lock step.

Goals for Next Week

Try to up the vertical some more. 15,000′ on my feet and a generous amount on the bike would be wonderful. Maybe try to PR the Long Canyon route down Green for real this time, which would be a nice ego boost. My best time on the route is soft, so I’d like to PR on a few other segments, like the Crown Rock Trail. Most importantly, keep healthy.