Training Time

The training has officially begun! I recently registered for my first 100-mile race, the Leadville Trail 100 (LT100), taking place August 21-22 in Leadville, Colorado. I've been a runner for 20 years, but have never run the century distance non-stop. The closest I've come is the TransRockies Run stage race three years ago, which covered a little over 100 miles from Vail to Aspen, Colorado, over five days. We would run about 20 to 30 miles a day, then hang out in camp each afternoon, recovering, getting massage and physiotherapy and enjoying huge dinner buffets and a cozy sleeping bag each night.

This 100 miles, however, will be very different. Instead of spending only six hours on my feet at a time, I will be moving for close to 30 hours (which is the cut-off time for official finishers) without sleep. To prepare, I am upping my mileage by lengthening my weekly long run by about 15 minutes each week, and doing more hiking and snowshoeing (which I can do with my 10-month old in the backpack).

A limiting factor to how long I can hike with Reed is his tolerance of being in the Ergo baby carrier, which is a frameless canvas backpack that is great in that weighs almost nothing and keeps him close to my body. However, Reed likes to look around (and wiggle around) and I suspect he gets overheated when pressed against my back for an hour. When he's had enough, he twists his upper body and plants his pointy little elbow between my shoulder blades and throws his weight to one side in an attempt to peer around me. This completely throws me off balance and I end up staggering down the trail, hopping and jiggling him around in an attempt to get him to straighten out.

Anyway, I am soon getting one of Deuter's best-selling Kid Comfort II backpacks, which I can't wait to try out. I'll post a full performance review here once we've taken it out a few times.

So yesterday's workout, for example, was a 1:45 run with my friend Joy (who's also training for her first 100-miler this summer) pushing her daughter, Selah, in a Chariot. We ran 9-minute miles for 11 miles, which is decent considering the Chariot and snow patches on the road.

Immediately after finishing the run, I headed solo over to the Arbaney-Kittle trail near my home in Basalt, and hiked with Yaktrax on my running shoes for traction and trekking poles for uphill propulsion. Trekking poles are permitted at the Leadville race (they are forbidden in many trail races) so I plan on using them for the long uphill section over Hope Pass, the course's highest point at 12,600 feet in elevation. (For more about the use of trekking poles in long-distance running, check out the next issue of Trail Runner magazine, due out April 1, or check back here later for more on this topic).

After hiking uphill as quickly as possible for about 45 minutes, I turned around and ran back down, carrying the poles horizontally. My quads are certainly sore today, which is a good reminder that I'll have to work on my downhill endurance, since there is a lot of downhill in the LT 100.

Happy trails!

(P.S. Check back soon for an exciting women-only trail-running event hosted by yours truly!)