Sunday's long run was something a little different -- the South Switzerland Trail, off Sugarloaf Road. It's a dirt road that climbs gradually from 8400 feet to 9000 feet over 5.5 miles. That was perfect for a nice 11-mile out-and-back run.
Since the trail winds along a high ridge, you have alternating views in all four directions. You can see Long's Peak (a 14'er) to the north, the snow-covered Continental Divide to the west and south, and occasional views of Boulder and Denver to the east. In short, the scenery is fantastic.
Luckily, I had a bike-riding photographer to keep me company.
In spite of the altitude, I felt great. I'd been running for thirty minutes before I even noticed. There were storm cells moving all over the place, but it wasn't windy and I never felt any rain. In fact, the sun broke through a few times on my return trip.
This is an excellent run, and I highly recommend it!
Today's summary: 11 miles in 1:37 (average pace 8:47).
3 comments:
Hey Dakota, been following you since lurking the Sub-20 5k thread on CR. I actually have the Bolder Boulder date marked in my calendar so I remember to check your result...
Bear with me, I'm just a newb who read Daniels' book, but here's an idea.
Since you live in Boulder, have you ever considered peaking for a race at sea level? In theory, you could be able to cash in on a few minutes just due to being conditioned at altitude. You could use this as a real advantage.
Kevin, I've definitely thought about making a trip to sea level just to see what I could do.
Using an altitude chart from Daniels' Running Formula, it looks like a 40-minute effort at Boulder's altitude (~5400 ft) would be about 3% slower than at sea level.
40:00 / 1.03 = 38:50
I guess that's an estimate, for what it's worth! That's assuming I can run a 40-minute 10k in Boulder, of course.
Anyway, my goal is to break 40 at the Bolder Boulder, specifically. Once I do that, I might try one at sea level just for kicks.
Thanks for your comment!
Yeah, I definitely understand wanting to break 40 at Bolder Boulder (I hear it's a great race), but it would be interesting to see what you can do at sea level too.
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