Week 11 was light on running. I balanced workouts, my nagging left Achilles strain, and an extra gnarly project at work. Almost all of my tempo effort was on an elliptical trainer or stationary bike. The level of effort was better than the raw numbers, so I'm not concerned.

• 7.8 miles running

• 7 hours, 22 minutes all training

• 335 ft D+ running

Today I got up extra early to start the Colorado Marathon's 5K event with my family. We parked downtown, took a shuttle bus to the starting line, and ran down the Poudre River Trail to the center of town. My effort was a little disappointing. Heel pain, a massive bout of hay fever, and an unfortunate need to visit a port-o-let held me back. Nonetheless, we had fun seeing the half marathon leaders and cheering other runners from the finish line while waiting for the first marathon finisher to arrive.

Week ten was a fun and productive one. I ran five days in a row, one on the treadmill, with 80 minutes of tempo and hard running or elliptical pedaling.

• 33.5 miles running

• 10 hours, 30 minutes all training

• 4,304 ft D+ running

Sunday I logged my biggest elevation gain and longest run of the season in Horsetooth Mountain Park. After a few days of rain and drizzle, there was water in the creeks, no dust on the trails, and the scents of damp soil and pine bark were in the air. The sand lily and springbeauty continue to bloom, and I saw the first flowering larkspur. At the end of the last long ramp on Towers Road, aka Creeping Death, I found some mountain ball cactus with bright fuschia flowers.

My friend John Bender came along as I was photographing the cactus and we ran together for more than an hour. He has lived adjacent to the park for almost 40 years and is one of the founders of the local trail running community. I'll be cheering him on at Quad Rock in two weeks.

Week 11 will have more tempo running, and instead of a weekend long run, a 5K race with my family, all four of us in the same running event for the first time.

I have enjoyed a rest week. I exercised every day, but nothing intense or long, with double easy workouts on Thursday. I did a short bit of tempo pace running on Thursday, 8-8.5 effort out of ten. It felt great.

• 16.3 miles running

• 7 hours, 16 minutes all training

• 981 ft D+ running

Next week I'll be diving into tempo runs for real as I get into my second eight-week training block.

I brought running back in week eight. I ran five times, and four days in a row for the first time since early June, 2024. The numbers:

• 31.9 miles running

• 12 hours, 12 minutes all training

• 5,171 ft D+ running

Tuesday I did hard running and hiking intervals on Towers road, 5.5 km of 10% grade. 30 minutes at 9/10 effort, my biggest single workout of the season. I'm only a minute slower on the climb than early season runs in 2020 and 2021. That's very encouraging.

Today I went back to the hills for an easy long run. It felt easy until mile eight, where I boarded the struggle bus for the last two and a half miles. Still, I enjoyed the entire run, saw lots of hikers, and the season's first wildflowers: sand lily, clematis, pasqueflower, and springbeauty.

Conditions are very dry in our foothills. The creeks in Well Gulch and below Arthur's Rock often have running water into May, but have none now. It's not a good sign.

Poor weather last week complicated my training plans. I ran more than I did in week six, but not much more. I did some indoor intervals, a tempo run, the usual yoga and pool HIIT, my favorite bike loop of Southwest Fort Collins, and a great trail run in the hills of Lory State Park on Saturday. All together, here are the numbers:

• 24 miles running

• 9 hours, 32 minutes all training

• 2,313 ft D+ running

My body is holding up well, so I'll be doing even more running in week eight. Spoiler alert: I've already had one solid running workout, the hardest of my season so far.

I'm not the first person to make a sandwich with fried eggs and pastrami, but I think I may have come up with a name for it that could stick. Served hot with melted cheddar cheese on slices of grilled sourdough bread, I call it the "Poulletier" after François Poulletier de la Salle, the discoverer of cholesterol.

Hash browns would be good in this. As would a thick smear of pesto sauce, suggested by a person in a reply to my Mastodon post. I'll try one or both of these additions next time.

Tuesday, April 1, Ruthie and I, and a couple of friends, drove to Denver to see The Bug Club at the Hi-Dive on South Broadway. The Bug Club have become one of my favorites over the past two years, since I first heard them on a WFMU show. I can't remember if it was Joe Belock's or Todd-o-Phonic Todd's. I was extremely excited to see them, and to see them with Ruthie. We're going to Denver to see music less frequently as we get older, so this was a special occasion. The Breeders at The Ogden in 2018 was our last show in Denver, if I recall correctly.

The Hi-Dive is a small club with a modest stage and no seating, only an open floor in front of the stage. I don't think there is any backstage, either. Bands enter and leave the stage using steps at the front of the stage. It's unabashedly no-frills and I liked it.

Ducks Limited were nominally the main act. I've listened to them a little and they're good, if not exactly my cup of tea. The opening act was Denver's own Mainland Break. Like Ducks Ltd., they play a jangly 80's pop, but also channel the Replacements on stage. I enjoyed their short set.

The effect of putting The Bug Club between these bands was a bit like giving the Minutemen a long set in the middle of an REM show in 1983. They tore through 20 songs in a little over an hour with humor and grace but otherwise no break. Every song from The Intricate Inner Workings of The System, minus Actual Pain and Cold Hard Love (which I love), a new single, and from earlier albums: Marriage, Cheap Linen, Short and Round, It's Art, and Little Coy Space Boy. There were songs I didn't recognize, including one with dueling spiels between Sam and Tilly, that especially reminded me of the Minutemen, what with their physically imposing and proficient producer Tom Rees driving the drumbeat, Sam's buzzed head, and it being D. Boon's birthday. Uncanny!

I'm looking forward to my next chance to see The Bug Club. They really did put on a satisfying show.

A productive week six is done!

• 22.8 miles running

• 11 hours, 39 minutes all training

• 2,277 ft D+

That's not a lot of running, but it's the most I've done in a week since last July. I did two hill workouts outside on a 10% grade stretch of single track above Pineridge open space, Tuesday and Thursday. Today, Sunday, I did an easy long run from my house to the same dirt climb, and went up to the bench one time. My left Achilles, which has been nagging me, feels better. Weather permitting, I'll run 3-4 days next week, and increase my mileage to 25-26.

My week 5 was a light one. I did some indoor workouts early in the week, some telemark skiing on Friday, and then short and easy trail runs Saturday and Sunday. Saturday's was my first run above 8000 ft elevation this season, on some very nice trails outside Nederland, Colorado. Here are the numbers, not including my skiing, which I didn't record.

• 8.5 miles running

• 5 hours, 6 minutes all training

• 761 ft D+ running

Week 4 was light on trail running, because I'm letting my irritated left Achilles tendon settle down, but it was still a pretty good training week. I logged 34 minutes of max intensity intervals on an elliptical trainer, a new weekly high for me. I also did the usual yoga, weight training, pool exercise, and some biking.

• 4.5 miles running

• 10 hours, 3 minutes all training

• 36 ft D+ running

The highlight was a long ride along creeks and rivers in Fort Collins and through the valley trails of Lory State Park. I'm getting more comfortable on the steep road descents between my house and Horsetooth Reservoir and am feeling more fit on the steepest climbs. I didn't set any records climbing up from the Blue Sky trailhead or up Centennial from the reservoir, but I was able to stay below my aerobic threshold. Last fall I was blowing apart on the same climbs.