Bear training week 16 recap

Week 16, the end of the first half of my trail running season. I started out sick, but was able to get back into training pretty quickly. I had a nice gravel ride Wednesday, some tempo treadmill Thursday, a 2.5 hour ride on Saturday with a significant amount of comfortably hard uphill pedaling, and a 90 minute uphill treadmill run on Sunday. I avoided my usual group classes at the gym.

I continued with the therapeutic dose of Naproxen, iced my left Achilles tendon every night, and did no running on pavement or trails. Walking felt better all week, I'm happy to report.

It's seven weeks to Never Summer. It's weird to approach it with a base, a solid base, of cycling, and uphill treadmill and elliptical sessions, without the hundreds of miles of real trail running that I've done in the past.

My fitness level is pretty good. Based on my perceived level of exertion during workouts, my resting heart rate, and my body weight, it seems like I'm back where I was at this point in 2023. That's great, I'm pumped! I'm eager to do some fast downhill running before Never Summer. That's the thing that's hard to simulate in the gym, and I've been feeling soreness after my rare downhill runs this spring.

It'll be interesting to see how I fare on an alpine run like Twin Sisters, for sure. I'm planning that outing now.