In my January training recap, I mentioned having ramped up my training a little quickly after having just returned from a big trip over the holidays – not so much in terms of mileage, but time-on-feet which is how I measure my longer efforts. I had started strength training again along with weekly speed work at the track.
February’s focus continued to be on building a good foundation of speed and strength to get ready for a couple of shorter races coming up in March, including the Yeti Snowshoe Race at Cypress and the Coast Mountain Trail Series Cap Crusher, while starting to build volume and doing some recon runs for April’s Diez Vista 50k.
Things went pretty much as planned. I managed to keep my volume down to a reasonable level while still getting out on a few big adventures and I spent a couple of good days chasing some much faster guys around on the DV50 course, so I’m starting to feel ready for that.
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- Running in the snow at Grouse.
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- Snowshoe run at Seymour with the Tuesday crew.
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- Looking up while pre-running the Cap Crusher 8k.
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- Let it snow! Capilano Lake seen while pre-running the Cap Crusher course.
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- A wet speed work session at the track.
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- White Pine Beach on a DV50 training run.
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- Dave Running up Lynn Peak.
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- Running near Lynn Peak.
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- Dave discovering the meaning of life on Lynn Peak.
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- Yeti Snowshoe Fun Run at Cypress.
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- Pre-running the Diez Vistas 50k course.
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- Sasumat Lake on a DV50 training run.
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- Backcountry adventures
I had taken up skate skiing this year for a bit of cross training but, despite a late-season dump of snow, I only got out a couple more times last month before deciding to finally set it aside for the season. A day of lessons at Whistler did leave me looking forward to hopefully jumping back into it a little earlier next year. That freed up my Tuesday nights to once again start running with my regular Tuesday trail running group – an easy social run that I look forward to almost as much as the sushi feast afterwards.
I also received the results from my most recent lactate threshold analysis at the Peak Centre for Human Performance (which you can read more about in this post I wrote last month).
Results of my most recent lactate threshold analysis compared to tests over the past two and a half years.
While my Aerobic Threshold and Lactate Threshold aren’t quite as high as they were at my peak back in November, I definitely didn’t lose as much fitness this year as I did in previous years after taking a month off of structured training – no doubt thanks to all of that trekking and running at altitude in Nepal.
Final Stats for February:
- Distance Run: 290 km
- Time-on-Feet: 40 hrs
- Elevation Gain: 10,760 m
- Cross Training: 5x strength, 2x skate ski
The body is feeling good and with the help of my new sit-stand desk I hope to keep it that way. March is when my fairly long, upcoming racing season officially kicks off – wish me luck!
Check out my training in more detail on Movescount or Strava and see more of my photos from the trails on my Instagram Feed. Anyone else starting their race season now as well? Tell me about it in the comments below..