Spring adventures

The last two months have flown by as I have gotten back into busy training mode. We spend most of our time in Canmore with the exception of a short jaunt to Kaslo BC last week for a 3-day camp. I have been feeling really strong training and successfully came into the new training year with a decent level of fitness. We did testing at the end of May and everything went really well. I got a PB by 28 seconds in the double pole test which is pretty substantial considering it is a 5-6min course (though the tailwind blowing me up the hill accounted for part of the improvement). It was a great to have such a positive start to the training year.

Last week we drove down to summery Kaslo for a short camp. The main goal of the camp was to bike the Silver Triangle, a 216 km loop in the Kootenays. You can see our route here. Last year I made it 170km and my goal this time around was to bike the whole circuit in one day. The ride started off well as I was with Brittany and some of the boys for the first 50km. I dropped off the back of that pack and was going to let the next group of boys catch me and jump in with them. Unfortunately my plan was foiled by a flat and the last group of boys passed me as I was pulled over fixing it. That meant I was stuck in no man's land between the boys and girls and ended up riding the next 50km entirely alone, made worse by another flat an hour after the first. The other girls finally caught up to me at a refuelling stop and I rode the next 50km to Nelson with them.  Most of the girls stopped at Nelson but Rebecca and I decided we still had gas in our tanks and kept on going. Fuelled by energy bars, gels, bananas and coke we continued on and finally made it to Kaslo. I was out for 9hrs, with 8.5 hrs of riding but I made it the full distance.

I am partway through a a training camp with the National Team. We were supposed to do 2 short Haig camps but the first one was cancelled since there was too much snow up there! Instead, we've been doing long roller ski workouts around Canmore. It has been fun training with the NST girls and I am excited to go up to the Haig and do some skiing next week.

I have been keeping busy outside of training with some work. I am continuing to work part-time at the Ultimate Fit Centre running store as well as the Buff Canada warehouse. The spring course options at University of Calgary are limited and I am running out of electives for my degree so I decided not to take a course this spring. But I seem to be plenty busy without school so it was probably a smart decision. It has given me a chance to really focus on the smaller details that are important to overall recovery such as nutrition, napping and ice baths. I have noticed that I am recovering quickly even from hard workouts so I think the added attention is paying off.

Helping out at the Icebreaker tent at the Out There expo in Calgary. Photo: Mark Ambler

Watching the Canada Day fireworks from a great vantage point above the Bow River