Week Ending Feb. 21

Mon - 5.5 miles (1,000'). Soderburg/Falls. Leg still nagging on the hills. Ho hum.

Tues - 6 miles (500'). Soderburg TH to Arthurs and back. Wow, major slop on the valley trails. Leg felt okay, but still gimped up a bit after four or five miles.

Weds - 8 miles (2,000'). Horsetooth/Audra. First time in over two weeks that I've been able to get up Horsetooth. Pain from yesterday's run was negligible by dinner time, which had me thinking good things about today's run. Woke up with no pain so was raring to go come noon (my standard midweek run time). With nothing but a dull pain in the calf for most of the run, I was actually able to enjoy being outside rather than being entirely preoccupied with the signals coming from my right calf. To cap it all off, I felt reasonably fit, at least fitter than I've felt gimping around the last couple of weeks. Salida is looking increasingly likely, and I may even be able to give Burch and Pedatella a run for their money - if not Parr.

Thurs - 8 miles (2,000'). As yesterday. Same dull pain there. The cold, snow and wind made me feel like I was getting serious about training again.

Fri - 6 miles easy. Bike paths.

Sat - 8 miles. Two-mile warm-up, then 5k, followed by 5k warm-down.

Sun - 10 miles (2,200'). Soderburg - Falls - Spring Creek - Stout - Towers - Herrington - Spring Creek - Wathan - Horsetooth - Soderburg. Enough with the snow already. Had originally planned on running long with Nick P today but considering the conditions we postponed (again) for a future weekend. Spent the morning at home getting stuff done and watching the relentless snow dump. Couldn't face the mill, so finally made the call in the early afternoon to get out and do what I could at Horsetooth.

A gray weekend in Fort Collins

Got into some good snowshoe tracks on the Falls/Spring Creek trails, but they mysteriously disappeared halfway around on Stout, so I was forced to break trail in shin to knee deep powder to Towers.

Plenty of traffic through on the Falls trail

Got off 'trail' a couple of times and ended up thigh to waist deep in places. Towers had seen some decent traffic, so things were far improved up to Herrington where it was back to the deep stuff through to Spring Creek. I was surprised to see snowshoe tracks heading up to Horsetooth on Wathan, so I got into those and hoofed it up that way.

Horsetooth from the top of Wathan

I was out for more than two hours and covered a measly 10 miles (if that). Just can't catch a break with the snow. We get close to good trail and then another big dump. This stuff will be here for at least two weeks I'm guessing, then we'll go through crusty ice, sloppy mud and another dump I'm sure. I am well and truly ready for spring.

Total: 51.5 miles (7,700').

Good to get back above 50 miles. While the calf is still noticeable at times, I feel like I'm ready to restart the mileage buildup. The challenge right now is to find somewhere to run. It's looking like roads for the next couple of days.