It’s Christmas break, baby! My apologies to those of you who have to go to work the next couple of days. I don’t, and it’s awesome, although a snow storm is messing up my Christmas travel plans. Oh well. You can’t win them all.

This was the last week of school, so there was not a lot of blogging done, but it was another solid week of base building.

Monday: 

I got up at 4:15 so I could get in my entire workout (7 miles plus 30 minutes of strength work), as the high school band and choir concert was scheduled for that evening. Halfway through my workout, I got the call that school was cancelled for the day, thanks to this:

So I got up early for no reason, but it was nice to have it done and enjoy the rest of the snow day.

Tuesday:

6 miles of hill intervals. Again in the early a.m., but this time, no snow day.

Wednesday:

The concert was rescheduled for 7:00, but since Wednesday and Thursday were finals days, I figured that I wouldn’t have to stay as late as usual after school, so I could come home and get in my run and strength training between school and the concert. Too bad I forgot that I had a meeting after school. I managed to do another 7-miler, but no strength. Oops.

Thursday: 

I got up early to make up Wednesday’s missed strength session, and then in the evening was the fun run I accidentally organized. About 25 people had said on Facebook that they’d come, but Monday’s snow and ice were refusing to melt (rare for Colorado… normally it melts off in a day or two). Most people decided not to run in the dark and on the ice, so there were only five of us (and two walkers). But it was still fun, and hopefully next year, we’ll get better weather and more participation.

We started by saying hello to Santa (a.k.a. our friend Donny), then ran 4.5 slow  but fun miles. I ended up with 4.75, as Jaylin’s knee was bugging her and caused her to walk, so I backtracked and caught up with her again after I finished. 

Friday: 

40 minutes on the spin bike and 30 minutes of strength at the gym

Saturday: 

7 easy miles… although they weren’t that easy, as I was dodging ice and snow the whole time.

Sunday: 

15.1 miles, pretty much exactly like the day before. I couldn’t run the country roads (too much snow piled on the shoulders) or at the park (they don’t plow it), so I was limited to running the town’s streets/sidewalks (most people had shoveled, at least). In case you haven’t gathered this from my blog’s name, this town is not big. In order to get in my 15, I literally ran up and down almost every street in town, some twice. It was not the most exciting run of my life, but it’s done.

A hot shower, warm sweatpants, fuzzy socks, and cocoa were the best things ever after this run.

Totals: 47.2 miles, 1.5 hours strength training

The name of the game this week is “just get something in.” And then next week, marathon training starts!

Have a wonderful Christmas!!

What are your holiday plans?

Any tips for running on ice without hurting myself? This might be a loooong winter training cycle…