Running at Altitude

Hello!

Last week Joe and I were out in Boulder getting to know the area a bit and looking for a place to live. First, it is GORGEOUS and I'm surprised that I didn't hit anything while driving the rental car from the airport to the hotel since I was looking at the mountains the entire time. Second, housing is EXPENSIVE! I knew this ahead of time, but it really hits when you're looking for a place. I guess we'll just have to adjust to that though.

Then there's the whole running at altitude issue. I was very curious as to what this would feel like. I wasn't exactly gasping for air or anything, but I did feel slightly out of shape. Seeing as how I've been marathon training for months now, I'm in pretty decent running shape. I've read that it takes about 14-60 days to adjust to altitude (from Running Times' website) and even then your performance is slower than it would be at sea level. I was only there for 7 days and it did seem to get easier as time passed. It'll be interesting to see what training up there full time is like. I was listening to an episode of the Marathon Talk podcast where they interviewed Ryan Hall while I was out there and he mentioned that when he comes down from altitude he feels like he has a third lung and an extra gear. Of course, he's training at an even higher altitude (I think about 7000 feet) but I do hope to head up into the mountains once a week or so and do a trail run. I know that there is inconclusive evidence on the effect of altitude training, but it seems to work for some of the elites. It didn't help that it was fairly warm and I did almost all my runs in the midday heat.

The area is amazing and I love the athletic culture. The majority of people seem to be active and it's easy to see why with the mountains in your backyard. Joe and I went on a couple of easy hikes and that was fun. Hopefully our hiking skills will progress and we'll be able to progress to some harder ones. I think our dog will love it too.

A few pictures:

Me beating the Frank Shorter statue at CU in a race:

Now I know what to do if I run into a Mountain Lion!!!

Another great thing about the Boulder area is the abundance of breweries and the apparent love of very hoppy beers. Did I mention that I love hoppy beers? We tried out Oskar Blues, Mountain Sun and Avery.

I didn't get the greatest workouts in there, partly because I was on vacation and partly due to the altitude, but I did get a bunch of runs and two hikes in the bank while out there, so I'm pretty happy with the week overall.

Happy Running!

Jen