So every year I've choosen a couple of weekends to make into mini "training" camps.  Last year I did two of these camps in addition to the formal Endurance Sports Camp in Tuscon and my extended camp in Kona. 

What do I love about these mini camps?  They're close to home but not at home, totally focused on training and I believe a great way to hammer in some miles and boost our overall fitness.

So normally I just do these camps alone but this year I decided to see if anyone wanted to join me for one of these camps.  I'm planning my first camp the end of April 4/30 - 5/3 in Hood River, Oregon just 3.5 - 4 hours from Seattle, an hour from Portland.

I've spent lots of time riding in "The Gorge" and love it.  There is some good challenging riding, generally uncrowded roads (both cars and bikes) and good weather. 

This isn't a formal camp. No "pros", big name coaches, or fees hopefully jsut some passionate triathletes who want to spend some time focusing on getting ready for the season and enjoying each others company and learning from one another.  My focus for this weekend will time on the bike with a little running thrown in.  It would be fun to get some open water swimming in but since the columbia will probably only be in the upper 40's I'm not planning on it.

See the Camp page for more details, tentative schedule, dates, accomodation recommendations, and general bike pace guidance (doesn't mean you can't join in if you ride slower or faster).

If you're interested in joining in for all or part of the time get in touch with me.

 
 

My vacation has turned into a pretty intensive training camp. The first few days were a good mix of workouts and windsurfing but the heat has been turned on and the wind has dried up.

Last weekend and the first part of the week had temps in the mid 80's and it has slowly increased into the triple digits with the high tomorrow expected to be 107 degrees.  Despite all of the heat the training has been great with a focus on the bike. 

So far this trip (since Sunday I've logged 320 miles on the bike and with one more ride scheduled for tomorrow I'm going to top 420 miles.   I've also logged 35 miles since last Saturday with another long run scheduled for Sunday.

Saturday through Monday was either runs or rides followed by some solid windsurfing sessions.  As the tempeatures began to heat up the wind dropped off and the focus became the training. 

Tuesday I tried a new route from Lyle to Goldendale up highway 142 (and back).  The route climbs very gradually for the first 12 miles along the Klickitat river.  Before finally climbing up a steeper grade for 4 miles up to the plateau where the road rolled up and down through wheat farms for the final 12 miles or so.  The ride was beautiful but the road was rough and tough on the body.  On the way back to Lyle I was fighting a serious headwind roaring up the canyon and just wished that I could get done.  It was maybe the hardest 72 miles I've ever ridden (hard on the body).

Wednesday was a good run in the heat of the day.  A negative split cruise but not too fast as the temps were in the upper 90's. 

Yesterday was supposed to be the big day of the week but with temps forecasted in the low 100's.  I didn't swim I just got out on the bike before it got really hot.  I explored another new route east of The Dalles on a road called fifteen Mile Road.  It was a great ride out this canyon the road wound it's way past farms and scrub brush.  I turned around at 15 miles although the road continued to go on for who knows how far.  I was tempted to keep going but was running low on water and though that around each corner would be just a little sign of civilization but not place to refill my bottles and knew I had 20 miles to the nearest refill.  The wildest part of this ride was all of the coyotes I saw.  I saw probably 20 including a pack of about six.  Pretty unusual to see them out in the heat of the day.  I also had a run in with a ground squirrel, well actually I ran over the ground squirrel.  Thankfully I wasn't going too fast otherwise it could been ugly for me.  I don't the the squirrel was any the worse for wear. 

I finished off the day with a short one hour run up the Rowena Grade and back about 3 miles up at a steady 7-8% grade.  Of course this was in the hottest part of the day.  My frozen water bottles were turned into hot water by the end of the run. 

Today was my "off" day but given the forecasted high of 105 degrees I hit the river for a standup paddle board adventure, I did a 90 minute trip from our house in Rowena to the mouth of the Klickitat river and up the river a ways and back, it's a pretty cool way to see the river.

 Two more fairly big days with another long run tomorrow and a 2 hour run on Sunday.  I plan to hit it early.

Hope to post some pictures and possibly some video at the end of the week.

 
 

I do enjoy a little suffering in my training a few wet, cold windy days during the winter out on the bike or run.  It gives you this great sense of accomplishment surviving a long day in the crud and let's face it there are few things better than a hot shower after a long cold day.  At a certain point in the spring it's time for the clouds to part, the sun shine down and to be able to begin to worry about getting too warm instead of getting hypothermic.

I've now officially had it with the weather.  It's mid April and the forecast for the weekend is snow here in Seattle, enough is enough.  I'd go back to Hood River this weekend but the forecast is no better there.  My only hope is that it stays dry for my long ride on Sunday.  To give you an idea how bad it is we're 10-12 degrees below our average this time of year every day and I did my first open water swim last year on April 21st (yeah it was refreshingly cool but it was above 50 degrees), at this rate I won't be in the lake until the end of May.

I headed south to Hood River, Oregon last weekend as the forecast was for warmer temps, it was forecasted to be nice in Seattle but frankly I don't trust the weather here this year, so I went for the sure thing.

Saturday I did a 5 hour ride heading out with just knee warmers and arm warmers and sans gloves at 8am.  There was a lot climbing in the first hour, followed by a mind bending switchback laden 5 mile descent to The Dalles at over 31 mph avg and a max of 49 mph.  After a casual cruise through The Dalles I did my 20 mile hard effort on fifteen mile road.  It's a surreal ride the road seriously looks like it's going downhill at a 2-3% grade but is in fact an uphill grade where you're lucky to top 18 mph with the pedal down.  After 10 miles you hit the turnaround and then the fun begins with averages above 25 mph back to town.  Back through The Dalles and on to Rowena where I did three intervals up and down the climb to Rowena Butte.  It's 2.2 miles of perfectly even 7.5% grade and I love this climb, I got progressively faster each interval by 10-15 seconds which is great at the 75 mile mark of the ride.  Next I rode back to Mosier, there is a lot of slightly downhill riding in this section but this was the first time I've ridden this ride without fighting the famous gorge winds, normally I'm lucky to average 15 or 16 mph working my ass off but today there was no wind and got to enjoy the 8 miles ride at a 25 mph average.  My final few miles I did the easy spin back to Hood River.  The temps topped out in the low 80's which was heaven.

Sunday I did a very comfortable 90 minute run on the twin tunnel trail and actually ran negative splits.  It was great running comfortably for 90 minutes at 7:30/mile pace and I feel like my run form is finally returning after being absent for several years.

This weekend I'm expecting a tough couple days with the weather and next weekend I'm supposed to be in Coeur d'Alene for my long training weekend but I'm just hoping that it warms up or it's going to be a miserable couple of long days.