Buns of Steel and Beautiful Vermont

Buns of steel, thighs of thunder, tired legs...call it what you want, but that's been the name of the game for the past couple weeks. Our last week of training culminated in a 3.5 hour combi workout that consisted of two hours of skating followed by an hour and a half run. Luckily, it was a beautiful day and I got to spend it with my awesome teammates, but I had some tired legs by the end of the ski. This ski ends in about 30 mins of steep uphill and what kept me going was Pat driving by asking if my buns were burning and encouraging me by telling me how strong my legs were going to be. I've been doing a running and skating focus since I hurt my elbow and training is going really well, but my legs were definitely ready for an off day after last week. 

After a bit of a rainy start to the summer, the last week or so has been beautiful! Some of the highlights included a trip up to Acadia to rescue my sister and Dave who were stranded there after their car broke down, a Girls on the Run wrap up and preview of a video that the SMS media class did a wonderful job putting together, our first Summit Sisters hike, swimming (or dunking) in various bodies of water around here after workouts, AND getting strong legs. The biggest downfall of the past week was a nasty rollerski crash Annie Hart took the other day. She has plenty of road rash to prove how tough she is, but it's one more reminder to wear a helmet, dress in bright clothing, and to be a little extra cautious when we're out skiing. On the bright side, she joined me in one pole intervals this morning since she scraped up her left side pretty badly. We probably looked pretty funny skating as hard as possible while she was only using her right pole and I was only using my left, but it works! 

We've been doing 30 mins of agility before each of our strength workouts with the SMS and devo kids. We mix it up between skating, classic, and foot agility and I think everyone has been getting a lot out of it. Here Annie, Erika, and I chase a couple of the devo girls through a foot slalom course. 

Girls on the Run wrap up. Thanks T2 Foundation and Skida for the pretty headbands! I can't emphasize enough how cool I think this organization is. These girls are really important to me and it made me happy to see a handful of them at our Summit Sisters hike. Click HERE to see the video about the work Erika and I do with Girls on the Run.

Bunny ears with Hilo, Ada, and Serena

Coach Pat hopping in a ski walking interval with Erika

The Annies leading KO and me up Stratton for our L3 ski walking intervals. We do this workout once a week or once every other week throughout the summer and it's always better to do it with speedy teammates. 

Annie P practicing backwards skiing with Chip and Sage in our pre-strength skate agility

Simi challenging Wyatt, Chip, and Finn to a "silly start". We mixed up our sprint starts this week by adding something like pushups or a 180 before starting.

Thanks to FinnSisu for providing us with skis for the off season

Hiking in Acadia with Iz and Dave

Beautiful Acadia

Got my dorky sister back!

Ski walking

Wild flower season!

My cousin Alexa made a visit and we took a nice afternoon hike up Bromley with her dog, Kip!

cousins on top of Big Brom

Bromley

We made a pit stop at Dutton's Farm in Manchester so I could say hi to my goat friends

One more goat photo. A goat cheesing = goat cheese!

Wanderlust Festival was going on at Stratton last weekend. We went for a little walk around the village and this was one of the more interesting scenes we encountered. 

Summit Sisters on top of Styles Peak

Summit Sisters before the hike

Some happy Summit Sisters eating cookies made by Jessie after the hike

Fresh veggie season! Some chives from our garden

Simi teaching Jessie how to roll a kayak at the snowmaking pond

Iz an Dave taking a plunge

Jess diving into the snowmaking pond on our off day yesterday