Merry Christmas

Today there will be no training.  Instead I will spend the day playing games with the kids (me included) and stuffing as much food down my pie hole as possible.  Like the great grizzly bear, I need to pack on some winter fat before heading to the Yukon Territories in 5 1/2 weeks.  The only difference is that I won't be going into hibernation, I'll be working off the fat over 300+ miles of some pretty gnarly terrain.  Body fat currently is less than 10%, probably close to 7-8% with the heavy training and race schedule over the past 6 weeks.  IM Phoenix and Fiesta Marathon jump started the metabolism and my daily 12 mile treks with my 30 pound tire and 10 pound backpack have only continued to burn fat calories.

Overall I'm feeling pretty good.  I must say that pulling a tire for 12 miles across pavement beats up the hip flexors, quads, calves, achilles, foot arch and core.  I'm hoping and praying that the sled will be much easier to pull across snow than a tire on pavement.  I've been toying around with the idea of putting a blow up inter tube sledding device in one of my drop bags to place under my sled to reduce friction and make it easier to actually pull the sled.  I've got to check it out and give it some thought as to how I would jerry rig this to my sled or if it'll even help.

It's a little concerning that if I'm sore after pulling a tire 12 miles, exactly how I'll feel after the first 100 miles of pulling sled.  Still plenty of time to get in some good training....but today will be a day of "rest".

Santa has already come to Brentwood, TN and while the kids sleep I'm sitting in front of the fire sipping coffee with my little ole pal Oliver.  Very peaceful.........Merry Christmas.