Hello from Las Vegas.
I’m here for at least another week while my company finalizes arrangements with my next assignment, which will fortunately be a few hours from home instead of half a country away. I imagine latter assignments will come in time, but having the first one close enough to spend a weekend or two back in Vegas is nice.
The drive technically took two full days, with a day long break in Denver/Boulder. Colorado to Vegas took a lot less time than I expected and I arrived a day early.
I considered running during the road trip, but everything else ultimately made it impractical. Having my entire life either in my car or a hotel room also limited my bandwidth for running. I did sneak into the hotel fitness room and use the spin bike for a bit. I did also hike with my friend Sam in Eldorado Canyon, and walked quite a bit through Downtown Denver while in town.
The 105+ degree daytime heat limits my options in the short run. Like virtually everyone else in Vegas, I need to run early in the morning if I want to run outside at all. The good news is (thanks in part to time zone shifts) getting up before 6am is really easy for me, and I’ve been able to run at 6am several mornings. Of course, the sun builds heat quickly, and temps exceed 85 degrees by 7am. The one extended run I’ve taken got pretty difficult towards the end. So I may need to keep runs short until the temps drop in fall, or I get out of town to somewhere cooler.
I also have black card access to the Planet Fitness near my home, and they have a lot more resources and space than my previous Chicago gym, plus the lack of humidity means the air conditioning there works a lot better. I’m not visiting everyday like I did in Chicago, but I’ve gone for some strength and cross training work a couple times.
have a bit more time to settle than I expected, and it’s nice after weeks of near-constant work to pack and sort out for my move to not have that constant pressure hanging over anymore. Yes, I’m about to hit the road and that will change everything all over again. But at least I won’t be carrying my entire life with me or need to sort all that out before traveling. Packing lighter will make re-figuring things out a lot easier. It’s in a way a good thing I had to go through all that this past couple months, because everything going forward will seem a lot easier in comparison.
Until things cool down (in more ways than one), the only running goal I have for now is to resume a normal, consistent training schedule and aim for adding a speed workout and a longer run back to that schedule. I don’t have a race planned before the next Vancouver Marathon next May, and so I have no pressing need to seriously train before January.