Leadville 100 Training Diaries, Week 1 Day 4

Not going to lie, this week is really long, but I'm making it. Luckily, I have a great job that’s not stressful. Since moving to Gunnison, Colorado, my workload is so much more manageable. I went from seeing 15–16 patients a day, double-booked, to now seeing one patient an hour. I can't express how blessed and grateful I am for this opportunity in Colorado. So far, it's everything I could possibly want. Living in a place that feels like a vacation every day makes every workday enjoyable.

I think today I want to share my story about how I got the opportunity to relocate my life to Colorado. It’s really a whirlwind of events and doors that opened that almost seemed too good to be true, but when God puts a door in front of you—sometimes several doors—I’m on the side of the line saying you have to say yes and see where it leads. I have a theory that many people are too scared to take that step forward even when your heart says yes—and if you’re a numbers person, all the numbers point yes too! I may lead more with my heart, but JJ is our numbers guy in the family. When he ran the numbers in our budget and they worked out, and we were both offered jobs, how could we possibly say no?!

So here we go. Go ahead and settle in for a little journey; hopefully, you find it entertaining, and maybe it will give you that little push to take that step forward into a new and exciting adventure.

JJ and I decided our big trip was going to be an epic road trip to visit Yellowstone National Park, the Grand Tetons, Glacier National Park, and all the way up to Banff National Park in Canada. We had the whole trip planned out—it was going to be epic. We were going to buy a plane ticket to Utah (Salt Lake City), rent a car, and make our way up.

However, renting a car in the States and then crossing the Canadian border to drop it off is astronomically expensive—I mean seriously, it was going to cost almost $3000 for the car! So we had to make some changes.

Instead, we would fly to Utah, rent a car, and drive to Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons, spend 2–3 days there, then fly from Jackson Hole, Wyoming to Calgary, Canada, rent car number two, and drive to Banff where we would stay for 5 days and camp out at Lake Louise. We were going to have to skip Glacier National Park this time around, but it’s on our list for the next adventure.

We arrived in Utah, did a little sightseeing, and then went to Wyoming. Let me tell you, it was a gorgeous drive through the countryside. When our eyes fell upon a field of gold, the song America the Beautiful immediately came to mind. The verse "O beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain" was brought to life before my eyes. I got to see and be filled with the beauty of God's creation out on the open road.

We explored Jackson Hole, went to church up in the mountains, drove across four state lines, and spent the weekend with my family and celebrated my mom’s birthday.

Banff would be the next highlight of the trip. After three days in a nice Airbnb, we could now hunker down in our tent and spend some peaceful nights under the stars. At this point, I’d only seen pictures of Banff, and it’s at the top of the bucket list for a lot of people I talked to. Pictures will never do it justice, but I will share a few.

Banff was magical. The lake water was the color of a turquoise gem. The air was crisp, and every breath was invigorating. We decided to connect all the major hikes around Lake Louise, going up to the Tea House and then hiking along the entire park. The views at the top were breathtaking.

On the penultimate day, we were coming down from our last hike. I decided to pop a question. I asked JJ if he would be willing to move. Normally, he just says, “No, not yet,” but this time, he surprised me. He said, “Yes, let’s look into it.”

We both love the mountains, and every time we vacation in them, we are reenergized for life. We also realized that every time we returned home to the city, the noise, the traffic, and the busyness of city life increased our stress. We realized that was not the life we wanted. JJ agreed—if we both found jobs, we could discuss the opportunity to relocate.

I knew Colorado was where I wanted to look. The mountains there are special. After going there for both races and vacations—and leaving a little piece of my heart in the mountains of Leadville—I knew that’s where I wanted to go.

They say the mountains call you. I believe they do.

As soon as I returned to the tent, I opened my LinkedIn app and adjusted my settings to say “Open to jobs in Colorado.” I had a few criteria to make the move:

• I wanted to work for a hospital system.

• I wanted to live in a smaller, less busy city or town.

• I wanted to find a home with easy access to trails for running and biking so I could walk or run out my back door and hit a trail without driving.

• I wanted to be able to see the mountains.

So, I sent up a prayer and patiently waited to see what would happen. I decided to put out the job request and see what would happen. I would not actively look or scroll on LinkedIn. If the opportunity were to present itself, I would trust it would organically occur. If it were God’s will, it would happen.

And the story will continue next time.

Leadville Training Reflection

The next aid station is Outward Bound. We are 23 miles in at this point, and the cut-off is 10:00 a.m. This is where we hastily changed clothes so we could breathe and take a restroom break. Our crew member Louis met us on the road and asked what we needed. We told him food, water, and clothes. He ran off and prepared it.

I’ll talk more about my crew soon—but they were incredible.

Once we changed, we grabbed our packs and food and continued running. It was beautiful leaving Outward Bound. The field ahead was wide open, with a clear Colorado blue sky. At this point, we were slightly ahead of schedule. I remember feeling good, but my legs were getting that tired marathon feeling. We pushed through and started making our way to the next aid station.

Today’s Workout

Easy run: 60 minToday’s run was an easy recovery run. For fun, I threw on the incline at 1.0, and at the end, I cranked up the incline to 15% and did 6 reps of 30-second hard intervals at 10 mph.

Nutrition Check-In

Weight and food were stable.

Breakfast: Overnight oats Snack: Apple Lunch: Lamb and brown rice bowl with purple cabbage Dinner: Date Night – split a burger, side of fries, and Caesar salad

Call to Action

Is there an adventure you want to take but are afraid? What would it take to pull the trigger? If you can’t do it now, what could you do to make it happen in the future? Is there something holding you back? If you can identify it, is it in your power to control it?

Just some things to think about. I hope whatever your next adventure is, it brings you joy and happiness.

Jeremiah 33:3"Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know."